Fast food is the ultimate American invention — cheap meals for people on the go. But we’ve paid a heavy price for our national addiction — an epidemic of obesity, the destruction of our fragile environment, and the loss of community ties that are maintained by taking the time to prepare and eat food together.

Despite these negatives, the need for quick affordable food is undeniable in today’s world. But why on earth are McDonalds and its competitors our only option? Every single time I get hungry on the road, in an airport, or at a shopping mall I wish someone would open a healthy fast food restaurant… and it turns out the wait is finally over. Amanda’s Feel Good Fresh Food restaurant opened it’s doors for business in Berkeley at the end of July 2008.

The restaurant happens to be located right downstairs from my office so I was among the first to check it out (read my review here.) I’m pleased to report that Amanda’s is pretty much exactly what I’d been wishing for–the food is healthy (they have the nutrition guidelines to prove it, too), tasty, and affordable (a cheeseburger made with naturally raised beef and organic cheese is $4.50, baked sweet potato fries are $1.50, and a freshly made agave-sweetened soda is $1.75.)

Amanda’s also goes out of its way to reduce its impact on the environment. For example, they won’t sell bottled water since it creates too much landfill waste and takes a lot of petroleum to transport. Everything served in the restaurant is also fully compostable so any “trash” left over at the end of your meal can be deposited in one of the restaurant’s green bins that feed directly into Berkeley’s city composting program where it will become rich soil for local farms and city landscaping projects in a matter of months. The restaurant also tries to foster a sense of community with a series of events in the restaurant and around the neighborhood. The future of fast food has never looked so green nor so healthy!

Amanda is often behind the counter in the restaurant, filling orders alongside her team (the handwritten “Amanda” on her wooden name tag was the only thing that tipped me off.) I was curious to know more about how she’d gone about making her idea a reality and what her plans were for the future of the restaurant so I introduced myself. She was kind enough to meet with me and answer my questions late last week.

How did you come up with the idea for Amanda’s? What prompted it?

I’d wanted to someday run a business that had a social and environmental mission ever since college when I was inspired by a book I read by Tom Chapel, the founder of Tom’s of Maine. So I always had that in the back of my mind. I went into technology when I graduated from college because that’s where there was great opportunity to learn business — I figured I needed to learn about business first and then I could figure out how to bring in the social mission.

I went back to business school because I wanted to focus on businesses with a social mission. Stanford has a really great social responsibility/public management program. At first, I actually thought I wanted to work at Trader Joe’s because I love their products – a lot of them are organic and natural and they’re affordable. They also treat their employees well – it’s just a cool culture. But when I learned more about it, I found that it wasn’t very entrepreneurial and after being in the technology industry, I realized I had grown used to that. So I thought I would intern for a smaller company whose products I was really excited about. I ended up interning for Niman Ranch which is a natural meats company that was located in Oakland. And that was the summer that the movie Supersize Me came out and I also read Eric Schlosser’s book, Fast Food Nation.

The summer I was at Niman Ranch, I did operations and marketing projects and got to do some ride-alongs on their delivery trucks. We came up to Berkeley and went to Chez Panisse and Whole Foods and some other really nice grocery stores and I realized that that quality of food was not reaching many people, and definitely not reaching the people Schlosser writes about in Fast Food Nation. So that’s when I started thinking about this need. Then I spent my second year of business school focusing on building a business plan for the restaurant, researching the market, and talking to everyone in the restaurant industry. When I graduated from business school, I decided to actually start implementing the plan.

Once you’d had the idea for the restaurant, what was the path to making it a reality?

I think almost everyone who saw the movie Supersize Me had the same idea – that was the clear reaction. But the restaurant industry is really challenging and a lot of people who had the same idea probably didn’t pursue it because it’s so tough – there’s a lot of competition and profit margins are slim — that’s what I found out after studying it more in business school. But I also knew that I had the passion to do it anyway.

There are just hundreds of people who’ve helped build this. The restaurant has my name on it but it’s definitely a community effort. In business school there were probably half a dozen classmates of mine and also people in other graduate programs helped put the business plan together. It was very well-researched which I think gave me confidence in it as well as giving a lot of other quality people the confidence to invest in the business both financially and with their time as advisers or as the consultants that helped design the menu and helped design the space.

Since I work right upstairs I walk past Amanda’s all the time and I also eat there often. It seems to be a melting pot of sorts. I see a pretty diverse mix of customers — Berkeley high students (who tend to frequent the non-healthy fast food joints in the neighborhood), UC students, local professionals, young parents, hippies, security guards, and other people who look like they’d be equally at home in the McDonalds up the street. Would you say that is an accurate description of your clientele? And is that what you expected?

It’s what I hoped! It’s interesting because we thought that women would be our core customer (and I think they still are though I haven’t spent enough time analyzing our customer base and actually counting customers) because women tend to care more about their health and make a lot of the restaurant decisions for their families and co-workers but it has been even more diverse than I expected. That’s one of the things I like about being in Berkeley–we’re not only bringing healthy food to people who already eat healthfully, there are also so many different people here that we can start actually making a change in the way some people are eating.

