Take It Slow

For Pierce Abernathy and environmental art collective Aerthship, mindful eating is a way of life

- ALMA AVALLE

Maybe it seems obvious, but if something can’t grow where you live, it came from somewhere else. And sure, it’s every season at all times in the supermarket produce section, but as cook, recipe developer, and video producer Pierce Abernathy tells me, that abundance comes at a cost to our planet and our plates. He points out that people are used to just buying a tomato or mango at any point in the year, not thinking about “whether that mango is coming 2,000 miles from South America or that tomato is grown in a greenhouse and has almost no flavor because it’s December.”

Abernathy is a Slow Food advocate, which in his words, means “getting as close as possible to where your food comes from.” Eating locally is a big part of that, but it also means enacting a type of mindfulness about the work that goes into getting any ingredient on your plate. In practice that means getting to know the people who produce the food he cooks to celebrate their contributions, highlighting farmers in his viral social media videos, and acquainting with the butchers and fishmongers in his neighborhood. It’s a more sustainable way to cook, and as Abernathy explains, it affects our health, our cultures, our ideas, and our planet. “Eating is one of those very holistic and personal experiences that we do every single day,” he tells me. “There are so many opportunities to just make it feel really special.”