Dimos's Blog

Throughout my youth I was connected directly or indirectly with food. In my small agricultural village all my relatives and friends worked off the land to make a living. I was always surrounded by loud noise of tractor and heavy agricultural machinery, also by smells from fresh crops and the view of vast fields surrounding the outskirts of my village. If you really think about it, all of your five senses are at work constantly. Touch, is one of the key senses because you have to work with your hands and you grow an appreciation because you see how tough it is to grow and process what we eat, so waste is out of the question! Taste, is the most amazing sense, you get to enjoy all of your hard work coming together in an amazing culinary experience and you enjoy it to its fullest because you know that everything is safe, healthy and organic.

My grandfather would send me home with the bed of my truck full of tomatoes, cucumbers, olives, eggs and freshly slaughtered poultry. When I arrived at home my mother knew exactly what to do. She was cleaning the produce, peeling the cucumbers, cutting the tomatoes and salting the olives to be consumed in the following weeks and also taking the feathers off the poultry. I have no words to describe the unique smell of the dirt as it was coming off the fresh produce. I get the same feeling every time I am outdoors during spring or summer and it is so dry out, and all of a sudden a few drops of rain hit the freshly plowed dirt on the ground.

Even though I only mentioned half of the products we produce my mother would have in her mind a lot of different ways to combine these products in order to make the most exquisite meals. The combination of fresh produce and the spices such as; cardamom, colander, fresh garlic, rosemary, paprika, cumin, saffron, and cayenne can even satisfy the most demanding taste buds. To some people of different cultures might think the way we cook is a little odd. For instance, we make “kokoretsi” which consists of lamb intestines, liver and tongue of the lamb all skewered and wrapped around a metal stick. First we skewer the tongue, after that we cut the liver in to little pieces and then to finalize the process we wrap the intestines around the skewer and grill the whole thing for a few hours. Also the same process works for another meal called “magiritsa” and we usually cook it and consume it on Easter Sunday. We have a lot of traditional foods that coincide with specific holidays and religious events. For each of these events my mother would cook the appropriate meal.

Food is a whole process from beginning to end and it is a family event that is treasured by everyone, young and old. Almost every day we have a new freshly cooked meal in my house that we eat as a family. Coming to America has given me a new perspective on food because the vast majority of the food is very processed and it is very rare for families to sit together and enjoy a home cooked meal. I believe this is one of the many reasons for the growing rate of obesity in the America and in the world. It is hard nowadays in this fast paced society to cook a meal everyday and sit together to dine. It seems that people have found the solution to this problem by inventing energy bars, drive through fast food joints, TV dinners and canned foods but they do not know that nothing can substitute the nutritional value of real food.

In my future family I plan on implementing family dinners, home cooked meals and a garden full of valuable nutritional fruits and vegetables. It is hard to keep up with what I just mentioned but I believe that it so important for a healthy happy family. Like Hippocrates, the father of medicine, said “We are what we eat”.

Cheez it commercial

In comparison with different food commercials, I have come to a conclusion that the company that produces the Cheez-it snack, has come up with the smartest and simultaneously amusing ideas. One of the aspects that I like from this commercial is that they provide the people the education, and certainly the right information about what they eat and for instance about the condition of the particular type of cheese they use and on what maturity level that cheese has blended into their food. However, and logically, they do not provide to people the information about the nutrition facts of the particular product which is introduced as a snack. As we all know, snacks are usually packaged in small boxes that contain  no more that 100 to 150 calories. In the contrary Cheeze-it is packaged only in big boxes, and all the different flavors make the consumer buy this product only in large quantities.

