One of my favorite foods are fresh blueberries, although I love to eat them frozen in the summer time, but I also really enjoy fresh blueberries in PIE!
Joy of Cooking
Rombauer/Becker:
About Berry and Other Fruit Pies
If you dont find the fruit combination you are looking for in our fruit pie recipes, perhaps you would like to experiment with fillings for yourself. A 9-inch fruit or berry pie needs about 4 cups of fresh fruit or 3 cups of cooked fruit. Each fruit will require its own quota of sweetening, depending on acidity and your personal taste. Four cups of gooseberries, for example, need about 1 3/4 cups of sugar, while the same amount of blueberries may need no more than 1/2 cup - plus lemon juice to heighten the flavor.
As to thickening for pie fruit: technically, each batch would require a different amount of thickener, depending on the variety of fruit, degree of ripeness, etc. For practical purposes, an often suggested formula for 4 cups of fruit is:
1/4 cup all purpose flour
However, acid fruits should be thickened with tapioca, cornstarch or arrowroot starch because the acidity of the fruit may neutralize the thickening power of the flour. So for 4 cups of fruit, mix:
2 2/3 tablespoons quick-cooking tapioca
2/3 to 1 cup sugar
or mix:
2 tablespoons cornstarch or arrowroot starch with:
1/4 cup water or fruit juice, until very smooth then blend with:
2/3 to 1 cup sugar
Whether you use tapioca or cornstarch, let the mixture stand for 15 minutes after blending it gently into the fresh fruit. Correct the sweetening, then proceed as directed in Berry Pies, below.
Some suggested proportions are:
1/2 apple and 1/2 pear
1/2 apple and 1/2 green tomato
1/2 rhubarb and 1/2 strawberry
1/3 gooseberry and 2/3 strawberry
1/2 cherry and 1/2 rhubarb
1/3 cranberry and 2/3 apple
1/2 mincemeat, 1/4 applesauce and 1/4 crushed pineapple
1/2 fresh strawberries and 1/2 bananas
2/3 raspberries and 1/3 currants
Fruit pies freeze well, but do not freeze those with a custard base.
Berry Pie with Fresh Fruit - A 9 -inch Double-Crust Pie
Please read About Berry Pies, above. Use:
Gooseberry, currant, blackberry, raspberry, strawberry, blueberry, huckleberry or loganberry
Line a pie pan with:
A pie dough
Prepare by picking over and hulling:
4 cups of fresh berries
Combine:
2/3 to 1 cup or more sugar
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
(1 1/2 tablespoons lemon juice or 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon)
If the fruit is juicy, add:
(2 teaspoons quick-cooking tapioca)
Sprinkle these ingredients over the berries and stir gently until well blended. Let stand for 15 minutes.
Preheat oven to 450˚.
Turn the fruit into the pie shell. Dot with
1 to 2 tablespoons butter
Cover the pie with a well-pricked top or with a lattice. Bake the pie in a 450˚ oven 10 minutes. Reduce the heat to 350˚ and bake 35 to 40 minutes or until golden brown.
May 16, 2009
May 13, 2009
Commenting on blogs
Hi John,
I like that you wrote about your eating habits, for example, you eat 6 meals a day. While most of America has 3 meals a day (some only lunch and dinner) breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Having more small meals a day rather than 3 large does seem like a healthy way to eat.
I looked it up:
"eating every three hours would certainly help some people control appetite and feel more energized... if we feed the body at regular intervals we send a signal to the body that it doesn't have to store calories and when we skip meals, we affect the metabolism negatively."
http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=56254
I like that you wrote about your eating habits, for example, you eat 6 meals a day. While most of America has 3 meals a day (some only lunch and dinner) breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Having more small meals a day rather than 3 large does seem like a healthy way to eat.
I looked it up:
"eating every three hours would certainly help some people control appetite and feel more energized... if we feed the body at regular intervals we send a signal to the body that it doesn't have to store calories and when we skip meals, we affect the metabolism negatively."
http://www.medicinenet.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=56254
May 9, 2009
Response to Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma Food #6
Michael Pollan's argument about the way Americans eat made me realize how caught up everyone is in fads about dieting, losing weight, and getting skinnier. Which none of these "goals" ever happen. I completely agree with the idea/argument that Americans basically eat unhealthy foods, an excessive amount, or little to no food at all. They, we, do not have a healthy eating habit.
