full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Mark Bittman: What's wrong with what we eat

Unscramble the Blue Letters

They both get it wrong, though. The first at least is populist, and the second is etsilit. How we got to this place is the history of food in the uetind saetts. And I'm going to go through that, at least the last hundred years or so, very quickly right now. A hundred years ago, guess what? Everyone was a locavore: even New York had pig fmars nearby, and shipping food all over the place was a ridiculous notion. Every family had a cook, usually a mom. And those moms bought and prepared food. It was like your romantic vsiion of Europe. Margarine didn't exist. In fact, when margarine was invented, several states passed laws dleancrig that it had to be dyed pink, so we'd all know that it was a fake. There was no snack food, and until the '20s, until Clarence Birdseye came along, there was no fezron food. There were no rearutsnat chains. There were neighborhood rrttenaauss run by loacl people, but none of them would think to open another one. Eating ethnic was unheard of unless you were ethnic. And fancy food was entirely fernch. As an aside, those of you who remember Dan Aykroyd in the 1970s doing Julia Child imitations can see where he got the idea of stabbing himself from this fabulous slide. (Laughter)

Open Cloze

They both get it wrong, though. The first at least is populist, and the second is _______. How we got to this place is the history of food in the ______ ______. And I'm going to go through that, at least the last hundred years or so, very quickly right now. A hundred years ago, guess what? Everyone was a locavore: even New York had pig _____ nearby, and shipping food all over the place was a ridiculous notion. Every family had a cook, usually a mom. And those moms bought and prepared food. It was like your romantic ______ of Europe. Margarine didn't exist. In fact, when margarine was invented, several states passed laws _________ that it had to be dyed pink, so we'd all know that it was a fake. There was no snack food, and until the '20s, until Clarence Birdseye came along, there was no ______ food. There were no __________ chains. There were neighborhood ___________ run by _____ people, but none of them would think to open another one. Eating ethnic was unheard of unless you were ethnic. And fancy food was entirely ______. As an aside, those of you who remember Dan Aykroyd in the 1970s doing Julia Child imitations can see where he got the idea of stabbing himself from this fabulous slide. (Laughter)

Solution

  1. french
  2. elitist
  3. farms
  4. declaring
  5. restaurants
  6. frozen
  7. restaurant
  8. united
  9. states
  10. local
  11. vision

Original Text

They both get it wrong, though. The first at least is populist, and the second is elitist. How we got to this place is the history of food in the United States. And I'm going to go through that, at least the last hundred years or so, very quickly right now. A hundred years ago, guess what? Everyone was a locavore: even New York had pig farms nearby, and shipping food all over the place was a ridiculous notion. Every family had a cook, usually a mom. And those moms bought and prepared food. It was like your romantic vision of Europe. Margarine didn't exist. In fact, when margarine was invented, several states passed laws declaring that it had to be dyed pink, so we'd all know that it was a fake. There was no snack food, and until the '20s, until Clarence Birdseye came along, there was no frozen food. There were no restaurant chains. There were neighborhood restaurants run by local people, but none of them would think to open another one. Eating ethnic was unheard of unless you were ethnic. And fancy food was entirely French. As an aside, those of you who remember Dan Aykroyd in the 1970s doing Julia Child imitations can see where he got the idea of stabbing himself from this fabulous slide. (Laughter)

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations

ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
junk food 3
organic food 3
global warming 2
livestock production 2
ann cooper 2
food pyramid 2
united states 2
greenhouse gases 2
red herring 2
ate food 2
eat real 2
home cooking 2
ice cream 2
corn products 2
stop eating 2

Important Words

  1. aykroyd
  2. birdseye
  3. bought
  4. chains
  5. child
  6. clarence
  7. cook
  8. dan
  9. declaring
  10. dyed
  11. eating
  12. elitist
  13. ethnic
  14. europe
  15. exist
  16. fabulous
  17. fact
  18. fake
  19. family
  20. fancy
  21. farms
  22. food
  23. french
  24. frozen
  25. guess
  26. history
  27. idea
  28. imitations
  29. invented
  30. julia
  31. laughter
  32. laws
  33. local
  34. margarine
  35. mom
  36. moms
  37. nearby
  38. neighborhood
  39. notion
  40. open
  41. passed
  42. people
  43. pig
  44. pink
  45. place
  46. populist
  47. prepared
  48. quickly
  49. remember
  50. restaurant
  51. restaurants
  52. ridiculous
  53. romantic
  54. run
  55. shipping
  56. slide
  57. snack
  58. stabbing
  59. states
  60. unheard
  61. united
  62. vision
  63. wrong
  64. years
  65. york