I picked this, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life, up because I have totally loved other Barbara Kingsolver essays. This is fantastic book, addressing issues of how we eat, what we eat, where and how it grows...

Kingsolver seems to manage that fine line between having an opinion and being an evangelist who turns you off the very idea they'd like you to consider. I suppose that "consider" is the difference. She tells you what she thinks, how she arrived at the idea, she gives you a few other viewpoints, she makes you consider your own views. It's a fine line to walk and she does it wonderfully.

Of course, I'll readily admit that I already grow some of my own fruits and vegetables so probably lean towards her views a bit. But at the grocery store, I tend to lean towards the cheap cooking viewpoint. Organic stuff is expensive generally. Free range chickens? My gosh, they cost 4 times what I can get a chicken for. So how do I balance my desire to feed my family cheaply with good farm habits, etc.? It's a puzzlement. (Sorry, we just watched The King and I, again.)

My eldest just read Fast Food Nation so we've both been approaching this idea from different angles. I don't think I'm ready to make an ultimatum. And frankly we already grow a good percentage of fruits and vegetables or buy them at the local farmer's market, but the meat, that we all enjoy, is becoming a new focus.

Food for thought takes on a whole new meaning after you've read this.