How the

Other
Half Eats

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd ii 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM
 How the
Other
Half Eats
THE UNTOLD STORY OF FOOD AND
INEQUALITY IN AMERICA

PRIYA ­F IELDING-​S INGH, PhD

Little, Brown Spark

New York Boston London

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 Copyright © 2021 by Priya Fielding-​Singh

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Ellen Bass, excerpt from “The World Has Need of You” from Like a Beggar.
Copyright © 2014 by Ellen Bass. Reprinted with the permission of
The Permissions Company, LLC on behalf of Copper Canyon Press,
coppercanyonpress.org.
Excerpt from “Paul Robeson” by Gwendolyn Brooks Reprinted By Consent of
Brooks Permissions.
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Copyright © 1999 and used with permission.
All names and identifying characteristics of research participants in this
book have been changed.

ISBN 9780316427265
LCCN 2021938481

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Printed in the United States of America

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 For Josh, who beat the odds

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd vi 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM
 we are each other’s harvest:
we are each other’s business:
we are each other’s magnitude and bond.
 — ​Gwendolyn Brooks, “Paul Robeson”

What I want is so simple I almost can’t say it: elementary

kindness. Enough to eat, enough to go around. The
possibility that kids might one day grow up to be neither
the destroyers nor the destroyed.
 — ​Barbara Kingsolver, Animal Dreams

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd viii 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM
 Contents

Preface xi

Part I: Divides 1
Chapter 1: Diverging Destinies 3
Chapter 2: Families in an Age of Inequality 17
Chapter 3: Feeding Kids 40
Chapter 4: All That Matters 58

Part II: Nourishment 67

Chapter 5: Scarcity, Abundance 69
Chapter 6: Within Reach 78
Chapter 7: Being “Good” 89
Chapter 8: Hunger and Pickiness 101
Chapter 9: Status Symbols 111
Chapter 10: Kale Salad 118

Part III: Compromises 129

Chapter 11: Mom’s Job 131
Chapter 12: Time and Money 142
Chapter 13: Stuck 152

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 Contents

Chapter 14: Fluctuating Finances 160

Chapter 15: Becoming American 167

Part IV: Emotion 177

Chapter 16: Downscaling 179
Chapter 17: Upscaling 193
Chapter 18: Priorities 203
Chapter 19: Control 211
Chapter 20: Stacking Up 223

Part V: Conclusion 239

Chapter 21: Windfall 241
Chapter 22: Where We Go 248

About This Project 267

Acknowledgments 283
Notes 289
Index 315

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 Preface

Outstretched on a hospital bed, I clutched Veda’s slippery body

close to my chest as she stared up at me for the first time, her
wrinkly right hand wrapped around my thumb. At six pounds,
five ounces and twenty-​one inches long, my daughter stretched
from my collar down to my hip bone. I took her in, admiring her
full head of thick black hair, ten scaly fingers, ten stubby toes,
and the surfboard-​shaped birthmark above her left thigh. As I
stared into her soft brown eyes, my heart swelled. It’s you, I
thought. It’s been you all along.
The moment I met Veda was the moment I discovered a new,
surprising kind of love. I had known the love a daughter feels
toward her parents, a sister toward her brothers, and a wife
toward her husband. But this love felt different. It was searingly
visceral and uniquely overwhelming. For months, I had envi-
sioned what feelings might arise upon finally meeting my daugh-
ter. I knew that I would care deeply for her. But what made my
love for Veda distinct was this: At its core was an enormous, at
times overpowering, feeling of responsibility. From her first
moments resting on my chest up until today, I have not been
able to separate my love for my daughter from the immense
ownership I feel for her well-​being.
Pregnancy provided the training grounds for this feeling.
As Veda grew inside of me over the course of nine months, my
sense of responsibility for her also ballooned. My body was her

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 Preface

home. We were separate people, but we were inseparable. That

inseparability made it challenging for me to act without first
considering that action’s impact on her. I longed to be a self-​
assured, composed pregnant woman who “trusted the process”
and knew her baby would be fine. But I was not that woman, and
trying to be her proved fruitless. Every one of my behaviors held
potential implications for Veda. Was it okay to use a certain skin
cream? Had I accidentally eaten unpasteurized cheese at a holi-
day party? Would sleeping on my back deprive her of oxygen?
When Veda was born, I knew these kinds of questions would
only multiply.
Fourteen minutes after Veda’s arrival in the world, a post-
partum nurse appeared at my bedside. It was time for my daugh-
ter to eat, she said, giving me a warm smile. The nurse gently
scooted Veda up on my chest, then guided her nose and mouth
toward the source of milk. My eyes focused on Veda, and I held
my breath in anticipation.
By the time Veda was born, in 2019, I had already spent five
years as a sociology graduate student researching the trials and
tribulations of feeding children. That work, combined with
countless conversations among friends and family about the
challenges of breastfeeding, meant that I was braced for this
moment. I expected nothing to be easy about feeding my daugh-
ter, now or in the future. Today I’d struggle with nursing a baby.
In a year, I’d navigate a toddler’s pickiness. In a decade, I’d face
a teenager’s love of fast food. When it came to food, the road
ahead, as far as I could see, was anything but smooth.
Her skin glued to mine, Veda could barely open her eyes. I
tracked her closely as she sniffed around. Then the nurse
craned Veda’s head back, and my daughter’s tiny pink mouth
opened. I watched her head fling forward as she clamped down
on my breast and began to drink.
Thank God. I exhaled, feeling more relief than happiness.
That nursing was physically painful was completely irrelevant.

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My daughter was eating. And if she was eating, that meant she
was fine. Great, even. For a moment, I felt satisfied. I was ensur-
ing Veda’s well-​being. I was a good mom.
This was the first of many moments over the coming days,
weeks, months, and years during which I would hold my breath.
My husband, Ansu, also felt ownership for Veda’s well-​being, but
biology significantly raised the stakes for me. As the parent
using my own body to literally grow our daughter every single
moment of every single day, I often felt like I had no respite from
my responsibility for her.
Society has only reinforced my maternal sense of account-
ability for Veda. One particularly fraught setting for me — ​where
I often feel reminded most viscerally of this accountability — ​has
been our pediatrician’s office. During those office visits, my
daughter’s height, weight, and body mass index (BMI) is fastidi-
ously monitored to track her nutrition and development. On
Veda’s third day of life, Ansu and I brought her in for a routine
checkup. In the exam room, we undressed her, fumbling like
the new parents we were as we pulled her green-​and-​white-​
striped onesie up over her head and removed her diaper. Gin-
gerly, Ansu placed her on the scale to be weighed.
“Let’s see how good of a job Mom is doing,” the nurse said
cheerily, turning the scale on.
In that moment, my heart sank.
I knew the medical questions that lay behind the nurse’s
casual comment, and I assumed her intentions were good. I felt
confident that she wasn’t trying to single me out or place an
added weight on my shoulders. She wanted to know how much
Veda had been eating. She wanted to see whether my daughter
had gained any ounces since being discharged from the hospi-
tal. These were reasonable questions about a newborn’s develop-
ment. But these were not the questions the nurse had asked.
Instead, she had conveyed a very different message to me — ​one
that made clear that I was only as good a mother as the number

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on that scale revealed. My daughter’s body, I now understood,

was feedback about my parenting.

Food is foundational. We eat multiple times a day from the day

we are born to the day we die. To eat is to live. By extension, to
feed others is to provide the means for them to survive and
thrive. When parents feed their children, they act on an almost
primal instinct to nourish their kids physically and emotionally.
As a parent, to feed your children well is to succeed; to feed
them poorly or to struggle to feed at all is to fail.
This book is about feeding families and the weight that
bears on parents from all walks of life. Feeding, like any act of
love, is both challenging and fulfilling. There are moments of
frustration, triumph, and comic relief. But in this time and
place — ​America in the twenty-​first century — ​feeding has become
both an extremely difficult task and a high-​stakes parenting
endeavor. Parents today feed their children against a national
backdrop of mounting inequalities in wealth and health; a food
environment increasingly saturated with sugar, salt, and fat; ris-
ing rates of childhood and adult obesity; and an insidious
national discourse that emphasizes personal over social respon-
sibility. This broader context shapes the obstacles parents today
must overcome to fill kids’ stomachs. It also showcases parents’
creativity and devotion.
What parents feed their kids — ​and what gets eaten within
­families — ​also has profound implications for society at large. All of
us were once kids ourselves. Most of us grew up within a family.
That family may have taken different shapes — ​with one or two par-
ents, with few or multiple generations, with or without siblings — 
but whatever the particulars, the food practices of our child-
​
hoods have had ripple effects extending into our adulthoods. As
kids, we learned — ​ either through explicit conversation or by
observation — ​what and how to eat. We learned what constitutes a
meal, what’s “healthy” and “unhealthy,” what foods are meant for

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daily consumption and what foods are reserved for special occa-
sions. Our childhood diets cultivated our taste buds, familiarizing
us with certain flavors and cultural traditions. Whether we iden-
tify today with what we ate as kids — ​whether we eat the same
things our parents ate or whether we’ve paved new dietary paths
for o
­ urselves — ​what we saw, touched, smelled, and tasted as kids
affects what we consume now. What we learned about nourishing
ourselves then affects how we nourish ourselves today. And all of
these lessons influence how we then nourish the next generation.
While this is a book about how parents feed their kids, its stories,
lessons, and relevance extend to every single one of us.
This book is a work of nonfiction. It is the product of years of
ethnographic research on families’ diets, most of which I con-
ducted as a doctoral student in sociology at Stanford University.
The people, places, and events I describe are real.
I carried out this research with the approval of Stanford
University’s institutional review board, an organizational body
that oversees and protects the rights and welfare of people who
participate in research studies. Everyone I spoke with consented
to be part of a scientific study and all were made fully aware that
their perspectives would be anonymously reported in journal
articles and, potentially, a book. To safeguard the privacy and
ensure the anonymity of my research participants, I replaced
their real names with pseudonyms and altered any details that
could help identify them, like the particular suburbs they lived
in or the companies they worked for. I promised participants
anonymity first and foremost for their own protection. But this
promise also granted them the freedom to speak candidly with-
out fear of one day having their identities disclosed.
To represent my research participants and to reconstruct
events and conversations as accurately as possible, I used thou-
sands of pages of field notes, interview transcripts, e‑mails, and
text records. From this extensive documentation I have edited
quotations for length and, when absolutely necessary, clarity. I

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kept these edits as minimal as possible to allow the richness

and diversity of individuals’ voices and personalities to shine
through. The families that participated in my research brought
incredible generosity, candor, and vulnerability to our inter­
actions. My aim here is to bring their experiences, struggles, and
triumphs to life as truthfully and empathetically as possible.
“What’s your goal with all this?” Joaquin Vargas, a stay‑at‑home
father of two, asked me one afternoon. Joaquin was one of the
first parents I interviewed for my research. Two cups of tea
between us, refilled after almost two hours spent discussing his
family’s diet, Joaquin was curious to know whether he’d ever
hear of me and my research again. Other parents echoed Joa-
quin’s question. What was the point of all this work?
It’s a question I’d often asked myself as well. At first, my princi-
pal goal was to contribute to social science research, an objective
typically achieved through publishing articles in academic jour-
nals. I enjoyed — ​in fact, I still enjoy — ​much of this process. The
deep and dynamic analysis of thousands of pages of interview tran-
scripts and field notes, the grappling with sociological theory, and
the challenge of ushering in data to substantiate an argument — ​
accomplishing these tasks transformed me from a student into a
sociologist. But I also felt called to reach broader audiences with
my work and to move beyond the peer-​review process to partici-
pate in a more public conversation. I began writing op‑eds and
doing radio and TV interviews about my research for outlets like
the Los Angeles Times, Univision, and the Canadian Broadcasting
Corporation. These led to further media appearances around the
country and e‑mails from physicians, researchers, students, par-
ents, and activists with whom my research resonated. It was grati­
fying to engage with others about my work. In using my research
to bring new data and ideas to public discourse, influence read-
ers’ views, and instigate conversation on issues I cared about, I
felt, for the first time, that my work might actually help people.
These experiences gave me the answer to Joaquin’s ques-

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tion. I wanted to write a book — ​this book — ​and a particular

one at that. Books about food and diet are numerous. And I’ve
spent years poring through them, carefully underlining pas-
sages, highlighting arguments, and scribbling my own notes in
the margins. Having immersed myself in these texts for over a
decade, I’ve noticed a shared trait: Books about food are often
filled with insights or advice that makes us feel bad about how we
are eating. They tell us that we should follow a plant-​based diet
or that our TV dinners are irreparably harming the planet.
Because these books, informative as they may be, tend to be
highly prescriptive, they can inadvertently make us more judg-
mental. They can encourage us to be increasingly critical of our-
selves and others. This is a different kind of book. I hope you
will find it short on judgment and long on empathy and evi-
dence about the feeding challenges that unite and divide fami-
lies across American society.
My professional role as a sociologist — ​and my own personal
identities — ​are also woven into the story that follows. For years,
I have written scientific articles partially in the passive voice:
interviews were conducted, observations were made, data were
analyzed. Such scientific norms have never bothered me, but
they underscore how we scholars tend to abstract ourselves out
of our research. Whether to sound more sophisticated or feign a
veil of objectivity, we can make it seem as though we, as research-
ers, are nothing more than tools through which scientific truth
is uncovered and knowledge is produced.
Yet try as we might, we are always a part of the research. As
scientists, we cannot help but bring ourselves — ​how we identify,
our past experiences, the biases we hold, the assumptions we’d
rather not admit to — ​into the work we do. The research fea-
tured in this book exists only because I conducted it. I was the
one who approached families at food banks, department stores,
pharmacies, and gas stations. I designed the interview questions
that asked parents about their kids’ favorite snacks or whether

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they had ever not had enough to eat. I stood on my tiptoes to

grab moms cartons of cereal from top supermarket shelves,
chopped cherry tomatoes for salads, pulled frozen pizzas out of
ovens, and sat beside kids at kitchen counters. I wrote up the
field notes from my observations, analyzed the data over cups of
tea at my own kitchen counter, and put the words to the pages
you’re reading now. All of these things made me part of the
research that features in this book.
What follows here is my earnest attempt to be transparent
about what it was like to be there and how I have come to under-
stand those experiences. For a scientist, there can be safety in
hiding behind a third-​person voice and vulnerability in expos-
ing one’s own subjectivity through a first-​person narrative. At
the risk of criticism, I have chosen the latter. Throughout this
book, I share not only what I saw but also what I thought, felt,
questioned, and contended with over the years. My hope is that
exposing this hidden part of the research process will bring
clarity and context to you as a reader and help you understand
how I arrived at my central arguments.

I brought to this research my own history and my own relation-

ship with food. These reflect the multiple identities I hold as a
biracial, second-​generation South ­A sian American, highly edu-
cated millennial woman. As with most people’s, my story with
food began before I was born. What I know starts with my father,
who grew up in India, and my mother, who was raised in both
France and the United States. My parents’ paths crossed in 1976
in New York City. That their first date was at a steak house aptly
foreshadows meat as a dietary staple in our household.1
As in most American families, my mother was in charge of
food at home. Her own childhood experiences shaped how she
approached that task.
“I have great memories of food, and I have terrible memo-
ries of food,” she explained to me one afternoon. Her fond

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memories were formed on both sides of the ocean. Some took

place in Normandy, France’s northwesternmost region, in her
maternal grandmother’s home. Normandy is filled with sparsely
populated farmland: gently rolling hills dotted with cows and
sheep, scattered houses framed by stone walls, and the occa-
sional roadside stand selling fresh apple cider. My mother loved
the food of Normandy; she delighted in warm baguettes with
thick slabs of bright yellow butter, fatty soft cheeses, rich mashed
potatoes, slow-​cooked pork chops, and any and all vegetables my
grandmother grew in the backyard. My mother similarly reveled
in many of the dishes she ate during the summers that she spent
in New York City. Her father, who was of Russian Jewish descent,
would take her to Jewish delis in Manhattan, where they would
enjoy pastrami sandwiches and dill pickles. On Saturdays, they
would hop on the ferry to Staten Island for ice cream. Sunday
nights meant Chinese food.
My mother’s terrible memories of food were equally as
sharp, centered mainly on the dishes her mother prepared. My
grandmother, a petite Frenchwoman with an eye for order,
placed severe restrictions around food. My mother was forbid-
den to eat American junk food. Portion sizes and snacks were
limited, and my mother recalls feeling hunger pangs in the
hours leading up to late dinners. But what my mother remem-
bers most is being forced to eat foods that she loathed. Just the
thought of a particular sour cream and green pepper salad is
enough to make her shudder even now, sixty years later.
“I didn’t want to do that to you,” my mom told me, smiling.
“I wanted you to love food.”
For my mother, loving food meant having some say in what
one ate. As a result, I grew up with very few dietary restrictions.
My mom said no to some things — ​Twinkies and Cocoa Puffs,
for instance — ​but yes to almost everything else. At home, we ate
a smorgasbord of American, French, and Indian cuisines. There
was a steady flow of bread, butter, and cheese in our kitchen. My

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mom prepared the pork chops and mashed potatoes of her

youth, and she learned to cook new dishes like sausages and cab-
bage and salami-​and-​Gouda-​cheese melts. We also devoured
North Indian food. My father had fond memories of his child-
hood diet, which was rich in chicken, lamb, chana, and chapa-
tis. “Everything was fresh, local, and delicately prepared,” he
told me. When he moved to Chicago, at twenty-​three, my father
quickly became a fan of American food’s convenience, tastiness,
and affordability. But because he missed the spices and flavors
of his New Delhi childhood, he learned a few simple dishes,
which he later taught my mother. Those were the dishes I grew
up with: a ground lamb dish called keema, aloo gobi, dal, and
well-​buttered basmati rice with peas.
Looking back, what I remember most about my diet growing
up is the freedom. I basically ate whatever I wanted. Many of
those foods were nutritious. I adored peas and corn, bananas,
roasted chicken, eggs, broccoli, and milk. But like many chil-
dren’s, my palate was primed for sugar and salt. There was noth-
ing I wouldn’t do for ice cream, cookies, and, most notably,
hot dogs.
“For a year,” my mother said, laughing, “you ate a hot dog for
breakfast every morning.” Hot dogs were delicious, but I also
loved them because I was the one who chose and prepared
them. They made me feel independent and capable. At six years
old, I would carefully remove one link from the refrigerator,
poke four holes in it with a fork, wrap it in a wet paper towel, and
heat it for exactly one minute in the microwave. Then I’d set it
inside a white, fluffy bun and scarf it down. While my breakfast
habits became a running joke in the family — ​the particular
irony being that I later became a vegetarian — ​I don’t recall
being chided or scolded for my food choices as a child.
My parents also treated us to inexpensive takeout on occa-
sion, letting us choose Mexican, Chinese, or Italian food. Every
time my dad picked me up from high-​school volleyball practice,

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I’d ask for a dollar milkshake, and he’d oblige. I drank soda and
ate fast food.
“I didn’t want to deliberately feed you junk,” my mother told
me when I asked her about it while writing this book. “But junk
was always a part of what we ate.”
“We’re not saints!” my father added.
Age later brought changes to my own diet. At twenty, I began
to eat more plants and fewer animals. Since then, I’ve had my
fair share of dietary phases, pescatarianism and veganism
among them. But for the most part, vegetarianism has been my
home base for over a decade.
How I eat is a work in progress. I go through periods where
my diet feels rich in whole foods; other times, I find myself lean-
ing more on processed and prepared products. I genuinely love
most vegetables and some fruits, but I will readily forgo them for
a greasy slice of pizza or a generously iced wedge of carrot cake.
I snack constantly, stockpile pastries, and notoriously oversalt
my dinner. Cooking has long been a hobby of mine, but I don’t
know how to bake bread and I don’t enjoy spending hours over a
hot stove. Like most women in America, I’ve spent time worry-
ing about my weight; I’ve gone through stretches where eating
has been far less about enjoyment or health and far more about
striving to meet societal standards of beauty. I consider myself
extremely fortunate that I have always had enough money to
buy not only the food I need but also the food I want.
Having now interviewed hundreds of people about how they
eat, I feel like my relationship with food makes me part of the
human race. It’s a complicated, ever-​changing bond. I control
my portions one moment and eat my feelings the next. I’ve had
phases of overeating and phases of undereating. I’ve dug my
heels in on some food habits and worked patiently to change
others. I use food for all kinds of purposes. Survival and satia-
tion are part of it, but so are comfort, nostalgia, boredom, van-
ity, and celebration. I devour foods from my childhood because

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they remind me of happy moments, particular people, or spe-

cial places. I eat foods to signal my membership in different
communities or my various identities. And other foods end up
in my stomach simply because I’m tired and impatient.
Balancing such priorities has shaped how I feed my daugh-
ter. As an infant, Veda drank breast milk and formula. She ate
store-​bought baby food. When she became a toddler, I fed her
peas and oranges as well as Cheerios, pasta, and uthappam.
Ansu and I care about how our daughter eats, but this concern
is not the sole determinant of her diet. How we feed her on any
given day depends in part on how tired we are and how much
patience the three of us can muster during a meal. Sometimes
Ansu and I have the bandwidth to negotiate with a stubborn
toddler to get her to eat more of what we want her to; other
times, Veda emerges from the meal victorious, the crumbs of
her less preferred foods scattered across the dining-​room floor.
For me, as her mother, feeding Veda remains a source of both
joy and conflict for me. Nourishing her feels at once natural and
burdensome, as each spoonful I provide reminds me that I am
on the hook for her. It reminds me that, try as I might, I cannot
shake the responsibility that the nurse in my pediatrician’s
office assigned me years ago.
Let’s see how good of a job Mom is doing.
To this day, this comment continues to ring in my ears. It
reminds me of just how readily — ​casually, even — ​parents are
put on trial for what and how much goes into their children’s
bodies.
The evidence summoned for these trials is often buttressed
by metrics, like height, weight, and BMI, that assess whether
children are being fed well, too much, or not enough. In the
broadest sense, I support these measures as public health tools;
limited as they may be, they also allow us to easily evaluate and
compare kids’ health across a population and identify precur-
sors and symptoms of disease. In fact, the nutritional and health

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inequities revealed by such metrics provided one motivation for

my research and this book. But these metrics have their limits
and downsides. BMI, for instance, is a blunt diagnostic tool and
an imprecise measure of health; calculated merely as a ratio of a
person’s weight to height, it does not take into account age, sex,
or an individual’s body composition, including how much of the
weight comes from fat and how much from muscle. What’s more,
metrics like BMI can promote tunnel vision, focusing societal
attention on kids’ nutritional outcomes and leading them to
overlook why there may be gaps between those outcomes and
parents’ efforts.2
Most parents I met as part of my research wanted to do what
was best for their kids nutritionally and shared overlapping
ideas of what “best” was. But they were dealt dramatically differ-
ent hands to do so. Some parents had ample resources — ​enough
time, a living wage, job security, stable housing, quality health
care, social support, safe neighborhoods, and intergenerational
wealth. Other parents lacked some or all of those resources. I
saw how parents with fewer means struggled not only to get food
on the table but also to maintain their dignity while being
indicted for their kids’ dietary outcomes. With inches and
pounds as largely agreed-​upon measures of kids’ well-​being,
parents found — ​like I did — ​an upsetting truth: that their chil-
dren’s bodies served as an external signal of their worthiness
as caregivers.
But scholarship and motherhood have opened my eyes to a
different truth: While parenting is measured in outcomes, it’s
largely about effort. Much of this effort is hidden, performed
daily by parents in a million unseen moments. A drawing by the
artist Paula Kuka captures this reality nicely. On the left-​hand
side, under the words What I Did, she has drawn images of a
mother changing one child’s diaper, cooking for her children,
consoling them, playing with them, nursing them, reading to
them, dancing with them, and teaching them how to ride a bike.

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 Preface

On the right-​hand side, under the words What You Saw, we see a
mom pushing a stroller.
As a society, we see numbers and outcomes. And it’s tempt-
ing to believe that there exists some linear relationship between
parents’ efforts and children’s outcomes. Especially in America,
a country largely rooted in the idea that people get what they
strive for and deserve, it can be difficult to accept that the par-
ents of kids with “poor” outcomes work just as hard as the par-
ents of kids with “good” outcomes. It doesn’t seem fair.
But just because something isn’t fair doesn’t make it any
less true.
This book is an earnest attempt to expose and explore a
largely hidden truth: that parents across society undertake sacri-
ficial, complicated, and frustrating work to feed kids. Because the
shape this work takes is context-​dependent, it continually risks
being overlooked, misunderstood, or, worst of all, condemned.
My hope is that by the time you reach this book’s final pages,
you’ll have gleaned a deeper and more nuanced understanding
of parents’ nutritional efforts and obstacles. I also hope that
you’ll join me in asking how we as a society can move away from
judging and critiquing parents to empathetically tackling their
struggles. Rather than relentlessly heaping more responsibility
and judgment onto parents’ plates for what goes in kids’ bodies,
we can begin to regard kids’ diets as a communal endeavor, one
in which we all have a role to play. If we can accept this as our
social and societal responsibility, then the question will no lon-
ger be: How should parents feed their kids? Rather, the question
will become: How can we, as a society, ensure that parents — ​all
parents — ​have the means necessary to nourish their children?

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 PART I

Divides

I often wondered: is it some kind of a trade-​off ? Do

others have to lose so we can win?
 — ​Z adie Smith, Swing Time

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 2 9/10/21 2:19:47 AM
 CHAPTER 1

Diverging Destinies

On a sweltering summer afternoon, I sat in the back seat of a ’91

Lexus sedan with the windows rolled down. It was July, and Sili-
con Valley was baking under a blazing sun and a cloudless sky.
For the past two hours, I’d joined Nyah Baker and her fourteen-​
year-​old daughter, Natasha, as they ran errands around town.
My shoulder blades stuck to the car’s black leather seats, and I
looked forward to the brief moments of respite that came when
we picked up speed and a breeze poured through the open win-
dows. Behind the wheel, Nyah fiddled with the radio and settled
on an R and B station; she turned up the volume and began to
sing along. To her right, Natasha sank deep into the passenger
seat, tapping away on her phone.
It had been just over a month since I’d started spending
time with Nyah and her family. Driving with Nyah meant being
constantly reminded that money was scarce. As we neared each
intersection, she shifted the car into neutral, coasting the final
feet to keep the gas light from coming on for just a little longer.
All of July, Nyah had complained about the car’s broken air-​
conditioning. Leather seats and hundred-​degree weather didn’t
mix. But I knew it would be at least another month before Nyah
had enough cash in hand to fix it.
Yet amid these recurring reminders that money was tight,
there were rare moments when Nyah’s worries temporarily sub-
sided. In these moments, she almost seemed to forget that there

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 D ivides

was barely enough money for rent and utilities. One such moment
came three hours into our outing, when Nyah and Natasha spot-
ted the unmistakable green-​and-​white logo of a Starbucks café. A
few minutes later, after a quick exchange of knowing glances, we
were inside ordering at the counter. Nyah bought herself and
Natasha two large Frappuccinos and offered to buy me one as
well. “You can treat me next time,” I assured her with a smile.
When the barista rang Nyah up, the number that flashed
across the register caught me off guard. The drinks cost $10.80.
An hour ago, I’d seen Nyah haggle with a cell phone agent to
subtract one dollar off her monthly statement. Now she was
spending double digits on two coffee-​ caramel milkshakes
topped with whipped cream.
As we waited for the drinks at the counter, I found myself
wondering why Nyah was putting her last few dollars for the
month toward a pair of Frappuccinos rather than saving to
repair the car’s air-​conditioning. This question begged a broader
one, one that I’d found myself asking time and time again over
the years I’d spent researching families’ diets. What did these
kinds of food purchases mean to moms like Nyah who were rais-
ing their kids in poverty? What would’ve been different about
this exchange to moms with significantly more money in the
bank?
That summer day, food’s meaning to Nyah started to reveal
itself to me. When the drinks popped up on the counter, I saw
Nyah’s face soften from worry to satisfaction. She handed Nata-
sha a green straw and watched her daughter happily sipping her
milkshake, taking extra care not to neglect the generous fluffy
layer of whipped cream at the top. Sure, Nyah had put her last
change toward the drinks. And sure, that money could have
gone toward fixing the car or covering the overdue electricity
bill. There wouldn’t be money to fill the gas tank today, tomor-
row, or the next day.
But for Nyah, the money had been well spent regardless. It

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 Diverging Destinies

had gone to something much bigger: her daughter’s momentary

happiness. On the drive home from Starbucks, Nyah and Nata-
sha savored their drinks. And, for the first time that day, no one
seemed bothered by the lack of AC.

In 2014, I set out to research how American families eat. Between

2014 and 2016, I interviewed parents and children from seventy-​
five families and observed four families — ​including Nyah’s — ​at
length as they went about their daily lives eating and feeding. I
also met with food-​service workers, school administrators, and
teachers, all of whom play a role in how families eat. My research
introduced me to people from all walks of life. I met families liv-
ing in gated communities, townhomes, trailer parks, and their
cars. I spoke with dentists, cashiers, lawyers, janitors, software
engineers, nurses, and sanitation workers. I came to know Black,
Latinx, Asian, white, and multiracial families, single parents
and married couples, fourth-​generation American citizens and
undocumented immigrants, stay‑at‑home caregivers and full-​
time workers. While I spent, on average, three to six hours with
most of the families I interviewed, I spent months with the four
that I followed in depth. Inside these families’ homes, I poured
bowls of cereal, reheated leftovers, sliced fruit on kitchen coun-
ters, and twirled spaghetti at dining-​room tables. Outside their
homes, I joined families as they navigated crowded supermarket
aisles. I stood beside them in winding food-​bank lines. I came to
know the daily dietary rituals of the moms, dads, and kids, plus
a few extended-family members and friends. I knew who took
sugar and cream with their coffee and whether they dipped
their fries in ketchup or ranch. Through it all, I learned how
profoundly, at times paradoxically, families’ circumstances
shaped the way they ate.
In the “About This Project” section in the back of this
book, I share the details of how this research came to be, includ-
ing how I developed relationships with families, how I

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 D ivides

conceptualized my role as a researcher and confidante, how I

wrestled with the ethical and practical issues that arose during
my time embedded within families, and how everything I
learned along the way changed me as a scholar and a human
being. But it’s worth touching on a few of these issues here.
Why did families let you spend so much time with them? Over the
years, I’ve been asked this question in one form or another more
times than I can count. There is no one-​size-​fits-​all answer to it.
Families’ motivations for speaking to me — ​and, in some cases,
spending months of their lives with me — ​ varied. Certainly,
some parents signed their families up for the money; sixty dol-
lars in compensation for an interview was a decent deal. And I
provided the families I observed at length three hundred dol-
lars for their time, which was not an insignificant sum. But
money wasn’t the sole driver behind families’ decisions to par-
ticipate in my research. Parents who didn’t need the money
agreed simply because they were curious about the research.
Others did it because a friend referred them. Still others took
pity on a graduate student in need of data for her dissertation.
Whatever the families’ motivations for signing up, who I was
and how I presented myself likely helped facilitate their partici-
pation. It helped that I was a woman in my twenties, since con-
ducting interviews and observations involved my spending many
hours alone with mothers and children. I found that moms were
comfortable with letting me inside and allowing me to speak
with their kids in private; they were even eager to know if I had
kids myself. When they discovered the answer was no, some told
me to reach out again when I became a mother — ​they’d be
happy to share their wisdom with me then too. While I never
reached out later for that particular purpose, I was struck by the
sincerity and warmth most moms showed in opening their doors
and their lives to me.
I enjoyed spending time with families. Most made me feel
like I belonged, treating me like an insider rather than an

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 Diverging Destinies

intruder. They invited me to birthday parties and communions,

introduced me to extended family and friends, and never let me
pay for gas (no matter how many times I offered). But I was vigi-
lant about not letting families’ generosity confuse me. No mat-
ter how well I came to know a family, no matter how much they
shared or how kindly they included me, I always remembered
the truth — ​that I was no insider. Their lives were not mine, and
I would always be a researcher documenting their stories. My
role as a researcher also implied an ethical responsibility to do
no harm; mistakenly believing that I could ever truly walk a mile
in families’ shoes had the potential to do real damage. Such a
misguided notion could convince me that I understood their
struggles personally, that just because I’d watched them experi-
ence those hardships, I knew those hardships too.
I did not. I do not. And instead of trying to, I strove to employ
in my research approach what the Pulitzer Prize–​w inning author
Isabel Wilkerson calls radical empathy. Radical empathy involves
putting in the work “to educate oneself and to listen with a hum-
ble heart to understand another’s experience from their perspec-
tive, not as we imagine we would feel.”1 Radical empathy demands
that you accept the limits of your understanding, given who you
are and the hand you’ve been dealt in life. Rather than trying to
make sense of other people from your own perspective and lived
experience, you must work to understand their experiences
deeply, from their perspectives and lived experiences.
Radical empathy is a tall order, and I would never claim to
have wholly succeeded at it. Like all human beings, I am prone
to biases born of my own experiences that color how I make
sense of everything I observe. But an awareness of these biases — ​
and a continual commitment to questioning them — ​also posi-
tioned me to see what others might have missed when it came to
families’ diets. As families granted me the rare opportunity to
walk beside them, I worked to grasp their worlds the way they saw
and experienced them. In doing so, I gained a deeper, richer

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 D ivides

appreciation of the fuller contexts encompassing their lives.

When it came to how families ate, choices that likely seemed
strange from the outside appeared perfectly understandable.
What society, the media, and scholars deemed irrational, irre-
sponsible, or misguided began to make perfect sense to me.
And I learned that nothing short of radical empathy is what I
needed — ​what all of us need — ​to understand families’ diets
today, as well as the deeply entrenched inequalities that drive
those diets apart.

Before embarking on this research, I knew a few important facts

about the standard American diet, or SAD, as it’s cheekily
known. The American diet is “sad” because it’s generally
unhealthy. Despite how contentious discussions about what’s
healthy and unhealthy can feel, the nutrition community actu-
ally largely agrees about what constitutes a nutritious diet — ​and
most Americans aren’t eating it. Nutritious diets consist primar-
ily of plant-​based whole foods and are rich in fruits and vegeta-
bles, whole grains, low- or fat-​free dairy, legumes, nuts, and
seafood. They are low in red and processed meats, refined
grains, and added sugar.2
Even the federal government agrees. Every five years, begin-
ning in 1990, the U.S. Department of Agriculture has published
the Dietary Guidelines for Americans (DGA). The DGA provides the
public with food-​based recommendations to meet their nutrient
needs and help prevent diet-​related chronic diseases.3 To be fair,
the DGA doesn’t always promote optimal nutrition science, as
food-​and-​beverage-​industry lobbyists work their own interests
into federal nutritional advice. But even with industry influence,
the DGA’s recommendations broadly align with those of nutri-
tion scientists. The DGA currently recommends that half one’s
plate should be fruits and vegetables, a quarter should be grains
or starches, and a quarter should be protein; a meal should also
include some low-​fat dairy. These general dietary prescriptions

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 Diverging Destinies

allow ample room for personal choice, leaving it up to individu-

als to customize their diets with any combination of these foods.
But the majority of Americans don’t follow these guidelines.
Most fall short of meeting the DGA, and Americans consistently
score poorly on measures assessing dietary health.4 One com-
monly used diet-​quality scale, the Healthy Eating Index, scores a
person’s diet quality from 0 (lowest quality) to 100 (highest qual-
ity). The average American diet earns a failing score of 59.5
Three-​quarters of Americans eat a diet low in vegetables, fruits,
dairy, and oils and high in added sugars, saturated fats, and
sodium. Fewer than one in ten Americans eat enough vegeta-
bles and fruits, and most consume too many calories each day.6
Like American adults, American kids aren’t getting the
nutrients they need. Slightly over half of children and two-​thirds
of adolescents eat a low-​quality diet with too much sodium, too
many processed foods, and too few vegetables.7 On average, kids
consume eighteen teaspoons — ​or just over seventy-​one grams — ​
of added sugar every day, making sugar one out of every seven
calories they eat.
Sad as the American diet may be, it’s actually improved mod-
estly since the turn of the twentieth century, largely due to wide-
spread nutrition-​ education efforts and food-​ safety advances.
Between 2002 and 2012, the share of people in the United States
eating an unhealthy diet fell from around 56 percent to under
46 percent. Americans have slowly started eating more whole
grains, nuts, and seeds and consuming less meat (specifically
beef and pork). They’ve also begun drinking fewer sugar-
​sweetened beverages. The statistics on children are similarly
encouraging: in 1999, three-​fourths of kids ate what is termed a
low-​quality diet; in 2016, just around half did so. Kids are also
eating more whole grains, yogurt, and fruits and vegetables and
drinking fewer sugar-​sweetened beverages.
And yet these national dietary gains have not been shared
equally across American society. Study after study has revealed

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nutritional inequalities across socioeconomic status and race and

ethnicity in America.8 Improvements in diet over the past decades
have largely been concentrated among middle- and higher-​
income Americans. In particular, high-​income Americans are
now eating better than ever — ​more often swapping fruit juice for
whole fruits, replacing refined grains with whole grains, and eat-
ing tons of nuts — ​ while improvements among lower-​ income
Americans have been much more modest. Such dietary strides
have also been racially patterned; white people’s diets have been
steadily improving over time, while Black and Mexican-​A merican
individuals haven’t experienced the same upward trends. Such
inequities exist for both adults and children.9
These nutritional disparities are alarming because of just
how much diets matter for our overall health and well-​being.
Unhealthy eating causes more than half a million deaths per
year and is linked to multiple chronic diseases, including car-
diovascular disease, high blood pressure, several types of can-
cer, and type 2 diabetes.10 Today, an unhealthy diet is the leading
contributor to mortality in the United States. What we eat has
become, quite literally, a matter of life and death.
Because our diets have such profound implications, nutri-
tional disparities help drive broader health disparities that
disproportionately harm individuals already marginalized in
American society — ​ low-​
income communities and racial and
ethnic minorities. Compared to high-​income Americans, low-​
income Americans have greater rates of diet-​related disease and
shorter life spans. They are also five times more likely to report
being in poor or fair health. People of color similarly bear the
disproportionate burden of diet-​related illness. Compared to
white people, Black, Latinx, and American Indian individuals
have higher rates of chronic disease and fewer years of life.11
While the factors underlying socioeconomic and racial health
disparities are multifaceted and complex, nutritional inequali-
ties help perpetuate them over time and across generations.

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 Diverging Destinies

Nutritional and health inequalities also tie into a much

broader story of American inequality. Economically, inequality has
long been on the rise, with the gap between the haves and have-​
nots becoming perhaps the most defining and consequential fea-
ture of contemporary life in the United States. While the rich have
gotten much richer since the 1970s, nearly everyone else has seen
their incomes stagnate or decline. The top 1 percent of earners’
annual wages have grown by 135 percent over the past thirty years,
but middle- and working-​class wages have stagnated and declined,
respectively. In 2015, the top 1 percent of families nationally made
over twenty-​six times as much as the bottom 99 percent.12
Inequality today is not only growing within generations; it
also remains shockingly durable across them. This fact stands in
stark contrast to the American Dream, which promises that
hard work and opportunity will lead to a more prosperous life, if
not for oneself, then at least for one’s children. The American
Dream delivered for many kids born in the middle of the twenti-
eth century — ​more than 90 percent of Americans born in 1940
were earning more at the age of thirty than their parents had
earned at the same age. But today, that American Dream has
become a mirage. Only half of kids born in 1980 earned more at
the age of thirty than their parents had earned at that age. Kids
born to affluent parents since the 1980s are most likely to grow
up to be affluent, while the children of the poor are more likely
to remain poor their entire lives.13 These economic inequalities
are neither natural nor inevitable but the direct consequence of
American social policy that has eroded the social safety net over
time, depressed real wages, and largely avoided instituting strong
family policies that support child-​rearing and caretaking.14
Economic inequalities are intimately intertwined with racial
and ethnic inequalities, leading people of color to be dispropor-
tionately represented among those with lower incomes and less
education. Stark and persistent racial disparities in Americans’
economic well-​ being reflect a legacy of systemic, structural

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 D ivides

racism throughout American history. In particular, enduring,

deeply rooted racial discrimination in many forms — ​including
in education, housing, hiring, and pay practices — ​has gener-
ated persistent earnings gaps between white individuals and
those of color. Over the past fifty years, the racial income gap
has not budged. In 1968, shortly after the passage of the Civil
Rights Act, the median Black family income was 57 percent that
of whites. In 2016, it was 56 percent. But the starkest racial
divides are in household wealth, reflecting centuries of white
privilege that have made it particularly difficult for people of
color to achieve economic security. Today, the average Black
family with children holds just one cent of wealth for every dol-
lar that the average white family with children holds.15
These intersecting economic and racial inequities mirror
America’s nutritional divides; as the country’s most socioeco-
nomically and racially privileged draw farther and farther ahead,
the rest are left farther and farther behind. Nowhere was this
more apparent than during the COVID‑19 pandemic. In my
final days of writing this book, SARS-​CoV‑2, the novel coronavi-
rus, spread across the globe. As it did, domestic rates of unem-
ployment, poverty, food insecurity, and hunger soared in the
United States, with Black, Latinx, American Indian, and low-​
income communities hit the hardest. These same communities
also experienced disproportionate rates of COVID‑19 infec-
tions, hospitalizations, and deaths.
Researchers attributed these severe disease outcomes and dis-
parities to multiple causes. For one, more low-​income people and
people of color had jobs that qualified them as essential workers;
they had less ability to social distance or work from home, and
this increased their risk of viral exposure. Furthermore, these
groups faced longstanding barriers to health insurance, h ­ ealth-​
care facilities, and equitable treatment by health-​care providers,
which increased the virus’s harmful, often lethal, impact. But
worse viral outcomes were also associated with the kinds of

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 Diverging Destinies

diet-​related chronic diseases — ​such as heart disease and type 2

diabetes — ​disproportionately affecting low-​income communities
and communities of color. In this way, the inequalities largely
responsible for driving nutritional disparities across race and
class also helped fuel the virus’s disproportionate impact on
America’s most vulnerable groups. As these communities fared
astonishingly worse overall than their wealthier, whiter counter-
parts, the inequalities that have long permeated American soci-
ety grew more visible than ever before in modern history.16

I was first exposed to these inequalities at nine years old. It was

1995, and my family had just begun fostering children. Over the
next five years, four foster children — ​two special-​needs, medi-
cally fragile babies and two elementary-​school siblings — ​came
to live with us through the State of Arizona’s foster-​care system.
I observed and interacted with this foster-​care system largely
within the four walls of my family’s home in Tucson. I knew from
an early age that this system was infinitely bigger than anything
my eyes could show me. I could see my foster siblings’ clothes,
watch their facial expressions, hear their intonations, share their
favorite foods, and listen to their native tongues. I could count
endless appointments, court hearings, and meetings with medi-
cal specialists, school counselors, social workers, and extended
family. I could observe my parents — ​who were willingly fostering
children, who had chosen to be a part of the system — ​constantly
struggling to work within and push back against it.
This experience left me feeling deeply conflicted about fos-
ter care and the American safety net. The foster-​care system was
brimming with ambiguities and contradictions. At times, its
institutions appeared to work in kids’ interests, temporarily
removing them from abusive or unsafe environments. It offered
food, shelter, and care when children needed them most. In
some cases, I felt that the system had done right by kids in plac-
ing them under our roof. And every so often, happy endings

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 D ivides

unfolded, like my foster brother’s reunion with his biological

mother following her completion of a rehabilitation program.
But other times, the outcomes weren’t so clearly positive.
Some of the kids who ended up in foster care, I suspected, might
well have been better off staying out of it. When the system tore
kids away from their parents, separated them from siblings, and
shuffled them from home to home with no end in sight, it wasn’t
clear that kids’ well-​being was the administration’s highest pri-
ority. From where I was sitting, the harms to a kid in the system
could potentially outweigh the benefits.17
As I grew up, observing the system’s gaps and shortcomings
fueled my desire to know more. I wanted to understand what
had happened to my foster siblings before they showed up at our
front door. I was aware that my siblings’ stories often involved
experiences of deep poverty, unemployment, parental incarcer-
ation, substance use, and sexual, physical, or emotional abuse.
But what had caused my siblings to encounter those circum-
stances? What forces were shaping my siblings’ lives, and how
did those forces relate to the ones shaping mine?
My foster (and, eventually, adopted) brother Josh helped me
explore these questions. I first met Josh on a February afternoon
in a hospital neonatal intensive care unit. Josh was born three
months premature, weighing in at just under two pounds, and
the first minute of his life forever changed the rest of it: sixty
oxygen-​deprived seconds created the physical and cognitive dis-
abilities he’d bear forever, including cerebral palsy, microceph-
aly, and a host of developmental delays.
Quickly following Josh’s birth, the State of Arizona severed
the legal rights of his biological mother, Tracy. At the time,
Tracy was herself a child at seventeen years old. While the state
may have deemed her a perpetrator, she had also been a victim,
bearing scars of persistent childhood neglect, domestic abuse,
and her own harrowing experiences in the foster-​care system.
Even though Tracy was without legal parental rights, my

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 Diverging Destinies

parents were resolute about offering her the chance to be a part

of Josh’s life. She would always be his mother, even if the circum-
stances prevented her from assuming the caregiving role that
status usually entailed. Until she passed away, at the age of
thirty-​t wo, Tracy was an important part of Josh’s life and of our
lives too. We saw her consistently for decades. She sat at our din-
ner table. She attended Josh’s school graduations and birthday
parties. During his multiple hospital stays, Tracy visited him.
When Tracy gave birth years later to a second son, Jeremy, we all
met Josh’s younger half brother.
Tracy’s life imprinted on mine. She and I were eight years
apart. In another world, she could have been my big sister, my
babysitter, or my cool older neighbor. She might have swung by
my neighborhood lemonade stand or told me all about what to
expect in high school.
But in this world, she was none of those things. Tracy and I
had been born into dramatically different circumstances: Tracy
into poverty, me into the middle class. I lived in a physically and
psychologically safe home and neighborhood. Her childhood
home had been anything but. The gulf between our experi-
ences felt greater than our difference in age.
Without Josh, my path would almost certainly not have
crossed with Tracy’s. But with Josh, our lives were intimately
intertwined. As the mother of my brother, she was, in some ways,
my family. And observing Tracy — ​her diffident smile, her kind
eyes, her high-​waisted jeans — ​I found myself often considering
the fact that her life could have been mine. Why hadn’t I been
born Tracy, and Tracy born me?
Through my foster siblings, I observed firsthand other lives I
could have led, other circumstances in which I could have been
raised. How had I ended up here and they ended up there? The
facts were these: For a moment, we all existed in the same world.
We lived under the same roof, slept in the same rooms, shared the
same clothes. We sat around the same dinner table, attended the

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same schools, watched the same TV shows. But the similarities

that bound us in those moments were, well, momentary. They
were completely contingent on a system that temporarily tethered
us together. I knew that because of the different worlds from which
we had come and to which we would ultimately return, our desti-
nies would eventually diverge. I came to understand, as deeply as a
child can, that my life and my future were largely sculpted by one
lucky, arbitrary chance — ​to whom and where I’d been born.
Years later, as a doctoral student researching social inequal-
ity, I often thought back to these early interactions with the
­foster-​care system. I’d reflect on the inequities I’d seen shape
my life and those of my foster siblings, and I’d connect what I
was learning in lectures and articles to what I’d beheld with my
own eyes. During this period, I found myself grappling with one
particular aspect of inequality that I’d observed as a child but
that didn’t seem to feature prominently in sociological research.
That aspect was food.
For years, I witnessed the interplay between food and inequal-
ity in the foster-​care system. I saw how deeply rooted inequalities
affected my foster siblings’ and my diets and how those diets
had far-​reaching consequences for our health and well-​being.
I’d fed some of my foster siblings through feeding tubes and
watched while others hoarded cans of soup under their beds. I
observed how my siblings wanted and begged for foods unfamil-
iar to me and how my own cravings could similarly perplex
them. I witnessed how, when everything was constantly chang-
ing around these kids — ​people, houses, pets, furniture — ​food
could become a rare source of stability and refuge.
I had seen how the human need to eat unites us, but the way
that each of us meets that need pushes us farther apart. Now,
what I wanted to uncover was how.

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 CHAPTER 2

Families in an Age of
Inequality

One summer afternoon in 2014, in the cluttered, windowless

office at Stanford University where I spent most of my days as a
doctoral student, I sat at my desk reviewing the latest research
on nutritional inequality in America. I was searching for infor-
mation about its causes.
One epidemiological article reported that, from 2000 to
2010, diet disparities between rich and poor Americans had not
only persisted but widened.1 I scrolled through the article on
my laptop, speed-​reading until I reached the conclusion. Here
was where I thought the authors might discuss what was causing
these growing disparities.
The conclusion’s first sentences were encouraging. “There are
several potential explanations for the disparities across income lev-
els,” the authors began. My office chair creaked as I leaned forward,
ready for answers to my questions. The authors proposed two.
The first was price. They explained that “price is a major
determinant of food choice, and healthful foods generally cost
more than unhealthful foods in the United States.” The second
was geographic access to healthy foods. “Access to healthful foods
also contributes to income-​related disparities,” the authors wrote.
“Low-​income households are less likely to own a car and thus may
have limited access to supermarkets that sell healthful foods.”

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From there, the authors seamlessly and speedily moved on

to other topics, including their study’s strengths and limitations
and directions for future research. I closed the laptop and my
eyes for a moment.
Is that really it? I wondered. My confusion was exceeded only
by my skepticism. Was nutritional inequality completely explained
by the fact that healthy food was more expensive and farther away
from lower-​income folks than wealthier ones? Were price and
proximity the primary factors shaping how Americans ate?
Trying to set my skepticism aside momentarily, I decided to
take a walk and clear my head. I stuffed my phone and keys into
the back pocket of my jeans, shut my office door behind me, and
descended a flight of stairs to the ground floor.
Outside, the air was still, and the sun filtered through palm
trees onto the pavement. My mind wandered to a chilly autumn
afternoon in Manhattan. The year was 1990. I was five years old.
After my mom picked me up from kindergarten, we took the
bus to my favorite place in the entire world: a bagel shop one
block from our apartment. Inside, the air was warm and smelled
of toasted bread, garlic, and onion. My mom ordered us two
bagels — ​one plain bagel with cream cheese for me, one sesame
bagel with butter for her. I hung my coat on a chair back as the
plastic red baskets with our bagels popped up at the pickup
counter. My mom grabbed them and set them down in front of
us. The steam and scent rose toward my nose. I looked at my
mom, admiring her easy smile and long, auburn hair tied
loosely in a low ponytail. Nothing could beat my favorite food at
my favorite place with my favorite person.
Now, as I weaved my way through campus, dodging students
biking to and from class, a pang of nostalgia hit. I longed to be
back in that moment — ​to stare across a wobbly wooden table at my
mother as we bit into steaming bread and licked cream cheese or
butter from our fingers. This was not the first time I’d felt this way.
As a first-​year college student, homesick and lonely, I had trudged

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

in subzero Chicago temperatures to a sandwich shop to enjoy a

toasted sesame bagel slathered in butter. While I was still a plane
ride away, each bite made me feel just a tiny bit closer to my family.
The farther I walked, the deeper in thought I sank. I medi-
tated on a simple truth that so many of my life’s most salient mem-
ories were connected to food. From my childhood in Arizona, I
could still hear the sizzle of eggs frying in a pan on Sunday morn-
ings in my family’s kitchen. I could smell the toasted cumin and
coriander in steaming bowls of dal I devoured in my grandpar-
ents’ New Delhi home. I could taste the chocolate chip cookies
my older brother and I fought over in high school. In college, I
reveled in the newfound freedom of all-​you-​can-​eat dining-​hall
buffets. I packed dried cereal into paper cups and smuggled them
back to my dorm room as snacks for late-​night study sessions.
When I moved into my first shared apartment, I baked frozen piz-
zas and roasted broccoli florets in the oven. I savored what felt like
adulthood as I prepared breakfasts of Greek yogurt, granola, and
sliced banana. After college, living in Germany, I enjoyed slowly
perusing the aisles of unfamiliar supermarkets and sampling new
foods. I felt a part of German culture as I ordered my Franz-
brötchen, a north German cinnamon bun, from the local bakery.
Later, when I settled in California as a graduate student, I loved
cooking barefoot while listening to my music of choice in my tiny
studio apartment. After dinner, I ate cookie dough ice cream with
a long spoon out of the carton, the freezer door open.
So many foods embedded in so many of my memories. Some
of these foods I no longer ate; others remained staples in my
diet. What united them all, though, was that they felt like a part
of me — ​etched into who I’d been and who I’d become. They all
meant something to me. Fried eggs meant home, casseroles com-
fort and family, Franzbrötchen adventure, and frozen pizzas
freedom. Some made me feel warmth, comfort, and joy; others
transported me back to grief or loneliness.
I eventually found my way back to the office and plopped

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myself down at my desk. I remained engrossed in thought about

food’s connections to certain places, people, and feelings in my
life. How did those connections shape my food choices? As the
article’s authors had noted, what was both financially affordable
and geographically available had in part influenced my dietary
decisions. I didn’t buy foods priced beyond my graduate-​student
budget, and I only had the time and energy to travel so far to eat
(although I understood that being a full-​time student without
caregiving responsibilities granted me a unique amount of
scheduling flexibility). But beyond price and proximity, my
choices were shaped by what food meant to me and how it made
me feel. I ate for pleasure and connection. I ate to satiate and to
remember. I ate to show affection and to rejoice in celebration. I
ate to signal who I was, where I came from, and what I believed in.
But was I alone in attaching such significance to food? I
didn’t think so.
This hunch catapulted me into years of research on fami-
lies’ diets. My goal was to understand how families ate and how
their different circumstances shaped the food they put in their
bodies. I wanted to know whether price and proximity were the
only things that mattered and, if not, what else factored in.
Through it all, I learned that the contexts within which families
live shape their physical, logistical, financial, and psychological
access to eating healthy food. But families’ disparate contexts
also fuel dietary inequalities by affecting something even more
fundamental. They affect the very meaning of food itself. Food’s
different meanings to families across society, I came to see, are
central to the story of nutritional inequality today. And I learned
that only by understanding these meanings will we have a shot
at reducing the inequities that drive our diets apart.

For my research I interviewed one hundred sixty parents and

kids and observed four families in depth. Because adolescence
is a particularly vulnerable nutritional period  — ​kids’ diet

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

quality generally declines when they become teenagers — ​ I

focused on families with teenagers, although many also had
younger children and a few had young adults who lived at home.
All of the families lived, as I did, in the San Francisco Bay
Area, one of the most unequal places in the country. Over the
past thirty years, incomes for Bay Area families in the top nineti-
eth percentile have grown by 60 percent while those for families
in the bottom tenth percentile have edged up a mere 20 per-
cent. Today, the ninetieth-​percentile earners bring in around
$400,000 a year, while the bottom tenth make just over $30,000.2
The Bay Area owes its skyrocketing inequality to the social and
economic changes that accompanied the growth of new industries
such as the tech sector. Bigger incomes at the top increased the cost
of living for everyone, including low- and middle-​income earners,
whose wages largely stagnated. Sky-​high rents and the vanishing
possibility of home ownership have driven low-​income families
and communities of color from its inner to its outer reaches, or
out of the region altogether.
Yet even within the wealthiest areas, concentrated affluence
and poverty coexist. In every single Bay Area county, the number of
families living in poverty has grown since the 1980s. In San Mateo
County, where I rented an apartment my final year of graduate
school, I saw extended families living in their RVs just a stone’s
throw away from exquisitely landscaped gated mansions. Tech
moguls drove their Teslas down streets lined with public housing.
Twenty-​something data scientists making six figures ordered coffee
from single mothers working two jobs to make ends meet.
While the Bay Area’s juxtaposition of affluence and poverty
feels extreme, it is also increasingly characteristic of American
life. In an age of rising inequality, the region has been a trend-
setter, not an outlier. Today, America is looking more and more
like the Bay Area: increasing residential segregation, a hollow-
ing of the middle class, and growing financial hardship among
the poor. While the families I met all lived in the Bay Area, they

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tell a very all-​A merican story. They also showcase the diversity of
that story, hailing from different socioeconomic, racial, and cul-
tural backgrounds.
In most families, I almost always spent time with the moms.
Moms were the ones who generally responded to my calls, set up
interviews, and hosted me when I came over. Dads were some-
times, but not always, present. There were exceptions to this
general rule; I met a handful of families whose fathers, some of
whom were stay‑at‑home parents, took the lead on food. But
these cases were rare in my study, just as they are across the
country. Despite societal gains in gender equality at home over
the past century, American moms today remain families’ pri-
mary caregivers. Moms still do more of the work of raising kids
and managing homes, spending more time each day on their
children and having less leisure time for themselves compared
to dads. In 2016, mothers spent a weekly average of fourteen
hours on childcare; dads spent eight hours. Moms devoted eigh-
teen hours a week to housework; dads put in ten hours a week.
The statistics are even starker when it comes to who does the
feeding. In four out of five families headed by married, hetero-
sexual couples, mothers are the primary food providers. Even
when both parents work outside the home, mothers continue to
do most of the foodwork. They grocery shop, cook and clean up,
and pack lunches and snacks. They also shoulder feeding’s cogni-
tive and emotional labor, including meal planning, worrying
about what family members should be eating, and navigating and
negotiating different food preferences and allergies. When it
comes to cooking, moms spend three times as much time on meal
preparation every day as dads, clocking sixty-​eight minutes ver-
sus twenty-​three minutes.3 The families I met generally followed
this very gendered pattern, with moms assuming the vast majority
of responsibility for shopping, prepping, and cooking. Some of
these moms enjoyed or took pride in this responsibility, while oth-
ers loathed or resented it. Regardless, all of them did the work.

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

For this book, I debated how best to show how this food-​related
work played out across families. How could I both showcase the
shared experiences binding moms while also revealing important
differences between them? I landed, ultimately, on an imperfect
solution. In the following pages, I delve most deeply into the lives
of the four families I observed extensively while interweaving
others’ stories in. Doing so allows me to share details of families’
experiences while also highlighting their heterogeneity.
The four families I spent the most time with came from varied
educational, economic, and ethno-​racial backgrounds. The Bak-
ers were a Black family living below the federal poverty line; the
Williamses were a working-​class white family just above it; the
Ortegas were a middle-​class Latinx family; and the Cains were an
affluent white family.4 These families’ stories do not represent all
families that share their socioeconomic or racial/ethnic charac-
teristics. The Ortegas don’t exemplify every middle-​class Latinx
family, nor are the Cains a universal depiction of all affluent white
families. Each family’s diet was uniquely theirs. At the same time,
their experiences highlight particular dietary challenges, feelings,
and meanings shared by families with overlapping situations.
Below, I introduce the Bakers, Williamses, Ortegas, and
Cains before delving into their diets. While raising their chil-
dren under dramatically different circumstances, the moms in
each family were united by their devotion to their kids and their
desire to use food to do right by them.

The Bakers

I first met Nyah Baker at her home on a damp, overcast January

afternoon. Two days prior, I’d interviewed her sister Dominique,
who had pointed me in Nyah’s direction for another interview.
“She needs that sixty bucks,” Dominique said with a chuckle
as she pulled out her phone to text her sister. Forty seconds later,

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Dominique told me I could drive over to Nyah’s for the inter-

view. Given that it often took weeks or even months to schedule
interviews, Nyah’s availability caught me off guard. But I’d soon
learn that what Nyah lacked in money she made up for in time.
A lecture on campus pulled me back to Stanford that after-
noon, so Nyah and I scheduled our meeting for two days later.
Nyah lived just ten minutes down the road from Dominique on a
wide, peaceful residential street lined with Buicks and Fords and
sparsely dotted with trees. Nyah was one of five million Ameri-
cans living in Section 8 housing. The Section 8 Housing Choice
Voucher Program is a form of government rent assistance through
which private landlords can rent to qualified low-​income families
at a market rate; the federal vouchers cover some or all of the fam-
ily’s rent, while the family takes care of the rest. Many of Nyah’s
neighbors were also voucher recipients. When Nyah moved in
eight years ago, she paid $87 a month in rent. Now, she was paying
$603. But Nyah knew that she was lucky; most Americans don’t
live in public or voucher-​subsidized housing, and three out of four
who qualify for assistance don’t actually receive any.5
Nyah loved her three-​ bedroom house with its spacious
garage that she’d converted into a second living room. For the
past eight years, it had been home to her and her two younger
daughters: Mariah, now sixteen years old, and Natasha, now
fourteen. Nyah’s eldest, twenty-​ four-​
year-​
old Latoya, lived in
Arizona with her husband and their son.
The afternoon I met Nyah, she opened the front door dressed
in black sweatpants and a neon-​green hoodie. Her long, black,
braided hair was pulled into a tight bun atop her head, with a
leopard-​patterned headband to keep the flyaways at bay. Across
one collarbone, the word family was tattooed in black cursive.
Nyah and I hit it off instantly. She had a straight-​shooting
candor and self-​assuredness that made conversation easy. You
could talk to Nyah for an hour and think it was twenty minutes.
Part of what made the time fly was Nyah’s disarming humor, an

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

effortless blend of self-​deprecation and lighthearted teasing.

With food, as with other topics, Nyah was authentic and
unabashed. “I’ve got nothing to hide,” she told me the first day
we met. She meant it.
Over time, I grew to be in awe of Nyah. Despite enduring
countless traumas, she approached life and looked to the future
with a seemingly bottomless well of hope, ingenuity, and guts.
Nyah was born in Georgia; when she was seven, her mom
fled with her and her four siblings to escape a physically abusive
domestic situation. They found refuge in Northern California,
near Nyah’s maternal grandmother. But soon after arriving on
the West Coast, Nyah’s mom got caught up in a bad crowd, spi-
raling into drug addiction and leaving Nyah and her siblings
largely on their own. Nyah had to grow up fast. She took care of
her two younger sisters, one of whom was Dominique, shielding
them from their mother’s addiction and sexually predatory male
relatives and family friends.
“I had to play the role of a mom at a young age,” Nyah recalled
as we sat at her kitchen table. When Nyah turned fourteen, she
became a mom herself. After years of repeated sexual assaults by
her uncle, Nyah discovered she was pregnant. When Latoya was
born, Nyah was forced to drop out of school to care for her
daughter.
“The only way I knew how to survive and to feed my baby,”
Nyah said with a sigh, “was to go out and sell my body.” Nyah’s
teenage years were dark, not only because of this but also
because of her drug and alcohol addictions. But when Nyah
turned twenty, two wonderful things happened. First, she got
clean. Second, she met Darius, who would later give her Mariah
and Natasha. Things were good for a while, even though money
continued to be tight and the two had their issues. For the most
part, Nyah was happy. But when Darius died of a stroke a decade
later, Nyah was left alone with the two girls. Now, Nyah was rais-
ing them as a single mom. She was one of twenty-​one single

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mothers I met during my research and one of over nine million

single mothers in the United States.
I met both Mariah and Natasha that first afternoon too.
Natasha, with thick black cornrows, a white gap-​toothed smile,
and a red T‑shirt, waved hello from the couch, where she spent
most of the afternoon tapping away on her phone. Mariah, in a
black yoga tank top and leggings, her hair in a high bun with
wandering strands down her cheeks, sauntered in and out of the
house over the course of two hours. At one point, she carried a
brown bag from McDonald’s filled with two cheeseburgers and
a sixteen-​ounce soda for her sister.
Mariah and Natasha were sweet-​ tempered, soft-​ spoken
girls. They were also best friends. Nyah saw herself in both of
them. Mariah was an easy kid, Nyah told me, as Nyah herself
had been. “She’s not all wild and stuff.” Nyah beamed. “She’s
not into the stuff that most kids her age are into.” Natasha had
Nyah’s sense of humor. She was the comedian of the family, a
tomboy with a bright smile. “I never had a boy, so she’s like my
son.” Nyah laughed. “Crazy, sexy, and cute all in one.”
The three got on well. The girls helped Nyah host neighbor-
hood barbecues, where they would grill steaks and prepare bowls
of potato salad. In the evenings, the three of them would
immerse themselves in movie marathons, repeating their favor-
ite romantic comedies from Nyah’s extensive pirated-​DVD collec-
tion. Nyah’s pride in her girls was always on display. Mariah and
Natasha were going to do better than she had. They were going
to finish high school. Already, Nyah’s eldest daughter, Latoya,
had broken the cycle of becoming an early-​teen mom. She’d
waited until she was seventeen to get pregnant, Nyah explained.
I also came to know Nyah’s boyfriend, Marcus, a lanky, gruff
man in his forties who concealed his skin-​and-​bones physique
under oversize T‑shirts and baggy shorts. Marcus often hung
around in front of the house. A neighborhood mechanic, he
spent most afternoons working on his own car, a worn blue van

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

permanently parked at the foot of Nyah’s driveway. Nyah loved

Marcus deeply, but his limited ability to contribute financially
coupled with his heavy alcohol use left Nyah feeling profoundly
alone. She couldn’t depend on him or anyone else to help sup-
port her and her girls economically, emotionally, or psychologi-
cally. Nyah’s experience reflected the economic reality in America
for single moms, a third of whom are raising their children in
poverty, nearly five times more than married-​couple families.
“It’s like I’m in this all by myself,” Nyah told me one morn-
ing as Jerry Springer flashed across the garage TV screen. “I’m
the one taking care of the bills and making sure we keep a roof
over our heads, food in our mouths, clothes on our backs.”
For years, Nyah had made good money as a cleaning lady.
She worked long hours scrubbing toilets, mopping hardwood
floors, and sanitizing sink basins. Thirteen dollars an hour
wasn’t much, but it added up over fifty or sixty hours each week.
But the year I met Nyah, she was confronting a set of disabling
health conditions that took her out of the workforce. At thirty-​
nine, Nyah felt that she was facing the challenges of someone
double her age. She was a type 2 diabetic, had hypertension,
and was awaiting a hysterectomy to address a painful, debilitat-
ing overgrowth of uterine fibroids. She had a slipped disk in her
back and relentless, dull pain in her joints. Mentally, Nyah
struggled with depression and anxiety.
Nyah’s health conditions struck me, first and foremost, as the
consequence of weathering. The weathering hypothesis, which
was first proposed by the public health scholar Arline Geroni-
mus in 1992, argues that the constant stress of racism — ​for Black
women in particular — ​leads to premature biological aging and
poor health outcomes. Geronimus proposed, and mounting
research since has corroborated, that Black women’s health dete-
riorates in early adulthood as a consequence of cumulative expo-
sure to socioeconomic adversity, political marginalization, and
the lived experience of ongoing racism and discrimination.6

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Together, Nyah’s health conditions made working impossi-

ble. Nyah had no choice but to rely on government support to
make ends meet. She felt ashamed of that fact. It was not who
she was. That shame was matched only by the financial stress
she felt daily. Nyah had filed for disability benefits months ago,
but she had yet to see any checks arrive in the mail.
In the meantime, Nyah made ends meet by constructing
both a formal and an informal safety net for herself. Her income
consisted mostly of monthly sixteen-​ hundred-​ dollar Supple-
mental Security Income (SSI) payments she received for her
daughters’ learning disabilities. That covered some of her
expenses, including the highly subsidized rent of $603, utilities,
cable, cell phones, and gas for her car. Nyah was also resource-
ful; she recycled beer cans, borrowed cash from her aunt, took
out payday loans, and pawned her jewelry. When paying the bills
demanded another hustle, Nyah took temporary employment as
a sex worker. Nyah had no savings and thousands of dollars in
credit card debt that she knew would never be paid off.

