The Wholistic Research Company

Health Issues In The News

<<back

Cooking For The Best Future
by Katriona Forrester, B.Soc.Sc., FKI

The essence of my work is to design food for people. What do you think of that?
Do you think that the design of the food that you eat is important?

The personal answer to that question may depend on whether you are hungry or not. The global answer is that yes, it matters a lot. Individual eating habits multiplied by 6.1 billion people has an bigger impact than anything else on our environment. We are ultimately talking about the organic root of all social ills : poverty, exploitation, war, disease, racism, earthquakes, floods and anomie.

It's hilarious to imagine "chewing our way to enlightenment", but in reality there is no better way - no way which respects the ridiculous as well as the sublime, which in any worthy spiritual scheme has to be done. No better way to stumble daily across the plain fact that each and every one of us is a miracle of transformation, moment to moment transmuting brown rice, pizza, curry, fruit juice and donuts, and creating human flesh and blood, energy, activity and consciousness. The key to creating the best future is in acknowledging that the qualities of the things we eat will determine the quality of the things that we create, i.e. the things that come out of us.

Designing food for people means providing:

Fuel - combustible energy source at right time and place in right amount.

Sensorial pleasure - to eye, nose and tongue of persons of many tastes.

Satisfaction on emotional level - being truly cared for by the heart - aah !

Knowledge about nutrition and health factors: proteins, vitamins,

minerals et al.

Ecological responsibility and economic parameters.

A sense of who the eaters are and who they want to become - food which supports them to reach their goals, in the biggest and best way possible.

An impulse of creativity which dares to try to include all these contradictions along with a pinch of salt i.e. a sense of humour which is a sense of the divine. Wicked!

I have been educated as a philosopher-cook, and the job I just described goes far beyond the territory normally ascribed to the domain of a cook. This view sees the cook as having huge responsibility for quality of life and the future of humanity. It's a view both simple and maddening. On the one hand it's really too silly a job and downright boring, as well as hard work and bad pay. Who cares what Beethoven had for breakfast. Do we give a thought to Michaelangelo's mum and what she made for dinner? No, we don't! It's really too absurd. It is threatening too ~ who wouldn't feel threatened by change in such a personal and intimate matter as breakfast?

But on the other hand, if the food on your plate doesn't tally with who you say you are and what you say you stand for, then your word isn't worth much, is it?

It has been brought to my attention by my teachers that cooking is an essential part of the peace process. Any ideas of world peace are without any real future if the dimension of daily nourishment is wrong. It follows that the entire human race may be on course for a huge reality check in the viability of our individual futures and our collective future, if the consequences of this crucial daily choice constantly veer from our long-term best interests. I believe, and I do my best to live it through my work, that the biggest difference that can be made to world peace and to the quality of the future will be on a mouth by mouth basis.

And so I go on. Designing food for people. People who eat. Food which is nourishing and responsible at the same time. Food for kids, food for grannies. Food for lovers, food for consciousness raisers. Food for the sick, food for those who are bursting with health. Food for dancers, for athletes, for bookworms, for couch potatoes........

My theoretical guide and inspiration are the principles of yin and yang - sounds kind of fancy, and it is; actually outrageously fancy if the truth be known - it has been called Macrobiotics and it is a huge and ambitious attempt to describe the workings of the entire universe in a language understandable to anyone and applicable to the choices and decisions we make in daily life. Yin and yang. Giving and Taking. Recycling and always moving forwards. Expansion and contraction. All there is. The hands of Mr. and Mrs.God.

In my work I need to remind myself over and over again that it is that simple. I need to accept that most people will never be interested in what it takes behind the scenes to make the show go on. In my work there are many important but often unmentioned characters, equivalent to the playwright, the director, the prima donna, the anonymous stage lighter, the carpenter who laid the wooden floor, the lady who cleaned the dressing room ..... sometimes I'm just too scared to accept the responsibility and exposure of the key roles. Sometimes I'm just too proud to accept the lowliness of the anonymous characters, and sometimes, on the other hand, all of this work appears to me as the heart of the matter.

What I do looks like this :

Designing menu plans for specific educational events, plus executive
support.

Teaching classes world-wide in natural foods cookery.

Writing recipes and articles about food and nutrition. (Cookery book published 1997)

There is no difference in principle between what I do and what everybody does when she or he makes lunch. The differences are in scale (most people don't make lunch for 40 or more at a time) and in awareness : I've been taught to be conscious of the wider ramifications of my choices and actions.

© Copyright Wholistic Research Company 2001
Click here for additional copyright information.

Links to Related Articles...

	A Close Look at Complementary Medicine : What is it good for?
	Biological Medicine : Lead Article
	Creating your own Health Care Team
	Guidelines for choosing your course of treatment : Orthodox or Alternative?
	Katriona Forrester (Food Design, Food Therapy)
	Kicking The Caffeine Kick
	Where is Natural Medicine Headed?
	Back to previous page