The American Paradox perfectly describes the ways of the Americans: for example, diets such as the Atkins Diet, people think going on a diet and not eating certain foods will make them healthier and slimmer. They are trying to lose weight my dieting, not eating carbs. Meanwhile people are thinking they are living and eating in a healthy manner when in actuality the diet is making them less healthy. Instead we 'Americans' should be eating all types of food in moderation of course. Beneficial foods should also be eaten as well and not so much the pure sugar types. Americans have no food culture, no tradition. America has a National Eating Disorder, there is a violent change in this cultures eating habits and it has become extremely unhealthy.
Another Paradox I enjoyed reading about was the French Paradox: I have been to France and for dinner my host family would make all kinds of food and eat of a lot of it. Usually all very traditional food, lots of cheese, bread, and salad. A type of meat and a side dish, all very rich in salt and butter. Their food was delicious but at the same time, I felt like I was either eating too much of it or the food itself felt fatty and not too healthy to eat. But my host family seemed okay with everything they had on the table for dinner, whether it looked or tasted like it had been cooked in a lot of butter they still ate it and did not care. It was food and they were hungry, they food tasted good and they ate it. So when I read the Pollan's argument stating the French Paradox: eat unhealthy and happier and be healthier. It make a lot of sense, the French ate whatever they felt like eating and because they were happy with themselves and with whatever they were eating, they in turn may be healthier. Although there is the other part that makes this situation a paradox, if you eat all you want, you may feel happy and comfortable with yourself but it does not mean that you are nutritionally healthy. It all depends on what and how much you eat. Think in moderation, small portions and eat a balanced meal, not just protein, and don't skip out on the carbs. They are good for you too.
My family and I pay a lot of attention to articles in health magazines. We tare out recopies from the magazines and replicate them in our own kitchen. We try to make new dishes, to try new things and to try to eat healthier meals. Although my brother and I both watch a fare share of television neither of us are remotely interested in any of the diet plans offered on tv. Then look fake and not too appetizing. I would not want to go on a diet like that because you never know how you body may react to only eating the pre-packaged food from a company. Being on a diet change make positive and negative changes appear on your body. We do however watch the Food Network Channel a lot. We like to watch people cook and come up with different ways of eating foods that don't always seem tasty to us, it is a creative way to eat healthier foods. We learn from the chefs on Food Network, how to make meals in our own home that are affordable, taste good, and are healthy, well-balanced.
The American Paradox perfectly describes the ways of the Americans: for example, diets such as the Atkins Diet, people think going on a diet and not eating certain foods will make them healthier and slimmer. They are trying to lose weight my dieting, not eating carbs. Meanwhile people are thinking they are living and eating in a healthy manner when in actuality the diet is making them less healthy. Instead we 'Americans' should be eating all types of food in moderation of course. Beneficial foods should also be eaten as well and not so much the pure sugar types. Americans have no food culture, no tradition. America has a National Eating Disorder, there is a violent change in this cultures eating habits and it has become extremely unhealthy.
Another Paradox I enjoyed reading about was the French Paradox: I have been to France and for dinner my host family would make all kinds of food and eat of a lot of it. Usually all very traditional food, lots of cheese, bread, and salad. A type of meat and a side dish, all very rich in salt and butter. Their food was delicious but at the same time, I felt like I was either eating too much of it or the food itself felt fatty and not too healthy to eat. But my host family seemed okay with everything they had on the table for dinner, whether it looked or tasted like it had been cooked in a lot of butter they still ate it and did not care. It was food and they were hungry, they food tasted good and they ate it. So when I read the Pollan's argument stating the French Paradox: eat unhealthy and happier and be healthier. It make a lot of sense, the French ate whatever they felt like eating and because they were happy with themselves and with whatever they were eating, they in turn may be healthier. Although there is the other part that makes this situation a paradox, if you eat all you want, you may feel happy and comfortable with yourself but it does not mean that you are nutritionally healthy. It all depends on what and how much you eat. Think in moderation, small portions and eat a balanced meal, not just protein, and don't skip out on the carbs. They are good for you too.
