Trendsetting: Macrobiotics

Living in America during a recession can put a real strain on people’s diets. When pennies are being pinched, one of the first things to go is healthy, locally grown food. Why pay $50 for a bag of groceries when you can get two burgers, fries and a Coke for for $3 at McDonald’s? —a rhetorical question, of course, but one that many people are answering by spending their money on fast food.

That’s why the Korean Times article about well-being and macrobiotic cooking that was published a few days ago made me so happy: people around the world are getting it. You are what you eat and if you want to be healthy, you have to eat healthy.

Apparently, macrobiotics is gaining a lot of momentum in Korea these days.

Chef Rah Byeong-joon of Grand InterContinental Seoul’s Marco Polo restaurant told the Korean Times that  ”[macrobiotics] categorizes all ingredients into yin and yang. For example, meat, especially red ones such as pork or beef, are considered to be strongly yang. Cheese and other dairies are strong yin-foods. Therefore, if you want to eat one of them, it is better to have one from the other side as well,” he said.

Rah is serving some of his macrobiotic dishes at the restaurant through February, scrapping the use of all meat and dairy in his dishes.
“If you use tastes that are too strong, it is hard to strike a balance,” he said.

Rah has created some compelling and adventurous dishes, including soybean cheese caprese salad with vegetable ratatouille; Korean black rice risotto with eggplant, pine nut and balsamic reduction; green spaghetti served with anchovies, mushrooms, tomato and Kalamata olives.

The goal of each dish is to have a positive effect on the human body, preventing heart disease, providing essential fatty acids for brain health and relieving the body from stressful toxins used in highly processed foods.

Way to set the trend for 2010. Macrobiotics in mainstream eating culture would be truly awesome.

[image / Korea Times Photo by Shim Hyun-chu]