Thursday, June 7, 2007

Final Exam Question #1

Elliot Levine

Throughout time there has always been a constant factor to what grows on earth and what people will eat, food. Food has been there since the beginning starting with the fresh fruit and vegetables that grow from trees and the ground to bushes and under the sea. Food is everywhere that you can go making it one of the larges systems known to mend and why every living thing must eat food to survive. See food has also evolved or changed over time as people and animals have. Food was a little bit different though, food didn’t become something new by time people and animals made it that way with their materials that they learned when they were changing. For an example corn has always grown from the ground since the times of the Indians but after when the Indians changed into what we are today we started to use pesticides and other types of plantation growth methods to make more corn and different types of corn all together. The same for other types of foods can be said for they have the same outcome as the corn did.

First I would like to start by talking about food in the past. Past food has always been what it was grown and meant to be for. It would grow because it was where it naturally grew and would be come what its physical and chemical structure was made to be. People and animals that then lived where this specific food was growing would take advantage of it by picking or plucking it out and then eating it. Also back then when it came to food it was more of a natural taste when it came to food because they did add any other extra spices or flavoring to distort the real taste of the food. And also cattle and other animals would be slaughtered just when they need a meal and not on a regular basis.

Now I want to start talking about food that is currently in the present of our living. Food has come a long way since the beginning and has changed drastically for some and for others have stayed the same. Some of the main changes that have been happening to food lately is food is now getting more scientific treatment like chemicals and other things being sprayed over them for growing reasons. And also for the reason that the food needs to be protected from other animals or insects that want to eat the food growing. Food taste has changed now that people have been using spices and other added flavorings to enhance the taste of natural food changing the way that cultural dishes are made and served. But probably the most drastic change that has been made is that instead of animals being killed when they were needed for dinner. Now cattle and livestock have been put on lines in industrial food factories and is being slaughtered in cruel ways one by one each meeting a horrible death all for them to become a burger at a fast food restaurant let alone an unhealthy burger.

If I had to predict the way that food will grow into the future I would have to say that based on historical trends more chemical and scientific testing on the food will increase. More chemicals will be dropped for growing and food will be desecrated and destroyed of there natural taste because of all the unnatural things that people will be doing to the food over time. Also I believe that cattle will continue to be in industrial factories coming to horrible deaths all for becoming a fast food burger until there are no more cows left to be sloughed. If out of everything that I learned from this class is one thing it is that people have turned food into something that it is not and something that it wasn’t intended for. People have changed what food was meant to do and even though they think there making food better they’re really making it worse. Food and the natural taste of food are doomed, as we know it.

Wednesday, April 18, 2007

energybulletin

What i like about energy bulletin.net was that each page was on a diff88rent topic that had to do with oil. When i was reading the articals i found that alot of the stuff said was stuff that i had alread knew. But there was some stuff that i had never heard about befor. "Historically, taxing the subject state has been in various forms—usually gold and silver, where those were considered money, but also slaves, soldiers, crops, cattle, or other agricultural and natural resources, whatever economic goods the empire demanded and the subject-state could deliver. Historically, imperial taxation has always been direct: the subject state handed over the economic goods directly to the empire." (energybulletin.net) i liked this quote because i thought that it was interesting on how back in this time and empire there was diffrent ways of basicly currancy. but what i found interesting was that all the things listed were some ofthe stuff that we still use today except for slavery. But then i thought even though we dont use slaves we still use imagrants to do the work in some fields just like in sloughter houses as seen in our daily bread and fast food nation.

Thursday, March 29, 2007

IFS ESSAY

As this course has been going on I have learned a lot of things about the industrial food system. What I have learned is that is extremely fucked up. The industrial food system is based on the fact that they can take animals and use them for what ever they want. They can use them to chop up and be sent off to fast food restaurant. The worst part of it all is when they do kill the animals for the restaurants using they defile the meat by dropping that animals fiancés in the meat. That courses many diseases and many other unhealthy problems to the human body.

While watching the movie our daily bread I was thinking about how the food companies use the animals as if they are objects and not the real creatures that were put on this earth. They were treating them like they were nothing and they were being abused. It made me think more about what they were feeling and what if we were in the same problem or predicament. What if we were subjected to a world where we have one purpose to do one thing? What if that one thing was to die for other creatures to eat us? And what if we are abused and hurt during it. What if we are living in a fake world?
I was really destroyed emotionally about how these animals in the slaughterhouses are treated. How they go through grueling processes to be electrically sedated, and then sliced in half and all this while they are still conceded alive.

