Changing America’s food landscape

The season's finale of ABC's Food Revolution didn't end with the proverbial cliffhanger, but Jamie Oliver has created quite a hustle to bring his audience back next season.

Here you see a man who loves food as much as he loves to talk about food; but he doesn't quite talk the way other food celebrities on television do. Anthony Bourdain, Alton Brown, Robert Irvine, Andrew Zimmern , Rachel Ray, Ted Allen, Gordon Ramsay and many others all talk about pleasing the palate, the craft of cookery, the profession, or the adventures with food. But Oliver is quite unlike any other connoisseur. He is the food-pontiff on a mission to save America.

After attaining iconic status in the United Kingdom for reforming lunches in schools, Oliver travels to Huntington, W. Va., America’s “unhealthiest” city according to Centers for Disease Control. The show chronicles his mission to fix high school’s lunch program against the wishes of lunch bosses, vitriolic local radio show host, and fuzzy federal regulations.

Oliver wants a healthy America. He is not a proponent of no-meat diet or vegan-only food. His rants are mostly about the dangers of processed foods and the harmful effects of fast food on a person’s health. To encourage people, especially kids, to eat fresh vegetables and local produce, he wants to educate them first. The message that Huntington brings with its notoriety for being the fattest city is as disturbing as having one-third adult population in the country as obese and more than half considered overweight. The price? Direct or indirect annual spending of nearly $150 billion.

Have a look at America's expanding waistline

There is much to blame on America’s food culture and the ease of fast food. It’s not hard to predict whether a person will grab a quick burger or spend 15 minutes in the kitchen preparing a “healthy meal.” And it’s precisely this message that Oliver is emphasizing: Teach children to cook.

At the recent TED talk, he spoke about the importance of changing the "landscape of food around us" so that children of the future generation can live healthier and much longer lives. His focus on educating kids about good healthy food at school seems just right to set the tone toward future eating habits that could come either by integrating cooking classes in the school curriculum or learning to cook ten simple recipes before leaving high school. And he might just have achieved that in Huntington. At least, he won the bet (beer) and friendship of the local radio talk show host whose skepticism didn’t stop the community members to flock at Jamie’s Kitchen, and at the street in front, to toss pepper and spaghetti.

Food Revolution is a reality-TV-documentary that brings the right dose of message to address a killer issue. Oliver’s message is simple: If America does it, the rest of the world will follow. So?

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