You Can Stop Cooking!

Image courtesy of womensvoicesforchange.org

Finally, the future is here and not only can you stop cooking, you can save hours a day in food preparation and all that cleanup too! Is this good news? You may or may not know that I rely heavily on the Colbert Report for my news, and recently his guest was Robert Rhinehart creator of Soylent your new food replacement. Soylent comes in a pouch, with its own special pitcher to mix it up. Each package is enough for your day, providing adequate nutrients and calories for any adult. It is inexpensive, and obviously a real time-saver. But is it for you?

Apparently the flavor is neutral, Colbert added a good amount of chocolate syrup to his, but all I could think of as I watched was why. There is tons of info available about Soylent, including a lengthy New Yorker piece.  For one  guy it was an overall positive experience, though he has gone back to solid food, as would almost anyone who enjoys food. There are plenty of people though for whom cooking and even eating are a chore. They go through the motions, they eat what they eat, and they get on with things that are more important or enjoyable.  But are people really so busy, so short of time, so driven that they would forgo eating, for a flavorless beverage meant only to provide nutrients?

Coincidentally I also saw part of the documentary Happy, this week, and in it they discussed a phenomenon in Japan called Karoshi, which is people literally working themselves to death, working seven days a week, 12-15 hours a day. It was the opposite of Happy! I will say that Rhinehart didn’t imply that work was the only reason to choose Soylent, perhaps you’d like more time to surf, the ocean or the net, or maybe you just really hate doing the dishes… It all feels really soul-less to me, and would it be a great sacrifice to give up food. Not in the way a strict diet limits what you eat, and often causes you to think and obsess even more about food than ever, but in the way you might lose one of your senses,or more pointedly, sacrifice one of your senses as a way to save time. How much do you really hate doing the dishes?

The remarkable thing about this product is its application for people starving, people in impoverished or drought stricken areas where the food supply isn’t adequate.  Of course they would need potable water, but this could make a huge difference.  A product like this could save lives, and give children a chance to grow and allow their brains to develop if the formula was tweaked for their nutritional needs. You could even add some flavor! I think that this might have been a good option for my mother towards the end of her life when she could barely eat anything, especially if it was chocolate flavored.

I have not tried Soylent, nor am I likely to, and though Rhinehart claims his health has greatly improved, and his skin conditions cleared up, and some of the accounts I read included people saying they felt more energetic and clear headed, and felt liberated by not having to think about food, but for all of them this was a temporary experiment. All of the accounts I read ended with people either giving up before they planned to, or making it to the end of the set time, and immediately rushing to their favorite pizza joint.

I think for me the notion of giving up food is saddening, and I do find the name of the product incredibly creepy. For those of you too young to remember, the movie Soylent Green, (based on the book Make Room! Make Room!) is about the now not very distant future—2022, when there is no more food left on the planet, and a new company engineers a food called Soylent Green, and as the tag line goes, Soylent Green is people.  Which leaves me wondering why Rhinehart would name his new food Soylent.

Though I am not a candidate for this type of product, I’m sure there are enough people who are to make Rhinehart a zillionaire. I hope this isn’t the future of food, I hope this isn’t what our children and grandchildren will be eating in the not too distant future. This product clearly has some great applications, and perhaps will be used for good and not for evil. For now, I return to my stove to cook something delicious!