Tag: healthy food

Slow Food, Social Mobility, and Whole Foods in Detroit

Food, Health, Maps, Projects

Anyone who follows news about Detroit hasn’t missed that Whole Foods is opening its Midtown location on June 5th. Young people are tweeting that they are already writing up their grocery lists, students are excited for the organic produce, and who out there can actually afford to shop exclusively at Whole Foods for their groceries!?

I know that I for one, cannot. It is exciting that Whole Foods is coming into Detroit when all of the chain supermarkets fled the city, but to the tune of huge tax breaks that the city could really use. It must also be noted that Whole Foods in Midtown does NOT address the scarcity or availability of healthy foods in Detroit. Rather Whole Foods taunts Detroit residents with the bright lights of an upscale chain food store, but no change to access in Detroit’s food system.

Classism in Slow Food 

“Slow Food Detroit” was founded in Clarkston, MI  –  51 Miles away from the city.

“Slow Food is an idea, a way of living and a way of eating. It is part of a global, grassroots movement with thousands of members in over 150 countries, which links the pleasure of food with a commitment to community and the environment.” (SlowFoodUSA.org)

Slow food is inherently easier for those with higher incomes. Access to better foods, organic options, and what some might call “picky” food choices favors those with extra money to spend. In Detroit income is highly correlated with race. A major reason that Detroit has limited grocery stores and high rates of diet-related diseases among African Americans is due to the fact that historically African Americans were either not considered for grocery store hiring or were hired and kept away from management positions. When the riots hit and many people left the city, there was no one with the skills to fill the grocery store void. Likewise, the supermarkets followed wealthy white populations leaving for the suburbs.

The addition of Whole Foods represents a similar imbalance in the “slow food” movement where all items are local sourced, organic, etc. with a price tag to match. Personally, my wife and I only shop at Whole Foods for wine, dessert, and food items that help manage lactose intolerance. Other than that, we would never dream of doing the bulk of our grocery shopping there. If anything Whole Foods has come into Detroit to capture the commuter market in one easy spot before they drive home outside of the city.

The Detroit Drilldown Report 2010 reported on grocery leakage (people spending grocery dollars outside of the city), that Detroit resident spend $200 Million (31% of grocery budgets) outside the city on their groceries. People may start shopping inside the city limits at Whole Foods, but I predict that the majority will take it back home outside the city.

Social Mobility & Transportation

An important aspect of slow food and access to healthy food is unfortunately transportation. Detroit residents are up against a public transit system that is broken and in serious need of repair. In Detroit healthy transportation can mean healthy food access as well. Many families that I have worked with work hard to car pool with their friends and neighbors to be able to shop at a chain grocery store or they utilize a plethora of food options: local stores, buying co-ops, gardens, etc.

When people do not have adequate transportation that also constrains their food options. If you are walking to a grocery stores that is miles away, why wouldn’t you choose the convenience store instead? If you can’t afford personal transportation, that may also limit you to low cost, high calorie food items. If you can’t often go grocery shopping that may also mean you choose items that will last much longer, which also tend to be the least healthy food items.

Social m0bility is linked to transportation, especially in economically depressed urban centers. These issues both disproportionately affect low income minority community the most.

Detroit’s Changing Food Environment

Meijer is also starting to build close to the Westside and that represents a better potential for healthy food access than Whole Food ever could, but there really needs to be tax incentives for local grocery store owners if healthy food access is going to improve. The Fair Food Network has been advocating and now “Double Up Food Bucks” for fruit and vegetables will be available in some grocery stores soon.

There are increasing food and grocery options Downtown, where the 2010 Census shows population growth, however this population growth is from new residents not residents moving from the East and West side into Downtown. Ye Olde Butcher Shoppe has called itself a grocery store, with Papa Joe’s Market coming soon thanks to Dan Gilbert, these are options on top of the new Whole Foods. The growing Downtown/ Midtown populations are not the populations of Detroit who do not have social mobility and do not face the higher prevalence rates of diet-related disease and obesity. The population dense neighborhoods on the East and West side of the city have not seen new grocery stores and in a number of cases local grocers have shut down only to be turned into Family Dollar locations.

