The Beginning...

I've been thinking of doing this for quite a while now, but lacked a direction - and really, who wants to listen to another amateur foodie ramble on about her gastronomic escapades when there are already so many people doing real, quality food reporting? It dawned on me today, however, that I am on a slightly different adventure now. One that will most certainly involve advances and setbacks, and perhaps others are in the same place. (or better yet, are eons ahead of me and I can steal ideas!)

For the past 6 or 7 years I have made an effort to pay attention to what is in my food. At times this is a half-hearted, convenient effort - others I approach it with gusto. This later position was especially true when, after years on my own, I ended up back in my mother's house for a few months. Being obnoxiously picky about processed food was a rollicking, passive-aggressive romp. Ah, but I've matured.

I've largely cut out fast food (except when I am just dying for a junior bacon cheeseburger and fries) as long as you don't define Chipotle as fast food. I read labels in the grocery store and mostly stick to outer edge, skipping the aisles and aisles of processed food (except when cheeze-its or a Reese's peanut butter egg are calling my name) My boyfriend and I joined a farm share and as I write this I am peeking over at my seedlings just barely popping their heads out of the soil and reaching toward the grow light. I have a notorious black thumb and despite my springtime enthusiasm for growing my own food, the majority of these little lives will end up in an over-watered, under-fertilized pile of neglected good intentions.

So today, where in the last 24 hours I have watched Food, Inc. (leaving me full of indignant gusto and motivation to once and for all commit to this change) and then pulled through a McDonald's drive thru for a Shamrock Shake, I decided writing my way through this might just be the way to go. In my defense, I can't tell you the last time I drove through a McDonald's drive thru, but I am willing to bet it was for hashbrowns some morning when I partook in the spirits just a tad too much (completely justified in my opinion), and that lure of "you loved these things as a kid, and you can ONLY get them in March..." was just so damn overpowering. The shake was awful, and I swore it was the last one I'll ever have. I do believe I said that three Marchs ago...