The Williamses

“It takes a village,” Dana Williams told me as we sat at her kitchen

table one swampy afternoon in early June. Like Nyah, Dana was
a single mom raising two daughters: thirteen-​year-​old Madison
and five-​year-​old Paige. The Williamses’ eight-​hundred-​square-​
foot, two-​bedroom apartment was a ten-​minute walk from Dana’s
childhood home. Over the past few decades, the placid, residen-
tial area had changed significantly, transforming from a
working-​ class white neighborhood of front yards displaying
American flags to a community of primarily first- and second-​
generation Mexican-​A merican families.
At four foot eleven with short, flat-​ironed brown hair and a
face full of freckles, Dana had spunk. Most of the time, she

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

paired thin black leggings with a racerback tank top and silver
hoop earrings that swung back and forth with each springy step.
Dana had ten tattoos, including Paige’s name on her left foot
and Madison’s on the back of her neck. When we first met, Dana
showed me one tattoo she was in the painful process of remov-
ing: her ex‑husband’s initials around her ring finger.
A quick-​w itted and frank conversationalist, Dana paired her
opinions with open-​mindedness. She had deep convictions, yet
that never dampened her curiosity about other viewpoints.
Aspects of my life — ​this research, for instance — ​seemed strange
to her, but she always praised me for doing what made me happy.
Like Nyah, Dana was resilient and optimistic. She was also no
stranger to feeling lonely, although she generally didn’t feel alone.
Her family’s support, Dana liked to tell me, was what allowed her
to financially and emotionally weather the challenges she had
faced over the years: her biological father’s alcoholism, her
ex‑husband’s drug addiction and emotional abuse, a tumultuous
divorce, and, most recently, her own battle with breast cancer.
At forty years old, Dana had already overcome a lot. When
Dana was a baby, her mother left her father — ​a physically abu-
sive drug addict and alcoholic — ​and quickly remarried. At fif-
teen, Dana dropped out of high school and moved out of her
mother and stepfather’s place and in with her boyfriend. While
Dana eventually dumped that boyfriend and went on to earn
her GED, the experience taught her the value of independence
and grit. At twenty-​four, Dana met a man named Justin.
“We fell in love, whatever,” Dana said with a laugh as she
replayed their romance for me. A year later, Dana gave birth to
Madison. Six weeks after that, Justin split, leaving Dana alone to
care for their newborn. In the end, Justin gave Madison little
else beyond life.
Without child support or a job, Dana moved back in with her
mom, Debra. Debra was a wiry, fiercely loyal woman with an eye-
brow ring and inability to suffer fools. Debra supported Dana the

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first year of Madison’s life while Dana put herself through medical-​
assistant school and then secured her first job at a pediatric clinic.
When Madison was four years old, Dana fell in love again.
His name was Chris and he was tall with coarse brown hair and
a diamond stud in each ear. Chris was ready to commit. A year
later, the two got married. Two years after that, Paige was born.
Dana thought she had found her happy ending: a loving mar-
riage and a family of four. But Dana soon saw her mother’s his-
tory repeating itself in her own life. Chris started drinking
frequently and dealing and using drugs. Dana intervened, tell-
ing him he had to get his act together. On her salary, she put
him through rehab, after which his substance use seemed to
subside. But when it flared up again two years later, it was accom-
panied by extreme verbal and psychological abuse.
On Paige’s fourth birthday, Dana decided to cut her losses:
she filed for divorce and issued a restraining order against
Chris. Two months later, she discovered she had breast cancer.
The next year was spent in a haze, cycling between courtrooms
and chemotherapy.
“I’m a push‑go‑shove kind of person,” Dana said, recounting
the most challenging year of her life. “So I pushed and shoved
my way through it.” Dana devoted whatever energy she had to
shielding her girls from the effects of both traumas. Looking
back, she was proudest of the fact that nothing changed for
Madison and Paige during that year.
“My girls never saw me cry.” Dana smiled, tucking a flyaway
strand of brown hair behind her ear. “I either cried in the
shower or in bed.”
Dana survived both the divorce and cancer, successes that
she in part attributed to her parents’ support. Through it all,
Debra had watched both girls. Dana’s father, who was now clean,
had helped her financially. And her kids — ​well, her kids were
what had kept her going. They were her entire world, her single
greatest source of joy.

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

Dynamic and curious, Madison and Paige endeared them-

selves to me the first time we met. Madison, who had long dark
brown hair, wide eyes, and a cheerleader’s physique, had strug-
gled over the years with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder
and anxiety, but she had an electricity that could light up the
darkest room. With light brown hair, a contagious gap-​toothed
smile, and boundless energy, Madison’s younger sister, Paige,
was notoriously affectionate, often snuggling with her mom in
bed and meeting me at the front door with a bear hug. The rest
of the time, Paige was cracking jokes, impersonating her favor-
ite cartoon characters, or somersaulting across the living room.
Dana was a devoted mother, adaptive to her girls’ evolving
needs and interests. And whatever time she didn’t spend with
her kids, she spent trying to support them. Whether that meant
working around the clock or calling various camps and sports
leagues to inquire about youth scholarships, Dana strove tire-
lessly to grant her daughters their dreams. For Paige, that meant
getting to practice gymnastics and softball. For Madison, it was
cheerleading and church camp. What Dana didn’t want was for
them to have less than meaningful childhoods just because they
weren’t growing up rich. She wouldn’t let them be shortchanged
just because she was a single mom.
“I’m their mom and their dad, basically,” Dana informed me
one afternoon as she poured in the powdered cheese for Paige’s
mac-​and-​cheese dinner. She also told me that she had no inten-
tion of remarrying. “I refuse for my kids to feel like I’m picking a
man over them,” Dana explained, stirring the cheese and pasta.
“I’m trying to break the cycle.”
Part of breaking the cycle involved shielding her daughters
from negative influences. Dana, for her part, had resolved to
stay clean: no tobacco, no drugs, not even prescription narcot-
ics. “After my double mastectomy and reconstruction,” she told
me, “I took meds for three days and that was it.” When she had
her ovaries and fallopian tubes removed, Dana didn’t pop one

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pill. Once a month, she treated herself to a cocktail with her

girlfriends. That was the extent of her drinking.
Financially, Dana was close to making ends meet. Her full-​
time job as a medical assistant with benefits gave her some degree
of financial stability and health care for her and her daughters.
Even though she was still paying off thousands in credit card debt,
didn’t receive any child support, and had never opened a savings
account, Dana felt that she was managing. Each month, she
brought home a little over four thousand dollars. That, coupled
with three hundred dollars a month from her dad and his willing-
ness to cover her car payments and half of Madison’s cheerleading
costs, helped. But Dana’s income went fast. Half of her monthly
paycheck, about two thousand dollars, she put toward rent and
utilities. The rest was divided among cell phone bills, cable bills,
gas, trash pickup, and the girls’ activities and after-​school care.
Dana and her brother also paid Debra’s rent and cell phone bills.
Once a month, Dana treated herself to a manicure.
“People always tell me you have to make your own time.”
Dana laughed, looking down at her newly polished nails. “But I
don’t know. Maybe when the girls are all grown.”

The Ortegas

“We’re a busy family,” Renata Ortega told me the first time we

met. It was a crisp October morning, and we were standing in the
kitchen of the three-​bedroom house that Renata and her hus-
band, José, had bought in 2009 for just over $400,000. The Orte-
gas lived in a middle-​class neighborhood lined with single-​family
homes belonging to Latinx, white, and Asian families. Renata’s
kids  — ​fourteen-​year-​old Amalia and twelve-​year-​old Nico  — ​were
on fall break, and Renata was preparing their breakfast. After
sautéing two sausage links in a frying pan, she poured in four
whisked eggs to make an omelet. When the omelet was ready, she

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

divided it onto two plates and added a handful of oven-​baked

crinkle-​cut fries to each. “Nico! Amalia! Breakfast is ready!” she
called to the kids as she carried their plates into the dining room.
Renata, with her wide brown eyes and thick black hair tied
in a neat ponytail, had a welcoming, measured demeanor. Warm
and patient, Renata could calm even the most frayed of nerves.
That morning, she wore gray pin-​striped trousers and a black
V‑neck shirt featuring the logo of the bank where she worked as
a business manager.
Renata was a fourth-​generation Mexican-​A merican. Her hus-
band, José, was third-​generation. Both were born and raised in
the Bay Area, Renata as a self-​identified latchkey kid. Her father,
a Vietnam veteran, became an engineer, and her mother held
jobs as a telephone operator, teacher’s aide, and small-​business
owner. Together, Renata’s parents worked hard to open doors for
their kids. While Renata’s brothers spent much of their time on
the soccer field, Renata’s passion was dance. It was a love she car-
ried through her high-school and college years, performing on
the sidelines for sports teams and in a major dance company.
Upon graduating from San Francisco State University, Renata
began her career in commercial banking. A few years later, a
friend set her up with José, a tall man with gelled black hair and
a soft smile who was nine years her senior. José didn’t have Rena-
ta’s college degree, but he was both a successful musician and a
salesman for technology products. After a couple of years of dat-
ing, the two got married and had Amalia. Renata had always
wanted a family of four, and two years after Amalia was born,
she got her wish when she gave birth to a son, Gabriel. But at just
three months old, soon after Renata returned to work, Gabriel
passed away from sudden infant death syndrome.
The tragic loss of their son forever changed Renata and
José. “You cannot imagine what it’s like to go through some-
thing like that,” Renata told me. The loss took a toll on them as
individuals and as partners. But in that utter darkness, Renata

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and José uncovered something new: their faith. Turning to God

and the church, they found hope and purpose in Christianity.
“Church became the platform for us to heal, pick up the
pieces, and rebuild our lives,” Renata said, smiling. Their faith
also became a centerpiece of their family life, helping them
“beat the odds.” Most marriages, Renata knew, didn’t survive
the loss of a child.
In the end, their son Nico’s arrival gave Renata the family of
four she’d always longed for. That family became everything to
her. As a mom, Renata was a devoted Energizer Bunny and an
eternal optimist. The kids and their interests and activities
kept her and José very busy, which was how they liked it. One
evening as we sat on the couch watching TV, Renata told me
about her recent career transition. After two decades working at
one bank, five years ago she moved to a different bank, Metro-
politan Trust.
“I told Metro that I needed to be able to prioritize my fam-
ily,” she explained. “If my kids need me, then I have to be able to
pick them up and tend to them.”
Amalia and Nico were easygoing and amiable like their
mom. With coarse brown hair woven into two long braids, Ama-
lia had high cheekbones and smiled often. Nico had light brown
hair and a calm energy. Both kids were involved in the perform-
ing arts, church youth groups, modeling, and commercial act-
ing. Many of the hours I spent at Renata’s side were in the
passenger seat of her Ford Fusion as she shuttled Amalia and
Nico around to their various extracurriculars.
Renata traced her devotion to her kids back to her own
childhood. “Growing up,” she told me, “we didn’t feel poor. But
looking back now, I see that we were kinda poor.” When Renata
was growing up, she knew that her parents worked hard, even
scrambling at times to make ends meet. She knew they had out-
standing debts on at least a dozen credit cards. She also recalled
a brief period when they were both out of work. Money was so

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

tight then that in order to pay their mortgage, they had to cash
in the savings bonds they’d bought her and her two brothers.
But whatever financial hardships her parents endured, they
made sure Renata never suffered the effects. They sacrificed to
deliver Renata a vibrant childhood packed with dance recitals
and competitions. They never skimped on anything for their
daughter’s dancing, whether that meant covering the hotels for
overnight competitions or buying the glitteriest outfit to help
Renata shine onstage. Reflecting on everything her parents had
done for her, Renata was clear about one thing. She wanted to
provide the same for her own children.
“I feel that we are doing that for our kids now,” Renata told
me, smiling. Compared to her parents, Renata believed, she and
José were in a more comfortable position to offer their kids
active, fulfilling childhoods. She also felt that, health-​w ise, they
were prepared to do this. Renata, who was in her mid-​forties,
was mindful of her family history of high blood pressure and
diabetes. But apart from her marginally high cholesterol and
José’s high blood pressure, they were in good shape.
Renata wished they made more money, but she appreciated
what they had. Together, Renata and José brought in around
$175,000 a year. They had a mortgage, but they also had savings
and retirement accounts. Their kids were enrolled in good pub-
lic schools, and once a year they took a family vacation.
“At least we own our home!” Renata said. This was indeed a
remarkable thing in an area with a median home price of
$928,000. Still, Renata told me, she sometimes worried. “We still
feel like we’re living paycheck to paycheck.”

The Cains

I first met Julie Cain in the foyer of the two-​story, four-​bedroom

house she shared with her husband, Zach, and their two kids,

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thirteen-​ year-​
old Jane and seventeen-​ year-​
old Evan. Just a
fifteen-​minute drive from the Ortegas, the Cains lived on a
quiet cul‑de‑sac in a largely white, upper-​middle-​class residen-
tial neighborhood. That day, their home was decorated in
anticipation of Halloween in two weeks. Outside, pumpkins of
assorted shapes and sizes lined the front steps. Inside, kitchen
countertops and the fireplace mantel were covered with
pumpkin-, witch-, and ghost-​themed decorations.
When I rang the doorbell that first afternoon, I heard Max,
the Cains’ border collie, scurry across the living room to greet
me, his toenails tapping on the hardwood floors. Julie followed,
calling his name to quiet his barking. Julie, who was in her mid-​
forties, had short, straight, straw-​blond hair that she wore in a
layered bob. Warm and affable, Julie had a bellowing laugh that
echoed off the kitchen tiles and an unmistakably Midwestern
hospitality. She also carried the remnants of a Midwestern
twang even though it had been decades since she’d called the
middle of the country home.
Julie had a casual, polished style. She was often sporting a
cardigan with skinny jeans, athleisure-​style leggings and tank
tops, or, on a summer afternoon, a T‑shirt with khaki shorts.
Her oversize Longchamp tote and reusable water bottle accom-
panied her wherever she went, the latter filled with bubbly water
from her SodaStream machine. While Julie’s demeanor com-
municated a traditional approach to life, she was, deep down, a
free spirit. One afternoon, as the two of us sat outside the Cains’
temple at a picnic table while Jane was inside preparing with the
rabbi for her bat mitzvah, Julie pulled up her pant leg. “I got a
tattoo,” she said, smiling, her voice filled with mischievous
delight. It had hurt, and Zach had jokingly called it a tramp
stamp. But Julie loved it, and she especially enjoyed that she and
her girlfriends had all visited the tattoo parlor together. “It was
soccer-​mom Saturday at that tattoo parlor,” she said with a
chuckle, pulling the pant leg back down.

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

With her kids, Julie was loving and spirited. She had been a
stay‑at‑home mom for the past seventeen years, and Evan and
Jane were her whole world. For that, she felt truly lucky, men-
tioning more than once how fortunate she had been to be able
to stay home with them since the day they were born.
Julie had called the Bay Area home for the past fifteen years,
but she was used to moving around. While she was growing up,
her father’s jobs in retail and insurance had taken the family all
over the country. When Julie was a high-​school sophomore, her
parents announced that they were moving to Alabama. “That
was probably the most traumatic part of my childhood,” Julie
said. “Having to move my junior year.” Other than that, Julie had
fond memories from her youth, including her parents’ happy
marriage. Her mother, who worked part-​time as a secretary, was
always home after school to care for Julie and her younger sister.
“Nothing extraordinary or extreme happened in my child-
hood.” Julie smiled.
For college, Julie headed east to Georgia to study communi-
cations. At graduation, she met Zach, a California-​born lawyer
who had just passed the bar and was clerking for a judge. After
two years of dating, they had a country-​club wedding. Zach’s job
in corporate law sent them briefly to Mississippi and then to
Kentucky, where Evan was born. Two years later, they headed to
California, where they welcomed Jane. The Cains moved around
the Bay Area for a while, renting houses before finally purchas-
ing their current home in 2008 for just under a million dollars.
Broad-​shouldered with slicked-​back gray hair and a goatee,
Zach was an extrovert with a cutting sarcasm. Most of the time I
spent with the Cains, Zach wasn’t home. He was generally at the
office, putting in long hours as in‑house counsel for a global
technology company. Other times, he was at the gym or enter-
taining clients at business dinners. Jane and Evan were chatty
and gregarious. Jane had long, curly red hair, a bubbly demeanor,
and her dad’s disarming sense of humor. An avid dancer and

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volleyball player, Jane was navigating eighth grade while touring

private high schools for the next year. Evan, who was tall with
shiny brown hair and a wide smile, exuded a casual warmth that
could set a room at ease. He had a mild case of senioritis and
devoted most of his a­ fter-​school hours to theater. He would soon
be graduating from prep school and heading off to college at
the University of Southern California in Los Angeles.
In anticipation of becoming an empty nester, Julie was con-
sidering going back to work part-​time. But she struggled to fig-
ure out what she might excel at after so many years out of the
workforce. She updated her LinkedIn profile and sent her
résumé around while keeping busy. Julie spent most afternoons
and evenings behind the wheel of her Mercedes SUV shuttling
Jane to and from extracurricular activities. Beyond that, there
were exercise classes, lunches with friends, and errands to run.
Julie also served on the boards of her Jewish temple and a local
mother-​daughter charity organization.
While Julie had an active social life, I sensed that some of
the loneliness I’d felt in Nyah, Dana, and Renata lived in her as
well. It lived in a lot of the moms I met. I sometimes wondered if
that was a reason they let me hang around. Did they enjoy the com-
pany? I wondered. One evening, Julie and I sat at the kitchen
counter eating homemade pizza. Evan and Jane were gone, and
Zach was swinging by the gym after a long day at work. “At least
you’re here to spend time with me!” she joked. But I knew that
behind that laugh lay a kernel of truth.
Julie and Zach were largely in good health. While Julie
thought Zach could afford to lose some weight, she left that
largely to him to manage. With Jane, however, she and Zach both
intervened when they felt their daughter was struggling with her
weight. Consulting with their pediatrician and hiring a nutrition-
ist and a therapist, they had tried over the past couple of years to
help Jane make different dietary choices. “It’s been a huge topic

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 Families in an Age of Inequality

of discussion in our family,” Julie said with a sigh late one after-
noon as the two of us chopped tomatoes at the kitchen counter.
Financially, the Cains were worlds apart from the Bakers,
Williamses, and Ortegas. Each year, Zach brought home a little
under half a million dollars. The Cains owned a home now
worth almost four times that. They were still paying the mort-
gage but were otherwise debt-​free. Evan’s yearly high-​school
tuition ran around twenty thousand dollars, and Jane’s would
soon run a similar amount. That fall, the Cains were paying for
Evan’s college tours and college applications. The kids’ extra-
curriculars also broke into the thousands. During my time with
the Cains, they took spontaneous cross-​country trips to visit
family, purchased front-​row tickets to concerts, and planned a
family cruise.
Still, even with their financial cushion, the Cains saw the
Bay Area as too expensive for them long term. “We have a good
life here,” Julie told me one afternoon as we drove home from
the dry cleaner’s. “But it’s still competitive and expensive, so I
don’t think it’s a good place to retire.”

Julie, Renata, Dana, and Nyah came from divergent back-

grounds and parented their kids with wildly different resources.
At first glance, it might have seemed as though they didn’t share
much beyond motherhood. But that one commonality, in many
ways, united them more poignantly than all their differences
could divide them. Each of these moms felt an aching love for
her children. Each had a fierce instinct to protect them. Each
held a deeply rooted desire to see her kids grow into healthy and
happy adults. These sentiments underpinned how all four moms
approached their kids’ diets. But as I soon came to learn, the
vastly different resources moms had at their disposal to act on
these feelings translated into vastly different approaches to
nourishing the ones they loved.

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 CHAPTER 3

Feeding Kids

When Nyah Baker was a child, her aunt used to sauté fresh spin-
ach leaves with a generous heap of butter and minced garlic.
From their bedroom down the hall, Nyah and her sisters could
hear the handfuls of leafy greens hit the sizzling frying pan in
the kitchen. Moments later, a distinctly earthy smell would waft
through the house, and they would start to gag.
“Me and my sisters,” Nyah recalled, laughing. “We used to
go, ‘Ew, this stinks!’ ” Despising its bitter taste and slimy texture,
they would beg their aunt not to make spinach for dinner. When
they found it on their plates, the protests would begin. But
Nyah’s aunt had zero tolerance for her nieces’ gripes. Spinach
was part of what was for dinner, and they weren’t getting any of
their favorite dishes — ​potato salad, fried chicken, pork chops — ​
until they got down at least one helping of the soggy vegetable.
Nyah would hold her nose and force down bite after bite, winc-
ing as she swallowed. For encouragement, Nyah’s aunt would
remind Nyah of the cartoon character Popeye, whose spinach-​
rich diet was responsible for his bulging biceps. “You want to be
strong like that man!” her aunt would chime in over the sound
of Nyah’s pained gulps. While Nyah resented her aunt at the
time, that resentment blossomed into gratitude over the years.
“Now,” Nyah said with a grin, “I love spinach!”
To get her own daughters to try the greens she once loathed,
Nyah called on her aunt’s cartoon character from thirty years

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 Feeding Kids

ago. “I tell them about Popeye too.” Nyah laughed. “And they buy
it. They thinkin’, I’ma be strong! ” Now Mariah and Natasha loved
greens of all kinds. They would gobble up spinach, collard greens,
and chard, all of which were packed with vitamins and nutrients
that Nyah knew were healthy and good for their development.
Spinach was just one nutritious food Nyah wanted her girls
to eat. Plenty of other fruits, vegetables, and meats made good
choices in her book. A nutritious diet was important because it
would make her daughters strong and healthy, Nyah told me. It
would also help them sidestep challenges Nyah had faced
because of her health, including high blood pressure and diabe-
tes. Nyah wanted Mariah and Natasha to get the nutrition they
needed to thrive, be active, and live long and fulfilling lives.
Dana Williams, Renata Ortega, and Julie Cain all felt the
same way. So did most moms I met. Dana’s experiences working
in the medical field as well as her recent battle with breast cancer
had underscored for her the profound importance of a healthy
diet. Dana didn’t want her daughters drinking soda or eating
dessert before dinner. She hoped they’d never become part of
the increasingly “sick society” she saw all around her.
“They should know they have to eat healthy,” Dana said. “We
only have one body.”
Renata similarly told me that it was critical for her kids to
make healthy choices, eat fruits and vegetables, and learn how
to eat the right portions for their hunger and bodies. “We do try
to eat healthy,” she told me one morning as we sat side by side at
her dining-​room table drinking water. When Renata took Ama-
lia and Nico grocery shopping, she taught them how to make
those healthy choices. She told them to choose whole wheat over
white bread and advised them to pick fruits that were ripe and
that were easy to take to school.
Julie also wanted her kids to eat nutritiously so they wouldn’t
face debilitating health conditions. Sitting down to a healthy meal
each night, Julie told me, was fundamental to kids’ health and

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well-​being. Julie considered herself fortunate to live in a time when

there was so much knowledge about how to eat well. “I know more
today than I knew ten years ago,” she said, “and I can just imagine
what my kids are gonna know in ten years!”
Moms up and down the income spectrum resoundingly
echoed these four women. If anything was clear to me, it was this:
Most moms cared deeply about their kids’ diets and health. During
our conversations, only a handful didn’t raise the importance of a
healthy diet for their kids; the vast majority connected the dots
between kids’ diets and their current and future health. Moms
articulated their desire for their children to eat healthy in order to
be healthy. They told me that healthy food was an investment in
their kids’ well-​being, that it was medicine, and that it was key to liv-
ing a long, healthy life. As one mom put it, “Your health is gonna
depend on what you put into your body. Period.”
I was similarly struck by the fact that moms were largely
aligned on what they meant by healthy. There was more consensus
than disagreement. Vegetables, fruits, whole grains, fish, and lean
meats — ​these were what most deemed nutritious choices. Many
also talked about the importance of eating organic, fresh, home-
made, or whole foods. The virtues of drinking water were regu-
larly extolled. In contrast, soda, candy, chips, fried and fast foods,
and foods high in fat, salt, or sugar — ​moms agreed that these
were less than ideal and unhealthy choices. Sugar was widely con-
demned, with moms underscoring its negative consequences for
their kids’ teeth and weight, its addictive properties, and the
sneaky inclusion of it in so many of the most tempting foods.1
Of course, there were also differences in how moms defined
healthy. Some thought foods higher in protein — ​such as meat — ​
were healthier; others saw more plant-​based diets as equally or
more nutritious. Some viewed starchy foods like bread and
cereal as healthy choices; others wrote those off as empty calo-
ries. Some believed there was a place for fruit juice in their kids’
diets; others saw such drinks as an inadequate and unhealthy

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 Feeding Kids

substitute for fresh fruit. Still, even with these differences, I was
overwhelmed by the degree to which moms’ ideas about healthy
eating and the value they placed on it converged.2
When it came to how families actually ate, there were also
striking similarities. Most families I met shopped primarily at
supermarkets. Most fridges had some amount of fresh food, like
fruits, vegetables, raw meat, bread, and dairy. Families’ freezers
were packed with frozen vegetables, frozen pizzas, and party
appetizers. Dana always had pizza rolls, Nyah chicken drum-
sticks, Renata bagel bites, and Julie ice cream.
Most cabinets were lined with packaged and processed foods.
In Renata’s pantry, I found jasmine rice and canned tomatoes as
well as Ritz crackers, fruit cups, Capri Sun pouches, and cans of
Spam. Julie’s pantry was filled with the latest Trader Joe’s nonperish-
able creations, like pumpkin-​flavored cereal, cookies, pastas, pop-
corn, and pretzels. One October morning, I saw Julie put together a
breakfast of pumpkin pancakes with pumpkin butter and pumpkin-​
spice maple syrup alongside a cup of pumpkin-​spice coffee. Nyah’s
cabinets were overflowing with canned vegetables, beans, soups,
and sauces, plus bags of chips and nuts. Dana’s included rows of
boxed mac and cheese, Froot Loops, Oreos, and Kool-​Aid.
Given the powerful reach of the food and beverage industry
into families’ lives, the abundance of less nutritious, processed foods
in families’ homes didn’t surprise me. All year round, Big Food and
Big Beverage use powerful advertising and marketing to regularly
bombard Americans with images of these items. In 2017, food com-
panies spent eleven billion dollars on television ads, 80 percent of
which were for their unhealthiest offerings, including soda, fast
food, candy, and snacks.3 These foods are also inexpensive and
engineered to be delicious. When you pair those qualities with the
fact that these foods are virtually everywhere, it’s easy to see how
they become appealing choices for busy moms and families.
During my time with families, I saw how the food industry
pushed the foods mothers, fathers, and children most often

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encountered in daily life. On their daily commutes to work and

school, billboard advertisements for Pizza Hut and radio ads for
Lay’s grabbed their attention. During their evenings in front of the
television, Jack in the Box commercials and Pepsi product place-
ments caught their eyes. These foods also appeared as advertise-
ments on Instagram and Twitter feeds and embedded in news
articles and clothing sites. At the supermarket, two-​for-​one deals
on Hamburger Helper and Chex cereal pulled the mothers I met
away from full-​priced heads of broccoli and cartons of eggs. As I
weaved through grocery aisles at the sides of these moms, I noted
how fresh foods formed a thin outer ring around the store while
processed products made up the bulk of the middle.4 Processed
foods also beckoned to families from checkout lanes in every Nord-
strom Rack and Bed, Bath, and Beyond. Even Office Depot had a
full aisle packed with chips, soda, and candy alongside other aisles
of printer paper, whiteboards, and writing utensils. When families
went out to eat, persuasive marketing tactics — ​supersizing, meal
deals, and buy-​ one-​
get-​
one-​free offers — ​
tempted them to con-
sume more nutritionally dubious foods.
Together, these tactics encouraged families to put their dol-
lars toward ever-​present and appetizing but less nutritious foods.5
These tactics are also a major reason why the American food
environment — ​ that is, the physical and social surroundings
shaping our diets — ​is generally considered, at best, difficult to
navigate and, at worst, toxic. The fact is that the overwhelming
abundance of food promotions and “deals” makes it much easier,
financially, physically, and psychologically, for Americans to eat
less healthy foods.6 The result was that not one of the four fami-
lies I spent time with escaped food corporations’ long reach.
On weekdays, most families ate at home. Nyah and Julie
cooked almost every day, Dana and Renata a few days each week.
Some moms re‑created at least a couple of dishes from their
childhoods, and every family had a few family favorites on steady
rotation. Dishes like pasta, tacos, and pizza graced many tables.

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I ate garlic bread independently with Nyah, Dana, Renata, and

Julie. These meals often had a joyful element to them. For most
families, food was central to holidays and celebrations. It could
also be fun and delicious. Dana and her kids loved having break-
fast for dinner. Dana would whip up instant pancakes while the
girls set the table with unsalted butter and real maple syrup.
Nyah and Marcus enjoyed spending weekend afternoons mak-
ing okra, mac and cheese, and pork chops the mouthwatering
way Nyah’s grandmother had taught her to twenty years ago.
Most families also ate food from outside the home, some-
times during the week and even more commonly on weekends.
For some, that meant frequenting restaurants. For others, it
meant cruising through the drive-​through, ordering takeout,
joining family potlucks, or picking up a pizza during a run to
Costco. Try as they might to resist, almost every single family I
met at least occasionally indulged in the kinds of American clas-
sics featured in fast-​food advertisements: a juicy burger, chicken
wings, French fries, or onion rings.
And yet, despite the similarities that bound families across
society, their diets diverged in important ways.
First, although most families shopped primarily in super-
markets, they chose different ones. Wealthier families frequented
pricier supermarkets like Whole Foods, Safeway, and Trader
Joe’s; lower-​ income families occasionally popped into these
stores but shopped more regularly at places like Lucky’s, Walmart,
Target, and discount grocers like FoodMaxx or dollar stores.
Some lower-​income families received food from food banks,
although many did so only under what they deemed “extreme”
circumstances; going to the food bank wasn’t something fami-
lies did casually. In the supermarket, wealthier families often
purchased organic foods; most, if not all, of their fruits and veg-
etables were organic. Lower-​income families bought conven-
tional fruits and vegetables. They purchased organic foods only
rarely — ​for instance, when they were heavily discounted.

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Wealthier families also tended to keep more fresh produce

around than low-​income families, who had a larger share of
more processed, nonperishable products.
Families also talked about food in different ways. While
moms across income levels shared similar dietary wishes for
their kids, wealthier moms mentioned far more food-​related
rules at home. These moms discussed — ​often at great length — ​
restrictions they had placed on their children’s diets. They also
described having more dietary “teaching moments” and instruc-
tional conversations with kids. Lower-​income moms, however,
mentioned far fewer rules and restrictions around food with
their kids. They did not have the same kinds of “teaching
moments” or conversations about dietary health.7 As similar as
families seemed in some ways, the deeper I dug, the more clearly
I saw how dramatically their dietary habits and beliefs diverged.

What accounted for these dietary differences across families?

This was the question that many public health scholars pro-
posed we already knew the answer to — ​dietary differences, I’d
read, were driven by differences in people’s access to healthy food.
Fix food access, I’d been told, and you’ll close the dietary gap.
To many of us, the food-​access argument is better and more
widely known by its buzzword: food deserts. A food desert, accord-
ing to the USDA, is a low-​income census tract where at least a
third of the population lives more than one mile from a super-
market in an urban area and more than ten miles from one in a
rural area. While the USDA definition requires a neighborhood
to be low income to be considered a food desert, people often
use the term to refer to any neighborhood where it’s hard to find
fresh fruits and vegetables — ​for instance, neighborhoods with-
out any affordable (or any) supermarkets. Lower-​income neigh-
borhoods more often fit this colloquial understanding of what
constitutes a food desert; while a fourth of all zip codes in the
United States lack a supermarket, that number doubles for zip

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codes with a median income below $25,000, and slightly over

half of those very-​low-​income areas have no supermarket at all.
The more I read about food access, the more I wondered
where the term had come from and why it had become so widely
accepted as the driving force behind nutritional inequality.
In the United States, the concept of food access was popu-
larized quickly and dramatically by First Lady Michelle Obama’s
Let’s Move! campaign to end childhood obesity. The campaign
was a watershed period in the American healthy-​ eating
movement — ​ it raised widespread awareness about food and
health as issues of social justice and made swift strides to pre-
vent and treat childhood obesity.
Some of these strides were political; others were symbolic.
Michelle Obama launched the first-ever Task Force on Childhood
Obesity, which created a national action plan to mobilize public
and private sectors and engage communities to improve kids’
health. The opening of the White House vegetable garden made
a powerful statement about dietary health. On the policy front,
the Healthy, Hunger-​Free Kids Act of 2010 offered a momentous
step toward improving school food; it updated school-​meal nutri-
tion standards for the first time in fifteen years and increased
funding for the first time in thirty years. The act provided $4.5
billion in new federal funding for school-​meal and child-​nutrition
programs over a decade, leading American public schools to start
offering healthier meals and snacks to over fifty million kids.8 The
First Lady also recognized the powerful, pernicious reach of the
food industry and worked to limit students’ exposure to unhealthy
food marketing. While many of the improvements to school food
made during the Obama administration were ultimately rolled
back under President Trump between 2016 and 2020, the new-
found awareness and visibility of these issues could not be undone.
The Let’s Move! campaign also popularized the idea that
childhood obesity stemmed in part from inadequate geographic
food access. It was an idea with immediate, broad resonance and

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an accessible avenue for talking about inequalities in nutrition

and health. Michelle Obama made eliminating food deserts a
central element of her broader campaign, the underlying assump-
tion being that poor children (many of whom were children of
color) were obese because their families did not have access to
healthy foods. By increasing families’ and neighborhoods’ access
to healthy food, kids’ nutrition would improve. Over time, obesity
rates would fall. The argument had wide appeal because it offered
a straightforward, actionable solution. It also helpfully shifted the
blame away from individuals and families, instead highlighting
structural constraints and suggesting that the deck was stacked
against them. If access was the problem, then the fix was clear:
open supermarkets in low-​income communities.
Over the next decade, Herculean national, state, and local pol-
icy efforts followed to increase low-​income communities’ access to
healthy food. By 2010, the USDA had quantified and mapped food
deserts across the country, created an online food-​desert locator,
and instituted National Food Desert Awareness Month. Federal
and state programs provided loans, grants, and tax credits to stim-
ulate supermarket development and encourage retailers to offer
healthy foods in food deserts. The federal government launched
the Healthy Food Financing Initiative to support retailers running
supermarkets in low-​income areas, providing $400 million for the
program and $250 million in tax credits. Overall, the coordinated,
collaborative effort to invest in underserved communities and
bring healthy food into food deserts was widely successful.
But if the goal of those efforts was to improve families’ diet
quality and reduce childhood obesity, the initiatives were sur-
prisingly disappointing. Over the years, a growing number of
studies have assessed the impact of opening supermarkets in
food deserts. While research has shown that supermarket open-
ings increase residents’ perceptions that they have access to
healthy food, these openings have little to no effect on residents’
diets and physical health. Most notably, two major studies in

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Philadelphia and New York City found new supermarkets

brought no significant change to food-​desert residents’ diets.9
Other studies have echoed these findings, underscoring a disap-
pointing reality: improving food access does little to improve
poor communities’ diet quality. Food access, it turns out, doesn’t
explain much of the nutritional inequality in the United States.10
Geographic access to healthy food seemed to play a negligi-
ble role in the diets of the seventy-​five families I met. Because I
knew where every family lived, I could map families’ distance
from supermarkets and use the USDA’s online food-​ desert
tracker to see whether they lived in a food desert or an area with
low food access. Together, my own maps and the federal tracker
revealed to me that most families had high geographic access to
healthy food. None resided in food deserts, and almost all lived
within two miles of a supermarket.
I seriously considered whether my measure of food access
was leading me astray. While it was capturing families’ proxim-
ity to supermarkets, perhaps what mattered more than objective
geographic access to food was subjective access. Did families feel
like they could get ahold of the food they wanted and needed?
Did they feel physically cut off from it? Maybe the supermarkets
near families were too expensive, too limited, or too alienating.
Maybe the lines were too long or the produce underripe.
As I pored over the transcripts of my conversations with fam-
ilies, it became clear to me that families’ subjective perceptions
of food access matched their objective realities. To my enor-
mous surprise, families simply didn’t see geographic access as
an issue. Almost every mom said she had access to an affordable
supermarket nearby. In fact, I found that in the largely subur-
ban context of the Bay Area, the vast majority of families owned
cars that they could use to drive to the supermarket. The two
families that didn’t have a car both lived within half a mile of a
grocery store. In the end, while moms told me, at great length,
about all kinds of challenges and constraints when it came to

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feeding their families, physically accessing the food they wanted

just wasn’t one of them.11 Differences in families’ geographic
access to healthy food didn’t explain their different diets.
While I didn’t know it back in 2014, emerging research since
has helped explain why food deserts and geographic food access
don’t matter as much as we once thought. National statistics on car
use mirror what I saw among my families: the vast majority of
U.S. households today (over 90 percent) have access to a car. And a
2019 study using real consumer data found that, like the parents I
met, most people are also actually quite willing to travel for their
groceries. In fact, the average American travels 5.2 miles to grocery
shop, and 90 percent of shopping trips in the country are made by
car. It turns out that people are quite okay with traveling longer
distances to buy food and are less geographically constrained than
formerly thought. Because of that, when a new supermarket is set
up in a neighborhood, most residents simply shift from shopping at
a more distant supermarket — ​not a gas station or bodega — ​to the
closer one. Ultimately, the study’s authors estimated that just
10 percent of socioeconomic diet disparities in the United States
can be traced to differences in access to healthy food. That leaves
the other 90 percent of the nutritional gap unaccounted for.12
Of course there is more to food access than geography. Finan-
cial access to food, healthy food in particular, matters too. Among
the families I met, financial access offered a more promising expla-
nation for dietary differences than geographic access. In the United
States, lower-​income families spend less on food than higher-​
income ones do — ​$3,767 a year, compared to $12,340 a year for the
wealthiest households. Poorer families also devote a greater propor-
tion of their household income to food — ​33 percent of their earn-
ings go to food, compared to wealthier households’ 9 percent.13
Many Americans also simply don’t have enough money to buy
food. This is best evidenced by the fact that in 2018, forty million
Americans participated each month in the federal government’s
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, also known as

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SNAP.14 SNAP provides financial support for food for low-​income

Americans  — ​two-​
thirds of whom are families with children.
SNAP’s monthly stipends rarely provide families with enough
funds to buy nutritious meals for an entire month. This is in part
because the program was designed to be supplemental and to assist
families, not to guarantee them sufficient amounts of healthy food.
Its modest benefits — ​averaging less than just $1.40 per person per
meal — ​are hardly enough to cover families’ monthly food costs.15
The allotments also inadequately account for the reality that
healthier food generally costs more than unhealthier food.16
Calorie for calorie, more nutritious staples like lean meats, fish,
fruits, and vegetables are more expensive than less nutritious
foods higher in refined grains and added sugar. It’s true that a
tomato can be cheaper than a bag of chips and that a head of
cauliflower sometimes costs less than chicken nuggets. But these
calculations take neither calories nor quantities into account.
For families living hand to mouth, trying to maximize overall
caloric intake can mean purchasing more food for less money.
This incentivizes families to make their dollars stretch by pur-
chasing cheaper, unhealthier foods.
The families I met spent vastly different amounts on food each
month, from less than $200 to over $1,000. Nyah, Dana, Renata,
and Julie illustrated this variation, spending around $300, $360,
$450, and $900 each month on food, respectively.17 Their spend-
ing patterns also echoed national data showing that higher-​income
families spend more on food overall, but lower-​income families
spend a greater share of their income on it. While Julie and Renata
each spent more overall on food than Nyah and Dana, Nyah and
Dana put a comparatively larger chunk of their earnings toward it.
Nyah, like many low-​ income moms I met, depended on
safety-​net benefits to feed her family. Many families below the
poverty line, like hers, used SNAP, and some low-​income preg-
nant moms or those with young children also depended on
Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) benefits. Undocumented

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parents, who were almost always low-​income, were not able to

access any public benefits.18
Marcus’s SNAP funds kept Nyah and the girls fed each
month. Technically, Nyah explained to me once, Marcus was
homeless. He registered his blue van rather than Nyah’s house as
his residence. Doing so made him a member of a separate house-
hold, which entitled him to his own separate public benefits.
Each month, Marcus received $194 in SNAP funds to buy food.19
When those funds arrived on the first of the month, Nyah would
spend them immediately at a discount grocer. Wandering the
aisles, she would fill the shopping cart to the brim with foods to
last her family until the first of the next month. She bought
greens like spinach to cook that week, but almost everything else
that made it into the cart was nonperishable, since it had to last
thirty days without rotting. As backup, Nyah kept a freezer in the
garage full of frozen meat and her cupboards stocked with
canned corn, beans, and ravioli. Most months, Nyah supple-
mented Marcus’s benefits with one hundred dollars of her
daughters’ SSI stipends.20 She used some of that money on gro-
ceries, and the rest went to takeout food and beer, both of which
were unallowable purchases under SNAP. Sometimes, this was
enough to carry her family through the month.
Other times, it wasn’t.
Nyah, like roughly half of all households participating in
SNAP and a third of single mothers in the United States, was
food-​insecure. Being food-​insecure meant that she had unreli-
able access to a sufficient amount of affordable, nutritious food.
Food insecurity in the United States affects more than thirty-​
five million people and about two-​thirds of households below
the poverty line. In 2019, one in nine Americans lacked enough
food.21 In 2020, the economic hardship brought on by the coro-
navirus pandemic significantly worsened the problem; food
insecurity rates in the U.S. doubled, affecting around one in
five households. What’s more, the rate for families with children

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tripled; just short of one in three families with kids experienced

food insecurity that year.22
Food insecurity is associated with a less healthy diet for a num-
ber of reasons. First, uncertain and insufficient access to enough
food incentivizes people to purchase higher quantities of cheaper
and often less nutritious food to ensure they will get enough calo-
ries. Indeed, food-​insecure individuals are more likely to consume
salty snacks, sugar-​sweetened beverages, and red or processed
meat.23 For the same reason, food insecurity also financially incen-
tivizes families to purchase more energy-​dense, satiating foods,
such as full-​fat dairy products, nuts, seeds, and legumes. While
many of these foods are nutritious, they may also be high in fat,
sodium, and calories. Finally, food insecurity subjects people to
repeated periods of food restriction or deprivation, making them
more likely to overeat when food becomes available. This feast-or-​
famine cycle is exactly how both hunger and obesity can coexist in
the same communities and even in the same people.24
Nyah’s resourcefulness is what allowed her to make the
foods she bought last. But if things got really tight, she would
rely on her sister Dominique or the local food pantry to make
ends meet. Nyah once told me that part of surviving as a mom
was “using what I got to get what I want.” Then she paused. “As
long as I am a woman, I should never be broke, and my kids
should always have food to eat.”
Nyah was the first to admit that the food her kids ate wasn’t
as healthy as it could be. She made sure I understood that the
day we met. “I’ma keep it real,” she told me as we plopped down
side by side on her sofa. “I buy a lot of junk food. Snacks like
doughnuts, Nutty Buddies, the popcorn, and stuff like that — ​
chips, sodas. We always buy Hot Pockets, corn dogs.”
Then she pulled two packages of the chocolate and marshmal-
low cookies known as Moon Pies from her sweatshirt pocket. “You
know,” she said as she set them on the sofa arm, “fat-​girl snacks.”
Compared to Nyah’s, Dana’s earnings put her in a slightly

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better position to feed her family. While Dana had at times

received SNAP, she was earning too much to qualify when I met
her. Still, Dana kept a pretty tight food budget, spending no
more than three hundred dollars a month on groceries, plus
another sixty dollars on eating out. A savvy Costco shopper, Dana
would stock up on large quantities of her kids’ favorite foods:
chips, pasta, pesto, cream cheese, and milk. She bought the rest
of what she needed at Target, which had less expensive generic
versions of brand-​name favorites. Purchasing organic was, for
financial reasons, not on Dana’s radar. I never saw Dana buy veg-
etables, and I saw her buy fruit only once. Often, I w ­ itnessed
Dana pile the shopping cart with the processed foods her daugh-
ters asked for and then lament the high price of healthier options
like grapes and bananas. Dana told me that healthy food was
more expensive and that she sometimes didn’t have the money to
buy what she wanted the girls to eat.
“I was going on a big salad and vegetable kick the last few weeks,”
she told me one evening as we drove home from the nail salon. “I
feel like it is expensive — ​you buy lettuce, and all those little things
are expensive. And then you go to the frozen-​food section and why
are all these TV dinners one dollar? It’s so backwards!” One week, I
watched Dana partake in a juice cleanse, purchasing and consum-
ing six bottles of premade juices daily at a cost of just over thirty dol-
lars a day. But most of the time, Dana and her daughters ate leftovers
and repurposed meals. Sometimes the girls complained, but Dana
explained to them that it wasn’t up for debate. “If you think you’re
too cool for leftovers,” she said, laughing, “then I’m sorry!”
Renata also worked to stay within a food budget and be mind-
ful of her purchases. She spent around four hundred fifty dollars
each month, two hundred fifty on groceries and the rest on take-
out food and dining out. Inside Renata’s home, I often saw pizza
boxes from Papa John’s on the kitchen counter and family-​size
containers of Panda Express on the top shelf of the fridge. Renata
shopped at a variety of places, including a higher-​ end super­

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­ arket and a discount grocer. She often bought generic brands.

m
She was wary of food spoiling and preferred to make two runs to
the grocery store during the week rather than risk having to throw
away moldy grapes or a stale loaf of bread. She didn’t worry about
having enough food, but she also didn’t feel like she could just buy
whatever she wanted without first checking how much it cost. If
they had more money, Renata once told me, maybe her eyes
wouldn’t dart to the price tag so readily. Overall, while Renata felt
that healthy food was expensive, she also believed it was within her
reach. She had the money to buy the fresh foods that she wanted,
especially if she sprang for conventional over organic produce.
At the top of the income spectrum, Julie rarely, if ever, made
financially motivated food choices. Julie shopped at a variety of
places, including Safeway, Target, and Costco. But her absolute
favorite store was Trader Joe’s. She bought almost exclusively
organic fruits and vegetables. When pressed, neither Julie nor
Zach could pinpoint exactly how much they spent on food each
month. I noted that lower-​income moms could effortlessly share
with me their monthly food expenditures while wealthier moms
like Julie often struggled to come up with an amount. Julie once
told me that they spent “way more than five hundred dollars a
month” on groceries, in addition to eating out. Together, Julie
and I estimated that her family spent around nine hundred dol-
lars each month on food. While she tried to keep their spending
“within a reasonable amount,” Julie found it difficult to do that
and purchase everything she wanted for her family. One chal-
lenge was that she was a self-​identified last-​minute shopper and,
as she said with an eye-​roll, a “terrible planner.” I often saw Julie
make two to four trips to the supermarket in one week, and the
Cains usually went out to eat once or twice a week. Both Julie
and Zach joked that they wished Julie was a little financially sav-
vier when it came to grocery shopping. “But,” Julie said with a
sigh, “I’m not a coupon cutter.”

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So maybe price is what matters most, I thought one morning as I

typed families’ food budgets into the spreadsheet where I logged
information from every family I met. I could clearly see how
their finances influenced their diets. And yet, as I mulled that
idea over, a confusing conversation I’d recently had with Nyah
kept coming to mind.
On a Thursday afternoon, I’d sat on a backless stool at
Nyah’s laminate kitchen counter watching Nyah and Marcus fry
batches of chicken drumsticks coated in garlic powder and
flour. As Marcus plunged each drumstick into a tall, steel pot of
boiling oil, Nyah flipped the cooked ones onto a paper-​towel-​
lined plate to remove the excess grease.
Nyah caught me eyeing two boxes of cereal atop her fridge.
“Those are from the free-​food box,” she said, motioning to
the cartons of wheat-​bran flakes and plain O’s that had captured
my attention. Every couple of months, Nyah collected a free box
of food from her local pantry. But it often came filled with items
she neither recognized nor knew how best to use. What exactly
was she supposed to do with celery, saltines, and canned pears?
“No one actually eats those.” Nyah grabbed the box of O’s and
passed it to me. “Why don’t you try them?” she said, chuckling,
adding that if I liked them, they were mine. I shook the cardboard
to dump some O’s into the palm of my hand and tasted a few.
“They’re pretty plain,” I said, chewing slowly. “But, um,
they’re okay.” I thought they tasted a bit like the cardboard box
they’d come from.
“Exactly!” Nyah laughed. “The kids don’t like ’em either.”
What the girls did like were Trix and Cinnamon Toast
Crunch, Cookie Crunch and Fruity Pebbles. I smiled as Nyah
explained that sometimes she could get the girls to eat these
healthier cereals if she let them mix a spoonful of sugar into the
milk. “It’s not good,” she said, shrugging. “But I can’t blame them!”
Healthier food in Nyah’s home is going to waste, I scribbled in my
notebook, my hand accidentally smearing the ink as I wrote.

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Nyah doesn’t just buy the sugary cereals because they’re cheap. She buys
them because her kids like them. They eat them.
Nyah told me that last year, she had gone on a health kick.
For weeks, she’d bought only healthy food: Fruits and vegetables,
lean meats, and low-​fat dairy. No junk food. Nothing processed.
“Was that expensive?” I asked her, downing another hand-
ful of O’s. Even though they were flavorless and dried my mouth
out, I was hungry. They were also directly in front of me.
Nyah shot me a perplexed, almost incredulous look. “That
stuff’s all cheap!” she responded, flipping another drumstick
onto the plate. “Lettuce and chicken, that stuff doesn’t cost
much compared to what I usually buy.”
I did a double take. “It was cheaper to eat chicken and
salad?” I asked hesitantly. I assumed I’d misunderstood her.
“Yeah.” Nyah chuckled. “Actually, I would only spend, like, a
hundred and twenty bucks, and then I would have extra food
stamps. When I was eating healthy, I would still have extra food
stamps throughout the month. Buying bananas, apples, and
that stuff is cheap.”
“Is it really?” I asked again. I wanted to be sure I was under-
standing what Nyah was saying. Was she really telling me that
healthy food was less expensive than unhealthy food?
“Yeah, it’s cheap! ” Nyah reiterated, shooting me a dumb-
founded look. Her eyes reflected a growing annoyance at my
relentless repetition of the same question. I saw that, but I also
couldn’t help myself. Nyah was telling me the opposite of every-
thing I’d ever learned about food access and healthy eating.
Now, as I finished entering food budgets into the spread-
sheet, our intriguing exchange lingered in my mind. If healthy
food was cheap, and Nyah was spending more money to get less
healthy food, then clearly there were other influences beyond
price shaping her food choices. And maybe, I thought, those
influences affected other families’ choices too.

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 CHAPTER 4

All That Matters

“Miranda?” I asked the towering, stocky woman staring down at

her phone. Miranda looked up from her screen and smiled.
“So you’re the lady my daughter keeps telling me about,” she
said, grinning slightly. It was a calm spring evening, and the two
of us were meeting outside a busy strip-​mall Starbucks.
“Thank you so much for taking the time to meet with me.” I
reached out, shook Miranda’s hand, and asked if I could get her
anything to drink. She was in the mood for a strong cup of cof-
fee after a long day at work but politely declined my offer to
treat.
“I’ll get my drink if you get us a table,” she countered, open-
ing the door to the café and letting out a freezing gust of air-​
conditioning. While Miranda grabbed her coffee, I looked
around for a table outside. Options were slim, as high-​school stu-
dents and retirees had parked themselves in patio chairs for the
evening, delving into homework or games of checkers. I spotted
a small table around the corner that faced the on‑ramp to a free-
way. The sound of cars accelerating and honking was deafening
at first, but as rush hour began to subside, so did the noise.
A few minutes later, Miranda appeared, a small black coffee
in hand. She took a seat across from me. At six foot one and just
over two hundred pounds, Miranda was a commanding pres-
ence. She wore a boxy black short-​sleeved T‑shirt and billowy
jeans. Short, choppy brown hair and a red baseball cap framed a

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 All That Matters

porcelain-​white face, and her large hoop earrings swayed back

and forth in the breeze. Around her neck hung a gold chain
with a heart pendant.
Miranda’s intimidating stature was offset by her gentle,
soothing voice. It was calming but also so quiet that I feared my
audio recorder might not pick up our dialogue over the sound
of freeway cars whizzing by. Miranda’s seventeen-​year-​old daugh-
ter, Ebony, had spoken in a similar way. I thought back to when I
had first met Ebony, two weeks prior. “I’m a vegan,” Ebony had
disclosed up front. “But I live in a food-​insecure home.” Ebony’s
story struck me because it seemed like an outlier or an unusual
case. I’d spoken with dozens of kids so far; a low-​income kid who
also subscribed to a strict diet was, in my experience, rare. So
over two cups of green tea at a quiet café one Saturday morning,
I’d talked to Ebony to learn how she pulled it off. A few years
ago, she told me, she had become a vegan out of a concern for
animal welfare. Now she also strongly preferred to eat organic
food for environmental and human rights reasons.
While the decision to eat vegan and organic had felt natu-
ral, adhering to those preferences had proven challenging. With
Miranda’s income, Ebony struggled to get the food she needed
for a healthy plant-​based diet. Ebony’s biggest obstacle by far
was consuming enough of the foods she really wanted. Not just
the ones she needed to survive — ​like rice and beans — ​but the
foods she craved and that made her feel good and satiated,
foods like tofu and almond butter.
“Dates,” she answered excitedly when I asked what her favor-
ite food was. The texture, the sweetness, how filling they were — ​
these were the dried fruit’s selling points. But, Ebony explained,
she rarely ate them.
“They’re really expensive,” she lamented, tucking a strand of
her curly black hair behind her right ear. Tall like her mother,
Ebony had a short bob that bounced as she spoke. With a long-​
sleeved flannel shirt rolled up to her elbows and skinny jeans,

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she looked comfortable and put together. “I just can’t swing it.”
Ebony let out a sigh of defeat. “My mom can’t swing it.”
At home with her twin sister, older sister, and mom, Ebony
dreamed about a day when she’d be able to afford to stock the
fridge with whatever her heart desired. But for the time being,
she lived for Fridays. Friday was payday at the health-​food store
she worked at evenings and weekends, and every Friday, Ebony
took her paycheck and treated herself to a trip to her favorite
grocery store: Whole Foods.
“It’s kind of expensive there,” Ebony said, her hands folded
neatly on the table. “But it’s actually like my favorite store ever.”
As much as Ebony relished the smell of fresh tomatoes and
basil in the produce section, the vegan sushi rolls filled with
cucumber and avocado, and the free kombucha samples, she
rarely had the funds to make a trip to Whole Foods worthwhile.
The part-​time-​job paychecks only went so far, and sometimes she
had to put her earnings toward household expenses to supple-
ment her mom’s earnings. Discount grocers like FoodMaxx and
Fresh and Easy were better go‑tos for her family’s everyday needs.
“I definitely get angry sometimes when there’s no food in
the house,” Ebony said, bringing the steaming mug of tea to her
lips. “When you’re hungry, you have more of a temper maybe, so
when I have to go to school without food, it’s annoying.”
Even though Ebony qualified for free school meals, the caf-
eteria had neither vegan nor organic options. Egg and bacon
sandwiches, beef tacos, and chicken fingers were on steady rota-
tion, and pickings were slim for non-​meat-​eaters. Because of
this, Ebony largely stayed away from the one place she could eas-
ily get free food. Free and reduced-​price school meals are meant
to provide low-​income kids like Ebony with two meals a day five
days a week and offset food costs for low-​income families. Some-
times, these meals did what they were designed to do; while
wealthier kids at Ebony’s school congregated in courtyards
around colorful lunch boxes and glass containers of food packed

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 All That Matters

at home, most of the low-​income kids sat at the long plastic

tables inside the cafeteria, light gray trays of school food in front
of them. But not every low-​income kid. And not Ebony. Most stu-
dents I spoke with found school meal options repetitive, lacklus-
ter, or gross. Many who qualified for the free meals actively tried
to avoid them, in part to escape being labeled as poor — ​the des-
ignation that inevitably followed from lining up outside the caf-
eteria. Together, the low quality and stigma of school meals
made them unappealing to the kids they were meant to serve.
But when students like Ebony turned these meals down, it put
the financial onus back on parents like Miranda to pay for her
daughter’s meals during the school day.
When the fridge at home was stocked, Ebony brought her
own lunches to school. She’d wrap a sandwich in tinfoil or fill a
thermos with chili. But sometimes the fridge was empty. In
these instances, rather than cave and accept the cafeteria’s
offerings — ​and betray her vegan diet — ​Ebony generally did not
eat. She could go six or seven hours with just water, especially if
it was carbonated. The little bubbles would fill her stomach, cre-
ating the illusion of fullness. Sometimes, when Ebony’s hunger
pangs grew too intense, she’d grab a piece of unripe fruit from
the cafeteria. But more often, she waited until she got home
from school and then filled herself up on quinoa. It wasn’t her
favorite, but it was a healthy, satiating option that she could pre-
pare relatively quickly. Most important, Miranda could afford to
buy it in bulk. Every once in a while, the assistant principal at
Ebony’s school — ​who knew Ebony came to school hungry most
mornings — ​gave her a gift card to Trader Joe’s.
I was eager to hear Miranda’s thoughts on Ebony’s diet.
Originally, Miranda told me, she hadn’t been so keen on Ebo-
ny’s new dietary preferences. But over time, she realized how
important veganism was to her daughter, and it became impor-
tant to her too.
My mind wandered to the stereotypes portraying low-​income

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moms as unconcerned about their kids’ diets. Sitting across

from Miranda, I had no doubt that her kids’ health and happi-
ness were of the utmost importance to her. She would give — ​in
fact, she had given — ​anything to support Ebony’s choices. Her
eyes lit up as she discussed Ebony’s love of sauerkraut and soy
and all her daughter had taught the family about sustainable
seafood. Ebony, Miranda said, beaming, was her “forever teacher.”
But something else was equally obvious: Supporting Ebony’s
choices while also covering the family’s living expenses was a
relentless struggle and a deep source of stress for Miranda.
“Every dime I get goes to pretty much food and bills,” Miranda
said, leaning back in her chair. “I’m just scraping by.”
Until Ebony reached middle school, Miranda had raised her
three kids in Bozeman, Montana. It was a nice place, but there
were limited opportunities there for a single mom with a GED
and line-​cook experience. So Miranda moved her kids and then
partner, Jenny, out to California so that she could finally realize
her longstanding dream of producing and selling cannabis
­edibles. California was also a place where Miranda, as a white
mother, felt more comfortable raising her half-​Black children.
Miranda’s dream came true when she started working for a
small cannabis shop. But unfortunately, the move also prompted
Miranda and Jenny to split.
“When Jenny left,” Miranda said, “everything kind of went
in half.” All of a sudden, Miranda was pulling in a fraction of
their prior household income. Overnight, she found herself hav-
ing to say no to virtually everything the kids asked for.
“How come it’s always no, no, no?” Ebony and her siblings
would complain to their mother. “Money,” Miranda told them.
“I can’t get you anything unless it’s free-​ninety-​nine.”
Being poor was hard work. Miranda was one of millions of
­full-​time workers earning a poverty-​level wage, or an hourly wage
that leaves a full-​time, full-​year worker below the federal poverty
line. Without Jenny, Miranda — ​despite working fifty or sixty

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 All That Matters

hours per week at the cannabis shop — ​couldn’t carry her family

over that line. That made her a member of the working poor, a
designation that applies to one in nine full-​time employed Amer-
icans. Despite breaking their backs, the working poor come up
short. Even with a full-time job, Miranda still relied on SNAP to
put food on the table and on housing vouchers to pay her rent.
Miranda saw Ebony’s new tastes as an additional backbreak-
ing expense. She also felt trapped between her desire to support
her daughter and her need to keep the family financially afloat.
“When it’s someone you love” — ​she paused, rubbing her neck-
lace between her thumb and index finger — “what do you do?”
What Miranda did was try to make it happen with the pay-
check she earned. She was resourceful, shopping around and
purchasing older or uglier organic produce untouched by other
shoppers. She borrowed a friend’s Costco membership to buy in
bulk. She started a backyard garden, growing tomatoes and
squash. She skipped meals so her kids would have more to eat.
“Sometimes I don’t even eat dinner,” Miranda told me. “I’ll
have a bowl of cereal if there is some.” She preferred to make
sure her kids ate first. “I buy that food for them unless I’m really,
really hungry.
“The way I feel about food” — ​Miranda took a final sip of
coffee and set the empty paper cup on the table — “is like, if
they need food and they’re hungry, then I’m gonna buy it. I
don’t care how much money is in my pocket. I’ll spend my last
twenty dollars. That’s how it is. It’ll come. Sometimes it’s hard.
Everything, literally every dime I get, goes to food. Every dime.
But what do you do? I just buy it for them. It’s for my babies. I
love them more than anything on the planet.”
Of course, as with most low-​income families, rare moments
emerged when Miranda came into a bit of extra money. Maybe
she worked some overtime hours or reached into an old coat
pocket and found a crumpled bill. Sometimes, it was just a cou-
ple of bucks.

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“If she wants a two-​dollar candy bar,” Miranda said about

Ebony, “I get it for her if I have it.”
But sometimes it was more money, like twenty dollars. When
this happened, Miranda said with a grin, she usually gave the
cash directly to Ebony to take to the supermarket — ​even though
it felt to Miranda like throwing it away. The other week, she’d
given Ebony exactly twenty dollars. With it, Ebony had pur-
chased just two pomelos from Whole Foods.
“Two pomelos? ” Miranda rolled her eyes. Even now, she
couldn’t hide her incredulity. It was, she said with a chuckle, just
like the story of Jack and the Beanstalk.
In exceptionally rare cases, Miranda found herself with an
extra thirty dollars or more. In those moments, her favorite activity
involved taking her daughters out to eat. Just a short ride from
home was a fancy vegetarian pan-​Asian restaurant that Ebony
adored. Penny-​pinching and saving, Miranda was occasionally able
to treat her to a meal there. “Their raw pies are delicious,” Miranda
noted, a wistful look in her eye. “And we never have leftovers.”

Ebony may have been unusual in her dietary preferences, but

Miranda reminded me of so many other low-​income mothers I
had met — ​the ones who told me that they often spent the last of
their paychecks on special meals or foods for their kids. Some-
times, like Miranda, they went out to a big meal with their fami-
lies or bought pricier items their kids requested. Their accounts
didn’t fit into the common narrative about low-​income families,
food access, and nutrition.1 Their experiences suggested that
there was more to the story than public health researchers knew.
Jada Morris, for instance, treated her family of six to luxuri-
ous seafood dinners whenever there was enough money in her
pocket and enough time to gather the entire family around the
table. Once or twice a year, Jada would take a hearty chunk of
her SNAP benefits for the month and splurge on fresh crab,

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 All That Matters

lobster, and scallops. The weekend before I sat down with her,
she had spent eighty-​five dollars on six crabs.
“I was like, we’re gonna eat good today.” Jada laughed. “I
took those crabs and cleaned them and boiled them and I fried
them. And the kids, they ate them all up, and it was good.”
The purchase had put Jada in the hole for the next month,
but she didn’t mind. “It was worth it,” she said, a satisfied grin
sweeping across her face. “The rest of my stamps I have to save
for Thanksgiving. I can’t spend no more. Have to make do with
what we have now.”
After wrapping up my interview with Miranda, I sat in my
car for half an hour scribbling random thoughts and ideas in
my notebook. I kept returning to one central source of confu-
sion. I thought it was all about money, I wrote. But if that’s true, then I
can’t explain some of these food purchases.
If Miranda was spending a paycheck on a family dinner at a
restaurant while also struggling to make rent, then her food
choices couldn’t be solely financially motivated. Miranda clearly
didn’t always prioritize spending the absolute least amount of
money on food. Sometimes she did, but other times she didn’t.
The same was true for Jada — ​and Nyah too. As influential as
food prices were to moms, I realized something else wielded
incredible influence: Their kids’ desires. Their kids’ happiness.
Miranda strove to buy food with the best financial value, but
she was also trying to secure food with the most symbolic value to
her kids.2
Spending thirty dollars or more on one restaurant dinner
was a lot for Miranda. She rarely had that kind of money lying
around, and she could certainly have found other uses for it — ​
that was enough money to restock the family’s quinoa and bean
supply or pay for a week’s utilities. But what didn’t make sense
financially for Miranda made perfect sense symbolically. A meal
out gave Miranda the opportunity to bring a genuine smile to

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Ebony’s face — ​to surprise and delight her. A meal out gave

Miranda a moment out of her busy schedule to sit and connect
with her daughter over delicious, warm, and satiating food. A
meal out offered Miranda a chance to show Ebony that she was
listening — ​that she really heard and would do anything to
honor her daughter’s preferences. A meal out gave Miranda the
rare chance to say yes to Ebony.
Those nights when Miranda could treat Ebony to a special
meal reminded her that amid all the hardship — ​ amid the
empty kitchen cupboards and the growl of her own stomach
most evenings as she climbed into bed — ​she was still a loving
and capable mother. For all that, thirty dollars was a steal.
“They want food, they’ll get it,” Miranda told me about her
children. “One day they’ll know. They’ll know I love them, and
that’s all that matters.”