Recipe: Sweet Potato Quinoa Burgers

Food, Recipes

This new recipe comes by way of my little sister which she found on a food blog, whose author ate at this restaurant in Grand Rapids, MI and found the original recipe on a cooking website.

When my little sister first made them for us they turned out to be massive patties of vegetable goodness falling everywhere out of the bun. I swore there must be a way to make them stick together better. My wife and I attempted a second time with the leftover veggie mixture for a longer cooking time, but again they fell apart. The third time (pictured) I sprayed more oil on the grill pan and made the patties a little bit smaller. After reading through the food blog and cooking website I think I’ve discovered my error. The cooking website notes to use:

“Pour a generous amount (8” depth) of grapeseed, canola, or vegetable oil in the bottom of a large skillet.  Heat the skillet to high heat, taking care not to let the oil smoke.”

Basically, you need to fry the patties so that they will stick together – not as healthful as I hoped. I’m thinking using a bit of egg in the mixture will help it congeal and keep the vegetable goodness less fried.

Here is the recipe that we adapted from the two listed online.

Ingredients:

  • 2 cups of diced onion
  • 2 minced garlic cloves
  • 2 cups of cooked lentils
  • 2 cups of cooked quinoa
  • 1.5 cups of mashed sweet potato (about 2 sweet potatoes)
  • 1 cup grated carrot
  • 1 cup chopped kale
  • 1.5 cups of oats (any kind)
  • 0.5 teaspoon ground cumin
  • 0.5 teaspoon ground coriander
  • 1 tablespoon of curry powder

Steps:

  1. Pre-cook the lentils and quinoa.
  2. Mix all the ingredients in a large bowl. We used our food processor to blend everything together into a nice sweet potato “dough.” Let the mixture set in the fridge for 1 or 2 hours.
  3. Saute the onions and garlic until the onions become clear.
  4. Make the burger patties from the mixture. They can be as big as you want because they won’t shrink when cooked.
  5. Place a thin layer of oil on a pan to cook the patties (we’ll try to cut down on the oil as much as we can – feel free to be as liberal as you need). We used a grill pan, but I think the uneven grill surface caused the burgers to separate more during the cooking process. A flat pan would be best.
  6. Cook each side of the patty for 3-4 minutes.
  7. Serve with ketchup, hot sauce, or I prefer a dab of hummus on top.

the missing ingredients from Jamie Oliver’s #FoodRevolution

Featured, Food, Health

Since November 2010, when I started working with adolescents in the Detroit area tackling childhood obesity, television shows that deal with weight loss and healthy eating have become more interesting. I diligently watched The Biggest Loser and similar shows to re-examine the tactics they use and how successful they were.

More recently I’ve been caught up in Jamie Oliver’s “Food Revolution” because what children and adolescents eat at school is a critical piece if the current trends of obesity are going to be reversed. I’ve been very interested in Jamie Oliver’s attempt to become a healthy food “rockstar” from the UK (sorry Jamie, you can’t compete with First Lady Michelle Obama). Watching the most recent season in Los Angeles, I can’t tell you how many times I yelled at the screen about how ineffective Jamie’s tactics were or how naive he was going up against an institutionalized system.

I don’t doubt Jamie’s good intentions or his passion for the work, but if this is going to be a real revolution then there needs to be some basic understandings of behavioral change and social change as well as community engagement. I’m not sure if this is just a case of making good TV by “making noise” vs. making social change by public health, but there is room for improvement.