The next thing that we focused on in class was watching a movie called Fast Food Nation. This movie that we watched really got me thinking out of all the other things we have done in this class so far. First we saw a scene where workers at a fast food restaurant spit on a bad customers order. It doesn’t seem like its that big of a deal or have that much of meaning but to me that was the first thing that really woke me up and made me see how the system is so corrupt. The next thing that happened in the movie is when they showed the illegal immigrants working in the slaughterhouse. It was weird to think that they are supplied drugs to work faster ad then when the workers get hurt they say that it’s the workers fault. With that in mind they then send that worker to the hospital and then either fire them or do something to there position in the company because they get tested and told that they are using illegal drugs. Basically to me it seems like the system is trying to get the workers into a trap.

Then again in this movie they brought up the fact that there is shit in the meat and that the meat could contain diseases that are harmful to the health of humans. Then they tried to explain that if you cook the meat for a specific amount of time that all the diseases and shit will be heated up and destroyed. But then I had to think that if the people that work at the fast food restaurants are mean enough and have he power to spit in the food then what’s to say that they don’t have the power to not heat the food up to the specific point. Plus its also just the fact that the workers just like in the slaughter house are working so fast that they make mistakes and not cook all the shit and diseases out of the meat.

Thursday, February 22, 2007

Atkins Diet essay

I want to know when people think of food what do they believe is healthy. To many different people different things are healthy in this world. Everyone has their own system of eating and there own diets that they go by because they believe it works for them. But what truly is the best diet system to go by. And who is the person that says that that is the best one to use. When I look at food and the diets systems that are out on the market today I see what I would like, and what would mainly benefit my body and me. The Atkins diet is the best diet system.

Most people in this world have grown up learning to eat their fruits and vegetables because thoughts food groups are known to be the healthiest for the human body. But what if there was a diet that said that thoughts are the worst of the all and that the best to eat for fast results is meat and cheese. Well the Atkins diet is that diet that says that meat and cheese is the right way to go to see fats results and healthier eating habits. “Because the diet advocates meats, cheeses and other fatty foods and eliminates fruits and vegetables due to the high carbohydrate content, many feel that it is unhealthy and could cause more harm than good. The Diet is broken into four phases in which the goal is to gain “carb control” before slowly reintroducing carbohydrates into the diet.” (www.skinnyondiets.com) What the Atkins diet is trying to do is they are trying to target the carbohydrate system In the human body for they believe that is what will cause you to see that best and fastest results.

The Atkins diet is formed around not eating fruits and vegetables and only eating mats and cheeses. This will target the carbs for the human body making what the Atkins diet to believe is the best way to diet. During the lifestyle of the Atkins diet the people will have to go through an intake of fatty food. “Because of the types of foods allowed on this diet, it appeals to many people – eggs, steak, bacon, cheese, cream and butter are allowed, some of the top foods eliminated in most diets. On this diet, the rich foods should create feelings of fullness for longer periods of time so snack foods containing carbohydrates will rarely be considered.” (www.skinnyondiets.com) For most diets you would never see this on the list of foods to eat but for the Atkins diet this is what they think works. The Diet Also states that the users should eat 3 regular meals or 4-5 smaller meals so that the body can adapt to the feeling of fullness, and there can be no skipped meals.

The Atkins diet is a great diet to go by and helps you to loose the amount of weight that you would like. There are positive things that come out of using the Atkins diet. “ Diet aims to provide a lifelong approach, and
Products do not contain trans fat.” (www.skinnyondiets.com) The diet does not include exercise, which will help to loose the amount of weight that you want. They don’t stress on the exercise and work out plans because the food system is believed to be good enough.

Some people believe that the best form of diet is the vegetarian lifestyle. People believe that it is the best form of diet for a number of reasons. For example some people think that it is bad to kill animals. “More than 27 billion animals are killed for food every year in the U.S. alone. Animals in factory farms have no legal protection from cruelty that would be illegal if it were inflicted on dogs or cats, including neglect, mutilations, genetic manipulation, drug regimens that cause chronic pain and crippling, transport through all weather extremes, and gruesome and violent slaughter.” (http://goveg.com/theissues.asp) Another reason to why people think that a vegetarian diet is the best diet to go with is that it protects us from diseases. “Healthy vegetarian diets support a lifetime of good health and provide protection against numerous diseases, including our country’s three biggest killers: heart disease, cancer, and strokes.” (http://goveg.com/theissues.asp)
Although I do agree with what the vegetarian diet is trying to accomplish with the saving of animals and making the world a better place with less diseases. The main thing that people are trying to get out of diets is weight loss and not helping the planet.