Have you considered listing where you source your different ingredients from on your menu or your web site?

It’s a balance, we try to talk about it on our web site but also not everyone wants to know. I’d rather source things locally (and it’s cheaper to do that!) but you can’t get organic tomatoes locally all year round or local organic apples so sometimes they have to come from New Zealand because we offer our apple fries all year long. It’s interesting — everyone is so enamored of Niman ranch. If you say you buy your beef from Niman Ranch, people automatically assume that it was raised up in Marin County but in reality their meats come from ranches all around the country. We source our meat with a local family-owned distributor that sources its meats similarly to the way Niman Ranch does. So if people ask, we tell them our beef is from the Midwest and raised all-naturally. The veggies are as local as we can get them – they’re sourced through a local produce company.

Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Well, one thing that I didn’t talk about is that everything we do, all the decisions we make in the restaurant are based on our goal of creating a healthy community. For example, when we’re deciding whether to buy local or to buy organic, that is what we use as our decision-making metric. This goal of a healthy community is something that we’re trying to foster with our own customers and with our employees – we got all our staff trial memberships to the YMCA and Funky Door Yoga to encourage them to exercise. And they’re really inspiring – most of them find more time to exercise than I do! Our team really makes us what we are – we’d be nowhere without them.

Photos: Eve Fox

In response to some of the worst economic times since the Great Depression, I’m excited to launch my “Grow. Cook. Grub.” series.  With unemployment climbing, diet-related illnesses increasing, and health care costs sky-rocketing, more and more people are looking to feed themselves healthfully, simply, and cheaply.  Using my family and community as an example, I will show readers how easy it is to cook health-promoting, delicious, and inexpensive meals year round using food from my home garden, CSA, and local farmer’s markets. Smoky Black-eyed Peas Yield: 8 to 10 servings Soundtrack:  “Money Jungle” by Duke Ellington With Charles Mingus & Max Roach from Money Jungle If you’ve read my first book, Grub, you already know that eating black-eyed peas and greens on New Year’s Day is a ritual among Southerners to help usher in a year of good luck and prosperity (bep = copper and greens = dollars).  I forgot to buy black eyed-peas before New Year’s Day, so I was in a bit of a panic trying to get my hands on some to cook up before the day ended (since most stores were closed).  I called a few friends to see if anyone had some that they could share with me, and my neighbor Luna had a bag of fresh black-eyed peas that she had bought from the Mandela’s Farmer’s Market in West Oakland.  Score. This is the recipe that I created with Luna’s fresh peas.  I made a larger serving so that I could give her half.  I had most of the staples on hand, and I got the fresh herbs from my front-yard planter boxes.  If using dried black-eyed peas reduce the amount of peas to 1 1/2 cup then sort, soak, drain, and rinse them before cooking.  Like most beans, this dish tastes much more flavorful after they have sat in the broth overnight. 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil 1 large onion, diced 4 cloves garlic, minced 3 cups fresh black-eyed peas 1 (3-inch) piece kombu 2 large dried chipotle chilies Simple Stock (see recipe below) 1 1/2 teaspoon coarse sea salt 1/2 teaspoon fresh thyme White pepper • In a skillet over low heat, warm the oil.  Add the onion and sauté until the onions start to caramelize, about 10 minutes. • Stir in the garlic and sauté for 2 minutes more. • Transfer the mixture to a medium saucepan.  Add the black-eyed peas, kombu, chiles, and enough Simple Stock to cover. • Over high heat, bring to a boil.  Quickly reduce the heat to medium and simmer, covered, until almost tender, about 1 hour and 15 minutes.  Add the salt and simmer for another 15 minutes, until tender.  Add the thyme and cook for 5 more minutes.  Remove kombu with a slotted spoon. • Season with white pepper to taste and serve hot with or without the gravy along with greens and cornbread. Simple Stock Yield:  about 1 1/2 quart Soundtrack: “Home” by The Modern Jazz Quartet from Blues At Carnegie Hall This stock is all-purpose and can be used whenever a vegetable stock is called for.  In addition to the suggested ingredients below, you can add the tough stems and trimmings from leafy greens and other vegetables. 2 large onions, quartered (include skin) 1 large carrot, thinly sliced 4 celery ribs, thinly sliced 8 ounces button mushrooms, thinly sliced (stems included) 1 whole garlic bulb, unpeeled, broken up, and smashed with the back of a knife 2 bay leaves 3 sprigs fresh thyme 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper 9 cups water • In a stockpot over medium-high heat combine all the ingredients, bring to a boil, reduce heat to medium-low, and simmer, uncovered until the vegetables are meltingly tender, about 1 hour. • Strain the vegetables, pressing down on them to extract all their liquids.  Discard (and compost) the cooked vegetables.

We all want to do the right thing. We want to buy organic exclusively. We’d love to buy grass-fed beef regularly. And we’d like nothing more than to eat wild seafood all the time.

But I know I’m not alone when I do a double-take at the seafood counter. I blink when I see wild shrimp selling for $15.99 a pound versus farm-raised for $5.99 pound. I gulp when I stop at a farmers’ market to find grass-fed rib-eyes priced at least three times higher than conventionally-raised ones.

