Expect More From the People Who Feed You
Dietary choices shape our bodies, planet, and culture. When we eat out, we delegate those choices to others. It’s time we expect more from the people who make those decisions on our behalf.
Food is not just food. Our food systems touch nearly everything. Roughly half of the world’s habitable land is used for agriculture, and global food systems account for about a third of greenhouse gas emissions (1). Food systems employ a massive share of the global workforce and account for roughly 12% of global GDP (2). Food is also culture: how we connect to places, history, and one another; how we care for people, celebrate, and create shared experiences.
The people and institutions that determine what we eat wield enormous power. When we talk about that power, we usually focus on industrial systems: fast food, ultra-processed convenience, conventional agriculture, and the global supply chains that have hollowed out soil, air, bodies, and small farms alike. These forces deserve scrutiny.
But there is another point of influence much closer to home: our local restaurants. Every day they decide what ingredients to buy, where those ingredients come from, how they’re treated, and how they’re served. Those decisions matter because Americans eat food prepared outside the home now more than ever before. Food spending away from home, as a share of total food expenditures, reached a high of 59% in 2024 (3).
Eating out is not a neutral act. It is a delegation of responsibility. When we let others cook for us, we hand over decisions about sourcing, processing, and preparation. We trust chefs and restaurateurs to decide what ends up on our plates, and ultimately in our bodies. That trust carries real weight.
As a chef, I see this as a matter of personal responsibility. At restaurants, we expect food to be tasty, timely, and consistent. When we cook at home, many of us also think (at least a little) about health, ingredients, and long-term well-being. Some of us ask where food comes from and whether its quality matches its cost. Why don’t we expect the same, or rather, even more care from the people who feed us professionally?
Would you feel good about the ingredients in your local restaurant’s pantry? Do you trust that those ingredients were chosen for reasons beyond price and convenience? Do you believe your money supports farmers, workers, and systems you’d be proud to stand behind? Often, the answer is no. And that outcome isn’t accidental, it’s shaped by what we tolerate, reward, and ignore.
At Tarrytown Local, I have the rare opportunity to write my own job description and help define what the job of a chef should include. For me, it isn’t enough to cook food that tastes good. Cooking professionally means caring for people you may never meet. It means making decisions with guests’ well-being in mind. It means recognizing that menus shape habits and that purchasing choices ripple outward into farms, landscapes, and communities.
Influence over what people eat, especially when exercised at scale, should be used deliberately. Not just to impress, but to nourish. Not just to profit, but to support systems worth sustaining and to serve food that is good for bodies and for the world.
This is not a call to action for chefs alone… I suspect few will read this. Chefs and restaurants will ultimately respond to what their customers demand and reward. This is a call to action for diners - for you. Expect more from the people who feed you. Ask questions. Support restaurants that take this responsibility seriously.
Eating out is an intimate relationship, even if the kitchen is hidden in the back. Food can harm. Food can heal. It can extract, or it can restore. In restaurants, the difference lies in the choices made on your behalf, and in whether you insist those choices be made with care.
Ruggeri Laderchi, C., Lotze-Campen, H., DeClerck, F., Bodirsky, B. L., Collignon, Q., Crawford, M. S., Dietz, S., Fesenfeld, L., Hunecke, C., Leip, D., Lord, S., Lowder, S., Nagenborg, S., Pilditch, T., Popp, A., Wedl, I., & Food System Economics Commission. (n.d.). The economics of the food system transformation. https://foodsystemeconomics.org/wp-content/uploads/FSEC-Global_Policy_Report.pdf, page 8
Waughray, D., Khatri, A., & World Economic Forum. (2020). New Nature Economy Report II. In AlphaBeta, World Economic Forum. https://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_The_Future_Of_Nature_And_Business_2020.pdf, page 11
Total food spending reached $2.58 trillion in 2024 | Economic Research Service. (n.d.). https://www.ers.usda.gov/data-products/chart-gallery/chart-detail?chartId=58364&utm_source=chatgpt.com