My family and I pay a lot of attention to articles in health magazines. We tare out recopies from the magazines and replicate them in our own kitchen. We try to make new dishes, to try new things and to try to eat healthier meals. Although my brother and I both watch a fare share of television neither of us are remotely interested in any of the diet plans offered on tv. Then look fake and not too appetizing. I would not want to go on a diet like that because you never know how you body may react to only eating the pre-packaged food from a company. Being on a diet change make positive and negative changes appear on your body. We do however watch the Food Network Channel a lot. We like to watch people cook and come up with different ways of eating foods that don't always seem tasty to us, it is a creative way to eat healthier foods. We learn from the chefs on Food Network, how to make meals in our own home that are affordable, taste good, and are healthy, well-balanced.
May 6, 2009
Habitual Food
Please write a post about how your family uses grocery stores and the variety of vegetables, fruits, roots, grains, and nuts that you eat in a typical week.
From the class list I came up with 30 items including fruits, vegetables, and grains that my family consumes in a typical week:
Fruits: apple, pear, apple/pear [Japanese pear (I forgot its real name)], avocado, papaya, cucumber, banana, dates, figs, pepper, tomato (11 fruits)
Vegetables: spinach, celery, potato, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, garlic, asparagus, bean sprouts, edamame [boiled soy beans, in pod]. (10 vegetables)
Beans/Grains/Roots: fresh ginger root, walnut, peanuts, rice, potato, kidney beans, onions, lima beans, lentils, chickpeas. (10 Beans/Grains/Roots)
With all of these foods my family usually cooks a homemade meal and also includes meat or fish in a main dish. For example we eat white rice from Nishiki Rice (Japanese white rice) almost everyday. We have a rice cooker so there is always fresh rice to eat. Sometimes we wrap seaweed around the rice and eat it in little bites. Besides dried seaweed we also eat Hijiki. Hijiki is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines around Japan, Korea, and China. It is a traditional food and has been freely sold and used as part of a balanced diet in Japan for centuries. Hijiki is known to be rich in dietary fibre and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g). (wikipedia definition)
Just for clarification my mother usually cooks dinner unless, I am home by myself, then I make my own dinner. Not a fish stew or anything but I have hummus on sun-dried tomato and basil wraps (although I don't really care for the taste of the wraps alone, the hummus over powers the wrap, so I don't notice it) with slices of fresh tomato on top.
When we go grocery shopping, we usually go to the Met Food in our neighborhood. They have pretty much everything we like to eat, including all 30 food items I listed above. My family goes food shopping because most of the time we prefer to make our own meals instead of going out to eat. My mom loves fish so when she has the chance she makes a very spicy fish stew, usually with salmon or a white fish like tilapia. The base is a chicken broth with tons of cabbage, carrots, beans, and plenty of hot peppers. She lets it simmer all day long and it is excellent on rice as well as eating it as a soup.
From my list of fruits eaten in a typical week: my family and I eat the fruits as they are, we do not mix them or make anything with them. Just eat them. From the list of vegetables I eat, they are eaten as they are but most of them are cooked in a certain way before eaten. For example: fresh ginger root is put into a stir fry for extra flavor or a fish dish. Walnuts, peanuts, and other nuts are eaten as they are as snacks. Rice eaten as a base in most meals, sometimes I put rice in a bowl, then put fish or meat on top. Rice is like my pasta. Potatoes are either boiled then made into mashed potatoes or boiled cut up and put into a curry (which also has meat and carrots). Chickpeas are eaten in a salad or in the form of hummus. Other beans are put into soups or made in a chicken dish.
Favorite Meal: Sakedon (Salmon-don) which is salmon, sliced sashimi style, on a bed of seasoned rice. I could eat that meal any day. It is delicious! As for homemade food, my mom's fish soup is my favorite.
