Chris Kimball's Book Reviews

The Light Eaters

by Zoë Schlanger

Attention, all vegetarians. Those carrots, eggplants and tomatoes that you have been eating may someday qualify as sentient beings. Cabbages release a death sound when injured (when dropped in boiling water, they produce an “electrical convulsion”). Sunflowers recognize their kin and grow better when planted together. Many plants produce their own pesticides (plants can “hear” caterpillars and emit pesticides as a result) or know how to attract insects that will eat those that are eating them. Pea plants send their roots toward flowing water rather than standing water—they know the difference. Playing tones to plants has positive effects—mustard plants are better able to fend off fungal infections, and rice has a better survival rate under dry conditions. Tomato plants emit a clicking sound when stressed by drought. Corn can recognize the type of caterpillar attacking them and send out a chemical gas to attract just the right type of wasp that will come and inject eggs into the caterpillars so the larvae eat the caterpillar from the inside out when hatched. Rye plants evolved to look more like wheat so they would not be weeded out when they grew in wheat fields. All gardeners know that touching plants encourages growth. Plant personhood is an old concept in many cultures—the Maya believed that the first people were made from corn—but eating vegetables without moral opprobrium may be a thing of the past.

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Omnivore

with René Redzepi

This is an Apple TV+ series hosted by René Redzepi and producer Matt Goulding, author of many first-class titles from Roads & Kingdoms (“Pasta, Pane, Vino,” for one). Over eight episodes, it tells the story, in the style of nature documentaries, of foods that have shaped cultures around the world. It worships at the altar of small-scale farming, while opening the curtains on how agribusiness produces, for example, corn on a scale so vast that corn syrup is in almost everything we eat and buy. Visually, this is a stunning series, right up there with David Attenborough, and as a record of indigenous growing methods, it is important stuff. Yet the gap between large-scale agriculture to feed the world and small family-­run businesses that grow and dry chilies, harvest salt, raise pigs and grow corn is one that is not open to colorful homilies. One cannot feed the world; the other may not be sustainable. I desperately hope that small-scale farming does not go the way of, say, the buggy whip. I would prefer to preserve the past in the present by serving it at my table rather than being preserved in a docuseries for future generations.