Question of the day: what's up with packaging materials? These "Sealed for your Protection" tops on everything, the individually wrapped this and that, the double-bagged for freshness loaves of bread. I mean, it would be one thing if the manufacturers decided to increase the outer packaging because they wanted to reduce the amount of preservatives in our food, but that's not why they're doing it (or else I'm sure they'd proclaim it loudly on the label). Seems to me like they just want to leave things on the shelf or on the truck longer than ever before they reach our kitchens. And maybe I'm mis-remembering, but when I was wee (in the early to mid-80's) I swear that not everything in creation was individually sealed. Doesn't anyone worry about using up the landfills anymore? Or were we concerned with that just while it was momentarily newsworthy, and the public's attention span has moved on?

One of the problems is that food has become a commodity rather than a cuisine. Why else would the people who grow and make our food have to focus more on how well something ships and how pretty it looks rather than how good it tastes or how well it nourishes? And then, just to make the system a bit more self-perpetuating, plenty of people have no idea how to cook, or no time to do it, unless dinner comes out of a box.

I'd like my life to be a bit more freshly and locally produced and a bit less sealed for my freshness with BHT added. Freshness should be in the flavor, and not the state of my corpse 3 months after my demise.

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