The American Chestnut was one of America's most common, valued, and beloved trees-a "perfect tree" that ruled the East coast forests from Maine to Georgia. He finds lost foods, examines local food traditions, makes his own pasta while visiting and learning from all types of people involved in the burgeoning local food movement of the time. What Nabhan explores is regional foods, local foraging and gathering traditions and the impact of their loss in our culture, and redefining food as we think of it now.
We want it – we can go to the grocery store and get it. With our global consumer culture we are able to get green peppers, bananas, blueberries and nearly anything else any time of the year.
With this experiment Nabhan explores what food can be. Documenting his effort to eat only foods “grown, finished, or gathered within 220 miles of his Arizona home.” The important message in this book is to think about what we consider food differently. Michael Pollan's masterful story-telling makes for an engrossing read from cover to cover, and I highly recommend this book to any gardener!ĭescribed as one of the first books in the local food movement, Gary Paul Nabhan writes about what many of us from the east coast may think of as impossible – growing vegetable in the desert. Several of his practices (like planting a Norway maple in his yard) are questionable, but this may be more a result of the time the book was written than his level of expertise. Pollan's opinions on gardening are enlightening, and frequently laugh-out-loud funny.
However, Pollan's writing is much more expansive than to only include his personal experiences he often seeks the advice of our great nature writers, gardeners, and landscape designers to arrive at his own ethical code for gardening. Hillarious, honest, sincere, and philosophical, this book is framed by the story of Michael Pollan's failures and triumphs in his own garden. If you have ever wondered about the ethics and history behind common gardening practices such as mowing a lawn, planting a tree, making compost, or whether we should tolerate weeds in our garden beds, Second Nature: A Gardener's Education is a fascinating read.
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