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Food is something we required every day. More and more food comes together by people sharing the food. It makes people can have food with different styles or even from different nations. I only feel like enjoy Chinese food and this feeling becomes stronger after I came to the United States. As an international student, I don’t always have time to enjoy the food from my hometown, due to the schedule; I have to finish my meal in several minutes sometimes so I must eat fast food to make me full with energy. In my mind, I think most of the Chinese students who lives in the United States will agree with me because I could see Chinese students in every Chinese restaurant I went. Some of them just move out of campus because of the food in the dining hall and eating in Chinese restaurants or cook themselves instead.

I love Chinese food and usually eat a lot in Chinese restaurants compared with eating in the dining hall. First of all, Chinese food is delicious and always has a lot of oil with the dishes. This can make the food smells good and attract my attention of taste. The liquid oil in the food makes my throat get a smooth feeling while eating. It satisfies me a lot. For American food, these is oil inside the fast food, for example, fast food, there is oil with them like French fires and the meat in the burgers. However, the oil in this kind of food is not liquid even when the food is hot. This kind of food like burgers always have pieces of bread covering so it is usually dry and needs drinks to eat with or the throat will feel uncomfortable. Secondary, we have cooked vegetables in Chinese food. There vegetables are always hot with oil and fabulous taste. Also in Chinese food, there are not only broccolis and lettuce but also a lot of other vegetables that most of the Americans have never seen before. After some complicated steps of cooking, they are all delicious but tastes different. The most famous one is green vegetable, which is the most common vegetable that Chinese people eat. I hate eating vegetables when I was young. At that time, I just eat little food but spend all the meal time watching Television instead. Now, especially coming into the United States, I finally realize how good the Chinese cooking vegetables are and I only can get green vegetables in some Chinese restaurants. In American food, most vegetables are in salad which is uncooked and mixed with many kinds of fruits, other foods and some sauce. I found some of them are really sour or sweet and makes me uncomfortable to eat them all. Absolutely, most of the American vegetables are cold just like salad, because of being uncooked.

       Not only the taste of Chinese food is good but also the nutrition of it is beneficial for our bodies. I always find many kinds of food in a dish while eating Chinese food like meat, vegetables and potatoes. (about health and still need Research to support)

       However, Chinese food is expensive here and always complicated. This means that I can’t eat Chinese food for all the meals. Due to the schedule, sometimes I have to finish my meal in 5 minutes because of the short 10 minutes break: I also have to go to another classroom. In this case, I often choose fast food to make myself full and sometimes eat nothing but drink some soda instead. Fast food is efficient enough to be finished in several minutes. Even sometimes you can’t finish it in time; maybe you can have a choice to take the food with you and go, eating while on the road or having a class. Fast food like burgers, French fires and pizzas are mostly prepared so people do not have to wait for these foods. They can hold the food with their hands and just eat without the requirement of other tools like chopsticks while eating Chinese food. It saves a lot of time. ( then go back to chinese food…..)

       In my opinion, a meal is something you should enjoy and make yourself satisfied, not just eat and go; so I always go for my favorite tastes and feelings while choosing food.

Post 9

In the article “Unhappy meals” which is written by Michael Pollan, the author pointed out people have unhealthy eating habits in recent society. He gave us a clear view of what factors or causes may affect people’s health about eating. Pollan has some suggestion for people to change into a healthy habit of eating. In his mind, follow the habits of the old is a good way of eating healthy. People should buy and eat the food which exists for a long time rather than the new things because the society is changing too fast and the people are not healthier than they were in the past. Also, don’t eat too full; otherwise, the stomach will have a hard job of digesting the food. I really agree with this point because there is an only saying in Chinese to ask people to have good breakfast, full lunch but little dinner. The last is people should eat more and more kind of food just like several dish in a meal. For example, have meat, vegetables and fruit. This is a good way of keep the balance of nutrition and also this can help you to have several tastes.

In Dupuis’s article, “Angels and Vegetables”, it shows the idea of the spirit: he thinks that people should eat following their hearts but not always listen to some scientific reports or some sayings. This means people always change their eating habits by the newest saying or reports, so they lose the real thing in eating: the taste, the feeling by their hearts. When I need to choose the food, I just go to what I want and what I like. I sometimes may listen to some healthy reasons but usually just go with my feeling.

