Book Description

A professor of nutrition leaves his office and heads into the fields of a local farm to dig deeper into the reality of his food. With the help of several of his students, he films his experience chronicling the life of a tomato plant, from seed to harvest, on a small family farm. He is introduced to farm life at quirky Eco Farm by “Big John,” the rock star farmer. Over the course of one summer, he is schooled on the ways of organic agriculture, the sex life of the tomato, is introduced to the enigmatic world of heirloom tomatoes, and ponders the spiritual life of plants and the miracle of a seed. Told with humor and personal anecdotes from his food upbringing in New Jersey in the 1960s, he takes a fresh look at the changes in the American dietary landscape over the last half-century, and attempts to salvage a connection to his food. Upon visiting a tomato seed company in western North Carolina, he learns of a unique heirloom tomato - Aunt Ruby’s German Green – a rare, green-when-ripe variety. He decides to track down the story behind “Aunt Ruby” and her backyard tomato treasure, hidden from the world for most of her life. What starts out as a straightforward plan to learn more about where his food comes from, takes him on a journey of self-discovery that leaves him questioning his core assumptions about nutrition and the very essence of food, finally finding clarity by way of an elderly woman from a little town in Tennessee and her unusual tomato.