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 PART II

Nourishment

Even after all this time

The sun never says to the earth
“You owe me.”
Look what happens with a love like that
It lights the whole sky
 — ​Daniel Ladinsky, “Even After All This Time”

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 68 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM
 CHAPTER 5

Scarcity, Abundance

On a blistering-​hot Monday afternoon in June, I sat on the worn

beige couch in Nyah Baker’s garage. The garage door was open
to the driveway and sunlight poured into the concrete room.
Next to me, Nyah leaned forward on a light gray polyester
recliner with Natasha cross-​legged at her feet. For the past hour,
Nyah had been braiding Natasha’s hair, weaving in thick black
wig strands to create a voluminous braid. The two of them
passed a green Costco-​size bag of pistachios back and forth
every few minutes, each taking small handfuls.
Earlier that morning, I’d texted Nyah to figure out what
time I should come by. When I didn’t hear back for a few hours,
I figured she was otherwise occupied. Nyah was often busy with
her daughters rather than glued to her phone. So I hopped in
my car and drove down to her place. When I stepped out onto
her street a half hour later, the still, hot air enveloped me.
Nyah’s neighbors were mostly Mexican-​A merican and Black
families, the majority of whom were low-​income. Black families
were a shrinking minority in the Bay Area. From 1970 to 2010,
the region’s Black population declined from 13.8 percent to
7 percent. Gentrification, rising rental costs, and federal and
local exclusionary policies displaced Black communities while
also keeping them out of whiter neighborhoods. As a result,
many Black families were driven to the Bay Area’s outer reaches.1

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 N ourishment

But in this particular neighborhood, Nyah, Nyah’s sister, and

dozens of other Black families had managed to stay put.
I waved hello to Marcus, Nyah’s boyfriend, who was fixing
up his van at the edge of her driveway, squatting to fill a back
tire with air. I heard Simon, their football-​size mutt, yapping
away in the backyard that wrapped around Nyah’s house like a
moat. As usual, the garage door was open, and I spotted Nyah
and Natasha settling in for an afternoon of hairstyling. Nyah
used to have air-​conditioning in the house, but last summer,
after Nyah had been repeatedly late paying her bills, the land-
lord had removed the AC unit. Without that indoor respite from
the blazing heat, the garage was now the airiest spot available to
the Bakers. The radio blasted nineties jams, and Nyah had engi-
neered a breeze by tilting a standing fan in their direction.
“Did you text me sometime in the past couple days?” Nyah
asked as I strolled up the driveway, using my hand as a visor to
block the sun. In her solid pink tank top and checkered pink
boxer shorts, she was dressed for the weather. I mentioned my
text earlier that morning, and she nodded. Her and the girls’
phones had all been turned off the past few days because she
hadn’t had the money to pay that month’s phone bill. The bills
were due on the twenty-​fifth of each month. Today was the
twenty-​seventh.
“But I just got some money yesterday,” Nyah assured me,
pulling a coarse black strand of Natasha’s hair taut. “We can all
go pay it off today.”
I sat on the couch as Nyah and I caught up from the week-
end. Nyah had visited a friend who lived about forty minutes
north. The friend had loaned Nyah enough gas money for her
to make the journey. They ate subs and drank beer. Overall,
Nyah said, it wasn’t a bad time.
“What are you up to for the Fourth of July?” I asked her, slid-
ing deeper into the couch, aware that this might be my seat for
the next couple of hours. Nyah was planning to take the kids to

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 Scarcity, Abundance

Fresno — ​a three-​hour drive — ​to camp with the rest of her fam-

ily. Nyah’s brothers and sisters all lived within a few hours of one
another, and it was a tradition for them to get together with the
kids on Independence Day. But with her car’s air-​conditioning
busted for the past three months, Nyah was dreading the car
trip.
“It’s hard because I’m heavy,” Nyah explained. “And that
makes it really hot to sit in that car.” Having spent a good amount
of time personally stuck to its sunbaked leather seats, I could see
what Nyah meant. While Nyah waited on Marcus to find and
install a new unit, the last thing any of us wanted to do on a day
like today was pile inside those four doors.
Still, Nyah was keen on heading to Fresno because it would
likely be her last big trip before her hysterectomy. She wanted to
make it count.
“I just really want to go camping before I have to have my
surgery,” she said, letting out a tired sigh and handing Natasha
the bag of pistachios. For the past few months, Nyah had been
suffering. Her uterus had grown increasingly inflamed, and the
growing fibroids made her writhe in pain. That pain was over-
shadowed only by Nyah’s fears about undergoing major surgery
with general anesthesia. Nyah wasn’t sure she’d survive being
put under, which was one reason why this Fourth of July trip felt
so important. Maybe it would be her last time with her family.
And Nyah needed the boost; not being able to work this sum-
mer had taken its toll on her mental health.
“I want to work,” she said, frowning. “It’s just the health stuff
that’s like a block. It’s like a wall stopping me.”
Nyah took medication to cope with the stress that came with
not having a steady income. She also had pills to calm anxiety
attacks, two of which she’d experienced in the past month alone.
The weekly visits to her psychiatrist helped, but Nyah knew her
challenges fell outside the scope of his expertise. One day she’d
feel fine, the next she’d spiral down. The drugs helped bring

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her back, but they rarely stopped her from eventually swinging
to the other end of the pendulum.
“You never know what you’re gonna get with me.” Nyah
rolled her eyes, leaned back in the lounger, and cracked her
knuckles to ease the tension from braiding Natasha’s hair.
This summer, Nyah felt more frustrated and bored than she
had in years. She felt frustrated because money was scarcer than
ever and bored because that scarcity limited her and the girls’
possibilities. When she’d been working, Nyah had been able to
cover the rent and utilities and still have enough left over to take
Mariah and Natasha to the water park. Now, with no steady
income and barely enough to cover the essentials, Nyah didn’t
have the funds she needed to make the most of summer for her
girls.
“The thing is,” Nyah told me, “you need money to do stuff.”

“Priya’s here!” I heard Jane yell to her mom. It was a sunny Tues-
day afternoon in September, and I was standing outside the
Cains’ front door. I could hear the doorbell sounding through
the house and their collie Max’s paws slipping and sliding on
the living-​room floor. Julie’s footsteps trailed behind him.
“Come on in!” Julie said after she opened the door and
greeted me with a bright smile. Dressed in skinny jeans and a
gray T‑shirt, she looked ready to go out, save for the fuzzy slip-
pers she wore to keep her feet warm on the hardwood floors.
I slipped off my flats in the entryway; Max rolled over at my
feet and I knelt down to scratch his stomach. I’d obliged him the
first time we met, and he’d remembered ever since. I made my
way into the kitchen and found Jane in black leggings and a
black T‑shirt, ready for dance class. She was sitting on a stool at
the granite island with a jar of Planter’s peanuts in one hand.
Every couple of minutes, she reached the other hand into the
container and pulled out a few nuts.
There was an abundance of food on display in the Cains’

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 Scarcity, Abundance

kitchen. A large fruit bowl overflowed with navel oranges, clem-

entines, mandarins, and limes, and a two-​tiered basket was filled
with bananas, butternut squash, peaches, and onions. To the
right of the sink, neatly laid out, were all the Trader Joe’s ingre-
dients for that evening’s dinner: a bag of tortilla chips, avocado,
black beans, refried beans, chili-​ lime spice, and gluten-​ free
tortillas.
“Taco Tuesday!” Julie smiled as she saw me eyeing the
ingredients.
While Julie organized some papers on the dining-​ room
table, I plopped myself down on the stool beside Jane, and we
chatted about her two favorite after-​school activities: dance and
volleyball.
Earlier that day, Julie had texted me our agenda for the after-
noon. The plan was to spend that afternoon, like many after-
noons, shuttling the kids around. In a few minutes, we’d drop
Jane off at the dance studio. While she was there, Julie and I
would go to the bank, pick up dry cleaning, and then stop by
home for a little bit to relax. Afterward, we’d get Jane and bring
her home again so that she could change and grab a snack, then
we’d drive Jane to volleyball camp, come back home, and make
dinner for everyone. Julie and I would eat with Evan; Zach would
collect Jane on his way home from work, and the two of them
would have a late dinner. Maybe, Julie joked, they’d even clean up.
Sometimes when I was with Julie, amid all of the picking up
and dropping off, my mind would wander. I’d think of my after-
noons with Nyah. I’d recall the feeling of watching TV while
sinking deeper and deeper into the couch. As parents, Nyah
and Julie had very different lives.
“Mom, it’s time to go.” Jane jumped up, screwed the lid back
onto the peanut jar, and put it away in the cupboard. Julie nod-
ded, grabbing her purse from the counter. As Julie refilled her
reusable water bottle, she asked Jane if she had remembered her
own water bottle.

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 N ourishment

“Yup,” Jane said, heading toward the garage. “But I’m not
going to take a granola bar because I’m not going to be doing
that much.” Julie nodded approvingly, pulling out her keys from
her purse.
Today, the conversation in the car was a bit stilted. Jane sat
in the back seat of the Cains’ Mercedes, her eyes glued to her
phone. From the driver’s seat, Julie threw questions toward the
back — “How was school today?” “How is social studies class
going?”  — ​that Jane grudgingly answered with one-​ syllable
responses.
At first, I wondered if I was the reason for the silence. Per-
haps I made everyone feel self-​conscious or uncomfortable. But
Julie had assured me earlier that that’s what Jane did now. Her
world was in her phone.
That afternoon, though, Jane wasn’t just quiet. This was
something more, I realized. She was in a bad mood.
“Do you need a tutor for math?” Julie gently asked her
daughter, flipping the left blinker on as we pulled into the dance
studio’s parking lot.
“I’m fine, Mom,” Jane said as she continued tapping on her
screen. Her irritation was palpable. Jane explained that she had
gotten a twenty-​five out of thirty on a math quiz a week ago, but
she had improved her score to a twenty-​six out of thirty on the
next quiz. Julie hoped to continue the conversation, but Jane
made it clear that they were done for now, swinging open the
car door and hopping out onto the concrete.
An hour later, when we picked Jane up from dance, her
mood seemed to have worsened. After a quick pit stop at home,
we made the forty-​five-​minute drive to volleyball camp. The
three of us sat in silence the entire ride.
“Have a good time!” Julie yelled cheerfully to Jane as she slid
the back door open and climbed out. Jane responded with only
a forced grin before slamming the door shut and disappearing
into the gym.

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 Scarcity, Abundance

As we looped around the parking lot, I was struck by Julie’s

silence. Usually, she was chatty when it was just the two of us in
the car. She’d tell me stories from the weekend or update me on
her kids. But now, Julie seemed upset, and she didn’t have to tell
me why. I knew it had to do with Jane. For ten minutes, I joined
Julie in silence. We each sat absorbed in our own thoughts, the
muffled voices of an NPR newscast playing faintly in the
background.
“You know,” Julie eventually said, glancing in my direction
as we pulled up to a stoplight, “Jane has basically always gotten
everything she wants.”
Judging from the time I’d spent with the Cains, I thought
that assertion rang true. I was starting to get Jane’s world; it was
one where so much of what she asked for was not only possible,
but usually granted. Whether Jane wanted front-​row seats to a
Beyoncé concert, new Lululemon leggings, or plane tickets to
fly across the country and visit family, Julie and Zach almost
always seemed able and willing to say yes. But Jane didn’t always
seem to appreciate just how good she had it. When Julie and
Zach had given Jane those Beyoncé tickets for her birthday, Jane
asked them what else they’d gotten her.
“She lives in a bubble,” Julie explained. “And if I’m honest,
she’s really spoiled.”
Again, my mind drifted to Mariah and Natasha. Any of the
gifts Jane had received were beyond their wildest dreams.
Beyond their mom’s too. It seemed to me, in that moment, at
that stoplight, that Julie’s and Nyah’s worlds had never been far-
ther apart.

As moms, Julie and Nyah shared simple truths: they loved their
children more than anything, and they found raising them to
be both immensely joyful and, at times, terribly stressful. Both
knew intimately that nurturing kids was filled with struggles
and triumphs and that it was at once an immediate challenge

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and a long-​term investment. As their kids had slowly grown into

teenagers, both moms had watched their maturation in awe
while also missing the days when their babies would snuggle into
their laps and stare up admiringly into their eyes.
While these shared emotions bound Julie and Nyah, their
tangible experiences as moms diverged sharply.
To my eye, these diverging experiences seemed to be largely
the consequence of the different contexts within which Nyah
and Julie were raising their kids. And yet I struggled to pinpoint
exactly what accounted for their vastly different parenting expe-
riences. What specifically widened the gulf between them? Was
it the different neighborhoods the Cains and the Bakers lived
in, the different homes they shared with their families, the dif-
ferent schools their kids attended, or their different household
incomes? Was it the fact that Julie navigated the world as a mar-
ried, white, affluent woman and Nyah as a single, Black, low-​
income one? When it came to their parenting experiences, how
much did it matter that Julie’s family had few, if any, financial
stresses while Nyah was living so close to the bone? Which of
these differences mattered a great deal, which ones mattered
somewhat, and which ones didn’t matter at all?
My job as a sociologist was to zero in on each of these
factors — ​Julie’s and Nyah’s distinct neighborhoods, incomes,
and racial identities  — ​and explain how each specifically
affected their families’ diets. But trying to isolate these kinds of
individual factors and quantify their precise impacts proved
fruitless. No one factor could adequately account for how
widely — ​profoundly, even — ​Julie’s and Nyah’s paths diverged.
Yes, Julie’s and Nyah’s neighborhoods differed. Yes, they had
different housing situations. Yes, their financial circumstances
were light-​years apart, and yes, they had vastly different degrees
of racial and socioeconomic privilege. But as I interrogated
each of these differences, I came to appreciate that each differ-
ence individually mattered in large part because of what it

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 Scarcity, Abundance

contributed to the whole. Together, all of these differences

coalesced into distinct holistic parenting experiences. They cre-
ated, essentially, different worlds for Julie and Nyah.
Julie had many resources that eased the grind of mother-
hood. She had money, time, security, stability, and the safety of
white privilege. The accumulation of these assets meant that
Julie parented in relative comfort. The Cain kids may have had
their issues (what teenagers didn’t?) but there was never any
question as to whether their basic needs would be met. Julie did
not worry about whether Jane and Evan had the essential neces-
sities to carry on physically and emotionally. Nyah, on the other
hand, couldn’t always take that for granted. In fact, she rarely
could. While Nyah had time, that was about all she shared with
Julie. She worried about keeping the lights on, the fridge
stocked, and her kids out of the police’s gaze. Nyah often felt
one step away from her daughters not having enough — ​of them
not being okay.
Nyah parented in a world of scarcity. Julie did so in a world
of abundance. And this deeper fault line dividing Julie and
Nyah as parents, I discovered, shaped food’s dramatically differ-
ent meanings to each of them.

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 CHAPTER 6

Within Reach

One afternoon, Nyah thought she might come into some money.
We’d gone out to pay off the cell phone bills and grab six dol-
lars’ worth of glazed and powdered doughnuts, and we were in
the Dunkin’ Donuts parking lot when a call came in. Nyah had
looked down at the unknown number, furrowing her brow
before answering with a quiet, suspicious “Yes?” The man on
the other end congratulated her on being eligible to receive
seven thousand dollars from the federal government, no strings
attached. Nyah asked to borrow my pen and notebook to write
some information down. I handed them over, and she quickly
scribbled a few words and numbers on a blank page. After hang-
ing up the phone a few minutes later, Nyah ripped the sheet of
paper out of my notebook, folded it up, and stuffed it in her
purse. Turning to me, she explained that the man had said she
could pick up the money at Walmart anytime.
“I thought it was a scam at first,” Nyah said, popping a pow-
dered doughnut hole into her mouth. But then she considered
that maybe it was legitimate.
“I’m sure going to try it.” Nyah rolled her eyes, a slight grin
crossing her face. “Broke like I am.”
Ultimately, though, Nyah didn’t try it. Back at the house
later that afternoon, Nyah called a friend who warned her that it
wasn’t a good idea. “She’s right,” Nyah told me. “Plus, they told
me that first I needed to buy a card for two hundred and thirty

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 Within Reach

dollars before I could get the seven thousand.” She paused. “I

think it’s a scam.”
During the months I spent at Nyah’s side, that was neither
the first nor the last time she would be called with an enticing
but ultimately spurious offer. Nyah was a consistent target of
phone scams. Some were initially exciting, like when she learned
about different prizes she’d won, low-​interest loans she’d quali-
fied for, or new government benefits she’d earned. Others were
scarier, like when she was informed that her Social Security
number had been hacked or she was going to be arrested for
fraud. Most calls ended with a request for her credit card num-
ber, at which point Nyah would crack up. “You think I use a
credit card?” She’d chuckle and hang up.
Still, Nyah approached each call with cautious optimism. As
unlikely as it was, maybe one of them would turn out to be the
real deal. “You only gotta win the lottery once,” she’d say, a soft
chuckle escaping her lips.
But Nyah never won the lottery. Her time never came. Days,
weeks, and months went by. We passed them in her garage,
where we sat immersed in sitcoms and movies from the early
2000s. As Nyah spoke to the friend who told her that the seven-​
thousand-​dollar offer was probably a scam, we were watching
our second movie of the day, the 2004 remake of Walking Tall,
which starred Natasha’s all-​ time-​
favorite actor and celebrity
crush, the Rock. Then Mariah came by and the sisters played on
their phones while Nyah and Marcus cracked open two cans of
Bud Light that Marcus had bought at the gas station three
blocks away. Their next-​door neighbors Jim and Big Mike — ​t wo
white, burly mechanics with tattoos and a few hours to kill — ​
stopped by to say hi and bum a couple of cigarettes off Marcus.
The afternoon dragged on. Our foreheads glistened in the
summer heat. My eyes began to glaze over as one movie bled
into another. We passed around a roll of Ritz crackers while
Nyah worked carefully and meticulously on Natasha’s hair.

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 N ourishment

It’s almost like Nyah is drawing out the time, I scribbled in my

notebook. It’s like she’s trying to fill the hours and minutes to get to the
end of the day.
The highlight of that afternoon came as the clock hit six
and I could hear, at first faintly, the recognizable jingle of an ice
cream truck. The truck was making its way through the neigh-
borhood, and its music intensified as it rounded the block onto
Nyah’s street. Finally, out of the corner of my eye, I spotted it
three houses down.
“Stop the truck!” Nyah bellowed at Marcus, who had planted
himself on the side of the road to repair a friend’s motorcycle.
“Stop it so Natty can get an ice cream!” Nyah yelled again. Natty,
as Natasha was affectionately called, hadn’t asked her mom for
an ice cream. In fact, she’d been so engrossed in the movie that
she’d hardly noticed the truck nearby. But as Marcus flagged it
down, Nyah tapped on Natasha’s shoulder, and she stood up,
her hand outstretched toward her mom. Nyah dug into her
purse and pulled out two crinkled dollar bills. She smoothed
them out with her fingers and laid the bills in Natasha’s hand.
Then she looked at me. “You want anything?” she asked, as she
often did whenever she bought her daughters anything. Nyah
never let poverty diminish her hospitality or her humanity.
“No, I’m okay.” I smiled. “But I’ll go with Natasha to see what
they’re selling.” Natasha and I hustled down to the end of the
driveway just as the ice cream truck slowed to a halt. Natasha
quickly scanned the menu on the side of the truck before order-
ing Airheads Xtremes Sweetly Sour Candy Belts. From the
image on the carton, the candies looked like miniature rainbow
conveyor belts coated in frosty sugar.
That’s really smart, I thought. Better to get something that won’t
instantly melt in this blazing heat.
We walked back up to the house and Natasha resumed her
position at Nyah’s feet so her mom could continue with the hair
weave. Natasha opened the carton, pulled out a strip, and

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 Within Reach

handed it behind her head to Nyah. Nyah took a bite and

paused.
“Mmm.” She nodded, savoring the bite. “That’s good!”
The three of us sat there for a couple more hours as the sun
dipped behind neighbors’ houses and the air cooled. Nyah
nursed a beer, and I followed the plot of another Rock movie.
Mariah left to meet up with friends and came back with a carton
of McDonald’s fries and a medium Coke for her little sister.
Sharing the fries, the two of them perched side by side on the
couch as the opening credits for another thriller scrolled across
the screen.
It was a day like any other day that summer. If I were to ask
Nyah about any of it now, I doubt she’d remember it.
Little happened. That was the point. The deeper I sank into
Nyah’s couch, the more keenly I noticed something. As stressful
as financial scarcity was, it could also be tedious. It could make
daily life monotonous. With nowhere to go and nothing to do,
Nyah had little she could give to Mariah and Natasha that they
would get excited about.
What’s more, with no signs of income on the way, there wasn’t
a lot to look forward to. The next morning, the sun would again
rise, and the girls would resume their positions on the couch.
This time, Nyah would style Mariah’s hair. Someone else would
call with an offer of seven thousand dollars or more, the neigh-
bors would come over, and the ice cream truck would once again
roll around the corner. The days would pass, but Nyah never
seemed to have the financial means to take advantage of them.
She had time, sure. But without money, she and her daughters
were stuck in that garage.

One evening in early June, Nyah had sat Mariah and Natasha
down to mentally prepare them for the long summer ahead.
Trying to spin a difficult situation into a positive lesson, she
explained to her daughters that despite all that they lacked,

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 N ourishment

there was still a great deal to be thankful for. Nyah knew that it
was a hard sell, and she felt bad about it. But what if she could
help them not feel so bad about it?
“I told them it’s not all about fancy clothes and fancy cars,”
Nyah recounted to me. “ ‘Be happy you have a roof over your
head, you have food in here, you can watch TV when you want to
and use the bathroom whenever you want to. You have a fan
inside to go to when you get hot, and a blanket to get under
when you’re cold.’ ” After Nyah relayed this story to me, she
paused for a moment, glancing down at the phone in her
right hand.
“I’m just trying to survive,” she whispered, looking back up
to meet my eyes.
Surviving came with sacrifices. And like other parents, Nyah
survived and saved money by consistently saying no to her chil-
dren’s large requests.
I thought about Julie, who had the means to parent in a con-
stant flow of yes — ​yes to the big things like private school and
dance classes and yes to the smaller things like a new pair of
shoes and a replacement for a shattered phone screen. In con-
trast, Nyah had to say no to her kids constantly. Summer camp
was off the table, as was a trip to Disneyland or even a day pass to
the local water park. Even the smaller things — ​a trendy pair of
jeans or a refurbished iPad — ​were off the table. None of these
were indulgences that Nyah could provide on her budget.
Nyah’s constantly having to say no wasn’t just hard on
Mariah and Natasha; it was also devastating and guilt-​inducing
for Nyah herself. It made her feel less-​than.
And yet, next to all the things Nyah truly couldn’t afford,
food was different. More often than not, food was miraculously
within reach. Unlike larger items like new sweaters or even
grander indulgences like family vacations, gifts of food were
actually within the realm of possibility for Nyah. Almost always,
Nyah had a few dollars lying around. She could generally

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 Within Reach

overturn a sofa cushion or plunge her hand into her purse and
scrounge up a buck and a handful of coins. That money was
never enough to pay off a bill or fill up a gas tank, but that didn’t
mean it was useless.
It had value because it could help Nyah say yes to her daugh-
ters’ junk-​food requests. On a daily basis, food was the thing she
and her girls could afford and the thing they could look forward
to. A one-​dollar doughnut, a two-​dollar ice cream, a three-​
dollar burger, Airheads Xtremes Sweetly Sour Candy Belts.
These were treats Nyah could swing that brought smiles to her
daughters’ faces. So on a recent trip to the grocery store when
Natasha asked Nyah for a ninety-​nine-​cent bag of Doritos, Nyah
said yes. When Mariah requested a dollar-​fifty Dr Pepper, Nyah
obliged. These small purchases were what allowed Nyah to say
yes to her kids at least once a day.
Just because Nyah said yes to her girls’ junk-​food requests
didn’t mean that she didn’t care about their health. Nyah talked
often about how good nutrition was key to her and her daugh-
ters’ health. One afternoon, as Nyah, Mariah, and I drove to the
pawnshop, Nyah monologued about the importance of a nutri-
tious diet for longevity. Mariah sat in the front seat eating Fruity
Pebbles out of the box, singing along to the radio while gob-
bling up handfuls of the colorful, puffy balls. Glancing at her
daughter, Nyah said matter‑of‑factly, “If you eat well, you’re
going to live long, that’s for sure.”
Another afternoon, Nyah told me that she didn’t really want
the girls to be eating junk food. “Some things they do ask me,
and I don’t like to buy that stuff for them.” Nyah let out a heavy
sigh, then added, “They win. They win all the time.”

Food for her girls is where I most often saw Nyah’s money go.
One Saturday, we’d ducked into a hole‑in‑the-​wall salon where
Nyah paid twenty-​eight dollars to get her and her daughters’
eyebrows threaded. Of the many hours I’d spent at her side, that

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was one of the few non-​food-​related activities I saw Nyah take

her kids to. Most of the time, she was spending a few dollars
here and a few dollars there on small edible treats.
What if Nyah just saved her money? This was a question I asked
myself often, not because I thought she should, but because I
knew someone would eventually fire it at me. This seemed like
an almost inevitable outcome of sharing my observations more
widely. Critics would point out how financially irrational parents
like Nyah acted, how frivolously she wasted what little money
she had. If Nyah had just saved all of the cash that she spent on
cans of Sprite and Wendy’s chicken sandwiches, they’d argue,
maybe she could lift herself out of poverty. If Nyah was in dire
straits but also squandering her money on junk food rather than
investing or saving it, then she had no one to blame but herself.
The idea that low-​income people like Nyah are responsible
for their position below the poverty line is known as the
culture‑of‑poverty argument. The theory originated in the 1960s
with the anthropologist Oscar Lewis. Lewis argued that sus-
tained poverty generated a set of cultural attitudes, beliefs, val-
ues, and practices, and that this culture of poverty would likely
perpetuate itself over time, even if the structural conditions that
gave rise to it changed. Lewis’s idea was popularized by the soci-
ologist Daniel Patrick Moynihan, then an assistant labor secre-
tary to Lyndon B. Johnson, who introduced the idea to the public
in 1965 in what became known as the Moynihan Report. Moyni-
han argued that Black families were caught in a “tangle of pathol-
ogy” that resulted from the cumulative effects of slavery and
structural poverty. In particular, he blamed Black poverty on
“ghetto culture,” failure to marry, and absent Black fathers.
Moynihan’s argument quickly gained steam among conser-
vatives. It furthered the idea that people in poverty played a cen-
tral role in maintaining and reproducing their conditions, and
it also reinforced racist stereotypes about Black communities’
loose family morals. It was up to Black people, conservatives

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 Within Reach

opined, to extricate themselves from a perpetuating cycle of

poverty.
The culture‑of‑poverty argument has been the subject of
much backlash, with critics underscoring how it diverts atten-
tion away from structural barriers and toward blaming the vic-
tim. Social scientists have shown that poor individuals don’t
have different or “delinquent” values that perpetuate their cir-
cumstances; rather, they face systemic obstacles that cement
them and their children in place. Sociologists like Mario Small
and Michèle Lamont have worked to refine what culture is and
isn’t and how it interacts with structures to reproduce inequality
and limit social mobility. But the argument still circulates, rein-
forcing an American individualistic viewpoint that people should
be able to pull themselves up by their bootstraps. As recently as
2020, Lawrence Mead, a professor of politics and public policy,
published an article titled “Poverty and Culture” in which he
argued that neither racism nor policy failures were responsible
for poverty in the United States. Rather, the long-​term poor
themselves — ​ namely, Black and Latinx people — ​ lacked the
individualism, ambition, and “enterprising temperament” of
descendants of European immigrants.1 (Following scholarly
outcry and condemnations of the piece as “false, prejudicial,
and stigmatizing,” the journal that published the article, Society,
retracted it.2)
In light of this intellectual history, I knew that my research
observations could be interpreted in wildly different ways. I
shuddered at the thought that, taken out of context, what I had
observed could mistakenly be seen as buttressing a culture‑of‑
poverty argument. By truthfully showing where Nyah chose to
put her money, might I inadvertently bolster a view that she was
responsible for the hardships she endured? Might my findings
suggest that Nyah’s spending choices were what kept her in pov-
erty? Worst of all, might they reinforce racist tropes of single,
Black moms as lazy or irresponsible?

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 N ourishment

This was completely counter to my aims. And yet I couldn’t

lie about what I had observed; as a scientist, I had an ethical
obligation to present my observations as fully and transparently
as they’d transpired before my eyes.
But, I realized, I also had the profound responsibility to put
these observations into the correct context.
So yes, it was true that I’d seen Nyah spend six dollars on
doughnuts, seven on chicken fingers and fries, and ten on Frap-
puccinos. But there was also this truth: even if Nyah didn’t
spend that money on her kids, twenty-​three dollars wouldn’t lift
her out of poverty. It wouldn’t change her circumstances. With
the number of debt collectors coming by, the bills to pay, unex-
pected medical expenses, and family emergencies, that money
was going out the door no matter what. It always did. I’d seen
Nyah’s last bills fly out of her wallet — ​fifty bucks to help a friend
pay for a funeral, forty to help make another’s bail, twenty to pay
off her sister’s cell phone bill, forty-​five to keep her own daugh-
ters’ phones working. There was always a debt to pay and some-
one coming around to collect it.
The author and activist James Baldwin once said, “Anyone
who has ever struggled with poverty knows how extremely
expensive it is to be poor.” Nyah’s life was testament to this
truth. Nyah spent a significant share of what little money she
had to keep herself and her kids housed and safe. First, when
Nyah was working, she put over half of her income toward her
rent, making her “severely rent-​burdened” like one in every five
Americans. Even with all she paid for housing, there were addi-
tional expenses that added to her monthly bills, expenses I
didn’t see high-​income families dealing with. For instance, the
water from Nyah’s kitchen faucet wasn’t safe to drink, so she
spent around forty dollars each month on bottled water for her
family, although sometimes Nyah would drink the tap water and
save the bottles for her daughters. Nyah also paid for a security
system — ​ eighteen dollars a month  — ​after her house was

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 Within Reach

broken into twice in three months, an expense that families in

safer neighborhoods didn’t have.
I also saw how consistently coming up short — ​how never
having any financial reserves to draw from — ​increased Nyah’s
expenses. Her jewelry was one example. Years ago, when Nyah
lost her job, she didn’t have enough to make rent. That week,
she pawned what jewelry she had for two hundred dollars, which
allowed her to keep a roof over her and her daughters’ heads. As
the months wore on, Nyah wanted to get the jewelry back, but
the cost of pulling the jewelry out of the pawnshop also increased.
She never had the two hundred forty dollars she needed to get it
out, so she continued to pay a storage fee of sorts — ​thirty-​five
dollars a month, which came to more than four hundred dollars
a year — ​for the shop to keep holding on to it.
There are other examples of how expensive poverty is. Nyah
couldn’t afford a newer car, which meant that she was constantly
forking over money to repair her old one. She didn’t have
enough money at any moment to put in the bank to gain inter-
est, making her one of the nine million Americans without a
bank account. She was constantly paying late fees. Five years ear-
lier, Nyah had gotten a credit card but failed to pay the monthly
bill when she needed to redirect her money toward buying a
new car part so she could drive to work. Then the interest started
compounding and Nyah could never get on top of it. She still
owed the credit card company tens of thousands of dollars.
“They be callin’, harassing and threatening me,” Nyah
explained. “I’m like, ‘Whatever. I’m already broke.’ ” Nyah knew
she’d never pay that card off or qualify for a credit card ever
again. Having no reserves and no support made climbing out of
poverty an impossibility.
That knowledge shaped how Nyah dealt with money when
she had it. Dollar bills were ephemeral, best suited for spending
before someone took them away again.
I could see how Nyah’s decision to spend rather than save

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might seem irrational. But rationality is always subject to con-

text. What is irrational in one context may be highly rational in
another.
As I saw cash fly in and out of Nyah’s hands, I understood
that a context of financial scarcity and instability made Nyah’s
junk-​food spending the most rational choice in the world. Nyah
spent the money in her pocket on her kids — ​what the sociolo-
gist Allison Pugh calls “windfall child rearing” — ​ because it
wasn’t clear how empty or full her pocket might be the next day.3
Nyah used cash on hand like the windfall it was — ​a piece of
good luck, its presence not to be taken for granted or assumed
in the future. Money now did not mean money later. For Nyah,
the decision to treat the girls came down to the fact that she
couldn’t know when another emergency might strike or another
bill collector would call. If Nyah didn’t treat her kids today, she
might not have anything to give Mariah and Natasha for weeks.
That was not okay. Good moms made sacrifices to give their kids
joy. Good moms found a way when there was no way.4
Nyah found a way, and that way was saying yes to her daugh-
ters whenever it was possible. Nyah generally prioritized satisfy-
ing the girls’ immediate wants for chips, soda, and candy rather
than risk losing the chance to get them anything at all. This was
how Nyah made lemonade out of the bitter lemons she’d been
given. It was how she provided for her girls, knowing they’d likely
never have all the opportunities she wanted for them. Those
opportunities were, she felt, off the table. But food wasn’t.

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 CHAPTER 7

Being “Good”

The first time I met Dana Williams, she and I chatted at one of a
handful of wooden tables inside a supermarket. We sat kitty-​
corner from each other, the smell of pastrami and pasta salad
from the deli just a few feet away filling our noses. During the
conversation, Dana’s thirteen-​year-​old daughter, Madison, kept
herself entertained by touring the grocery aisles. Madison
stopped by our table five times over the course of an hour with
various goodies: gummies, Ritz crackers, tortilla chips, chocolate-​
covered pretzels, soda.
“Can I have this?” she asked her mom each time, smiling
hopefully while holding the treat up with one hand. Dana
explained that Madison could pick one. As her daughter walked
away, Dana turned to me.
“I feel bad,” she said, letting out a heavy sigh. “But I’m a sin-
gle mom. I can’t get her everything she wants.”
This was neither the first nor the last time I would watch
Madison and her younger sister, Paige, beg their mom for junk
food. One Wednesday evening, I met Dana at her house to join
her family for a grocery run to Target. I was hanging out on the
front stoop with Dana’s mom, Debra, and the two girls when
Dana got home feeling exhausted, as she did most evenings. In
her medical-​assistant scrubs, she trudged up the driveway with
her purse and a thermos of water, a tired look in her eyes. Madi-
son and Paige, in contrast, were bursting with energy. Paige ran

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up to Dana and threw her pudgy arms around her mom’s waist.
Dana put her hand on Paige’s back and bent over to kiss the top
of her head. Madison stood up on the front steps.
“Can we go to Target now?” she asked her mom, a hand on
one hip.
“Don’t I get a hello?” Dana said, feigning offense.
“Hello,” Madison said in a deadpan tone, the sides of her
mouth beginning to curl slightly upward to reveal a grin.
“Hello.” Dana matched Madison’s tone. We all broke into grins.
“They’ve been asking to go all day,” Debra told her daugh-
ter, pulling a pack of cigarettes out of her jeans pocket and tak-
ing a few steps away from everyone to light one. “But I told them
they had to wait till Mom got home.”
Dana nodded. I could tell from the ever-​present bags under
her eyes and the way she’d dragged her feet coming up the
driveway that the last thing Dana wanted to do was head back
out. As she often did within five minutes of getting home, Dana
wanted to change out of her scrubs into yoga pants and a tank
top and then plop herself down on the couch, put her feet up,
flip through pictures on her phone, and catch up on the day
with Debra. But the only thing Dana hated more than going
back out after work was letting Madison and Paige down, so the
five of us loaded ourselves into Dana’s Honda Civic.
Inside Target, families roamed brightly lit, well-​ stocked
aisles. Dads pushed around carts filled with jumbo packs of toi-
let paper, and kids pulled at moms’ pant legs, begging for video
games, baseball caps, and Snickers bars. As we began our stroll
through the grocery department, Paige and Madison started
begging Dana for what felt like everything in sight. They pointed
out virtually every appetizing item they spotted: Velveeta mac
and cheese. Extra-​large marshmallows. Cinnamon Toast Crunch.
Taco shells. If I hadn’t known they were asking for these items, I
would have assumed they were giving us a tour of the supermar-
ket or practicing reading labels.

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 Being “Good”

But they weren’t docents of a grocery excursion; they had an

agenda. We hadn’t been in the cookie and cereal aisle for two
minutes before Paige’s index finger shot up toward the top shelf.
“Mom, cinnamon-​roll Oreos with peanut butter!” she yelled,
teetering on her tiptoes to get a better view. Dana ignored Paige as
she rolled her shopping cart over to the juice section. Dana’s strat-
egy for moving forward without getting stalled, I quickly learned,
was to pretend she couldn’t hear her daughters. This only sort of
worked. Dana ignored the girls, and the girls ignored Dana ignor-
ing them. Paige grabbed a bag of pancake mix to show Dana, and
Madison yelled out, “Cinnamon Pop-​Tarts!” We chose a chocolate
powder for Madison to mix with milk in the morning for breakfast
as Paige screamed in the background, “Mom, can we please get
cereal? I am begging you!” Dana allowed the girls to put items in
the cart. Then she stealthily removed those items once her daugh-
ters were distracted with something else.
This back-​and-​forth continued as we navigated the eight
aisles of food and drinks. Halfway through, Dana turned to me
and said, exasperation palpable in her voice, “As you can imag-
ine, I prefer to grocery shop by myself.” She pulled a box of
Cookie Crisp cereal out of the shopping cart and put it back on
the shelf. “They have way too much energy.”
When it came to food marketing, the supermarket aisles
were a battlefield. Everywhere we looked, there were packages
meant to appeal to both kids and parents. So many foods that
Paige and Madison begged for were designed to make kids’
mouths water and simultaneously assuage parents’ guilt about
buying them. The Cocoa Puffs box was a great example. Madi-
son’s and Paige’s eyes were drawn to the cute cartoon bird drink-
ing chocolate milk through a straw from a heaping bowl of
crunchy brown puffs next to the words Cuckoo for Chocolatey Milk!
That imagery, combined with the brown background, screamed
chocolate. But at the top of the box was the comforting message
With Whole Grain First Ingredient, meant to assure moms that this

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unhealthy-​looking cereal was actually a nutritious choice for

their kids — ​or at least that it wasn’t complete junk. The Kraft
­macaroni-​and-​cheese box struck this same balance, highlight-
ing for kids how completely cheesy and comforting the pack-
age’s contents were while at the same time assuring parents that
the product contained no artificial flavors or dyes.
The food industry is masterful at playing on the stresses of
modern parenthood. Its marketing people know that moms like
Dana make the vast majority of household purchasing decisions,
collectively spending more than two trillion dollars a year.1 Food
companies market to a population of parents they see as over-
whelmed, harried, and racked with guilt and doubt. Dana’s neg-
ative feelings are all “pain points” that the industry tries to
“solve” by pushing its products. It delivers these solutions by
bombarding parents with convenient processed products that
let the parents supposedly have it all: they can both please their
kids and ease their own guilty consciences. Companies promote
the idea that kids don’t like adult food and that their products
offer healthy, child-​ friendly alternatives. They package their
products tastefully, evoking a sense of health and naturalness
while making false or meaningless health claims (“calcium-​
rich,” “30 percent less sodium,” “gluten-​free,” “with probiotics”).
They sneak language referring to fruits and vegetables into
their packaging, even if those ingredients are minimal addi-
tions to the products. Kix cereal’s “Kid-​Tested, Parent-​Approved”
slogan underscores the message that kids should pick their
foods and then parents should approve, not the other way
around.2
All of these ploys work.
“ ‘Real cinnamon’?” Dana read on the box of Cinnamon
Toast Crunch Paige handed to her. “How about Cheerios?” she
asked Paige, who was staring up at her mom expectantly. Paige
shook her head adamantly and glared in my direction, perhaps to
enlist me as an advocate on her behalf. Dana rolled her eyes and

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 Being “Good”

looked down at the box in her hands. Here, too, whole grains
were listed as the first ingredient. “Well,” Dana said with a sigh,
tossing the carton into the shopping cart, “how bad can they be?”
Madison and Paige weren’t the only kids nagging their mom
for foods filled with sugar, salt, and fat. Moms across the income
spectrum experienced the same onslaught of requests from
their kids. I witnessed this during shopping trips with Nyah,
Renata, and the other parents I interviewed for my research.
Not one mom completely escaped Big Food’s aggressive market-
ing or their kids’ desires for Cap’n Crunch or Chips Ahoy. Not
one mom left the supermarket without making an unwanted
compromise to appease her child. Not one mom felt great about
everything listed on her grocery receipt.
“They always want junk,” Julie Cain told me one afternoon
as we prepared a pot of beef chili for dinner. “I mean, they really
ask for a lot of it.” Whenever Julie announced that she was going
to Trader Joe’s, Jane and Evan reliably had requests. Chips,
cookies, soda — ​you name it, they wanted it.
Jane and Evan loved swinging by Starbucks after school to
get Frappuccinos and going to Jamba Juice on the weekends for
peanut b ­ utter–​chocolate smoothies. When they went to the
movies, they wanted buttered popcorn. When they went to the
mall, they asked for slices of pizza. These foods brought genuine
smiles to their faces.
In general, I saw Dana, Nyah, and moms with similar resources
saying yes to their kids’ requests. I also saw them occasionally say
no. Nyah drew the line one evening after Natasha had eaten too
many bags of Cheetos. Dana wouldn’t let Paige get Starbucks after
six o’clock because she didn’t want her having that much caffeine
and sugar before bed. But most often, lower-​income moms’ refus-
als derived from financial necessity; they largely said no to their
kids when they didn’t have the money. When discretionary funds
were there, these moms strove to oblige.
Moms like Nyah and Dana said yes to junk food as a means

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of buffering their kids against hardship. In saying yes and hon-

oring their children’s food requests, moms showed their kids
that they saw them, that they heard them, and that they could
give them not just what they needed but also what they wanted.
Honoring and nurturing kids also meant giving them choices.
In a context where moms felt like they didn’t have all the options
to present to their kids, that their kids’ lives were already con-
strained by the realities of growing up in poverty, food was one
of the few things kids really got to choose. Life was hard enough,
and to take that agency away — ​to tell their kids they were wrong
to want and ask for small indulgences — ​felt almost cruel.
“It makes them happy,” Nyah had told me about junk food
one afternoon as we pulled the car into the driveway. This rang
true to me. Mariah and Natasha asked for treats like Pop-​Tarts
and Kool-​A id all the time and were elated when their mom
obliged. When her mom handed her money for fast food,
Mariah did a little dance — ​complete with a two-​step and head
nod — ​that made all of us erupt in laughter.
By contrast, I generally saw higher-​income moms like Julie
defaulting to no to these requests. The same was true, though to a
slightly lesser degree, for Renata; even though Renata obliged her
kids’ requests more often than Julie, her general inclination was
to say no rather than yes to their asks for Cheetos and Mars bars.
One evening, Julie and I stood in the kitchen making pasta.
Dropping the long strands of spaghetti into a boiling pot of
water, she recounted the fights that she’d gotten into with Jane
and Evan. “Apparently I don’t buy enough junk food.” She
chuckled, giving the dancing noodles a stir. “They say, ‘I don’t
ever have things in my lunch box. You don’t buy enough treats,’ ”
Julie said, imitating her nagging kids. “But I just am pretty much
like, ‘No, no, and no.’ ”
Actually, Julie didn’t always say no. She and Renata chose their
battles. Sometimes, Julie was too exhausted to fight. She got tired
of hearing Jane and Evan complain about not getting enough of

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 Being “Good”

the foods they asked for, and Jane and Evan similarly grew frus-
trated at their mom when she too quickly dismissed their requests.
The kids also knew how to push their mom’s buttons. For instance,
Jane would turn Julie’s and Zach’s consumption of Diet Coke
against them — ​if her parents could have soda, why couldn’t she?
Sometimes, Julie found herself at her wit’s end. In those moments,
she took the path of least resistance and indulged her kids.
Still, Julie and other affluent mothers maintained the gen-
eral approach of saying no. This was in part motivated by a
shared desire to keep kids’ diets healthy. But I also saw that
Julie’s parenting context uniquely shaped what saying no meant
to her and also how saying no felt to her. Saying no to the big
stuff wasn’t something that Julie had to navigate. Her ability to
say yes to more of her children’s needs and wants translated
directly into an abundance of daily opportunities, big and small,
for Julie to show her kids that she loved and cared for them. She
gave them summer camps, weekend tutoring, and new laptops.
She took them shopping, toured private high schools with Jane,
and visited colleges with Evan. Food was neither a unique thing
she could offer her kids nor a rare gift she could say yes to, so
Julie didn’t have to use food as a daily buffer against hardship.
Food didn’t serve the same purpose for Julie as it did for Nyah.
Julie’s context also meant that saying no to junk food wasn’t
as emotionally distressing to her as a mother. What was one no
in light of a thousand yeses? When Julie said no to Jane’s pleas
for salt and vinegar chips, she didn’t worry about whether she
was potentially harming or depriving her daughter.
Like Nyah and Dana, Julie and Renata used food to provide
their kids with love and care, to nourish and sustain them. But
each mom’s broader parenting context changed how she used
food to accomplish that goal.

Saying yes and saying no was as much about the moms as it was
about the kids. Moms used food to care for their children, but

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they also used food for themselves — ​to feel a sense of worth as

caregivers. Food wasn’t just about kids’ well-​being; it was about
moms’ too. The food industry knows that. That’s why it preys on
moms so intensely, taunting them with that generally elusive
prize of satisfying kids while also feeling like good caregivers.
But what does it mean to be a “good” mom? What were Julie,
Dana, Renata, and Nyah all striving for in the first place?
In the United States, we share deeply held beliefs about what
makes women good mothers. Sociologists refer to these beliefs
as “the ideology of intensive mothering.” The sociologist Sharon
Hays coined the term intensive mothering in 1996 when she
detailed the unreasonable, gendered demands society had
increasingly placed on mothers since the 1980s. In the 1980s
and 1990s, as more women in North America became educated
and began entering the labor force, the intensive-​mothering
ideology arose as a means to redomesticate women through
motherhood. The ideology specifies that good moms must act
as kids’ primary caregivers. Good mothering is child-​centered
and labor-​intensive; good moms devote all of their energy, emo-
tion, and attention to their kids. Good moms also listen to
experts (for example, doctors and public health officials) to
protect kids from harm and pave their way to success. Good
moms are self-​sacrificing; they put kids’ needs before their own
and forgo whatever is necessary — ​time, money, one’s own din-
ner or mental health — ​to ensure their kids’ well-​being and
happiness.3 In a country with few legal protections and support-
ive policies for mothers, such as legally mandated paid mater-
nity leave and universal childcare, intensive-​mothering ideals
have vested children’s well-​being almost exclusively in moms’
hands.4
This notion that raising kids is a highly individual rather
than communal or societal endeavor also favors more privi-
leged, resourced moms who are less reliant on the state. That
means that good moms in America end up being seen as white,

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married to men, monogamous, and stay‑at‑home caregivers.

Because of this, being a good mom in the United States is an
exclusionary ideal, challenging for all, attainable by few, and
demanding of the highest level of selflessness and devotion.
Intensive mothering’s standards are both unachievable and
deeply gendered. The ideology dictates that mothers should not
need or want the help of others — ​for instance, fathers and part-
ners — ​in raising children. It specifies that mothers should also
gladly engage in self-​sacrifice in the name of their kids’ best
interests. It devalues mothers’ inherent worth as humans, shift-
ing that worth to how well they enact the role of their children’s
caretakers. It vests moms’ dignity in motherhood, making chil-
dren the metric by which society evaluates them and by which
they come to value themselves. Intensive mothering dooms
moms to feelings of inadequacy and the sense that they never do
enough — ​that they never are enough.
Despite the ideology’s unreasonable and unachievable stan-
dards, sociologists have found that moms across society buy into
it. Although many recognize — ​and even critique — ​the level of
stringency and self-​sacrifice intensive mothering requires, they
still feel beholden to its ideals and want to live up to them.5 Put
simply, moms across society aspire to be intensive mothers.
Intensive mothering has everything to do with what food
means to moms. For one, feeding children is broadly considered
to be mothers’ inherent, biologically dictated responsibility. It
starts with pregnancy, when most moms grow and develop their
children in utero. It continues with breastfeeding, when moms
are again expected to use their own bodies to fuel their chil-
dren. While the physiological component disappears after that
stage, moms continue to be viewed as naturally best poised to
nourish and sustain their children. This powerful sentiment is
held across society, within families, and often by moms them-
selves. It helps drive the reality in today’s society that feeding is
almost always the moms’ primary responsibility.6

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Food’s centrality to motherhood made it a fitting, ongoing

tool for the moms I met to enact intensive mothering. Food was
an avenue for moms to devote resources, sacrifice their own
needs or wants, and ensure their kids’ well-​being. It was a metric
by which moms felt accountable and judged. Food was how moms
strove to live up to intensive mothering’s ideals. It was how they
tried to stand tall and say, loud and clear, I’m a good mom.
But the very different worlds in which the moms I observed
were raising their kids drove how specifically they used food to
accomplish this goal of being “good.” Saying yes to junk-​food
requests was how low-​income moms worked to prove to them-
selves they were good mothers; saying no was how affluent moms
tried to derive that exact same sense of worth.
I thought back to my evening at Target with Dana. Dana had
let Madison and Paige fill the shopping cart with frozen pizzas
and sugary yogurts, forgoing the bags of grapes and bunches of
bananas she’d been eyeing. Obliging Madison’s pleas for Dr
Pepper and Paige’s squeals for Rice Krispies Treats was to some
degree about keeping the peace; Dana would do anything to
avoid a battle with the girls at the end of a long day. She also
wanted to make sure Madison and Paige felt provided for.
But there was more to it than that. Letting the girls grab
whatever they wanted off the shelves was intimately tied to
Dana’s desire to feel competent in a world that too often told her
she wasn’t. While Dana didn’t want her kids eating junk, she
also couldn’t bear to hear herself say no to one more of their
asks. It would remind her of how limited she was, of how many
noes she’d said so far in their lives and how many more she’d
have to say. Good moms, Dana believed, had more to give their
kids. Good moms found a way to say yes when it mattered.
So, staring at a six-​pack of soda Paige had placed in the
shopping cart, Dana nodded. “That’s fine,” she said with a sigh,
rounding the corner into the freezer section.
I saw the same thing when I watched Nyah say yes to her

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 Being “Good”

daughters. Junk food was certainly a gift to her kids, a momen-

tary satisfaction of their dietary wants and the reason for Mari-
ah’s hilarious dance. But saying yes gave Nyah something too.
As a Black, single, low-​income mom, Nyah never felt like she
could do enough — ​like she was enough. Whether in her daugh-
ters’ pediatrician’s office or during a meeting with her social
worker, Nyah got the message loud and clear, every single day,
that she did not fit society’s definition of a good mom. The pos-
sibility of proving that wrong could seem futile. Nyah navigated
stigma and judgment simply for existing and raising her kids as
the woman she was. But the daily act of saying yes and bringing
smiles to her daughters’ faces offered Nyah a rare, welcome
glimmer of hope. It suggested to her that maybe she was a bet-
ter, more competent mother than the world cast her as.
In contrast, Julie and other affluent moms seemed to derive
feelings of gratification by doing the exact opposite when it came
to junk food. Julie sometimes laughed when she told me about
denying her kids’ requests. Certainly, in the moment, the requests
annoyed and even wore her out. But it struck me that Julie was, at
least in hindsight, proud about every time she was able to say no.
She seemed, almost, to enjoy it. And that enjoyment, I realized,
stemmed from how saying no made Julie feel.
Julie didn’t face the same kind of societal scrutiny as Dana
and Nyah about whether she was a good mom. According to the
dogma of intensive mothering, she was. She was white. She was
married. She was affluent. She was the definition of a child-​
centered caregiver, having chosen to prioritize raising her chil-
dren over pursuing a professional path. She was equipped with
resources to enact intensive mothering: more money in the
bank, more space to move in, more gas in her car, more time to
rest. Unlike Nyah and Dana, she was rarely asked to justify her
parenting — ​ no one asked Julie to defend buying her kids
iPhones and expensive clothes. Society trusted Julie as a mother,
a trust it did not bestow on those with less economic or racial

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privilege. If any mom was poised to achieve intensive mother-

ing’s standards, it was Julie.
And yet just because Julie fit the definition didn’t mean that
she always felt like a good mom. Even Julie, with all the resources
in the world, sometimes felt like she wasn’t doing enough. Like
she could be working harder. Like she could be doing better.
Like she could be better.
It was this gnawing feeling of inadequacy — ​that little voice
in the back of every mom’s head that told her she was falling
short — ​that kept Julie and other affluent moms continually try-
ing to find ways to invest more energy, time, and money in their
children. Food offered an opportune outlet to channel these
efforts. Not only were moms held accountable and harshly
judged for their kids’ intake and bodies, but food was also omni-
present. Keeping their kids’ food nutritious and curbing kids’
unhealthy preferences were things affluent moms could work
on every single day and, in doing so, try to meet the bar of inten-
sive mothering.
Simply put, saying no reflected Julie’s deep commitment to
intensive mothering. Julie demonstrated her devotion to her
kids’ nutritional well-​being by continually striving to stem their
unhealthy cravings. Sure, it could be exhausting and frustrating
or even devolve into a battle. But Julie’s willingness to wage a
yearslong war against her kids’ desire for sugary and salty snacks
proved to her that she was willing to do anything that was in her
kids’ best interests, even if they didn’t see it that way. That’s why
Julie said no. That’s why Julie beamed with pride when she
talked about how frustrated her kids were that she never bought
“fun stuff.” Julie beamed because, with every denial of her kids’
unhealthy requests, she found momentary proof that she was a
good mom.

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 CHAPTER 8

Hunger and Pickiness

For low-​income moms, financial scarcity could give way to food

scarcity. The ever-​present threat of running out of money meant
living with the fear that food could also just as easily run out.
Such fears were often rooted in moms’ prior experiences.
Nyah, for instance, knew what it was like not to have enough to
fill her daughters’ stomachs. The memory that haunted her
most viscerally came from a time when Mariah was still in dia-
pers. One evening, the six-​month-​old had awoken from a nap
and proceeded to drink all of the formula intended to last two
more days. With the formula depleted and no money to imme-
diately restock it, Nyah paid her local food pantry a visit. There,
she learned that they wouldn’t be getting any formula in for
another twenty-​ four hours. Desperate, Nyah returned home
and tried giving her daughter whole milk. But the taste was for-
eign and unappetizing; Mariah spit it out and wailed from hun-
ger. Nyah called her aunt who lived an hour away, and she
promised to bring Nyah some more formula the next morning.
Nyah stayed up all night with crying Mariah while she awaited
her aunt. Sixteen years later, when Nyah closed her eyes, she
could still hear her ravenous daughter’s screams. Nyah never
wanted her daughter to be in that kind of pain again — ​and
she’d do everything in her power to make sure she never was.
Nyah wasn’t alone. Other low-​income moms had similar sto-
ries to share — ​some distant memories like Nyah’s and others

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more recent. But whenever they had transpired, these prior

experiences of food scarcity were seared into moms’ brains. And
the constant fear that such an experience could recur without
warning shaped moms’ priorities when it came to feeding kids.
That is, the looming threat of food scarcity made their kids’ cur-
rent satiety a top priority for mothers.
Delfina Carrillo, a spunky single mom of three and a super-
market cashier, exemplified this prioritization. I met Delfina
one afternoon in the three-​bedroom, twelve-​hundred-​square-​
foot apartment she shared with her youngest son, fifteen-​year-​
old Luis. Delfina, a second-​generation Mexican-​A merican, wore
a blue tank top and jean shorts that hit right above her knee.
Chatty and candid, Delfina paired a contagious laugh with a
tendency to gesture enthusiastically.
Like Nyah, Delfina had lived through periods when the
fridge was empty and the freezer was headed in that direction
too. Feeding herself and her three kids on a cashier’s salary had
been a feat of magic that she’d worked hard to pull off, all while
trying to hide the emotional toll that struggle took. For years,
what had proven extremely stressful for Delfina was that all
three of her children — ​who loved sports and seemed to rotate
through growth spurts on a weekly basis — ​were always hungry.
“They had serious appetites.” Delfina chuckled, rubbing her
stomach.
Some afternoons, the kids returned home from school insa-
tiable. And if money hadn’t been an issue for Delfina, her kids’
appetites wouldn’t have been either. If they’d wanted second or
third helpings of dinner every night, she could easily have
bought more food.
But money was an issue, and therefore, so was their hunger.
While two of her three children were now grown and living out-
side her home, Delfina would never forget the lesson she’d
learned over the years of filling their bellies. That lesson was
that she had to be painstakingly intentional about how she

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 Hunger and Pickiness

grocery shopped — ​ about how and where she put her hard-​
earned dollars toward food. If Delfina wasn’t careful, she could
easily blow through the week’s earnings on food that didn’t fill
her kids up and left them tossing and turning in their beds from
growling stomachs. Delfina learned to prioritize satiety.
But another hard lesson that Delfina learned was that her kids
could be as picky as they were ravenous. This is a lesson many par-
ents learn at some point, and often the hard way. They discover
that trying to get toddlers and children to eat something new
comes with risks. Giving kids unfamiliar and less preferred foods
can lead to battles, ones that kids are more likely than parents to
win. When her kids were little, Delfina discovered that even if her
children were starving, they wouldn’t eat just anything. They
could — ​and often did — ​turn down dishes they didn’t like, even
throwing them onto the floor. When this happened, Delfina grew
frustrated and more stressed: not only was that food on the floor
wasted, but Delfina was out the money that it had cost her to buy it.
The sociologist Caitlin Daniel has written about the bind
that kids’ pickiness creates for low-​income moms. Daniel inter-
viewed moms of young children and observed their trips to the
supermarket, and she discovered that low-​income moms had to
consider not only how much food cost but also what would hap-
pen if their kids refused it. “To avoid risking waste,” Daniel
explained in her New York Times opinion piece, “these parents
fall back on their children’s preferences.”1
The low-​income moms I met faced the same food-​waste con-
cerns and responded similarly. The moms explained that they’d
learned early on in their kids’ lives that catering to kids’ prefer-
ences was a more financially sound choice than attempting to
force new foods on them. Catering to what children wanted all
but eliminated the possibility of wasted food and money. When
moms customized shopping lists to kids’ tastes, then whatever
food they bought was consumed and contributed to their chil-
dren’s growth and satiety.

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Delfina’s drive to fill Luis up at home was related to the fact

that Luis often went hungry during the day. Delfina worried
because Luis, like Ebony — ​the vegan teenager from chapter
4 — ​frequently skipped school lunch. Having eaten it since ele-
mentary school, he had grown tired of the monotony of flavors
and textures. What was on offer never seemed to change. Some-
times, to tide himself over until school let out, Luis turned to
the school snack shop. There, he’d buy Smart Snacks.
Since 2014, the food industry has reformulated popular
brands of snacks to meet the CDC’s Smart Snacks in Schools
standards but packaged them to resemble the widely available,
less nutritious versions. These look-​alike versions of junk food
get kids exposed and hooked. Luis could buy reduced-​fat or low-​
sodium versions of his favorite snacks, like Cheetos, Doritos, and
Sour Worms. The packaging was the same, the taste virtually
identical, and the price under two dollars a bag.2 Outside of
school, when they stopped at a gas station or picked up school
supplies from Walmart, Luis would ask his mom for those same
treats. Delfina would oblige, unaware that his school was helping
cultivate her son’s demand for the junk she wished he’d avoid.
But when Luis didn’t have the money to buy school snacks,
he returned home in the early afternoon starving and ready to
raid the family’s kitchen.3 Those afternoons, Delfina catered to
Luis’s requests because doing so ensured he wouldn’t go hungry.
She got him what he asked for. Sometimes that involved buying
him Papa John’s, Taco Bell, or Panda Express. Other times, it
meant that Delfina cooked for Luis. She asked him before going
to the supermarket exactly what he wanted so she could be sure
to purchase something he’d eat. Delfina knew that if she bought
or baked Luis a pizza, he would definitely fill up on it. But if she
insisted that he eat green beans, he might go to bed hungry.
“The most important thing to me is that I have something
Luis likes so he will eat,” Delfina said, running a hand through
her thick brown hair. “He’s happy. I’m happy.”

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Indeed, when Delfina plopped down with Luis on the couch

after a long day, she was quick to sacrifice her own food prefer-
ences to assure her son’s. She’d get Luis whatever he wanted and
try to fill herself up with something shelf-​stable. It was not
unusual for Delfina to skip a meal so Luis could order Domino’s.
Delfina would grab something off the shelf of soups, beans, and
flour tortillas she kept in the kitchen cupboard for exactly that
reason. The stuff she got from the food pantry wasn’t her favor-
ite, but it was edible. Delfina sometimes ate less so that Luis
could eat more. Delfina went to bed hungry so Luis wouldn’t
have to.
This is the irony of many moms who work in the food
system — ​in supermarkets, like Delfina, at restaurants, or on
farms. Surrounded by food all day, they find themselves food-​
insecure and constantly worried about their children’s satiety.
Indeed, food workers in the U.S. are more likely to experience
food insecurity than workers in other industries. The numbers
are even starker for restaurant employees, who report food inse-
curity at double the rate of the U.S. population. And compared
to their male and white counterparts, women and workers of
color like Delfina are more likely to be food-​insecure.4 Delfina
helped make the food system run, but she couldn’t afford to reli-
ably feed herself or her kids the way she wanted.
Thinking about what to eat for dinner that night, Delfina
told me she’d probably order Luis a pizza. She grimaced, joking
about how sick she was of cheese and bread. But then, leaning
back on the couch, Delfina grinned. “As long as he eats,” she
said, shrugging, “I’m happy.”

While moms like Delfina were focused on ensuring their kids

had enough to eat, wealthier moms often seemed more con-
cerned about their kids having too much to eat — ​especially of
the “wrong” things. That ability to worry about the particulars
of kids’ diets, I came to see, was an inequitably distributed

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luxury. Knowing that there would be enough to fill their chil-

dren’s bellies, wealthier moms focused on the details of what
went into those bellies. Rather than losing sleep over whether
the foods their kids ate were satiating, moms instead focused on
sculpting kids’ preferences.
“We don’t eat for comfort,” Julie explained to me one after-
noon while we sat on the couch watching TV, folding laundry,
and awaiting Jane’s return from school. I asked Julie if she
talked to her kids about that. Did her kids know that they
shouldn’t be eating for comfort? Of course, Julie replied, flip-
ping through the channels, landing ultimately on CNN. But it
wasn’t like she wanted them not to enjoy food. Rather, Julie said,
she wanted Evan and Jane to love food but also know that its pri-
mary purpose was to keep them alive.
“I also want them to think, Well, I don’t necessarily need all this
food either,” Julie clarified. “My body can do without it.”
Julie’s comment about restricting certain foods reminded
me of Patricia Adams, a white single mom with an easy laugh and
an eye for order. I joined Patricia’s family at home on a calm win-
ter evening, and the two of us sat kitty-​corner at a kitchen table
with bright yellow checkered place mats and a vase of pink tulips
in the center. Patricia, who had a master’s degree in education
and worked as a private-​school teacher, had just finished clean-
ing up from dinner. Her eldest daughter, Zoe, was on her way
home from volleyball practice, and her two younger daughters,
Mary and Louise, were finishing up their homework in the living
room. Every occasion that Patricia and her daughters were
around food, she told me, presented an opportunity for her to
teach them something about what to eat and what not to eat.
“I’ve done my own bit of research on food,” Patricia told me,
straightening out the place mat. “So I try to buy organic and
healthy and limit the amount of fat and hydrogenated oils that
we eat. It’s really important to me what we eat.”
Despite the fact that Patricia and Delfina were both single

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 Hunger and Pickiness

moms working full-​ time with kids at home, their situations

diverged sharply. Compared to Delfina’s job as a cashier, Patri-
cia’s job as a teacher paid significantly more and came with ben-
efits that gave her retirement savings and health insurance. Her
work hours allowed her to drop the kids off at school and be
home prepping dinner before they returned. While she too was
on her feet much of the day, she never worked nights or week-
ends. She never had her hours cut or her wages stolen. Patricia
received child support from her ex‑husband. She had more time
to spend with her kids and more money to make use of that time
the way she wanted than Delfina had.
Patricia’s resources meant she didn’t have to worry about her
kids’ hunger the way Delfina did. That her kids would be full
was a given. Indeed, never once did Patricia mention her chil-
dren’s hunger or satiety as relevant concerns. Patricia’s resources
also meant that she didn’t need to worry about the financial
implications of wasted food. She didn’t love throwing food away,
but if her daughters didn’t want to eat their broccoli, there were
no serious economic consequences. Because of this, Patricia did
not need to cater to her daughters’ preferences. Patricia’s finan-
cial security allowed her to turn any signs of her kids’ pickiness
into what she called “teaching moments.”
“As a parent, everything you do is a teaching moment,” she
told me, rolling up the sleeves of her flannel shirt and leaning
forward to rest her elbows on the table.
Night after night, Patricia could put stalks of broccoli on her
kids’ plates. It didn’t matter if her kids refused once, twice, or
fifteen times. It didn’t matter if they tossed that broccoli into the
trash can or onto the kitchen tiles. Patricia had the financial
reserves to buy more. Running out of food or money was not an
issue. Her kids’ pickiness, from a financial perspective, was irrel-
evant. It didn’t factor into her food purchases, and it didn’t stop
her from trying to convince them — ​for the hundredth time — ​
to eat their vegetables.

