Without the potato, the balance of European power might never have tilted north.

The garden suggests there might be a place where we can meet nature halfway

How did these organs of plant sex manage to get themselves cross-wired with human ideas of value and status and Eros? And what might our ancient attraction for flowers have to teach us about the deeper mysteries of beauty - what one poet has called "this grace wholly gratuitous"? Is that what it is? Or does beauty have a purpose? (64)

I don't think it's a journalist's job to issue shopping lists or policy descriptions. We're supposed to show people how the world is, to give them the tools they need to make good decisions as citizens or consumers. Depending on what your values are — the environment, your health, animal welfare — the answers are going to be different for every person.

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

Before I started writing about food, my focus was really on the human relationship to plants. Not only do plants nourish us bodily - they nourish us psychologically.