Great talk by Mark Bittman, NYTimes culinary journalist, on how we’re diligently marching off an agricultural cliff to certain planetary demise.

Bittman offers a humorous retrospective of American consumption, from the grain-obsessed 20th century to the carb-phobic, protein-gorging 21st, and how our food industry is effecting harm on the environment and our health. Parts of his rant are reassuring (it’s not your fault you still crave overly-processed macaroni and cheese; there was a war somewhere and Mom had to find work at the Twinkie plant downtown), and other parts less reassuring (so you enjoy that organic salmon? It was vacuum-packed in plastic, crated in styrofoam and flown up on a jumbo-jet from Chile). His data is thorough and his observations sobering.

The takeaway? Buy local. Buy seasonal. More produce. Less meat.

What’s Wrong With What We Eat
http://www.ted.com/talks/view/id/263