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Teaching moments abounded in Patricia’s world. Whether it

was how to read a nutrition label, scramble an egg, or exercise
portion control, Patricia was always thinking about what lessons
she could instill in her girls. She wanted to show them how to
exercise self-​restraint and control around food. She tried to
teach them how to develop “better” tastes and overcome what
she saw as inferior ones.
I thought of Delfina when Patricia started talking to me
about salty snacks. Like Luis, Patricia’s daughters had come
across Smart Snacks in school. They’d seen their friends buy the
food industry’s school-​approved potato chips and candy bars.
And they’d come home to tell their mom that they wanted to eat
Cheez-​Its and Goldfish just like their classmates.
“I’m like, ‘Oh my God, I don’t want to give my kids fishy
crackers!’ ” Patricia exclaimed, remembering her horror at her
kids’ request. “Especially not the red, blue, or green ones or
whatever those are.”
Patricia didn’t want her girls ingesting food coloring and
additives. She couldn’t bear the idea of that stuff making its way
into their bodies. Patricia believed, as many affluent moms I
spoke to did, in the importance of raising what the sociologists
Kate Cairns, Josée Johnston, and Norah MacKendrick call the
“organic child.” Raising an organic child means more than get-
ting your kid to eat vegetables and fruits, although that’s essen-
tial. It also goes beyond choosing organic over conventional
produce. Raising an organic kid is about so much more. It
means making carefully calculated, informed, and often costly
decisions about what goes into your child’s body. It means mak-
ing baby food by hand, reading the fine print on labels, research-
ing omega‑3 to omega‑6 ratios, and thinking about the plastic
packaging encasing granola bars and milk cartons.5
The ideal of feeding kids an organic diet has, over the past
decade, become a kind of gold standard of healthy child-​
rearing. This standard is generally communicated to and

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absorbed by moms across society, although it’s largely accom-

plished in full by only the most privileged. That is, it’s a feature
of intensive mothering reserved almost exclusively for moms
like Patricia and Julie. News media and public health initiatives
target these moms to tell them it is their responsibility to protect
their kids from an unsafe, risky, and contaminated food indus-
try that puts artificial dye in crackers, infuses arsenic into baby
food, and keeps kids’ palates from developing by packing chil-
dren’s menus with cheeseburgers and French fries. Interestingly,
moms today get the message that it is their job to safeguard their
kids, not that it’s the state’s responsibility to regulate and moni-
tor industry practices.
The organic-​child ideal creates yet another hoop for “good”
moms to jump through and a set of impossible standards that
even the most privileged caregivers, like Patricia, feel they are at
constant risk of falling short of. Patricia was always looking for
ways to keep her growing girls in an organic bubble. She tried to
find a healthier alternative to the conventional Cheez-​Its, one
that she could live with as a mom without depriving her kids.
She researched online and in‑store at Whole Foods. She read
labels. She talked to her friends. Finally, she found a substitute
that, although pricey, met the minimum criteria for her: Annie’s
Cheddar Squares.
“It had natural coloring, organic cheddar, no hydrogenated
oil,” Patricia said, breathing a sigh of relief. For that moment,
Patricia felt good about how she had handled the Cheez‑It
dilemma. She had neither given in nor given up. She had trans-
formed an unhealthy preference into a teaching moment.
Patricia worked hard to keep her home an organic bubble,
safe from the food industry. She also saw her teaching moments
paying off more and more. Sure, her kids still asked for things
like Cheez-​Its and Oreos. And yes, they still ordered pizza with
their friends and got buttered popcorn at the movies. This was
inevitable. But Patricia could tell that they now had an ingrained

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taste for nutritious foods like quinoa, salads, squash, and cashews.

Rather than succumbing to her kids’ pickiness, she had flipped
the script — ​she was making them picky for the right foods.
One of Patricia’s proudest moments happened when, as a
last resort on a road trip, she swung by Taco Bell with her daugh-
ters. It was late, they were in the middle of nowhere, and every-
one was hungry. Patricia acted out of desperation but worried
that she would later pay the consequences of that decision. What
if her girls loved fast food? What if they started asking for it non-
stop? What if all of her years of hard work were undone with
one bite?
“But,” Patricia said cheerfully as she told me the story, “they
didn’t like the bean burrito! They didn’t like the taste. Not at
all!” Patricia beamed at the memory of her kids actively reject-
ing fast food, registering it as proof of her own success. She
recalled with pride how they’d tossed their half-​eaten burritos
in the parking lot’s trash can before getting back in the car.
As Patricia recounted her success story, I thought of Delfina.
I thought of how differently this story would have played for Del-
fina — ​how bad she would have felt if Luis had wasted half his
dinner. I thought of the frustration it would have caused her to
see her son discard perfectly edible, satiating food that she’d
worked hard to be able to buy. I thought of the financial stress
she would have endured as she wondered whether she had
enough money to get him something else. I thought about how
Patricia’s proudest teaching moment was Delfina’s nightmare.

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 CHAPTER 9

Status Symbols

Sometimes I wondered if food’s nutritional content was all that

moms like Patricia cared about. Certainly, their desire to keep
their kids healthy and protected from the food system was part
of the story. But it wasn’t the whole story.
Moms like Patricia also cared about food as a signifier of
their social position — ​a status symbol. If we are what we eat,
then the food we put in our bodies says as much about our iden-
tities and location in the social hierarchy as it does about our
health. The moms I met cared about food’s reputation, about
what eating certain ingredients and buying particular brands
signaled to the world about who they were as individuals as well
as what kind of parents they were. They cared about who else
consumed those foods and bought those brands. These criteria,
which sometimes had very little to do with food’s nutritional
properties, helped moms decide whether something was appro-
priate for their children to eat.
Patricia’s Cheez‑It substitution reflected these considerations.
Patricia’s concern about her daughters’ health motivated her to
search for an alternative cracker. But it wasn’t clear how much
more nutritious Annie’s Cheddar Squares were. Calorically, the
two items were nearly identical: 150 calories for twenty-​seven
Cheez-​Its and 140 for the same number of cheddar squares. The
former had 8 grams of fat, 1.5 grams of which were saturated
fat; the latter had 7 grams of fat, 1 gram of which was saturated

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fat. Interestingly, a serving of Cheez-​Its contained 20 milligrams

less sodium than cheddar squares did. Each cracker had a
lengthy list of ingredients, but the cheddar square had organic
ones and did not contain the hydrogenated oils in Cheez-​Its.
Overall, the cheddar squares were probably slightly health-
ier than the Cheez-​Its. But neither snack was an apple. And yet
Patricia felt so strongly about her daughters consuming the
organic version over the conventional one. And she was not
alone. Moms labeled certain products as unacceptable while
being okay with others that were nutritionally comparable. They
derided Cheetos but let their kids eat Barbara’s Cheese Puffs.
They pointed out that they never ate McDonald’s, but they regu-
larly visited In‑N‑Out Burger as a family. A bean burrito from
Taco Bell was unacceptable but getting the exact same thing
from a local taqueria made them culturally open-​minded and
cosmopolitan. Julie, for instance, wholeheartedly approved of
Trader Joe’s Joe-​Joe’s cookies but discouraged her children from
eating nearly identical Oreos. One mom told me that Friday
nights were pizza nights at her house, but she always made sure
to order a “good pizza” and not “the five-​dollar pizza,” which she
saw as devoid of any nutrition.
But what was the difference between a Joe-​Joe and an Oreo?
What distinguished a good pizza from a bad one? What made a
food acceptable or unacceptable?
Often, the label — ​and its associations — ​mattered most. It
mattered that Julie’s Joe-​Joe’s could be purchased only at Trader
Joe’s and couldn’t be found in any old gas station. It mattered
that the pizza was prepared by a local restaurant and not a
national chain. It mattered how moms answered this question:
Do people like us eat this?
Do people like us cruise through Burger King drive-​
throughs?
Do people like us frequent all-​you-​can-​eat buffets?
Do people like us have Froot Loops for breakfast?

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 Status Symbols

Do people like us shop at the dollar store?

If the answer was no, then that food was not an acceptable
choice.
By “people like us,” moms generally meant people who
looked like them — ​the ones they saw around them on neighbor-
hood sidewalks and in school parking lots. Most of the moms I
interviewed, like many Americans, lived in sharply segregated
neighborhoods. Their children attended schools with relatively
homogenous student populations. There were exceptions, of
course. But often, those closest to the families I interviewed
resembled them racially and socioeconomically. And moms’
ideas about how these proximate, similar others ate informed
their understanding of what was an appropriate diet.
Such ideas also influenced where families shopped for gro-
ceries. Store prices and proximity were certainly part of the cal-
culus. But so too was whether a store felt right or wrong, whether
moms saw themselves reflected in the clientele or noticed cars
like theirs in the parking lot. That was one reason why Patricia
loved Whole Foods and Julie Trader Joe’s, why Dana shopped at
Target and Nyah Grocery Outlet. These were the places where
they felt at home. These were the supermarkets where they felt
like they belonged.
But there was a flip side to wealthier moms’ food purchases.
On the one hand, they bought organic versions of popular prod-
ucts and frequented “higher-​quality” fast-​food establishments.
These choices communicated moms’ elevated tastes. But many
of these moms also went to great lengths to show me that
their tastes weren’t too elevated or highbrow. They weren’t
­overbearing, extremist health freaks who deprived their chil-
dren of all salt, sugar, and fat. They weren’t pretentious snobs.
They too shared an appreciation of less healthy, less “sophisti-
cated” foods.
Often, moms showcased their humility and easygoingness to
me by zeroing in on one or two products that they felt made

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them seem down‑to‑earth. One mom discussed her love of Eggo

waffles and her disdain of Whole Foods’ whole-​wheat, gluten-​
free substitutes. Another noted that her kids ate only McDon-
ald’s fries, which were cut and salted to perfection; oven-​baked
sweet potato wedges could never compare. One emphasized
that she bought her kids the classic Fig Newtons rather than the
dense, organic fig bars she found in the supermarket bulk sec-
tion. And another told me that she would never make her son a
grilled cheese with anything but the “super-​processed Kraft
slices” of American cheese; well-​aged Brie or goat cheese was
delicious but completely inappropriate.
I believed moms, but I also suspected they were making a
big deal out of their “humbler” tastes to dispel any notion I
might have of them as elitist. I wondered if they mentioned these
foods in order to downplay their privilege.
If that was the case, then these efforts only underscored
their privilege to me. When it suited them, these moms could
glorify feeding their kids less nutritious foods in a way that less
privileged moms couldn’t without being criticized. The former
used these foods to show that they were grounded, reasonable
caregivers — ​good moms who practiced moderation and didn’t
go to extremes. Sometimes, these moms were saying, they could
be laid-​back, or even fun! Offering Kraft American cheese and
Fig Newtons as evidence of good parenting was a luxury that
lower-​ income moms didn’t have. Were these moms to talk
openly about feeding their kids those products, they would be
regarded as negligent for not caring enough or lazy for choos-
ing shortcuts that undermined their kids’ health. They would
be deemed “bad” moms even if they were serving their kids the
same foods the “good” moms were. When privileged and less
privileged moms fed their kids the exact same thing, I learned,
the former were viewed as down to earth while the latter were
chastised for their choices.

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 Status Symbols

Moms who had grown up poor but now identified as middle or

upper ​middle class illustrated how clearly food operated as a sta-
tus symbol. For these upwardly mobile moms, like Latisha Jen-
kins, their kids’ diets were tangible evidence of their success in
ascending the social hierarchy. Latisha helped me see how more
privileged moms used their kids’ diets to lay claim to their place
in society. Food was about more than nourishment — ​it was
about embodying and displaying a class identity.
Raised in Arizona in a small agricultural community, Lati-
sha had moved to the Bay Area in the mid-​1980s to attend Stan-
ford. She had not planned to stay there, but after she met her
husband and had children, it felt like home. Now a single mom
of four, Latisha worked full-​time at a local nonprofit. Latisha
and I met late one afternoon in the Stanford student union. Her
thick black hair pulled back tight in a low bun, Latisha had
chestnut skin and carried a Harrods tote bag. Surrounded by
students studying for midterms, we pulled up two plastic stools
to a high communal table.
“It cracks me up to think that my kids will say they grew up
in Palo Alto.” Latisha laughed, looking around at hordes of stu-
dents hunched over laptops. “But one day I guess they’ll be able
to say that!”
During her own childhood, Latisha never thought that
much about food. Her mom put food on her plate, and she ate
it. Latisha didn’t remember ever being hungry, but she also
didn’t remember feeling excited about food. Eating was, as Lati-
sha put it, instrumental. The fact that Latisha now had the
resources to teach her kids about food and cultivate their pal-
ates was proof to her that she was doing better economically
than her mother and father. The fact that she could choose
between an Eggo and a Whole Foods waffle was a big deal.
“My lunches were terrible growing up,” Latisha said, tucking
a wiry strand of black hair behind her ear. “My lunches were
Oscar Mayer deli meat in between two pieces of bread.”

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Thinking about the sandwiches she now sent her own kids to
school with, Latisha continued, “It was never this lovely sand-
wich with lettuce and cheese and all these elements.”
In college, Latisha started learning more about food — ​
where it came from, how it tasted, what was healthy and what
wasn’t. These revelations fundamentally changed how Latisha
thought about her own diet and, later, that of her kids. Latisha
felt that her mom had thought comparatively little about food.
Now Latisha took great pride in giving her kids what she called
“better.” She felt strongly about teaching her kids what she
hadn’t learned until her twenties. Her kids were growing up as
part of the upper middle class, and she wanted them to act like
it. They couldn’t show up to private school with Oscar Mayer
deli meat. She wanted them to love avocados and rustic loaves of
bread, heirloom tomatoes and poached eggs. Latisha had worked
hard to get them to a higher rung of the class ladder. Now she
wanted them to feel like they belonged there — ​and eat like it
too. She also understood that her kids’ peers and their families
might make assumptions about her children’s diets. She knew
the racist stereotypes about how Black families like hers ate. She
could imagine the jokes their classmates might make about her
kids living on fried chicken and macaroni and cheese. She
wanted to equip her kids to swiftly and seamlessly dismantle
those misguided assumptions.
Because of this, Latisha took educating her kids about food
seriously. Their futures, after all, depended on it. Like Patricia,
Latisha was quick to identify teaching moments in daily life.
Whether they were sitting down at a café or perusing the outer
aisles of the supermarket, she always had something to show her
children. At the farmers’ market, Latisha said, “We smell things.
We taste things. We look at how different things look.” Latisha
talked to her kids about what they were seeing. She made sure
they knew what was right and what was wrong to eat.
Latisha wanted her kids to like certain foods, but she was

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equally invested in making sure they didn’t like — ​or even know

about — ​certain foods that she had grown up with. Her family
had come so far, and those foods could set them back.
“My kids don’t eat bad lunch meat.” Latisha smiled. “They
only have kosher, wonderful, flavored salamis and all these
kinds of things. Great cheeses. Not just some processed cheese.
They know different cheeses. They know how different cheeses
taste.” Latisha felt proud that they ate only Fuji and Pink Lady
apples. “They couldn’t imagine eating a mushy, tasteless, thick-​
skinned apple,” she said, beaming. They were similarly clueless
about products like bologna, Ding-​Dongs, and Twinkies.
“What’s a Twinkie?” Latisha’s daughter had asked her mom
one afternoon after seeing it at a friend’s house. Latisha explained
that they didn’t eat Twinkies.
“I’m like, ‘We don’t live like that.’ ” Latisha laughed, shifting
in her seat. “ ‘We don’t have to live that way.’ ”
This, Latisha felt, was one of the greatest gifts she could give
her kids. She could give them the luxury of choice. Taste and
desire would drive their food selections, not necessity. And Lati-
sha knew that eating well today would serve them well tomorrow.
Latisha could see her kids’ future now, and it excited her to envi-
sion her hard work paying off. One day, years from now, they
would visit a law school professor’s home for dinner or attend a
networking function hosted by a prestigious firm. They would
attend a ­w ine-​and-​cheese function or be invited to a dinner at a
fancy restaurant. Because they would know how to eat — ​and
enjoy — ​the food on offer, her grown‑up kids would thrive in
those settings. Their elevated tastes would enable them to take
advantage of the opportunities Latisha had worked hard to pro-
vide them. These tastes would allow them to achieve even greater
social mobility than Latisha herself had. And these tastes would
help solidify their place in the upper middle class, making it
clear to anyone and everyone that they were there to stay.

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 CHAPTER 10

Kale Salad

There are many ways to eat nutritiously. And yet the media gen-
erally present a relatively narrow image of a healthy diet. They
do this by drawing attention away from broad food groups
and focusing on the merits and faults of specific foods or nutri-
ents. Certain items are included in the “good” and “healthy”
­category while others are excluded and portrayed as “bad” and
“unhealthy.” These acts of inclusion and exclusion certainly
have something to do with the foods’ nutritional properties, but
they also have a lot to do with these foods’ cultural and racial
associations and histories. Foods are classified as healthy not
just because of what they are but also because of what they rep-
resent and who they have been historically produced and con-
sumed by.
Discourses around soul food underscore this point. There’s
a reason why people sing the praises of kale but not collard
greens. Throughout American history, in both the nutrition
community and mass media, soul food has largely been dero-
gated rather than celebrated. Although soul food is rooted in
the historical and present-​day resilience and survival of Black
communities across America, it has generally been regarded as
unhealthy, uncivilized, and backward. Foods that are culturally
white — ​yogurt, cottage cheese, avocado toast, almonds, tofu,
and salad — ​are paraded as healthy and sophisticated. Foods

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associated with Black culture — ​fried chicken, sweet potato pie,

and biscuits — ​have consistently been stigmatized as inferior.1
Just as ideas about healthy foods are culturally and racially
inculcated, so too are notions about who is healthy and what
healthy is. For the most part, these associations unfairly position
white families, white bodies, and white diets as healthier. Fami-
lies of color — ​and bodies of color — ​are generally considered to
be unhealthy, and their traditional diets are seen as deviant.2
Many of the moms of color I met were keenly aware of the
racist narratives pervading dietary discourses. These moms
wrestled with and fought against such narratives on a daily basis.
Janae Lathrop was one such mom. I met Janae on a balmy
spring afternoon in the two-​story home she shared with her hus-
band, three daughters, and their fluffy, freckled Labradoodle.
Janae had firsthand knowledge of the racist assumptions society
made about how Black mothers fed themselves and their kids.
That knowledge, I came to understand, shaped our initial
interactions. Janae had been challenging for me to schedule
time with. Each time I had reached out to her over the previous
few months, she was too busy to meet. I could see why; manag-
ing a job and a family of five made time a scarce resource. But
when she and I finally connected, carving out a couple of hours
on a Sunday afternoon, I realized that her hesitancy had had as
much if not more to do with her concerns about me and my
research as with scheduling constraints.
When I arrived, Janae opened the front door wearing a
denim button-​down collared shirt and pink workout leggings.
She immediately invited me to take a tour of the first floor of
her home. Walking through the bright entryway back into her
chef’s kitchen, I could see why she wanted to show it off. The
kitchen was straight out of an interior-​design magazine: Sun-
light poured in through big windows onto a white, granite
island. Atop the island were bowls of fresh fruit and a pristine

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Vitamix blender. Cookbooks lined the built‑in bookshelves above

a silver gas stove.
“I didn’t want to do anything formal when you came,” Janae
explained, casually pouring the smoothie she’d just made into
two glasses and then passing one to me. “I just thought I could
bring you into our life as it is.”
Smoothies in hand, we migrated over to the living room to
chat. Janae kicked her slippers off and curled her legs up on the
couch as sunlight streamed in through the bay window. While
Janae had told me up front that she’d budgeted only an hour for
our conversation, that hour turned into two and a half once we
eased into conversation. Janae was surprised that we were hit-
ting it off. She made comments throughout the afternoon about
how much fun our chat was turning out to be and how she
wished she’d found the time earlier.
When I asked Janae to tell me about herself, she began by
mentioning that she and her husband, Darryl, had advanced
degrees — ​he an MBA from Harvard University, she a JD from
the University of Massachusetts — ​and that, as two Black work-
ing professionals, she and Darryl were extremely active in giving
back to low-​income Black communities.
Then we started talking about food.
“Food for us was big growing up,” Janae told me, bringing
the smoothie to her lips and taking a quick sip. Janae’s mother
and grandmother were phenomenal cooks, preparing dishes
not only for their families but also for weddings and church
gatherings.
“You’ve heard of soul food?” She squinted at me optimisti-
cally.
“I have.” I nodded, smiling.
“Good for you!” Janae exclaimed, setting the smoothie
down on the glass coffee table. “My mother’s specialties are soul
food, so she cooks mostly casseroles and fish and baked chicken
and greens — ​which is a big soul food — ​and black-​eyed peas

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 Kale Salad

and corn bread and mac and cheese and yams. And she bakes.
She makes red velvet cake. She makes peach cobbler. She makes
pound cake and Seven‑Up cake.”
Janae paused, sitting up on the sofa.
“It’s really different than how I cook,” she said. “I’m more
into organic and salads.” Janae’s mom didn’t really get the way
that Janae cooked for her family. That food was alien to her.
Janae liked kale, Greek yogurt, and quinoa. “My mom doesn’t
do quinoa!” Janae laughed. “She does comfort food. I don’t
think she’s even said quinoa before!”
Janae sprinkled comments like this throughout our conver-
sation — ​ comments that underscored how different she was
from the rest of her extended family. These comments seemed
slightly forced, motivated, perhaps, by a central thesis she
wanted me to grasp. When she later mentioned that her parents
always had chips at their house, she quickly added, “You’re not
gonna find any of that here!”
Janae saw her mom’s cooking as partly the product of Ameri-
can racial segregation and discrimination. Her mom’s opportu-
nities had been limited and her exposure to other people and
environments curtailed. “I mean, this is America, right?” Janae
rolled her eyes. “We’re talking demographics and who we are,
and so as a culture, my mother and grandmother were only
around mostly people just like them. That’s how it was.”
But things had been, in some ways, different for Janae, who
had come of age in a later era. It was an era still characterized by
widespread structural and institutional racism and unequal
access to opportunities for Black communities, but Janae had
more opportunities than any family members who had come
before her. And she seized those opportunities with every fiber
in her body, devoting herself to academics throughout her youth,
proving wrong the teachers and college counselors who doubted
or discouraged her, and ultimately landing a spot at a top
university.

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 N ourishment

In college, Janae started learning about what went into her

food. “I got exposed to new things and new cultures and new
people and new experiences through my education,” Janae said.
“I was able to try other things, where for my mom and her mom,
it was pretty limited.” Janae started to question things she had
once taken for granted. “That caused me to say, ‘Oh, there
might be more than just mac and cheese.’ ” Janae laughed.
“Because mac and cheese is butter and cheese, and I know that
that can’t be all that healthy.”
Janae committed herself to approaching food differently
with her kids. Like Latisha, she attributed her new approach to
her upward mobility. At the same time, Janae felt a deep attach-
ment, warmth, and nostalgia for the food she’d been raised on.
That was the food that had made her who she was today. So she
tried to offer her daughters a bit of both worlds: the new stuff
Janae was embracing plus the foods reflecting their culture and
heritage.
“It’s not all quinoa for my girls,” Janae told me, placing her
feet firmly on the floor and leaning forward. “I look to my mom
too. Like, ‘Mom, help me bring in some of that comfort food.’ ”
She paused. “So I have my mom’s influence, but then I’m bring-
ing in all these other things that I was exposed to.”

Janae was on my mind the next week when I met Harmony Ross,
a nonprofit leader and mom of three. Janae and I had talked
about one of her favorite foods, kale, and now the leafy green
had come up with Harmony too.
Over the past decade, kale has been identified by elite food-
ies and restaurateurs as an “it” ingredient and deemed trendy as
a healthy superfood. Health gurus tout the vegetable’s nutri-
tional punch. Restaurants feature kale salads with avocado
dressing and bread crumbs. Supermarket aisles offer kale chips
and kale flakes, and juice bars sell expensive kale smoothies for
­post–​yoga workouts. Kale has become a status symbol; tote bags

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 Kale Salad

and sweatshirts feature phrases like eat more kale and oh

kale yes!
But while kale has surged in popularity, that popularity has
been socioeconomically and racially skewed, as kale is generally
marketed toward and endorsed by upper middle class, primarily
white people. Because of that, while kale may be healthy, it is
seen as a wealthy white person’s food, making its appeal cultur-
ally limited and its glorification culturally alienating. While kale
was attractive to Black moms like Janae because of their strong
identification as high-​income and well-​educated members of
society, some middle-​class Black moms like Harmony were put
off by it.
On a warm Wednesday afternoon, Harmony and I sat out-
side at a picnic bench. In black leggings and a gray track jacket,
her brown hair pulled back in a high bun, Harmony looked
like she was on her way to or from the gym. Her bright smile
and resounding laugh matched her bright pink lipstick and
diamond-​studded bangles.
“My mother and father are from Georgia,” Harmony told
me. “So growing up, we had soul food — ​greens, cabbages, corn
bread, potato salad, short ribs, starches, always dessert, sweet
potato pie, cobbler, Seven‑Up cake.”
Harmony paused. “You know, just kind of soul food, South-
ern comfort food.” When Harmony’s family relocated from the
South to the West Coast, her mom continued cooking those
dishes, which were always eaten at lively and convivial family
dinners.
Harmony mentioned kale a few times during our conversa-
tion, explaining that it was not a vegetable she would put in her
shopping cart or one she’d order at a restaurant. To Harmony,
kale was a skinny white woman’s food — ​not hers. Harmony then
told me a story about kale that she found so funny, she had trou-
ble getting it out without erupting into laughter.
This was the story: Harmony’s seventeen-​year-​old daughter,

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 N ourishment

Ida, recently visited a white friend’s house after school. The two
girls spent the afternoon hunched over the dining-​room table
solving calculus equations. When dinnertime rolled around,
her friend’s mom had offered to make them dinner.
“Guess what she made them?” Harmony asked me, her eyes
widening and the sides of her mouth curling slightly upward.
“Something with kale?” I ventured. Harmony began vigor-
ously nodding.
“She made them a kale salad!” She cackled, putting both
hands on the table as if to brace herself. “Can you imagine?”
Harmony was tearing up from laughter. She called Ida, who
was doing homework at a nearby table, over to join us.
“Ida,” Harmony said to her daughter as she took a seat beside
her mom on the bench, “what would you do if I made you a kale
salad for dinner?”
Ida side-​eyed her mom. “I would wonder where the meat is,”
she said, her tone deadpan.
They looked at each other and erupted in laughter.
Kale’s whiteness and cultural otherness to Harmony and Ida
had little, if anything, to do with the vegetable’s nutritional
properties or even its taste. Kale is, in fact, strikingly similar in
flavor, texture, and nutrition to collard greens, which have long
been a staple of traditional soul food and are still a mainstay in
many Black households. Both Harmony and Nyah cooked col-
lard greens every week, stewing the leaves in large frying pans
with garlic and, sometimes, bits of bacon.
But it is no coincidence that kale, not collard greens, has
been embraced by the healthy-​eating community as a super-
food.3 And it is no surprise that some Black moms reject not
only the vegetable but also mainstream healthy-​eating recom-
mendations advising them to eat “white people” foods like kale.
Understandably, Harmony generally assumed those recommen-
dations were from and for other people. Maybe Ida’s white class-
mates, Harmony mused. But they certainly weren’t meant for

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 Kale Salad

her and her family because there was no way Harmony was toss-
ing a bunch of shredded kale with balsamic vinaigrette, topping
it with pine nuts, and calling it dinner.

As Janae and I wrapped up our interview, we circled back to the

kitchen, where I rinsed my empty glass in the farmhouse sink.
Hesitantly, I asked Janae if she knew any other Black families
who might be willing to speak with me.
“Well, sure!” Janae answered eagerly, taking my glass and
putting it in the top rack of the dishwasher. Then she paused.
“What kind of Black families are you looking for?”
Janae said that she could point me toward the low-​income
Black families from her church. “It’s in the inner city,” she said,
sighing. “Totally not like this neighborhood.” I explained that at
this point in my research, I was actually hoping to speak with
other higher-​income Black families like hers.
Janae looked genuinely surprised. Taken aback, even. “When
you wrote me,” she said, “I was like, I might not be the African-​
American family that she’s looking for! Because most people
who interview African-​A merican families — ​let’s be real — ​they’re
looking for this socioeconomic one that’s the masses.” Research-
ers, Janae said, didn’t want to speak with Black people like her,
ones with law degrees and multimillion-​dollar homes.
Janae’s perception of the research community resonated
broadly with my own. With notable exceptions, social scientists
have had a long and problematic tradition of studying — ​focus-
ing on, even — ​poor, urban communities of color. Because of
that, Janae had assumed I wanted to speak to a low-​income
Black family. She was sure that I would be disappointed when I
met her and discovered that she wasn’t the least bit poor.
That was why she’d put off the interview for so long. And
that was why, when we’d finally scheduled it, Janae had made it
very clear that her family was well-​off, detailing how highly edu-
cated and high-​earning she and her husband were. That’s why

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 N ourishment

she’d made me that organic smoothie and offered me a tour of

her kitchen and its clean-​ eating cookbooks. And that’s why
she’d reiterated that her family’s diet was worlds away from that
of her fellow churchgoers. Janae was deeply familiar with the
assumptions that I, or any other non-​Black researcher, might
make about her family. She knew all about the stereotypes asso-
ciated with them. Janae was adamant that she did not want to be
“lumped in,” as she put it, with the low-​income Black families in
my study. “Other people, if they didn’t know our color, might
think this is a white family,” Janae said.
I asked Janae what she meant by that. “Well,” she explained,
rolling her eyes, “it’s a stereotype that all white people are well-​off
and educated and eating healthy, organic foods and quinoa and
all Black people are eating Doritos and getting it from wherever.”
I nodded in agreement.
Not all Black people ate those foods, she reminded me. In
fact, sometimes white people were the unhealthiest of all. “Go
to the state fair,” she continued, closing the dishwasher. “We go
every year and I’ve never in my life seen — ​that’s the biggest con-
centration of low-​income white Americans eating fried lard on a
stick and diabetic. Like, in the wheelchair eating the lard. Like,
‘Your leg is ready to be cut off. And so it’s real. Why are you eat-
ing fried cheese? And you’re white!’ And we’re Black at the fair
eating a cantaloupe stick. But they would never put that. They
would put us . . .”
Janae’s voice trailed off, and we stood in silence for a few sec-
onds. I waited for her to finish her sentence, but she never did.
I read Janae’s silence, in part, as a sign of her exhaustion.
Janae was tired of people making assumptions about what kind
of mother she was and what kind of food she fed her kids. She
was tired of people concluding, without evidence, that she fed
her kids fried chicken and Doritos. And she was tired of having
to fend off those and all the other assumptions people made
about her as a mom simply because of the color of her skin.

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 Kale Salad

After returning home from Janae’s, I flipped open my laptop,

opened a new browser window, and navigated to Google Images.
I was thinking about the fact that Janae had mentioned multiple
times during our conversation how important Michelle Obama’s
Let’s Move! campaign had been for low-​income Black communi-
ties. I understood her point. The campaign had raised aware-
ness across the country and inspired activism around issues of
food justice and childhood obesity. It had also ushered signifi-
cant resources into Black and brown communities to improve
families’ nutrition and ease parents’ struggles.
But as scholars, advocates, and the media piled onto the
movement, a particular imagery had also risen to the surface — ​
an imagery that took on a life of its own and went beyond the
original movement’s scope or goals. This imagery shaped peo-
ple’s ideas about which children from which communities lacked
proper nutrition and which children were obese. That evening,
when I typed Let’s Move Childhood Obesity into my search bar, pic-
tures of Black and Latinx kids flashed across my screen. There
were no white kids, only Black and brown. My screen offered
proof of what I had suspected: over the years, these kids had
become the faces of childhood obesity, the mascots of a public
health crisis.
In contrast, to witness our society’s glorification of whiteness
and thinness, all I needed to do was flip open the latest issue of
Self magazine in my dentist’s office the next week. I looked at the
thin, able-​bodied blond woman drinking a green smoothie in a
remodeled white kitchen, and I juxtaposed this photo with the
ones I’d seen earlier of overweight Black children. It made my
blood boil to consider how these two starkly different images
reinforced a widespread cultural ideology of healthy as white and
thin and, conversely, unhealthy as Black, brown, and overweight.
The day I spent with Janae highlighted just how profoundly
racism shapes society’s understanding of both healthy eating

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 N ourishment

and healthy feeding. Janae was right: When most people thought
about childhood obesity, they didn’t picture overweight white
kids. They envisioned low-​income Black kids in a low-​income,
urban Black neighborhood. This was the stereotype that Janae
spent every day of her life pushing back against. It was impossi-
ble for me to ignore how fervently, even desperately, she wanted
to separate her family from these depictions. Her view of herself
as a responsible mother demanded that she distance herself
from the pervasive assumptions that she ate unhealthy food and
raised unhealthy children.
We live in a country in which people are deemed responsi-
ble for their own successes and failures. We applaud parents for
their kids’ successes and blame them for their kids’ failures.
When it comes to food, if kids eat well, it’s because their moms
were active and caring. If kids eat poorly, it’s because their moms
were lazy and neglectful. The photos of overweight Black and
brown kids filling my laptop screen reflected and reinforced
untruthful, harmful stereotypes that circulate widely in Ameri-
can society, even if they often go unspoken: that Black and
brown moms are bad mothers who don’t care about their kids’
diets, health, or well-​being.
Shutting my laptop, I knew what Janae had been trying to
prove to me. I knew how diligently she (and so many other Black
and brown parents) had to work to demonstrate that even
though she wasn’t white, she was still a loving, devoted parent
who fed her kids responsibly. That society’s depiction of her — ​
and other caregivers of color — ​wasn’t true. That despite the
hue of her skin, she was still a good mom.

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 PART III

Compromises

Rosie was also used to conflicting emotions, for she was

a mother and knew every moment of every day that no
one out in the world could ever love or value or nurture
her children as well as she could and yet that it was
­necessary nonetheless to send them out into that world
anyway.
 — ​L aurie Frankel, This Is How It Always Is

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 130 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM
 CHAPTER 11

Mom’s Job

Picture a parent feeding a child. What do you see?

If you’re like most people in the United States, the parent
you’re probably imagining is a mother. Perhaps she is plating
her kid’s food at a dining-​room table. She may be perusing a
supermarket with a toddler strapped into the child’s seat of a
shopping cart. Or maybe she is rifling through the pantry in
search of a key dinner ingredient.
If the image of a mother came to mind for you, then your
imagination is largely aligned with reality. In the United States,
the mom is the parent most likely to be in charge of food. Every
day, moms spend, on average, triple the amount of time prepar-
ing meals that dads do.1
Before beginning this research, I was aware of these national
statistics. They made sense to me, aligned as they were with my
own personal experiences and observations. I grew up in a family
where my mom had been the one to cook meals while my dad had
sat down at the table when the meal was ready to be eaten. My dad
was handy for a supermarket run and burgers on the grill, but his
culinary contributions stopped soon thereafter. I’d seen a similar
dynamic play out in friends’ and family members’ marriages, and
I would eventually come to understand its pull within my own
marriage and experiences of motherhood. As a woman, I also
recognized in myself the myriad ways that I had been socialized

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 C ompromises

to see feeding and nourishing as my responsibility — ​and even

something that made me feel good about myself.
So it was no surprise when I discovered during my research
that foodwork in families was gendered and highly unequal. I
already knew that moms were overwhelmingly responsible for
feeding kids and that dads’ involvement was relatively limited.
But the longer I spent at families’ sides, the more I realized
that an even more important story lay behind the well-​known sta-
tistics on mothers’ and fathers’ different time contributions.
While these numbers are a key part of what is so unequal, they
obscure a key parental dynamic — ​a dynamic that means moms
are often doing even more work than national data suggest. Moth-
ers not only spent more time feeding than fathers did; fathers,
I found, often increased mothers’ feeding-​related stresses and
frustrations.

Nyah, Dana, Renata, and Julie were like most moms in America:
They undertook the work of feeding their kids largely single-​
handedly. They were the ones in the family who managed the
physical and logistical load of keeping everyone nourished.
They grocery shopped, restocked fridges and freezers, and
threw out expired pantry items. They diced, marinated, sau-
téed, and baked. They also did feeding’s invisible work, from
organizing and strategizing to monitoring, worrying, and trou-
bleshooting everyone’s diet.
Moms sometimes got help from different family members. I
met moms (mostly of color) who harnessed a network of (mostly
female) caregivers to help get their kids fed. These were largely
mothers who, like 20 percent of the U.S. population, resided in
multigenerational homes, as well as moms who lived near
extended family.2 The latter was Dana’s situation; Dana’s mother,
Debra, lived nearby and would sometimes pop over to Dana’s
place and get dinner started before Dana arrived home from
work. I met other moms who enlisted their kids to help with

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 Mom’s Job

food. Older kids, in particular, were good for boiling pasta,

chopping carrots, and swinging by the supermarket to grab a
gallon of milk.
But for many moms, the family member closest to them — ​
the husband or the father of their children — ​offered relatively
little help with feeding. Most dads left the lion’s share of the
daily foodwork to moms.
Of course, this wasn’t the case in all of the heterosexual
married couples. On one end of the spectrum of paternal
involvement was a handful of fathers who were heavily involved
in feeding, and some were even the head cooks and primary
grocery shoppers in their families. Nationally, about one in ten
families have a father who is in charge of both grocery shopping
and cooking.3 Later in the book, I share the experiences of two
such dads — ​Alvaro Morales in chapter 14 and Joaquin Vargas
in chapter 17.4 I also met fathers in the middle of the spectrum
who aided moms in making grocery runs, loading the dish-
washer, and scrubbing pots and pans. Some of these dads
enjoyed cooking but on a recreational basis rather than as rou-
tine labor. Brunches and barbecues were where such dads gen-
erally took the reins. They could whip up the occasional plate of
French toast or host a Sunday grill with a spread of burgers and
steaks. On the least-​involved end of the spectrum were the dads
who were completely uninterested in anything having to do with
feeding their families. These dads expressed their dietary pref-
erences to moms, who then had to figure out how to incorpo-
rate those preferences with their own and their kids’.5
Why were moms generally saddled with most — ​or all — ​of
the food-​related work? One reason is that traditional gender
norms dictate that mothers undertake that work. The families I
met often had very gendered ideas about moms’ instinctual and
natural talents for feeding. Many dads told me that moms were
inherently better at cooking and all things nutrition-​related.
They insisted that mothers’ “maternal instinct” gave them a

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 C ompromises

natural understanding of what and how their children should

be eating. This instinct made mothers better suited to feed kids.6
As one dad explained, “I’m just a little less . . . ​I don’t know what
the right word is. I don’t read about it as much as she might or
think about it as much as she might maybe because I’m a guy.”
Other dads talked about these differences in almost biological
terms, as if being a woman was a prerequisite for caring about
the food family members ate.
But it wasn’t just dads who saw things this way. As we know,
foodwork and its relationship to cultivating and protecting chil-
dren’s health are central to motherhood and consistent with
intensive mothering’s expectation that moms be kids’ primary
caregivers in all dimensions. Most moms I met didn’t question
how or why they had fallen into the role of primary food pro-
vider, and some described actively seeking it out when they were
establishing their families. For moms, being and feeling good
required feeding children.
The dads I met, however, didn’t need to devote themselves
to feeding their kids in order to feel like they were good dads.
As core as feeding is to motherhood, it is largely peripheral to
fatherhood. While American dads today spend more time with
their children than dads did thirty years ago, their involvement
in the everyday management of kids’ lives and the mundane
forms of labor associated with this involvement has continued to
lag behind mothers’. Being a good dad in America today has
more to do with caretaking activities, like involvement in kids’
educational and extracurricular endeavors, than it used to, but
what’s expected of fathers in terms of food remains extremely
limited.7
What’s more, broad conventional masculinity norms often
discourage dads from engaging in healthy behaviors them-
selves. Research has found that men’s lifestyle choices generally
include higher rates of risky behaviors that are harmful to
health and longevity — ​for instance, substance abuse and delay-

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 Mom’s Job

ing medical care — ​and lower rates of behaviors that promote

optimal health, including dietary behaviors. Indeed, men in the
U.S. are less likely to consume a healthy diet than women are.
Men’s diets are richer in red and processed meats, and men
are much less likely than women to be vegetarians. The dads I
met told me that their wives generally ate healthier than they
did, often offering up gendered explanations for why. As one
dad told me, “I am probably less careful than my wife is about
what I consume for myself. She’s, I think, a little bit more
thoughtful and more disciplined about what she’ll eat or the
portions that she will have. I just thought that, as a guy, maybe I
didn’t need to pay as much attention.” The same norms that
guide fathers toward less healthy behaviors can translate into
how they care for their children’s health. When it comes to food,
men’s preference for and consumption of a less healthy diet may
discourage them from feeling a sense of responsibility for their
kids’ diets.8 Indeed, this is what I saw.

One night, Renata and I were prepping dinner in the kitchen

before a midweek church service. Renata was making a salad,
dicing cucumbers and cherry tomatoes and tossing them into a
wide glass bowl of romaine lettuce. I chopped baby carrots into
bite-​size pieces and added them in handfuls to the mix. Renata
grabbed a bottle of Italian vinaigrette from the fridge, poured it
over the vegetables, and tossed them delicately with two silver
spoons. Then she started working on the garlic bread. She cut
the remainder of a baguette into thin slices, then stroked each
one with butter and topped it with minced garlic, salt, and dried
parsley.
“Does José cook?” I asked her as I put the bag of baby carrots
back in the produce drawer. I’d never seen José in the kitchen
for longer than the ten seconds it took him to grab a bag of Fri-
tos from the pantry or put a dish in the sink. Renata chuckled
and rolled her eyes as she slid the bread into the preheated oven.

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 C ompromises

José knew how to cook a few things, she said, but he preferred
her to cook because she knew more recipes.
“He can put a pot of rice on the stove,” she told me, putting
a few dirty dishes into the sink to soak. “If I call him on my way
home and tell him to put a pot of rice on, he can do that.”
Most often, Renata prepared José’s food. Another evening,
before José left to perform a show with his band, Renata had
made him two roast beef and cheese sandwiches on white bread
and zipped them up in a lunch box along with a bag of chips. It
was how she prepared the kids’ lunches too, and it made me
wonder if Renata ever felt like she had three kids to feed rather
than two. Tonight, she said, sighing with relief, José would either
grab fast food before church or eat leftovers after the service.
While we were on the topic of men and cooking, Renata
mentioned a friend whose boyfriend loved to cook. “She’s so
lucky!” Renata laughed, turning the oven light on and kneeling
down to check on the garlic bread. If Renata wasn’t home, José
would pick up the kids, Renata said, and then go to the drive-​
through because “it’s quick and it’s easy to do. He thinks that he
did what he needed to do.” I could see why: José’s goal was get-
ting the kids fed, and the drive-​through was an obvious way to
check that box. But buying the kids fast food was not what
Renata thought he should do. For Renata, the drive-​through
was a cop-​out. It was a last resort, not a first choice. Renata
thought that when she wasn’t home, José should make sure the
kids ate some vegetables. He needed to reflect on what he was
teaching them every time he let them eat junk. José, Renata
thought, needed to stop making her life harder.
To be clear, José and other dads were not deliberately trying
to frustrate moms or compromise their children’s diets. The
dads I met were loving, committed caregivers who wanted the
best for their children. Nonetheless, dads largely felt absolved of
responsibility for their children’s diets.9 This absolution could

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 Mom’s Job

lead dads to inadvertently undermine moms’ efforts. Dads were

more likely to relax boundaries or ignore rules moms struggled
to uphold. Dads were more inclined to take kids to the drive-​
through and say yes to chips and soda. Dads took a more laid-​
back approach to food and were willing to go with the flow
when moms would have preferred them to lay down the law.
What was striking to me about fathers’ undermining atti-
tudes and behaviors was that they rarely seemed malicious, or
even intentional. It was almost like dads were clueless about how
much additional stress they inflicted on moms when they under-
cut moms’ efforts. In fact, many dads seemed completely
unaware of how deeply and emotionally invested moms were in
their kids’ diets.
But this was exactly the issue. The problem for moms wasn’t
just that dads did less of the foodwork; by caring less about their
kids’ intake, dads also amplified moms’ anxieties and added to
moms’ labor. José’s behavior and Renata’s reaction were com-
mon among the families I met. Other dads mirrored José in
their willingness to feed kids less healthy food. Other moms
noticed, as Renata did, their husbands’ tendencies, which then
became an additional source of stress. Dads added even more
balls to moms’ already untenable juggling act. In addition to
having to navigate and negotiate kids’ unhealthy preferences,
moms had to worry about whether dads were further derailing
kids’ diets — ​and then figure out if and when to intervene.
When dads treated kids to fast food or indulged their
requests for candy, moms felt that their hard work was being
undone. Watching dads say yes to the very things they were
working so hard to say no to felt like a punch in the gut to moms.
It made them feel that, even in a pinch, they could not rely on
fathers to feed kids with the required amount of care and inten-
tionality. They couldn’t depend on dads to track or intervene in
kids’ diets as necessary. They couldn’t even trust dads to put

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 C ompromises

together healthy lunches for kids if moms were otherwise occu-

pied. Moms knew this simple, frustrating truth: if they didn’t
monitor what their kids ate, no one would.
This feeling mothers had of exclusive responsibility — ​ of
always being on the hook, even if they weren’t physically there — ​
upped the already high stakes for them. There was no respite
from feeding, and there was rarely a day off. Moms had to keep
track of what went into and came out of the fridge, monitoring
stock and making shopping lists. Each mom was the family gro-
cer, restocker, shopper, head chef, line cook, and server. She had
to figure out how to vary lunch-​box contents and plan out din-
ners. When the egg carton was empty, she had to go to the super-
market or remind someone else to swing by. When kids left for
school without eating breakfast, Mom was the one running
behind with a granola bar or piece of fruit. When someone
refused to eat peas, Mom did the negotiating at the dinner table.
Many moms complained about fathers when it came to food.
Julie, for instance, was annoyed that Zach was rarely home for
dinner and that he would stock up on items from Costco that
ended up going to waste because he chose the wrong things. It
wasn’t the cost that bothered her; it was Zach’s lack of concern
for what their family actually liked to eat.
“He’ll buy stuff from Costco that he knows I’ll never use,”
Julie said, rolling her eyes. “It goes bad, it gets freezer burn, and I
throw it in the trash.” One Wednesday before heading out for a
long girls’ weekend, Julie walked me through the plan she’d
worked out for family meals in her absence. “Zach will probably
take the kids out for dinner on Thursday and Friday because he
does not know how to cook.” Julie looked down at the calendar
on her phone as she scrolled through the days she’d be gone.
“They’ll make their lunches. And then I have a friend coming to
watch them on Saturday and Sunday. I’ll have stuff for her to
make — ​chicken or pasta, the standard go‑to.” Julie paused. “The
kids will eat. They just might not eat a vegetable at every meal.”

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 Mom’s Job

Zach agreed with Julie’s take. He once told me that he didn’t

really get involved with Evan’s or Jane’s diet. It was Julie’s job,
and Zach just pinch-​hit when absolutely necessary. “I only pay
attention to what the kids eat when I’m here or when we’re all
out traveling,” he said.
Zach also figured that when he had to feed the kids — ​if Julie
wasn’t around for some reason — ​he didn’t have to think too
much about what they ate. Because moms were so diligent most
of the time about setting and enforcing the rules, it wasn’t a big
deal if dads broke them once in a while. What this meant for
moms was that dads were essentially always off the hook.

Stay‑at‑home moms saw dads’ laissez-​faire approaches to feed-

ing differently than working moms did. While Julie found
Zach’s lack of interest in food, cooking, and shared meals annoy-
ing, she felt largely resigned to that reality. Because of the clear
division of labor that came with being the stay‑at‑home parent,
Julie saw feeding as a central part of her job. It would have been
nice if Zach contributed or took more of an interest in food, but
Julie never expected it. She was okay with this responsibility rest-
ing on her shoulders and with Zach being a player in his kids’
diets only when it was convenient for him.
Compared to Julie, working mothers like Renata were often
visibly more frustrated by the unequal division of labor. Even in
families where both parents were employed full-​time, moms still
took on most of the feeding.10 Renata felt that José did little, if
anything, to help when it came to feeding the family. That
responsibility rested squarely on Renata’s shoulders, something
that had to be done in addition to working full-​time and shut-
tling the kids around — ​commitments that kept Renata out of
the house from at least seven a.m. to six p.m. most weekdays and
many weekends as well.
One thing I admired about Renata was her understated
optimism. Renata was genuinely thankful for everything God

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had given her. Even when she described life’s hurdles and incon-
veniences, she did so almost matter‑of‑factly; complaining or
whining wasn’t her style. Because of Renata’s usually positive
disposition, I noticed on the evening that we prepared a salad
and garlic bread that she seemed unusually, visibly irritated.
Renata was frustrated with José’s giving the kids fast food
because she knew there was no real solution. As far as feeding the
kids was concerned, her and José’s arrangement was likely not a
negotiable one. So instead of trying to change things, Renata
worked to make light of the situation. “It’s a joke to us, like, ‘No
more fatty patties.’ ” She imitated herself scolding José, forcing a
laugh. “ ‘Quit going through the McDonald’s drive-​through!’ ”
But Renata was actually more irritated than tickled. If José
was going to be swaying the kids’ diets in a negative direction, it
meant Renata really had to feed them well the rest of the time.
Doing all the grocery shopping and cooking was hard enough.
But on top of this, if she wanted to establish healthy habits for
her kids, she had to go the extra mile to offset José’s unhealthy
dietary influence.
Still, like other moms, Renata sometimes reluctantly took
cues from José, allowing his less healthy preferences and his
penchant for fast food to win out. Just as it could be easier to say
yes to her kids’ food requests than to fight a battle, following
José’s lead offered the path of least resistance. A few weeks back,
Renata had returned home after a long day at work, dropped
her purse by the front door, and collapsed onto the living-​room
sofa. Although bone-​tired, she was still planning to cook dinner.
The pasta ingredients were waiting in the fridge. But then José
offered her an alternative. “Do you just wanna go get pizza?” he
asked hopefully.
Renata usually disliked José’s eagerness to order takeout.
But that night, she mostly felt a sense of relief about not having
to make dinner for everyone. They ordered two pizzas, and
Renata ate cross-​legged on the couch with the TV on. It was

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 Mom’s Job

luxurious. But later, Renata felt guilty about letting José steer
her family toward a less nutritious dinner.
Renata paused after telling me this story. Then she pulled
the garlic bread out of the oven and said, “We really gotta limit
our fast-​food intake.”
Try as Renata might not to worry so much about what her
family ate, she couldn’t tamp down the stress that arose when
she fell short of feeding them healthy, homemade meals. Maybe
José didn’t need to nourish the kids to feel like a good parent,
but as a mom, Renata didn’t have that luxury. When she gave in
to either her kids’ or José’s requests, she struggled with the
maternal guilt that quickly ensued. Even in her most exhausted
state, even when there wasn’t time to cook, and even when
Renata told herself it shouldn’t be her responsibility alone, in
her mind, the facts remained the same — ​it was Renata’s respon-
sibility to keep the family nourished. And if she didn’t do it, no
one else would. The next evening, Renata made sure to prepare
a homemade meal of chicken, pasta, and salad.

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 CHAPTER 12

Time and Money

“I’ve always worked,” Delfina Carrillo, the single mom of fifteen-​

year-​old Luis, told me. Her full-​ time job as a supermarket
cashier, Delfina explained, was one key reason why Luis’s diet
diverged so sharply from hers growing up.
“My mom never worked.” Delfina sighed, pushing her wire-​
framed glasses back on her nose. Delfina’s mom, who had raised
Delfina and her siblings, had spent hours in the kitchen each
day rolling yellow and blue corn tortillas and making pots of
posole and caldo de pollo. Delfina, however, had worked as a cashier
for twenty-​six years, laboring for ten hours a day on her feet. By
the time her shift wrapped up, at half past six in the evening,
cooking a homemade meal was the absolute last thing Delfina
wanted to do. She was mentally and physically beat, with aching
soles from standing and a gnawing headache from fending off
customer complaints from dawn till dusk.1
“I’d call the kids up after work and say, ‘You know what?’ ”
Delfina took a sip of water. “ ‘I’m tired. What do you want? I’ll
pick it up.’ ” Other nights, Delfina would just grab a pepperoni
pizza from the freezer aisle before driving home. Pizza was
always a safe bet.
Talking with Delfina about work underscored just how physi-
cally distinct low-​ income moms’ jobs were from wealthier
moms’ — ​and how much that affected their food choices. Del-
fina’s job was extremely physically taxing. I met other moms who

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 Time and Money

worked as cashiers, clerks, childcare providers, home-​ health

aides, house cleaners, dishwashers, restaurant servers, baristas,
or line cooks, and many of them spent eight to twelve hours a
day standing, walking, pushing, pulling, and carrying. Com-
pared to the careers of many wealthier working mothers, these
moms’ jobs taxed their bodies for hours without rest and with
minimal breaks.
For Delfina, coming home to toil over a hot stove or hunch
over a cutting board demanded even more physical exertion. It
sometimes felt like too much — ​like the straw that might finally,
actually break her back. When Delfina was married, she worked
fewer hours and had more energy at the end of the day. She
would generally cook at least a few evenings a week. But when
her husband left, she started putting in longer hours to make
ends meet. She went from working forty hours a week to sixty.
She dragged herself home most evenings feeling more depleted
than ever.
“It’s hard to explain.” Delfina exhaled. “But I didn’t want to
spend all my time just cooking and cooking and cleaning and
doing, doing, doing. I kind of wanted to spend some time with
Luis and then have some downtime for myself too, you know?”
Delfina’s desire to spend time with her child and have a
moment for herself was widely shared by moms across income
levels. But low-​income moms, who endured longer, less flexible,
and more physically demanding work shifts than moms with
high-​income jobs, found it hard to achieve this balance while
pulling together the homemade meals they felt they should be
cooking. They were well aware that good moms cooked dinner.
But many also felt, like Delfina, that good moms spent quality
time with their kids. So on weekday evenings, when Delfina
walked back through the front door and knew that she had just
a couple of hours to catch up with her son, there was a hard
decision to be made. Did she spend those precious moments
standing in the kitchen chopping bell peppers and peeling

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potatoes, or did she sidle up on the sofa beside Luis to catch a

few moments in his company?

When it comes to public discussions of healthy eating, time is a

well-​known issue. It’s common knowledge that a lack of time is a
major barrier to eating nutritiously. When time is short, cook-
ing is one of the first things to go out the window. The hours
that it takes to visit the supermarket, prep ingredients, cook a
meal, and wash pots and pans are ones that many of us don’t
have. And because of that time scarcity, we turn to quicker, more
convenient, and less healthy options, and our diets can suffer.
For families especially, time has become tighter than ever.
For one thing, parents work longer hours and commute longer
distances than they used to. For another, today there are more
mothers in the workforce and more mothers raising children as
single parents than there used to be.2 These two trends mean
that many families today no longer have a parent with ample
time to devote to feeding. Even though, as I highlighted in the
prior chapter, moms were still generally the ones getting every-
one fed, most moms didn’t have much time to devote to the
cause. Rather, they fit shopping and cooking into their busy
working and caregiving schedules where they could.
Just as pervasive as discussions about time scarcity are sup-
posed antidotes to it. The internet is full of solutions or life
hacks that highlight ways to cut corners or plan ahead so you
can still pull off homemade healthy meals, even in a time
crunch. Magazines feature articles with headlines like “Twelve
Ways to Eat Healthy No Matter How Busy You Are” and “How to
Eat Healthy When You Don’t Have Time to Meal Prep.” The
market is flooded with cookbooks with titles like Weeknight Won-
ders: Delicious, Healthy Dinners in Thirty Minutes or Less and The
Quick and Easy Healthy Cookbook. Moms are a special target of this
messaging, with parenting blogs featuring posts like “Seventy-​
Two Easy Kid-​Friendly Dinners Perfect for Weeknights” and “A

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 Time and Money

Week of Healthy Kids Meal Ideas (That Actually Work in Real

Life).”3
The take-​home message is clear: If you have a half hour,
then a healthy, homemade meal is possible. Of course, the pre-
and post-​work of cooking and the time required to grocery shop
and clean up are rarely included in this half hour. But more
important, these relatively simplistic discussions of time gener-
ally ignore one of its essential components: quality.
Certainly, time is a quantifiable resource, measured in sec-
onds, minutes, hours, and days. But time also has a rich qualita-
tive element to it — ​time can be enjoyable, stressful, restorative,
or exhausting. You evaluate how well spent your time is based on
these kinds of qualities. When you reflect on how you currently
spend your days and consider how to spend them moving for-
ward, you may ask yourself: What is the best use of my time?
This question bears directly on food choices, and yet it’s one
that is rarely, if ever, discussed with any nuance. Cooking a
healthy meal, according to the prevailing wisdom, is time well
spent. But the reality for moms, I learned, wasn’t so clear-​cut.
For moms who were pressed for time, cooking meals came
with real, tangible trade-​ offs — ​
especially when those meals
were supposed to come together quickly on a weeknight after a
long day of work and school. Those trade-​offs had everything to
do with the quality of the time these moms got to spend with
their children.
In general, moms’ decision to cook more entailed a choice to
spend less recreational time with kids and on themselves. It
meant feeling more exhausted than they already felt and even less
connected to the kids whom they hadn’t seen all day.
Delfina explained that when she let Luis eat what he liked,
she enjoyed their time together more. Her son was fed and
happy, and the two had longer to hang out. What’s more, that
time together was way more pleasant. Occasionally, Delfina
devoted the time she saved by not cooking to helping Luis with

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his homework. Often, the two kicked back and watched a sitcom
together. But whatever the case, for Delfina, the quality of that
time together surpassed that of laboring over a frying pan.

Driving home from Delfina’s, I kept thinking about how time

wasn’t a resource that only l­ow-​income moms lacked — ​moms
across the income spectrum were generally busy and harried.
All working moms were overbooked, whether they were cashiers
like Delfina or had jobs as dentists, teachers, or lawyers. Some
held down multiple jobs, and many were gone more than forty
hours a week. But stay‑at‑home moms like Julie were also really
busy. Julie often had difficulty finding time to schedule me in
amid all her household responsibilities, volunteering activities,
social engagements, and shuttling. One week, she texted that
she couldn’t find a single time for me to stop by.
But there was one important difference. Compared to work-
ing moms who struggled to find time to shop, cook, and clean
up, Julie embraced food as a critical use of her time. Because
Julie had spent the past seventeen years as her children’s full-
time caregiver, food was neither an afterthought nor something
to squeeze in on the evenings and weekends — ​it was her daily
work. It was a key part of her job, and she tackled it with profes-
sional ambition. Whether it was making multiple trips to the
supermarket in a day or preparing dinners specifically requested
by Evan and Jane, Julie devoted herself to the cause of her chil-
dren’s diets. And when she saw her home-​cooked meals grace
her kids’ plates, she felt fulfilled. When Julie watched Jane eat
one rather than four cookies or Evan order a salad, Julie found
proof that the hours she devoted to feeding her kids each week
was time — ​and energy — ​well spent.
I witnessed firsthand Julie’s temporal investment in food.
One week, she drove to the supermarket four times to make
sure that the fridge was stocked with Jane’s favorite healthy

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 Time and Money

snack: red and green grapes. Julie’s time is what allowed her to
make sure that Jane always had fresh fruit to eat and not just
bags of chips. Another evening, I spent hours helping Julie pre-
pare a side dish especially for Jane: a “tornado potato” dish
made from spiral slicing, skewering, and roasting potatoes in a
homemade sauce. Sometimes, Julie was exhausted by her efforts
and even found the task a little thankless. But she also saw it as
her job, and Julie took her job seriously.
But not all high-​income moms had as much time as Julie to
devote to food. How are these moms making it work? I wondered.
What I learned was that in the absence of time, money could
mean the difference between a more or less nutritious meal.

“It’s more stressful than I would like,” Sonali Kapoor, a mom of

two, told me about feeding her family of four. I met Sonali and
her husband, Arjun, one evening in their spacious two-​story
house at the end of a quiet cul‑de‑sac. Their street was lined
with other two-​million-​dollar homes, each with a white façade, a
brown thatched roof, and a neatly manicured front lawn. Arjun,
a short man with thick black hair and a well-​trimmed mustache,
opened the door.
“Come on in,” he said. I removed my shoes in the entryway
and followed him into a bright living area with high ceilings and
broad windows that faced the backyard. An open-​concept kitchen
flowed into a beige and white den. Sonali, her thick brown hair
swept into a neat bun, stood by the kitchen sink, rinsing plates
from dinner and loading them into the dishwasher. The Kapoor
boys  — ​sixteen-​year-​old Zubin and nine-​year-​old Dev  — ​had
already retreated upstairs to get ready for bed.
The first thing I noticed about Arjun and Sonali, still both
in their gray and black business-​casual attire, was that behind
their upbeat exteriors lay exhaustion. I could almost feel the
heaviness of Sonali’s eyelids as she took a seat by their fireplace

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and pulled a thick blanket over her legs. Arjun sank into the
chair next to her. I sat across from them on a tan sofa, my cup of
water on the glass coffee table.
Sonali and Arjun had grown up in India, where they’d met
as graduate students. They married and then moved to North
America — ​first to Canada and later to the Bay Area. “Education
was very, very important and so we got educated,” Arjun explained.
Once they had their degrees in hand, their careers had taken
off — ​Sonali now ran the marketing department of a large tech
company, and Arjun was in charge of a global firm’s human
resources office.
The Kapoors’ diet, however, felt far less successful to Sonali.
When the Kapoors first arrived in the United States, American
food culture was a shock to their systems. Growing up in India,
Sonali and Arjun ate nothing but fresh food. Both of their
mothers, stay‑at‑home caregivers, bought fruits and vegetables
daily from the market and prepared three meals a day using
fresh produce. Sonali and Arjun had both been raised in vege-
tarian households, where okra, paneer, and lentils were staples.
Sonali and Arjun felt that their current lives were a far cry
from that. “I think the biggest differences from back then,”
Arjun said, “are that we don’t eat as much fresh food so there’s a
lot of processed food or leftovers. And we tend to eat out I’d say
about thirty percent of the time or so.”
These differences weighed on Sonali and irked her more
than they did Arjun. “Too often, convenience kicks in for us,”
Sonali lamented, bringing a glass of water to her lips. Daily
supermarket trips and nightly meals from scratch were out of
the question. For Sonali, it all came down to time. She simply
didn’t have enough of it. Both she and Arjun commuted to work,
and the boys were enrolled at two different schools. Between
drop-​offs, pickups, Bay Area traffic, and extracurriculars, the
Kapoors were constantly on the go. While moms like Julie had
mornings and afternoons to shop and prepare family meals,

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 Time and Money

Sonali had only the weekends. But spending all her time shop-
ping and cooking on Saturday and Sunday came at a cost. Those
were the only two days the family could spend quality time
together.
“I have to choose between being together and making food,”
Sonali said, sighing.
On Saturdays, Zubin and Dev attended Hindu school. The
school was about a forty-​five-​minute drive from their home.
Arjun could easily take them, and Sonali could use the time to
shop and meal prep for the week. But splitting up had its down-
sides. The boys would be gone for four to five hours while Sonali
worked alone in the kitchen. Since Sonali barely caught glimpses
of her husband and children during the week, she decided to
forgo weekend meal-​prep time and instead ride along to Hindu
school so that the four of them could spend time in one anoth-
er’s company. “Even if we are in the car,” Sonali said, smiling, “at
least we are together.”
Many lower-​income families were also short on time, but the
Kapoors had a key extra resource: money. Families like Sonali
and Arjun’s could throw cash at the problem of time scarcity.
Everything, from shopping to prepping to cooking, could be
outsourced. The outsourcing strategy I saw families use most
frequently was grocery delivery. But I also met those who relied
on meal companies that delivered premeasured raw ingredients
that could be transformed into a dinner in fifteen minutes.
Other families used services that delivered the meals already
cooked and ready to be reheated. And some families even hired
personal chefs or a “mother’s helper” to prepare meals in their
kitchens. The Kapoors decided to give this last option a try.
“The solution,” Sonali told me, “is that somebody comes on
Sunday morning to make food.” That somebody’s name was
Dipika, and she had years of experience preparing North Indian
cuisine. Paying Dipika to cook left Sonali with just enough con-
trol — ​Sonali still did the grocery shopping and picked the

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recipes, but Dipika minced garlic, ginger, and onions and

kneaded dough. Dipika was essentially Sonali’s sous-​ chef.
Because Dipika stood over a warm stove for hours while the
spices and bases for dishes simmered, Sonali could devote her
time to other things.
When I spoke with the Kapoors a few months into this new
arrangement, they told me that it was working well for them. It
freed Sonali on the weekends to spend more hours with her
sons. While Sonali didn’t love how Dipika prepared some of the
dishes, the outsourcing allowed her to check a bunch of boxes
that mattered to her. Healthy, Indian, home-​ cooked meals:
check. Time to spend with the rest of the family: check.4
The Kapoors weren’t the only ones with this idea. Sonali
explained that Dipika worked for a handful of other South
Asian families in the area. After spending the early hours of
Sunday morning in the Kapoors’ kitchen, Dipika would travel to
four or five other homes throughout the day to help other moms
get a head start on the week. Sometimes Dipika brought her
own assistant, which allowed her to work with even greater
speed and pay more families a visit in one day.
Outsourcing also gave wealthier moms more bandwidth to
say no to their kids’ food requests when they had to. It gave them
that extra bit of patience to refuse when their kids asked for
Pepsi or Snickers. In this way, having money helped not just
because it enabled parents to buy more expensive food and save
time while not sacrificing quality; it also gave parents the inter-
nal strength to wage yearslong battles to keep their kids’ diets as
nutritious as possible. Before her helper had come on board,
Sonali had often been so tired at the end of the day that the last
thing she wanted to do was argue with Dev about whether he
could have ice cream for dessert. Her situation has echoed Del-
fina’s in this way. But with a little time and a bit of energy freed
up, Sonali could more often summon the will to negotiate. Her
resources gave her that extra buffer to keep going — ​to keep

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striving to improve her sons’ diets. Sonali didn’t regret paying

someone else to cook instead of cooking herself. That invest-
ment was what kept her and her family on track.
When I compared Delfina’s situation to Sonali’s, I saw how
resources like time and money could come together to make it
easier for some families to eat healthier than others. Having
both resources gave more privileged families an obvious advan-
tage. But in a pinch, one resource in particular could compen-
sate for the other — ​ money remained the key currency for
opening doors. Money solved problems, allowing mothers to
creatively devise strategies to overcome obstacles to healthy eat-
ing. Money let moms order in, take out, hire help, and do more
with fewer hours in the day. Money, quite literally, bought moms
quality time to spend with their children. It bought them more
bandwidth and energy to keep working at their children’s diets.
It bought them healthier food without all the effort. When time
was lacking, I learned, money could always compensate.

