The coronavirus health crisis has interfered with almost every part of our daily human lives – including what we eat.
Almost a year after social distancing, many people enjoy foods long forgotten or once rejected for taste, sense or smell. Some have added healthy foods to their diets to strengthen the body’s natural defenses.
Home cooking is everywhere due to restrictions on restaurants and other grocery stores. People are increasingly exploring new food experiences in their kitchens.
The joy of pears
Maeri Ferguson is a 31-year-old woman living in Brooklyn, New York. She received COVID-19 last year and has recovered. But the disease has affected his sense of taste and smell for months. Many of her favorite foods no longer satisfied her.
Ferguson can feel the sweetness, saltiness and spiciness again, although many foods don’t seem to taste strong yet – but not pears. The fruit was not part of her pre-COVID diet.
“I knew what a bad, unripe pear tasted like, but not a good one,” she said. Thanks to a gift from a friend, she pushed herself to find a good example. It was one of the first foods he could really taste again.
“I’m a complete convert,” Ferguson said. “I’ll never forget to bite a juicy red pear.”
Fermented foods
Fruits are simple pleasures. But fermented foods have also become popular. Fermented foods last a long time in the refrigerator, which helps if you go shopping less often than before.
Anastasia Sharova, chef from Stuttgart, Germany, runs Happybellyfish.com. The company is an online cooking school that works on healthy foods. He added fermentation rates at the end of 2019. Then the coronavirus crisis hit.
Suddenly, the interest in making kimchi and sauerkraut, two kinds of fermented cabbage; and miso, the fermented soybean, suddenly grew. Previously, Kombucha, a fermented tea, helped popularize fermented foods at home.
“Health has become … number one for many last year,” Sharova said. She added that being at home led many to make discoveries about cooking. She said fermenting things is like a community activity done by families or at online classes.
Thirty-year-old Alicia Harper also discovered fermented foods. She’s a nutritionist in New York. At first he did not like the strong tastes and smells of fermented foods.
“Since I tried them again recently, my opinion has completely changed. Now I come to love the taste and the smell “, she said.
Anne Alderete from Los Angeles, California, now enjoys natto. Made from fermented soy, natto is popular in Japan, but considered too unusual by many people.
“I’ve smelled it many times since I was half Japanese and lived in Tokyo after college for seven years,” said the 47-year-old. But he never liked to eat natto before COVID-19.
“It simply came to our notice then virtuous when I eat natto because the health benefits are many, but also because they brought me closer to the roots “, said Alderete.
Concerns and comfortable food
Some experts believe that the changes in the way we eat come from the fact that we have more time to consider information about how the food comes to our meals.
Ryan Andrews is a dietitian who has written a book on herbal foods. Ryan is also an advisor for Precision Nutrition, which trains nutrition coaches. He said many people learn painful truths about the food system.
Andrews said: “People have learned about the unsafe working conditions in meat packing factories, about the unfair wages of agricultural workers.” He added that other issues include “diet-related” diseases, cruelty to farm animals and the cost of industrialized agriculture.
At the same time, research firm Semrush studied Google searches related to changing food interests during the COVID-19 crisis. Their findings suggest comfort food and some unusual combinations are still in people’s minds.
The company found a 17% increase in searches for “peanuts and coke” in December compared to December 2019. It found a 33% increase for “prosciutto and melon”. And he found a 95% jump in searches for “bacon and jam. ”
A service called WoodSpoon uses technology to connect people who cook at home with people who are willing to pay for a meal cooked at home. The company is headquartered in New York. Its head, Oren Saar, spoke to the Associated Press. He suggested that before the health crisis, there was a strong interest in healthy, less processed foods. Subsequently, orders for bread, pasta and fatty meat increased.
“Into the challenging moments like this, trades looking authentic, homemade food, ”said Saar.
I’m Mario Ritter Jr.
And I’m Ashley Thompson.
Leanne Italie reported this story to the Associated Press. Mario Ritter Jr. adapted it for VOA Learning English. Caty Weaver was the editor.
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Words in this story
comfort –N. a state or feeling of not being worried, upset, or unhappy, painless
fermented –Adj. a chemical change in food (and some industrial materials) that changes the nature of food and often keeps it
jam –N. a sweet, sticky food made with fruit and sugar
challenging –Adj. difficult
authentic –Adj. real, authentic
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