Wednesday, March 30, 2011

5 sources of research

1. Grabbing as much information from my great grandmother explaining how the food was raised and prepared. How its changed or not changed
2. The movie Food Ink. in which they discuss how they got their food which is different to how we get our food now in 2011. As well as how their meat, milk, and spices were different.
3. Using the internet where they have the different recipes of puerto rican food. websites such as
http://www.topuertorico.org/cocina/ 
4. fast food nation pg.193. where the meat comes from. how people got sick with eating this type of food because of the chemicals in them.
5. cookbook. Puerto Rican Cookery. recipes of different spanish foods.

Thursday, March 24, 2011

paper 1

Lydia Garcia
Eng 101: Composition 1
    Throughout history people have consistently invented new and creative technology to improve the way we eat. Despite many differences, people in 1911 and 2011 have many similarities. The method in which food is prepared, bought, and eaten has vastly changed, but the way people eat according to their social class has not.
    The difference in which food was prepared is that they used big steal pots and place them over a fire or would hang them on a chain over the fireplace. It was only the more of wealthiest of households that can afford to install and run an oven. Unlike now in 2011 we use gas stoves to cook all of our food. On the other hand the way food was bought is different as well. They killed animals to get meat. In our time now we have supermarkets to buy our food from. Lastly is how our food was eaten that was a major difference. 100 years ago there was no seasoned food and everything was mostly eaten raw. It was definitely fresh meat but tasted very plain. People would migrate around bodies of water like rivers and lakes because water was a big necessity and was good to hunt around for food. They ate as a family all of the time there was no such thing as restaurants.
    There are similarities that have not changed. It’s the different types of social class from 1911 till now. There have always been the higher class families and the more lower class. There hasn’t been any change with that because the rich still ate lavishly and the poor had trouble seeking their food and had a more difficult way of living. In 1911 they still had what we have now to live and that goes for,  most importantly having water to drink, having meat to eat whether it was cooked differently or not they still had there ways of producing food that we still have today in 2011.  Farming and crops of fruits and vegetables are still the same but now we have large farms that produce for massive populations and is exported and imported from around the world while in 1911 their crops were grown individually.
    My ancestor Jesenia Cruz Fuentes from San Juan Puerto Rico was someone I didn’t know personally but heard much about and learned how her food was raised, bought, prepared, and eaten. I learned it hearing from my great grandmother who was raised in that era. It was very much different and similar from the way I eat today. My main meals eaten daily is macaroni and cheese, pizza, arroz con gandules ( Puerto Rican rice and pigeon peas), steak , white rice and eggs, pan con queso ( bread and cheese) etc. I personally always eat out at restaurants where the food is made or at home where my grandmother cooks for the family. One hundred years ago it was very family oriented. Food was always cooked at home and always eaten together at a table. They had no refrigeration so they would take the meat they killed and dig a whole in the ground to where it was cool enouph to keep it as fresh as possible. This is why people came out with a lot of diseases because of the dirt that they surrounded there food with. 
    In conclusion patterns of eating in Puerto Rico have not changed as much as you think. Although there lie many differences in the way they ate as opposed to the way we eat and prepare the food, similarities in social class still exist till this day. Even after one hundred years you can still see that the Puerto Rican culture of food has had a large impact on our nation and the diversity in which it consists of.

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

Food Inc.

          I grew up watching my grandfather slaughter chickens in Puerto Rico. He used to do it in a very certain way. He would take the white chicken by its legs and cut their throats. Of course my grandmother covered my eyes for that. I was a very young girl back then and I was very interested in what my grandfather was doing. He would take out its feathers first, then burn the chicken itself so it doesn't have any feathers left. Once the corpse was cleaned, he would call me over and show me different organs because he wanted to show me the internal anatomy of the chicken. He showed me the chicken's liver, then he showed me its stomach - and then he opened it up to show me what the chickens were eating - it was funny because all I saw was a greenish-yellowish paste with rocks in between. Then he took out the heart.

        I was amused by Food Inc. because of the way they have slaughtered the chickens. It looks like a torture not only for the animals, but also for the farmers. Usually, people in the United States of America do not care where their food comes from, but I strongly suggest for everyone to watch this movie. It shows the realities of agricultural hardships, what farmers have to upgrade from their usual traditions to what the companies implied them to do so. Throughout the movie, what has caught my attention the most, was a woman whose contract with a company was terminated because she did not want to change the setting of her "chicken house". Also the figurative numbers shown in the movie, what kind of debt the farmers have to go into to build such a house was anywhere from $300,000 - $500,000 where their yearly income was only $18,000.
       Now I am debating whether or not should I be a vegetarian. :)