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Stuck

Renata didn’t have the money to compensate for time scarcity.

Her situation diverged from that of more affluent moms. To the
outside world, the difference between a mom like Renata and a
mom like Julie wasn’t always obvious. Both were married. Both
were devoted mothers to a son and daughter. Both were raising
kids who were happy, busy, and excelling in school. There was
no question that Renata and her family lived relatively comfort-
ably. Like Julie, Renata was able to get her kids many things that
they wanted, whether it was new back‑to‑school clothes or the
dog they’d been asking for for months. And when it came to
food, both Julie and Renata thought and cared about what their
kids ate. They wanted their kids to be healthy, and they used
the resources they had at their disposal to help make that happen.
But I was also struck by the visible distinctions between
the approaches each took to feed her family. Compared to Julie,
Renata was always being forced to make compromises. Not the
kind of daily compromises that Nyah and Dana had to make,
but compromises that left Renata feeling inadequate  — ​
especially when she juxtaposed them with her vision of a good
mom. As was the case for other middle-​class moms, the trade-​
offs demanded by Renata’s situation left her feeling stuck. With
more limited time and money, she couldn’t figure out how
exactly to feed her kids the way she aspired to.
Some of Renata’s compromises stemmed from her full-​time

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 Stuck

job and evenings spent shuttling the kids to their various activi-
ties. All of this exhausted and fragmented Renata, often leaving
her too depleted to feel excited about whipping up a gourmet
dinner. In this way, her lifestyle paralleled Sonali’s, whose
demanding job also rendered her less bandwidth to devote
to food.
But Sonali’s and Renata’s situations diverged from there.
Sonali had the money to outsource some of her load, thereby
wrangling back some of that bandwidth. Renata, however, didn’t
have the money to outsource the cognitive or physical load of
cooking. Renata somehow, and often largely on her own, had to
make it work.
“Our busy schedules sort of guide how we eat,” Renata
explained to me one morning. Because of that, Renata tended
to prepare the same simple meals over and over again, ones she
knew by heart and that she could get on the dinner table in less
than fifteen minutes. She wasn’t spending hours perusing reci-
pes online, delving into cookbooks to try out new meals, or
watching cooking tutorials on Instagram. Renata was all about
familiar, fail-​safe recipes that could be popped in the microwave
or oven at the last minute. She was about efficiency. On the
nights she was totally exhausted, Renata opted for pizza delivery.
Sometimes, I felt like I could almost see the gap between
Renata’s dietary aspirations and her reality. The Ortegas’ fridge
was often filled with stacks of takeout boxes and restaurant dog-
gie bags. One Tuesday evening, I spotted two Papa John’s pizza
boxes and some Panda Express containers peeking out of the
recycling bin. Renata, I knew, was one of the modern mothers
whom the food industry had in mind when it came up with pro-
cessed products — ​the supposed “solutions” to moms’ desire to
feed their kids nutritiously, quickly, and without complaints. But
these solutions generally only left Renata feeling guilty about
the shortcuts she’d had to take to get there.
Renata’s guilt was usually highest when it came to giving the

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kids processed foods. One afternoon, as Renata and I drove

Amalia to the pediatrician, we talked about Amalia’s love of mac
and cheese. “It’s our favorite,” Amalia chimed in from the back
seat over the sound of pop music on the radio.
“And I feel bad giving it to them,” Renata quickly added as
we turned into the parking lot. Renata found processed prod-
ucts overly artificial, with the powdery cheese and expiration
date years out. At the same time, Renata didn’t want to just out-
right refuse the kids’ requests. After all, it was an easy dinner to
put together and a surefire crowd-​pleaser. It was also a simple
way for Renata to show them she was listening to their prefer-
ences. Renata’s compromise? Stove-​top mac and cheese, rather
than the microwaveable version. It had more real cheese and
less of the artificial stuff.
Were these meals exciting? Renata didn’t think so. Were
they exactly what she wanted her kids to be eating? Not quite. But
were they nutritious enough? Could they be put together in the
time she had? Did they get the job done? The answers were yes,
yes, and yes. For Renata, that had to do.

Feeling stuck complicated food’s meaning to Renata and other

middle-​ class moms. These moms were precariously trapped
between competing ideals and pressures around what it meant to
be a good mom. Renata aspired to have as many home-​cooked
meals as Julie and as many “teaching moments” as Patricia
Adams, but having fewer resources barred her from that reality.
As I spent time with wealthier moms who had so much of
what Renata wanted, I began to imagine how more resources
could change how Renata felt about feeding. This was on my
mind one Wednesday evening in August when I met Renata at
home. Outside, it felt like summer; at half past six, the air was
warm and the sun shone high in the sky. But inside, summer was
officially over — ​almost. Tomorrow was the kids’ first day back at
school. Amalia would be starting tenth grade and Nico eighth.

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Amalia sat at the dining-​room table in jean shorts and a blue

tank top, tapping away on her iPhone screen.
Renata was sorting the family’s mail into two piles, one to
keep and one to toss. “The plan tonight is to go to the mall,”
Renata told me, occasionally glancing up from the pile of papers.
Placing her hand on Amalia’s shoulder, she smiled. “Amalia
needs some new clothes for school.” Amalia grinned without
looking up from her phone.
Grabbing the pile of mail to toss with her left hand, Renata
motioned to me with her right to follow her into the kitchen.
The Ortegas’ kitchen was narrow and densely packed. On the
four-​burner stove sat a colander and a small saucepan. Renata
picked the colander up and scraped a knotted clump of day-​old
angel-​hair pasta into the trash. Then she grabbed the handle of
the saucepan, brought it over to the sink, and filled it with warm
water. She used a sponge to wash the tomato residue out, then
placed the wet pan upside down on the countertop to dry.
On the top of the fridge was a double box of Honey Bunches
of Oats and a six-​pack of pale ale. Between the microwave and
fridge, a half-​eaten loaf of wheat bread was covered in plastic.
“Nico is going to start making his sandwiches for school this
year,” Renata said, noticing me eyeing the bread. She seemed
relieved. “I just want both kids to be in charge of their lunches
so I don’t have to worry about it.”
Rolling up my sleeves, I asked what was for dinner that night
and how I could help.
“Amalia isn’t hungry,” Renata told me, adding that her
daughter had biked that afternoon to the local pizza place. “But
we can make something for Nico now, and then Amalia can eat
some of it later if she wants.”
Renata opened the fridge and scanned the shelves to see
what she had. Then she reached into the freezer, grabbed two
pork cutlets wrapped in plastic, and started defrosting them in
the microwave. Amid the hum of the microwave, the two of us

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talked about how hard it was to line up everyone’s schedules so

that they could share a meal in the evenings. The kids each had
different extracurricular activities, and in his off-​hours, José
played with the band. Sometimes he was home in the evenings,
but that wasn’t something Renata could count on.
“It’s okay that we don’t eat together,” she assured me. “I have
enough to worry about, I don’t need to be getting everyone on
different schedules all synced up.” I couldn’t tell if Renata actu-
ally believed that or if she was trying to convince herself — ​or
me. She didn’t need to convince me. From where I was sitting,
Renata’s approach made perfect sense for her family. Everyone
was busy, and I had witnessed how frustrating it was for moms to
spend so many hours cooking only to find out that one kid had
already eaten with friends or another had stopped liking a cer-
tain food. Renata was, above all, pragmatic.
But pragmatism wasn’t a tenet of intensive mothering, and
Renata often felt like she wasn’t doing enough. She walked to
the end of their long galley kitchen and opened a door to reveal
a narrow pantry lined with crackers, fruit cups, canned toma-
toes, chips, cereal boxes, and soda. She picked up a large bag of
long-​grain white rice, carried it back to the counter, plopped it
down, and opened it up. She combined two cups of dry rice with
four cups of water in a saucepan and set it to cook.
As Renata pulled the defrosted pork cutlets out of the micro-
wave and started to sear them in a nonstick frying pan, she told me
about a fantasy she had been entertaining. That fantasy, it turned
out, was Sonali’s reality. It was a fantasy about getting unstuck.
Renata prefaced it with “I know it’s not realistic.” She pursed
her lips. “But my dream would be to hire someone who could
get home a bit before me, start tidying up, and cook us dinner.”
That person, Renata explained, would change everything for
her. It’s not that Renata minded grocery shopping or popping
something in the oven. And sure, in a world where she had after-
noons to chop and prep, she could imagine spending an hour

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 Stuck

getting things ready for the evening. But that wasn’t Renata’s
reality. Instead, she generally came home after a long and stress-
ful day to a messy kitchen and had to do what she was doing
tonight: cleaning up, defrosting, cooking something new, serv-
ing everyone, and cleaning up again.
Looking longingly down at the pan, Renata flipped over a
pork cutlet.
“That would be the best.” She sighed, smiling to herself.
Then she started telling me about a friend who had recently
hired a caretaker for her kids. But, Renata added excitedly, that
caretaker went above and beyond, cleaning the house and cook-
ing full meals for the family. She could make lasagnas, tacos,
and even gourmet salads.
“Now, that’s what I want!” Renata proclaimed, passing me a
cucumber to chop. I peeled, seeded, and sliced the cucumber,
wondering if Renata could or would actually hire someone to
make her life easier.
“Do you think you could do something like that?” I asked,
scraping the cucumber slices from the cutting board into a
bowl.
Renata paused, setting the spatula down on the counter for
a second. “You know, it’s not really in our budget,” she said, her
disappointment lingering in the air. The Ortegas had just
bought a puppy, and both kids were hoping to go on a school
trip to Washington, DC, that summer. “But I don’t know,” she
continued. “Maybe it could actually be worth it.”
Renata was quiet for a few minutes as she poured two table-
spoons of soy sauce into the pan. The black liquid popped and
sizzled as it flavored the cutlets. Turning the stove off, she seemed
to be actively calculating whether she and José could swing it.
I did my own math. Assuming someone like that cost around
thirty dollars an hour and would be needed two hours a day,
five days a week, that added up to about twelve hundred dollars
a month. If they used the money they would receive as

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compensation for participating in my research — ​which was three

hundred dollars — ​they could afford a helper for . . . ​one week.
While it would make a world of difference in Renata’s life, I
couldn’t see them putting down over fourteen grand a year to
make it happen. I couldn’t even imagine them paying half that
amount. Renata knew that too — ​which was why she felt stuck.
She definitely didn’t love cooking and she didn’t want to be spend-
ing her time on food. She had so many other interests she’d
rather have pursued with any extra time, whether it was practic-
ing a dance routine with Amalia or lying on the couch watching
the Olympics women’s swimming finals. But Renata also felt like
she needed to be making at least a few homemade meals each
week for her kids. She couldn’t subvert that feeling enough to
abandon the whole endeavor. She couldn’t overcome the guilt.
“I do it,” Renata explained about cooking, “because I have
to.” Renata felt trapped between how she wanted to feel about
feeding her family and how she actually felt about it. Good moms
loved cooking and nourishing their families. Good moms never
resented chopping cucumbers or deboning a chicken. Cooking
should have been a source of joy or satisfaction in her life,
Renata thought. But it just wasn’t. More than that, it was stress-
ful constantly looking for things to feed her kids that they liked,
were nutritious, and wouldn’t keep her in the kitchen for hours.
Renata told me that some of her friends, also moms, cooked
nightly for their families. “They find it therapeutic,” she said,
flashing me a look of incredulity. “They love to try new recipes,
and they love to have lots of friends over to eat their food.”
Renata paused. “I am not one of those people.”
After scooping the pork cutlets onto a plate, Renata checked
to see if the rice was ready. “This will get us through tonight and
tomorrow,” she said with relief. As she started to clean up, Renata
shouted to Nico that his dinner was ready. Nico sauntered into
the kitchen in a black T‑shirt and blue jeans, a pair of headphones
around his neck. Renata heaped two spoonfuls of white rice, a

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pork cutlet, and a large helping of cucumbers onto his plate. As

she did that, Nico reached into the fridge, grabbed a gallon car-
ton of milk from the lower shelf, and poured himself a tall glass.
He took both the plate and the glass into the dining room to eat.
For a moment, Renata felt good. She leaned back onto the
counter with a sense of accomplishment. In just under an hour,
she had done what she needed to do to get the kids fed and have
leftovers for the next few days. Paired with other foods Renata had
on hand, the pork, rice, and cucumbers would last through Fri-
day, easily. But as she started to scrub the dirty pan in the sink, she
glanced at the microwave clock. “Oh, shoot!” she said, turning the
faucet off. “Nico,” she called, “I have to rush you because the mall
is closing soon, and we have to go.” Nico had barely taken his first
bite, but he shoveled a few scoops of rice and meat into his mouth
before picking his plate back up and walking it into the kitchen.
Grabbing her purse off the table, Renata ushered us out.
The mall was closing in less than an hour, but we managed to
stop by Forever 21 and Hollister and pick up a pair of shorts and
two shirts for Amalia. By the time we got home, it was nine
o’clock and Renata was completely wiped. While Amalia showed
off her clothes to her dad at the dining-​room table, Renata col-
lapsed onto the large beige sofa in the den. Crossing one leg
over the other and letting her eyes close for a second, she sighed.
“I’ll clean the kitchen up tomorrow.”
Later that night, back home scarfing down a late dinner at my
own kitchen island, I typed up my field notes from the evening.
“Renata is keeping her head above water, but she’s also mak-
ing so many compromises,” I wrote. It was true; she was giving her
all to everyone. She juggled work, family, and everything that so
predictably fell on moms when it came to food. But without extra
resources to make that juggling act a little easier, middle-​income
moms like Renata were all on their own to pull it off. Renata was
forced to make trade-​offs that left her feeling a sense of guilt and
inadequacy. And, as I’d soon learn, she was in good company.

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 CHAPTER 14

Fluctuating Finances

As a society, our image of middle-​class families is that they are, for

the most part, financially stable and secure. This image reflects
nostalgia more than reality, as the stability that used to character-
ize the American middle class has been dwindling over the past
forty years. The term middle class used to refer to Americans
who had a steady income, a home, and savings for the future. But
today, as the journalist Anne Helen Petersen has pointed out,
being middle class mostly means being able to put bills on autopay
and service one’s debt. Middle-​class wages have increased over
time, but those increases mostly keep pace with inflation rather
than with the rising costs of living in the U.S. More of middle-​class
paychecks now goes to covering basic expenses, like out‑of‑pocket
health-​care fees, childcare, and educational investments.1
While the American middle class continues to buy and lease
cars, purchase homes (though not at the rate they used to), go
on vacation, and pay for kids’ education and activities, they are
now doing so by taking on significant debt. Indeed, rates of
middle-​class debt have soared. In March 2020, household debt
in the U.S. was $14.3 trillion and student-​loan debt was $1.56
trillion, with the average student-​debt load for an individual just
above $32,000.
Many of the middle-​class families I met reflected this reality.
While their education placed them culturally in the middle
class, their wages and accumulated debt could locate them just

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above the poverty line. This meant they were both scraping by
and earning too much to qualify for government aid. For some,
attending college had been a double-​edged sword; on the one
hand, it had propelled them into higher-​paying jobs. But on the
other, it had saddled them with payments they never seemed to
be able to get fully on top of.
Of all the middle-​class families I met, Renata and José seemed
to be doing the best. They didn’t feel financially secure, but they
were faring relatively well. They were contributing toward retire-
ment savings. They had health insurance. They owned their
three-​bedroom house and were regularly making their mortgage
payments. They weren’t paying off student loans. They could
also afford to cover an emergency expense. But other middle-​
income families were not as lucky, and for those families, unex-
pected job losses or medical fees laid bare their hidden financial
insecurities.
Middle-​class families could find their financial situations
fluctuating dramatically when one parent lost a job, business
was slow, or unexpected costs arose. And I found that food’s
meaning to middle-​class parents could shift in lockstep with
these financial changes. Overnight, food could go from being a
teaching tool to a means of compensating for tougher circum-
stances. That is, how parents used food was extremely sensitive
to whether they were making ends meet. When things were
going well, parents could focus on food as a medium for teach-
ing kids about nutrition. When things got tough, these same
parents could turn to food as an antidote for hardship.
Alvaro and Sofia Morales, parents of three, showed me just
how intensely food’s meaning could vacillate within a family. As
we sat in the Moraleses’ living room one evening, Alvaro explained
that a few months ago, he and his family had been eating very
nutritiously. But in January, Alvaro had been laid off from his
job in construction management, an unexpected loss that shook
his self-​esteem and his family’s world. When Alvaro was

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gainfully employed, feeding his family had felt like relatively

smooth sailing. But now, things were different.
“We used to be really conscious about clean food,” Sofia
said, putting her hand on Alvaro’s knee as they sat side by side
on a gray sofa. “The big shift was when we started having all of
this financial stress and all this burden — ​we became so focused
on just surviving.”
Sofia’s mention of survival took me back to an afternoon on
Nyah’s couch. “I’m just trying to survive,” Nyah had told me. She
hadn’t been thinking ahead. She had been trying to move
through each moment in time, to get by until her prospects
improved. Certainly, the Moraleses were in better financial shape
than Nyah had been, but their mentalities had striking parallels.
“Now we’re just in survival mode.” Alvaro echoed his wife,
gently placing his hand atop hers. Alvaro rattled off all the
expenses currently weighing on them: their eldest daughter’s
college tuition next year, their son’s soccer club, their youngest
daughter’s day care, and Sofia’s emergency root canal that their
dental insurance wouldn’t cover.
“It’s just so overwhelming.” Alvaro sighed, his brown eyes
widening.
Food was also overwhelming them. What had once been
Alvaro’s well of joy had become a major source of angst. Before
losing his job, Alvaro had reveled in weekends spent grocery
shopping. The kids would pile into the minivan with their dad
and he’d hit all of his favorite stores. Their first stop was Whole
Foods, where they’d grab fresh, seasonal fruit and specialty
items like cured olives and goat’s‑milk yogurt. Then they’d head
over to their local deli for the best cuts of meat. They’d end up
at the farmers’ market, where Alvaro would choose vegetables
for the week and his kids would sneak as many free samples as
they could. But now, because of all of the other stresses his fam-
ily was facing, food was often the last thing on Alvaro’s mind.
“To eat healthy,” Alvaro told me, “it takes more resources.”

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Because Alvaro’s resources were now in short supply, his week-

end shopping itinerary looked different. There was no more
perusing the aisles at Whole Foods or sampling peaches at the
market. “Now it’s just ‘What’s on sale at Safeway and kind of
organic?’ ” Alvaro chuckled, though I could tell he didn’t really
find it funny. “We’re still trying to keep the same frame set, but
we don’t have the luxuries, so sometimes we have to buy the
ninety-​nine-​cent chicken and it’s just got to stretch a little bit
longer. Maybe make two meals out of it instead of four-​ninety-​
nine‑a‑pound chicken that’s gonna be for one meal.”
Even though Alvaro still cared about what his kids ate, he found
it hard to care as much when he knew that he had less to devote to
their diets. Comparing how they used to eat with their current con-
sumption stung. Alvaro still strove to teach his kids about nutrition
and health, but he also found himself using food to compensate for
the stress that his job loss had inflicted on his family.
“Sometimes I just can’t pull it together,” he said, closing his
eyes for a moment. “And that’s when we end up picking up fast
food.” Alvaro didn’t love fast food — ​he questioned the quality
of the meat — ​ but the kids did. And these days, his family
needed any morale boost they could get.
Alvaro and Sofia weren’t alone in struggling with the dietary
challenges that came with shifting finances. Chastity Banks simi-
larly felt that she was being stretched too thin. I first met Chastity
one Saturday afternoon at Target. Chastity had caught my atten-
tion when I spotted her with her three daughters in the cereal aisle.
I was awestruck watching Chastity as she absorbed the two younger
daughters’ pleas with a seemingly endless well of patience. Even as
the youngest — ​who was seven — ​tugged on the bottom of her shirt
and whined for her attention, Chastity acted remarkably, almost
eerily, calm. I was so amazed by Chastity’s poise that I asked her for
an interview. Maybe I can uncover the secret to her serenity, I thought.
But I soon learned that internally, Chastity, like most moms,
was battling feelings of inadequacy. With these emotions

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compounded by a recent financial loss, she felt stretched to the

brink and unable to focus on her daughters’ diets the way she
wanted.
“I’m concerned about their health and what they’re eating,”
Chastity told me the next weekend over two cups of jasmine tea
at a bookstore café. Chastity’s wiry black hair was pulled back in
a bun, and she blew on her steaming tea as we spoke.
A year prior, Chastity’s husband, James, had decided to go
back to school to become a chef. The decision had not been
reached easily; it had been the culmination of countless late-​
night discussions that unfolded around the kitchen table as
Chastity repeatedly plugged the numbers — ​her income, James’s
income, school tuition, the girls’ extracurriculars — ​into her
phone’s calculator. After what seemed like the hundredth calcu-
lation, Chastity saw a way forward. She understood the kinds of
financial tweaks they’d have to make to pull it off.
In the long run, a culinary school degree and new career as
a chef would leave James more fulfilled and boost the Bankses’
overall household income. But in the short term, the transition
set the family back financially. James continued working the
night shift for the postal service, but he went down from full-​
time to part-​time hours. James’s salary reduction hadn’t hit the
Bankses hard enough to qualify them for federal food assis-
tance. But the change had placed an enormous amount of stress
on Chastity, who, overnight, had become her family’s primary
breadwinner. Chastity started picking up more hours at the hos-
pital where she worked as a medical technician. She went from
spending mornings and evenings with her kids to showing them
how to use the defrost function on the microwave.
“I don’t want to disappoint.” Chastity paused. “And I feel like
I’m disappointing them.”
Chastity’s biggest challenge came from not being home. All
the extra hours at work meant less time to grocery shop and
cook for her kids the way they’d come to expect over the years. It

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meant less time with her kids overall. “I feel bad.” Chastity
sighed. “It’s kind of a struggle because I did stay at home with
them for a little while and so they kind of got used to that. But
now it’s like, I can’t do that anymore.”
Her lack of time was especially challenging in the mornings.
Chastity wanted her thirteen-year-old and seven-​year-​old to eat a
healthy and satiating breakfast before school. This was essential
for their education. Brain food, Chastity called it. But Chastity
was rarely home when they were getting ready for school. What
could the girls eat when both she and her husband were gone?
“I don’t want them touching the oven or the stove,” Chastity
said. “I don’t want a fire or someone to get hurt. So I try to buy
little oranges, like the Cuties.” The kids sometimes ate those for
breakfast. They also had Pop-​Tarts and granola bars around for
something quick. This was fine, Chastity felt, but it didn’t make
her feel great.
“It’s rough,” Chastity said. “Nothing’s as healthy as cooking
your food and having a good hearty breakfast, huh?”
With both her and James out of the house most of the day,
Chastity also didn’t want her kids to feel neglected. She wanted
them to know, deep down, that she still cared about what they
wanted, food included. That’s why, rather than saying no all the
time, Chastity negotiated with them. “It’s a lot of back-​and-​forth.
It’s give-​and-​take.” She chuckled. “But maybe lately more of a give,
rather than me taking.” Chastity bought small plastic bins that
she labeled with each of her daughters’ names and filled with
snacks for them to eat when she wasn’t home. Each morning
before leaving for work, she’d ensure that the bins had fruit
snacks, juice boxes, Fig Newtons, and oatmeal packets in them.
On her evening drive home from work, Chastity would swing by a
nearby Burger King to grab a carton of fries. Those fries would
tide her kids over while she put dinner together. Chastity would
toss a bag of vegetables in the microwave to steam and spread fro-
zen tater tots across a tray to bake in the oven.

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It wasn’t that Chastity wanted her kids’ diets to tip toward

the processed end. But amid all of the chaos in their lives cur-
rently, it actually felt good to give in a little. It felt easier to nod
in agreement than shake her head and fight. Doing so, I real-
ized, helped Chastity stay as calm as she appeared. It helped her
have energy for the extra twenty hours a week she was putting in
at the hospital. For Chastity, food could help bridge gaps.
But when Chastity had the time — ​when she worked a late
instead of an early-​ morning shift — ​she made sure that she
cooked the girls a special meal. “I’ll make a full breakfast,”
Chastity said, setting her hands on the table. “I’ll make biscuit
sandwiches like they have at McDonald’s, with the sausage.”
Even though Chastity knew sausage biscuits weren’t the
healthiest, cooking something healthy wasn’t what these morn-
ings were about anymore. Amid the tougher circumstances the
Bankses were currently weathering, these mornings were about
Chastity’s love of her family and quality time together. They were
about showing herself and her kids that she was there for them.
Chastity took menu requests from the girls. She picked up the
bacon and waffles they asked for to show them that even though
she was not around as much, she still cared deeply about them,
about their wants and their needs. The mornings Chastity worked,
while she sterilized ultrasound equipment or collected specimens
from the lab, she thought of her daughters lined up at the dining-​
room table. She pictured their smiles and the sound of them
chomping on waffles, their front teeth coated in warm maple syrup.
One day, Chastity hoped, she and James would settle into a new
family routine. James would finish school and start earning a real
income again. Chastity would scale back her hours at the hospital;
she’d be home in the mornings to take the kids to school. In the
afternoons, she’d pick them up again and get home early enough
to make dinner. Maybe, she mused, James would even use his new-
found culinary skills to help get an evening meal on the table. In
this distant future, Chastity thought, food would get easier again.

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 CHAPTER 15

Becoming American

It was a warm September afternoon when I first met Teresa

Lopez. The two of us sat at two desks in an empty social studies
classroom at Lincoln High School, where her only son, Esteban,
was in the ninth grade. A thin ray of sun streamed through an
open window, hitting a recently cleaned green chalkboard.
Teresa’s curly brown hair was pulled back in a taut bun, and she
wore bright pink lipstick, a floral top, and boot-​ cut jeans.
Around her neck hung a pearl necklace with a silver cross, and
over her shoulder a tote bag with the words san francisco in
cursive.
Born in Sinaloa, Mexico, Teresa had immigrated to the
United States sixteen years ago, first to Los Angeles and later,
after separating from her husband, up to the Bay Area. “Since
then, I have been here,” Teresa said softly, “facing a thousand
different hurdles to get ahead in life.”
Over the years, Teresa had worked hard to come to terms
with the realities of her situation. It was a life harder, in many
ways, than the one she’d led before crossing the border. Since
arriving in the U.S., Teresa had survived domestic abuse and a
contentious separation. She’d cleaned toilets and nannied rich
people’s kids. She’d been laid off and evicted. She’d lived in her
van. She’d wiped away Esteban’s tears when she couldn’t afford
to get him even the cheapest television set.
But, Teresa told me, things had grown easier over time. It’s

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not that her life improved. Rather, she had, bit by bit, come to
terms with everything. Teresa had worked to reconcile the dif-
ferences between her expectations and her reality. She had
fought to center gratitude over disappointment.
“Little by little, one forgets about what was left there, what is
over there.” Teresa sighed, thinking of the village where she’d
spent the first twenty years of her life. “It has been difficult, but
little by little one overcomes it. One learns to live with what
happens.”
Over the past few years, Teresa had worked full-​time as a
house cleaner. She always made rent, but her paychecks’ timing
often meant that there were certain days each month when she
didn’t have money to restock the kitchen. The cupboards, nor-
mally piled high with flour tortillas, black beans, and canned
vegetables, were bare. A few white onions rolled around the veg-
etable drawer, rather than the usual zucchini, squash, and heads
of broccoli.
“If I don’t have anything when it is the first few days of the
month,” Teresa said, “I have to pay rent, insurance, such and
such. I tell Esteban, ‘Let’s go experiment, come on! Let’s see
what we can come up with.’ ” Teresa smiled, her dark eyes crin-
kling at the corners as she described spinning hardship into
opportunity. “Sometimes when there isn’t anything, you need to
invent something out of what you already have.”
Hard as being an inventor was, Teresa believed that the sac-
rifices she had made to come to America — ​and to survive in
America — ​ would yield Esteban a better life. Here, he had
opportunities unthinkable south of the border. Teresa was
undocumented, but Esteban’s American citizenship was his
ticket. His future was brighter than hers — ​he would speak flu-
ent English, go to college, and get a good job with benefits. He
wouldn’t have to worry like she had. He wouldn’t have to give up
the things she had given up.
To secure Esteban’s future, Teresa kept putting one foot in

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 Becoming American

front of the other. She scrubbed more toilets. She babysat on the
weekends, bringing Esteban with her to help watch the chil-
dren. She learned enough English to help her son with his social
studies homework. She attended parent-​ teacher conferences
and back‑to‑school nights. She joined a Hispanic parent associa-
tion at Esteban’s school, building a support network with other
parents whom she could rely on to look out for her and her son.
Sometimes, this country still felt as foreign to Teresa as the day
she’d first stepped foot on its soil. But, she told herself, Esteban’s
future was worth it.
One of four siblings, Teresa was raised in a village by a mom
who worked and a grandma who cooked for their extended fam-
ily. Teresa remembered running home from school in the early
afternoon for midday comida to find caldos or sopas de fideo. No
meal was complete unless all nine kids — ​Teresa, her siblings,
and her cousins — ​were seated around the kitchen table. “We
were the typical family.” Teresa smiled. “Home-​centered, home-​
cooked meals.” No one ever ate alone, and there was always
enough for everyone. “My mother would say, ‘Where one eats,
three eat. Where three eat, six eat.’ ”
Still, there was little money to pull together grand, elaborate
meals. Sometimes, she and the other kids ate beans and rice for
days in a row. They would complain, begging for something else.
“In this house,” her grandmother would reply, “you eat what we
have. This is not a buffet, nor is this a restaurant. We are all
going to eat the same thing.” Teresa glanced out the open win-
dow. “And all of us, whether we liked it or not, ate it.”
Today, Teresa’s greatest joy came from preparing the Sinaloan
foods of her childhood for Esteban. While they too sometimes
had to scrape by on rice and beans for a few days, more often
she got to revel in watching him devour her tostadas, tamales de
camarón, and sopes. Esteban never felt shortchanged flavor-​w ise
by his mom. “You’re always inventing dishes, and they come out
good,” he complimented her.

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The longer Teresa spent in America, the more she saw how this
country was changing her. She was starting, slowly, almost
imperceptibly, to experience what had once seemed impossible.
She felt more and more American.
“I feel that here is my home,” Teresa explained, “and that
this country is more so my country than over there.” She waved
her arm as if pointing toward Mexico.
Esteban’s Americanness hit Teresa even harder. All his life,
Esteban had attended American schools. He’d made American
friends with names like Clint and Logan. He’d played American
sports like football and watched American TV programs in Eng-
lish like Sesame Street. His diet was more American too. As much
as Esteban devoured his mom’s tamales and aguachile, he also
loved Kraft mac and cheese and Krispy Kreme doughnuts.
Teresa, too, ate those foods with a smile on her face.
Scholars call what Teresa and Esteban were doing accultura-
tion, or the process by which immigrants begin to adopt aspects
of American culture, including certain ideologies, beliefs, and
practices. And they call the Americanization of Teresa’s and
Esteban’s diets dietary acculturation, or the process by which
immigrants start to adopt the dietary practices of the countries
they settle in. Dietary acculturation, it’s argued, is a big way that
immigrants assimilate into American society. As they eat Ameri-
can food, they become American.
Nutritionally, dietary acculturation in America has its down-
sides; in general, the more immigrants and their children adopt
American dietary habits, the lower quality their diets become.
This is largely because America’s highly commercialized, rela-
tively cheap, and generally unhealthy food landscape creates
new opportunities for consumption. Immigrant families start
dining out and carrying out more and eating greater amounts
of convenience foods, sugar-​ sweetened beverages, and red
meat. What this means is that as these families adopt more
1

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 Becoming American

features of the American diet, they may actually be worse off

nutritionally.
Immigrant parents are usually deemed responsible for their
kids’ dietary acculturation. Supposedly, kids’ diets are Ameri-
canizing under their parents’ direct supervision, making par-
ents the ones to blame for declines in kids’ nutrition. But this
narrative oversimplifies the situation.
Teresa didn’t always see what Esteban was eating. In fact,
Esteban spent quite a lot of time away from his mom. In the
school cafeteria, he ate shrink-​w rapped hot dogs and defrosted
sweet potato fries. When he hung out with friends on Sundays
after church, they spent their last bills at 7‑Eleven and Sonic. On
weekday afternoons, as he awaited Teresa’s return from work in
their one-​bedroom, second-​story apartment, he watched com-
mercials for Cocoa Puffs and Mountain Dew flash across the
screen. During those times, Teresa had at best a sense of — ​but
rarely a hand in — ​the American foods Esteban filled his stom-
ach with.
Other times, though, Teresa herself helped Americanize
Esteban’s diet. While Teresa still cooked most evenings, she
downshifted her family’s consumption of traditional Sinaloan
foods. She and Esteban ate more convenience foods, more meat,
and more fast food than she had growing up. In the supermar-
ket, Esteban grabbed boxes of Froot Loops and cans of Cheez
Whiz off the shelves, negotiating with his mom to give them a
chance. “For fun!” he’d joke, and Teresa would laugh, pretend-
ing not to notice as he tossed them in the cart. Other nights,
Esteban would beg his mom for a McDonald’s cheeseburger and
fries. If it was also her payday, she’d oblige.
Why did Teresa do that? I wondered.
In public discourse, commentators have posed similar ques-
tions, usually judgmentally. Why do immigrant parents incorpo-
rate American food into their kids’ diets? they ask. Why don’t
these parents do more to keep their kids’ diets healthy when

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 C ompromises

they come to America? Why don’t these parents work harder to

feed their kids healthier traditional foods and protect them
from unhealthy American ones?
These questions are deeply problematic. For one, they insid-
iously shift the blame away from America’s unhealthy food envi-
ronment and onto the parents. They present a structural problem
as an individual one for which parents alone are culpable. But a
bigger issue with these questions, I realized, was their underly-
ing flawed assumption. They assumed that immigrant parents
saw American food as unhealthy or worse for their kids but
chose it anyway.
But what if, I wondered, the opposite was true? What if
immigrant moms actually regarded aspects of American food as
better? What if they saw partially Americanizing their kids’ diets
as a good thing rather than a problem? What if, when moms fed
their kids both traditional and American foods, they were actu-
ally trying to do right by them?

Teresa said yes to Esteban’s food requests, in many ways, for the
same reasons other l­ow-​ income parents obliged. The Froot
Loops and the Cheez Whiz offered Teresa an opportunity, amid
scarcity, to emotionally nourish Esteban. Teresa’s financial scar-
city could also force her prioritization away from Esteban’s
nutritional intake, making a Tuesday-​night McDonald’s run a
reasonable choice for her family.
But there was more to it than that. Immigrant moms like
Teresa also faced a deeper cultural tension that left them caught
between the foods of their home country and the foods of this
new one. Teresa worked to preserve the meaningful culinary
traditions that anchored her to her childhood and extended
family. Even if Esteban had never lived in Mexico himself, Teresa
wanted him to feel a sense of belonging and rootedness to his
homeland.
Because of this, Esteban’s adoration of his mom’s cooking

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 Becoming American

filled Teresa with an immense satisfaction. To watch him devour

her dishes — ​the same dishes she’d devoured as a girl at her
grandmother’s wooden table — ​made Teresa feel connected to
her family thousands of miles away. Sometimes, that food was all
she had to remind her — ​the last vestige of a culture she was now
alone tasked with keeping alive for her son. She wanted her son
to remember that he was Mexican as well as American. When
she prepared traditional Sinaloan dishes for him, Teresa showed
Esteban that. She remembered who she was too. Teresa had
given up so much to come to the U.S. At the very least, she didn’t
have to sacrifice their identity.
Teresa also clung to Sinaloan food because it helped her
survive America. For Teresa, getting by in this country meant
continually overcoming the daily realities of living undocu-
mented. Getting paid under the table meant perpetual insecu-
rity. She had no benefits and no recourse if things went sour.
Living without papers meant that Teresa had to both accept and
simultaneously try to forget that at any second, she could be
deported. She knew that every moment with her son could also
be her last, even as she prayed that, God willing, it would never
come to that.
As these hardships wore Teresa down, it was often food that
could help pick her back up. Teresa savored the comfort that
came from cooking the same dishes she’d grown up with. These
were the dishes she knew like the back of her hand, the ones
that smelled and tasted like her grandmother’s kitchen. When
life in America yet again proved far more trying than Teresa
could have ever imagined, that food was her and Esteban’s cush-
ion. Even after an arduous day scrubbing floors, she could catch
up with Esteban over her grandmother’s chilorio. When lan-
guage barriers prevented her from helping her son with his sci-
ence homework, she could bring him a warm cup of milk with
pan dulce for extra motivation. No matter what, Teresa could
nourish herself and her son with Sinaloan foods.

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Yet moms like Teresa also had to reckon with the reality that
their kids’ tastes — ​not to mention their own — ​were changing
in the midst of their immigration story. Esteban didn’t always
want the foods Teresa prepared. Sometimes, he just wanted the
stuff he saw his friends at school eat. He wanted to fit in, not
stand out. One morning, he felt embarrassed bringing a ther-
mos of Teresa’s soup to school, and he begged her to make him
a peanut butter and jelly sandwich instead. Pleas like these could
make Teresa’s heart sink. It’s not that she disapproved of PB and
J; she just felt rejected. Who was this child she was raising? she
asked herself. How quickly he had forgotten where he came
from. How little he seemed to understand the sacrifices his
mom had made to get him here.
And yet Teresa also saw where her son was coming from. She
knew that part of Esteban’s future success in this country hinged
on being American. He would never make it here if he didn’t
learn its cultural practices, expectations, and norms. Food was a
part of that. He needed to eat American food to fit in. As his
mother, she had a duty to help him with that. It was her job to
make sure he succeeded here.
Because of this, Teresa didn’t regard Esteban’s diet as an
either/or trade-​off. She didn’t believe that he needed to eat only
Mexican or only American food; there was space for both the
traditional and the new. Esteban could eat Teresa’s soups one
day and a turkey sandwich the next. “I pick up on the good
things here and conserve the good parts of my culture,” Teresa
said, interlocking her fingers. “The two are united.”
The point is, some immigrant moms, like Teresa, did not
fear the Americanization of their kids’ diets. Rather, they saw it
in some ways as a positive. While still working to hold tight to
certain dietary traditions, moms also embraced the opportunity
to eat and feed their kids coveted foods newly available to them
in the U.S. Even though they recognized that at times, doing so
came at a nutritional expense, it was also worth it. The symbolic

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 Becoming American

victory of feeding kids American foods often outweighed the

costs because it achieved multiple goals at once: it buffered their
children and boosted their own maternal self-​worth. It helped
kids fit in culturally, to feel a sense of belonging and rootedness
that moms themselves could struggle to secure.
Teresa believed that Esteban benefited from eating in Amer-
ica. She saw the benefits for herself too. Teresa explained to me,
a wide grin on her face, that when it came to food, “I am learn-
ing from him.” After enrolling in a nutrition course at school,
Esteban had taught Teresa about healthy sources of protein and
the difference between organic and conventionally grown pro-
duce. He had shown her YouTube cooking channels. When they
grocery shopped, he pointed out different kinds of fish she’d
never heard about. All of the milk and meat he was eating here,
Teresa was also convinced, was helping her son grow taller than
his cousins in Mexico. More than that, Esteban was helping
Teresa and himself fit into American society, educating them
about their food choices and bringing some highly welcome
diversity into their diets.
For Teresa, the personal symbolic victory of American food
was powerful. American dining became the bright spot, the
happy ending (even though it was ongoing) of an otherwise dif-
ficult immigration story. Being able to buy her son American
food offered Teresa momentary proof that she had made it, that
the seemingly endless hardships she’d endured were worth it
and that she had done better for her son. On the evenings when
she could get her son to eat something satisfying and satiating,
Teresa also felt the optimism she’d brought to the States swell
up inside of her. They were poor, yes, but they could still afford
to try the deep-​dish pizza down the street. They could still split a
basket of chicken fingers and sweet potato fries. When Teresa
looked back on how hard things had been those first few years
in this country, she knew things were better now. The future,
too, was bright.

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Teresa remembered herself as a lanky girl begging her

grandmother for sugary cereals. Now here she was, able to buy
Esteban a box of Froot Loops. She recalled strolling by a sit-​
down restaurant on her walk home from elementary school,
peering in longingly to see families gathered around white
tablecloths, sharing dishes she knew her family could never
afford. Now she took Esteban to Red Robin for his birthday, the
two of them cozied into a corner booth, sipping their Pepsis out
of tall glasses and joking about their ornery landlord. When
things were rough, Teresa reminded herself of how lucky she
was and how hard she’d worked to raise Esteban in a country
where she could delight him, every so often, with delicious foods
and unique flavors. She had sacrificed so he could have better.
And in those moments, Teresa thought, maybe she’d succeeded.
Maybe, after all — ​and despite how it often felt — ​she was winning.

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 PART IV

Emotion

I learned to make my mind large, as the universe is large,

so that there is room for paradoxes.
 — ​M axine Hong Kingston, The Woman Warrior

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 CHAPTER 16

Downscaling

I first met Brenda Rojas on an overcast afternoon inside her

son’s tae kwon do studio. The studio was one storefront among
many in a vast, bustling strip mall. Brenda and her daughter,
Ava, sat in a waiting area. Spotting me from afar, Brenda waved
gregariously as I weaved through a crowd of families to join
them. At five feet two inches with short, curly hair, copper skin,
and the same thin-​framed glasses as her daughter, Brenda was
as cheery as her bright pink lipstick. But her torn jeans and
frayed sweater hinted at a harder reality.
Amid the sounds of children counting out sit-​ups, shouting,
and smacking assorted pads, the studio was noisy. Brenda sug-
gested we head next door to Burger King to chat. Inside, I
treated each of us to a cup of coffee. “Two Splendas and two
creams,” she told the cashier. While we waited for our drinks,
Brenda entertained me with stories from her job as a sales asso-
ciate in the gardening section of a large hardware store. Wan-
dering through aisles of plants all day, Brenda said with a
chuckle, made her feel like she worked in a jungle.
While I was struck by Brenda’s positivity, a few minutes into
our conversation, it became clear that Brenda’s story was nowhere
near as sunny as her disposition. Over the past two decades,
she’d experienced deportation, family separation, unemploy-
ment, and poverty.
Brenda had been born in the United States and moved to

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Colombia at the age of five. As a teenager, she had married and

quickly thereafter given birth to Ava. Unfortunately, when
Brenda tried to return to the U.S. with her daughter in tow,
there was a mix‑up with Ava’s documents.
“The papers for my daughter were lost,” she explained,
slowly stirring the cream into her coffee. Ava stayed in Colombia
with her father, Victor, and her grandparents while Brenda
moved north to start working and sending remittances. Alone
in an unfamiliar country, Brenda soon encountered a new source
of despair. In 2001, she learned that she had type 2 diabetes.
The unexpected diagnosis traumatized her.
“Psychologically, I was alone,” Brenda said, her face harden-
ing as she recalled the feelings of hopelessness. “I was separated
from my child and my husband. When they say to me I have dia-
betes, I feel like I was going to die because no one explained to
you in a good way . . . ​they say, ‘Oh, you have diabetes, it’s this and
that.’ I say, ‘Okay.’ I went home. I was crying. I went to sleep.”
Thankfully, Brenda was not alone for long. Victor came to
the United States a year later, but Brenda would have to wait
four more years to reunite with her daughter. During that time,
she and Victor lived paycheck to paycheck, constantly relocating
from one apartment to another amid an unforgiving cycle of
unemployment and reemployment. Every eight to ten months,
one of them lost a job, whether it was her husband’s position as a
night janitor or hers as a cashier at Jack in the Box.
In 2008, Brenda was finally able to bring ten-​year-​old Ava to
the United States and discovered soon after that she was preg-
nant with a second child, a son they would name Rodrigo. With
a baby on the way, Brenda was grateful to land a job at a video
store a block from their apartment. “I work at that video store
for eight years,” she told me. “But then the video store closed
because people don’t rent any more videos. They watch it on
their computer. And then I was without job for almost a year.”
The lack of job security made caring for her own health and

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 Downscaling

that of her family difficult. Brenda learned to manage her dia-

betes using whatever means were available at any given moment.
Occasionally she got health insurance through work, which gave
her access to oral medications and insulin injections. Most of
the time, she received no treatment at all. After one unexpected
layoff, Brenda found under-​the-​t able work at her son’s elemen-
tary school and used the money to manage her condition.
“The principal of the elementary gave me a job — ​a special
job. I’m not going to say.” She smiled slightly. “He gave me like
twenty hours a week. He gave me good hours to pay my medicine.”
Yet for all of Brenda’s struggles  — ​financial, legal, and
health-​related — ​she exuded an unmistakable air of apprecia-
tion. There was more hope and gratitude in her tone than
despondency. After mistaking her original diabetes diagnosis
for a death sentence, Brenda rejoiced when she learned her con-
dition wasn’t fatal. The morning after being diagnosed, Brenda
got out of bed. “When I woke up, I was like, I am still alive, I
didn’t die! I thought I was going to die that night. I thought I
wasn’t going to see my children, my husband. I woke up and
I was like, thank you!” Brenda continued, “Every day that I wake
up, I have to smile. I am still alive.”
Brenda’s positive attitude, while heartening, was also a bit
perplexing. At the time we met, Brenda worried that she and
her family were just one paycheck away from eviction. One pay-
check. She couldn’t have been living any closer to the bone, and
her situation was far from unusual. Over half of the low-​income
families I met, like millions of Americans every year, had
­experienced a forced move or eviction. Sociologists like Mat-
thew D ­ esmond have shown that this kind of housing instability
is all too common, with around 15 percent of children born in
major U.S. cities experiencing an eviction by age fifteen. These
kinds of forced moves have concrete negative impacts on fami-
lies. They increase families’ financial stress and material hard-
ship. They fuel parental stress and moms’ depression. They

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increase the chances of kids experiencing food insecurity. They

strip away the psychological and physical security of having
a home.1
Eviction was top of mind for Brenda these days because she
had just gone through it eighteen months prior, after her land-
lord had unexpectedly raised the rent. With Victor hunting for
work, they started falling behind on rent each month. After
three months, her landlord got fed up, and the Rojases ended
up on the street. After two weeks in a shelter and then two
months on friends’ couches, the Rojas family finally moved into
their own apartment. There, the stove worked, the water was
hot, and all the doors locked. The kids were able to stay in the
same public school. For a moment, Brenda could breathe.
But now, because Brenda’s boss had recently reduced her
hours at the gardening center, she foresaw them barely making
their rent this month. If they came up short, they’d soon be
hunting for a new place.
And yet, Brenda didn’t behave like disaster was imminent.
How, I wondered, could Brenda act so thankful when there was
so much ongoing struggle and uncertainty in her life? The life
Brenda lived in San Jose seemed to diverge so drastically from
what she had expected when she stepped foot on American soil
years before. So then why did Brenda seem okay with — ​even
thankful for — ​this reality?
Brenda wasn’t the only low-​income mom I met who continu-
ally highlighted the positive while recounting the tremendous
material hardships, struggles, and anxieties she lived with. Over
time, I learned that this glass-​half-​full outlook wasn’t something
that necessarily came naturally to these moms. It wasn’t that
Brenda just happened to be inherently optimistic or prone to
seeing the brighter side of things. These mothers’ optimism
was, in fact, a survival strategy — ​a tool for resilience in the
midst of adversity. And it had serious implications for how they
approached their kids’ diets.

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A few months into my research, I began to grapple with a contra-

diction. I walked away from interviews with moms like Brenda
knowing that they were parenting under exceptionally challenging
conditions that made feeding kids difficult. But overall, these
moms didn’t seem all too worried about their kids’ diets. Sure, they
talked about wanting their kids to eat healthy and they voiced frus-
tration about how that didn’t always happen. But they still seemed,
somewhat surprisingly, optimistic about how their kids ate.
I knew it wasn’t that simple. I came to see that these moms’
emphasis on the positive was a coping mechanism they employed
in order to resolve the tension between their aspirations and
their realities. Like Brenda, most low-​income moms dealt with
enormous challenges, be it securing affordable housing or qual-
ity health insurance. There were obstacles that Brenda wished
she could resolve; she wished she could ensure that she and Vic-
tor had steady wages that let them put money in savings and that
landlords would stop raising the rent each year. But when it
came to those kinds of big changes — ​the things that could
really turn things around for families — ​moms like Brenda told
me they felt resigned. They knew that these weren’t the kinds of
changes they could expect to see anytime soon.
So, with limited chances to make things materially better for
themselves and their children, moms fought to feel better about
how things were, to accept their current realities rather than
constantly wishing for better ones. They took this fight on inter-
nally, trying to change how they felt inside. Sociologists call this
emotion work, a term introduced in 1979 by the sociologist Arlie
Hochschild.2 As the name implies, emotion work is the work
people do to manipulate their own emotions — ​ monitoring,
inhibiting, evoking, and shaping them in different ways — ​so
that their feelings are in line with what they think they should
feel or what they want to feel. Emotion work involves more than
just displaying the right emotions on the outside. It means

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trying to conjure up the appropriate feelings through manag-

ing the ones that naturally emerge.
People engage in emotion work for a number of reasons. A
major one is that it’s often far easier to change one’s thoughts
about one’s reality than to alter reality itself. I may not be able to
move into a new house, but I can work to change the way I feel
about my current house. I may lose my job, but I can convince
myself that I never really liked that job anyway. We all do emo-
tion work. And we’re told it’s a good thing; self-​help blogs and
articles that advise us to change our mindsets, practice grati-
tude, and focus on life’s blessings reinforce the idea that we can
make ourselves happy despite our surroundings.
Like foodwork, emotion work within families is largely gen-
dered. Moms are widely seen as responsible for helping mediate
and manage family members’ emotions to keep family life har-
monious and households running smoothly. These goals are
also achieved when moms work on their own emotions. When
Renata tried to find the humor in José’s penchant for fast food,
for instance, she worked on her emotions to transform frustra-
tion into amusement.
Discussions of nutritional inequality rarely, if ever, mention
emotions or emotion work. But I learned that emotions have a
lot to do with how families eat. As I watched moms across
income levels managing their emotions, I came to understand
how broader inequalities burrowed themselves deep inside of
moms, shaping the thoughts and feelings they used to get by
from day to day. And these thoughts and feelings had every-
thing to do with how moms then approached food with their kids.
As I’ll explain in the next chapter, privileged moms engaged
in emotion-​work strategies that helped pull their families far-
ther away from the middle and bottom; these moms strove to
manage their feelings of anxiety through doing more. They
shopped more, cooked more, and monitored more. They worked
harder to get their children the best food they possibly could,

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devoting extraordinary financial, temporal, and emotional

resources to constantly improve upon and refine their kids’
tastes and diets. Their work never felt complete, so they kept
searching for new and better ways of eating. In this manner,
affluent moms’ emotion-​work strategies catapulted their fami-
lies even further away from families with fewer resources.
By contrast, low-​income moms’ strategies to deal with unjust,
challenging circumstances worked in the opposite direction. For
moms like Brenda, moms for whom real, meaningful improve-
ments in their circumstances were rarely attainable, there was a
sense of resignation that their kids’ diets might never be what they
hoped. This is not to say that these moms stopped trying to get
their kids to eat healthy food. Many still did what they could. But
they knew the deck was stacked against them. Rather than fighting
an uphill battle they’d likely ultimately lose, they worked to see
their kids’ diets’ virtues rather than fixating on their shortcomings.
They worked to appreciate what they had rather than desiring
what they lacked. They found a survival strategy that let them feed,
eat, and preserve their dignity. But this strategy could also inadver-
tently cement less privileged families’ diets in place by lowering
moms’ expectations and beliefs in what was possible food-​wise.
Low-​income moms’ survival strategy involved a particular
kind of emotion work, what the sociologist Marianne Cooper
calls downscaling.3 Downscaling is when people lower their
expectations to adapt to and survive a difficult life. The low-​
income moms I met downscaled their expectations about almost
everything, whether it was their job prospects, financial futures,
or the food their families ate. Downscaling provided an
approach for navigating persistent hardships, an approach that
had profound implications for their kids’ diets.

I met Lorena Garcia, a single mom of four and grandmother of

two, at a coffee shop one November afternoon. She arrived with her
sixteen-​year-​old daughter, Linda, and Linda’s six-​month-​old son.

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Lorena, a short, stocky woman with wavy brown hair and choppy
bangs, spent hours talking with me about how she loved incorporat-
ing her mixed Mexican and Filipina heritage into her cooking. To
Lorena, eating healthy meant consuming “more of the good foods,
like eating fruits and vegetables. Trying not to snack on garbage so
much. That kind of stuff. That’s what I think healthy is.”
Lorena felt her family was falling short of her dietary aspira-
tions. In addition to her own sweet tooth and proclivity for
McDonald’s, she was frustrated by her kids’ lack of interest in
fruits and nuts. Her kids pleaded for flaky, salty treats that dis-
solved in their mouths but never filled them up. Linda, Lorena
said, letting out a tired sigh, had a “chip problem.” Lorena also
mentioned several other barriers her family faced when it came
to healthy eating, including her recent job loss and subsequent
lack of reliable income and the fact that when she was employed,
she was generally working sixty or more hours a week and barely
had time to grocery shop, let alone cook.
But when I asked Lorena directly if she faced any challenges
when it came to food, her answer caught me off guard. She
insisted that no, she actually didn’t have any challenges at all.
What is she talking about? I wondered. Minutes earlier, Lorena
had detailed a number of serious issues, job insecurity and time
scarcity among them. Her response didn’t make any sense until
weeks later when, replaying the audio recording of our conver-
sation, I realized that Lorena had interpreted the question dif-
ferently than I’d intended. She was thinking about challenges in
relative terms, comparing her current situation to previous peri-
ods in her life. When she stacked this current moment up
against earlier, more difficult ones, there was hardly anything
challenging about food today.
“I don’t really have any challenges at this time,” Lorena had
said, taking a sip of coffee and allowing her mind to wander
back to her kids’ early years. “There was a time in our lives
where — ​before I even met my husband — ​my children and I had

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it really bad. I had barely enough to pay the bills and not much
to pay for food.”
Even though Lorena had applied for Section 8 housing, she
was thousands down on a never-​ending waiting list. Like many
low-​income moms, she turned to an unaffordable and unforgiv-
ing private housing market that continually jostled her around.
There was a three-​year period during which Lorena moved six
times. Once, her landlady kicked her out after she was four hun-
dred dollars short on rent two months in a row. Another time, she
initiated the move after discovering mold in her kids’ room. She
could tolerate maggots in the sink, but the mold was too much.
They’d moved into a new apartment, only to discover a family of
rats living between the bathroom and bedroom walls. As much as
Lorena hated the never-​ ending moves, she didn’t see much
choice. She did every move alone, her toddler and baby in tow.
Moving so much made everything else virtually impossible.
Keeping her job as a sales associate at Old Navy was difficult.
Lorena relied on her aunt to watch the kids when she worked, but
sometimes her aunt was unavailable, and Lorena had to bring the
kids with her to the store. When she wasn’t working, she was using
up gas driving around in search of better housing. She was earn-
ing just above California’s minimum wage — ​at the time, nine dol-
lars an hour — ​which meant Lorena could generally come up with
the first month’s rent on a new place. But she almost never had
enough to put a security deposit down if a landlord asked for one.
That security deposit was her diaper supply for the next month.
There were no savings. There was no buffer. There was just getting
through each day and praying the next one would be easier.
Compared to back then, food today wasn’t too challenging for
Lorena. For one, she could regularly buy it. Now her kids always
had enough to eat. She, too, generally ate enough. Sure, Lorena
was frustrated that food was pricey, that she rarely had time to
cook, and that her kids only wanted junk. But Lorena could also
shine a positive light on all of those things. Sure, food was

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expensive — ​but at least she had enough to scrape by. Sure, she

rarely had time to cook — ​but at least she lived near a Jack in the
Box. And sure, her kids only wanted Lay’s potato chips and Dr
Pepper — ​but at least she could afford to get them exactly what
they liked.
Even in the face of hardship, Lorena was resilient. Part of
that resilience stemmed from her tremendous ability to recon-
cile her reality with her ideal; by thinking back to times when
things were really tough, Lorena could downscale her emotions
into feeling better about any current shortcomings.
When things were hard, other low-​income parents focused not
only on the past but also on the future. They concentrated on the
temporariness of it all, and they shared hope for a new day. Nyah,
for instance, often assured herself — ​and me — ​that better times
lay right ahead. As much as Nyah’s attention was often on daily
survival, she also worked to orient her gaze toward a hopeful
future. “It’s just not our year,” she told me one morning as we drove
to the drugstore. “It’ll get better when my health gets better.”
Turning left into the parking lot, Nyah sighed. “I’m not
gonna be down forever.”

“Watch this!” Paige shouted. She did an effortless backbend that

looked as if she had a rubber hose for a spine. On a Monday eve-
ning, I sat in Dana’s living room with Madison sidled up beside
me on the worn beige couch. While the muted TV played in the
background, Madison and I cheered Paige on as she performed
her latest gymnastics routine, flipping and spinning with endless
energy. Dana was cleaning up from dinner in the kitchen, occa-
sionally popping her head into the living room to check on us.
I thought back to the first time Dana and I had met. In our
initial conversation, Dana had explained that her family’s diet had
been unusual lately. “This week has been so busy,” she told me,
twirling the silver chain hanging around her neck. “We got deli
sandwiches on Saturday, because we were painting and dizzy. It is

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 Downscaling

out of the ordinary. Then we went to sushi dinner, which was kind
of cheating.” Dana paused. “This weekend doesn’t count for food.”
More recently, Dana and I had taken her daughters out to
an early Friday dinner at a local taqueria. Families, twenty-​
something couples, and hordes of teenagers were packed within
its four bright orange walls. We lined up to order at the counter.
When both Madison and Paige ordered soda, Dana quickly
pointed out that they didn’t normally do that. “It’s Friday,” she
said with a laugh, handing the cashier the dollar bills.
To an outsider, it may have seemed like Dana didn’t really
care about her kids’ diets the way she said she did. But I knew it
was more complicated than that. Dana was genuinely concerned
about the soda. She knew it was bad for the girls’ teeth and loaded
with sugar that drove their hyperactivity late into the evening.
In a less immediately challenging world, Dana would have
had the bandwidth to politely inform the cashier that, actually,
her girls would be drinking water this evening. Dana would have
then explained to Madison and Paige that soda had too much
added sugar and artificial coloring, and that it would give them
cavities. Water, she would’ve assured them, was a better choice for
them, tonight and every night. Next, she would have stood
patiently  — ​calmly, even — ​
as Paige spiraled into a tantrum,
throwing her sparkly necklace on the floor and yelling at Dana
that she was the meanest mom in the entire world. At the table, as
Paige pouted and refused to touch her food, Dana would smile to
herself, reveling in the comfort of knowing that she was a good
mom who ensured her daughters’ health and protected them
from a toxic food system. She had neither given up nor given in.
That’s what Dana would have done in this parallel universe.
But that was not the universe Dana lived in. That evening,
Dana was completely at the end of her rope after five days of hos-
pital shifts and her unhappy discovery, earlier that afternoon, of
a utility bill double what she had expected.
So Dana made compromises that kept her kids happy and

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calm, which, in turn, allowed her to keep putting one foot in

front of the other. Internally, Dana did the emotion work to feel
better about the compromises. Framing her kids’ diets as an
aberration helped her downplay the gaps between her dietary
aspirations and their dietary reality.
Dana and Lorena did the same kind of emotion work in
comparing their current situations to past, more difficult, ones.
Some single mothers who had been previously partnered or
married noted that feeding was less stressful now. They no lon-
ger had to cook for a “deadbeat ex‑husband” or a partner who’d
been “a grown-​ass kid.” There was one fewer person to shop for,
one fewer palate to cater to, and one fewer plate to clean. It was
all so much easier.
But I knew that easier didn’t necessarily mean easy. For Dana,
domestic life may have been more peaceful without her
ex‑husband, Chris, but it was still incredibly tough. Like two-​
thirds of single moms in this country, Dana didn’t receive child
support from either Madison’s or Paige’s father. It was stressful
and taxing for Dana to cover her own and her two daughters’
needs on her salary alone. Dana’s father helped her out with a
bit of money each month, and other family members could also
be tapped in a pinch. But mostly, Dana was on her own.
I sometimes wondered about the long-​term effects of this
pervasive stress on moms like Dana. A growing body of research
shows that chronic stress is a central mechanism through which
living in poverty has a negative impact on kids and adults alike.
The ongoing stresses of poverty lead to a constant release of
stress hormones. These stress hormones create ongoing wear
and tear on the body, which can dysregulate and damage a per-
son’s physiological stress response system, reduce cognitive and
psychological resources for battling adversity, and increase the
risk for a range of mental and physical problems.4 While I saw
Dana tamp down her stress through downscaling, I knew that
didn’t mean the stress went away. It lay heavy on her chest, a

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constant weight that stopped her from ever fully breathing easy.
Dana knew she didn’t have a safety net wide enough to catch her
and the girls if something went really wrong.
Dana often fantasized about leaving all the stress behind.
“The Bay Area is too expensive,” she said one evening as she
walked me out to my car, the sound of crickets echoing all
around us. “And there’s too much drama.”
That drama came from many sides, but I was privy to the kind
emanating directly from Chris, whom I’d had the “misery of
­meeting” — ​as Dana put it — ​multiple times. Some nights, Chris
appeared unexpectedly at Dana’s front door, reeking of cigarettes
and beer. Before he arrived on one Wednesday evening, after what
had been one of the hottest days of summer, Dana and I were
plopped side by side on the couch. Dana scrolled with an index
finger through photos on her phone, showing me professional
ones of her and the girls from last year at their neighborhood park.
When Chris showed up, wearing his usual T‑shirt and trucker hat,
Dana asked him for money for back‑to‑school supplies. Dana
hated having to ask. She wished Chris would just offer, like he was
supposed to. But Dana was running short that month and needed
him to pitch in. Right hand on her hip, Dana showed Chris a
receipt from Target for notebooks, pencils, a ruler, and crayons.
“You think I don’t believe you?” Chris joked, his defensive-
ness piercing the air. “I got you, home slice.”
But Chris didn’t have her. With each passing minute, Dana
grew frustrated as Chris somehow found a way to keep skirting
the issue and avoid paying up. After he drove off without com-
mitting to anything, Dana looked at me with visible exasperation.
“He’s a mess.” She rolled her eyes. “You see he’s a mess,
right? You don’t have to lie.”
Dana fell back onto the couch, stuffing the receipt in her
front pocket. “Write down for your thing that being a single — ​a
broken-​home mom  — ​is tough.”
I wrote it down and underlined it twice.

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But just a half hour later, Dana acted like it hadn’t hap-
pened. “That’s our life, nothing too exciting!” she said cheerily
as we folded Paige’s leotards and Madison’s tank tops.
Dana was downscaling her frustration and exasperation to
normalize everything. At times like this, I saw that downscaling
wasn’t just about coming to terms with reality. It was also a way
of preserving dignity, of being the hero of one’s own story rather
than the victim. Dana had been a victim several times: of sexual
assault, intimate-​partner violence, cancer, and, now, two negli-
gent fathers to her two children. But Dana didn’t want to see
herself that way. It was exhausting and depleting to focus on
those stories. So Dana did the emotion work to spin the situa-
tion and see it in a brighter light. She took control of the narra-
tive and came out on top.
Another evening a few weeks later, Dana opened the door to
find Chris filling the door frame, a white plastic trash bag slung
over his shoulder. The bag was overflowing with Paige’s clothes
that hadn’t been washed in months. When Dana opened the
bag, an unmistakable stench of smoke and alcohol filled their
tiny kitchen. Dana’s eyes welled up as she knelt on the white tiles
and stuffed the clothes into the washing machine. I helped her,
breathing through my mouth to let the stench pass. But fifteen
minutes later, with the laundry running and Dana at the kitchen
sink washing up from dinner, she casually commented, “Just
another boring night at home.”
Even when things were tough, even when Dana’s tears over-
came her, she continually worked to downplay it, to reframe
challenging, stressful occurrences as uneventful. She did the
internal work to feel that things were normal even when her raw
emotions revealed that they were, in fact, not. She undertook
the internal efforts to save face, not so much for me as for her-
self. When I once asked her if she’d ever remarry, Dana gave me
a bewildered look. Why would she do that? She squinted at me.
Things were perfectly great on her own.

