I, cheeseburger

Vidare på återkommande bloggtema: ostburgarmiraklet - från Waldo Jaquith, via Kottke:

Further reflection revealed that it’s quite impractical—nearly impossible—to make a cheeseburger from scratch. Tomatoes are in season in the late summer. Lettuce is in season in spring and fall. Large mammals are slaughtered in early winter. The process of making such a burger would take nearly a year, and would inherently involve omitting some core cheeseburger ingredients. It would be wildly expensive—requiring a trio of cows—and demand many acres of land. There’s just no sense in it.

A cheeseburger cannot exist outside of a highly developed, post-agrarian society. It requires a complex interaction between a handful of vendors—in all likelihood, a couple of dozen—and the ability to ship ingredients vast distances while keeping them fresh. The cheeseburger couldn’t have existed until nearly a century ago as, indeed, it did not.

Det bör också noteras att Jaquith ifall han nu verkligen ville göra allt från grunden även borde ha tillverkat de nödvändiga redskapen själv, vilket än mer belyser omöjligheten. Carl Sagan-citatet han sedan nämner är alldeles fantastiskt:

“If you wish to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first invent the universe."

Tidigare inlägg på temat: närproducerat (bloggetikett)