Book Review :: Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver
By Meghan Mast
Food literature often provides dark insight into what we eat. In her new non-fiction narrative, Barbara Kingsolver breaks this trend and shines a real, but hope-filled light on food. Instead of focusing on the harm of pesticide-plagued food, Kingsolver fills the pages with a beautiful re-dedication to the joy of eating good, fresh food. “Animal, Vegetable, Miracle” is sure to reawaken jaded palates through vivid descriptions of tantalizing foods.
Who would choose a cardboard-tasting microwave dinner after glancing over the scrumptious recipes featured throughout the book, such as the Sweet Potato Quesadillas or the Disappearing Zucchini Orzo?
For one year the Kingsolver-Hopp family made a pledge. Moving from dry Arizona to a little farm in lush Virginia, the family took on the full time job of gardening and raising agriculture with the goal of eating (mostly) only what they produced.
While most people want to distance themselves as much as possible from admitting that their boneless, skinless chicken breast used to be a walking, flapping bird, the Kingsolver-Hopp family fully confronts this fact. Not only do they raise their poultry from infantry, this family is key players in the conversion from pet to pot roast. Mystery meals are not an option, as they strive to eat food from their literal backyard. Juicy tomatoes that were featured in the family’s homemade pasta sauce had been born and raised within twenty feet of the kitchen table.
Each family member contributed to the compilation of this book. While Barbara writes the bulk of the novel, her husband Steven Hopp provides a research perspective and her eldest daughter Camille shares recipes and narrative essays. Her youngest daughter did not contribute through writing, but throughout the year faithfully cared for a herd of purple egg laying hens.
This book strips food down to its most basic level, serving as a reminder to what good and real food is. Somehow this has been lost through our culture’s mess of dieting drinks and TV dinners. Kingsolver raises a through provoking question through her family’s food venture; we are what we eat, so why not be sure we know what we’re eating?
