Hi, my name is Maggan. Welcome to Maggan’s kitchen!
Plate ethics. What’s this? I was curious so I read the article by Anna Hellsten titled “Plate ethics” in the Daily News in the City issued on Thursday.
The awareness about the food we eat in restaurants has increased with the awareness on environmental issues, namely the greenhouse gas effect. The food culture is experiencing a wave of ethical and ecological trend. Eating with a conscience.
Going to restaurants these days can be problematic if we want to eat and keep a clear conscience. Shall we, as customers, continue to order what we think is tasty and forget about how the food source was raised and cared for? Is living on locally produced turnips the only way for Swedish consumers to eat with a clear conscience?
Plate ethics is as much a problem for Filipino consumers even if there is a good variety of local vegetables all year round (except when a strong typhoon blows through the country and wash the crops away). The problem is in the sourcing of organic produce and the farming methods. It is still very popular among local growers to use chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Locally organically grown vegetables and organic meat are hardly available in the market.
Plate ethics on the part of the restaurant owners mean serving foods sourced from animals and plants that were cared for with love and care before they are served on a plate. The restaurateur and chef with a conscience will only serve foods that are locally organically produced with love and care and that are in season. A produce calendar comes handy here. This calendar lists produce that are in season and provides the basis for creating the restaurant’s menu. For example, avoid mangoes that are forced to bloom and fruit more than once a year since these fruits have been generously sprayed with chemicals. Ensure that the bok choy leaves in the beef soup are organic (are imperfect and have holes or worm bites).
This brings back green revolution memories. In the neighbourhood where I grew up, there was a vacant lot that was being used as a bok choy (pak choy, pechay) patch. I often saw the grower spraying the growing bok choy to keep worms away. Worms love bok choy leaves. This was back in the 1970’s and went on until the early 1980’s. I don’t even want to think what happened to the grower.
Avoid shrimps and fish farmed where mangroves used to be. Flashback summer 1979. My family was invited to Infanta, Quezon. A friend of my parents’ friend had a fish farm in Infanta by the coast of the Pacific Ocean. We drove through the Sierra Madre rainforest. It was different. Wonderfully different. The place was like an open rice field. A brown field. The ground was divided into big squares. One day we went to the ocean by a short boat ride through a mangrove.
I thought that summer vacation was the grandest ever. It was unforgettable. But now I wonder if that fish farm still exists. I wonder how much of the mangrove was destroyed to build that fish farm. Can a piece of land that used to be filled with salt water be productive again?
Restaurateurs and chefs must be willing to use only the best produce as possible. Look for organic farmers who can supply and build a network with them. Let them know about the demand for organic produce and meat from animals raised organically with love and care. This can even encourage other growers to start using organic farming methods. Some restaurateurs and chefs in Sweden who work directly with farmer-suppliers attest that it feels rewarding to be part of something bigger than being restaurant owners. The restaurant guests and consumers become more than just guests. After all, food is an experience and a reward far beyond the ordinary.
The challenge for restaurant owners is finding an organic farmer and supplier. The challenge for consumers is the cost of eating with a conscience. We pay the price whether we take up the challenge or not. The greenhouse gas effect is not a passing trend. After all, plate ethics and eating with a conscience are about our planet’s survival.