The funny/amusing aspect that the advertising agency has successfully accomplished makes the consumer wants to buy this rather unhealthy product and as is universally known, entertainment most often goes with food. I mentioned the word smartest earlier because they have found the right words to make peoples’ minds concentrate mainly on the product and through this word “mature” are trying to bring people closer to the product because people use the word mature mostly to describe the maturity of a person. Also this commercial is successful because when it starts they present the end form of the product, after that the jokes that this personalized cheese says which indicates whether the cheese is ready to be blended with the crackers or not, which shows the process, and again in the end, the end form of the product is illustrated. Lastly, the fact that a person, which pretends to be a doctor who examines if the cheese is ready for consumption, shows that the premises that the food is produced are inspected regularly and that the inspectors pay attention to each wheel of cheese. Also each cheese has a different character such as, the interrupting cheese, the mocking cheese, the cheese with the headphones and that shows the different flavors of cheeses such as pepper jack, baby swiss, mozzarella etc. Lastly, the colors used for this commercial are the most attractive to they eye. Red and yellow are two really vibrant colors that make the perfect contrast and catch peoples’ attention.

In conclusion, these are the tricks that advertising agencies use in order to market their products without caring about the consumers’ health and well being. On the other hand commercials are meant to appeal to emotions and not logic. In which case the Cheez-it company did a great job making the consumer view their company as a reliable and fun company to follow and buy their snacks from.

- My home town was small but lively, as you walk down the street you always see familiar faces.

-Laci was very comfortable with herself and her style, even though she wore mismatched colors and clothes.

-Mr. Brown does not help his students when they ask a question, and he is very harsh with grading.

- The room had a cold feeling, it was lacking color and decoration.

I would like to choose food for my theme. Food has been a big part of my life, especially because it is a big part of my culture. Since an early age, I was observing how my grandfather was working off the land, in order to produce food for the household. I basically grew up on a farm that had everything, such as corn, olive trees and twenty different kinds of vegetables and fruits, as well as livestock. I thought I was very lucky and smart enough to appreciate one of nature’s greatest gifts; food. I also got to see how the food came from the ground to my plate, from sowing the crops to gathering, to cooking with the recipes that have been handed down from generation to generation.

For my other essays I would like to write about my personal experience from working on the crops, cooking, celebrating traditions that involve food, working in the food business, and experiencing different cultural eating habits. As for my ethnography, I would like to write about eating trends in America, and how they have changed over the years, for instance, small restaurants, bakeries, and coffee shops have been taken over by big franchises, and all because of money which conflicts with health. Now, for my picture essay I would like to research different variations of traditional foods that are found in different regions of Greece, as this is something I have always been interested in. Finally, for my argument I would like to write about obesity as a phenomenon and why this is happening in our society. Also I would like to include in my argument the contrast between obesity and hunger in third world countries as well as ads on TV and  food supplements/vitamins. I hope you consider me for this theme because I feel like I have so much to write about food and everything related to it.

I, Dimos Apostolou was born on a sunny day in August of 1988 in Panorama, province of Thessaloniki which is located in the Northern part of Greece. I attended primary, secondary and high school in the town over, Serres, because at an early age we had to move as a family because of my father’s occupation. I come from a family which is very traditional and culture oriented and this is a big factor that influenced my personality over the years. After I graduated high school, I attended a 1 year mandatory military service in Polykastro Kilkis, and I finished with the rank of sergeant at the age of 19. As I was growing up I had to make some critical decisions about my future as far as my education. I met my fiancee, Fanee, in Greece and we decided to immigrate  to the U.S. in order to get an education and work. America has offered me a wide range of experiences, such as work and education. Moreover, I have enrolled in BCC in the Engineering Technology program, and so far I have accomplished to get on the Dean’s list and maintain a great GPA. My skills are mainly stronger in the math and science fields and less in the humanities, and I am very confident that English writing is going to help me improve my weaker skills. My writing history is very short due to the fact that I have only been in this country for 2 years, however during those two years I have attended ESL courses at BCC which improved my English tremendously. I have yet to write an extensive essay in English, however, I feel like I am at the level to begin college level writing at this time. I am looking forward to this class because I feel like I will be able to broaden my English writing skills, as I feel I am weak in certain areas such as flow, cohesion and coherence and I will also be able to develop a secondary vocabulary. I look forward to working with you throughout the semester.