Works Cited

Michael Pollan.  "Unhappy Meals. " New York Times Magazine  28 Jan. 2007:  ProQuest Newsstand, ProQuest. Web.  19 May. 2012.

Melanie Du Puis, E.. "Angels and Vegetables: A Brief History of Food Advice in America. " Gastronomica  7.3 (2007): 34-44. Research Library, ProQuest. Web.  19 May. 2012.

Thoughts on Eating Practices

Now I spend a lot of meals on french files and chicken sandwiches. As the points in my short essay 5, french fries are harmful which can make me fat and even cause some disease like cancer. It is horrible. Chicken sandwiches which is a kind of junk food just like the views in the movie last Friday. Now, I pay a lot of attentions to the health and diet while eating. I am interesting about changing the drinks of meals. I drink a lot of soda which I think is not healthy at all. To change my eating practice, I may try drinking some more mike or tea while having meals. This kind of drinks are more beneficial for my body or have some more nutrition I think.

response to SE5

Zechi's blog is about skipping breakfast which is a common thing in our student life. Also, Yuan also pointed out the same thing. Because of the schedule, many students work hard in the night and just keep sleeping until in the afternoon. Sometimes, it's depends on how you define the breakfast just like waking up at 12 and it is the first meal in the day but it is also the lunch time.Ran talked about eating disorder, especially the international students. Compared to the american students, they have more stress and always eat when feeling hungry. Deng's essay is about vegetarian and diets. He pointed out some important elements and talked something about its benefits.

French fires: popular tasty potatoes but dangerous

French fries are concerned as one of the most common staple food in western countries. In my daily life, I can see French fires everywhere: in the supermarket, the dining hall and the restaurants, and I find they are popular because almost everyone just eating them every day. As to be the fired potatoes, French fries are always tastier than the common cooking potatoes and people all like them. They can make people full because they are made of potatoes.

       French fires become a symbol of the junk food that people always eats. In the food journal, it is easy to find that almost everyone eat French fries in that three days even some of the students have them almost every meal. Our dining hall in the Centennial Hall keeps providing French fries every day and every meal. French fries are sold so well and I find the chief just keep frying them and baking some meat to provide enough food for students. “More than a quarter of all potatoes sold in the US are turned into fries.” This means in the United States, French fries has a huge market requirement so people make and provide so many French fires. In a survey, people find more than 90 per cent of the consumers at Burger King have the same characteristic: they order French fries. I eat a lot of food which is American style after coming to the United States and I find I am getting fatter than I was in China. Moreover, on the roads, there are a lot of American guys walking or driving with big stomachs so that French fries can make people overweight. “For dieters, French fries have long been a forbidden thing.” This shows how much power that French fries can make people become fat. Furthermore, fat will always lead some other health problems or even illnesses. “Heavy consumption of French fries has been linked to an epidemic of obesity, increased blood cholesterol, and consequent coronary heart disease and atherosclerosis.” Being overweight is totally not good for health because of increasing blood cholesterol, heart disease and atherosclerosis. These horrible disease can be well prevented and decreased if people take care of their diet.

       In late 2005, there was a survey about French fries. “Harvard, and Brigham Young University evaluated nurses who had consumed French fries at least once weekly during early childhood.” As the result, twenty seven per cent of these children were likely to have breast cancer as adults. This means French fires will lead the increasing of the risk of getting a cancer. “French fries have high levels of acrylamide, reported to be a possible cancer-causing substance.” Some parts of the potatoes may make the acrylamide while frying in the oil in high temperature. This chemical is dangerous because it will lead people to have cancer. As I know, cancer is so dangerous and hopeless because almost nobody can save you if having this kind of disease. A lot of people who have cancer spend all the money they and their family have but just can have a few days to live in this world, only little people can survive if having a cancer. Even eating French fries just have a little probability of cancer and a lot of people just eating French fries everyday still don’t have cancers, but why stay always from this dangerous risk?