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 CHAPTER 17

Upscaling

It was often the wealthiest, most privileged moms who emanated

the most stress, worry, and uncertainty about their kids’ diets.
At first, this confused me. From where I was sitting, affluent
moms had reason to feel pretty good about what their kids were
eating. Were their children perfect angels who always ate all their
peas and never asked for cake? No, but with all the resources these
moms possessed to make feeding easier, their concerns felt
­disproportionate to their circumstances. Why didn’t they exude
an air of confidence and comfort that reflected their positions of
privilege?
Wealthier moms’ anxieties about getting kids’ diets “right”
were embedded within a much broader, deeper class anxiety
that has characterized privileged parenting in the United States
for at least the past thirty years. Sociologists have shown that
growing economic inequality and uncertainty have augmented
wealthier parents’ stress about their children getting and staying
ahead. These parents want their children to enjoy the same
financial and educational advantages they have but see such
advantages as harder to guarantee. Many parents are aware, for
instance, that the competition for admission to elite colleges and
universities has skyrocketed since the 1970s. Parents’ fears about
children’s futures reflect their awareness that in an increasingly
winner-​takes-​all society, their kids are at risk of losing.1
Moms saw kids’ diets as key to them winning. As Latisha — ​the

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socially mobile mom from chapter 9 — ​knew, what kids ate could
facilitate or impede their success. It could establish them as mem-
bers of the upper middle class, or it could drag them into a lower
social stratum. Food’s consequentiality placed a burden on moms.
Moms shouldered that burden and ran with it — ​constantly ques-
tioning their feeding strategies, second-​guessing whether they were
doing enough to get their kids the “best” foods, wondering whether
they were cutting out enough of the “bad” stuff, and fearing they
weren’t successfully instilling nutritional ­values in their kids that
would ensure their long-​term health.
Instead of downscaling their feelings or putting the situa-
tion in perspective, these moms often did the exact opposite.
They increased the effort and mental energy spent on feeding
their children. They did this by upscaling, or constantly ratchet-
ing up the standards by which they evaluated their kids’ diets
and themselves as moms. In their minds, they never did enough,
and upscaling helped fuel such feelings of inadequacy on a daily
basis. Simply put, wealthy moms dealt with their deep-​seated
worries about what their kids ate by worrying even more. While
low-​income moms’ downscaling helped align expectations with
reality, high-​income moms’ upscaling widened the gap between
expectations and reality. Upscaling not only led these moms to
raise their standards; it was also a tool to manage their anxieties
through engendering a sense of being in control of a situation
that could often feel uncontrollable.

If lower-​income moms applied a wider lens to put things in

perspective — ​ comparing their current diets to what they’d
eaten in earlier, more difficult times — ​their wealthier counter-
parts took a microscope to the issue, drilling in on all sorts of
shortcomings and challenges. Wealthier moms were quick to
identify problems with their kids’ diets, including their bad hab-
its and guilty pleasures. They were also quick to point out places
where they, as moms, were failing. Self-​deprecating comments

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were so common I started a list to keep track. Sometimes these

comments were as specific and concise as Julie’s admission that
“usually we don’t eat breakfast, which is terrible because it’s the
most important meal of the day.” Other times, such comments
permeated longer monologues about parenting failures, like
one mom’s confession of guilt “for not giving my children all the
things that I know that they could do better with.”
Moms were also resolute that they should be able to solve
these problems. They should be able to break their kids’ Cocoa
Krispies cravings or get them to like cauliflower — ​and they
should be doing it now. As moms created and fixated on these
challenges, they raised the bar to a level that was incredibly high
and usually unrealistic. They set themselves up to fall short.
How high was the bar moms were trying to vault? While it
varied, most moms were trying to surmount the unreasonably
lofty standard set by intensive mothering — ​the one that told
them they should be child-​centered, self-​sacrificing, and protec-
tive in their feeding practices. Most moms bought into these
tenets. They felt that they should be regularly preparing home-
made meals for their kids. But above this already high bar, many
moms also believed — ​ unrealistically, from my perspective — ​
that their kids should want, or even prefer, their cooking to fast
food or takeout. Moms thought that they should be so talented
at feeding that their kids would run home after school, breezing
by the gas station with its shelves of candy, and beg for their
moms’ lasagnas, dumplings, migas, or biryani.
What made the high bar moms set even less achievable was
that it happened to be a moving target — ​the closer a mom got
to it, the higher it could be raised. The only thing moms could
count on was that it would always be out of reach.
This was the experience of Janae Lathrop, the mother of
three I introduced in chapter 10. As Janae and I drank our fruit
smoothies in her brightly lit living room, she told me about her
experiences trying to integrate the fresh food she loved with the

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soul food she’d grown up with. But time was not on Janae’s side.
Monday through Friday, Janae took the train into San Francisco
for work and then back home, an hour each way. With her two-​
hour daily commute and her responsibility for feeding the fam-
ily, Janae was often stretched thin and stressed out. She felt like
she wasn’t measuring up. Janae wanted her daughters to eat
healthy, but couldn’t always make that happen.
Mostly, she said, “It’s the dinner thing that we have to figure
out.” Dinner had been a struggle for years. Last year, Janae’s
long work hours brought her to the point where they were eat-
ing takeout most evenings. Even now, she guiltily told me, she
resorted to takeout at least once a week. “Currently I’m still
probably doing — ​I want to say one day a week pickup. There was
a point in time where we did, like, three days a week. People,
they all know me. Like, I would just call, and they would say, ‘Hi,
Janae! Your usual? Yeah, okay. Bye-​bye!’ And they would meet
me on the road.” Janae set her glass down on the table. “It’s
embarrassing.”
Things came to a head for Janae when her daughters
divulged to their grandmother — ​Janae’s mother — ​that Janae
was feeding them Chinese food and pizza most nights.
“One time, my mom asked my children, ‘What does Mommy
cook for you each night?’ And they said, ‘Whatever’s in the bag,’
meaning the takeout bag. And I was crushed. As a mom, talk
about guilt. I’m like, ‘Oh my goodness.’ I didn’t have that expe-
rience. My mom never bought takeout. Her food was better than
the takeout.” Janae shook her head ruefully, tucking the wisps
of black hair around her face back into her bun. For Janae, rely-
ing on takeout was akin to failing. It was also humiliating. “Can
I not figure this out?” Janae had asked herself. “To be a mom — ​
a working mom?”
If Janae’s idea of figuring it out involved zero takeout and all
homemade meals, then from my perspective, the answer to her
question was likely no. These were tall orders that would

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probably demand that Janae stay at home rather than work full-​
time. So far, I’d seen only moms like Julie pull that off — ​and
even they still felt guilty about perceived shortcomings! For
years, women, and mothers in particular, have been repeatedly
told that it’s possible to “have it all” — ​to raise a family, work full-​
time, keep up hobbies, and feel a sense of balance. Moms like
Janae wanted this to be true. They worked hard to make this
true. But this wasn’t true because society has never been set up
to make it true. In the United States, unrealistically high expec-
tations for moms’ obligations to their families have been accom-
panied by a glaring absence of structural supports — ​things like
paid leave and flexible work hours — ​to meet those expectations.
But Janae was more optimistic than me. She decided that
she could have it all — ​but only by getting a new job. When I met
Janae, she had been in her new role for four months. While the
hours were still long, they were more manageable. Janae now
had time to prepare weeknight dinners. But Janae’s honeymoon
period after the job change was short-​lived. She quickly found
new ways to raise the bar for herself and, in doing so, convince
herself that she was still disappointing. Janae was now making
dinners regularly during the week, but she started to feel guilty
that her dinners were more “semi-​ homemade” than “home-
made.” The precut vegetables and whole roasted chickens she
purchased became a new source of embarrassment. Was she giv-
ing it her all if dinner took only a few minutes to come together?
Janae’s original goal had been to prepare more dinners at
home. But that goal soon vanished, replaced by a new one. Now
“homemade” meant “from scratch.” It meant using raw, whole
ingredients. It meant lots of prep work — ​cutting, chopping,
peeling — ​and, ideally, at least an hour of cooking time. It meant
using a recipe. Unless dinner was a hot meal that Janae had
planned out and over which she had labored for hours, she felt
that what she was offering her daughters just wasn’t good
enough.

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“Trader Joe’s even has the whole thing that you toss with the
sauce,” Janae told me, referring to a salad kit that came with its
own dressing. She rolled her eyes. “I’m like, ‘You’re kidding!’ It’s
almost embarrassing because I think literally, one time, dinner
was done in five minutes. Like, the chicken lasagna. Here’s a
salad. Everyone’s happy. Everyone’s happy.”
Gesturing toward the kitchen where the frozen chicken lasa-
gna was presumably waiting, Janae sighed. “It’s like we’re
cheating.”
As our conversation continued, Janae became increasingly
convinced that she was going to make some big changes to her
family’s diet. Meeting me, she said, grinning, was motivating
her. Indeed, my mere presence seemed to amplify moms’ desires
to upscale. Our conversations brought moms’ feelings of guilt to
the surface and intensified their desire to alleviate those feel-
ings through action. Some interviews ended with moms compil-
ing a laundry list of dietary improvements they were going to
implement once I left.
“So I’m actually at that place where this is important for me
to do.” Janae leaned forward, clasping her hands. “I mean, liter-
ally even beyond this study I was actually like, ‘Okay. How can I
do this? How can I do this?’ ” Janae was determined to have it
all — ​to thrive professionally and win at intensive mothering.
She could work nine to five and give her kids healthy, home-
made food. Minutes later, Janae jumped up from the couch to
retrieve three cookbooks from the bookshelf. She came back,
and together, we flipped through the pages of Chrissy Teigen’s
Cravings, which featured recipes like spicy tomato skillet eggs,
vegetable tortilla soup, and a “dump and done” ramen salad. We
discussed which dishes Janae could try that week, and she
started jotting down the ingredients for a sesame chicken noo-
dle dish.
When Janae said our conversation motivated her, it was like
she thought I was actively encouraging her to make changes. In

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 Upscaling

reality, I had posed non-​leading, open-​ended questions, nodded

along, and taken notes. I had assured her that I was a sociolo-
gist, not a nutritionist or a pediatrician interested in evaluating
anything. But simply talking about how their kids ate unearthed
moms’ deep-​seated feelings of inadequacy. Once those feelings
were on the table, moms like Janae felt they had no choice but to
raise the bar once again. They wanted me to know that they
were committed to doing better, and there was no amount of
reassurance I could offer to stop moms from judging them-
selves. While lower-​income moms navigated that judgment by
trying to make everything feel okay, wealthier moms navigated
it by demonstrating that they were committed to doing a bet-
ter job.
It wasn’t just working moms like Janae who struggled with
their own ever-​rising standards. Even stay‑at‑home parents who
were already regularly preparing home-​ cooked meals from
scratch felt that there was significant room for improvement.
Joaquin Vargas was one such parent. Joaquin, a short, lean
man with kind eyes and a receding hairline, was the only
stay‑at‑home father I interviewed. He was also an anomaly in the
United States, where only 7 percent of fathers are full-​time care-
givers to their children (compared to 27 percent of mothers).2 A
dad of two, he was also one of four dads in my study of seventy-​
five families who was primarily in charge of food.
“Growing up, we ate whatever was available,” Joaquin told
me about his childhood diet in Bolivia. “A lot of starch, rice,
potato, a lot of meat. A lot of soda. It was never questioned.
Sugar everywhere. MSG, it was actually part of every meal.”
When Joaquin moved to the States and met his nutrition-​
­oriented wife in graduate school, everything changed. After quit-
ting his job to become a stay‑at‑home father, he was determined
to raise his son and daughter on a diet that was healthy, unpro-
cessed, and free of pesticides and chemicals. To achieve this,
­Joaquin prepared their food from scratch, using a combination

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of the vegetables he grew in his backyard garden and organic

produce from the farmers’ markets. When I interviewed his kids,
­fourteen-​year-​old Xavier and twelve-​year-​old Ellie, in their bright,
minimalist house one afternoon, I found Joaquin in the kitchen
rolling out the crust for a quiche and chopping vegetables for a
salad.
Joaquin didn’t just cook food. He talked constantly to his
children about it. “I tell them about how I was raised and how
wrong it was,” Joaquin said, slicing an orange pepper. “How
nobody questioned it. How having means is good. Why it’s
important for them to study so they can buy better food and so
they can buy a big lot so they can grow vegetables in the back, or
fruit trees. So I don’t push things on them, but I tell them
constantly.”
Xavier and Ellie confirmed that their dad talked to them
incessantly about food. “ ‘Vegetables! Eat vegetables! And milk’s
good. It helps your bones grow. And sugar is poison!’ ” Ellie
laughed, imitating her dad.
While Joaquin felt that he was feeding his children better
than he had been fed as a child, he was also in a state of worry
that his efforts were falling short. And he made sure his chil-
dren knew this, because he never wanted them to settle for any-
thing less than the best.
“Now they know that stir-​fry is good but not that good, that
I’m trying to figure out ways to make it better,” he explained.
“We have to work on that in the near future.”
When it came to his kids’ diets, Joaquin was an optimizer.
Each day, Joaquin learned more and more about what foods and
means of preparation were healthiest, continually refining his
approach as his knowledge deepened. He read newspapers,
perused blogs, and stayed up‑to‑date on the latest nutrition
studies. When nutrition experts’ opinions changed, so did Joa-
quin’s. Recently, Joaquin had discovered that reduced-​fat milk
was healthier than the nonfat milk his family had been

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 Upscaling

drinking. The next day, Joaquin switched out the kids’ dairy.
Xavier and Ellie didn’t like the taste of the new milk at first, but
Joaquin stuck to his guns. “They had a hard time adjusting.” He
smiled. “But they did over two weeks or three weeks.”
Joaquin wasn’t alone on his endless quest for nutritional
information and improvement; he turned to the media, friends,
and fellow parents for dietary advice. But this relentless diges-
tion of information seemed only to intensify his anxieties that
he wasn’t doing enough. Despite Joaquin’s staggering efforts
to keep up — ​to find and feed his kids the “ideal diet” — ​he was
still plagued by a gnawing sense of inadequacy. “I think I’m
doing fine but I’m not doing great,” he confessed. “I want to do
great.”
When I asked Joaquin what he meant by that, he explained
that he wanted more information and clear guidance. “I wish
someone would say, ‘This is the right thing to do.’ There isn’t.
Like right now, at forty-​eight years old, I don’t know how much
better it is to steam broccoli instead of roasting it for a few min-
utes. People tell me no, it’s good fresh. Is that necessarily the
truth?” Joaquin sighed. “I don’t know.”
I couldn’t help thinking that perhaps it wasn’t an accident
that Joaquin didn’t know — ​that perhaps the goal of media out-
lets, health blogs, and the food industry was to keep people
guessing. Or, setting my cynicism aside, at the very least they
probably weren’t trying to clear up the confusion. Dissent — ​not
consensus — ​sells. The media always need new nutrition stories
to print, and health bloggers depend on making strong claims to
draw viewers repeatedly to sites. The food industry profits from
keeping people confused so that they continue buying its
spurious health claims and its products.
I could see how this confusion played out in my own nutri-
tional knowledge over time. It seemed like certain foods’ popu-
larity and supposed healthiness vacillated widely every few years,
going from healthy to unhealthy, from good to bad. For years,

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we knew that butter was terrible for us . . . ​until it wasn’t. Sugar

was supposedly fine for consumption . . . ​until it wasn’t. Fad diets’
promise and popularity were just as fleeting. I distinctly remem-
ber when the Atkins, Paleo, keto, and Mediterranean diets
debuted, each supposedly offering the solution to our nation’s
dietary woes. Rather than a surprise, Joaquin’s confusion seemed
like the natural consequence of this persistent, pervasive, and
puzzling nutritional discourse. And in upscaling, he and other
high-​income parents found a way to channel the anxiety about
that uncertainty into action.
As much time as Joaquin spent reading blogs and scanning
media outlets, he lamented that he didn’t “have the time to
research every little thing.” And like Janae, talking with me only
upped Joaquin’s motivation to institute changes he’d been toy-
ing with. Rolling up the sleeves of his North Face fleece, Joaquin
said, “Having this conversation with you is making me reflect
more on what I’m doing. It’s like talking to a psychologist
because you do all the talking and then you’re like, ‘Huh, that’s
right, I can change this!’ ”

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 CHAPTER 18

Priorities

“What keeps you up at night?” I asked Lorena Garcia in the liv-

ing room of the thirteen-​hundred-​square-​foot apartment she
rented for her boyfriend, daughter, son, and two grandchildren.
Lorena stared at me, stone-​faced. Every night when her cheek
hit the pillow, the same fear flashed before her eyes. “I worry that
I’m going to wake up to the police knocking on my door, telling
me my son’s been shot,” she said, looking down at her feet.
Three months earlier, Lorena’s son Alejandro had been
recruited into a gang. He was nineteen years old with a son of
his own and a steady girlfriend, and Lorena had hoped that Ale-
jandro’s new family responsibilities would keep him on the
straight and narrow. “You have people who depend on you now,”
she’d told him a year ago when he moved out of her house and
into an apartment with his girlfriend and son. But Alejandro
had gotten caught up in the wrong crowd, and now Lorena
didn’t know where he went most evenings. He didn’t have a job,
and his girlfriend cared for their child. Lorena felt frustrated,
but that frustration was overshadowed by her fears of the worst
possible outcome. If it happened, she said with a sigh, Alejandro
wouldn’t be the first person she’d loved to die by gunshot.
In the face of the very real possibility of losing her son,
Lorena rearranged her priorities. Food wasn’t at the top of the
list. Her most pressing concern wasn’t whether she was getting
Alejandro to eat enough broccoli or whether she could help

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curb her younger daughter’s chip cravings. Lorena was not

alone; many lower-​ income moms worried about things that
never crossed affluent moms’ radars. Some feared for their chil-
dren’s safety walking to and from school. Others worried about
their kids’ security once they were home, alone, waiting for an
adult to return from work. Others were seriously concerned
about their children not completing school at all. And still oth-
ers feared the impacts of addiction or intimate-​partner violence
on their children. This is not to say that every lower-​income
mom worried about all these things. And a few didn’t worry
about any of them. But when these concerns came up, it was
largely in conversation with lower-​income moms.1
Kids’ dietary health wasn’t always the highest concern to
these moms. The circumstances kids were growing up in could
force low-​income moms to feel just as, if not more, concerned
about their kids’ emotional health as their nutritional intake. For
these moms, children’s safety and psychological well-​being — ​two
things moms could rarely take for granted — ​often took prece-
dence over healthy meals. When evictions forced families to
move, when neighborhood shootings took friends’ lives, when
unexpected layoffs precluded medical care, or when the kitchen
cupboards were empty, moms worried not about the specifics of
what their kids were eating but about whether their kids were get-
ting by — ​whether they were doing okay. Doing okay had far less
to do with vegetable consumption and far more to do with staying
safe and relatively happy. Doing okay meant they were staying out
of the police’s sight and off the school principal’s suspension list.
Nyah told me that what made her happiest was knowing her
girls were safe and out of harm’s way. “When I hear that front
door open and I know they’re both in the house, I’m relieved.”
She smiled. “That brings me joy.”
I realized that affluent moms were able to upscale about
their kids’ diets because of all the other things these moms
didn’t have to worry about. They didn’t have to worry about their

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 Priorities

kids’ safety, shelter, or satiety. Privileged moms could take these

basic needs for granted, which freed up mental energy and
space to be concerned about other aspects of their children’s
well-​being, like their diets.
Because lower-​income moms’ circumstances often demanded
prioritizing their kids’ safety and security above all else, I saw
that shifting their focus away from food could actually be help-
ful. When the deck felt too stacked against their children eating
healthy, moms focused on other aspects of their child-​rearing or
kids’ well-​being to feel like they were doing a good job. Being a
good mom became less about pushing spinach and more about
being present and involved in children’s lives. The latter was how
low-​income moms enacted intensive mothering given the con-
straints they faced. It was how they acted child-​centered, self-​
sacrificing, and protective of their children. And it was how they,
personally, evaluated their worth as moms.
On top of that, low-​income moms were also keenly aware that
opportunities to substantially improve their families’ circum-
stances were limited. While many hoped for a better financial
future, most knew that the odds were that they would always hover
at or below the poverty line. So instead of battling endlessly to bet-
ter an unimprovable situation, they fought to feel better about how
things were, to accept their current realities rather than constantly
wish for better ones. They taught themselves to see the virtues of
their kids’ diets rather than the shortcomings. They focused on
appreciating the food they did have rather than pining for the
food they didn’t. On the broadest level, they worked to feel grate-
ful for what was going well and not think about what wasn’t.
Dana, for instance, constantly highlighted the pride she felt
about being there for Madison and Paige. While Dana wanted
her daughters to eat a nutritious diet, she was generally more ori-
ented toward other dimensions of their well-​being that she could
ensure by spending time with them and making positive memo-
ries together. Having put them through a rough divorce and two

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moves — ​including a major downsizing — ​earlier that year, Dana

was vigilant about making sure that Madison and Paige were still
doing okay. She spent the limited time and money she had to
throw her kids the birthday parties they wanted, get them passes
to a local water park, and take them on the occasional vacation.
She focused less on preparing wholesome meals and more on
providing them with opportunities to get an emotional boost: a
surprise trip down to Disneyland, a visit to the nail salon, a trip
to Goodwill with friends.
Dana sometimes framed being there for her children as a
trade-​off with healthy eating. So that she could be there as much as
possible for her kids, she often had to take them out to eat where
they wanted and sacrifice cooking the meals she thought would be
best. One evening, Madison offered to prepare a special dinner for
her mom and sister. Dana, wanting to encourage Madison’s inde-
pendence, left the decision about what to cook up to her daughter.
Dana hoped that Madison might prepare something vegetarian,
but Madison told her she was going to make angel-​hair pasta with
beef sauce and breadsticks. Dana didn’t want to upset Madison by
suggesting something else or offering a critique. She knew suggest-
ing that Madison make green beans instead of the beef would go
over like a lead balloon. Dana wanted the dinner to be fun and
pleasant, something that enhanced her daughter’s self-​esteem.
Later that evening, Dana was glad she’d bit her tongue. As
Madison set the table with three black plates and three stemless
glasses, the young girl’s pride was as palpable as the aroma of
tomato sauce filling the tiny kitchen. Madison placed a carafe of
tap water in the center of the table and served each of her din-
ing partners, beaming, as she discussed the evening’s menu. As
the four of us sat chatting around the table, Dana also seemed
happy. “My girls love eating dinner together because they think
it’s so cool.” She smiled, twirling the thin strands of pasta around
her fork.
Another evening, as Dana leaned over the kitchen table

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 Priorities

covered in school papers, she explained to me how her girls’

childhoods diverged from her own. “Growing up, we weren’t
busy.” She shook her head. “But me” — ​she paused — “I am with
my children.”
Dana had ample evidence of her involved parenting. She had
countless iPhone photos of recent excursions with Madison and
Paige, like a trip to the bowling alley, a Friday evening spent dye-
ing their hair, and a Friday afternoon spent getting their nails
done at a nearby strip-​mall salon. Dana’s involvement in her
daughters’ lives was in part motivated by a deep-​seated desire to
keep Paige and Madison happy. Some of the involvement,
though, had to do with keeping them safe. Dana worried about
her daughters’ safety around their neighborhood. The thought
of the two of them out and about after dark on the street sent her
heart racing. Theirs was a vibrant, diverse neighborhood but also
one where break-​ins, burglaries, and even the occasional shoot-
ing were not unheard of. Dana constantly reminded me to lock
my car, and she always accompanied me to it after dark.
Safety was such a priority that Dana often spent her Friday
evenings chauffeuring the girls here and there just to keep Mad-
ison from hanging out in the park with what Dana called “trou-
blemakers.” One such evening, we drove eighty minutes to get
the girls bubble tea with their friends. Another afternoon, we
visited Savers, a secondhand shop, where Dana let the girls try
on outfits, ultimately buying them a couple of leotards, tank
tops, and dresses for just over thirty dollars. Afterward, Dana
told me that she had all of Madison’s social media account
names and passwords so that she could monitor them. “I’m
involved,” she said proudly.
Other moms echoed Dana’s safety priorities. Ximena Gomez,
a soft-​spoken mom with olive skin and a wide smile, grew up in
El Salvador but came to the United States with her ex‑husband
in the early 2000s. Living undocumented, Ximena told me,
made everything more complicated. A few months before I met

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her, three of her five sons had been beaten up by a local gang
three blocks from her house, which she shared with them and
her eldest son’s children. To keep her sons and their families
safe, Ximena had to find a new place in a different neighbor-
hood. But securing a new home was not easy; the housing mar-
ket offered few affordable options that could fit her family. This
had forced her to temporarily split the family up. She and her
youngest son, Juan, lived in her car. Her older sons and their
families lived with friends.
“I lost my house,” Ximena told me. “They beat up Miguel
and Mario, those cholos. Then they beat up my son Juan, and
they tried to kill him. I needed to evacuate, to leave and live on
the street with my children.”
Other unhoused mothers told similar stories. Some of these
moms lived in their cars; others with friends, family, or even
coworkers. Shelters weren’t good long-​term options. And with-
out documentation, Ximena couldn’t apply for public housing.
On the private rental market, she couldn’t afford much. Even
the one-​bedroom she’d been renting cost her two-​thirds of the
income she brought in cleaning houses for thirteen dollars
an hour.
Ximena felt the deep, penetrating stress of making ends
meet, of keeping her kids and her grandkids clothed and fed.
“It’s ugly, undergoing this situation, and I wouldn’t wish it on
anyone,” she told me. “I’ve lived it. There are times I don’t have
money for gas. I don’t have any money sometimes. Life in the
United States is hard if you weren’t born here.”
While unhoused, Ximena could not feed her youngest son,
Juan, the way she wanted. “We eat in the street. We live in the
street,” she explained. Living in the street meant not having a
kitchen to cook in or a fridge to store food. Eating in the street
meant that she and Juan ate out almost every evening, mostly at
fast-​food chains like Pizza Hut and Kentucky Fried Chicken.
Doing so not only helped stave off hunger but also offered a

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 Priorities

toilet to use and a sink to wash up in. It offered a place to sit

down that wasn’t Ximena’s driver’s seat. It offered a fleeting feel-
ing of normalcy. When Ximena sat across from her son in a slick
red booth, enough food between them to fill their stomachs, she
could almost forget that they’d be retiring later that evening to
lumpy, polyester seat cushions, not comforter-​lined beds.
It wasn’t that Ximena particularly loved fast food or thought
it was a healthy choice for Juan. To the contrary, she was deeply
worried about Juan’s diet. “In the name of Jesus, this needs to
end,” she told me, running her hand through her wavy brown
hair. “I need to find a place for us to live so I can make them
food. Because meals are very important. The food you eat is what
your body depends on, and it may help your body function. And
the most important thing is having fresh food — ​eating healthy.”
Ximena missed many things about her old house. She missed
chasing her two-​year-​old granddaughter around its grassy back-
yard. She missed taking hot showers in the morning before
everyone else got up. She missed evenings sprawled on the couch,
sandwiched between her children, their eyes all glued to the
twenty-​five-​inch-​screen TV she’d bought them four Christmases
ago. But these days, Ximena couldn’t stop dreaming of her
kitchen. It had been a narrow room with limited counter space
and a fridge door that never reliably shut. It hadn’t been perfect.
But Ximena had never asked for perfect. She didn’t need perfect
to make her boys the squash soup she’d grown up with.
As Ximena bemoaned the reality that cooking them home-
made food probably wouldn’t happen for the next few weeks, if
not months, I started to feel something on a uniquely emotional
level. I felt a visceral anger boil up inside of me, a reaction to
society’s portrayals of low-​income moms as too negligent or
unaware to offer their kids nutritious food. Ximena’s story was
evidence of the level of inaccuracy, unfairness, and ignorance
informing that portrayal.
Ximena was neither negligent nor unaware. She knew the

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trade-​offs she was making. She’d done the calculations. In the

end, she had chosen — ​as any parent in her situation would — ​to
prioritize Juan’s life over his diet. Ximena had stared down the
constellation of impossibly difficult circumstances facing her
and her family and made the necessary sacrifices to overcome
them. Right now, Ximena decided, her kids’ lives were simply
more important than their fruit and vegetable consumption.
Ximena did her best with that difficult hand she had been
dealt. Even though she and her kids were without a home, she
focused on the few ways that she was still able to do right by
them. She worried less about controlling their diets and more
about how she could meet their emotional needs — ​their desire
to feel loved and cared for by their mom, to feel “normal.”
“They say, ‘I want McDonald’s. I want Taco Bell. I want Pollo
Loco. I want Carl’s Junior. I want Chinese food.’ ” Ximena rolled
her eyes. With limited opportunities to meet their needs else-
where, Ximena told me, she generally tried to oblige. She tried
to take them each to their favorite place at least once a week.
“In other words,” Ximena said with a grin, “I give everyone
the same privilege, always everyone. So that they’re happy. For
me, all of them are equal. Because all of them are my children,
and I adore all of them very much, and I want the best for them.”
Ximena did not feel great about her family’s current diet,
but she worked hard on her emotions to create a feeling of com-
fort — ​calm, even — ​in the midst of a heart-​w renching situation.
She fought to downplay her struggles and frustrations so as not
to be reduced by the current tumult. She assured herself that
good moms always found a way to make sure their kids came out
on top. Ximena had done it before, and she would do it again.
When she sacrificed to keep her kids safe and when she treated
each of them equally and with respect, she did right by them. By
concentrating on these positives, Ximena leveraged an awe-​
inspiring emotional resourcefulness, restoring her sense of dig-
nity in a context meant to strip her of it.

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 CHAPTER 19

Control

While low-​income moms’ extremely challenging circumstances

could force a de‑prioritization of their kids’ diets, the opposite
was true for wealthier moms: their privileged contexts seemed
to fuel a hyper-​prioritization of kids’ consumption. While low-​
income moms downscaled to worry less about controlling their
kids’ diets, high-​income moms upscaled — ​fretting about and
fighting to control what went into their kids’ bodies.
In just a few months, Patricia Adams’s eldest daughter, Zoe,
would be heading off to college. Patricia, whom we met in chap-
ter 8, would miss Zoe. After eighteen years under ­Patricia’s watch,
Zoe would be on her own soon, an independent young adult
solely responsible for her three daily meals, not to mention
snacks, drinks, and desserts.
But as long as Zoe was still under this roof, Patricia said with a
laugh, she was subject to her mom’s dietary rules and meddling.
As long as Patricia continued to buy Zoe’s food and make Zoe’s
meals, Zoe’s consumption was still very much Patricia’s business.
“I still try to control her!” Patricia chuckled. “I’m still going,
‘You need to eat five bites of zucchini! You need your vitamins!’ ”
Zoe’s diet mattered to Patricia because its impacts were far-​
reaching. Eating zucchini today wasn’t important solely because
it boosted Zoe’s current vitamin C intake; those bites of green
portended her future vegetable consumption. If Zoe binged on
Skittles now, the stomachache that would quickly follow wasn’t

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the only problem; too much sugar in this moment could drive
Zoe’s sugar addiction later. Zoe’s present food choices would
shape her future diet and health, and Patricia wanted to ensure
that future was as bright as possible.
As I explained in chapter 17, privileged moms’ anxieties
about their kids’ welfare are embedded within an overarching,
gnawing class anxiety that characterizes modern parenthood.
Parents’ deep-seated fears that their children might descend a
few rungs on the socioeconomic ladder, losing whatever class
advantages they currently possess, has motivated what the econ-
omists Garey and Valerie Ramey call the “rug rat race.”1 In this
race, parents direct more and more resources to parenting and
kids’ enrichment activities. Indeed, compared to earlier genera-
tions of caregivers, parents today devote significantly more time
and attention to their children. Wealthier parents also spend
more money on kids than they used to — ​and more than other
American families can currently afford to. Affluent parents
hope that, together, their temporal, cognitive, and monetary
investments will land their kids spots at elite universities and
secure them well-paying jobs. But there also exists a gulf
between affluent parents’ hopes for their kids and the limits of
parents’ power to achieve those hopes. This gulf can be
extremely anxiety-provoking, as parents have to confront want-
ing something so badly for their kids but also being unable to
guarantee it. How do parents navigate this frustrating reality?
One answer is control. Wealthy parents can try to control as
much as possible to increase their chances of attaining the
desired outcome. Over the years, catchy terms have popped up
to capture these controlling trends in parenting. Helicopter parent-
ing, for instance, refers to parental overinvolvement and overreg-
ulation of kids’ lives. Helicopter parents, so named because they
“hover overhead” like helicopters, take a risk-​averse approach to
child-​rearing, overseeing every aspect of their kids’ lives and
working to protect them from outside risks and harm. The more

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recent term snowplow parenting describes parents who go one step

further, trying, like a snowplow, to preemptively remove any
obstacles that might delay or prevent their kids’ success.2
While parents across society work to control aspects of chil-
dren’s lives, wealthier parents take a heavier-​handed approach,
as the sociologist Annette Lareau discovered through her research
of parenting practices in the 1990s. Through interviews and
observations of families, Lareau found that more privileged par-
ents raised kids differently than lower-​income families and that
these differences cut across racial lines. The former engaged in
what she called concerted cultivation — ​they viewed parenting as a
highly hands‑on, labor-​intensive project meant to provide chil-
dren with skills, activities, and behaviors that would secure
future privileges. Lareau contrasted this approach with a less-​
hands‑on parenting style she called the accomplishment of natural
growth that was more common among lower-​income parents.3
The affluent parents I met practiced the concerted cultiva-
tion that Lareau wrote about twenty years ago. But the same
anxieties that drove those parents to practice concerted cultiva-
tion also led them to engage in what I came to see as the physical
cultivation of their children. When parents worked to physically
cultivate their kids, they did so by instilling in kids the knowl-
edge, habits, and beliefs about food and health they hoped
would grant them advantages later on.

Patricia was painfully aware of all that she couldn’t control. She
couldn’t know what her younger two daughters would score on
their SATs or whether they’d earn spots on the varsity volleyball
team. But their diets were something different.
“What you eat, it’s something that you can control,” she said,
a grin sweeping across her face. “There are so many factors that
collide that you have no control over. For me, if I can control our
food, it’s one less thing that’s in that equation.”
Some moms were not comfortable discussing control as

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overtly as Patricia. Many couched their efforts to control in

softer language, telling me that they focused on “guiding smart
choices” and “offering good options.” When I asked moms if
they had any rules at home around food, some quickly delivered
a hard no before then sharing a list of “guidelines,” “habits,” or
“best practices” they generally stuck to. Certainly, some affluent
moms took a more free-​range approach to their kids’ diets,
highlighting the importance of moderation and accepting junk
and fast food as a natural, pleasant part of childhood. These
moms felt great pride in their comparatively laissez-​faire approach,
which highlighted the double standards of lower- and higher-​
income parenting. When lower-​income moms were less hands‑on
with their kids’ diets, they were generally labeled negligent or
ignorant. When wealthier moms practiced the same thing, they
were perceived as less overbearing and applauded for fostering
their kids’ independence and creativity. The same parenting
practices did not garner the same societal evaluations.
Yet even the less controlling affluent moms knew that they could
intervene and exert control if necessary. How did they know this?
One reason, I learned, was that wealthier moms (and the majority
were white) were simply accustomed to having more control when
it came to child-​rearing. In general, these moms could afford to
live where they wanted, send their kids to their preferred schools,
secure the best tutors, and enroll their kids in the extracurricular
activities of their choice. What went into their kids’ bodies was like
any other aspect of kids’ lives that moms oversaw and managed.
What’s more, not having the worries that kept low-​income moms
up at night, high-​income moms dug their heels into that manage-
ment. They were poised to jump in and fix any problems that arose.
And problems in need of fixing, I learned, arose often.
For Patricia, opportunities for physical cultivation were abun-
dant and helped her feel like she had some authority over her
kids even as they grew up. Food was as omnipresent as opportuni-
ties to regulate it. Moms helped kids pick their science classes

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once a year, but they could guide their food choices anywhere
from three to thirteen times a day. Kids were constantly making
dietary decisions, whether it was what to eat for breakfast, what
snacks to pack for soccer practice, where to eat with their friends
after school, or how many helpings to take for dinner. Patricia
had endless chances to insert “teaching moments,” to make hum-
ble suggestions to eat this and not that, and to put together a plate
with just the right balance of food groups.
Children’s diets and bodies were also highly visible to moms.
If ignorance is bliss, then for moms, seeing everything their kids
ate was hell. Moms noticed when the box of Milanos in the cup-
board emptied more quickly than usual or when kids put on
weight. Moms monitored their kids’ dietary intake by tracking
which foods disappeared and when. Food’s visibility only dialed
up moms’ attention and stress levels. With their kids’ “poor”
choices or missteps constantly on display, moms felt the urgency
of course-​correcting before it grew too late — ​before one bag of
M&M’s turned into two, or twelve.
Moms’ physical cultivation of kids began early and stemmed
from simply following prescriptive guidelines. As society’s shep-
herds of children’s health, mothers in the United States are trained
early and repeatedly to feel that deep, personal sense of ownership
over their kids’ intake. This responsibility for physically cultivating
children begins in pregnancy with directions to take prenatal vita-
mins and avoid coffee and cold cuts. It continues into the newborn
phase with the public health guidance to exclusively breastfeed
babies for at least six months. It carries into infancy with advice for
the best ways to expose a child to solid foods and into toddlerdom
and childhood with the clear advice to avoid sugar-​sweetened
products. Through it all, kids’ weights are fastidiously monitored
in pediatricians’ offices, with slight deviations in weight, height, or
BMI percentiles flagged as evidence of something wrong — ​of a
failure on the part of moms. My daughter’s weight had received a
grade during her first visit to the pediatrician, and other moms

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are subject to their own scores. From the time of baby bumps
onward, moms get the clear message that being a good mother
means controlling their kids’ intake and bodies.
Privileged moms with resources are positioned to act on
that message. Many such moms told me that their earliest,
sharpest memories had to do with feeding their infants. Many
followed the “breast is best” approach. As Janae Lathrop said, “I
was that anal mom with children. They never had a jar of baby
food. And I was all about, ‘Oh, let me cook my own applesauce
and smash my own bananas.’ And why buy bananas baby food?
You can do your own.” This philosophy of responsibility and
control evolved as kids grew. For the moms I met, years of nurs-
ing and pureeing sweet potatoes gave way to sugar-​free birthday
cakes and packed lunches. It fueled efforts to keep kids away
from juice and soda and expose them to a range of fruits and
vegetables. All of it was hard, but the teenage years were when
things started to get even trickier. Controlling a five-​year-​old’s
diet was a bit easier than regulating a fourteen-​year-​old’s. With
their increasing autonomy, independent spending power, and
outside social lives, teens made moms feel that they were losing
their grip. Physical cultivation grew even more challenging.
Moms’ fears of dissipating influence only fueled their anxiety.
To navigate it, they searched tirelessly for ways — ​big and small — ​
to exercise control over their teens’ diets. They sought avenues to
slip in fruits over candy, to substitute baked chips for Ding Dongs,
to swap lettuce wraps for burger buns. Moms knew that their
supervision had its limits and that when teens joined their friends
at the movies or biked downtown after school, they ate and drank
whatever they wanted. Moms understood their reach could
extend only so far. But as long as moms were constantly striving to
improve their kids’ consumption, then, at the very least, they
could go to bed at night feeling like they were mothering well.
Whatever the outcomes, no one could say they hadn’t tried.

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Ironically, trying to control their kids often heightened moms’ wor-

ries. When their efforts failed, it left them feeling frustrated and
inadequate. Because moms saw their kids’ diets as controllable,
they interpreted any inability to control them as a personal failure.
Weight was a key metric that moms used to deem their feed-
ing efforts a success or a failure. A teenager’s weight was measur-
able and visible. It was the physical manifestation of what kids
were consuming — ​the evidence of whether moms had done a
good or bad job. And it was also tracked by doctors and schools,
meaning that moms were constantly grading and being graded
on the numbers that appeared on the scale.
Almost every mom thought about their kids’ weight, although
how they did so differed. Among higher-​income families, often
white or Asian, moms talked more about the importance of
being thin. This was especially the case when it came to their
daughters. Some encouraged their daughters to watch their
weight because, as one mom put it, “Once you gain it, it’s hard to
lose.” Some moms framed a desire for their daughters’ thinness
as wanting better for their daughters than they had, referring to
their own struggles to lose or manage their weight. This pre-
mium on thinness also applied to sons, although there was
much more leeway; moms were inclined to accept their sons’
heavier bodies as “athletic,” sturdy, or husky.
Black and Latina mothers generally held a more inclusive
image of an appropriate body size. Their daughters needn’t neces-
sarily be thin so much as “healthy.” Curves were good. Being too
thin was worse than being a little heavy.
Many high-​income moms were also wary of compounding
kids’ — ​most often, daughters’ — ​body-​image issues or fueling
eating disorders by emphasizing weight too much. They were
careful not to overtly discuss weight with their kids even as they
engaged in an internal dialogue about it. This put moms in a
difficult position — ​they cared deeply about how much their kid
weighed but couldn’t speak openly with them about it. So

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instead, moms tried to control kids’ diets in ways that would pro-
duce thinness, or at least a pediatrician-​approved BMI. Rather
than discussing pounds and ounces, they strove to get their kids
to focus on being “healthy” and “feeling good.”
Moms whose kids’ weight deviated from the normal BMI
range often tried to rein that weight in themselves. Others
turned to more interventionist methods. Julie and Zach, for
instance, had hired a nutritionist and a therapist a year earlier
to help Jane bring her weight down. “When you see someone
that you love who has a belly and who eats a cupcake and imme-
diately after can eat again,” Julie said, “it can be disturbing and
not in the best interest of that person.” Julie hoped Jane would
learn how to exercise self-​control and make “better” choices
around food. But after watching Jane get bullied at school for
being chubby, Julie also just wanted to help restore her daugh-
ter’s confidence. Julie wanted Jane to fit in, make friends, and
feel good about her appearance. If losing some weight could
help achieve that, then Julie would help her daughter slim down.
The nutritionist had introduced the Cains to a system akin to
Weight Watchers, complete with a hierarchy of green, yellow, and
red foods to guide daily choices. “Green foods are foods that you
can eat all the time that include your fruits and your vegetables
and your lean proteins and your complex carbohydrates,” Julie
explained. Yellow foods were other meats, nuts, cheeses, and
dairy. And then you had red foods. “French fries are a red food!”
she said, laughing and taking a sip of carbonated water.
Julie tried to go by the nutritionist’s guidelines when she gro-
cery shopped. She bought more green foods and fewer red foods.
But she genuinely worried when she saw Jane bake a batch of
cookies and scarf down one after the other without pause. Julie
explained to me, with a heavy sigh, that she could only give her
kids information and it was their choice what they did with it. But
I could tell that taking on a purely information-​giving role could
feel too hands-​off for her. It stressed Julie out to leave Jane to her

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own devices. So Julie was constantly finding small ways to micro-

manage and steer the situation, whether it was asking Jane
whether she was still hungry after her third cookie or piling the
shopping cart to the brim with fruits so Jane would want to make
the healthy choice herself. When Jane went to Starbucks with her
friends, Julie reminded her daughter that she could amend her
usual Frappuccino order to err on the healthier side: “Get the
fat-​free Frappuccino instead of the full-​fat Frappuccino,” Julie
advised. “It’ll save you so much in calories.”
Virginia Bowen, a stay‑at‑home mom of two, found herself in
a similar position. The two moms knew each other: Julie had
hired Virginia’s youngest son, Liam, to tutor Jane in math. Vir-
ginia was deeply committed to her sons’ diets, which meant that
she often felt tormented by them. I first met Virginia one morn-
ing at her home. With her black Lululemon leggings, a bright
blue Nike tank top, and chestnut brown hair pulled back into a
messy, sporty bun, Virginia looked like the personal trainer she
worked part-​time as. Virginia’s world revolved around healthy
eating. As her husband told me, her space was “nutrition and fit-
ness and health and everything.”
Virginia was avid about her two sons’ physical cultivation
and tried to keep a tight grip on what they ate. Recently, though,
she’d felt that grip loosening as her sons grew from scraggly kids
who liked to run around the yard to teenagers who were more
interested in staring at their phones and playing video games
with their friends. As Virginia and I sat down to chat at her oak
dining table, she blurted out that her older son, Wells, was
overweight.
Virginia was frustrated, embarrassed, and shocked that
after a lifetime of trying to instill in him an appreciation for
healthy food, Wells didn’t care one bit about his weight or his
health. For the past sixteen years, she’d tried to model a healthy
diet for him. “I do not understand how I can do that,” she
lamented, “and I have a kid who overeats.”

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Wells’s current diet worried Virginia in more ways than she

could count. For one, she didn’t like the idea of her pediatrician
or other moms judging her because of how her son looked. It
was embarrassing, she admitted, for a fitness instructor to have
an overweight son who didn’t care about any of the healthy hab-
its so core to her whole existence. But she also worried about
Wells’s future, fearing the way the habits he picked up today
would affect how he fared tomorrow. Watching his current poor
eating choices and his reluctance to adhere to even one bullet
point of her advice only entrenched Virginia’s feeling of dread
about whether his tastes would ever improve. Would Wells one
day see the light?
“From a psychology point of view,” she said, “I super-​worry
about his weight. I feel like I sort of lost that battle. It’s one of my
greatest angsts in life.” Despite feeling like she was failing, Vir-
ginia never gave up trying to set a good example. When I asked
her whether she thought that approach was working, she replied,
dejectedly, “Ask me in ten years. I think modeling good food
behavior is really important, but I don’t know yet because I’m
not seeing the effect.”
Some of Virginia’s anxiety stemmed from this frustrating
truth: She was doing everything she could to fix Wells’s diet, but
nothing seemed to be working. Wells’s hoarding and bingeing
habits were starting to take on a life of their own, and that felt
unfamiliar to Virginia. As a mom, Virginia was accustomed to
having a handle on her family and her kids. Experiencing her
control erode was confusing and upsetting.
But failure only made Virginia upscale more fervently and
strive even harder to fix the problem. She reevaluated and
re‑strategized. She tried talking to Wells. She tried listening. She
tried bribing. She even gave praying a shot. Recently, she had
transitioned from trying to persuade Wells to eat healthy to just
giving him and his younger brother what she thought they should
be eating. On her kitchen counter that afternoon I spotted a

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bowl of grapes and a plate of baby carrots. “I pretty much just put
it in front of them now,” Virginia said, motioning to the snacks.
But putting fruits and vegetables in front of Wells hadn’t yet
proven particularly effective. Wells just bought junk food when
he was out with his friends, returning home in the late after-
noons and sneaking it into his room. When Virginia found out
about Wells’s secret stash of treats, she tried to instate new
boundaries. “I said, ‘You can have it outside of your room and
just put it in a bowl, but I’m not going to let this be in your room.’ ”
But the next week came and Wells did it again, hiding a half-​
eaten bag of cookies in his nightstand. Wells’s stubbornness
tested Virginia, who found it hard not to fixate on what she
deemed her personal failing as a mother. Tormented by his
secrecy, she waffled on how best to approach the situation. Per-
haps she could ask their pediatrician to intervene. Or she could
leave Wells to his own devices and hope for the best.
Other affluent moms struggled with similar questions of
how and how much to control their kids. Some even stressed
about whether they were overcontrolling their children. Virginia
was concerned that her continuous nagging might eventually
have a negative impact on Wells. Maybe all her supervision now
was shortsighted and would impede his ability to self-​regulate in
the future. “I realize I’m just setting him up for hoarding and
hiding,” Virginia said. Then, throwing her hands up in the air,
she sighed. “So I’m like, ‘All right. You’re in charge of you. I can-
not be in charge of what you eat!’ ”
But Virginia and I both knew that she didn’t really mean
it — ​that she’d keep on trying to be in charge until the day her
son moved out. As his mom, she couldn’t help it. A lifetime of
training and practice in physical cultivation wasn’t so easily
undone. Sure, that evening, Virginia was exasperated. But I had
a feeling that, as she’d done dozens of times before, she’d pull
herself out of bed the next morning with renewed gusto. Maybe
she’d even come up with a different strategy or a novel trick to

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test out. Wells’s diet and weight would continue to matter to Vir-
ginia because they augured how he’d fare in the future. And
Wells’s future well-​being and success, Virginia knew, would be
the ultimate grade she’d earn as a mom. She couldn’t bear the
thought of a failing one.

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 CHAPTER 20

Stacking Up

“How would you compare the way your family eats to other
families?”
This was a question I asked every parent I met. I intention-
ally worded the question to be ambiguous and vague. I wanted it
to be unclear whether I was referring to other families in their
neighborhood, their country, or around the world. My goal was
to see who parents chose to stack themselves up against.
Parents answered the question by discussing all kinds of
other families. Some mentioned families they’d met through
their kids’ schools, church services, or neighborhood potlucks.
A few mentioned members of their own extended families.
­Others mentioned families who did or did not share their socio-
economic, cultural, or racial backgrounds. And still others
described hypothetical families who they only imagined ate a
certain way.
Lower-​income moms generally compared themselves to other
lower-​income families. Often they underscored that they were
doing comparatively better than these families. These moms
knew how I, someone with socioeconomic privilege, might see
them — ​how I might try to put them in a box before even hear-
ing their story. Aware of poverty’s stereotypes and stigmas, they
distanced themselves from the former and deflected the latter.
They impressed upon me that while they might be poor, they
were not poor-​poor. They were not as poor as other families.

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They were self-​sufficient. Doing okay. They weren’t leeches on

public resources or “welfare queens.” Most of the time, they had
enough money to buy food. When that wasn’t the case, they had
others they could turn to for help: a sister, a cousin, a neighbor,
or — ​if they were in dire straits — ​a food pantry. Some other
families, they told me, didn’t have that. Other families might be
struggling and failing; they were struggling and getting by.
Lower-​income moms strove to show me all the ways they
were thriving and not just surviving. They wanted to underscore
for me all they had rather than what they lacked. And it was true.
They had a lot — ​deep bonds between immediate and extended
family, strong ties to community members and organizations,
grit and perseverance in the face of hardship, kind, curious,
and clever children, and an enduring hope for the future. But
convincingly telling the story of their success benefited from a
point of comparison. It helped to show how others were failing.
In this way, social comparison to worse-​off families was a key
downscaling strategy; even when things were difficult, moms
could downscale their challenges by highlighting others’.
Kiara Bell, a single mom of four, taught me this. I met Kiara
at her home on Veterans Day. Like most houses on the street,
Kiara’s was fenced in by a black steel gate. The windows and
doors were lined with bars, and the hum of cars on the adjacent
freeway was deafening. Her neighbors to both sides sat on their
front porches, while down the street, kids lined up at a one-​man
taco stand.
For the past two decades, Kiara had worked at a public
elementary-​school cafeteria. “I’m what you call a lunch lady,”
she said with a laugh as we sat down at her kitchen table and she
kicked off her fuzzy zebra slippers. Kiara had curly short black
hair, a broad face, and thick-​framed tortoiseshell glasses that
slipped down the bridge of her nose as she talked.
The steady income from working forty hours a week for
twelve dollars an hour helped Kiara pay the rent on her

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nine-​hundred-​square-​foot, two-​bedroom house. Kiara’s family

was one of the few who had both qualified for and secured pub-
lic housing. Her housing vouchers covered five hundred dollars
of her fifteen-​hundred-​dollar monthly rent. After shelling out
the remaining thousand each month, she used the rest of her
income to feed, clothe, and care for her children.
“I think the more the economy gettin’ higher, the more they
think food is supposed to get higher too,” Kiara told me, taking
a sip of water from a tall green thermos. “A gallon of milk is
almost five dollars, and I have four girls that drink milk. It’s just
crazy.”
But pricey as food was, Kiara felt blessed by the support sys-
tem that kept her kids fed and happy. Every month, she gave her
grandmother, a retired school-​ bus driver, money to grocery
shop for the entire family. The evening we met, like most eve-
nings, Kiara would walk her kids over to her grandma’s for
dinner at five thirty. “We basically don’t eat here,” Kiara said,
tapping the kitchen table with her index finger. “We eat at my
grandmother’s house.”
Kiara, her aunt, and her brother all gave her grandmother
money to feed the entire family. Kiara shared with her a SNAP
debit card as well as an extra hundred dollars for food. Kiara
knew that if it were just on her to feed the kids, she’d probably
come up short. Even with the federal assistance, four girls with
four growling stomachs and four growing bodies meant that
food generally disappeared as quickly as it entered her house.
But with everyone contributing, they rarely went hungry.
“There’s a lot of us eating together, you know?” Kiara said, peer-
ing out the window toward the freeway. “But it’s a lot of us
pitchin’ in too.”
Other families got by this way too, leveraging familial sup-
port to create their own informal safety net. When Kiara had
more to contribute to the family’s collective food budget, as
happened some months, she did. Other months, when the kids’

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school supplies and an unexpected car-​repair bill set her back,

she leaned on her family to cover her share. The net was built on
reciprocity and trust. Kiara knew it would be there to catch and
cushion her if and when she fell.
But she knew other single moms with no safety net, formal
or informal. She knew moms who were at the food pantry every
week rather than every month or two. She knew moms who
worked so many shifts they rarely sat down with their kids for a
meal. She knew moms who would have qualified for all the help
she got, but they were undocumented, so they had no housing
vouchers, no SNAP or WIC funds, and no Medicaid. When
Kiara thought of these moms, she knew she was doing okay.
Even though I had met Kiara outside a food bank — ​she
was lined up along with dozens of other parents for a Thanks-
giving food drive — ​Kiara was sure that her family was doing
better than most. “I work for the school district, so I know a lot
of babies come to school hungry, you know?” Kiara said, check-
ing her nails for chips. Her job gave her firsthand exposure to
just how bad things could get. Parents dropped their kids off at
school with empty stomachs. Most of those kids had to eat the
school breakfasts and lunches that she prepared, which were
bland or unappetizing. Some kids wouldn’t eat them even if they
were starving.
But that, she reminded herself, was not her kids’ situation.
Her daughters never went to school hungry. And on days off,
they always had food to eat at home. “Some babies is not gonna
eat today ’cause school’s not in,” Kiara told me, her eyes widen-
ing. “Like, if it’s vacation, what they gonna eat when they’s on
vacation? That’s not fair for babies to come to school hungry.”
This reality both frustrated Kiara and reinforced her gratitude
that she wasn’t in that position. She could always manage to buy
her kids food they’d eat.
“A lot of families can’t afford food,” Kiara told me. “If some-
body has a lot of kids, they be hungry.”

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Although Kiara may not have deemed four kids a lot, to me,
it didn’t seem like few kids. It seemed like a good number of
mouths to feed on a single income. It seemed, given the rising
price of food and her daughters’ growing appetites, stressful. It
seemed, from what Kiara had shared, challenging.
But Kiara must have been imagining more kids — ​maybe
five, six, or even seven kids. Families of that size were likely on
her mind when she highlighted her lack of challenges when it
came to feeding her family.
“Thank God for that!” She laughed. “No challenges, no. I
have a lot of support. Even if I did, I have a lot of support so I
wouldn’t even have those challenges. Some people don’t have
that, so thank God for that. I won’t have any of those challenges.”
Even though Kiara felt like she was barely paying all the bills
each month, she could downscale — ​even bury — ​her own strug-
gles by summoning others’ forward. She could stack her situa-
tion up against other families who were in even harder situations
to assure herself that she was doing just fine. Kiara thought
about unhoused people, people without extended family, peo-
ple without stable jobs. “People that’s living on streets that’s
homeless,” she said. “They have challenges. And some people
don’t have — ​can’t provide for their children.
“But” — ​she looked me in the eye — “I don’t have those.”

One morning a week after the utility bill was due, the water in
Nyah’s home was shut off. When I arrived in the early afternoon,
Mariah and Natasha were visibly frustrated. Natasha sat on the
garage sofa pouting, and Mariah headed out to meet friends,
not saying goodbye to her mom as she strolled down the drive-
way. Nyah was irritated too but felt like the girls were being a bit
dramatic. Nyah pointed out that they still had a roof over their
heads, which was “better than a lot of other people,” even if they
couldn’t take a shower that day.
“Some people don’t have that,” she reminded her daughters.

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Nyah was often making these kinds of comments, putting

things in perspective for Mariah and Natasha. She nudged them
to remember how lucky they were to have everything they had: a
microwave, two TVs, their own rooms. Back in Georgia, Nyah
and her siblings had grown up “one on top of the other.” By
comparison, she was raising her kids in a mansion.
When Nyah picked up a ­thirty-​six-​pack of extra-​soft toilet
paper — ​the plush kind — ​on sale one afternoon, she told the
girls they should appreciate the fact that they had toilet paper to
begin with. On top of that, they could now enjoy the non-​
scratchy kind for a month. One morning, Mariah complained
there was nothing to eat, but Nyah wasn’t having it. Some peo-
ple had literally nothing to eat at home, Nyah explained to her
daughter. “We have a whole freezer full of meat in the garage,”
Nyah reminded her. “You go pick something out.”
But as much as Nyah worked to assure the girls that all was
well, she didn’t really believe that they were in a good spot. I
didn’t need to read between the lines to see that. When she
wasn’t trying to put a positive spin on the situation, Nyah opened
up often about how she felt down and depleted, how others
didn’t know her struggles, and how she was never sure if next
month was the month in which she would finally receive the
eviction notice she felt was coming down the line.
Yet, amid those worries, Nyah found the ability to buoy her-
self in moments by looking around at other families. Many other
families she knew were also struggling or even worse off. Some
lacked toilet paper or food to eat — ​problems she didn’t face.
Nyah always had a square to tear off or a chicken to defrost.
Lower-​income moms’ strategy of using other moms who
were in worse shape as their basis of comparison was effective
on different levels. It helped bolster their and their children’s
spirits under challenging circumstances. It also enabled moms
to feel better about the particulars of their kids’ diets. If other
families weren’t able to afford vegetables or meat, then getting

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 Stacking Up

kids to eat some of those was winning. What’s more, if other

families were barely able to feed their kids, then feeding kids
period was a success.
The point is that even if their kids weren’t the healthiest eat-
ers, moms could use social comparison to find something about
their diets to feel better — ​ even good — ​ about. For instance,
some moms beamed with pride about their kids’ adventurous
tastes, highlighting the advantages of not having “picky eaters.”
Other moms underscored that their kids didn’t want to watch
TV when they ate or were eager to help with cooking. Finally,
some moms focused on how their kids were doing better overall
than their peers, their diets aside. This was the approach Faye
Bautista, a single Filipina mom, took. Even though her sixteen-​
year-​old daughter, Melanie, was eating fast food every evening,
Faye knew she was still doing better than her peers.
“I see other children,” Faye told me, “they do different
things, like prostitute or something like that. But she’s really
good. I really admire her for that, and I thank her for that.”

Wealthier moms also looked around to get a sense of how they

were doing dietarily. But while observing other families helped
lower-​income moms feel better about their situations, doing the
exact same thing had the opposite effect on their more affluent
counterparts.
Social comparison only heightened affluent moms’ anxiety
and fueled their upscaling. When these moms observed their
neighbors, colleagues, and fellow PTA members, they found
proof that they could be doing better. Even moms’ understand-
ing of their relative privilege did little to reassure them. Some
spoke about the challenges they knew food-​insecure families
faced or identified the fact that their kids didn’t rely on school
meals as a privilege. They expressed gratitude that they didn’t
have to worry about the price of food and about food deserts.
Many knew about raging inequality in America. Still,

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acknowledging their privilege generally wasn’t enough to put

their situation into perspective for them.
This was never clearer to me than at the Halloween party I
attended with Julie and Jane Cain. I met Julie at home on Hal-
loween afternoon. As she and I were catching up at the kitchen
island, Jane came downstairs from her room dressed in a black-​
and-​white cow onesie. Pulling up a stool at the counter, she told
me that we were going to the McGregors’ house that night
because they had a huge place that was good for hosting
people.
“Our house isn’t really good for parties.” Jane sighed, grab-
bing a handful of candy corn out of a communal glass bowl. “We
don’t really have a backyard.” I glanced out the kitchen window
at the Cains’ backyard; they had a deck with a grill and a giant
trampoline. As I transferred the homemade meatballs Julie had
prepared into a Tupperware container to bring to the party, I
couldn’t help picturing Dana’s eight-​hundred-​square-​foot apart-
ment and Nyah’s four-​foot-​w ide gravel backyard.
Jane was doing a familiar dance, stacking her situation up
against others’. I’d seen Julie do this too. Just the other after-
noon, Julie and I had chatted about the nutritionist they’d hired
to help Jane. Julie was encouraged by Jane’s progress, but she
still felt that her daughter wasn’t where she should be. “I think
other kids her age have this figured out,” Julie had lamented as
she washed a Gala apple in the sink. Julie dried the apple and
placed it next to a sandwich-​size Ziploc bag of fat-​free popcorn.
These, she told me, were Jane’s after-​school snacks for tomorrow.
Halloween afternoon, with the meatballs ready and the sun
beginning to set, the three of us headed to the party. I followed
Julie and Jane in my car on the ten-​ minute drive to the
McGregors’ calm, tree-​lined residential street. The McGregors
had decked both the inside and the outside of their two-​story
home for the occasion. There was a small, creepy clown by the
front steps and a ghost hanging above the front door, and

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motion-​sensor-​activated skulls rolled along the winding brick

path that connected the street to their home.
The party was largely concentrated on the sprawling front
lawn, where teens and parents congregated in small groups.
Most kids were in costume, some as giraffes and bunnies and
others as Disney princesses and vampires. Moms wore fitted tees
with pithy, holiday-​themed messages like #pumpkineverything.
Lawn chairs dotted the grass, and a long table wrapped in an
orange tablecloth was covered in potluck contributions: Julie’s
meatballs, a vegetable lasagna, arugula salad, plain and pepper-
oni pizzas, a cheese platter, a bowl of sliced pineapple, m ­ ini–​
beef sliders, and homemade Halloween cupcakes.
As Jane joined her friends on the lawn, I followed Julie into
the house and back to the kitchen. There, moms were filling
sparkly tumblers with cocktails of vodka and blood-​orange Ital-
ian soda. Lisa McGregor showed Julie the wheatgrass shot that
she had been giving her daughter Melissa every day for the past
month.
“What’s that for?” Julie asked. Lisa explained that the shot
was good for Melissa’s immunity. Then, pointing to the handle
of vodka on the counter, she said teasingly to Julie, “I know what
you use for immunity!” Julie grinned, sipping her chilled cock-
tail through a straw.
The first twenty minutes of the party, I stuck out like a sore
thumb. What was this twenty-​something-​year-​old woman with-
out children doing at a high-​school Halloween party? No one
knew who I was, and scribbling observations into my notebook
wasn’t helping me blend in. But that quickly changed. Within
the hour, word got out that I was a researcher studying families
and food, and I went from an awkward, uninvited intruder to a
cameo-​making celebrity. In droves, moms approached me to
bare their souls. They shared how much they cared about
healthy eating and how challenging it was to, as Lisa put it, “get
it right.” Some moms wanted me to understand the dietary

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principles or rules they followed, and others shared their go‑to

quick, easy, and healthy dinners. A few mentioned the vegetable
gardens they were planting in their backyards or the cleanses
they’d tried. Many brought up the absence of fast food from
their own and their kids’ diets.
And yet, a deep, palpable anxiety permeated these moms’
boasting. Their feelings of pride seemed remarkably fragile and
precarious, fueled by worry and a self-​imposed call to hustle.
While demonstrating to me their commitment to healthy and
nutritious eating, they seemed hungry to do more. A handful of
moms asked me for my “expert advice.” What did I think of soy?
What about gluten? Was juice ever okay? Was it terrible if their
kid ate apples but not broccoli?
Underlying all of these questions were clearly deeper, more
existential ones. Moms were asking me: How could they do bet-
ter? How could they be better?
“He refuses to eat anything green,” one mom complained
about her fifteen-​year-​old wrestling and soccer-​playing son. “He
thinks Jack in the Box is a well-​rounded diet.”
Another was frustrated by her daughters’ volleyball coach,
whom she saw as too lenient. He let the girls eat Burger King at
sleepaway tournaments. “That can’t be good for their game!”
She laughed, then called her daughter Caroline over to meet me
and share the details. “Tell Priya!” she implored Caroline.
After an hour of fielding moms’ questions and concerns, I
realized that all of this conversation with anxious moms was
making me anxious. After politely excusing myself, I retreated to
the first-​floor bathroom for a breather. I closed the toilet seat,
sat down on top, pulled out my notebook, and started writing.
Why do I feel so worried for these moms? I scribbled, pondering
why their anxiety felt contagious. Their nervousness made me
feel nervous. I didn’t even have kids at the time, but in that
moment, I felt myself already starting to worry about what I

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 Stacking Up

would eventually feed them! I thought about what it would be

like to be constantly surrounded by this apprehensive — ​and
guilt-​inducing — ​discourse. None of the questions moms had
asked me had easy answers, and many sparked even more ques-
tions. The more you asked, the more confused you became.
Moms were spinning in circles looking for a simple solution to
their dietary woes.
Julie’s social world consisted largely of the moms I’d met
tonight. These were moms who, like Julie, were deeply invested
in what their families ate. It made sense that they talked among
themselves, bounced ideas around, and motivated one another.
But I also saw how being in proximity to other moms made it
hard not to discuss and compare. As moms gathered and chat-
ted, as they evaluated one another’s potluck contributions and
observed other kids’ consumption, they dug themselves deeper
and deeper into worry. Their stress levels, significant already,
seemed to soar to even greater heights.

