Jamie Oliver's "Food Revolution" 2010

[David Ross]

I was glad that Jamie did a segment with a large food supply company last week. At first I was skeptical because I thought he was going to go down the path of portraying them as only the bad guys--which in my mind they really aren't--I see them as simply a vendor delivering a wide array of products to their customers. If the customer asks for it, albeit the most unhealthy, highly processed, sugar-glopped, canned stuff on earth, they will sell it to ya. On the other hand, if your order sheet specs call for Kurobata chops and a crate of Kumquats, they'll put that on your delivery van.

I was glad that Jamie visited the warehouse and showed that in addition to the thousands of boxes of frozen, processed, breaded, mystery meat cutlets, they also had huge walk-in coolers filled with all-manner of fresh meats, fruits and vegetables. Now mind you, as the representative of the warehouse told Jamie, "we can get anything for you," is not as simple of an answer as it sounds.. ....the additional underlying phrase of course would be "at a cost........" That seems to be one of the main challenges Jamie's been facing in Huntington and no doubt the challenge faced by families and school districts throughout the country--can we eat healthy at a reasonable cost? I think Jamie's only scratched the surface on the issue, but he's certainly made huge strides in the right direction. You can eat healthy at a reasonable cost and you can cook healthy dishes, (stir-fry), in a quick amount of time.

Jamie's created a lot of positive energy with the show and I'd like to see him keep it moving forward. While I've been a bit perturbed by some of the "schtick" and editing, that's television. I fully support the message he's delivering and he's done a great job. But this afternoon I was watching ABC and I saw a clip that said tonight was the final episode. Then I checked the show's website and in fact tonight is the final episode after only five shows. Seems a bit of a short season to me.

Television has the ability to reach so many people and have such a huge impact I was hoping for more shows. I'm hoping that even though this first season was short, Jamie has made enough of an impact with the sponsors that ABC will bring the show back again. Jamie's put the spotlight on an important issue and the efforts shouldn't stop after the show ends.