{"id":4745,"date":"2013-06-03T16:11:11","date_gmt":"2013-06-03T15:11:11","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/?p=4745"},"modified":"2013-06-03T16:29:17","modified_gmt":"2013-06-03T15:29:17","slug":"cooking-a-natural-history-of-transformation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/?p=4745","title":{"rendered":"Cooking: A Natural History of Transformation"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/michaelpollan.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-4753\" title=\"michaelpollan\" src=\"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/michaelpollan.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"580\" height=\"435\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/michaelpollan.jpg 580w, http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/05\/michaelpollan-300x225.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 580px) 100vw, 580px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Very pleasing to see reviews\/articles such as this appearing: evidence of the &#8216;trickle down effect&#8217; of discussions about the connection between Cooking and Consciousness starting to filter into mainstream media. Here, in the form of an interview\/review of Michael Pollan&#8217;s new book: <strong>Cooked: A Natural History of Transformation<\/strong>. I haven&#8217;t read the book, but it looks to be a continuation of a series of books he has written which broach issues around our relationship with food. In this case, a quite practical, hands-on exploration into traditional strands of cooking, exploring the transformative nature of the different techniques, whilst also hinting at the transformative nature of the effects of engaging with cooking: in terms of home, family, and community life. I was intrigued, yet not remotely surprised, at the dismissive tone of Observer critic Jay Rayner in his review of the book. He appears to confuse Pollan&#8217;s &#8216;pursuit of authenticity&#8217; as some search for an illusory &#8216;holy grail&#8217; of traditional, authentic recipes &#8211; rather than an advocation for a deeper engagement with the act and art of cooking as a channel to provide a more authentic connection with ourselves and others. Sure, this is my reading &#8211; having not even read the book &#8211; but this is the territory Pollan has been exploring for some time. Check out the full <a title=\"Michael Pollan article\" href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/lifeandstyle\/2013\/may\/25\/michael-pollan-family-meal-civilisation\" target=\"_blank\">Observer article<\/a> or have a look at\u00a0<a title=\"Jay Rayner review\" href=\"http:\/\/www.guardian.co.uk\/books\/2013\/may\/04\/cooked-transformation-michael-pollan-reviewhttp:\/\/\" target=\"_blank\">Jay Rayner&#8217;s review<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Very pleasing to see reviews\/articles such as this appearing: evidence of the &#8216;trickle down effect&#8217; of&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":4753,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[586,387,178,436],"class_list":["post-4745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-writings","tag-cooked-a-natural-history-of-transformation","tag-jay-rayner","tag-michael-pollan","tag-observer","comments-open","no-comments"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4745"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4745\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4755,"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4745\/revisions\/4755"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/4753"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.wholefoodkitchen.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}