I did not grow up thinking about what food really meant to me. There always seemed to be a plate ready for me to eat, and I would eat it. The thought never occurred to me that the meatballs my mom made took much longer than thirty minutes in the kitchen to appear onto our dinner table. Although I was always thankful for the food I was provided, I did not understand what I was thankful for or who I should be valuing. My mom instilled in me at a young age an appreciation for what I have, and food was a big part of that. There have been other influences in my life that finally brought me to my destined career path of food studies. Influences including my Aunt Tara, whom I lived with for most of my high school career, as well as my cousins that lived a glamourous life on a farm, and my biggest…show more content… This revelation led me to The Culinary Institute of America. My community of Olathe, Kansas did not talk about sustainability at the annual American Royal BBQ contest. Working in a community like this was enlightening to the ignorance of resources and my own ignorance. Attending the CIA was a starting point for the race against the doubtful. As portrayed in Shel Silverstein's "For the World's Record," there will always be those who are discouraged by the next big thing. Ordinarily, there will be people who discount the importance of food studies. In his book Food: The Key Concepts, Belasco provides a compelling look at how we make food choices, depicting a triangle made up of identity, convenience, and responsibility. Those who do not address this important topic are my motivators to learn as much as I can about the history of food and how it might repeat itself within our food choices. Unexpectedly, during my time at the CIA, I stopped looking at food as individual ingredients to make a dish, but as history and a way of communicating
