Entrevista

Debido a que no pude realizar las entrevistas que deseaba, tome la decisión de hacer una recopilación de preguntas interesantes a personajes que me hubiera gustado entrevistar.
La recopilación es de 3 entrevistados, el primero es de Joan Roca, uno de los dueños del actualmente mejor restaurante del mundo llamado El Celler de Can Roca. El segundo es Jamie Oliver, un chef y activista que ha trabajado mucho para cambiar la forma en que se educa y alimenta a los niños. Y por último un escritor ganador del premio Pulitzer con su libro llamado "Salt sugar fat: how the food giants hooked us", Michael Moss.


Joan Roca

Hablando de productos y productores, una curiosidad de régimen interno: ¿cómo se hace para lograr mantener a diario un suministro de materias primas de un nivel tan alto y constante? (Enrique R. Velasco, 2012)
Teniendo contactos muy directos. Hoy en día una de las preocupaciones más importantes de los chefs es encontrar productos de primer nivel, aparte de la creatividad y otras cosas que obviamente también influyen, pero encontrar productos empieza a ser una obsesión. 
¿Y qué hacemos? pues intentamos establecer contactos con pequeños productores, con gente que produce lo que queremos o que está dispuesta a producir lo que queremos y nosotros dispuestos a pagarles lo que vale. Esa es la clave para poder tener un producto excepcional, que es lo que buscamos todos: la única forma es establecer este tipo de sinergias y de contactos que permitan tener proximidad con el producto.

Su filosofía en la cocina (Liliana Martínez, 2013)

“La filosofía se fue construyendo a partir de la relación con mis hermanos, siempre hablo en plural, porque se hace a tres bandas. Somos tres vértices: cocina salada, cocina dulce y mundo del vino, que tiene como unidad principal nuestro restaurante, enmarcado en un territorio. Así, partimos de la cocina tradicional catalana y queremos que se proyecte. Partimos también de diálogos que establecemos con los agricultores, buscando el mejor producto posible, buscando aplicación y técnicas. Buscando conservar todo esto no es nuestra idea abrir nuevos restaurantes. Otros colegas lo hacen. Pero en nuestro caso no es el objetivo. Nuestro objetivo es cocinar aquí, vivir aquí, estar aquí y disfrutar de este trabajo como lo hemos hecho hasta ahora, disfrutar de este momento mágico. Y nos gustaría que se alargara tanto como fuera posible, sin la pretensión de abrir restaurantes”.

Jamie Oliver

What is Food Revolution Day and what drove you to start it? (BYC, 2012)

Food Revolution Day is really an opportunity for people all over the world to show that they care about real food and the importance of food education for our children. Everyone knows that we have huge food-related problems in many countries across the world and that the result of this is a significant rise in obesity and diet-related diseases. Governments don't seem to have the answers, so we need a bit of people power to start making a change, and I'm hoping that food revolution day will be the start of this movement.

In an ideal world, what would Food Revolution Day achieve? (BYC, 2012)

In an ideal world we wouldn't have Food Revolution Day because we wouldn't need to, but where food's concerned we've been making the wrong choices for so long, that we need to find a way to get ourselves back on track.  I'm really hoping that Food Revolution Day will focus as many people as possible on the problems we face, as well as the potential solutions and steps we can take to get things moving in the right direction. It's important that these changes happen on a personal, as well as governme

Why is it important to you to get food education back on the primary school curriculum? (BYC, 2012)

I'd like to see food education become compulsory at primary and secondary level. It's all very well learning history and maths - and these are important lessons that absolutely should be taught - but in my eyes basic life-skills such as cooking are equally as important. The critics always say that this is something that parents should teach, but many parents these days haven't learnt to cook, so how are they going to be able to teach it?  We've got a huge obesity problem in this country and we need to tackle it urgently. I'd like to get to a point where every child leaves school at 16 with the ability to feed themselves properly, and to understand which foods are everyday and which are treats.