What’s a budget-conscious, environmentally-concerned consumer to do, other than bolt to the dried pasta aisle and call it a day?

The answer is surprisingly simple, according to champions of sustainability:
Eat what’s best for you, but eat less of it.

With one third of all adult Americans now obese, that’s not such a bad lifestyle change to make. You might think twice about buying grass-fed ground beef at $9 a pound. But half a pound of it at $4.50 is doable for most budgets. After all, there’s no real reason each of us has to gorge ourselves on 6 ounces of beef at dinner. Try 3 ounces instead. Same with wild seafood. There’s no requirement that we must have a dozen shrimp in a serving of paella, when six shrimp is more than generous.

It’s easier than you think to get by with smaller servings of wild seafood, grass-fed beef because they generally have more flavor and plenty of protein, and are thus more satisfying. Put simply, it doesn’t take as much to feel satiated.

Round out meals with more whole grains and produce, which health experts always scold us to consuming too little of anyway.

How else can you better allocate your shrinking budget when organic items, on average, cost 50 to 70 percent more than conventional ones? The consumer guide, the Daily Green, has compiled a handy list of the top 12 foods to buy organic whenever possible, based on considerations of pesticides, chemicals, additives, and hormones. Its top picks for organic are:

1. Beef
2. Milk
3. Coffee
4. Peaches
5. Apples
6. Sweet bell peppers
7. Celery
8. Strawberries
9. Lettuces
10. Grapes
11. Potatoes
12. Tomatoes

When gas prices skyrocket, you don’t stop filling up. You just drive less. When the price of movie tickets soars, you don’t stop patronizing your local multiplex. You just become choosier about which movies to see. Organic and sustainable foods may carry higher price tags, but you can afford to enjoy them in some form or quantity. Given today’s health and environmental concerns, you can’t afford not to.

Photo by framboise

Have you been to the grocery store lately? Of course you have. Have you gone into shock at the prices yet? Of course you have. Even if you are like me and don’t spend a lot of time figuring out prices and food budgets, you have been caught off guard. It’s not just the price of that great filet, or wild salmon that has your head spinning. In fact, we expect those things to be higher. I pay just about $10 a pound for my favorite pastrami, and am happy to do it. But it is the staples that have me on pause.

According to the latest American Farm Bureau market basket survey of 16 basic groceries, the price was $45.03 in the first quarter, up 9% from the same period last year. They say that we are paying on average $2.69 for a five-pound bag of flour, 26% more than we paid last year. A gallon of milk has jumped 10 percent to $3.81. Cheddar cheese is now nearly $5 per pound. Wholesale egg prices have jumped nearly 60 percent. Pair this with the costs we pay for gas to get to work, or even to shop for food, the prices we pay for medical care and prescriptions, and the basics of keeping a roof over our heads and lights on, we are all feeling the squeeze.

The U.S. Department of Labor Statistics tells us to relax, because in fact, we are paying a smaller percentage of our income on food than we did in 1901 when groceries took nearly 43 percent. The last time it was measured, we hovered around 14 percent. But since I wasn’t buying groceries in 1901, I can only say that in 2008 the pinch is real and doesn’t promise to let up.

Why the high costs? I just assumed it was rising fuel costs to transport the food. But the experts in sustainable food systems are saying that there’s more to it. Fuel costs are certainly a factor, but so is the cost of feed—primarily corn. The government’s mandate for ethanol production (corn based) has driven the costs up. And then there is the question of food scarcity around the world. Scarcity leads to demand. And with the drop of the dollar in the U.S. it is more cost effective for other countries to get their food here.

So what does it all mean for us? A colleague of mine suggests that it means that we will all have to learn to live with less. I would say that there are so many people who are living with so much less that there is no give in the game for them. Soup kitchens and food pantries are feeling big shortages. Children are already going hungry right here in the U.S. because of poverty. In a country where there are many who have a lot, there is an arrogance that exists in simplifying the solution to doing with less. At least that’s the way it feels to me.

Food, and the ability to have fresh, fair and affordable food is a basic human right. Food insecurity for our young and for our elderly speaks to what comes in between. A community that does not have access to affordable, healthy food is also a place where there is poverty, low educational opportunities, vulnerable living situations, and huge health problems. As fresh food prices rise, it becomes more affordable to buy fast food or packaged and processed foods that bring with them obesity, diabetes and a number of diseases that lead to increased premature mortality rates. And here is the thing we must remember: it won’t be long until we all feel more than the pinch. If gas prices continue to rise, even those of us who see ourselves firmly planted in the middle class will feel the vice grip of food insecurity.

Solutions? Be aware. Push your policy makers on the state and national levels to take some steps. Look beyond your own kitchen to the needs of your community and your city, and become an advocate for food for all. Know what legislation, such as the Farm Bill or the upcoming Child Nutrition legislation that comes up in 2009, and make your wishes known. God old school—support your farmer’s markets, community gardens and your own little backyard crops.

Photos by newhousedesign, roadsidepictures, and jbcurio.