From the class list I came up with 30 items including fruits, vegetables, and grains that my family consumes in a typical week:
Fruits: apple, pear, apple/pear [Japanese pear (I forgot its real name)], avocado, papaya, cucumber, banana, dates, figs, pepper, tomato (11 fruits)
Vegetables: spinach, celery, potato, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, garlic, asparagus, bean sprouts, edamame [boiled soy beans, in pod]. (10 vegetables)
Beans/Grains/Roots: fresh ginger root, walnut, peanuts, rice, potato, kidney beans, onions, lima beans, lentils, chickpeas. (10 Beans/Grains/Roots)
With all of these foods my family usually cooks a homemade meal and also includes meat or fish in a main dish. For example we eat white rice from Nishiki Rice (Japanese white rice) almost everyday. We have a rice cooker so there is always fresh rice to eat. Sometimes we wrap seaweed around the rice and eat it in little bites. Besides dried seaweed we also eat Hijiki. Hijiki is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines around Japan, Korea, and China. It is a traditional food and has been freely sold and used as part of a balanced diet in Japan for centuries. Hijiki is known to be rich in dietary fibre and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g). (wikipedia definition)
Just for clarification my mother usually cooks dinner unless, I am home by myself, then I make my own dinner. Not a fish stew or anything but I have hummus on sun-dried tomato and basil wraps (although I don't really care for the taste of the wraps alone, the hummus over powers the wrap, so I don't notice it) with slices of fresh tomato on top.
When we go grocery shopping, we usually go to the Met Food in our neighborhood. They have pretty much everything we like to eat, including all 30 food items I listed above. My family goes food shopping because most of the time we prefer to make our own meals instead of going out to eat. My mom loves fish so when she has the chance she makes a very spicy fish stew, usually with salmon or a white fish like tilapia. The base is a chicken broth with tons of cabbage, carrots, beans, and plenty of hot peppers. She lets it simmer all day long and it is excellent on rice as well as eating it as a soup.
From my list of fruits eaten in a typical week: my family and I eat the fruits as they are, we do not mix them or make anything with them. Just eat them. From the list of vegetables I eat, they are eaten as they are but most of them are cooked in a certain way before eaten. For example: fresh ginger root is put into a stir fry for extra flavor or a fish dish. Walnuts, peanuts, and other nuts are eaten as they are as snacks. Rice eaten as a base in most meals, sometimes I put rice in a bowl, then put fish or meat on top. Rice is like my pasta. Potatoes are either boiled then made into mashed potatoes or boiled cut up and put into a curry (which also has meat and carrots). Chickpeas are eaten in a salad or in the form of hummus. Other beans are put into soups or made in a chicken dish.
Favorite Meal: Sakedon (Salmon-don) which is salmon, sliced sashimi style, on a bed of seasoned rice. I could eat that meal any day. It is delicious! As for homemade food, my mom's fish soup is my favorite.
May 5, 2009
Food in a Typical Week: The Omae Household
Please write a post about how your family uses grocery stores and the variety of vegetables, fruits, roots, grains, and nuts that you eat in a typical week.
From the class list I came up with 30 items including fruits, vegetables, and grains that my family consumes in a typical week:
Fruits: apple, pear, apple/pear [Japanese pear (I forgot its real name)], avocado, papaya, cucumber, banana, dates, figs, pepper, tomato (11 fruits)
Vegetables: spinach, celery, potato, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, garlic, asparagus, bean sprouts, edamame [boiled soy beans, in pod]. (10 vegetables)
Beans/Grains/Roots: fresh ginger root, walnut, peanuts, rice, potato, kidney beans, onions, lima beans, lentils. (9 Beans/Grains/Roots)
With all of these foods my family usually cooks a homemade meal and also includes meat or fish in a main dish. For example we eat white rice from Nishiki Rice (Japanese white rice) almost everyday. We have a rice cooker so there is always fresh rice to eat. Sometimes we wrap seaweed around the rice and eat it in little bites. Besides dried seaweed we also eat Hijiki. Hijiki is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines around Japan, Korea, and China. It is a traditional food and has been freely sold and used as part of a balanced diet in Japan for centuries. Hijiki is known to be rich in dietary fibre and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g). (wikipedia definition)
When we go grocery shopping, we usually go to the Met Food in our neighborhood. They have pretty much everything we like to eat, including all 30 food items I listed above. My family goes food shopping because most of the time we prefer to make our own meals instead of going out to eat. My mom loves fish so when she has the chance she makes a very spicy fish stew, usually with salmon or a white fish like tilapia. The base is a chicken broth with tons of cabbage, carrots, beans, and plenty of hot peppers. She lets it simmer all day long and it is excellent on rice as well as eating it as a soup.
