A Borderless Society

A Borderless Society

When we speak about food origins, what exactly do we mean? In this case, we are curious to know where the components of our food come from that make up our meals. If you think about it, many types of elements of food and additives have to be brought together in a delectable, well-orchestrated manner to provide us the meals that we have come to love. It is almost too easy to forget or to take for granted where fruits, vegetables, meats, and condiments all come from, which are all the building blocks of the meals, we eat. Something as simple as salt can literally cross oceans (thousands of miles) just to be a part of our regular servings of food. I will delve into the meal chosen by my professor to describe exactly what goes into the meal, as well as how it becomes available for my general consumption.

The meal that was chosen for my class was beef burgers (fresh) on a hamburger bun, homemade potato salad, canned baked beans, and a fresh fruit salad consisting of strawberries, grapes, and bananas. The beef that is used to make the burger are from Iowa born and raised beef cattle. I also chose to include bacon, as I love it on my burger. Bacon is obtained from pigs that are bred in farms. Bacon & Company is one of the leading brands that sell processed pork products such as bacon. The bacon used for my burger came from pigs that are bred in the country sides. The meat obtained from them is cured with large quantities of salt and is then packed under air pressure to give it a bacon-y smell. The bacon is then processed by getting placed into bags and sold out at shopping malls and general stores (Royer, 2010). The hamburger buns are from my local grocery store, Shoppers and are distributed by a company named Supervalu Inc., which is based in Eden Prairie, MN. The main ingredients in my homemade potato salad are potatoes, onions, celery, mayonnaise, and eggs. Potatoes are grown commercially in 36 of the 50 states, but the highest potato-producing state is Idaho. I like to use onion in many of the dishes I make so I use onions out of my own garden (as well as in the burger). The celery for the potato salad is available year-round and in the United States, California grows the most celery, so that is where that is from. The eggs are not generally processed to be converted into some other products. Eggs are obtained from poultry farms that obtain thousands of eggs from hens and sell them out for retail. Eggs are sometimes sold in boxes by other companies that ensure their reliability by double checking the contents within the egg shells. For example, the eggs being used for the potato salad have come from H. F. Corwin and Son Inc. that sell eggs in boxes by first obtaining them from poultry farms from within the New York area (www.uspoultry.com, 2013). The mayonnaise is from my local grocery store and was distributed by the same place as the buns, Supervalu in M.N. The baked beans are not homemade, they are from my local store as well; they were distributed by Bush Brothers & Company, from Knoxville, TN. The strawberries, grapes, and bananas all came from my local grocery store, Giant. The strawberries were from California, the grapes from Chile, and the bananas from Maine. The last and most surprising ingredient that I use on most of this meal is sugar. The sugar is for the potato salad, the baked beans, and the fruit. Sugar is obtained from sugar canes grown as crops. The sugar canes are cut and transported to sugar mills within the United States. The sugar mills are responsible for the production of sugar. The sugar canes are first rid of their plant structures and their skin is taken off. The sugar canes then enter a grinder that extracts the sucrose from the sugar canes. The liquid extract is then mixed with other ingredients, dried and shaped into small sugar cubes or a white sugary residue for household use. The sugar is then dried, packed and sent out to the market for its sale (www.scgc.org, 2003).

The aspect of purchasing food from national or international sources by a country for its utilization within the country has to be analyzed in several ways. The economic benefits of purchasing processed food from within the country are that the cost of transportation of that food item from across borders and seas is not applicable in this regard. The costs are reduced and less expenditure on food is done by each family within the United States. The food grown nationally is also not prone to the application of any custom taxes. The ecological benefits of having local resources for food is that as the food is not imported from international resources, less fuel is burnt for the transportation