Customer Reviews

The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved: Inside America's Underground Food Movements

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in a time when spinach could be deadly, and cloned animals might be ground into that next Big Sandwich,
there is an underground revolution happening, and it's happening all over the world. folks are making possibly-unnoticed-but-radical choices about food. they choose not to let corporations and government dictate what and how they must eat, because when food choices are taken out of the hands of the people, the people lose.
in this textbook for the revolution, Sandor Ellix Katz examines the intricately interwoven web that is our food supply. from water and land rights to bake sales, "free trade," and free food, he shows the damage done when big government (big brother) and big business make our food choices for us. the book uncovers a whole lot of the story that they would prefer we not know, and shows how tied together it all is ~ history, ecology, economy, ethics, civil rights, big vs. small, corporate vs. community, seed laws and plant prohibitions, down to even the most basic right of putting in your mouth something you feel like eating, and maybe sharing it with a friend. the picture seems mighty bleak. but that's where the revolution comes in; people everywhere continue to join around the table ~ the very basis of culture itself ~ not to let the powers-that-be separate them from their food supply. for survival, for nutrition, for connection, for charity, for protest ~ for pleasure (!), folks are keeping food traditions alive, or exploring them for the first time. they're holding onto age-old agricultural practices (like seed saving), and creating new solutions to food waste (like dumpster diving and road-kill salvage!). but Katz doesn't stop there; each section (as well as including extensive resources for further study and connection) extends a personable and encouraging, do-it-yourself helping hand to guide the reader to take steps to becoming a revolutionary herself. because choosing to be aware about food at all has become an act of rebellion.
The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved is concentrated, intelligent research as well as compelling, passionate storytelling. it is manifesto, cultural catalyst and cookbook, promising a place for each of us at the revolutionary table.
a fan of Katz as soon as i opened Wild Fermentation, i highly recommend this book. if you are interested in food politics at all, or even just love to eat good food, this is a must-read textbook and reference tool for our time.

"What is for supper?" is a short question with a long history of many answers. "Why is it for supper?" is more recently and less frequently asked. One long answer is The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved, a fresh evaluation of how the other half of America eats, that is, the other half of one-percent.

Sandor Ellix Katz, author also of Wild Fermentations, examines our food choices, challenging us as would a moral philosopher, and inspiring us as might a romantic poet. But unlike poetry and philosophy, his texts are thoroughly researched and extensively footnoted. Scholarly without being stuffy, he ponders the social, political, ethical and environmental consequences of the foods we choose to eat, of the foods we choose not to eat, and of even our very acts of choosing. Food for thought about food.

Each chapter offers a wholesome essay that can be read independently of the others. Though inexpensive for a book of nearly 400 pages, its binding is especially durable. If separated physically from the whole, the leaves of each chapter stay bound together. This reviewer speaks from experience, having extracted entire chapters in this manner to distribute among friends.

Such portability is an appealing feature precisely because the topics are so diverse that few readers could possibly find the entire book relevant to their lives. Chapters such as these: Seed saving as political statement. Seeking and drinking raw cow's milk as acts of civil disobedience. The corporate takeover of natural foods, and the USDA makeover of organic foods. Whole food as healer, and processed food as killer. Medicinal herbs, including marijuana, as not just alternatives to pharmaceuticals, but their very basis. Pure and free water as birthright, now imperiled by pollution and privatization. Gardening as a means of reclaiming Eden. Vegetarianism as an act of compassion in contrast to carnivorous cruelty.

Vegetarians will be especially sensitive to and maybe even appreciative of the author's discussion of vegetarianism. Katz, a lapsed vegetarian, weighs the significance of life as a vegetarian among omnivores. The reasons for his own vegetarian apostasy are especially edifying. The chapter "Vegetarian Ethics and Humane Meat" begins almost with a confession: "I love meat. The smell of it cooking can fill me with desire.... At the same time, everything I see, hear, or read about standard commercial factory farming and slaughtering fills me with disgust." Whether filled with desire or with disgust, the author writes with humility and clarity. And charity. He continues: "I hold great respect for the ideals that people seek to put into practice through vegetarianism."

Katz acknowledges that vegetarians will brand "humane meat" a contradiction of adjective with noun, yet he nobly and duly presents the gist of vegetarian ethics and effectively distills into a few pages what we'd expect from an entire book.

This emerging moral vocabulary is one whose etymologies can be attributed to vegetarian evangelists and animal liberationists. Their shouts of protest and their cries of lamentation have been heard. Many meat eaters grown uneasy with their own complicity now seek the lesser of several evils. Michael Pollan, the eloquent author of The Omnivore's Dilemma, too deserves credit for expanding this lexicon.

Pollan, however, is less forthright about his own omnivorism than is Katz. Instead, Pollan applies his considerable intelligence merely to rationalize and bolster his considerable decadence. For Pollan, meat's taste trumps its waste. Rather than renounce meat as a superfluity, he chooses to denounce its cruelty. So thanks to Pollan and to his readers whom he has rallied to the cause, many herds of open-pasture cows and many flocks of free-range hens are now being spared the horrors of the feedlot and the factory farm. But that is small comfort to the cows and the hens still prodded on their death march to the slaughterhouse.

Pollan hunted a feral pig to write about it. Katz slaughtered a farm-raised pig to eat it. For Katz, writing is an afterthought to eating, as when he describes in necessary detail the physical difficulties of slaughtering a pig or a chicken. And Katz's book, in contrast to Pollan's, is one of few about food in which narrative use of the first person is welcomed and warranted. This is because Katz's life experiences and his resulting perspectives both are so very unique.