Favorite Meal: Sakedon (Salmon-don) which is salmon, sliced sashimi style, on a bed of seasoned rice. I could eat that meal any day. It is delicious! As for homemade food, my mom's fish soup is my favorite.
From the class list I came up with 30 items including fruits, vegetables, and grains that my family consumes in a typical week:
Fruits: apple, pear, apple/pear [Japanese pear (I forgot its real name)], avocado, papaya, cucumber, banana, dates, figs, pepper, tomato (11 fruits)
Vegetables: spinach, celery, potato, carrot, cabbage, lettuce, garlic, asparagus, bean sprouts, edamame [boiled soy beans, in pod]. (10 vegetables)
Beans/Grains/Roots: fresh ginger root, walnut, peanuts, rice, potato, kidney beans, onions, lima beans, lentils. (9 Beans/Grains/Roots)
With all of these foods my family usually cooks a homemade meal and also includes meat or fish in a main dish. For example we eat white rice from Nishiki Rice (Japanese white rice) almost everyday. We have a rice cooker so there is always fresh rice to eat. Sometimes we wrap seaweed around the rice and eat it in little bites. Besides dried seaweed we also eat Hijiki. Hijiki is a brown sea vegetable growing wild on rocky coastlines around Japan, Korea, and China. It is a traditional food and has been freely sold and used as part of a balanced diet in Japan for centuries. Hijiki is known to be rich in dietary fibre and essential minerals such as calcium(1400 mg/100g),iron(55.0 mg/100g) and magnesium(620 mg/100g). (wikipedia definition)
When we go grocery shopping, we usually go to the Met Food in our neighborhood. They have pretty much everything we like to eat, including all 30 food items I listed above. My family goes food shopping because most of the time we prefer to make our own meals instead of going out to eat. My mom loves fish so when she has the chance she makes a very spicy fish stew, usually with salmon or a white fish like tilapia. The base is a chicken broth with tons of cabbage, carrots, beans, and plenty of hot peppers. She lets it simmer all day long and it is excellent on rice as well as eating it as a soup.
Favorite Meal: Sakedon (Salmon-don) which is salmon, sliced sashimi style, on a bed of seasoned rice. I could eat that meal any day. It is delicious! As for homemade food, my mom's fish soup is my favorite.
May 4, 2009
May Day II
May Day, May 1st, usually refers to the International Workers' Day or Labour Day. (wikipedia/May_Day)
Initial Thoughts:
When I first heard someone mention May Day, I had not idea what they were talking about. As I started thinking about it and where I had heard it from I realized I did not know what May Day was/is what it stands for or how it is connected to my life.
Is a sense of history - or past struggles - necessary to live a good and meaningful life?
When May Day was first organized in Australia it was meant to be a one day celebration only in the year of 1856 but the workers liked the day of "stoppage of work" that they decided to celebrate May Day every year. The workers would meet and celebrate their favor of an eight-hour work day. After Australia created the idea of May Day the Americans workers were the next to demonstrated it and in 1886 the workers decided the universal MayDay date should be celebrated on May 1 of every year. After the organization of workers grew they decided their first demand should be the eight-hour work day.
"When the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honor of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past." (Rosa Luxemburg) I don't necessarily agree with this statement because it reminds me of all the other holidays we Americans celebrate. For example Labour Day, is supposed to be celebrated in memory of the Workers Union but instead Americans use the holiday to hang out with each other and have a barbeque and show fireworks. We don't even think about all the time and effort that the working class put in to earn their rights. That thought is not even spoken about in school or with each other. Some Americans probably don't even know the real meaning behind the celebration of Labour Day. Another holiday that is "mis-celebrated" is the 4th of July.
Americans misuse holidays and instead celebrate whatever they want on that specific day.
Having a sense of history or past struggles is can be both necessary and unnecessary to live a good and meaningful life because knowing from past experiences how not to suffer and struggle can change how we live our lives. Which may lead to living a good and meaningful life because we are not going to make the same mistakes made a hundred years ago. or you can look at this situation like some people do: having a sense of history or past struggles is not necessary to live a good and meaningful life because it doesn't matter what we have done in the past, all that matters is what we do now. Even holidays made a long time ago are now losing their true meaning and purpose in life.