In conclusion, French fires are always harmful to our health just like making people fat, the diseases caused by overweight and also the risk of cancer. Some research said that children are the people who will be affected by the cancer-causing substance easiest. However, they always enjoy French fires because they just want to eat tasty food. It is a hard work to prevent children from having cancers and maybe adults should eating less French fires and teach the children the different between healthy food and unhealthy food. People can also try some other ways of cooking potatoes or changed the original menu of the fast food so that they can have both the convenience and the health.

Response to food journals

Many students like drinking soda, and tea but also some milk and coffee. Some of them eat a lot of French files and males prefer meat meals. A glass of water is beneficial after waking up so some people always do it. Time of meals is always depending to their schedule. They often eat a simple meal for breakfast or even lunch but have a better and magnificent meal like Chinese food for dinner.

Food Journal

On Thursday, May 10^th, I woke up at 11.50 am and I had a class from 12 to 3 so I didn't eating anything but drink a cup of water after waking up. In the afternoon about 5 pm, I went to Jason’s Thai with my friends and ate the mutton pot, spicy chicken and pork ribs with a glass of Thai tea.  At night about 10 pm I went to the shop and got a Pepsi and an ice tea.

On Friday, May 11^th, I woke up at 11.20 am and went to the dining hall for lunch. I ate a chicken sandwich and some French files with a glass of apple juice. After the class on Friday, I went back to my room and made myself a cup of green tea about 3 pm. At 6 pm on Friday, I went to the dining hall and get a chicken sandwich, a piece of pizza and some broccoli with a glass of Sprite as my drink. At night at about 11 pm, I went to the vending machine and bought a Pepsi because the shop was closed.

On Saturday, May 12^th, I made myself a cup of coffee at 3 am and then drank some water at 5 am before I went to bed. I woke up very late at 7 pm so that I just ordered some food from the East Asia Garden for braised chicken and some chili and sour potato as the dishes. And also I ate some rice at the same time. Later on, at about 10 pm, I went downstairs and bought a bottle of Crush which is the orange favor.

Sheep and mutton: most ancient provider with culture in different nations

Sheep and mutton: most ancient provider with culture in different nations

Food is something that people need every day but now people only can see the food not the ingredient. American people pay a lot of attentions to the energy and the convenience to the food but I pay more attentions to the taste. Sometimes, I chose to go to Jason’s Thai, the nearest Chinese restaurant which is almost located beside the DU campus so my friends and I often go or order something for meals. There is also some American food or Japanese food like Sushi, but we just go for the traditional Chinese food there. One of my favorite dishes is the mutton pot. There is delicious Chinese vermicelli inside and also the mutton in small pieces. A mutton pot with some rice can always make me satisfied after the work whole day but it reminds me of my hometown as well.

As we know, mutton is the meat come from the sheep. It is one of the most common meats in people’s daily lives. Mostly, this meat is from the sheep older that one year but nowadays over two years. The sheep are its most ancient provider of meat to human beings. In the United States, most sheep are eaten as lamb which means the small sheep which are younger than one year old. “In the United States, most lamb is grain fed, which gives it a milder flavor.” Because the requirement of the meat market is really large today and the wild lambs cannot satisfy people’s requirement: if hunting too much wild animals, it will lead the species to become extinguished which may destroy the balance of species and food chain. We don’t want any species go die out so the price of wild animals is getting higher and most people eat the grain-fed animals just like the sheep. There lambs are always between 70 and 100 pounds. “Mutton, the meat of mature sheep, is more popular in Britain and Europe than in the United States.”  I found that mutton is also popular in China and there are several kinds of famous mutton soup and mutton shashlik in China. Just like the one in my hometown, Suzhou. There is a small town called Cangshu which is famous for the mutton. We have mutton festival in that town in winter and attract a lot of people’s attention and taste.