For instance, Katz expresses disillusionment with the pharmaceutical industry, yet he admits to his dependence upon their pills and potions for treatment of his AIDS. He even chronicles the long struggle of his unsuccessful attempt to survive and function without those pills and potions. Such candor about being poz is rare, and a testament to the author's integrity. Let's hope that Katz copes well with AIDS, and that he lives a long and healthy life, long enough to complete his third book, and fourth and fifth and sixth.

- Mark Mathew Braunstein [[ the reviewer is the author of Sprout Garden and of Radical Vegetarianism ]]

The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved follows on the heels of Sandy's Wild Fermentation. True to form, Katz writes in a flowing conversational tone that allows the reader to engage with the text in a comforterable way. The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved follows stories from underground food activists world wide, including farmers and food producers. Did you know that it is illegal to sell raw milk across state lines, and in some states it is illegal to sell it at all? Sandy carefully examines the cultural and political ramifications of such regulations. The tone of the book is solution based; rather than simply ranting about everything that is wrong with our food system, he presents examples of what you can do to create change in the system, or ways to go around the system. As a professional chef, I found this book inspiring to read, and feel that it will motivate me to be a more conscious consumer of food and other products. I highly recommend it to any foodie, activist, or citizen of the U.S.

This book is magnificent. I love Katz's depth of knowledge, his openness in talking about his own experiences, his exuberance and enthusiasm, and his well-informed outrage at the actions of corporations and governments in disrupting the very basis of our lives.

He tells us how they now want to interrupt and insert themselves into the final life cycle domains that they had been excluded from - procreation and food growing. It's appalling and so opposite to what life and sustainability are all about. It's hard to imagine the leaders of these corporations being so short sighted and ultimately so destructive of their own well-being.

And I love the recipes in both his books - the joy he infuses into the process, his ability to impart a deeper understanding of it all, and especially how he makes room for casualness and playfulness in working with food.

We are fortunate in having Sandor sharing his wisdom with us.

Katz has a charming style of writing - frank, yet humble and highly readable. His book "The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved" is a well-documented compilation of the issues we face with regard to our food, and an account of those individuals and groups who are making positive steps toward curbing an erosion of culture and nutrition. If you only read one book about food and activism, this should be the one - I wish I could afford to give a copy to everyone I know.

Along with "Wild Fermentation" Katz's books are both inspiring non-manifestos, and practical guides to revolutionary living. Katz has quickly become one of my favorite authors and persons.

I loved reading this book and feeling like a radical because of my food choices! Sandor Ellix Katz writes well and has great stories relating to food. This is a great book for those interested in healthy fermented foods and local, seasonal eating.

An excellent and impeccable work. Completely enriching and absolutely stuffed with references and contacts. Microwaves serve as great bookends.

Sandor Katz writes about the many avenues available for procurement of food, such as buying locally at farmers' markets, joining underground co-ops, growing our own, foraging for wild plants, reclaiming vacant city lots to garden in, saving seeds, and dumpster diving. He discusses many ways small-scale producers get around the burdensome laws that hamper them from dealing directly with consumers. Each chapter also includes a list of related books, videos and organizations.

But this book is even more about the regulatory state of affairs, corporate dominance and government abuse than about what we consumers are doing. I just wanted to learn about where I can get good, healthy food, and found myself feeling helpless against government coups and land grabs and the enormous loss of farm land to urbanization.

I began to lose interest in the book three-quarters of the way through as I came across recipes for cannabis butter and sassafras root beer, vegetarian ethics and roadkill worth scavenging. How do I wrest control of food production from government and corporate dominance by learning about water rights, eating of insects and recycling of vegetable oils for fuel?

Katz appears to be someone who has traveled a long and rich road on his life's journey, a clear benefit to his wonderful writing which avoids dogmatism and absolutism. He is both candid and circumspect, and I am impressed with the depth of his knowledge regarding the world's foodways and their history.

This book provides a comprehensive overview of our current food options, politics, and the government's excessive control. It loses some focus as the author tries to cover every conceivable topic related to food. I recommend it to anyone interested in the history of food politics.

"The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved" by Sandor Katz is created to be used by its readers, not merely consumed. He has clearly laid out as comprehensive and inclusive an agenda as any I have seen, covering industrial food production, dumpster diving, fermenting, foraging, vegetarianism and many other topics. His writing style is humble, clear and flows well -- while he incorporates plenty of information about his and his own experiences, the first person narrative is neatly integrated into the overall message. Each chapter is written as a standalone article and ends with recipes and resources for futher research.

Katz's approach is truly one of conservation and relativity -- he constantly notes that each individual's particular body chemistry, culture and food preferences mean that a diet that works for him (now) may not work for you. He encourages exploration, examination and critical thought.

Sadly, but perhaps not surprisingly, the negative reviews of his books on Amazon are largely from homophobes. While he mentions he's fighting AIDS with diet and medication, and that he lives in a queer community - he's not hamfisted about his sexual orientation or lifestyle. He's clear and up front about it but in no sense does he ever offer judgement about the relative merits of his orientation to the mainstream (nor is the book in anyway about sex). Katz provides details about his life as they are relevant to his experiences and experiments with food -- but he's clearly not out to recruit people to the "Gay Nation" nor to challenge their assumptions on homosexuality.

It's very clear that his mission is to provide a catalyst for his readers (whom he assumes are intelligent, inquisitive folks) to scrutinize their diets and food sources and to arm them with tools for making the best choices based on their own particular situations.

This is a great book. A really insightful, inspiring, honest and empowering account of somebody who cares about the planet, its people and its food.
I've shown my friends this book as it traveled with me. If I could I'd borrow you mine. Just get it!