A sad fact is that many of us are addicted to trite food programming on television, on websites and social media. Many of us deify certain celebrity chefs, filling the void by purchasing their cook books, subscribing to their television shows and worshipping their brand endorsements. My gripe is not with cooking and food education in a broader sense, but rather the fostering of the intense competition culture and commercialisation that never before existed in our dining.

A few months back, I posted a seemingly innocuous ode to Julia Child on my Facebook wall. I had been researching her for some time, watching her kitsch, grainy black-and-white home economics programme while trying to make up my mind about what statement she was trying to make.

I didn’t receive any comments on that Facebook post. The irony, it seems, was lost. I blame myself for that entirely. I tremendously undermined my own point by calling her cute and backdated, when I ought to have highlighted the statement I discovered she was trying to make: cook with heart, cook with authenticity and simplicity. Several generations of Americans, particularly in the stifled sixties, would have never learned (or bothered) to educate themselves in cooking practice and make the enormous leap and bound to broaden their cuisine without her.

Unlike our modern cooking competition programmes, labouredly manicured and intensely patronising to its viewing audience, it occurred to me after a few episodes that Julia is hilariously unconcerned about pretence and about the mishaps that inevitably arise in the kitchen. She speaks about food in the most matter-of-fact way, prepares efficiently but without pretentious flair. In one episode, the handle to the deep-fryer basket snaps off while submerged in hot oil. With incredible nonchalance, Julia plucks the basket out with a pair of tongs. There was no cut sequence or stagehand to correct what went wrong. Further, I have lost count of the number of times she has stuffed something up and patiently explained to the camera how to amend it.

We have a very important duty in campaigning for and educating ourselves in ethically sound and bio-diverse food sources.

We ought to be concerned that wealth, food and power remain perilously unbalanced and disturbingly intertwined. Faced with the rapid over-production, artificial preservation and homogenisation of food, we are at risk of forgetting that we simply must eat simply.

I took more than a year away from The Wild Thyme and Sweet Pea project to pick up a trade certificate and to re-assess why I continue writing about food. I hope to continue writing for what I am passionate about for as long as I can.

And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair. —Khalil Gibran