About 11,000 years ago or even earlier, the sheep were tamed by the nomadic people in the Middle East and Asia people. As people in different parts of the world got to know each other, people bring sheep to the countries all over the world, just like moving to the Europe and then were brought to the American. Sheep also appeared in the early European religious and mythological writing and history. “In Ancient Egypt, the ram was the symbol of several gods. In Greek mythology Jason pursued the Golden Fleece. The Abraham of the Bible and Torah sacrificed a ram instead of his son.” This is like an evidence of the culture and history of sheep in Europe which is relative to the religious and mythological and can stand for the special meaning in people in mind in the ancient years. This is a symbol of the early understanding and relationship of human beings and sheep. Furthermore, there is also some culture in early history in China. People know that they are twelve animals in Chinese culture means the Chinese zodiac. Moreover, there were some ancient Chinese bronze ware are designed with the shape of Sheep’s head before more than 3,000 years ago. These examples can both mean the sheep has significant meanings and influences to the Chinese people.

The sheep and lambs production is all over the United States and seasonal. “This is mostly due to the fact that lambs exhibit seasonal estrus, meaning that most breeds only breed during one time of the year, which is usually in the fall during the long days.” The older sheep can breed in the fall so they are only a period of time that comes up a lot of sheep babies. However, this characteristic will lead to be only one kind of sheep in a year. As to get a good breed of sheep, they need to select the good breed from a several kinds and take some experiment to get the advantages or disadvantages to get the best one which can produce the most meat with high efficiency. Usually, sheep are in the farmlands and have the machine with technology to produce meat in a long process, they have long steps and every machine has its own job like cutting the wools and bleeding.

Mutton is very healthy and has a lot of nutrition which can help people feel warm in the cold days. It is beneficial to people’s Spleen and kidney and can help the lying-in woman. However, there is a strange smell and state of the mutton which stops a lot of people from eating or even trying then. Overall, mutton is a good source of meat eater which is better and healthier than pork and beef I think, especially in the winter days.

P7:Response to Pollan’s “An Animal’s Place,” the introduction to Estabrook’s Tomatoland, and the infographic by Cook.

In the three articles this time, all of them are about the food resources and materials. In "An Animal's Place", which is written by Michael Pollan, the author pointed out the relationship between human beings and animals. As people eating a lot of meat every day, they hunt animal for food. Even if some vegetarians stop eating meat from animals there are still a large number of meat requirements every day. However, animals are easy to die in the wild world, people can provide them a better place to live and feed them food. Animals also provide productions for people and it helps both of people and animal. And it seems no too bad. The second article, introduction of “On the Tomato Trail”, is about the conditions and environment of food just like tomatoes. The author shows the difference on the taste and appearance between the tomatoes in different years. Moreover, the tomatoes in the same years which are grown in different places are also different in taste and appearance and all the characteristics of the tomatoes can show the environment of the place that grows the tomatoes. In the last article, “Fowl Trouble”, Cook talked about the harm and problems of the broiler chicken in recent society. The chicken is getting bigger than those in the past. The requirement of the market leads the production of chicken into a new one, which is dangerous for the workers in the process of production and checking. Some of the workers even became disabled because of the infection. I found the most noteworthy thing is the danger of the workers because that is the problem I have never thought about and I already known the other point just like the different environment of food leads the different characteristics and the new production of food due to the market requirement in some common senses, researches and news.

Response to "Our National Eating Disorder"

In the article “Our National Eating Disorder” which is written by Michael Pollan, the author pointed out the unhealthy diet and wrong eating habits in American people’s daily lives. These habits make their daily diet in a mess with disorder which means the people follow the wrong things that they should follow like the energy. The reason of having the disordered diet is that they listen to all kinds of reports and articles with believing these theories there. Every time there comes a new report or article; people may change and listen to it without their own thinking. As a big country without a long history, the United States do not have enough culture of food. Because all the food there is brought by the immigration, there are too many kinds of food for people to choice but none of the food is their own food. They listened to people in other places and follow the theories that they used in the past but obsolete now. Actually, a large number of food is not tasty at all and they don’t have high energy just like the vegetables. Because of the rule of convenience, a lot of Americans just hurry up to save time for their work and only pay attention to the food which can provide energy. The lack of other nutrition is serious and leads their bodies to get over weight. For me, I really pay attention to the taste of food and enjoy the food I like such as pork and chocolate. However, I still insist on eating some vegetables to keep my body healthy.