Barbara Kingsolver – Peaceful Reader

I cooked routine, easy meals this week. Leftovers, pasta with some of my frozen-from-last-summer pesto, and hamburgers nourished us this week. Over the last few years our family meals have taken new direction. Change is good. I would say we’ve always been on the cusp of healthy eating but not over the edge. Many people consider us to be over-the-edge though.

I’ve eaten a vegetarian diet since I was a teenager. Teenage boy was raised vegetarian. (Except for Gpa Dean who kept taking him to McD for chicken nuggets on their manly Saturday wash the truck days!!) My husband, who spent time as a young boy in both Sierra Leone and Malaysia has a versatile palate and he’s a runner. He swayed easily with my vegetarian cooking. Every once in awhile he would come home with a package of ground turkey, shape patties, and serve them for dinner. I just ate the side dishes.

As Teenage Boy became well, a teenager, and more active he begged for meat. I’d read Barbara Kingsolver’s book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, where she talks about making responsible meat choices. Every foodie should read her book. After some local research I found a Gentleman Farmer who sells straight to the consumer for a reasonable price. Now I can purchase meat from him because he has the same ideas about animals that I do and I’ve introduced meat back in to our diet over the last three years. My veg friends are shocked and a little disgusted but I’ve enjoyed the journey. I like the idea of helping the farmer practice sustainable, healthy food production. It’s all about supply and demand.

We still eat vegetarian at home most of the time and when we venture out for food I always eat vegetarian. I want restaurants to think about what they serve and how whole groups of us are left out when only two veg menu items are offered, usually one of the items is a cheese quesadilla; not very healthy and I’m a cheese snob. Lucky for us we have a dairy that practices sustainable and wholesome farming where we can purchase hormone-free milk and local cheeses. Trust me there is plenty of eye-rolling going on at our table as I sweetly question wait staff on vegetarian eating options. Nachos with cheese SAUCE always riles me up and confuses the poor wait person.

Teenage Boy is now tackling our sugar habit. He is an athlete and has decided to cut out refined sugars. We don’t eat a ton of sugar at our house but I like to bake and Teenage Boy loves to have cookies or bars on hand to eat. He is super thin and needs multiple food choices throughout the day. We are soda free but the kids drink healthy-ish real juice. Cereals are another area where sugar is an issue but we do have a special way of serving cereal that deserves an entire post all its own. The search is on for baking recipes that use natural sweeteners other than refined sugar. I need to read more to understand my options. Obviously we all know sugar isn’t good for us but what kind of treats can I make that my kids will still think of as edible and not tree bark?

Sidebars:

1. I browsed through this book, Chloe’s Kitchen, online yesterday and am completely enticed. While we are not vegan I think this cookbook offers some great variations on everyday recipes. Why not throw it into our already jumbled randomness of food ideas? Has anybody experimented with this book?

2. I started watching The Future of Food on Netflix instant while Groovy Girl was in gymnastics class. I plan to finish watching today. Genetically modified foods scare me and we need to be wary of their existence on our grocery shelves. I discovered this list of food documentaries on Lettuce Eat Kale. I’ve watched a few of them (I highly recommend King Corn) but should probably watch all. I always feel disgusted and angry after watching but more involved as well. Sick but smarter…

3. I get this Rodale newsletter through email and found this must-read article about the over-used word, natural. It’s crazy that we’ve watched this word transformed from a positive into a meaningless word. Tragic. Someday I hope it will come back from the dark side. The bottom line is if you see the word natural on products-it’s not because food manufacturer’s have watered-down the meaning of the word-ON PURPOSE-to make more money.

With all that…
Stay positive.
What changes can you make if the future of food is important to you?

This post is connected to Beth Fish Reads Weekend Cooking meme. Click her link to see more food-related posts.

I like this cover even though this is not the version I read.
Why two such different covers?