Then there is the most popular diet of them all and the one diet that most people in the world seem to fallow the Normal everyday US diet. The Normal US diet consists of what ever that person wants to eat regardless of heath or weight loss. When looking around everyday I see people consuming everything from vegetables, to fruit, to junk food. The normal US diet was created to be a comfort diet. The comfort of this diet is that you eat what you want and you are happy with how your body is taking in the food. Health and harming anything else isn’t your concern just what do you want to eat and how do you like your food. Why this is a bad diet plan is because it has no control on anything. The diet is free and it can’t target any one area or problem. Making is extremely hard for the person to make any positive changes. The only thing that the diet is good for is giving that person free choice on what he or she wants to eat.

In conclusion the best diet that is on the market today is the Atkins diet. The Atkins diet has a steady system that targets every point that you need to loose the amount of weight that you want. The Atkins diet is god for you and helps to make you stronger and healthier. I think that it is important for people to know what they are eating because it will help them to make better desiccations and live a happier and healthier life. By knowing what your eating people can pick out what they are suppose to eat and what will work for there body and what will work against there body. Also by when people know what they’re eating they can get stronger and loose more weight, which is the main point to why people are on a diet in the first place.

Friday, February 9, 2007

Question B: If I had unlimited time, skill and money to make type of food that I wanted for breakfast, lunch and dinner for three days I would make these foods for my meals. For the first day I would make cereal for breakfast with milk and orange juice for a drink. For lunch I would have a burger and soda. For dinner I would make stake and have soda for a drink. The second day that I could make food with all the unlimited time that I had I would make eggs and bacon for breakfast with orange juice. For lunch I would have tacos and soda. For dinner I would have seafood and soda. The third and last day I would have toaster strudel and orange juice. For lunch I would have pizza and soda. And for dinner I would have lamb because that’s my favorite dish in the world and soda.

Question C: What I believe people should eat every day of their lives is vegetarian foods and meals because that is the healthiest type of food that you can eat. It would be salads, other vegetables, and fruits. That’s the best way to keep everyone in the world healthy.

Tuesday, February 6, 2007

pasta


I decided to cook pasta for the homework. I cooked Fettuccine Alfredo. It was really good. When I started I had to add water, milk, and butter and the sauce was really thin so I thought I might have messed up. I went on and continued cooking anyway. When I put the pasta and the seasoning in the sauce remained to be thin. I stirred the pot for another 6-8 minuets and the sauce started to get thicker. I continued stirring the pot for another 2 minutes and the pasta was finally done. When I put the pasta in the bowl it looked better then ever and when I ate the pasta it was really good. That was the first time I ever had cooked Fettuccine Alfredo and it came out great I really enjoyed making it. When I took a bite from the pasta it went on my lips and the sauce stayed because it was so thick. The sauce went on my tongue and it had a very heavy cream taste like a milk but cheesy. It went down my throat and it kind of had a dry feeling. That was the sensation that I had when I had the pasta that I made.

Monday, February 5, 2007


The food item that I ate this time was a bag of Doritos Salsa chips. When I first put the chips into my mouth they hit all my teeth and all inside my mouth. The went up and down my checks and down into my gums where they would get mushy and get stuck. The chips were dry and getting stuck in my teeth as they grouped together. When the chips finally hit my tongue I had a sensation that took me by surprise. I found the chips to be very tomato based and very natural favored. I felt like the chip was really dipped in salsa dip. The taste really made me feel like I was eating the real thing it was delicious. When it was going down my thought it was really dry and also very pointy because of the sharp corners that were not fully chewed yet. After I had the chip I really wanted to get a drink but the taste was so good and natural that it made me want to keep eating the chips no matter what the circumstance. The feeling of the chips was really good and made me want to keep having more. It was almost like the chips were naturally sweet or something it was weird and shocking but very appetizing. These are really good chips and I re commend them to everyone to try at least once in your life.