ILC Program Description, Final Presentation, and Self-Evaluation

ILC Description

The student will explore herbal medicine and healing through food by reading, writing, watching films and documentaries, and classroom experience. The student will embark on field explorations of local forests, the Organic Farm, and various eating establishments and kitchens. The student will also research, form a definition of, and develop a practice of conscious eating. The student will write weekly entries on their wordpress site summarizing their work. Additionally, the student will present the current state of their project to the class at intervals throughout the quarter.

Final Presentation

Food is the Solution

Narrative Self-Evaluation

Meghan O’Kelley

Week 10

3/14/17

 

Final Self Evaluation

 

This quarter has been more interesting, challenging, triggering, and fulfilling than any other I have spent at school. Our program seminars on Kara Newman’s The Secret Financial Life of Food, Kyla Tompkins’ Racial Indigestion, Winona LaDuke’s Chronicles, and other texts including “Eating the Other” by bell hooks brought us topics ranging from and interconnecting social movements, first foods, flavor, emotion, permaculture, Michel Foucault, and anti-masturbation sermons. I have been brought to the brink of my reasoning skills and forced me to enter a new thought paradigm. I have pushed the boundaries of my understanding of the world and global food systems. In this self-evaluation, in the style of Kara Newman, I will discuss the process by which I came to my final area of study and my possible future projects and ideas.

 

I began this quarter as a complete rookie to food studies: confused, excited, and absorbing everything I possibly could. In learning about herbalism, my original area of study, I developed a fascination with conscious eating practices and how to re-link the sensational life of the body with the digestion in a world focused on the extraction of emotion from all processes, specifically cooking and eating (two of the most intimate functions performed by the human body). Seminars on these topics and others explored in class challenged me to reframe my narrative process and write scholarly about that which triggered, tempted, or eluded me. In my best seminar paper from Week 8, I found myself rambling and questioning more than I explained and illuminated, and I dove deeper into the conceptual world of Tompkins, hooks, and Gumbs than I thought I could. In the end, I had a creative and engaging piece of writing of which I am particularly proud.

 

Our tasting labs every other week and our class meals engaged me further with our program. To have someone cook for you, or to cook for them, and engage with the process and origins of the food you eat is an intimate and anti-capitalist activity which is all too often forgotten in today’s “fast food” culture. Cooking and consuming are labors of love, and to commodify them has allowed us to poison ourselves with that from which we should derive joy and nourishment. Our eating is perfunctory, disconnected from our food source, and often the result of bodily violence to that which we eat and they who prepare it. I believe that this process is a part of what makes us sick. But food can also be a source of community, healing, nutrition, and medicine. Thus frames my final project: “Food is the Solution: Critical and Conscious Eating Studies”.

 

Initially this quarter I had the opportunity to primarily address my classroom learning objectives (attending class and participating in associated activities), updating my website, and book and internet research. The second part of the quarter placed a greater focus on practical integration of that knowledge into my daily eating practices, information gathering, and structuring of my next quarter. As I began a new topic, I entered a new area of research and was delighted to find a wealth of information from such texts as Gastronomica and the Netflix documentary series Chef’s Table. My work, research, conclusions, confusion, and enjoyment are documented on my SOS WordPress website.

 

In my restructuring of my learning objectives and subsequent research, I developed a working definition of critical and conscious eating for my ILC:

“Critical and conscious eating is the practice of engaging with one’s food throughout the process that brings it to and through one’s body; from the nutritional value of the diet of the cow whose meat one eats to the physical sensation of digestion, conscious eating examines the relationship between that which is eaten and that which is felt. It is about experiencing agency over one’s physical health through the decisions one makes concerning food. For the purposes of this ILC, conscious eating also incorporates the consumption of herbs used for healing into one’s diet preventatively rather than through supplements or other means after the fact.”

Through this definition, I have been able to examine my own eating critically, which I discussed on my blog. It has led me to my plan for next quarter: a continuation of critical eating studies with a further focus on herbal foods, accompanied by an informative brochure or flier to be distributed on campus and a YouTube channel to track and share my discoveries.

 

In discovering this new field, I have developed a passion not just for conscious eating, but in fact for conscientious eating, and I would like to encourage others, especially the possible receptive audience at Evergreen, to do the same. In addressing our bodies need for food in a way that is economically viable, sustainable for the planet, and emotionally and physically nourishing, we can reclaim a part of our bodies that is lost to capitalism in what Dr. Alexis Pauline Gumbs would describe as the “[performance of] further and further newness,” or as I interpret it, a fundamental desire to experience the fast, the convenient, the fleetingly delicious morsel that teaches us to regret and fear it, or the very concept of food.

 

This brings me to my new fascination with the slow foods movement through the practice of chefs/farmers/scholars such as Carlo Petrini, Alice Waters, and Michael Pollan. I plan to join the summer program attending the Slow Food Nations Food Festival in Denver.