I worship at the feet of Ms. Kingsolver’s immense writing skills. I’ve been a fan since I happened upon The Bean Trees way back in college. Her books have an earthiness to them and thus highly appealing to me. I’ve read and enjoyed most everything she’s written. The Lacuna scared me at first because of its size…507 pages and also I’d heard many negative reports from friends both in person and in the blogging world. Many readers looked forward to The Lacuna’s publication date, reserved new copies at the library or ordered them and then abandoned the book half way through. I was crushed but knew eventually I would pick it up myself. Luckily a dear friend from my Good Spirits Book Club finished it, praised it and handed it to me to read. While I can understand why some gave up…I loved it and was once again impressed with Kingsolver’s amazing talent.

GoodReads Synopsis:

In her most accomplished novel, Barbara Kingsolver takes us on an epic journey from the Mexico City of artists Diego Rivera and Frida Kahlo to the America of Pearl Harbor, FDR, and J. Edgar Hoover. The Lacuna is a poignant story of a man pulled between two nations as they invent their modern identities.

     Born in the United States, reared in a series of provisional households in Mexico—from a coastal island jungle to 1930s Mexico City—Harrison Shepherd finds precarious shelter but no sense of home on his thrilling odyssey. Life is whatever he learns from housekeepers who put him to work in the kitchen, errands he runs in the streets, and one fateful day, by mixing plaster for famed Mexican muralist Diego Rivera. He discovers a passion for Aztec history and meets the exotic, imperious artist Frida Kahlo, who will become his lifelong friend. When he goes to work for Lev Trotsky, an exiled political leader fighting for his life, Shepherd inadvertently casts his lot with art and revolution, newspaper headlines and howling gossip, and a risk of terrible violence.
     Meanwhile, to the north, the United States will soon be caught up in the internationalist goodwill of World War II. There in the land of his birth, Shepherd believes he might remake himself in America’s hopeful image and claim a voice of his own. He finds support from an unlikely kindred soul, his stenographer, Mrs. Brown, who will be far more valuable to her employer than he could ever know. Through darkening years, political winds continue to toss him between north and south in a plot that turns many times on the unspeakable breach—the lacuna—between truth and public presumption.
     With deeply compelling characters, a vivid sense of place, and a clear grasp of how history and public opinion can shape a life, Barbara Kingsolver has created an unforgettable portrait of the artist—and of art itself. The Lacuna is a rich and daring work of literature, establishing its author as one of the most provocative and important of her time.

My thoughts:

I was amazed by the amount of research it must have taken for Kingsolver to create this truly multi-layered work. Harrison Shepherd drew me into his story, told mostly through journal entries and letters. His mother, both despicable and human, raises Harrison without any sense of home, always striving for a new and better boyfriend/husband/meal ticket/companion. She never finds fullfillment in her own life but somehow through her twisted, topsy-turvy life Harrison is satisfied with the simple side of his life.

He finds solace in writing, keeping a journal of sorts, and allowing life to lead him to work. I so enjoyed meeting Diego Rivera, Frida Kahlo and Leon Trotsky within the first half of Harrison’s Mexico story. I had an inkling of Trotsky’s relationship to Kahlo and Rivera but this book made me want to know more. I want to go back and watch the 2002 movie, Frida starring Salma Hayek and I’m interested in Trotsky’s ideas. I wonder if there is other historical fiction that includes Leon Trotsky’s early life in Russia.

The second half of the book takes place in Asheville where Violet Brown picks up Harrison’s thread as she works as his Girl Friday. Her character brings a new form of friendship to Harrison’s life as she takes care of him like a mother or a sister would, appreciating all of Harrison’s quirkiness. I loved the depth of this book and enjoyed discussing varying elements with my husband. If you haven’t given this book a try please do…it has, for me, put Kingsolver’s work on another literary level.

Check out Barbara Kingsolver’s website
Find it at an IndieBound bookstore near you…The Lacuna

Other bits about The Lacuna:

The Blue Bookcase
Molly’s Cafe Books
decemberthirty
and Amy at Totally Uninspired

Tag: Barbara Kingsolver

Weekend Cooking; Food for Thought

The Lacuna by Barbara Kingsolver