November
2003
A
Tale of a Culinary Activist
By Melinda Fox |
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First and foremost, I am what one would describe as
a “foodie.” Those familiar with the term already understand
the connotation. I am someone who appreciates food. Good, fresh food,
beautiful, flavorful and savory food, comfort food, trendy and classic
food, cultural foods, and yes, even free food—as long as it’s
vegan.
While the vegan part of the description hasn’t always been the
case, the preceding part always has. Raised a fisherman’s daughter
on the shores of Cape Cod, Massachusetts, my family was directly connected
to its food sources. Fresh fish and shellfish were the norm while hunted
game sporadically appeared on the menu. Vegetables—both fresh
and home-canned—were an integral part of all meals, sometimes
they were meals all by themselves. Not a single part of the culinary
process was removed from the picture, from cultivating vegetables with
constant weeding and composting to butchering the fish and animals.
While we were not a particularly close family, we knew how to work
hard
and everyone had a job to do. A second freezer in the basement filled
with a stockpile of packages for winter, and floor-to-ceiling wooden
shelves with home-canned jams, pickles and relishes, were a source
of
continuous work and harvest. Back then, I thought it strange that others
did not live like we did.
Later, I moved to Connecticut and lived with my sophisticated aunt
who had a decadent taste for flavors from around the world. Olives,
capers,
mushrooms, fine chocolate, rich desserts, and wines and liquors were
added to my repertoire. It was in this new home that I executed my
first
dinner party for my “lady” friends at age 16. Like many
folks, the kitchen served as the heart of the home and a place I felt
secure.
My first job in high school was managing a tiny gourmet cookie shop
and ice cream parlor. The sweet smells and guilty pleasures brought
in all kinds of people: professors, students, local professionals, blue-collar
folks and kids of all ages. Strong interconnections began building for
me. I realized that food brought people together, conversation and stories
were shared, families interacted and memories were born all around the
table! This had a profound effect on me.
After graduating from high school I attended culinary school in New
York State. The pace was rigorous while the training was competitive
and intense. This was my first exposure to classic technique paired
with high-volume production. It was at culinary school that I first
learned about what some renowned delicacies were made of and how farm
animals were raised for food. Subsistence hunting, local permit fishing
and grant shellfish cultivation were replaced by large-scale ranching,
feedlots, hoggeries, battery cage facilities and long line fishing.
These big producers are considered the royalty of the food service industry,
and their influence permeated the school curriculum with endowments,
presentations and purchasing incentives.
While I was overwhelmed by the glamour it brought to my new chosen profession,
I was becoming concerned with the processes and scale in which animals
were being utilized. My own eating habits began to morph. Beef was no
longer an option after viewing my first propaganda video shown by the
Iowa Beef producers, veal was unintentionally exposed as a cruel and
shameful technique, and many of the choice delicacies like sweetbreads,
caviar and foie gras were like something out of a horror movie. Little
did my chef instructors or I realize a vegan and animal rights activist
was beginning to emerge.
I began to limit what foods I would consume, prepare and enjoy as part
of my trade, and this combined with the stress of long hours and few
holidays or weekends off, began to take its toll on me physically, emotionally
and socially. I decided I would hang up my proverbial apron to return
to school to chart a new course of study in environmental and agricultural
sciences.
Back in school, I was overwhelmed by how much my culinary experience
permeated my studies by recognizing how what we eat is desecrating our
world and our bodies. With a feverish momentum I began to organize for
animal rights and vegetarianism on my campus and challenge the very
ethics of the land-grant agricultural institution I was attending. Organizing,
activism and vegan potlucks became the staples of my new life.
But, sadly, the art of the dinner party where my guests were captured
at the table by fun, beautiful food and wine was a shadow of my past;
and I quickly became disappointed with the few vegan options at local
restaurants and the uninspiring selections at my health food markets.
I desperately missed gourmet food that looked wonderful on a plate,
and I noticed that many of my activist friends were unskilled in the
kitchen and lacked fine dining experience. I was still budgeting generously
with food bills but the return for what I was buying wasn’t as
great as when I was an animal consumer. When I traveled, I realized
there were more options in large cities for a gourmet compassionate
consumer to work with, but it wasn’t happening in my town or at
my friends’ homes.
After a few years of being depressed by sweets that tasted dry and
earthy, cheese that was rubbery and would not melt, convenience products
consisting
mainly of hydrogenated oils and refined sugar, and worst of all, powdery
egg-replacer, I decided to take back that part of my culinary life,
and revisit the inspiration I once took from the words of culinary
expert
Craig Claiborne: “Cooking is at once one of the simplest and most
gratifying of the arts, but to cook well one must love and respect food.”
I began creating the type of inviting, exciting and flavorful cooking
I was used to—veganizing old favorites, patronizing my local farmers
market, incorporating high quality raw food products and building up
my bastion of organic seasonings and condiments for more flair. I was
again excited to host people; and today my guests—activists and
family members—are themselves practicing the art of the table
in their own homes.
While consulting a mentor in the movement about options to take my
activism to the next level upon graduation, he said, “The best thing you
can do for animal rights is to keep cooking amazing vegan food. Get
people where their hearts and passions are with food and wine and show
them that eating compassionately can be just as satisfying an experience.”
Maybe he’s right, and maybe we can all be a part of that culinary
phenomenon.
Melinda Fox is a graduate of the Culinary Institute
of America in Hyde Park, NY and a recent graduate with a B.S. in Natural
Resource Conservation. She co-founded Animal Activists of Alachua,
the
University of Florida’s only AR/Veg group, and hopes to keep
inspiring AR/Veg activists by organizing locally and cooking globally.