 

Proposed Credit Equivalencies:  16 Total of 16 attempted/registered

 

4 – Commodification Processes: Racism and Sexism in Food Systems

2 – Critical Eating Studies: Tasting Labs

6 – Individual Learning Project:  Food is the Solution: Critical and Conscious Eating Studies

4 – Creative and Expository Writing: WordPress ePortfolio

Final Program Description: Food is the Solution

The student will explore herbal medicine and healing through food by reading, writing, watching films and documentaries, and classroom experience. The student will embark on field explorations of local forests, the Organic Farm, and various eating establishments and kitchens. The student will also research, form a definition of, and develop a practice of conscious eating. The student will write weekly entries on their wordpress site summarizing their work. Additionally, the student will present the current state of their project to the class at intervals throughout the quarter.

Critical and Conscious Eating Definition

Critical and conscious eating is the practice of engaging with one’s food throughout the process that brings it to and through one’s body; from the nutritional value of the diet of the cow whose meat one eats to the physical sensation of digestion, conscious eating examines the relationship between that which is eaten and that which is felt. It is about experiencing agency over one’s physical health through the decisions one makes concerning food. For the purposes of this ILC, conscious eating also incorporates the consumption of herbs used for healing into one’s diet preventatively rather than through supplements or other means after the fact.

Week 9: Planning for Spring Quarter

Well! It’s nearly the end of the quarter, so I figured I would take this week’s project update as an opportunity to discuss the wrap-up of my research this quarter and what I’ll be looking forward to in the next!

To finish out this quarter,  I will be compiling my information on the practice of conscious eating and dietary herbalism in a private document to be turned into a brochure next quarter. I also will be working several hours each week with Aurora and a few other students to rehabilitate Evergreen’s Elizabethan herb garden and process the herbs into teas and possibly lotions and salves as well.

Initially we will be working to weed the garden and identify the healthy plants living there, and then we will be purchasing some seeds and starters to hopefully bring a flourishing spring herb harvest.

A traditional Elizabethan herb garden at Agecroft Hall in Lancashire, England
A traditional Elizabethan herb garden at Agecroft Hall in Lancashire, England

We will also be working to make a book with the layout and uses of the herbs as well as drawings and pressed plants. We plan to split the work of the quarter into six phases which will weave together as plants are ready for market, but the idea is to plant, weed, design labels, harvest, process, and create tea blends. We plan to dry the herbs in the Gnome Shed and our own homes prior to making our teas.

Additionally, I will continue my food studies. I don’t yet know where that will take me, but I am spending spring break in Washington D.C. at museums and historical locations, and plan to see several exhibits currently at the Smithsonian related to food culture in the United States. Hopefully that will give some direction to my more general ideas about what I plan to study.

I have also discussed with Kotomi the possibility of working together (recycling her used tea leaves) to make tea cheeses. I have an interest in studying the process of cheesemaking, and am interested in exploring that process especially through local farms and small dairies.

Finally, as a part of my blog for next quarter, I plan to begin a YouTube channel dedicated to my work in food studies and the herb garden. I will document progress in both, create recipes and prepare dishes, and discuss topics in the program.

Week 8 Project Update: Chef’s Table, Fermentation, and Temple Food

This week I spent a lot of time watching Chef’s Table, a Netflix documentary series that I would highly recommend to everyone in this program (and out of it as well). One episode in particular stuck with me, and I have now done a ridiculous amount of research on its subject and her cuisine, namely Jeong Kwan and temple food. In a phenomenon particularly unique to Buddhist temples in South Korea, an ancient food culture is finally emerging in media.

The philosophies behind temple food are simple: it is sustenance and an expression of joy and connection, though it excludes ingredients deemed inflammatory to the mental state necessary for meditation (garlic, onion, green onion, spring onion, and leek) and foods traditionally not eaten by Buddhist monks and nuns (meat, fish, MSG, and dairy).

A traditional meal one may experience at a Buddhist temple in South Korea
A traditional meal one may experience at a Buddhist temple in South Korea

Yet somehow, the nutritional needs of those who eat it are sufficiently and artistically met, and the food is delicious, nourishing, and fully satisfying even to a voracious American palette. In fact, Jeong Kwan was flown from South Korea by Eric Ripert to prepare a meal at Le Bernadin. Her food in particular appears to be delicate, flavorful, transcendent, and spiritually unique. However, the practice of temple food, often centered around homemade kim chi, pickled vegetables, and aged soy sauce.

Soy sauce to Buddhist monasteries in Korea is what Molé is to Oaxacan chefs – a continual process. Soy sauce is rarely started new, only added to to enhance and enrich flavor. In some places, soy sauce is left to ferment for 200 years. I had always just assumed the Kikkoman jugs I bought at the grocery store were all there really was on the market!

