We have to bring children into a new relationship to food that connects them to culture and agriculture.

I feel it is an obligation to help people understand the relation of food to agriculture and the relationship of food to culture.

Teaching kids how to feed themselves and how to live in a community responsibly is the center of an education.

I think America's food culture is embedded in fast-food culture. And the real question that we have is: How are we going to teach slow-food values in a fast-food world? Of course, it's very, very difficult to do, especially when children have grown up eating fast food and the values that go with that.

Food culture is like listening to the Beatles - it's international, it's very positive, it's inventive and creative.

Basically, the person in the White House should be principled, should have a philosophy about food that relates directly to organic agriculture. I will continue to push for that.