Show Us Your Food (Documentary Photography)

Turns out, my last post wasn't as off-topic as I originally thought. On the Freakonomics blog I found a long post interviewing the authors of Hungry Planet: What the World Eats. It's easiest to just let Freakonomics intro the book:

"Peter Menzel and Faith D’Aluisio sat down to a meal with 30 families in 24 countries, photographing their one-week food intake and talking to them about food, dieting, and shopping habits for their 2005 book Hungry Planet: What the World Eats."

If you're interested in the book, here's an Amazon link:


The photographic connection is the documentary photography involved. Instead of just writing down what each family ate in a week, the authors actually posed the family in their home with all items that were eaten in a week. There's a lot of other nice images in the book too, from what I can see (I haven't read it yet, but it has gone on my wish list).

For instance, the Caven family from the U.S.A. ate what you see below (click to see it a little larger):


Go ahead and read the full interview -- it's got some really eye-opening information. Turns out the Caven family has a very similar diet to my own (although we don't get corn dogs much!).

What would your food portrait look like?