This practice interested me so much because of my shifted focus towards conscious eating. In a way, eating to optimize meditation is the ultimate expression of that practice. Monks and nuns are so in tune with their bodies that they can sometimes affect their emotions, physiology, and even their longevity through meditation and centered focus. My whole interest in conscious eating is on the ways we can impact how we feel through what we eat, and temple food seems to be the ultimate expression of this.

Week 6 Project Update: The Dark Other and Getting Tea Drunk

This was one of the most interesting weeks I’ve had the privilege of in my education. To begin the week, I was working on my narrative self-evaluation and  trying to juggle a million personal projects. But I brought a fresh mind (though almost definitely not enough sleep) to class on Tuesday, and efforts to stay positive paid off. I had a great class, thoroughly enjoyed our tea tasting. Sarah suggested I write about our experience with the Week 6 tea tasting because of the unique social dynamic it manufactured.

As we drank our pu-er – some raw and some cooked, exploring multiple steepings and a range of complex and earthy flavors, we got somewhat giggly. As the tasting went on, we asked more questions, opened up, became vulnerable and silly and exploratory. It in many ways mimicked many of the symptoms of slight drunkenness, and I don’t understand why. I certainly enjoyed it (especially as tea drunkenness doesn’t seem to come with a hangover!) despite my inability to articulate exactly what it was. I left class that afternoon in a pleasant daze, and went on to dinner and the rest of my evening with an overwhelming sense of calm contentedness.

I was excited to meet with Sarah for my mid-quarter evaluation in the morning (boy did that sneak up), and after meeting to discuss the future of my ILC following through to next quarter, I attended a few hours of Farmworker Justice Day and hear about the current work with the CCBLA.

After that, I attended an incredible, life changing, and transformative talk by Dr. Alexis Pauline Gumbs. You can (and should) watch the full video of her talk here. She is a scholar, poet, author, speaker, and artist specializing in black feminist narratives and queerness. Her website can be found here and I highly recommend you explore it and her writings.

Blue Whales
Blue Whales

As she spoke from her new (and yet to be published book) she engaged us in what she described as an “echolocation re-memory oracle” based on whale communication which I could neither define nor describe to you, but if you’re interested in some possible explanations you can find them here, here, and here. She spoke a word from a poem read at the beginning of her presentation, asked us to do an out-loud free-association game (as she described, “like a free association…if we were free”), selected a triggering word from the audience, searched it in her manuscript document, and read a surrounding passage. So much of what she read was (for lack of a better phrase) blowing my mind, and I scribbled down verbatim as much of what she said as I possibly could. Below are some of her words (and in some cases context) that I found particularly memorable, triggering, or at least worth some unpacking. Let me know what strikes your fancy here! Just a few of my absolute favorite and most provoking quotes are bolded.

In reference to the idea of human communication (echolocation) across great distances “there is no sound I cannot travel through.”

“[we must learn] to open and shut our mouths appropriately.”

“look at them when they are silent. it’s almost like it hurts to be so soft.

The following quotes relate to a passage describing the transatlantic slave trade from the perspective of an enslaved person crossing the ocean in the hold of a ship: “we were preserved and packaged flesh.” “they had thought themselves the owners of their bodies.” Then, she goes on to describe the enslavement once landed in the Americas: “those hands that wanted to do and make…refined reuse into ritual.”

“scientists who had never understood dark matter [sought to measure it]” in which the dark matter exists both as the dark other, the dark body, the soul, the abyss, and the very fabric of space – the existence of all of these things is intertwined in Gumbs’ writing.

“they remembered the selves they had sent across generations.”

welded by her intention

“we scale the edges of our knowing.”

“there was the face she thought was hers when she saw it in her dreams.”

“do like the colonizers did and let the pheromones override the visual”

not without effort, but without force

she describes prison tattoos as “rebirthmarks” and says “even when their skin was stolen they remembered the maps and went within.”

“black feminist metaphysics, which is to say: breathing”

“the dark feminine, which is to say: everything”

“we violate the trust of being born.”

“what was in them [poets] that made work more food than food was?”

they say it’s about sea level, but the sea doesn’t have to level with you.

(last note: the choice not to capitalize the beginning of quotes was intentional; so far in Gumbs’ published works, she chooses not to capitalize the first letters of new sentences á la bell hooks or e.e. cummings)

Gumbs, D. P. (Writer). (2017, February 15). After Brightest Star. Live performance in Washington, Olympia.