Behavioral Change

With the recent release of new cigarette packaging and the tactics used on Jamie Oliver’s show, it has become obvious that many people disregard research in lieu of “making noise as public health.” Any first year public health student (or someone in close proximity) could tell you that the “Health Belief Model” (HBM) of making people change their habits by highlighting fears no longer works, especially among young people. The HBM relies on scare tactics, some of the best example are from old posters from the 1940-50s that feature skeletons, sharks, and death if you don’t immunize your child, cover your cough, etc. The posters and messages worked for the time period when people were scared of new health issues and followed the messages, but we live in a different time. People don’t respond to scare tactics or negative messages. This is true across the board: in politics, with non-profits, and especially within public health interventions.

The scare tactics that Jamie uses, predictably, have minimal impact on changing people’s minds or getting more people involved. People prefer to be told what is going right or what can easily be done to make things better. Messages that empower individuals and reinforce positive behaviors are more likely to receive a respond. People want to know that they have the ability to make the changes themselves. When Jamie has a classroom discussion with adults who are facing health problems as a result of their past bad eating habits and lack of activity he fails to realize earlier that this is something the teens are facing already with their own family members. Studies have shown that young people respond even less to HBM tactics like these, largely because out of all age groups young people like to know that they have control of their lives – and they do!

Tactics for Social Change

I know its a TV show, but one man cannot make a revolution happen. Any community organizer will tell you that it takes many hands and years to make real and lasting changes to systems and structures that are doing harm. Jamie Oliver stands in a great position to include more people, spread awareness, and organize communities to work together to change their political and educational systems for better school health. However, that is not what happens. Jamie is always surprised by the low turnout and minimal impact of filling a bus with sugar or getting upset with the LAUSD superintendent. Telling parents that they are doing everything wrong won’t create community buy-in.

It isn’t until the final episode that Jamie encounters a group of parents protesting high sugar flavored milk in the schools that a first real attempt to meet people where they are happens. There are many people who want a food revolution and they are already doing the hard work. The final episode is also where Jamie brings together a group of top chefs in LA to run a competition with school cooking teams. This is a great example of the necessary coalition building and community engagement that needed to happen closer to step one.

If you want to change the policies of structure of a system, then you can’t start at the top. The superintendent, as we saw, has the power to kick people out, but not change whole policies. Jamie needed to start by building relationships with people within the system who have more power to push for change. The cafeteria workers would have been a great start. When Jamie finally met some of them, they were overjoyed with his message and could have been  a big force for change in food preparation. The superintendent wasn’t on board, but maybe one of the Board members was sympathetic to the food revolution message and could have been an important ally inside. You have to work on smaller targets before you can take on your primary target.

Building a coalition of people both inside and outside the system that you want to change is critical to making real social change. Jamie kept trying to take on his primary target, the superintendent, as an outsider with no community backing. You have to start with the hard organizing work of bringing together other influential community members, workers in the system, and individuals with power inside the system in order to effectively push for change.

Community Engagement

Throughout the whole season it was painfully obvious that the community wasn’t behind Jamie’s antics, but there weren’t very many opportunities for collaboration. Many of the points I want to make about community engagement are already listed above, but I do have one key ingredient that was missing in Jamie’s outreach.

Listening. From Jamie’s first show in LA he was telling people what was wrong. He used a series of scare tactics about school meat by waving inedible raw pieces of cow in parents’ faces. It was gross and it made a point, but it didn’t give anyone the opportunity to get involved.

Thinking back between the first show and the final show, if Jamie (or his crew) had taken the time to LISTEN and find people who were already championing the cause of better school food then he might have had a more successful season.

Conclusions

Jamie ended this season by saying, “It’s not about me. […] We all gotta start stirring the pot.” I have more hope for Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution after the final show where he did some community listening, some great community engagement, and even some coalition building. Maybe he is even beginning to recognize that the problem isn’t all on his televised shoulders, but it is shared across the community – and they want change too.

Here are a few improvements to tactics that could revolutionize the food revolution:

  1. LISTEN to a community before acting on their behalf
  2. Focus on systems change, not just people in power
  3. Practice patience: the problem wasn’t created overnight, its not going to go away overnight
  4. Use inclusive tactics: don’t reprimand or scare