Only a handful of lower-​income moms said that working full-​

time made it extra-​challenging to eat healthy, perhaps because
few considered there to be an alternative. Full-​time employment
was a necessity, not a choice. But many working middle- and
higher-​income moms saw their jobs as major barriers. They per-
ceived families with stay‑at‑home moms as better able to pull off
the diets they aspired to. Empowered, progressive, and tena-
cious as they were professionally, they nonetheless felt a gnaw-
ing guilt that their desire, decision, or need to work undermined
their maternal duty to feed.
Lori Galvez, a human resources director and mom of three,
felt the frustration of a frenzied life. She also knew for certain
that stay‑at‑home moms had it easier. A career-​driven straight
shooter, Lori worked fifty-​ hour weeks at a large nonprofit,
spending ninety minutes in the car commuting every day. The

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afternoon I met Lori in her office for a “working lunch,” she

wore thick beige-​framed glasses and a thin barrette pinning her
wavy black hair to the side.
“I always feel guilty because I’m a working mom,” Lori con-
fessed, taking a sip of coffee. What she sacrificed by being a
working mom, she felt, was the quality of her kids’ diets. “I feel
like the children don’t get their three square meals like [the
kids of] a lot of moms that don’t work. I know a lot of them. I’m
involved in the high school’s performing-​arts boosters and some
of the other organizations at the high school. Most of those
moms don’t work or they work part-​time. So the children get a
breakfast in the morning, and their mom makes them lunch,
and then they come home to a dinner at like five thirty.”
This, Lori said with a laugh, was not her situation. Often,
her three kids were responsible for figuring out their own
lunches. “Winging it” for dinner was typical. While Lori loved
her job and understood the inevitable trade-​off of preparing
nightly dinners from scratch in exchange for pursuing a high-​
powered career, acknowledging this trade-​off seemed to do lit-
tle to assuage her guilt. Rather than work through or reject the
guilt, Lori accepted it, even indulged it. In some ways, it seemed
like she owned it. She admitted to always feeling guilty, an expe-
rience that wore her down and made trying to manage her kids’
diets feel like a losing battle.
Lori had countless examples of the ways that stay‑at‑home
moms were doing better by their kids. Take grocery shopping,
for instance. These moms, she explained, had all the time in the
world to shop at different supermarkets, farmers’ markets, and
delicatessens. They could exercise creativity and ingenuity in
ways Lori couldn’t because she was behind a desk fifty hours a
week. Worst of all, Lori feared that her kids’ palates weren’t
developing like their peers’. “I mean, I barely got them eating
hummus. That was, like, a big thing!” Lori laughed. But as
proud as she was of her kids’ acceptance of ground chickpeas,

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 Stacking Up

Lori didn’t have the bandwidth to make that kind of headway

with other foods she would have liked to see them eating.
“I’ve talked to a lot of children nowadays that are getting
more and more into a lot more vegetables.” Lori sighed. “But I
don’t think my children eat as many vegetables as they should.”

The power of social comparison really hit me when I met

stay‑at‑home moms — ​the objects of Lori’s nutritional envy — ​
who also compared themselves to others and emerged feeling
inadequate. Emma Romero, a stay‑at‑home mom of two, helped
me see this. I met Emma one blustery evening at a public high
school’s PTA meeting. Emma, the PTA president, had a light
brown, shoulder-​length bob and a warm, bubbly personality.
“I do a lot of cooking,” Emma told me as we cozied into a cof-
fee shop’s corner booth one morning the following week. Emma
nibbled on her egg-​white-​and-​spinach panini while I inhaled a
bear claw pastry far less gracefully.
“Food’s important to me,” she said, “and I try to make sure
it’s filling emotionally and physically.” Many weekdays, Emma
mulled over, shopped for, prepped, and cooked food. While
Emma felt strongly about healthy eating, she was happy to make
her sons’ favorite dishes as long as they met her desired ratios of
vegetables, starches, and proteins. Emma cooked meals like faji-
tas, tortellini, turkey burgers, and salmon.
Emma also obliged their cravings for sweets, but on her own
terms. When her sons requested cookies, Emma avoided the
supermarket ones. “I don’t like to buy those because they have
trans fats,” she explained. “And that’s one of the reasons I like to
bake. I know it’s probably too much sugar but at least I know the
ingredients, there are no preservatives, and at least, if they’re
getting something homemade sweet, it’s better than buying
something sweet.”
Most recently, Emma had made a lemon pound cake and
chewy maple cookies. So reliably did Emma bake that her sons

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came to expect homemade treats when they got home from

school. “They feel neglected if there aren’t cookies in the cookie
jar!” Emma chuckled, taking a bite of her sandwich.
From my vantage point, Emma was the envy of all moms.
She was doing what most said they wanted to do. She had the
homemade meals, the organic fruits and veggies, the limitless
time, the ample money, the white-​cabinet kitchen, and the cook-
ing know-​how. I’ve found her, I thought, the intensive mother herself.
But even Emma was overcome by those familiar pangs of
guilt. Even she felt that she wasn’t doing as well as she could by
her kids. With each passing year, Emma found new things to
worry about. The day we met, she was newly frustrated by the
fact that her kids weren’t getting enough vegetables. The chal-
lenge was that with all the calories they were burning in after-​
school sports and their growing bodies, they wanted more filling
foods that Emma knew were less healthy.
“I really need to push more vegetables and make sure they
get the protein they need.” She sighed, shaking her head. “I
don’t think I’m as good as I should be at it.”
It certainly wasn’t for a lack of effort on Emma’s part that
the boys weren’t eating plates of greens. Emma made sure there
were vegetables with every meal. She snuck them into casseroles
and scrambled them into eggs. But she also turned to bread and
pasta to fill them up when broccoli and carrots wouldn’t. “I
think I try,” she reassured herself, “but [with] the stuff they like
and the amount of food they need to eat, I feel like it’s hard. I
think that’s my concern now. For them to be healthy and get the
nutrition they need but still feel full.”
When Emma looked around, she saw other mothers who
were better at sticking to their guns when it came to their kids’
diets. There were also moms who cooked more often, who
whipped up more dishes from scratch, who packed nicer lunches,
or who got their kids to stop pleading for soda.
“One friend,” Emma told me, clearly envious, “she’s really

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 Stacking Up

just disciplined to begin with. She bakes but she bakes healthy
muffins and that kind of stuff but healthier than my chocolate
chip cookies. And they cook every night, every week, and really
only go out for birthdays, go out to eat.” While Emma’s oven-​
baked sea bass and banana bread might have been the envy of
moms like Lori, Emma herself thought that she did not measure
up. For her, as for many moms, the well of reasons to feel less-​
than was bottomless.
Emma was on my mind the next evening as I sat at my
kitchen counter jotting down some thoughts from our conversa-
tion. Privilege has an irony to it, I wrote. I started off thinking that
affluent moms must have it so easy with food. What do they have to
worry about? But now I’m wondering if they’re the most stressed of all.
But when I stepped back and took a bird’s‑eye view, I real-
ized that that assessment wasn’t quite right; almost every mom
I’d met — ​rich or poor, Black or white, single or married — ​was
stressed. No mom believed that she was doing a good enough
job, and every mom felt the sting of falling short. Even if moms
used different emotion-​work strategies for navigating those feel-
ings of inadequacy, the fact that most moms had to use any strat-
egy at all to save face and manage their self-​worth pointed
toward the larger and more insidious structural problem: moms
were up against impossible standards but had little in the way of
support to give them a fighting chance. While moms felt like
they were failing their families, the more I observed their strug-
gles, the more clearly and deeply I understood that it was actu-
ally society that was failing them.

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 238 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM
 PART V

Conclusion

Here I am, suspended

between the sidewalk and twilight,
the sky dimming so fast it seems alive.
What if you felt the invisible
tug between you and everything?
 — ​Ellen Bass, “The World Has Need of You”

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 CHAPTER 21

Windfall

“Three hundred dollars goes a long way,” Nyah said with a smile
as I handed her a stiff white envelope with that amount of cash
inside. It was a warm August afternoon, and we were standing by
my car at the end of her driveway. I was giving Nyah the com-
pensation for allowing me to observe her family. At the outset of
my research, after consulting with advisers and colleagues, I had
decided to pay families sixty dollars for interviews and three
hundred for observations. The latter was enough for families to
buy something special but not so large that it would coerce them
into participating if they didn’t want to. I offered families the
option of receiving the money in installments throughout obser-
vations or all at once when my research was over. Every family
chose to receive the full sum at the very end.1
I asked Nyah, Dana, Renata, and Julie to each keep track of
how they spent the three hundred dollars. My interest was in
understanding how a small windfall of cash might affect fami-
lies’ diets, particularly Nyah’s and Dana’s. Would moms put the
money toward food purchases? Would they buy fruits and vege-
tables with it? Or would they devote it to other purposes, like
covering rent, paying off a medical bill, or loaning it to a family
member in need? So that moms wouldn’t feel compelled to put
the money toward a particular use, I reiterated to them multiple
times that it didn’t matter to me how they spent it. Based on

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 C onclusion

what I later learned about where they each directed the money, I
feel confident that they believed me.
As I considered how Nyah, Dana, Renata, and Julie would
put the cash to use, I thought a lot about the food-​ access
­argument. I thought about how much healthy food’s price and
proximity shaped their families’ diets. Proximity had never
been a huge concern for any of these families, as none lived far
from a supermarket. But price, especially to Nyah and Dana and
somewhat to Renata, was a concern. With three hundred
dollars, a lower-​
­ income family would temporarily be able
to access healthy food. Three hundred dollars could pay
for ten — ​maybe even twenty — ​nutritious meals. It could cover
the cost of whole, organic foods and raw ingredients. If price
was the primary barrier to healthy eating, then for at least the
next week or two, a few hundred dollars should reduce that
barrier.
Nyah took the sealed envelope in one hand and extended
the other to shake mine. In light of how much time we’d spent
together, the gesture felt oddly formal.
“Seriously, Priya, thank you,” she said, leaning in to hug me.
I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and explained, smiling,
that she wasn’t completely rid of me yet. Nyah’s eyes opened
wide, as they did when she was a little surprised. Then she
laughed. “I know, I know, I’ll be seein’ ya,” she said as she turned
to walk back up the driveway. “Text me!” Then she disappeared
through the front door.
Exactly a week later, I did. The next day, I was back in Nyah’s
living room crashing her and Mariah’s movie marathon. In the
center of the room was a queen-​size air mattress covered in a
white sheet and blue comforter that Nyah had been sleeping on
the past three nights while Marcus’s daughter was in town. I
hadn’t seen them watch TV inside before (we were usually out in
Nyah’s garage), but Nyah explained that her cable had been

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 Windfall

shut off a few days ago. Luckily, she could still watch one of her
many pirated DVDs without paying a dime.
“I’m hiding my anxiety well.” Nyah sighed, fast-​forwarding
through an episode of Judge Judy. “But it’s through the roof right
now with these bills.”
Nyah broke down how she’d spent the three hundred dol-
lars. First, she had decided to split it equally among herself and
her daughters. That, I learned, had always been the plan. She
kept a hundred dollars for herself and gave Mariah and Natasha
each a hundred.
Wow, I thought. This was a woman I had once seen haggle
with a cell phone agent to get a dollar off her phone bill, and she
had just taken two hundred dollars and gifted it to her daugh-
ters to spend however they wanted. That money could have gone
to all the bills that were giving Nyah anxiety attacks. It could
have gone to the supermarket and a week’s worth of healthy
meals. It could have gone to the car’s AC, months of cable, two
cell phone bills, or the year’s school supplies.
But Nyah didn’t put that two hundred dollars toward any of
that. She put it toward something bigger — ​something monu-
mental, in fact. In giving Mariah and Natasha that money, Nyah
gifted her kids “the best week of the entire summer,” she said.
“That money put them in the driver’s seat,” Nyah told me as
she grabbed a handful of pistachios from an orange bowl on the
coffee table. The girls had gotten a glimpse of the summer
they’d hoped for, one where they could do what they wanted.
For a moment, they didn’t have to ration or share. They didn’t
have to ask or plead. They didn’t have to hear their mom say no.
They went to the mall to buy the clothes they coveted and
the treats they wanted. At the mall, Mariah had spent forty dol-
lars on a jean skirt and three tank tops. Then she’d bought two
pizzas from Little Caesars for eleven dollars and gifted everyone
in the family ice cream from the ice cream truck for ten dollars.

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At a convenience store, Natasha had bought herself two hot fries

and a blue Powerade for twelve bucks and burritos and sodas for
the family for fourteen. She spent another fourteen dollars on
ice cream over a week and gave Marcus ten dollars for gas. She
went to the mall to buy clothes, but she got McDonald’s and
Mrs. Fields instead for ten bucks. Nyah told me that Natasha still
had around thirty dollars left.
“And what about you?” I asked Nyah, reaching for some pis-
tachios myself.
Nyah had used sixty of her one hundred dollars to pay off a
utilities bill. She then put twenty dollars’ worth of gas in the car.
With the remaining twenty bucks, she bought herself some
things she’d wanted: an eighteen-​pack of beer and a bag of
Doritos.
In the end, while some of Nyah’s three hundred dollars had
gone to paying the bills that kept her up at night, most of it had
gone elsewhere — ​ toward her daughters’ and her own small
pleasures. I tried to be surprised, but I wasn’t. I wasn’t surprised
because what Nyah and I both knew was that once that money
ran out, she was still going to be poor. Three hundred dollars
wasn’t going to substantively change anything in the long run
about Nyah’s circumstances. But for that week, instead of hav-
ing to say no to her daughters and herself, Nyah had the rare
opportunity to say yes. And for Nyah, that was worth far more
than a week — ​or even two — ​of healthy meals.
Nyah’s spending drove home the fact that for many families,
small financial influxes would probably move the needle very
little nutritionally. The exception was families who could not
afford food at all to start; these families would undoubtedly use
the money to feed their kids and themselves. But even for fami-
lies like Nyah’s, those who were far below the poverty line, who
suffered from food insecurity, and who didn’t always make rent
each month, money was still better spent on their kids’ happi-
ness than on improving families’ nutritional intake.

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 Windfall

This was made even clearer to me when I learned that Dana

had spent the money similarly, splitting it equally among herself
and her daughters. Madison and Paige spent their money like
Mariah and Natasha had, enjoying new clothes and food. With
her hundred dollars, Dana got a haircut and extensions. With
the remaining money, she took Madison out to dinner at their
favorite sushi restaurant, splitting two rolls for twelve dollars
and covering the tax and tip herself.
“Priya can come back and do more research,” Madison said
the evening I returned to check on the Williamses, a big grin
sweeping across her face. “I want to get some more clothes.”
I gave Julie her compensation on the afternoon of Hallow-
een before I accompanied her and Jane to the neighborhood
Halloween party. I’d held a big bag of pumpkin-​shaped Reese’s
Peanut Butter Cups in one hand and rung the doorbell with the
other. Julie greeted me in boot-​cut jeans and a light gray Hallow-
een T‑shirt. She seemed a bit exasperated as she ran around the
house gathering things for the party. I found Jane where she
usually was, sitting at the kitchen counter playing on her phone.
On the stove top were snacks and dishes for the party. A bag of
mixed mini–​candy bars lay next to a stack of napkins that each
read drink up, witches! To the left I spotted a tray of mini-​
muffins with candy corn.
“Jane baked those,” Julie told me. “We also have meatballs in
the slow cooker.”
When Jane headed upstairs to get her costume on, Julie took
a seat at the counter and started texting. I knew the kids would
come back any minute, so I handed her the envelope with the
money. A warm smile shot across Julie’s face.
“Ohhh, lovely!” she exclaimed, taking the envelope from
me. “We will just put that in a safe spot, where nobody knows
about it but me!” Julie laughed as she tucked the envelope into
the front pocket of her purse. “Okay, perfect, thank you,” she
continued. I felt a bit dumbfounded. I had known that Julie

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 C onclusion

didn’t need the money, but it never occurred to me that she

would hide the payment aspect of the research from her family.
While Nyah and Dana had both instantly shared the money
with their children, Julie told me that she would keep it to get
herself something special.
But later, when I texted Julie to find out how she had spent
the money, she said that she hadn’t actually kept it for herself at
all. Like the other moms, she had put it directly toward her kids.
We spent the money on all things Jane for her birthday party, Julie
texted. Food, decorations, drinks, dessert. While Julie certainly
didn’t need the money to pay for Jane’s birthday party, nor did
she spend more on it than she would have otherwise, I was still
struck by the fact that she chose, like Nyah and Dana, to direct
her windfall of cash toward her children.
Renata was the last mom to receive the three hundred
dollars. As I had with Nyah, Dana, and Julie, I felt sad to say
goodbye to her. I had enjoyed the time I’d spent with Renata — ​
prepping dinner, attending church services, participating in
Renata and Amalia’s mom-​ and-​
daughter dance classes, and
watching reality‑TV shows in the living room.
Renata and I sat side by side on the couch with our eyes
glued to the latest episode of America’s Got Talent. We were enjoy-
ing a dinner of Little Caesars pizza and a homemade salad when
I handed Renata her envelope.
“Oh, wow, thank you so much,” Renata said, standing up to
grab her purse. Tucking the envelope into an interior pocket,
she looked at me and smiled. “We really had a blast. The kids
and I will miss you.” When I explained to her that I’d follow up
to see how she spent the money, she said that she had lots of
ideas. I texted Renata a week later to inquire about her decision,
and she told me that she’d purposefully delayed choosing how
to spend it. I stashed the envelope in my purse and I’m carrying it
around until I decide, she texted back.
I followed up with her again the next week, at which point

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 Windfall

she’d made the call. Renata had brought the envelope to church
and opened it up during the service. Where should this money go?
she had asked God.
I decided it would be a great idea to use it towards Nico’s East Coast
Trip, she texted. It’s a Travel Program with his school to visit Washing-
ton DC, NY, and Boston. I will make a monthly payment towards my
balance with this $300. A few minutes later, she followed up. This
is a really great help! Thank you!
I reflected on how the other three moms had spent the
money, and Renata’s choice seemed fitting. In one important
way, it was consistent with Nyah, Dana, and Julie. Every mom put
most, if not all, of the payment toward her children. That was
telling in and of itself, a clear signal of moms’ devotion to their
children’s happiness and well-​being. But Nyah and Dana had
spent the money quickly, as a windfall, treating their daughters
to luxuries they couldn’t otherwise afford. Julie had also treated
her daughter to a luxury, but one that she could have afforded
anyway. Renata’s choice fell somewhere in the middle. Renata
didn’t need the money to survive, and she didn’t need it for the
well-​being of her kids. But it certainly eased some stress in her
life and let her breathe a little easier. For all the moms, the
money offered a momentary means to provide. In doing so, it
helped silence, if only for that moment, the voices that repeat-
edly echoed in the back of their minds — ​the ones that made
them ask themselves whether they were indeed “good.”

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 CHAPTER 22

Where We Go

When I was thirteen, a pair of foster siblings came to live with us.
On a scorching August afternoon, a brother and sister arrived at
our doorstep, an oversize backpack slung over each one’s shoul-
der and a piece of luggage at each one’s feet. Eleven-​year-​old
Carla and her thirteen-​year-​old brother, Rodrigo, had weathered
years of emotional and physical trauma from their father.1 For
the past four months, the two kids had lived largely on their own
in the family’s trailer. Eventually, the neighbors had called Child
Protective Services, and the pair had ended up in our home.
Carla had long, jet-​black hair that hit just above her waist.
When she let out a boisterous giggle, her wide, genuine smile
revealed a gap between her two front teeth. Rodrigo was a few
inches taller than his sister with wavy, side-​swept hair. The two,
like most brothers and sisters, bickered and made each other
laugh. They loved to swim in the pool and play tag. Late at night,
I’d sometimes find them side by side on the living-​room couch
hours after the rest of the family had gone to bed. They’d be
watching cartoons on TV, the sound barely audible. Occasion-
ally, I joined them, the soft glow of the TV illuminating our faces.
Scarcity had left an impression on Carla, who started hoarding
food the day she moved in with us. In the trailer, the siblings had
quickly run out of things to eat. There often wasn’t enough to go
around, and they didn’t know when someone might drop off more
food. In our house, there was usually something to eat, even if it

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 Where We Go

wasn’t always what I wanted. Still, Carla would stuff boxes of cereal
and bags of cookies into her dresser drawers under heaps of
unfolded clothes. Sometimes I’d overhear her munching on them
as I passed by her closed bedroom door. Other times, the snacks
appeared during the late-​night television sessions. Cross-​legged on
the couch, she’d grab a cookie directly out of the bag and toss it
into her mouth as she laughed along with the cartoons. When Car-
la’s stomach called for something heartier, she’d grab a can of Chef
Boyardee from her personal pantry. I enjoyed watching her pop
open a can, squirt a generous amount of hot sauce inside, and
devour the cold tomato-​sauce-​coated raviolis with a spoon. My
mom, upon seeing Carla’s attachment to the pasta, loaded the cup-
boards with the red-​labeled cans. There was enough in those cup-
boards for Carla to live on Chef Boyardee alone for at least a week.
Carla stockpiled them under her bed anyway.
Food scarcity, I learned, can haunt you.
Thirty years later, I found myself stockpiling cans. It was late
February 2020, the beginning of a global pandemic that would
bring the world to a halt. The coronavirus was spreading swiftly;
first detected in China, it had already ballooned in South Korea
and Italy and would soon topple much of Europe, the United
States, and Latin America. In March, to curb its spread, the San
Francisco Bay Area issued an order for all residents to shelter in
place. With important exceptions, the order required people to
stay at — ​and, if possible, work from — ​home. Residents were
advised to have a month’s supply of food on hand.
Which is how my husband and I ended up at the supermar-
ket one Saturday evening at eight o’clock to find the pasta aisle
raided, a few boxes of fusilli flipped on their sides on the bot-
tom shelf. I grabbed those boxes as well as other nonperishables
like jars of tomato sauce, cans of soup, rice, couscous, and beans.
The frozen fruits and vegetables were already sold out. I got two
pints of ice cream and two frozen pizzas. In the produce aisle, I
snatched enough to last ten days — ​two packs of mushrooms,

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 C onclusion

three heads of broccoli, tomatoes, peppers, and oranges — ​

aware of most fruits’ and vegetables’ disappointingly limited
refrigerated life. I bought extras to blanch and freeze. Round-
ing out the trip, I grabbed five boxes of chocolate chip cookies.
Checking out, piling our hundreds of dollars’ worth of pur-
chases onto the conveyor belt, I thought about Nyah. This was
how Nyah had always shopped. On the first day of each month,
she’d head to the discount grocer and buy enough food to last
the next thirty days; when she swiped her EBT card, she was
always within a few dollars of her monthly allotment. She’d
return to her kitchen to fill the refrigerator and restock the cup-
boards. The last week of every month, the fridge was empty
except for rows of condiments that were never thrown out. She
and the girls lived off of the cupboards and freezer.
I recalled the stress that pulsed through Nyah each time she
reached the checkout. As the cashier rang the items up, each
appearing with its price on the screen above the register, Nyah
worried about whether she’d made the right choices. Was she
getting everything that she, Mariah, and Natasha needed? If
this was all they’d have that month, would it make them happy?
Would it give them something to look forward to? Would they
miss anything? Would it even last the whole month?
That evening in the supermarket, as I pulled out my credit
card to pay, I asked myself similar questions. And I wondered
how many people were, for the first time, asking them too. The
barren pasta and grain aisles suggested there was widespread
anxiety about quantity and satiety. The empty frozen-​produce
section hinted at concern about having something healthy. But
the nearly empty ice cream section and the shopping carts piled
high with muffins and cakes also suggested a desire to find com-
fort and pleasure during a difficult time.
These fears make sense during a pandemic. When a viral
outbreak shakes the world to its core, it is understandable for
people to fear food scarcity. It’s perfectly reasonable to stockpile

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 Where We Go

foods with longer shelf lives. Certain sacrifices — ​like substitut-

ing frozen produce for fresh — ​are to be expected. And it is
completely fair to prioritize satiating foods over healthier ones,
because food provides a much-​needed source of comfort for
weathering hardship.
And yet, for millions of Americans, these trade-​offs are a
daily reality, pandemic or not. Our country didn’t need a viral
outbreak to create a context wherein far too many people’s con-
cerns about the quantity, quality, healthiness, cost, and purpose
of food are rational and legitimate.
Every day in the United States, millions of people worry
about the food they eat, and too few get the nutritious food they
deserve. Many are hungry. Many sacrifice their own food intake
to feed their children or pay their rent. Many use food to
weather extreme adversity and buffer against scarcity. Others
eat neither what they want nor what they need to feel healthy.
Too many are rendered sick with chronic diseases by the food
they consume. During the pandemic, as unemployment soared,
so too did the demand for food banks and federal nutrition
assistance. But even before this, the number of families forced
to regularly line up outside food banks and access government
funds to feed their families was unconscionably high. It has
been unconscionably high for decades.
In one of the richest countries in the world, one that has more
than enough food to feed every single family and where over half
of produced food is dumped into landfills, this is a disgrace and a
moral failing. Every family should be able to comfortably afford
and access the food they need and, in addition, have the time,
energy, and bandwidth to cook and consume it. No family should
have to eat as if they are living through a pandemic that lasts their
entire lifetimes. No family’s consumption should be shaped by
and subject to the scarcity, uncertainty, and anxiety that perme-
ate so much of the American dietary experience.
These features of American eating also undermine the

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American Dream. In the United States, we are told that we can

become whatever we set our minds to — ​that everyone is entitled
to a shot at success. But success is possible only when we consis-
tently and dependably have nutritious food to eat. We deserve to
eat and feed our families real food — ​healthy food — ​that keeps
our bodies fueled and flourishing. We deserve to consume a diet
that promotes our health rather than undermines it. But today,
far too many Americans are living under circumstances that
make getting what they deserve unlikely, if not impossible.
When I began the research for this book, common wisdom
held that unequal food access was largely responsible for wide-
spread nutritional inequality. Food deserts were supposedly to
blame for low-​income families’ low-​quality diets. Scholars and
foodies alike argued that by increasing families’ proximity to
healthy food, kids’ nutrition would improve. Over time, obesity
rates would fall. The dietary gap would close. The food-​access
argument was popular in part because it implied a straightfor-
ward — ​not to mention doable — ​course of action. If access was
the problem, then the solution was staring us in the face: open
more supermarkets in low-​income communities.
But over the years, this solution unfortunately proved to be
hardly any solution at all. One reason, families taught me, was that
food access was just one of many issues that directly affected their
diets. In fact, families’ diets are profoundly influenced by a sweep-
ing array of social justice issues. These diets are affected by families’
broader contexts, including their neighborhoods, schools, housing,
and jobs. Food-​access reforms have fallen short of enabling a nutri-
tious diet for all families because they haven’t addressed how every
one of these contextual factors affects the food families consume.
The reality is that these factors — ​from where parents can afford to
live to the jobs parents work — ​fundamentally shape what food
means to families, which in turn shapes how families eat.
Because of the hidden power of food’s meanings, I learned
that improving families’ access to nutritious food is only the

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 Where We Go

starting point, not the solution, to ensuring nutritional equity.

Food access is a necessary but insufficient prerequisite. Reduc-
ing nutritional inequality will demand more than making fruits
and vegetables widely available and affordable. It will require
providing Americans with the financial, social, and emotional
resources to make a nutritious diet realistic.
Most moms I met desired the same things for their kids.
Moms wanted children to eat healthy, thrive, and be happy.
Moms also shared overlapping ideas about what it would take to
make that happen. But for most, insufficient resources rendered
those aspirations unachievable. Whether it was too little money,
not enough time, unpredictable work hours, absent social sup-
port, unstable housing, more pressing needs, or a lack of other
comforts, trying to provide the ideal balance of nutritious foods
was, for most mothers, akin to swimming upstream.
Moms also showed me that access to healthy food is about more
than geography and finances. Access to healthy food means being
able to live a life with resources and supports that make a nutri-
tious diet the default, not the exception. Access to healthy food
means not having to fight — to constantly struggle — to eat the
food you want and deserve. It is one thing to be able to find and
afford a head of cauliflower. But it is another to want to buy that
cauliflower, to choose to spend one’s money on that cauliflower (at
the expense of other purchases), to have the time and know-​how to
cook that cauliflower, and to possess the patience to weather one’s
child’s complaints and pleas for macaroni and cheese and soldier
on to feed that cauliflower to one’s child. Only a handful of parents
I met had all of these things. The vast majority didn’t. Families’
contexts determined whether they had access to and the money to
buy cauliflower, and those same contexts also shaped whether buy-
ing cauliflower made any sense, given everything else going on.
We have the power to re‑create our society as one wherein
every family has enough nutritious food and the bandwidth to
cook and eat it. But doing this will require, first, recognizing

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that a nutritious diet is not a privilege to be bestowed upon a

worthy few but a fundamental human right to which every single
person — ​rich or poor, Black, brown, or white — ​is entitled. For
too long, we have assumed that only a narrow slice of society
should and can lay claim to a nutritious diet. We have grown so
used to a dietary environment saturated with processed foods
rife with added sugar, sodium, and fat that we assume those to
be the ingredients to which most are entitled, while affluent
people, foodies, and “health freaks” have the precious means to
choose otherwise. Certainly, processed treats can have their
place. But they do not belong at the center of our diets. Making
meaningful dietary improvements across society requires stat-
ing loudly and clearly this fundamental truth: every single one
of us deserves the means to eat healthfully. Every single one of
us deserves to eat food that meets our tastes, respects our unique
and collective identities, and fosters our health.
We must also assume collective ownership for this human
right. For too long, our country has placed the burden of eating
healthy on individuals and families. That burden has often fallen
on mothers. But there is no biological reason why food should be
solely mothers’ cognitive, emotional, and logistical responsibility
to shoulder. As a society, we should consider foodwork — ​the labor
of nourishing current and future generations — ​a cornerstone of
American infrastructure. And rather than being deemed “wom-
en’s work,” these tasks should be distributed equitably and broadly
to include fathers, partners, schools, and workplaces.2
In addition to burdening mothers with an enormous respon-
sibility that should be shared instead, this country has long been
deferential to the food industry’s interests. It has been overly
invested in a corporate-​serving narrative of personal responsi-
bility with no parallel requirement of social responsibility. This
personal responsibility narrative — ​which underscores that indi-
viduals’ diets and health are up to them alone — ​often resonates
because of a broader ethos of American individualism as well as

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 Where We Go

how individual our diets feel. Optimal health comes from disci-
pline and disease from laziness, the narrative goes.
It is time not only to reject that rhetoric but to turn our gaze
outward. Personal responsibility has never solved a public health
problem or remedied an inequity. Food is no exception. Cer-
tainly, many of us could make small choices to eat differently.
Many of the families I met had either done so or were trying to
figure out how to eat more nutritiously with the resources they
had. But, largely due to the structures implemented by the food
industry and federal government, most felt like they were fight-
ing an uphill battle — ​and losing.
Assuming a collective responsibility demands policy changes
over personal ones. And food-​specific policy reforms are an
important place to start. For years, society has accepted federal
nutrition-​assistance programs and food banks as essential scaf-
folds that allow low-​income families to eat. But these programs
and institutions were designed to provide emergency relief, not
to support daily life. What’s more, food-​assistance programs still
remain underutilized.3 Undocumented families are ineligible
for programs like SNAP, and language barriers and government
distrust can prevent qualifying immigrant families from access-
ing these benefits. We need real, concerted efforts to increase
enrollment to ensure the broadest swath of society has access to
this aid.4 These programs must also move beyond reducing hun-
ger and realize their potential to improve nutrition, which they
currently do an inadequate job of.5 As long as families are still
stretching their personal and federal dollars to keep everyone
fed, full, and happy, the quality of families’ purchases may
remain low. Families must feel financially empowered and capa-
ble of buying the nutritious foods they want and deserve.6
This means, first, expanding the amount of money that
families receive in food assistance each month. At the time of the
writing of this book, there are encouraging signs that
food-​assistance benefits may increase in a lasting way. The

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coronavirus pandemic and accompanying economic upheaval of

2020 sparked a hunger crisis in the United States, leading an
additional 4.5 million Americans to enroll in SNAP. In response,
in early 2021, the Biden administration accelerated a campaign
of hunger relief that increased SNAP benefits by more than one
billion dollars a month and set the stage for lasting expansions of
food assistance. This is exciting because programs like SNAP and
WIC will be most effective when they guarantee that families
have enough food; removing concerns about hunger and satiety
grants families the financial bandwidth to prioritize nutrition.
Introducing financial incentives to promote the purchase of
nutritious foods can also aid in this. Incentive programs work by
stretching federal-​assistance dollars further when families pur-
chase nutritious foods. Already, these incentive programs are
being piloted in communities across the country. Double Up
Food Bucks and Healthy Incentives Pilot programs incentivize
fruit and vegetable purchases, the former by doubling allotments
to purchase nutritious foods and the latter by offering a thirty-​
cent rebate for every SNAP dollar spent on fruits and vegetables.
These incentives increase families’ purchasing power and reduce
the tough choices that families are often forced to make between
a nutritious purchase and one that packs a higher caloric, emo-
tional, or symbolic punch. They allow parents to buy nutritious
foods while also granting them resources to indulge some of
their kids’ food requests. So far, the results suggest that these
programs encourage more nutritious consumption.7
We must also expand and improve the National School
Lunch Program and the School Breakfast Program, which serve
­free- and reduced-​price lunches and breakfasts to low-​income
students across the country. Every day, thirty-​one million chil-
dren eat school meals; for some, these meals make up half of
their daily calories.8 But so many more children would benefit
from access to free or subsidized meals during the school day.
Indeed, a universal school-​ meal program — ​ available to all

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 Where We Go

students, regardless of family income — ​ would help support

children’s nutritional intake, rectify socioeconomic and racial
inequalities, and improve learning outcomes.9 While universal
school meals are common in many industrialized nations, the
proposition has long been seen as radical in the United States
and politically unfeasible, particularly in recent years under a
Republican administration. But the coronavirus pandemic began
to change that; incredible economic hardship, sudden school
closures, and soaring rates of food insecurity put pressure on
school districts to find creative ways to equitably feed more hun-
gry children within highly constrained budgets. To support
schools, the USDA began to offer federal waivers that reim-
bursed school districts for meals that were available to all stu-
dents, regardless of income. This policy not only offered a
lifeline to families but also began to lay the groundwork for a
similar long-​term solution. The universal school meal is an idea
whose time may have finally come in America.
Alongside expanding the program to serve more children, the
USDA needs to significantly improve the nutritional quality and
aesthetic appeal of these meals. Corporate interests have long
been and remain the biggest barrier to nutritious school meals.
Because school meals fall under the jurisdiction of the Depart-
ment of Agriculture, entities like the dairy lobby have an outsize
influence on what goes on kids’ plates. It is how school cafeterias
end up overflowing with cheese pizza and cartons of chocolate
milk. The Obama administration’s bipartisan Healthy, Hunger-​
Free Kids Act of 2010 took the biggest stride in recent history to
improve school food. It updated nutrition standards to align with
the Dietary Guidelines for Americans, upping the availability and por-
tion sizes of fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, requiring kids to
select a fruit or vegetable with each meal, establishing calorie
ranges, removing trans fats, and limiting sodium levels.
Many of those improvements were rolled back under the
Trump administration beginning in 2016, but we must continue

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to fight for higher-​quality, nutritious school meals that not only

nourish children but also teach kids about food, expose them to
new ingredients, flavors, and dishes, and shape their under-
standing of food. Currently, school meals are blatantly homoge-
nous, inadequately reflecting the diversity of students who eat
them. Apart from the occasional taco, cafeteria fare is suppos-
edly “American,” featuring items like burgers and fries. But what
if kids saw themselves reflected in school meals? What if the
dishes schools served helped kids learn to appreciate a wider
range of cultural cuisines? Just as food has the power to con-
nect, school food can help cultivate kids’ taste for different
ingredients, spices, and dishes while fostering an appreciation
of America’s diverse culinary landscape. Schools could become
powerful sites for nourishing and teaching kids all the ways to
eat a nutritious diet. Schools could offer nutritious foods from
all over the world, from aloo gobi to pho to paella. They could
prepare meals that celebrate the traditions and dishes of the
communities they serve. They could also provide and teach
about ingredients that are globally shared; for instance, cafete-
rias could showcase all the different cultural variations of dump-
lings, such as samosas, gyoza, empanadas, fufu, and ravioli.
Increasing kids’ access to healthy meals must be coupled with
minimizing their exposure to junk food. This requires regulat-
ing the food industry, which currently spends almost two billion
dollars a year on marketing to youth, targeting its least nutritious
brands to Black and Latinx kids. The solution is to ban market-
ing to children, which is also the recommendation of every lead-
ing public health expert and organization that has taken this
issue on. Currently, the only marketing regulation in schools is
that companies cannot market items that don’t meet school-​
nutrition standards. But this still allows companies to sell slightly
healthier junk food in vending machines and snack shops and to
market junk food through branded fundraisers, “educational”
materials, incentives for teachers, and sponsorships.10

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 Where We Go

Banning marketing to children would benefit kids and par-

ents. If kids weren’t inundated with ads for unhealthy treats on
TV, on their phones, and in schools, they would stop asking
their parents for them nonstop. Moms wouldn’t have to decide
between saying no and risking a battle with their kids and say-
ing yes and giving their kids something they don’t want to.
Currently, corporations hide behind the guise of “helping”
moms feed their kids. They promise moms ease, comfort, and
convenience. They promise moms quiet, happy children. They
promise moms the chance to be “good” by making their lives
easier and getting their kids fed. They promise less sodium and
fat and more whole grains and protein. They promise health.
But apart from, perhaps, convenience, the industry does not
deliver on any of these promises. In fact, it brings parents the
exact opposite. It fosters nagging and begging. It prompts melt-
downs and tantrums in the supermarket. It forces moms to sac-
rifice their preferences to keep kids quiet and content. It
promotes lies about food’s qualities and benefits.
It also increases maternal guilt, anxiety, and shame. Today,
because feeding families largely remains moms’ work, moms are
the ones who primarily suffer from the food industry’s power
and reach. They are the ones who have to navigate their kids’
preferences. They have to bear the weight of judgment — ​by soci-
ety at large and internalized by themselves — ​for what goes into
their kids’ bodies. Corporations make moms harder on them-
selves than they already are by reinforcing the idea that moms
alone are responsible for what their kids eat, all the while bom-
barding kids with ads for foods that deviate from the nutritious
diets moms want them to eat.
Banning marketing to kids would give moms a fighting
chance of being able to feed their kids what they want rather
than what corporations push on them. Currently, only those
families with the most money, time, and bandwidth have a shot
at prevailing against the industry — ​ and even those families

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often struggle and even fail. Protection from the food industry
should be a right granted to all families, not a privilege reserved
for the few.11
Food-​specific reforms must be accompanied by sweeping
structural reforms that materially better families’ conditions.
While increasing SNAP benefits and access to free and reduced-​
price school meals is an important expansion of the social safety
net, the primary societal goal should be to invest so strongly in
families that there is no need for these programs in the first
place. A broad, societal investment in families means lifting par-
ents out of poverty and offering them the opportunities they
deserve to raise their children with a sense of self-​worth and
support. It means ensuring that every family has the financial,
psychological, and emotional resources to feed themselves the
way they desire and deserve. Poverty rates are higher in the U.S.
than in other industrialized nations because we lack the policies
to support those at risk of being poor. We need structural solu-
tions that make it possible for all families to live with the secu-
rity, stability, and dignity to which they are entitled. Key to these
structural changes is tackling the underlying conditions that
cement families in place at or below the poverty line.
The first condition is the lack of a living wage. Most low-​
income parents I met worked full-​time, but for too many of
them, the wage they made was simply not enough to predictably
feed and provide for their children. That parents were working
themselves to the bone to merely scrape by is unacceptable. A
living wage would allow a parent to work one job instead of the
two or three many hold today. It would grant parents a predict-
able, consistent income that would make a reliable monthly bud-
get possible. It would give them hours back to spend grocery
shopping and cooking; it would preserve precious time for them
to spend with their kids and make positive, new memories with
them. By giving parents more financial and temporal resources
to invest in their children, a livable wage’s impact on parents’

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 Where We Go

sense of dignity would be as wide-​reaching as its economic influ-

ence. Together, these positive changes would shift the symbolic
meaning of junk food for lower-​income parents. With more time
and money to spend on other things for their kids, a bag of Dori-
tos would go from being a potent symbol of love and care to
being, well, just a bag of Doritos.
Beyond work, America must tackle housing, another under-
lying condition of poverty. America is in an affordable-​housing
crisis, as housing prices have outpaced wages and the affordable-​
housing supply falls drastically short of demand. California,
where four out of five low-​income households spend more than
30 percent of their income on rent, is one of the least affordable
places to live. Most low-​income families I met spent more than
half of their income on rent, just like over a quarter of renters
nationally do. There is also not enough federal assistance for
housing; nationally, only one in five low-​income households that
need federal rental assistance receive it.12
Families I met who couldn’t access federal assistance found
housing solutions that came at a high financial, psychological,
or emotional cost. These solutions demanded sacrifices that no
parent should have to make. Parents rented spare rooms for
their kids in shared apartments with kitchen cupboards pad-
locked to keep roommates from eating their food. Others dou-
bled up with family and friends, lived in cars, crashed on
living-​room couches, or slept in bathtubs. Other parents paid
market rates, which landed them in homes with unsafe or
unsanitary conditions. I encountered bathrooms covered in
mold, overrun with cockroaches, and echoing with the sounds
of rats between the walls. I interviewed families that lived in
neighborhoods with notoriously poor air quality and those that
put up with leaky roofs and no hot water. The poor housing
quality I witnessed has been shown to increase parents’ stress
and anxiety and damage kids’ mental and physical health.13
These parents also faced housing instability, including forced

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moves and evictions.14 I met families who had weathered up to

four evictions in the past few years. Each one of these moves was
destabilizing for families, increasing their financial stress and
stripping away the psychological and physical security of having
a home. Parents who experience eviction suffer more material
hardship, parenting stress, and maternal depression.15
Investing in affordable housing for all families makes both
economic and nutritional sense. Unstable, unsafe, and over-
priced housing zaps parents’ resources for food, as they expend
time, energy, and money struggling to keep a roof over their
kids’ heads. Conversely, better housing portends better nutri-
tion for children; as households have to devote less of their
income to housing expenses, their budget shares for food and
other necessities increase.16 They simply have more money with
which to feed kids. When parents are worried about environ-
mental toxins and eviction, they have less time and energy to
focus on kids’ diets. They must prioritize more pressing needs,
like clean air and shelter. A stable, safe address means the ability
to keep the same jobs and maintain kids’ enrollment in the
same schools. It can mean a shorter commute and more time at
home. It means always having a kitchen to cook in and a fridge
to store perishables. It means not wondering how, when, and
with what money you will feed your children. It means a table
around which to share meals with your children. It means stabil-
ity and security, which increase the latitude to move nutritious
eating up on parents’ priority lists.
Finally, beyond poverty-​ focused policies, universal policies
would benefit all American families and have positive, cascading
effects on their diets. Industrialized nations with strong federal
family policies offer paid family leave, paid sick and vacation leave,
subsidized preschool, and universal health-​care coverage.17 In the
United States, no such policies exist at the federal level, although
as I write this book, there are signs that that may soon change.
President Biden has recently proposed the American Families

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 Where We Go

Plan, part of a broader spending proposal to combat the economic

downturn of the pandemic. In addition to offering universal free
preschool, the plan would establish a nationally mandated paid
parental, family, and personal-​illness leave.18
The plan’s proposed policies make sense because they
account for the realities of modern parenthood and families’
struggles to make ends meet. When parents can’t afford to take
leave without pay, they either don’t take leave, take less leave than
they need, or take leave and lose wages. Single mothers, espe-
cially of color, suffer the most without these safety-​net provisions.
Most low-​income moms I met were single moms who did not
receive child support. They were also entitled to zero paid leave
with the birth of their children, had few sick days, and generally
no vacation days. When a baby or family member needed care-
taking, moms quit their jobs or reduced their work hours. When
they were then no longer able to afford rent, some moved them-
selves and their kids in with a grandmother or aunt at best, into
shelters or cars at worst. They experienced corrosive stress and
anxiety about keeping a roof over their children’s heads and
their own two feet on the ground. Policies that help assure paren-
tal employment and income through tough times would help.
Together, structural wage and housing reforms could trans-
form the contexts within which parents — ​and, in particular,
moms — ​are raising and feeding their kids. It would lift them
out of scarcity and into sufficiency. Remove the ongoing strug-
gle and trauma of deprivation, and parents can worry less about
children’s safety and psychological health. Remove the destabili-
zations, stresses, and fears that characterize American poverty,
and parents have the financial and emotional bandwidth to
focus on other dimensions of their kids’ well-​being, like their
diets, knowing full well that their kids are broadly okay. By
granting families more financial security, less stress, and more
time and bandwidth to care for loved ones, a tide of universal,
family policies would help lift all boats.19

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The point is simple: When parents are cared for by society,

they can best support their kids. When our government and
leaders support all individuals, no matter their circumstances,
we each have a real chance to meaningfully care for ourselves
and our loved ones.

The policy reforms and structural changes I laid out, along with
others, will be key to reducing nutritional inequality and ensur-
ing that all families have the means to consume a nutritious
diet. But as we work collectively toward these changes, there is a
role for each of us as individuals. It starts in the way that we talk
about food. Our words have power. They can encourage empa-
thy or judgment, understanding or critique. When we judge oth-
ers for their food choices, we help build a more judgmental
society. In contrast, when we consider what we would do in their
shoes, we create a more compassionate one.
Together, we can shift the conversation around food and
nutrition to assign less individual culpability and instead hold
policy makers and corporations accountable. When confronted
with negative portrayals of how families and kids eat, we always
have a choice. We can dig in our heels and perpetuate a culture
of individual judgment and blame, or we can pause to consider
the larger influence of impossibly challenging contexts, paren-
tal pressures, inadequate social policies, and corporate interests.
This applies specifically to how we talk about mothers and
food. The moms I met and my own experiences in motherhood
showed me how widely reaching and deeply resonant society’s
critiques of moms can be. There is, apparently, no correct way to
feed a child. Society reminds moms that no matter what they do,
there is always something they should be doing better, from
reducing their kids’ sugar intake to expanding their palates to
avoiding formula. Moms are expected to achieve the impossi-
ble: ward off a predatory food industry, prepare healthy home-
made meals, and follow ever-​evolving nutritional advice. On top

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 Where We Go

of all that, they are expected to enjoy doing it! Moms are sup-
posed to embrace being on the hook for their children’s intake
and accept responsibility for how that intake shapes their kids’
bodies. Moms shouldn’t mind that others use their kids as cen-
tral sources of feedback about their maternal worth. What’s
more, moms should be thankful for the feedback, even though
it is most often used to reveal to them their inadequacies and
shortcomings.
This questionable and precarious gold standard of intensive
mothering requires that moms keep striving to do more, to be
more. It rewards a select few as laudable, while the vast majority
can never be child-​centered, labor-​intensive, expert-​g uided, or
emotionally absorbed enough. Moms of color and single and
low-​income moms suffer the most under the assumptions and
prejudices built into our societal ideals of motherhood. These
ideals add to the already heavy burdens these moms carry, as
they must continually demonstrate that they are caring, com-
mitted providers, not the negligent, uncaring ones society gen-
erally casts them as.
That said, I was also struck by this simple truth: even moms
who had the deck stacked in their favor often still felt like they
were falling short. Before beginning this research, I expected to
meet at least one mom who felt really good about how her family
was eating. As I continued my interviews and observations, I kept
waiting to meet her. She’s out there, I told myself. She had to be.
But I never found this elusive mother, the one who truly
appreciated and patted herself on the back for all the hard work
she put in, the one who knew that she was doing an incredible
job. Instead, my conversations with moms left me feeling disap-
pointed and mystified. What does it say about our society that
even the most privileged moms were generally riddled with
stress and feelings of inadequacy about their kids’ diets and
their own worth as mothers?
These challenges also felt personal to moms, like something

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they alone were battling and that was up to them as individuals

to solve. Most moms were mired in intensive mothering’s expec-
tations and could not see the forest for the trees; they weren’t
aware that every other mom around them was fighting a similar
fight and feeling like she was failing. But from where I was sit-
ting, moms weren’t the failures. Society had failed them.
If we as a society are to stop piling feelings of failure onto
mothers, we have to unlearn what we have been socialized to
believe about motherhood. Each of us individually can start by
recognizing, appreciating, and supporting all of the hard work
that mothers across society devote to nourishing their children.
We can question the sexist, classist, and racist biases and assump-
tions that lead us to critique them so harshly. We can recognize
that at the same time that American society has fallen short of
supporting families’ diets, it has encouraged us to judge others — ​
and ourselves — ​unforgivingly for how we eat. And we can take
steps to change that reality — to hold ourselves and others to a
higher standard.
The point is: just because our country has long been this
way does not mean its future is set in stone. Our nutritional
problems are neither inevitable nor intractable. Together, we
can chart the path toward remedying nutritional inequality in
America, one grounded in understanding and empathy for
individuals and families and accountability and action for the
public and private sectors.
The future of our own and our children’s health is at stake,
and it depends on our ability to reimagine and reshape our
country in a way that takes ownership for everyone’s well-​being.
It hinges on our ability to collectively shoulder the responsibility
not just for our own future but for our children’s futures as well.
Are we willing to do what it takes to ensure that families — ​all
families — ​have the means to eat nutritiously? Nothing less than
our collective health and well-being depend on our answer to
that question.

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 About This Project

In the summer of 2013, I spent two months working in the nutri-

tion policy department of the Washington, D ­ C–​based Center
for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI), one of America’s old-
est and most powerful consumer advocacy groups promoting
safer and healthier foods.1 My primary job was to conduct
research on checkout aisles.
“Checkout aisles?” friends and colleagues asked me, furrow-
ing their brows. I nodded, agreeing that these seemed an
unusual object of study. But for an organization interested in
understanding all features of the American food environment,
checkout aisles were worthy of investigation. For years, food and
beverage corporations have strategically and unabashedly worked
to bombard shoppers with low-​ cost, high-​
calorie, unhealthy
treats at the end of their shopping trips. My responsibility that
summer was to document how and with what temptations check-
out aisles were luring consumers.
For two swampy months, I traveled around the District of
Columbia visiting chain stores — ​including supermarkets, pharma-
cies, gas stations, and toy shops — ​to record in excruciating detail
what they stocked in their checkout aisles. A clipboard in one hand
and mechanical pencil in the other, I spent hours examining
shelves of processed foods. I counted bags of chips and tallied cans
of soda. I answered employees’ inquiries about who I was and what
I was doing. I got kicked out of Bed, Bath, and Beyond — ​twice.2

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 About This Project

Researching checkout aisles expanded my understanding of

the American food environment. It also gave me informal
opportunities to observe people navigating it. I watched cus-
tomers place last-​minute Almond Joys on conveyor belts and
nine-​year-​olds melt down at moms’ refusal to buy them Twixes. I
saw how the food industry preyed on consumers and left them
feeling tempted, frustrated, and confused. That summer, when
I wasn’t standing in checkout lanes, I was reading about food in
America. I started learning more and more about nutritional
inequalities, which made it clear to me that not all consumers
were equally positioned and privileged to push back against this
industry.
I wanted to understand these inequalities’ root causes.
At the time, most popular and scholarly commentary on
nutritional inequality focused on financial and geographic food
access, food deserts in particular. I was suspicious of this dis-
course’s oversimplification of what I saw as an extremely com-
plex topic. I believed that food access shaped people’s diets in
different ways, but I questioned whether food’s price and prox-
imity were the sole, or even primary, determinants of food
choice. Rather, I suspected that these factors interacted with
others to differently shape people’s diets and fuel broader diet
and health disparities.
When I returned to Stanford University in the fall of 2013, I
began designing a research study to investigate, through inter-
views and observations, the facts and forces driving people’s
food choices. The negotiations and meltdowns I had witnessed
at checkout aisles drew me to focus on parents. Parents had to
navigate the food environment not only as eaters but as feeders.
Over the next two years, I interviewed one hundred sixty
parents and kids and conducted two hundred hours of observa-
tions among families and in public schools. While the vast
majority of these data did not make it into this book’s pages,
they vitally shaped everything that did.

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 About This Project

Many parents I interviewed had kids from six months to

twenty-​five years old. But all were parents of at least one teen-
ager. I decided to focus on families with teenagers, precisely
because the teenage years are difficult ones nutritionally; kids’
diets usually decrease in quality as they become teenagers. I
wanted to see how parents and kids from all kinds of families
navigated this challenging phase. In every family, I interviewed
at least one parent and one teen and sometimes other family
members too. Hearing different perspectives helped me grasp
the push and pull of each generation on what was consumed
and garner a fuller, more accurate picture of families’ food pat-
terns. I interviewed kids and parents separately, usually at home.
Grant funding allowed me to compensate each family that par-
ticipated in an interview with sixty dollars.
I spoke with a range of families that differed socioeconomi-
cally and ethno-​racially, including roughly equal numbers of
families from low, middle, and high socioeconomic backgrounds,
as well as white, Black, Latinx, Asian, and multiracial families.3
I made sure to speak with first- and second-​generation families
as well as those with deep roots in the United States; married,
cohabitating, and single parents; and single- and double-​earner
families.4 This variation allowed me to learn about as many dif-
ferent families’ experiences as possible while also distilling com-
mon themes and shared experiences. It showed me how different
types of resources and privileges are intimately entwined in peo-
ple’s food choices, sometimes in unexpected ways.
I began recruiting families for the research at Hillview Cen-
tral High School, a public high school with short buildings and
grassy knolls located on a quiet middle-​class residential street in
Silicon Valley. My plan was to find families to interview while
observing students at the school. Hillview’s student body was
unusually socioeconomically diverse, which would facilitate
recruiting a diverse group of families.
My doctoral mentor connected me with Nicola Vasquez, a

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 About This Project

bubbly twenty-​something Spanish and physical-​education teacher

with long black hair and an infectious smile. I visited Nicola at
Hillview on a Friday morning and we toured the campus, mean-
dering between security guards in golf carts and harried teach-
ers wrangling clusters of students back into classrooms. Twenty
minutes after Nicola shook my hand, she was convinced that
Hillview was the right place for me to conduct my research.
“We should get you in to see Martin today,” Nicola said. She
led me to the principal’s office, where I found myself face-​to -​face
with the man himself. Martin Schnell, Hillview’s new principal,
was an endearingly gruff man with squinting eyes, thick, black-​
framed glasses, and a white goatee.
“Who are you and what do you want from me?” Martin
looked up briefly, his brow furrowed, from a towering stack of
papers on a cluttered desk as I stood motionless in his doorway.
I eagerly delivered my spiel, hoping he wouldn’t notice the
quiver in my voice. I was a doctoral student, I explained, inter-
ested in researching how his students and their families ate.
Martin, a new principal eager to make a name for himself, was
into it.
“I could be the nutrition principal!” He chuckled before
cuing me to leave by refocusing on his paperwork.
Three weeks later, I had secured approval for the research
from Stanford’s ethics review board, and Martin had obtained
Hillview parents’ permission.
“You’ll always need to pick up a visitor pass in the front office
when you come here,” Martin informed me during one of our
early meetings. But this formality soon disappeared, as I morphed
quickly from a school visitor to a regular fixture. Over the next
year, students and staff came to know me as a nonintrusive addi-
tion to the community. I found families to interview through
teachers, staff, and students themselves. I attended PTA meet-
ings and watched baseball games. I helped run the student
store, a windowless room near the front office that sold Smart

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 About This Project

Snacks and flavored water. Lunch ladies recognized me, as did

student council members, sports coaches, and security guards.
Some knew me by my real name but most warmly referred to me
as the “nutrition lady” (despite my insistence that I was not a
nutritionist).
After months at Hillview, I decided to expand my research
beyond its campus to find a broader diversity of families. Hill-
view families were primarily middle- and high-​income white
families and low-​income Latinx families. But I also wanted to
speak with Black and Asian families, low-​income white families,
and high-​income Latinx families.
My catchment area became the Bay Area in its entirety, and I
found families through a variety of methods. I approached them
in person at shopping malls, gyms, gas stations, pharmacies,
and churches. I posted about my study on social media sites and
professional listservs. I hung flyers at local grocers and commu-
nity centers. I also used limited snowball sampling, meaning
that families I interviewed referred me to other families.
Recruiting families in the community was not as easy as it
was at Hillview. I was regularly turned down, stood up, and can-
celed on. I quickly discovered that I was an unessential addition
to families’ busy calendars. I learned to always confirm twenty-​
four hours before an interview and to carry an engaging book
with me wherever I went in case I found myself waiting around
for an hour or two.
Some families were simpler to recruit than others. Wealthy
white and East and South Asian families went out of their way to
participate. When my husband posted my recruitment pitch to his
college alumni listserv, I received an onslaught of e‑mail. For once,
I was the one having to turn families down. But affluent Black and
low-​income Asian families were virtually impossible for me to
recruit by myself. Historical legacies of ­ exploitation and mis­
treatment by academics — ​ medical researchers in particular — ​
made members of these communities rightfully suspicious of

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 About This Project

participating. I built relationships with gatekeepers 

— ​trusted
members  — ​of these communities, who vouched for me and
connected me to other families. Janae Lathrop, the initially
­
wary mom I introduced in chapter 10, was one such gatekeeper.
After our interview, Janae e‑mailed her wider network of afflu-
ent Black mothers to let them know about my study. For the fol­
lowing two days, my in‑box was flooded with interested moms
reaching out to learn more about the research and find out how
to participate.

Interviews are useful for learning about people’s experiences,

memories, meanings, perceptions, and judgments. But they also
have their limits, subject as they are to people’s filters and face-​
saving desires. Food in particular is a loaded, sensitive topic and
therefore extra-​challenging to discuss candidly. Emphasizing
my sociological — ​not nutritional — ​focus to families was one
way that I navigated these challenges. Once inside their homes,
I typically began by defining my professional identity. “I’m a
sociologist,” I’d say with a smile. “Not a nutritionist.”
Parents would often respond with theatrical sighs of relief. I
made it clear that I didn’t want to count their calories, nor was I
invested in how healthy or unhealthy their diets were. It didn’t
matter to me if they drank sodas or ate brussels sprouts. But
what they could help me understand, I explained, was how and
why they ate the way they did. I was there to listen and learn. No
detail was too small or too random, and there was no such thing
as a right or wrong answer. Most important, I assured them they
could speak honestly without fear of judgment. I took it as the
highest compliment of the trust I’d built when parents said
they’d been more honest with me about their diets than they
were with their doctor.
Creating a nonjudgmental space was key to learning from
families. Interviewing multiple family members also helped me
better understand a family’s food patterns. That parents’ and

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 About This Project

kids’ accounts generally aligned gave me confidence that I was

getting a reasonably accurate view of how families ate. And
when there were discrepancies between the stories, I returned
to each family member to discuss and, if possible, resolve them.
I also modeled my desire for honesty and detail by asking
open-​ended questions that allowed families to talk at length. My
probes delved into not only how families ate but also how they
thought and felt about food. What role did food play in their lives?
What meanings did it hold for them? And how did those mean-
ings translate, if at all, into their food choices?
With all families, I explored the role of finances, culture,
and convenience in shaping their diets. I also dug into the places
they spent time and how those influenced their food choices.
What was their neighborhood like? What shops and stores were
nearby, and what was missing? What kind of food did they serve
at work, church, and school? How did their friends and families
eat, and what pressures did that exert on their own diets? With
lower-​income families, I explored their experiences with food
insecurity, their participation in formal safety-​net programs like
SNAP and WIC, and how they cast their own informal safety net
through food banks and social support. I inquired about par-
ents’ food histories: What kind of food had they grown up with
and how had those experiences shaped the way they ate now, if
at all? I talked to kids about how they ate not only with their
families but also with their friends and classmates.
Still, I knew that no matter how much I tried to make the
interview about families, who I was shaped what transpired
between us. My identity opened certain doors and undoubtedly
closed others in this research. Being a woman was beneficial — ​
arguably crucial — ​since conducting interviews involved spending
many hours alone with mothers and children. My gender helped
moms feel comfortable leaving me in private with their kids. Even
though I was not a mother at the time, some moms also saw the
interview as an opportunity to give me advice “for the future.”

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 About This Project

I believe that my racial identity, in particular my racial ambi-

guity, was helpful overall, though at times it seemed to make
mothers uncomfortable. I am neither white nor clearly ethni-
cally identifiable (although my name certainly hints at my eth-
nic origins). Because most moms knew that I didn’t share their
racial/ethnic backgrounds, they couldn’t take for granted that
I’d understand their diets. This motivated them to explain
things to me clearly and in great detail. They discussed the role
of particular dishes in cultural traditions and celebrations, and
they laid out for me the ingredients in family recipes. But some-
times, I could tell that my identity sowed discomfort in families,
and I wondered how that might have altered their accounts. I
interviewed one white mom who repeatedly told me over the
course of an hour how much she enjoyed “ethnic food.” Finally,
after fifty minutes, she asked what my “specific ethnicity” was, at
which point she began explaining how much she loved Indian
food. She listed some Indian restaurants in the area and shared
her favorite dishes, perhaps in an effort to prove her cultural
competence to me. Ultimately, while I tried to meet families
where they were and be as open as possible, I had to come to
terms with the fact that my appearance and presence shaped
their accounts in ways beyond my control.
I recorded every conversation so that I could be present and
fully attentive during interviews. This left me with hundreds of
hours of interviews to listen to and transcribe.5 But there was more
to capturing interviews than just relistening and rereading dia-
logue. Immediately after every interview, I spent hours sitting on
the stool at my kitchen counter replaying each recording and writ-
ing up field notes. These notes were filled with detailed descrip-
tions of what I had observed: people’s facial expressions and
clothing, their interactions with each other, the smell of their apart-
ments, the comfort or tension that permeated the conversation.
As I wrote down the facts, I also put into words what I was
learning and how my own understanding of families’ diets was

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 About This Project

evolving. What had that interview taught me? How had this
interview aligned with or diverged from others? Writing field
notes was how I made sense of my data. By the time I sat down in
2016 to formally analyze thousands of pages of interview tran-
scripts, this process had already given me a sense of what these
analyses might uncover.

Beyond families’ stories, interviews offered countless opportu-

nities to observe their diets in action. Mothers whom I met in
cafés often bought breakfast and lunch, and teens showed up to
interviews with snacks in hand. More than a few times, I stepped
into families’ living rooms to find a smorgasbord of appetizers
laid out in anticipation of my arrival. Some made me lunch; oth-
ers asked if I wanted to look through their fridges. I sampled
samosas and collard greens, quesadillas and cheesecake.
These relatively brief observations showed me that more
extensive, sustained observations were key to unpacking fami-
lies’ food choices. These would also showcase how food fit within
the contours of family life. But to my knowledge, no one had col-
lected these kinds of data yet. So I decided to ask four families
I’d interviewed if I could observe them.
All four met my request with a subtle blend of curiosity and
confusion. Nyah, Dana, Renata, and Julie all wanted to know
what exactly I’d be observing, whether they should act normal or
plan something special for my visits, and if it would be “weird.” I
told them the truth — ​that I was interested in everything about
their lives and that I absolutely did not want them to make special
plans for my visits. They should simply live their lives as normal,
whether that meant preparing a four-​course meal or watching So
You Think You Can Dance while baking a frozen lasagna.
“Are you sure you want to study us? ” Dana squinted at me
during my first home visit. It was a Tuesday evening, and we were
sitting on her living-​room couch watching Paige entertain us
with somersault after somersault.

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 About This Project

“Absolutely,” I assured her. Then, smiling, I motioned to

Paige, who had somersaulted herself into a fit of laughter. “I
wouldn’t want to miss this.”
“Okay!” Dana laughed and looked at me quizzically. “If you
say so.”
Ultimately, all four families opened their doors to me. I
started observing them during different hours of the day, on
different days of the week, and at different places. Food was
front and center during mealtimes and trips to the supermar-
ket, but I also came to appreciate food’s omnipresence in daily
life. Food snuck its way into countless moments, big and small:
during trips to the mall and in the car, at graduation parties
and after dance recitals. Because food was everywhere, I too
tried to be everywhere. The more time I spent with each family,
the more hospitality they showed me, welcoming me into their
lives in unexpected ways. I began by asking to tag along to differ-
ent outings, but soon I found myself getting invited to birthday
parties, holiday celebrations, and cheerleading competitions,
and to meet extended family and friends.
While observing, I thought about what to do with myself.
How should I behave? How could I ensure that I was neither a
burden nor an unintentional influence on families’ behaviors?
Sociologists have long asked questions like these, debating the
researcher’s role in ethnographic observations. There are no
simple answers. Some scholars propose that the ethnographer
should be an unobtrusive observer, while others advocate for
becoming a full-​fledged participant in people’s lives.
My approach fell somewhere between these two poles but
edged toward observation over participation. Most of the time, I
tried to settle into the background and watch events unfold nat-
urally. The first day I observed a family was generally a bit awk-
ward. But that soon changed, and assuming a fly‑on‑the-​wall
approach helped me become a taken-​ for-​
granted fixture in

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 About This Project

families’ lives. Parents and kids fought, argued, played, gos-

siped, and went about their daily lives with little regard for my
presence.
When it wasn’t obvious how to act, I tried to read the
moment. Most of the time, this led me to take a more hands-​off
approach. I avoided inserting myself physically or verbally into a
situation. But moments sometimes arose when remaining periph-
eral or detached felt either inappropriate or damaging to the
relationships I was building. It’s one thing to remain silent when
no one asks your opinion; it’s another to actively avoid answer-
ing questions or decline an invitation. These refusals may come
from a place of not wanting to unduly influence a situation, but
they come at a cost. On top of simply being rude, not engaging
can destroy hard-​earned trust and rapport and thus compro-
mise an ethnographer’s ability to continue conducting research.
So when families tried to include me, I let myself be included.
I boiled rice, stirred pasta sauce, discussed the news, and
weighed in on prom dresses. I shared parts of my life with fami-
lies too, including childhood memories, weekend plans, favorite
dishes, and my plan to write a book. Sometimes I assumed the
role of a casual but inquisitive interviewer, asking questions to
understand what was happening around me. One Wednesday I
accompanied Renata to her church’s service, which took place
in an auditorium that could easily hold two thousand people. I
noticed ten minutes in that she was treating our visit like a
guided tour, introducing me to the pastor and showing me
where the youth service was held. I mirrored her approach, ask-
ing questions along the way. “When did you start coming here?”
I inquired as we took our seats and waited for the service to
begin. A Christian rock band — ​with José on the drums — ​kicked
off the service, and lyrics flashed across a sprawling screen. I
joined Renata in singing along. Another afternoon we sat on the
couch eating Papa John’s and watching the TV show The Voice.