Spoken word interactive lecture including excerpts from the author’s upcoming book M Archive: After the End of the World

Week 5 Project Update: Conscious Eating

This week, I’ve really been on a kick of conscious eating. I’ve been using MyFitnessPal to track the calories I ingest and my exercise. I was shocked at how many calories I have been eating unconsciously. Tracking them forces me to consider: do I really want to use up a third of my daily allotment of calories on this bowl of sugary cereal or a cup of soda? I’m eating much better and I feel like I have more agency over how my body feels.
I think the biggest thing I’ve learned so far is that it’s okay to feel hungry – I don’t always have to address it immediately. I can wait until the next meal and I will be fine! Snacking a little bit is okay, and I’ve been trying to direct it towards healthier stuff like apples or (unsweetened) dried mango or peanuts. I’ve also been drinking a lot of tea, and that feels really good in my body.
I wonder what it is about our culture (as Americans and more broadly as humans) that teaches us that the feeling of hunger is dangerous and bad. Obviously we are heavily consumerist and self-rewarding, but it seems to run deeper – almost an adaptive evolutionary sense that if we don’t eat right now we may not eat again. I try to be compassionate to that part of my brain and remind it that it’s okay, there will be food the next place I go so I  don’t have to eat until I’m totally full or feel sick right now. That’s a part of the conscious eating process that I’ve really been trying to focus on.
What are your eating practices? Please comment! For mine, I try to limit distractions and eat slowly, even if I feel rushed. Measuring out portions beforehand when I’m snacking is also good. If I’m having a conversation while I eat, I have to be extra careful that I’m not just shoveling food down. I try to check in with my body to see if it’s full yet from time to time.
To be honest, often when I’m snacking I’m also looking at a screen – watching something or doing homework or listening to music. Then it’s even harder to pay attention to my eating. It’s easy to go into the phone-zone while I eat and before I know it I’ve finished a bag of popcorn.
Apparently it’s important to eat away from the desk or the bed or wherever it is that you do work and relax so you don’t conflate the processes and create a connection that makes you feel hungry and distracted while you’re there. I watched a whole documentary about conscious eating that really made me think about distracted eating – it’s like distracted driving: unhealthy, potentially dangerous for your body, and all too common.
As for herbalism, my project has really refocused from medicinal herbalism to eating herbs and thus healing one’s body. I’ve been eating a lot of fennel recently, which is good for heart health and contains a lot of fiber. Pumpkin seeds are now my favorite snack. They’re high in magnesium, which is a nutrient I tend to be naturally deficient in. My favorite ones are CB’s harissa flavored pumpkin seeds. It’s a local company based in Washington state – you can visit their roasters and try fresh peanut butter. I highly recommend it.

Week 4 Project Update

This week in my project: research, nutrition, and traveling home.

It’s been a tough week. I haven’t been feeling quite myself recently, so it was hard to motivate to get my hours in. However, a short trip home for my Dad’s birthday felt really good, and talking to my parents about my program renewed some of my energy. We cooked together, ate together, and talked about food and nutrition and minimalism.

Prepared hot pot on the kitchen table
Prepared hot pot on the kitchen table

 

My Dad, my dog Lilly, and me (plus a truly ridiculous amount of food for 3 people)
My Dad, my dog Lilly, and me (plus a truly ridiculous amount of food for 3 people)

Cooking has always been an incredibly important part of my relationship with my parents. It was a special opportunity to take skills I had learned with my Aunt Shannon for making traditional Chinese hot pot and teach them to my Mom, the person from whom I have learned all of my chef skills.

Most of my work this week has been good old-fashioned book learning. I have so much to catch up on in my knowledge of plant medicine, and the more I learn the more tangents I go on. I’ve recently become fascinated with cilantro and how it binds with heavy metals in your digestive tract to pull them out of your body. Also, apparently we should all be eating chlorophyll. Go figure!

My main interest in herbalism is shifting from exploring how to make remedies for sickness or to improve wellness, but rather how consuming medicinal herbs and ingredients and consciously incorporating them into one’s diet can help with nutrition, health, and a connection to the way our food affects our bodies.

Sidenote: the documentary The Minimalists on Netflix is really fantastic. I’d love to have a discussion in class about minimalism in food (both preparation/display and content and the value or use of simplicity in cuisine). There’s also a website on minimalism here and my favorite blog on living simply and consciously here. These philosophies have greatly influenced my own ideas and priorities surrounding my body and my health.

Week 5 Tasting Lab

This week in tasting: corn!

I can’t say this was my favorite tasting – I don’t usually even enjoy corn on the cob much, so the idea of eating so many products made from it was not particularly appealing. In the context of our reading, I understand the value of tasting these products to understand the commodity, but I still liked the gravlax and kale tastings more.

Corn tasting from my Instagram @meghanokelley
Corn tasting from my Instagram @meghanokelley

We tried cornstarch, corn cake (prepared like rice cakes), corn flakes, corn chips, pureed corn, corn syrup, polenta, and corn bread. Oh, and we had some bourbon. I enjoyed the polenta and the liquor, but I can’t say I would ever put pure cornstarch in my mouth again; it’s the kind of thing I prefer in my pressed laundry or my baked goods.