Authors J.B. MacKinnon and Alisa Smith took the title from their joint experiment: living lightly on the planet by eating food produced within 100 miles of their Vancouver apartment for an entire year. The Seattle Times proclaimed their story one of the top 10 books of 2007.
Chapters are broken out by month, commencing with March and opening with a mischievous paraphrase of the maxim of Rousseau: “Man is born free and everywhere is in chain stores.”
Correspondingly, the epilogue begins with a quip from Annie Dillard: “It is no less difficult to write sentences in a recipe than sentences in Moby Dick.”
There are 12 recipes in Plenty, one for each month, and they are models of brevity and incisiveness. They span gooseberry oysters, spring salad (with asparagus) and maple walnut crepes.
In their narrative, the two independent journalists scrutinize the ecological footprint of food, farmers’ and community markets, the delectation of dark chocolate, the decadence of berry picking, the science of paleoecology, the ins and outs of canning and corn storage, and the profoundly addictive nature of convenience (i.e., TV dinners and microwave ovens). Eventually, MacKinnon and Smith realize their experimental diet has become “the new normal.” In the year’s time invested, they reconnect with the people and places that produce food in their region, while exploring how much both food production and eating habits have changed over the centuries.
Habits change, but taste for the exotic is timeless. Smith recalls that her grandmother, living in Edmonton, made delicious ox-bone soups. In ancient Roman times, she recounts, “food grown within the Italian heartland was considered suitable only for peasants. For a feast meant to impress, a guest might find laid out in one sitting peacocks from Samos, grouse from Phrygia, cranes from Ionia, tunnyfish from Chalcedon, eels from Gades, oysters from Tarentum, sturgeon from Rhodes, wheat from Africa, and spices from India and China.”
Plenty is the fifth annual selection of the HSU/CR partnership, which provides a forum to promote literacy and the free exchange of ideas among students, staff and community members. The latest book highlights campus and community interest in sustainability and local food production. It is also an accessible reading choice for freshmen.
Both the HSU and CR campuses will host one-unit classes and events, including an authors’ visit, throughout the academic year. Faculty at both schools are encouraged to incorporate the book in their classes.
HSU’s English 480 is open to the general public as well as students and runs through mid-term. The class will begin Wednesday, September 1, at 6 p.m. in Founders Hall, Room 235. Details are available from the English Department at 707-826-3758 or englasa@humboldt.edu.
CR will offer a one-unit, late-start Book of the Year discussion group class, Library 99A, beginning Thursday, September 16. Details are available from Vinnie Peloso at 707/476-4565 or Vinnie-peloso@redwoods.edu.
Interested “locavore” groups and organizations who wish to plan and coordinate community events should contact Peloso or Mary Kay at HSU (707-826-3414, Mary.Kay@humboldt.edu).