Holidays are not "properly" celebrated. Most things in life lose their meaning.
Is there a way to bring meaning back to a holiday? Will celebrating the true meaning/purpose of a holiday make my life good and meaningful? Is this idea of "renewing a purpose" possible?
Initial Thoughts:
When I first heard someone mention May Day, I had not idea what they were talking about. As I started thinking about it and where I had heard it from I realized I did not know what May Day was/is what it stands for or how it is connected to my life.
Is a sense of history - or past struggles - necessary to live a good and meaningful life?
When May Day was first organized in Australia it was meant to be a one day celebration only in the year of 1856 but the workers liked the day of "stoppage of work" that they decided to celebrate May Day every year. The workers would meet and celebrate their favor of an eight-hour work day. After Australia created the idea of May Day the Americans workers were the next to demonstrated it and in 1886 the workers decided the universal MayDay date should be celebrated on May 1 of every year. After the organization of workers grew they decided their first demand should be the eight-hour work day.
"When the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honor of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past." (Rosa Luxemburg) I don't necessarily agree with this statement because it reminds me of all the other holidays we Americans celebrate. For example Labour Day, is supposed to be celebrated in memory of the Workers Union but instead Americans use the holiday to hang out with each other and have a barbeque and show fireworks. We don't even think about all the time and effort that the working class put in to earn their rights. That thought is not even spoken about in school or with each other. Some Americans probably don't even know the real meaning behind the celebration of Labour Day. Another holiday that is "mis-celebrated" is the 4th of July.
Americans misuse holidays and instead celebrate whatever they want on that specific day.
Having a sense of history or past struggles is can be both necessary and unnecessary to live a good and meaningful life because knowing from past experiences how not to suffer and struggle can change how we live our lives. Which may lead to living a good and meaningful life because we are not going to make the same mistakes made a hundred years ago. or you can look at this situation like some people do: having a sense of history or past struggles is not necessary to live a good and meaningful life because it doesn't matter what we have done in the past, all that matters is what we do now. Even holidays made a long time ago are now losing their true meaning and purpose in life.
Holidays are not "properly" celebrated. Most things in life lose their meaning.
Is there a way to bring meaning back to a holiday? Will celebrating the true meaning/purpose of a holiday make my life good and meaningful? Is this idea of "renewing a purpose" possible?
May 2, 2009
May Day
May Day, May 1st, usually refers to the International Workers' Day or Labour Day.
When I first heard someone mention May Day, I had not idea what they were talking about. As I started thinking about it and where I had heard it from I realized I did not know what May Day was/is what it stands for or how it is connected to my life.
Is a sense of history - or past struggles - necessary to live a good and meaningful life?
When May Day was first organized in Australia it was meant to be a one day celebration only in the year of 1856 but the workers liked the day of "stoppage of work" that they decided to celebrate May Day every year. The workers would meet and celebrate their favor of an eight-hour work day. After Australia created the idea of May Day the Americans workers were the next to demonstrated it and in 1886 the workers decided the universal MayDay date should be celebrated on May 1 of every year. After the organization of workers grew they decided their first demand should be the eight-hour work day.
"when the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honor of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past." I don't necessarily agree with this statement because it reminds me of all the other holidays we Americans celebrate. For example Labour Day, is supposed to be celebrated in memory of the Workers Union but instead Americans use the holiday to hang out with each other and have a barbeque and show fireworks. We don't even think about all the time and effort that the working class put in to earn their rights. That thought is not even spoken about in school or with each other. Some Americans probably don't even know the real meaning behind the celebration of Labour Day.
When I first heard someone mention May Day, I had not idea what they were talking about. As I started thinking about it and where I had heard it from I realized I did not know what May Day was/is what it stands for or how it is connected to my life.
Is a sense of history - or past struggles - necessary to live a good and meaningful life?
When May Day was first organized in Australia it was meant to be a one day celebration only in the year of 1856 but the workers liked the day of "stoppage of work" that they decided to celebrate May Day every year. The workers would meet and celebrate their favor of an eight-hour work day. After Australia created the idea of May Day the Americans workers were the next to demonstrated it and in 1886 the workers decided the universal MayDay date should be celebrated on May 1 of every year. After the organization of workers grew they decided their first demand should be the eight-hour work day.
