Sophie Egan on American Food Culture
Join Sophie Egan, author of Devoured: From Chicken Wings to Kale Smoothies—How What We Eat Defines Who We Are, for a discussion about the ways that our national character drives our food choices. In conversation with Berkeley School of Public Health (SPH) lecturer Jaspal Sandhu, Egan explores American food culture and habits, “diet” foods, holidays that revolve around food, and ways to help prevent chronic diseases through a healthier diet. Egan is a program director at the Culinary Institute of America and an SPH alumna; Sandhu teaches Eat.Think.Design, a graduate course on food and design thinking at UC Berkeley.
Devoured: A Journey into the American Food Psyche
Thursday October 27, 5–6:30pm (talk and Q & A); 6:30–7:30pm (book signing)
Toll Room, Alumni House
UC Berkeley
Book review by Kristina Sepetys
Devoured: from Chicken Wings to Kale Smoothies—
How What We Eat Defines Who We Are
by Sophie Egan
(William Morrow, 2016)
Sophie Egan is the director of programs and culinary nutrition for the Strategic Initiatives Group at The Culinary Institute of America. Based in San Francisco, Egan writes about food and health for various publications. Her new book examines how the values that define our national character shape our eating habits, good and bad, including examination of the extent to which we’re outsourcing our food preparation. The book is filled with facts and statistics about our eating habits, like the fact that the inventors of Soylent, the meal replacement drink, hoped to raise $100,000 through a month of crowdfunding. They got it in two hours. What does that say about our desire for easy, no effort eating? Devoured weaves together insights from the fields of psychology, anthropology, food science, and behavioral economics, as well as examples from daily life, to create a powerful and unique look at food in America.