Michael Moss

It’s pretty widely known that sugary cereals and Cheese Whiz are not good for you. What surprised you? (Alexandra Sifferlin, 2013)

One of the things that really surprised me was how concerted and targeted the effort is by food companies to hit the magical formulation. Take sugar for example. The optimum amount of sugar in a product became known as the “bliss point.” Food inventors and scientists spend a huge amount of time formulating the perfect amount of sugar that will send us over the moon, and send products flying off the shelves. It is the process they’ve engineered that struck me as really stunning.

When it came to fat, it was the amazing role of what the industry calls the “mouth feel.” That’s the warm, gooey taste of cheese, or the bite into a crisp fried chicken that you get. It rushes right to the same pleasure centers of the brain that sugar does, but fat is carrying twice as many calories, so it is more problematic from an obesity standpoint. There is almost no limit to the bliss point in fat. If there is one, it’s up in heavy cream some place. So the companies discovered they could add as much fat as they wanted to products, and unless people looked closely at the nutrition facts, they are going to totally love it more than they would without the fat.

When it comes to salt, what was really staggering to me is that the industry itself is totally hooked on salt. It is this miracle ingredient that solves all of their problems. There is the flavor burst to the salt itself, but it also serves as a preservative so foods can stay on the shelves for months. It also masks a lot of the off-notes in flavors that are inherent to processed foods.

Do you have any advice for people going into the grocery store who want to eat healthier? (Alexandra Sifferlin, 2013)

Make a list and stick to it. Some of the plotting done by grocery stores and food manufacturers is to get you into situations where you are making spontaneous decisions. That’s when the soda and the sugary foods around the check-counter get sold most heavily. Spend more time on the ends of the supermarket near the fresh vegetable and fresh fruit aisle, and look for things that are affordable. When you get into the center aisle, be careful in the middle part because that’s the highest selling area, and where they put the most heavily laden salt and sugary products. Also, look first at the front of the packaging. That’s where they hit you with things like “low fat” and “low sugar” and “added calcium” and vitamin this and vitamin that. Take those as warning signs. When they say low fat, it’s often loaded with sugar to make up for the reduction in fat. Or likewise, low salt is often loaded with sugar and fat to make up for the low salt. When they splash the phrase, “added calcium” on the front, that’s often a signal that the thing is loaded in all three of the pillars.

Lastly, spend some time with the nutrition facts box. It has to be on every package now. It can be really revealing as to what exactly is in the package. Pay attention to the number of servings per container, because the companies know that people will typically eat a package of cookies that has three servings in it, all at once. You have to do the math yourself, because they will list the nutrient content based on one serving, which will dramatically understate the amount of nutrient load you’re getting by eating the package.

Very few of us can avoid processed foods all together. Our lives will not allow it. I’m certainly in that category. But ultimately we are the ones who decide what to buy, what to eat and how much to eat, and that’s a very powerful thing when we walk into the grocery store. I hope the book can help people to understand everything the food giants are throwing at you in terms of formulating, marketing and advertising. I think you come away feeling more empowered to take control of that decision-making process yourself.


Referencias

El diario de gastronomía. 2012. Juan Roca "Los cocineros tenemos muy fácil perder la cabeza". Recuperado el 12 de febrero de 2014 de: http://diariodegastronomia.com/entrevistas/11272-joan-roca-qlos-cocineros-tenemos-muy-facil-perder-la-cabezaq.html

Vive.in. 2013. El chef que le pone la sal al mejor restaurante del mundo. Recuperado el 12 de febrero de 2014 de: http://bogota.vive.in/restaurantes/bogota/articulos_restaurantes/mayo2013/ARTICULO-WEB-NOTA_INTERIOR_VIVEIN-12778745.html

BYC. 2012. Food revolution day: exclusive interview with Jamie Oliver!. Recuperado el 12 de febrero de 2014 de: http://www.byc.org.uk/news/food-revolution-day-exclusive-interview-with-jamie-oliver!.aspx#.Uv1rqkJdV6M

Time, health and family. 2013. Salt Sugar Fat: Q&A with author Michael Moss. Recuperado el 12 de febrero de 2014 de: http://healthland.time.com/2013/02/26/salt-sugar-fat-qa-with-author-michael-moss/