"when the working class of the world has won its deliverance then too humanity will probably celebrate May Day in honor of the bitter struggles and the many sufferings of the past." I don't necessarily agree with this statement because it reminds me of all the other holidays we Americans celebrate. For example Labour Day, is supposed to be celebrated in memory of the Workers Union but instead Americans use the holiday to hang out with each other and have a barbeque and show fireworks. We don't even think about all the time and effort that the working class put in to earn their rights. That thought is not even spoken about in school or with each other. Some Americans probably don't even know the real meaning behind the celebration of Labour Day.
Foodways
At home my family cooks dinner using fish, meat, and vegetables. We also use a lot of olive oil in the dishes we made. Although I don't do most of the cooking I help out sometimes. On the weekdays my mom usually cooks the meals. She enjoys making dishes with fish and spices. My younger brother enjoys making japanese chicken curry. He likes to cook with vegetables and chicken. I enjoy baking mostly because it involves being exact with measurements and ingredients. Rather than estimating everything and putting it all together.
Most US mainstream people eat fastfood or eat at home. But even at home they don't always make the food, for example when I lived in the mid-west, Berkely, Michigan, my friend's house was always filled with snacks and frozen dinners. They also had a lot of canned foods and not too many vegetables. Sometimes they had fruit lying around but that was about all they had for fresh produce. There was also an abundance of boxed food, like Craft's Mac n' Cheese, which even my family had then as well. I believe the reason for all of this "pre-made" or "boxed" in many of the homes in the mid-west was because it was more efficient to come home and pop a frozen dinner in the microwave or a pre-made pizza in the oven.
The location: where people live plays a large roll in where and what they eat. In the city there are thousands of restaurants to go to and hundreds of different cusines to choose from. Some healthier than others. There are also many fruit and vegetable stands and stores, like Fairway and other supermarkets that cell fresh produce. But in the mid-west there are no fruit and vegetable stands on the sidewalks and if you want to go out to eat there are only a select few restaurants. There are less choices.
Since you have to drive to the supermarkets and grocery stores in the mid-west, it is not as simple and easy as it is in the city to go to the store, where some people can just walk a few blocks to shop. In the city it is easy for people to buy fresh food everyday and have a healthy meal, while in the mid-west it would be a hassle to drive to the store everyday for fresh food so they buy more non-perishable foods once a week, to avoid having to travel all the way to the grocery store several times a week. Hence the presence of pre-made, frozen, canned, and boxed foods in many of the homes in the mid-west (mainstream US).
Most US mainstream people eat fastfood or eat at home. But even at home they don't always make the food, for example when I lived in the mid-west, Berkely, Michigan, my friend's house was always filled with snacks and frozen dinners. They also had a lot of canned foods and not too many vegetables. Sometimes they had fruit lying around but that was about all they had for fresh produce. There was also an abundance of boxed food, like Craft's Mac n' Cheese, which even my family had then as well. I believe the reason for all of this "pre-made" or "boxed" in many of the homes in the mid-west was because it was more efficient to come home and pop a frozen dinner in the microwave or a pre-made pizza in the oven.
The location: where people live plays a large roll in where and what they eat. In the city there are thousands of restaurants to go to and hundreds of different cusines to choose from. Some healthier than others. There are also many fruit and vegetable stands and stores, like Fairway and other supermarkets that cell fresh produce. But in the mid-west there are no fruit and vegetable stands on the sidewalks and if you want to go out to eat there are only a select few restaurants. There are less choices.
Since you have to drive to the supermarkets and grocery stores in the mid-west, it is not as simple and easy as it is in the city to go to the store, where some people can just walk a few blocks to shop. In the city it is easy for people to buy fresh food everyday and have a healthy meal, while in the mid-west it would be a hassle to drive to the store everyday for fresh food so they buy more non-perishable foods once a week, to avoid having to travel all the way to the grocery store several times a week. Hence the presence of pre-made, frozen, canned, and boxed foods in many of the homes in the mid-west (mainstream US).
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