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 About This Project

“Who are you rooting for?” I asked her, biting into my cheese
pizza. Through it all, I strove to be someone that families
enjoyed having around. I tried to be kind and a good listener
and to always engage with humility.
I wrote down detailed notes while observing families, but, as
with interviews, I also spent hours after each observation session
typing up field notes. Since my goal was to understand families’
lives — ​and how food fit into those lives — ​I made note of anything
I saw happen at home, from family feuds to a broken washing
machine. I worked tirelessly to link what I saw happening in their
lives with what I observed was happening with their diets.6

I decided to embed myself within families to closely examine

and seek to understand the textures of their lives. But I was
keenly attuned to the dynamics of power and privilege inherent
in these kinds of researcher-​respondent relationships.
This meant that I worried constantly about doing right by
families. This concern in part drove me to financially compensate
families for interviews and observations. Allowing me to observe
them would require some effort on their end — ​ coordinating
with me, working out any necessary logistics, letting me steal a
pizza bagel or two — ​ and I was deeply uncomfortable with a
dynamic of me as researcher “taking” without offering anything in
return. All four moms were interested in the money, but, unsur-
prisingly, it meant much more to Nyah and Dana.
Still, I discovered that families weren’t just financially moti-
vated to participate. They shared personal motives as well. The
fact that I took a genuine interest in their lives meant something
to the moms I spent time with. While it is neither my intention
nor a broadcasted “benefit,” participating in the research
offered them a rare opportunity to be the center of attention
and the recognized experts on their own lives. In a small way,
moms became the heroes of a story I was documenting.

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 About This Project

That said, it was always clear to me that I was documenting

these stories as an outsider. I knew that no matter how well I
came to know any one family, I would never personally — ​in any
way, shape, or form — ​experience their lives as they did. I would
not weather the same losses, confront the same challenges, or
face the same hardships. Similarly, I would not mark the same
milestones or revel in the same victories. Each evening, I would
retreat to the studio apartment that I rented as a graduate stu-
dent, to the academic seminars where I read books and wrote
papers, and to an impeccably manicured college campus that
felt starkly disconnected from the world I observed. While I was
there with families, I never tried to become of them.
And yet, knowing full well the impossibility of walking a
mile in a family’s shoes, I was fortunate that they granted me
the chance to briefly walk alongside them. They helped me dis-
cover the most essential tool of social science: withholding judg-
ment. Withholding judgment isn’t the same thing as objectivity.
Social scientific research, like any human enterprise, can never
be objective. When I stepped into families’ homes, I always
brought who I was, what I looked like, and what I’d experienced
with me. My identities and histories shaped all aspects of my
study. Objectivity is beyond my control.
But a concerted effort to refrain from judgment lies well
within it.
As much as possible, I refrained. Of course, as a human being,
I did not always find this easy or achievable. Some moments tested
my limits. But whenever I fell off the horse, I carefully climbed
back on again. I worked to watch families carefully. I listened
closely. I questioned my reactions. I wrestled with my confusions.
I called out my biases. I shifted my paradigms. I repeatedly strove
to replace feelings of judgment with ones of sincere curiosity. And
in doing so, I noticed two things. First, the more families sensed
that I was not judging them, the more readily they allowed me to

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 About This Project

see behind the curtain. Second, the more I refrained from

judgment, the wider my mind opened and the more deeply I
came to appreciate the fuller context and circumstances of fami-
lies’ lives. Choices that may have seemed strange from the outside
revealed themselves to me as perfectly reasonable and rational.
A keener ability to see the rational in what was generally
deemed irrational translated into a more grounded, empa-
thetic, and responsive research process. This process infused
my interactions and relationships with families. It also — I sin-
cerely hope — shaped how I wrote this book for the better.
I remember one evening when I accompanied Dana to
Walmart to get Madison and Paige new clothes and snacks for
the week. The trip had been challenging, as the girls had bom-
barded Dana with endless requests. Could she get them Fruity
Pebbles, a new bike helmet, a two-​piece swimsuit? Dana couldn’t
really afford any of those things, at least not on that day. The last
light of dusk faded as we pulled into the driveway after the
exhausting outing. Her foot on the brake, Dana let the girls out.
She and I sat alone in the front seats. Dana put the car in park
before dropping her head into her hands. And there, completely
overwhelmed and overtired, she started to cry. It was a soft cry,
but unmistakably raw and vulnerable.
With no tissue to offer, I offered, instead, my ear. Gingerly plac-
ing my hand on her shoulder, I listened quietly as she told me all
about the struggles with family and friends that kept her up at night.
Her sister’s cancer diagnosis. Her ex‑husband’s drug problem. The
electricity bill. The cost of gymnastics camp. Dana shared, and I lis-
tened like I knew what she was talking about, because by that point,
I did. Moments like this deepened my understanding of everything
moms like Dana were going through. They helped me connect the
dots between the countless moving parts of families’ lives and the
food that graced their plates. And these moments also reminded
me that if there was ever a question — ​if I ever had to choose — ​I
would always decide to be a human first and a researcher second.

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 About This Project

I’m often asked how this research changed me. Especially now,
as a mother, how did spending so much time studying kids’ diets
affect how I approach my daughter’s? People generally assume
that the research made me care more about what I feed her.
How could spending that much time researching kids’ diets not
make someone obsessed with her own child’s intake?
In fact, the research had the opposite effect on me.
It’s not that I don’t want Veda to eat nutritiously. Like most
moms, I do. Also like most moms, my child’s health and well-​
being are of the utmost importance to me. But this research
solidified a truth I’d known for decades, a truth that had lodged
itself beneath my rib cage the first day I’d interacted with the
foster-​care system at nine years old. That truth is that I am pro-
foundly lucky. This luck is what set me on one trajectory and my
foster siblings on another. Now, as a mom, this same luck affords
me luxuries in this country — ​like stable housing and a livable
wage — ​that shape how I feed my daughter.
I cannot, after being touched by so many moms’ stories and
struggles, take these luxuries for granted. I am privileged to be
able to afford not only healthy food but also many other things I
wish to give my daughter. Society has not backed me into a situa-
tion where I have to use food to buffer my child against hard-
ship. I do not need to sacrifice my satiation for hers, and I have
the means to take shortcuts when necessary, or even convenient,
to secure the nutritious food I want. I always knew these were
luxuries, but my research helped me feel it. I can temper any of
my worries that sprout up about Veda eating a bowl of sugary
cereal or drinking a can of soda with the knowledge that, in this
country, these luxuries stack the deck in my favor as a mom and
in hers as my daughter.
The research also made me angrier. Motherhood is hard,
but there are so many ways that America makes it an untenable
struggle, whether through an inadequate federal safety net, a

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 About This Project

consistent prioritization of corporate interests over families’

health, an insidious rhetoric of personal (often maternal) over
social responsibility, or a general devaluation of all things deemed
“women’s work,” feeding included. Seeing moms’ struggles made
me extremely wary and resentful of ­intensive-​mothering stan-
dards. In a country that offers such limited support to families, I
resented the onslaught of expectations and judgment that
seemed to go hand in hand with motherhood. Why should moms
always be primary caregivers, multitaskers, and overinformed
self-​sacrificers? I felt furious for the moms I met. And as a mother
myself, I didn’t want to feel like I was constantly failing — ​like I
was never enough.
And yet, that is how I sometimes feel. There are moments
when, as a mother, I feel inadequate, less-​than, selfish. More
often than I’d like to admit, a deep desire bubbles up in me to
prove my commitment and devotion to my daughter. I want to
show beyond a doubt to her, myself, and others how “good” I am.
In those moments, I call the moms from this research to the
front of my mind. I think of the countless mothers I met who
inspired me with their perseverance and grit, imagination, and
resourcefulness. They remind me that, like them and despite
how it can feel, I am good. We all are. Me, Nyah, Dana, Renata,
Julie, Ximena, Janae, Sonali. We are all good moms. We love
and nourish our children however we can. We make it work,
whatever the circumstances. There is no question that our kids
are our world. But as moms, we deserve to live in a society built
of infinitely more empathy, appreciation, and support.

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 Acknowledgments

To the families who opened your doors to me: thank you for
your generosity and candor, and for granting me the privilege
of hearing your stories. Nyah, Dana, Renata, and Julie — ​you are
the heart and soul of this book, and I feel immensely fortunate
to know each of you. I only hope that, through these pages, I
have done justice to your struggles, ingenuity, and courage.
My literary agent, Jessica Papin, catapulted my dream of
becoming an author into a reality. She was instrumental at every
turn, and I’m grateful for her unwavering belief in this work
and in me as a writer. “This is going to be an important book,
Priya!” she once e‑mailed me when I had hit a low point in the
writing process. Her optimism and encouragement were exactly
what I needed to keep my head down and continue putting
words to the page. This book is infinitely better because it had
her as its fiercest advocate.
During my first conversation with my editor, Marisa Vigi-
lante, it quickly became clear to me that her grasp of the book’s
potential and contribution far exceeded my own. Thank you,
Marisa, for always being able to step back and share the bigger
picture with me, for your graceful, incisive editing, and for sim-
ply getting it. Working with you has been an incredible privi-
lege. To the rest of the team at Little, Brown Spark and
Hachette — ​Tracy Behar, Ian Straus, Fanta Diallo, Jayne Yaffe
Kemp, Carolyn Levin, Jessica Chun, Juliana Horbachevsky, and

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 Acknowledgments

Stephanie Reddaway — ​I appreciate all of the hard work you

devoted to this book and the way you guided me as a first-​time
author. Thank you to Tracy Roe for her expert copyediting and
attention to detail, and to Deborah Jacobs for her meticulous
proofreading.
This book grew out of research I conducted as a doctoral
student at Stanford University. I’m grateful for my colleagues
and mentors within the Department of Sociology who guided
me and helped shape me as a scholar. My dissertation adviser,
Tomás Jiménez, opened my eyes early on to the craft of qualita-
tive methods and the art of data-​ driven storytelling. Tomás
advocated tirelessly for this project and saw it through to the
end, reading an early draft of the manuscript and offering
astute feedback that strengthened its sociological contributions.
Throughout the research, Doug McAdam and Michelle Jackson
provided pivotal support and keen insights; their ongoing
encouragement helped me keep putting one foot in front of the
other. Countless faculty and doctoral students within the
department’s Gender and Social Psychology; Migration, Ethnic-
ity, Race and Nation; Qualitative Methods; and Inequality work-
shops offered helpful feedback, suggestions, and advice through
the years that sculpted the research at the heart of the book.
At the Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality, David
Grusky, Kathryn Edin, and Charles Varner helped deepen my
understanding of the causes and contours of poverty and inequal-
ity in America while granting me key opportunities to expand
my methodological expertise. My time as a Graduate Disserta-
tion Fellow at the Clayman Institute for Gender Research changed
me personally and professionally. My colleagues and mentors at
the institute — ​including Shelley Correll, Alison Dahl Crossley,
Lori Nishiura Mackenzie, Caroline Simard, Sara Jordan-​Bloch,
Aliya Rao, Alison Wynn, Melissa Abad, Wendy Skidmore, and
Kristine Kilanski — ​were instrumental in tightening and adding
nuance to my analysis of food and gender inequality within

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 Acknowledgments

families. Before I had the confidence to trust my own ideas and

sociological intuition, Marianne Cooper carried that confi-
dence for me; she was the first person to believe that this project
mattered and that I was the right person to execute it. Her con-
viction gave me the guts to take a requisite leap of faith.
I was immensely fortunate to receive a number of grants and
fellowships that gave me the time and funding necessary to pur-
sue this research during my doctoral studies. I am grateful to
Stanford University’s Office of the Vice Provost for Graduate
Education and Department of Sociology, Haas Center for Public
Service, McCoy Family Center for Ethics in Society, Center on
Philanthropy and Civil Society, Clayman Institute for Gender
Research, and Center on Poverty and Inequality for their critical
financial support and for significantly enriching my worldview.
I’m extremely grateful to my research assistants who aided
me through all stages of the work. During the writing process,
Caroline Aung helped me present the bigger picture by digging
up important information about families, inequality, and food
policy in America. Caroline additionally carefully read various
chapters and offered pointed insights to improve their tone and
substance. I’m thankful to the many transcribers who turned
hundreds of hours of audio recordings of interviews into written
transcripts that I could pore over for analysis — ​thank you to Ari-
anna Wassman, Apoorva Handigol, Catherine Zaw, Corinna
Brendel, Laura Figueroa, Maria Deloso, Michaela Elias, Elen
Mendoza, Minjia Zhong, Sarah McCurdy, Sarah Roberts, Sarah
Techavarutama, and Victor Verdejo.
It was a privilege to write this book as a postdoctoral fellow at
the Stanford School of Medicine, where I was generously funded
by a National Institutes of Health T32 training grant. I am grate-
ful to Christopher Gardner, Jodi Prochaska, and Tom Robinson
at the Stanford Prevention Research Center for their support. In
particular, thank you to Christopher for his hands‑on, relentlessly
positive mentorship and for providing thoughtful, heartening

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 Acknowledgments

comments on an early draft. I wrote much of this book in the

midst of a pandemic without childcare; Christopher ensured I
had the time, space, and moral support to get the job done. Even-
tually, I was able to keep writing with the caregiving support of
Francineia Peres. Thank you, Fran, for providing my daughter
with abundant love, attention, and care, thereby allowing me to
focus on bringing this book to life. Revising this book took just
about as long as writing it did. I’m also thankful to my colleagues
at the Center for Health Outcomes and Population Equity at
Huntsman Cancer Institute as well as the Department of Family
and Consumer Studies at the University of Utah for their support
as I worked my way through revisions.
When I wanted to author a trade book but knew neither
where nor how to begin, I turned to Thomas Hayden. Tom took
me under his wing, mentored me through countless book-​
­proposal drafts, and remained a devoted advocate through the
entire process. Thank you, Tom, for being in my corner; I can
confidently say that this book would not exist without you.
Thank you also to Lauren Oakes for providing an inspiring
model of engaged, public-​facing scholarship that excited and
motivated me through all stages of this process.
I am indebted to my dear friends who generously read full
drafts of this book and provided focused line edits, multipage
editorial write-​ups, and multi-​hour phone calls to discuss and
troubleshoot. Aditi Mehta, Neel Lalchandani, Eric Xiyu Li,
Devon Magliozzi, and Laura O’Donohue — ​I can never thank
you enough for all the time you spent helping me. Your kind and
constructive insights fundamentally shaped the end product.
When I found myself with just two weeks left to finish my manu-
script, Jennifer Wang performed a feat of magic and big friend-
ship by reading and providing careful, detailed comments on
the entire book in a remarkably short period of time. Thank you,
Jen, for your selflessness, for the e‑mail you sent me at 4:09 a.m.,
and for your enduring friendship.

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 Acknowledgments

I am indebted to my close friends, fellow sociologists, and

feminist-​book-​club members Christianne Corbett, Catherine
Sirois, Chloe Grace Hart, and Madeline Young. Thank you for
being endless wells of inspiration and encouragement, not to
mention faithful readers whose brilliance strengthened the
book’s arguments and sociological foci. Alissa Dos Santos and
Bethany Nichols, from whom I never stop learning, provided
wise suggestions on various chapters that bolstered my voice
and regrounded me in the narrative. Other collaborators, col-
leagues, and friends across Stanford and sociology were ongo-
ing sources of emotional and intellectual support through the
years; my sincerest thank-​you to Swethaa Ballakrishnen, Natalie
Jabbar, Christof Brandtner, Caitlin Daniel, Lisa Hummel, Molly
King, Adam Horowitz, Sandra Nakagawa, Juan Pedroza, Nicole
Pedroin, and Rachel Wright.
For their friendship, I am eternally grateful to Carolyn
Donohue, Caroline Lopez, Cristina Pappas, Michelle Alden, Jill
Fay, Lindley Mease, David Wei, Holly Harridan, Maja Falcon,
Whitney Vallabhaneni, Michele Lanpher Patel, Elizabeth Tal-
bert, Justin Kreindler, Shadie Parivar, and Joel Weitzman. Thank
you to Lizzy Kreindler for her kind spirit, humor, and sister-
hood. The truth is that so much of what I’ve accomplished in my
life is because I’ve had such a generous, compassionate, and car-
ing friend to bring the wind to my sails when I’ve needed it most.
I have had the immense fortune to stand upon the shoul-
ders of my family. I thank my mom and dad for their steady
encouragement, boundless support, and measured optimism
and for raising me with the courage to chart my own path.
Thank you to my brothers and greatest teachers, Vikram and
Josh. Connie, Ethan, Owen, Mama, Bapa, Bubu Bhai, Bhabhi,
Anya, Nivan, Sonu, Alyssa, Kim, Steph — ​thank you for stead-
fastly believing in me and for offering me a soft place to land.
To Veda, who came into my life when I was in the middle of
writing this book, whom I nursed and rocked and bathed and

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 Acknowledgments

clutched in the moments I was not typing these pages: Before

you arrived, I worried about whether I could write a book (some-
thing I’d never done before) while caring for a newborn (another
thing I’d never done before). Now I know the truth — ​that I
could not have done it without you. Your sincerity and spirit gave
me a reason to write, and you helped me see with new eyes and
feel with a freer heart. We, this book and I, are better because
of you.
Lastly, to Ansu — ​you once told me that my dreams were your
dreams; my aspirations, your aspirations; my happiness, your
happiness. Never — ​not once — ​have I doubted this. Thank you
for your brilliance and bigheartedness. Through it all, you have
stood beside me, your fingers interlaced with mine. I am grateful
every day for your unwavering belief in me and for how, in my
moments of doubt, you boldly reflect my dreams back to me.

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 Notes

Preface
1. With their permission, I have used the real names of my brother and my
spouse. To accurately and precisely reconstruct our conversations and
experiences, I corroborated my own memories, journal entries, docu-
ments, and records with theirs.
2. Despite BMI’s imprecision and limitations, it continues to be used for a
few reasons. First, it’s not always inaccurate; BMI correctly categorizes
people as having excess body fat more than 80 percent of the time. But
second, and perhaps more important, there are currently few acceptable
alternatives. While there are certainly more precise measures of body fat
(for instance, MRI scans), these are often expensive and labor-​intensive
and therefore difficult to use across health-​care settings. Many scientists
and clinicians agree that BMI is useful when examining a population
over time but limited at the individual level; BMI measurements are most
valuable as an initial screening tool and to identify individuals who may
be at risk for certain conditions or diseases. For more about the merits
and drawbacks of BMI, see “Measuring Obesity,” Harvard T. H. Chan
School of Public Health, January 2021, https://www.hsph.harvard.edu
/obesity-​prevention-​s ource/obesity-​definition/how‑to‑measure-​b ody
-​fatness/, and Carla Kemp, “Merits, Drawbacks of BMI Measurement to
Be Debated,” American Academy of Pediatrics News, September 15, 2017.

Chapter 1: Diverging Destinies

1. Emphasis is mine. For a discussion of radical empathy, see Isabel
Wilkerson, Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents (New York: Penguin,
2020).
2. Overall, nutritionists agree that healthy diets consist of more plant-​
based, whole foods and fewer processed foods and foods with added
sugar. In 2015, the food-​education nonprofit Oldways hosted a confer­
ence during which they asked twenty-​one nutrition scientists of all beliefs
and backgrounds to align on a definition of healthy eating. The group was

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 Notes

chaired by nutrition professors David Katz and Walter Willett and

included Mediterranean diet researcher Miguel Martínez-​ G onzález,
Paleo diet founder S. Boyd Eaton, and vegan-​ diet promoter Neal
Barnard. After two days of debate, the scientists came to eleven points of
consensus, including a definition of a healthy diet that broadly aligned
with the food-​ based recommendations of the 2015 DGA. They also
agreed with the DGA that a focus on foods — ​rather than just fats, carbs,
and protein in isolation — ​was preferable. See Caroline Praderio, “9
Things the World’s Top Nutrition Experts All Agree On,” Prevention
(December 9, 2015).
Nutritionists Tim Spector and Christopher Gardner reflected on
the 2018 Food for Thought nutrition meeting, which was convened by
the British Medical Journal and Swiss Re. The meeting brought together
scientists, health practitioners, and journalists to discuss controversies
and consensus in nutrition and health. Spector and Gardner write that
during those discussions, there was broad consensus that healthy diets
are rich in fiber, vegetables, and fruits and low in sugar and ultra-​
processed foods. They note, however, that there was less consensus on
other issues, particularly dietary advice for patients with diabetes, the
benefits of keto diets, and the role of meat, saturated fats, and salt
restriction. See Tim Spector and Christopher Gardner, “Challenges and
Opportunities for Better Nutrition Science,” British Medical Journal 369
( June 2020): m2470.
In his 2020 American Heart Association talk entitled “Better Nutrition
Studies,” Christopher Gardner also notes that nutrition studies are
uniquely complex and that there is general agreement that the basis of a
good fundamental diet includes more vegetables and whole foods and
less added sugar, refined grains, and processed foods. See Alexander C.
Razavi et al., “EPI/Lifestyle Scientific Sessions: 2020 Meeting Highlights,”
Journal of the American Heart Association 9 ( June 2020): e017252.
3. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and U.S. Department
of Agriculture, 2020–​2025 Dietary Guidelines for Americans, 9th edition,
December 2020, https://health.gov/our-​work/food-​nutrition/current
-​dietary-​g uidelines.
4. Researchers use different scales to measure the quality of people’s diets.
These scales typically measure the amount of fruits and vegetables, whole
grains, fish and shellfish, sugar-​sweetened beverages, nuts, seeds, legumes,
and processed meat people are eating. For some of these foods, like fruits
and vegetables, higher intake means a higher score, while it’s the opposite
for others, like sugar-​ sweetened beverages. Researchers add up the
individual food group scores to get a total score of diet quality for each
person. To be sure, these metrics and their associated methods are
imperfect. To collect data on people’s diets, interviewers generally call
people on the phone and ask them to recall what they have eaten, in fine
detail, over the past twenty-​four hours. They use strategies to help people
remember and report their consumption accurately, but since these data

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 Notes

are based on people’s own recollections and reporting, they are subject to
interviewees’ memory lapses and misinterpretations. Even though these
scales vary in their specifics and are imperfect, most national studies using
them yield largely the same findings about overall American dietary intake.
5. M. M. Wilson, J. Reedy, and S. M. Krebs-​Smith, “American Diet Quality:
Where It Is, Where It Is Heading, and What It Could Be,” Journal of the
Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics 116 (February 2016): 302–​10.
6. “Poor Nutrition,” National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and
Health Promotion, April 14, 2020, www.cdc.gov/chronicdisease/resources
/publications/factsheets/nutrition.htm. The overconsumption of calories
is in part evidenced by the fact that two-​thirds of all adults in the United
States are either overweight or obese. This is double the rate of obesity from
thirty years ago. These trends hold for kids too; over the last thirty years,
obesity rates have tripled among children and quadrupled among
adolescents. Nearly one-​third of children are now obese or overweight. See
Cheryl Fryar et al., “Prevalence of Overweight, Obesity, and Extreme
Obesity Among Adults: United States, 1960–​1962 Through 2011–​2012,”
National Center for Health Statistics, November 6, 2015, www.cdc.gov
/nchs/data/hestat/obesity_adult_11_12/obesity_adult_11_12.htm.
7. Junxiu Liu et al., “Trends in Diet Quality Among Youth in the United
States, 1999–​2016,” Journal of the American Medical Association 323, no. 12
(March 24, 2020): 1161–​ 74, https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama
/fullarticle/2763291.
8. F. F. Zhang et al., “Trends and Disparities in Diet Quality Among US
Adults by Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Participation
Status,” JAMA Network Open 1 (2018): e180237; D. D. Wang et al., “Trends
in Dietary Quality Among Adults in the United States, 1999 Through
2010,” JAMA Internal Medicine 174 (2014): 1587–​95; Y. Wang and X. Chen,
“How Much of Racial/Ethnic Disparities in Dietary Intakes, Exercise,
and Weight Status Can Be Explained by Nutrition- and Health-​Related
Psychosocial Factors and Socioeconomic Status Among US Adults?,”
Journal of the American Dietetic Association 111 (2011): 1904–​11.
9. Liu et al., “Trends in Diet Quality Among Youth”; A. D. Guerrero and
P. J. Chung, “Racial and Ethnic Disparities in Dietary Intake Among
California Children,” Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics 116,
no. 3 (2016): 439–​48.
10. US Burden of Disease Collaborators, “The State of US Health, 1990–​2016,”
Journal of the American Medical Association 319, no. 14 (April 2018): 1444–​72,
https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jama/fullarticle/2678018.
11. Type 2 diabetes illustrates these disparities, as it disproportionately
affects low-​income communities and those of color. Approximately 13
percent of adults without a high-​ school education have diagnosed
diabetes, compared to 9.7 percent of those with a high-​school education
and 7.5 percent of those with more than a high-​ school education.
Counties with the greatest rates of poverty have the highest rates of
diabetes. Similarly, the risk of developing type 2 is 77 percent higher for

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 Notes

Black people and 66 percent higher for Hispanic people than it is for
white individuals. Asian-​ A mericans, Native Hawaiians, and Pacific
Islanders have the highest rates and twice the risk of developing
diabetes than the general population. Overall, 12.5 percent of Hispanic
and 11.7 percent of Black people have type 2 diabetes, compared to 7.5
percent of white people. See National Diabetes Statistics Report 2020:
Estimates of Diabetes and Its Burden in the United States, Centers for Disease
Control and Prevention (2020): 1 ­ –​32, and James A. Levine, “Poverty and
Obesity in the U.S.,” Diabetes 60, no. 11 (November 2011): 2667–​68.
12. For more information on economic inequality in the U.S., see Drew
DeSilver, “U.S. Income Inequality, on Rise for Decades, Is Now Highest
Since 1928,” Pew Research Center, December 5, 2013; Elise Gould,
“Decades of Rising Economic Inequality in the U.S.: Testimony Before
the U.S. House of Representatives Ways and Means Committee,”
Economic Policy Institute, March 27, 2019; Isabel V. Sawhill and
Christopher Pulliam, “Six Facts About Wealth in the United States,”
Brookings Institution, June 28, 2019; Estelle Sommeiller and Mark Price,
“The New Gilded Age: Income Inequality in the US by State, Metropolitan
Area, and County,” Economic Policy Institute, July 19, 2018; Robert Reich,
Saving Capitalism: For the Many, Not the Few (New York: Penguin, 2015).
The Gini coefficient is also a common and intuitive metric. Its value can
fall between 0 and 1, with the former indicating perfect equality (where
everyone has the same income) and the latter perfect inequality (where one
person has all the income, and everyone else no income). America’s Gini
coefficient has been rising for the past five decades and is higher than that
of social-​welfare states with stronger safety nets such as Sweden and France.
For more information, see Gloria Guzman, “New Data Show Income
Increased in 14 States and 10 of the Largest Metros,” United States Census
Bureau, September 26, 2019, https://www.census.gov/library/stories/2019
/09/us‑median-​household-​income‑up‑in‑2018-​from-​2017.html.
13. For more on the durability and intergenerational transfer of inequality,
see Richard V. Reeves and Katherine Guyot, “Fewer Americans Are
Making More than Their Parents Did — ​Especially If They Grew Up in
the Middle Class,” Brookings Institution, October 12, 2018; Raj Chetty et
al., “The Fading American Dream: Trends in Absolute Income Mobility
Since 1940,” Science 356, no. 6336 (2017): 398–​406.
Intersecting economic and racial inequalities coalesce to produce
“diverging destinies” for kids. Those born into privilege are more likely
to be raised in an environment of financial security and family and
housing stability; those born into less privileged families are more likely
to grow up with greater precariousness in these dimensions. Black, brown,
and low-​income children face major barriers to their health, including
inadequate health-​ care access, greater exposure to environmental
pollutants and contaminants, and more experiences of detrimental toxic
stress. As a result, they have comparatively higher rates of disease,
including obesity, type 2 diabetes, and asthma, along with learning

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 Notes

disabilities and poor oral health. Altogether, children from marginalized

communities face what’s called a concentration of disadvantage, pre­
venting them from accessing opportunities to get ahead. For more on
families, poverty, and inequality in America, see Kathryn Edin and H.
Luke Shaefer, $2.00 a Day: Living on Almost Nothing in America (New York:
Mariner, 2016); Barbara Ehrenreich, Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By
in America (New York: Henry Holt, 2011); P. J. Smock and C. R. Schwartz,
“The Demography of Families: A Review of Patterns and Change,” Journal
of Marriage and Family 82, no. 1 (2020): 9–​34; “Child Poverty,” National
Center for Children in Poverty, Bank Street Graduate School of
Education, 2019; Julie E. Artis, “Maternal Cohabitation and Child Well-​
Being Among Kindergarten Children,” Journal of Marriage and Family
69, no. 1 ( January 2007): 222–​36; Paula Fomby and Andrew J. Cherlin,
“Family Instability and Child Well-​Being,” American Sociological Review 72,
no. 2 (2007): 181–​ 204; S. McLanahan and W. Jacobson, “Diverging
Destinies Revisited,” in Families in an Era of Increasing Inequality: Diverging
Destinies, ed. P. R. Amato et al. (Basel, Switzerland: Springer, 2015), 3–​23;
Marianne Cooper and Allison Pugh, “Families Across the Income
Spectrum: A Decade in Review,” Journal of Marriage and Family 82, no. 1
(February 2020): 272–​99.
14. America trails other Western industrialized nations in the reach of its
social safety net, with many European welfare states better at redis­
tributing income among their citizens on a large scale, providing social
programs that reach a wide share of citizens, and offering more
progressive tax systems. In contrast, the U.S. government has historically
refrained from assuming responsibility for residents’ well-​ being. For
more information on the lack of affordable childcare and paid family
leave, see Swapna Venugopal Ramaswamy et al., “America’s Parents Want
Paid Family Leave and Affordable Child Care. Why Can’t They Get It?,”
USA Today, December 3, 2019, and Alberto Alesina et al., “Why Doesn’t
the United States Have a European-​Style Welfare State?,” Brookings Papers
on Economic Activity 2 (2001): 187–​272.
15. Christine Percheski and Christina Gibson-​Davis, “A Penny on the Dollar:
Racial Inequalities in Wealth Among Households with Children,” Socius
( June 2020).
16. For more about racial inequalities and COVID‑19, see M. Chowkwanyun
and A. L. Reed, “Racial Health Disparities and Covid‑19 — ​C aution and
Context,” New England Journal of Medicine 383, no. 3 (2020): 201–​203, and
Rashawn Ray, “Why Are Blacks Dying at Higher Rates from COVID‑19?,”
Brookings Institution, April 9, 2020. For more on the links between
nutrition and COVID‑19, see M. J. Belanger et al., “COVID‑19 and
Disparities in Nutrition and Obesity,” New England Journal of Medicine
( July 2020).
17. For a deeper, riveting dive into the drawbacks and constraints of the
foster-​care system, see Larissa MacFarquhar, “When Should a Child Be
Taken from His Parents?,” New Yorker, July 31, 2017.

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 Notes

Chapter 2: Families in an Age of Inequality

1. D. D. Wang et al., “Trends in Dietary Quality Among Adults in the United
States, 1999 Through 2010,” JAMA Internal Medicine 174, no. 10 (2014):
1587–​95, doi:10.1001/jamainternmed.2014.3422.
2. Monetary values are adjusted to pertain to a family of four in 2018 dollars.
See Sarah Bohn and Tess Thorman, “Just the Facts: Income Inequality in
California,” Public Policy Institute of California, January 2020.
3. Katherine Schaeffer, “Among U.S. Couples, Women Do More Cooking
and Grocery Shopping than Men,” Pew Research Center, September 24,
2019.
4. Dana Williams’s biological mother was white and her biological father
was Puerto Rican. Dana was raised by two white parents and was white-​
passing. Both of her daughters’ fathers were white, and her daughters
were also white-​passing.
5. Matthew Desmond, Evicted: Profit and Poverty in the American City (New
York: Crown, 2016).
6. For more on weathering, see Arline T. Geronimus, “The Weathering
Hypothesis and the Health of African-​ American Women and Infants:
Evidence and Speculations,” Ethnicity and Disease 2, no. 3 (1992): 207–​21;
Arline T. Geronimus, “Black/White Differences in the Relationship of
Maternal Age to Birthweight: A Population-​Based Test of the Weathering
Hypothesis,” Social Science and Medicine 42, no. 4 (1996): 589–​97; Arline T.
Geronimus, “ ‘Weathering’ and Age-​ Patterns of Allostatic Load Scores
Among Blacks and Whites in the United States,” American Journal of Public
Health (2006): 826–​33; Gene Demby, “Making the Case That Discrimination
Is Bad for Your Health,” Code Switch (podcast), NPR, January 14, 2018.

Chapter 3: Feeding Kids

1. Most moms leveraged a mainstream healthy-​eating discourse, a way of
thinking and speaking about food that is increasingly popular and
widespread in America today. This discourse’s pervasiveness illustrates
how most people across society believe in the importance of healthy
eating and share broadly similar understandings of what is healthy and
what is unhealthy. For more information on the mainstream healthy-​
eating discourse, see Brenda Beagan et al., Acquired Tastes: Why Families
Eat the Way They Do (Vancouver, Canada: UBC Press, 2017).
2. One reason for my surprise was that I had heard so many times before
that poor parents were not knowledgeable about healthy eating. How
many articles and tweets had I come across that implied that poor people
were ignorant about food? That they didn’t know that a Big Mac and fries
weren’t healthy? That they didn’t know what an eggplant or kiwi was?
While there is some research showing that poor parents may have lower
knowledge of specific nutrient groups, other research suggests that they
are just as knowledgeable about food groups and healthy and unhealthy
products. See P. A. Cluss et al., “Nutrition Knowledge of Low-​Income

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 Notes

Parents of Obese Children,” Translational Behavioral Medicine 3, no. 2

(2013): 218–​25.
3. For more information about targeted food and beverage marketing to
youth of color, see Jennifer Harris and Willie Frazier III, “Increasing
Disparities in Unhealthy Food Advertising Targeted to Hispanic and Black
Youth,” Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity (2019). The food industry
also spent twenty-​eight billion dollars in lobbying politicians at the federal
level. See “Industry Profile: Food and Beverage Lobbying, 2019,”
OpenSecrets.org, 2020, and “Food and Beverages,” Statista.com, 2020.
4. These are just examples of what we can see. Other, largely invisible
aspects of the food environment also push us toward processed foods.
Agricultural policies shape how foods are grown on farms in what
quantities, which foods appear in our supermarkets, and what they cost.
Countless federal, state, and local efforts exist to collaborate and collude
with (and sometimes regulate) the food and beverage industries,
affecting everything from food labels to brand marketing to which foods
make it into school vending machines, cafeterias, and fundraisers. See
“Why We Overeat: The Toxic Food Environment and Obesity,” Harvard
T. H. Chan School of Public Health, September 13, 2013, https://the
forum.sph.harvard.edu/events/why‑we‑overeat/.
5. There are several important causes of the unhealthy food environment.
Since the deregulation of the food and beverage industry in the 1980s,
this environment has become increasingly toxic. It starts on farms, where,
beginning in the 1970s, the federal government started subsidizing
certain crops to support rural communities and manage hunger by
assuring that consumers had a plentiful supply of food at reasonable
prices. Today, the U.S. government still spends billions of dollars every
year to provide subsidies to farmers. The vast majority of federal
agricultural subsidies finances the production of corn, soybeans, wheat,
rice, sorghum, dairy, and livestock. Many of these products are converted
into refined grains, high-​fat and high-​sodium processed foods, and high-​
calorie juices and soft drinks. These subsidies help keep the prices of
those products down. Not surprisingly, these cheap products are also the
ones overconsumed in the United States and the ones that raise people’s
risk of developing obesity, heart disease, and type 2 diabetes. For more
about the American food system, see Michael Pollan, The Omnivore’s
Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (New York: Penguin, 2006), and
Mark Bittman, Animal, Vegetable, Junk: A History of Food, from Sustainable to
Suicidal (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2021).
Big Food has also bought out plenty of scientists, nutritionists,
dietitians, and universities. Research remains one of the food industry’s
most powerful marketing tactics. The industry funds scholars to conduct
studies. When a medical journal publishes nutritional information
resulting from studies that have been privately funded, the data appear
objective; suddenly, marketing gets paraded as facts. This lack of
transparency has been going on for decades — ​ in 1967, the sugar

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industry paid three Harvard scientists the equivalent of about $50,000 in

today’s dollars to conduct research that proved sugar did not cause heart
disease. The research, published in the prestigious New England Journal
of Medicine, did not disclose industry funding. A 2013 analysis in the
prestigious journal PLOS Medicine found that beverage studies funded by
Coca-​Cola, PepsiCo, the American Beverage Association, and the sugar
industry were five times more likely not to find a link between sugary
drinks and weight gain than studies whose authors reported no financial
conflicts. Such conflicts of interest remain underreported, inconsistently
described, and difficult to access.
For more information about how the food industry influences
governmental nutritional recommendations and the nation’s health, see
Marion Nestle, Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and
Health (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2013). As she explains,
“Many of the nutritional problems of Americans, not the least of them
obesity, can be traced to the food industry’s imperative to encourage
people to eat more in order to generate sales and increase income.” See
also Jessica Almy and Margo Wootan, “Temptation at Checkout: The
Food Industry’s Sneaky Strategy for Selling More,” Center for Science in
the Public Interest (August 1, 2015).
6. As Tamar Haspel of the Washington Post argued, “Humans are simply ill-​
equipped to deal with a landscape of cheap, convenient, calorie-​dense
foods that have been specifically engineered to be irresistible. The
inability to navigate our food environment is as near-​universal as inabilities
get”; see Tamar Haspel, “The True Connection Between Poverty and
Obesity Isn’t What You Probably Think,” Washington Post, July 20, 2018.
7. For more information about differences in parent-​ child interactions
around food across income levels, see Priya Fielding-​Singh and Jennifer
Wang, “Table Talk: How Mothers and Teenagers Across Socioeconomic
Status Discuss Food,” Social Science and Medicine 187 (August 2017): 49–​57.
8. For more on Let’s Move! and Michelle Obama’s campaign to end childhood
obesity, see Emily Wengrovius, “Healthy, Hunger-​Free Kids Act of 2010 (P.L.
111-​296) Summary,” National Conference of State Legislatures, March
24, 2011, https://www.ncsl.org/research/human-​services/healthy-​hunger
-​
free-​
kids-​act‑of‑2010-​
summary.aspx; Hans Billger and Noereem Mena,
“Make a Cafeteria Date to Eat a Healthy Lunch with Your Child at School,”
U.S. Department of Agriculture, February 21, 2017; Theresa Chalhoub
et al., “Public Policies Promoting Healthy Eating and Exercise,” Center
for American Progress, November 27, 2018; “Healthy Food Financing
Initiative,” State of Childhood Obesity, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation,
2019.
9. Steven Cummins et al., “New Neighborhood Grocery Store Increased
Awareness of Food Access but Did Not Alter Dietary Habits or Obesity,”
Health Affairs 33, no. 2 (February 2014): 283–​ 91; Brian Elbel et al.,
“Assessment of a Government-​Subsidized Supermarket in a High-​Need

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 Notes

Area on Household Food Availability and Children’s Dietary Intakes,”

Public Health Nutrition 18, no. 15 (October 2015): 2881–​ 90. One
interesting case occurred in Pittsburgh, where a study found that food-​
desert residents’ diet quality and neighborhood satisfaction improved
(although not their health outcomes) after a supermarket opened.
Residents in the Pittsburgh study were actively involved in bringing a
market to their neighborhood, with public discussions and marketing
campaigns focusing on the need for healthy foods in the community.
While the new supermarket may not have directly improved residents’
diets, it likely had other positive impacts, as public and private
investments stimulated economic development in the neighborhood and
bolstered community members’ morale. See Tamara Dubowitz et al.,
“Diet and Perceptions Change with Supermarket Introduction in a Food
Desert, but Not Because of Supermarket Use,” Health Affairs 34, no. 11
(2015): 1858–​68, doi: 10.1377/hlthaff.2015.0667.
10. For more information on food access and food deserts, see Christine
Byrne, “It’s Great That We Talk About ‘Food Deserts’ — ​but It Might Be
Time to Stop,” Huffington Post, July 4, 2019; Michele Ver Ploeg et al., “Access
to Affordable and Nutritious Food: Measuring and Understanding Food
Deserts and Their Consequences: Report to Congress,” U.S. Department
of Agriculture, June 2009; Gina Kolata, “Studies Question the Pairing of
Food Deserts and Obesity,” New York Times, April 17, 2012. There are also
differences of opinion about what constitutes food access. New York Times
writer David Bornstein notes that “the standard way ‘food deserts’ have
been defined may overemphasize — ​and in some cases mischaracterize — ​
the problem of access and draw attention from other factors that influence
what people buy and eat, like food prices, preparation time and knowledge,
marketing, general levels of education, transportation, cultural practices
and taste.” Similarly, recent work over the past few years has emphasized
the need to redefine what exactly is meant by food access. As public health
scholars Donald Rose and Keelia O’Malley explain, the latest wave of food-​
access interventions has moved away from definitions based largely on
purchasing power and geographic location and moved toward ones that
see “the problem as structural in nature, originating in socially determined
inequities.” Organizations intervening under these new definitions “use
the food system as an entry point, but they cut across various sectors — ​
education, employment, community development, business development,
agriculture, environment, and health.” See David Bornstein, “Time to
Revisit Food Deserts,” New York Times, April 25, 2012; Donald Rose and
Keelia O’Malley, “Food Access 3.0: Insights from Post-​K atrina New Orleans
on an Evolving Approach to Food Inequities,” American Journal of Public
Health 110 (2020): 1495–​97.
11. This does not mean that geographic food access is never an issue. My
conclusion relates to a suburban setting in one area of the country with a
nonrandom sample of families. Rural regions, urban areas, American

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Indian reservations — ​these are places where food access may be more

challenging and exert a greater influence on people’s diets.
12. That said, average distances are slightly shorter among low-​ income
households (4.8 miles) and slightly longer among households living in
food deserts (nearly 7 miles). Still, the takeaway holds. See Hunt Allcott
et al., “Food Deserts and the Causes of Nutritional Inequality,” Quarterly
Journal of Economics 134, no. 4 (November 2019): 1793–​1844, https://doi
-​org.stanford.idm.oclc.org/10.1093/q je/q jz015.
13. “Poorest US Households Spent 33% of Their Incomes on Food in 2015,”
FreshPlaza, May 24, 2017, www.freshplaza.com/article/2175991/poorest
‑us‑households-​spent‑33‑of‑their-​incomes‑on‑food‑in‑2015/.
14. For more information on SNAP, see “Policy Basics: The Supplemental
Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP),” Center on Budget and Policy
Priorities, June 25, 2019, www.cbpp.org/research/food-​a ssistance/policy
-​basics-​t he-​supplemental-​nutrition-​a ssistance-​program-​snap.
15. Steven Carlson, “More Adequate SNAP Benefits Would Help Millions of
Participants Better Afford Food,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities,
July 30, 2019.
16. Marge Dwyer, “Eating Healthy vs. Unhealthy Diet Costs About $1.50
More per Day,” Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, January
13, 2014, https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/news/press-​releases/healthy‑vs
‑unhealthy-​diet-​costs‑1‑50‑more/.
17. How much families spent on food varied each month. The typical source
of variation was whether and how much families ate out. Grocery-​store
expenses were more consistent. These estimates are based on the months
I observed each family.
18. In California, SNAP is known as CalFresh. CalFresh income eligibility
rates are determined by family size, income, and some living costs.
Individuals can have income from a full- or part-​t ime job, unemployment
benefits, General Relief, or CalWORKs (a public assistance program
that provides cash aid and services to eligible families that have children
in the home) and still get CalFresh. In 2019–​2020, a household of one
was eligible for CalFresh if its gross monthly income did not exceed
$1,354, and the maximum SNAP benefit amount was $194. A household
of two could not have a monthly income over $1,832, and the maximum
benefit was $355. A household of three could not earn over $2,311, and
the maximum benefit was $509. Households may have up to $2,250 in
countable resources (such as cash or money in a bank account) and still
be eligible. SNAP eligibility has never been extended to undocumented
noncitizens. The Food and Nutrition Act of 2008 limits eligibility for
SNAP benefits to U.S. citizens and certain lawfully present noncitizens.
Generally, to qualify for SNAP, noncitizens must have lived in the United
States for at least five years, receive disability-​ related assistance or
benefits, or be a child under eighteen.
19. Public programs like food stamps incentivize living alone. Larger
households receive more in food stamps but not as much as members of

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 Notes

that household would receive if they lived separately. When Marcus

applied on his own, he got the maximum benefit amount of $194. What
was confusing about Nyah’s situation was that she didn’t then separately
apply for SNAP. If she had, she would have also qualified for between
$150 and $194, bringing their grand total to just under $400. I believe
she held off on applying for SNAP because she was waiting to get SSI,
which would then have covered some of her food costs. Nyah once told
me, “I have no income, but they’re trying to put me on SSI.”
20. Until June 2019, California residents who received SSI were not eligible
to receive SNAP because California gave these SSI recipients extra
money to be used for food. This was the case for Mariah and Natasha;
they did not qualify for SNAP funds, as their SSI allotments were
intended to pay for some food. It was never clear to me if Nyah knew this.
She once told me, “My kids, they don’t care about food stamps because
they get SSI and they don’t need that.” Regardless, Nyah did put some of
the money they received toward food.
21. “The Impact of the Coronavirus on Food Insecurity in 2020 and 2021,”
Feeding America, March 31, 2021, https://www.feedingamerica.org
/research/coronavirus-​hunger-​research.
22. D. W. Schanzenbach and A. Pitts, “How Much Has Food Insecurity
Risen? Evidence from the Census Household Pulse Survey,” Institute for
Policy Research, Northwestern University, June 10, 2020, https://www
.ipr.northwestern.edu/documents/reports/ipr-​r apid-​researchreports
-​pulse‑hh‑data‑10‑june-​2020.pdf.
23. Cindy W. Leung et al., “Food Insecurity Is Inversely Associated with Diet
Quality of Lower-​Income Adults,” Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and
Dietetics 114, no. 12 (December 2014): 1943–​53.
24. Emma J. Stinson et al., “Food Insecurity Is Associated with Maladaptive
Eating Behaviors and Objectively Measured Overeating,” Obesity 26, no.
12 (2018): 1841–​48.

Chapter 4: All That Matters

1. While mothers’ accounts diverged from prevailing public health
narratives, these accounts were consistent with findings from sociological
studies of families living in poverty. Two stand out. First, Kathryn Edin
and Laura Lein found in their research on single, low-​income mothers
that these mothers occasionally forgo material necessities in order to
pay for a trip to fast-​food restaurants or other types of culinary treats
for their children. Second, in his ethnographic study of eviction,
Matthew Desmond tells the story of a low-​income woman who spends
all of her food stamps for a month on one meal of lobster tails, shrimp,
king crab legs, salad, and lemon meringue pie. See Kathryn Edin and
Laura Lein, Making Ends Meet: How Single Mothers Survive Welfare and Low-​
Wage Work (New York: Russell Sage Foundation, 1997); Matthew
Desmond, Evicted: Profit and Poverty in the American City (New York: Crown,
2016).

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 Notes

2. For more about food’s symbolic value to low-​income mothers, see Priya
Fielding-​Singh, “A Taste of Inequality: Food’s Symbolic Value Across the
Socioeconomic Spectrum,” Sociological Science (August 2017).

Chapter 5: Scarcity, Abundance

1. For more information about migration and segregation patterns in the Bay
Area, see Stephen Menendian and Samir Gambhir, “Racial Segregation in
the San Francisco Bay Area,” Othering and Belonging Institute, 2018,
https://belonging.berkeley.edu/segregationinthebay, and Tony Roshan
Samara, “Race, Inequality, and the Resegregation of the Bay Area,” Urban
Habitat, 2016, http://urbanhabitat.org/sites/default/files/UH%20Policy
%20Brief2016.pdf.

Chapter 6: Within Reach

1. For more information about the culture‑of‑poverty argument, see
Phillippe Bourgois, “Culture of Poverty,” in International Encyclopedia of
the Social and Behavioral Sciences, 2nd ed., ed. James Wright (Amsterdam:
Elsevier, 2015); Judith Goode and Edwin Eames, “An Anthropological
Critique of the Culture of Poverty,” in Urban Life, ed. G. Gmelch and W.
Zenner (Long Grove, IL: Waveland, 1996). For a more relevant and
attuned discussion of the relationship between culture and poverty, see
Mario Luis Small, David J. Harding, and Michèle Lamont, “Reconsidering
Culture and Poverty,” Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social
Science 629, no. 1 (2010): 6–​27.
2. For a discussion of the 2020 Lawrence Mead paper, see Colleen Flaherty,
“U.S. and Them,” Inside Higher Ed, July 28, 2020; “News Release:
Statement from Faculty of Arts and Science and Wagner Leadership
Regarding Professor Lawrence Mead,” New York University, July 27,
2020, https://www.nyu.edu/about/news-​publications/news/2020/july
/Statement_FAS_Wagner_Leadership_Lawrence_Mead.html.
3. Allison J. Pugh, “Windfall Child Rearing: Low-​ Income Care and
Consumption,”  Journal of Consumer Culture 4, no. 2 (2004): 229–​49. As
Matthew Desmond writes, “To Sammy, Pastor Dayle and others, Larraine
was poor because she threw money away. But the reverse was more true.
Larraine threw money away because she was poor”; see Matthew Desmond,
Evicted: Profit and Poverty in the American City (New York: Crown, 2016), 219.
4. This insight also aligns with that of Allison Pugh in Longing and Belonging:
Parents, Children and Consumer Culture, in which she draws on her
ethnographic study of how parents from different socioeconomic
backgrounds navigate consumer culture. Pugh demonstrates how families
from different class backgrounds differentially engage in and rationalize
consumption choices for their children. While affluent families engage in a
process of “symbolic deprivation,” Pugh finds that low-​ income families
engage in “symbolic indulgence.” The affluent families in Pugh’s study
pointed to goods or experiences that their children did not have as evidence

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 Notes

of their own moral restraint and worthiness as parents. In contrast, low-​

income parents sometimes made considerable sacrifices to ensure that their
children had particular goods or experiences, often prioritizing their
children’s needs over their own. In these families, it was important to the
parents to demonstrate that their children were not missing out because of
their socioeconomic position; it was important for parents that their kids felt
“normal.” See A. J. Pugh, Longing and Belonging: Parents, Children and
Consumer Culture (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2009).

Chapter 7: Being “Good”

1. “Survey: Moms Still Make Most Household Purchase Decisions,” Chain
Store Age, October 24, 2013; “What Busy Moms Sneak In . . . ​TV Time,”
Wall Street Journal, November 2011.
2. Moms today are up against food and beverage industries that target
children, a vulnerable, susceptible, and profitable audience for
marketing. Although many countries around the world tightly control or
ban food advertising and marketing aimed at youth, the United States
has not done that since 1980, when, in response to corporate pressure,
Congress removed the Federal Trade Commission’s authority to restrict
food advertising and limited its jurisdiction regarding advertising to
children. Marketing campaigns targeting kids are extremely effective at
making them want to eat more high-​calorie, unhealthy products. The
marketing is also masterfully placed. There’s a reason why the least
healthy products in supermarkets — ​t hose often plastered with words in
kid-​friendly fonts and cartoon characters — ​are located right at or just
below children’s eye level. The industry adage that “eye level is buy level”
captures this strategy of marketing directly to the kids themselves.
Madison and Paige used their “pester power” to wear Dana down to get
the stuff they craved.
In 2016, the television ads aimed at children primarily promoted
unhealthy products, including fast food, candy, sweet and salty snacks,
and sugary drinks; fewer than 10 percent of food ads promoted healthier
products. Young kids’ developing brains prevent them from discerning
advertising from truth, which has led both the American Psychological
Association and American Academy of Pediatrics to call marketing to
children under eight inherently unfair and deceptive. But even teens
and young adults are tricked by food and beverage marketing; product
placements are skillfully and subtly woven into video games, movies, and
social media posts by celebrities and influencers on Instagram, Twitter,
and YouTube.
For more about the food industry’s marketing tactics and impacts, see
Michael Moss, Salt Sugar Fat: How the Food Giants Hooked Us (New York:
Random House, 2013); Michael Moss, Hooked: Free Will, and How the
Food Giants Exploit Our Addictions (New York: Random House, 2021);
B. Sadeghirad et al., “Influence of Unhealthy Food and Beverage

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 Notes

Marketing on Children’s Dietary Intake and Preference: A Systematic

Review and ­Meta-​A nalysis of Randomized Trials,” Obesity Reviews 17, no.
10 (October 2016): 945–​59.
For more about the food industry’s marketing specifically to children,
see Jennifer Harris et al., “Food Industry Self-​Regulation After 10 Years:
Progress and Opportunities to Improve Food Advertising to Children,”
Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity (2017); Bettina Siegel, Kid
Food: The Challenge of Feeding Children in a Highly Processed World (New
York: Oxford University Press, 2019); J. A. Horsley et al., “The Proportion
of Unhealthy Foodstuffs Children Are Exposed to at the Checkout of
Convenience Supermarkets,” Public Health Nutrition 17, no. 11 (November
2014): 2453–​58.
3. For more about intensive mothering, see Sharon Hays, The Cultural
Contradictions of Motherhood (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1996);
Deirdre Johnston and Debra Swanson, “Constructing the ‘Good Mother’:
The Experience of Mothering Ideologies by Work Status,” Sex Roles 54
(2006): 509–​19; Paula K. McDonald, Lisa M. Bradley, and Diane Guthrie,
“Good Mothers, Bad Mothers: Exploring the Relationship Between
Attitudes Towards Nonmaternal Childcare and Mothers’ Labour Force
Participation,” Journal of Family Studies 11 (2005): 62–​ 82; J. A. Reich,
“Neoliberal Mothering and Vaccine Refusal: Imagined Gated Communities
and the Privilege of Choice,” Gender and Society 28, no. 5 (2014): 679–​704.
Recent work highlights that mothers of color and employed, low-​
income, and single mothers experience and interpret motherhood
differently than white, class-​privileged, married mothers. This research
has generated offshoots of the intensive-​mothering ideology that highlight
such critical differences; these include extensive mothering, integrated
mothering, defensive mothering, and inventive mothering. Key differences
between these ideologies and that of intensive mothering pertain to
mothers’ varying attitudes toward and practices related to family,
child-​
rearing, and motherhood. See Karen Christopher, “Extensive
Mothering: Employed Mothers’ Constructions of the Good Mother,”
Gender and Society 26, no. 1 (2012): 73–​ 96; D. M. Dow, “Integrated
Motherhood: Beyond Hegemonic Ideologies of Motherhood,” Journal of
Marriage and Family 78 (February 2016): 180–​96; S. Elliott and S. Bowen,
“Defending Motherhood: Morality, Responsibility, and Double Binds in
Feeding Children,” Journal of Marriage and Family 80 (April 2018): 499–​
520; Patricia Hill Collins, Black Feminist Thought: Knowledge, Consciousness,
and the Politics of Empowerment (Boston: Unwin Hyman, 1990); Jennifer
Randles, “Willing to Do Anything for My Kids: Inventive Mothering,
Diapers, and the Inequalities of Carework,” American Sociological Review 86,
no. 1 (2021): 35–​59.
Christopher’s 2012 study of working mothers reveals that under an
extensive-​mothering ideal, mothers redefine good mothering as being “in
charge” and responsible for children’s well-​being even when mothers are
not providing that care as well as limiting the infringement of employment

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 Notes

on family life. In her study of Black middle-​class mothers, Dow finds that
their adherence to an integrated-​mothering ideology means that they see
child-​rearing, while mother-​centered, as extended-​family- and community-
​supported. This collective responsibility for children aligns with Collins’s
argument that Black communities have “recognized that vesting one
person with full responsibility for mothering a child may not be wise or
possible.” As a result, other women — ​grandmothers and other extended
family who assist by sharing mothering responsibilities — ​traditionally
have been central to the institution of Black motherhood. Dow also finds
that mothers view working outside the home as a duty of motherhood
rather than a selfish sacrifice. Elliott and Bowen leverage intensive
mothering and the conceptualization of defensive othering to define
defensive mothering as the strategy that low-​income mothers of color
engage in to present themselves as responsible, caring, informed mothers
and deflect negative characterizations of their mothering in the face of
societal scrutiny and surveillance. All of this research on diverse
experiences and ideological variations of motherhood highlights that, as
widespread as intensive-​mothering norms may be in the U.S., there exists
no uniform interpretation or performance of the ideal.
At the same time, these studies highlight that whatever variations exist,
two transcending tenets underpin what it means to be a good mother in
the U.S. First, all ideals — ​intensive, extensive, integrated, and defensive — ​
maintain that child-​rearing is a generally mother-​centered activity that
demands devoting resources  — ​often time, energy, and money  — ​to
children. Second, while not all mothers navigate or perform the same
mothering practices, intensive mothering is still the normative standard
by which mothering is societally assessed in Western contexts. That is,
whatever ideals mothers internally subscribe to or externally perform,
they are nonetheless societally judged by the standard of intensive
mothering.
4. Caitlin Collins, Making Motherhood Work: How Women Manage Careers and
Caregiving (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2019).
5. Patrick Ishizuka, “Social Class, Gender, and Contemporary Parenting
Standards in the United States: Evidence from a National Survey
Experiment,” Social Forces 98, no. 1 (September 2019): 31–​58; Jennifer
Lois, “The Temporal Emotion Work of Motherhood: Homeschoolers’
Strategies for Managing Time Shortage,” Gender and Society 24, no. 4
(2010): 421–​46.
6. For more on the centrality of food to motherhood, see Joslyn Brenton,
“The Limits of Intensive Feeding: Maternal Foodwork at the Intersection
of Race, Class, and Gender,” Sociology of Health and Illness 39, no. 6 (2017):
863–​77; Kate Cairns, Josée Johnston, and Merin Oleschuk, “Calibrating
Motherhood,” in Feeding Children Inside and Outside the Home: Critical
Perspectives, ed. V. Harman, B. Cappellini, and C. Faircloth (New York:
Routledge, 2019); Merin Oleschuk, “Gender, Cultural Schemas and
Learning to Cook,” Gender and Society 33 no. 4 (2019): 607–​28; Kate

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 Notes

Cairns and Josée Johnston, Food and Femininities (London: Bloomsbury,

2015).

Chapter 8: Hunger and Pickiness

1. Also see Caitlin Daniel, “Economic Constraints on Taste Formation and
the True Cost of Healthy Eating,” Social Science and Medicine 148 (2016):
34–​41.
2. For more about Smart Snacks, see Jennifer L. Harris et al., “Effects of
Offering Look-​A like Products as Smart Snacks in Schools,” Childhood
Obesity 12, no. 6 (2016): 432–​39.
3. Delfina made around $2,400 a month as a cashier, but she also received
$500 a month in child support and, eventually, another $1,000 in rental
income from the house her parents purchased back in 1980. That
brought her monthly income to around $3,900 and her yearly income to
$48,000. When Luis was in elementary school, Delfina learned that her
total income made him ineligible for free or reduced school lunch. She
could not believe it, but after that discovery she never again checked to
see if he was eligible. SNAP eligibility guidelines suggest that he would
not have been eligible, as the monthly income cap for a household of two
is $1,832. Because lunch was not free at school, Delfina sent Luis with the
few dollars it cost each day to purchase the cafeteria lunch, which he
generally did not buy.
4. Michelle Chen, “Nearly 1 in 3 Restaurant Workers Suffers from Food
Insecurity,” Nation, July 30, 2014.
5. For more information about the organic child ideal and the pressures
of ethical consumption, see Kate Cairns, Josée Johnston, and Norah
MacKendrick, “Feeding the ‘Organic Child’: Mothering Through Ethical
Consumption,” Journal of Consumer Culture 13, no. 2 (2013): 97–​118; Kate
Cairns, Norah MacKendrick, and Josée Johnston, “The ‘Organic Child’
Ideal Holds Mothers to an Impossible Standard,” Aeon, February 19, 2020;
Kate Cairns and Josée Johnston, “On (Not) Knowing Where Your Food
Comes From: Meat, Mothering and Ethical Eating,” Agriculture and Human
Values 35 (2018): 569–​80; Josée Johnston and Shyon Baumann, Foodies:
Democracy and Distinction in the Gourmet Foodscape (New York: Routledge,
2010); Norah MacKendrick, “More Work for Mother: Chemical Body
Burdens as a Maternal Responsibility,” Gender and Society 28 (2014): 705–​28.

Chapter 10: Kale Salad

1. It’s telling that Southern cuisine and soul food are believed to be a major
cause of higher rates of type 2 diabetes and hypertension within Black
communities even though research points more convincingly to other
causes, such as environmental racism, discrimination, stress, and poor
health-​ care access and quality. See Maanvi Singh, “Southern Diet
Blamed for High Rates of Hypertension Among Black Americans,” The
Salt (blog), NPR, October 2, 2018; Psyche Williams-​Forson, “More Than

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 Notes

Just the ‘Big Piece of Chicken’: The Power of Race, Class, and Food in
American Consciousness,” in Food and Culture: A Reader, 2nd ed., ed. C.
Counihan and P. van Esterik (New York: Routledge, 2007), 107–​17.
2. For more about diet culture and racism in America, see Sabrina Strings,
Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia (New York: New York
University Press, 2019); Priya Krishna, “Is American Dietetics a White-​
Bread World? These Dieticians Think So,” New York Times, December 7,
2020; Nicole Danielle Schott, “Race, Online Space and the Feminine:
Unmapping ‘Black Girl Thinspiration,’ ” Critical Sociology 43, nos. 7–​8
(2017): 1029–​43; Hanna Garth and Ashanté M. Reese, eds., Black Food
Matters: Racial Justice in the Wake of Food Justice (Minneapolis: University of
Minnesota Press, 2020).
3. Rebekah Kebede, “Collards vs. Kale: Why Only One Supergreen Is a
Superstar,” National Geographic, October 12, 2016.

Chapter 11: Mom’s Job

1. Katherine Schaeffer, “Among U.S. Couples, Women Do More Cooking
and Grocery Shopping than Men,” Pew Research Center, September 24,
2019.
2. D’Vera Cohn and Jeffrey S. Passel, “A Record 64 Million Americans Live
in Multigenerational Households,” Pew Research Center, April 5, 2018,
https://w w w.pewresearch.org/fact- ​ t ank/2018/04/05/a‑record‑ 64
‑million-​americans-​live‑in‑multigenerational-​households/.
3. Schaeffer, “Among U.S. Couples.”
4. While I don’t go into depth about these outliers in this book, other
research examines the experiences and perspectives of men with
significant domestic cooking responsibilities. This research finds that
such men may frame meal planning and cooking in traditionally
feminine terms. For instance, using interviews, cooking observations,
and meal diaries from thirty such men in Canada, the sociologist Michelle
Szabo found that these men view cooking as a form of care and concern
for the family’s satisfaction and health. See Michelle Szabo, “Men
Nurturing Through Food: Challenging Gender Dichotomies Around
Domestic Cooking,” Journal of Gender Studies 23, no. 1 (2014): 18–​31.
This work also underscores how constructions of masculinity and
fatherhood are not fixed but can be negotiated and challenged. Broader
sociopolitical structures and social norms can help incorporate domestic
investments in foodwork into men’s sense of masculinity. For instance,
research conducted in Sweden, a national context where domestic labor
has become increasingly de‑gendered, shows that with gender-​ equal
policies and public discourses, foodwork can become not only legitimate
and expected for men but also incorporated into men’s expressions of
progressive masculinity. See Nicklas Neuman, Lucas Gottzén, and
Christina Fjellström, “Narratives of Progress: Cooking and Gender
Equality Among Swedish Men,” Journal of Gender Studies (2015): 1–​13.

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 Notes

5. Research in the United States and United Kingdom on mothers’ views on

fathers’ involvement in foodwork shows that mothers characterize fathers
as uninvolved or tangential to this work. When fathers do contribute to
feeding families, they do so in a mostly supportive role, acting as sous-​
chefs and helping with special occasion cooking. See J. Blissett, C. Meyer,
and E. Haycraft, “Maternal and Paternal Controlling Feeding Practices
with Male and Female Children,” Appetite 47, no. 2 (2006): 212–​19; Kate
Cairns, Josée Johnston, and Norah MacKendrick, “Feeding the ‘Organic
Child’: Mothering Through Ethical Consumption,” Journal of Consumer
Culture 13, no. 2 (2013): 97–​118; Rebecca O’Connell and Julia Brannen,
Food, Families and Work (London: Bloomsbury, 2016); Brenda Beagan et
al., “ ‘It’s Just Easier for Me to Do It’: Rationalizing the Family Division of
Foodwork,” Sociology 42, no. 4 (2008): 653–​71.
6. While many moms (and dads) may feel that moms have a unique
expertise when it comes to kids’ diets, Sharon Hays, in The Cultural
Contradictions of Motherhood (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1996),
72, reminds us that it is “difficult to distinguish a ‘mother’s intuition’
from ideas arising from a woman’s social role, a woman’s upbringing,
and the culture of motherhood.”
7. For more about the expectations of modern fatherhood and the
centrality of food to motherhood and femininity as well as its
peripherality to fatherhood, see Marjorie DeVault, Feeding the Family: The
Social Organization of Caring as Gendered Work (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1994); Caron Bove and Jeffery Sobal, “Foodwork in Newly
Married Couples: Making Family Meals,” Food, Culture and Society 9, no. 1
(2006): 70–89; Caron Bove, Jeffery Sobal, and Barbara Rauschenbach,
“Food Choices Among Newly Married Couples: Convergence, Conflict,
Individualism, and Projects,” Appetite 40, no. 1 (2003): 25–​41.
8. For more about how conventional masculinity norms can discourage
fathers from engaging in healthy behaviors, including healthy eating,
see Will H. Courtenay, “Constructions of Masculinity and Their
Influence on Men’s Well-​Being: A Theory of Gender and Health,” Social
Science and Medicine 50, no. 10 (2000): 1385–​1401; David Williams, “The
Health of Men: Structured Inequalities and Opportunities,” American
Journal of Public Health 93 (2003): 724–​31. For more about masculinity
and dietary consumption, see Carrie R. Daniel et al., “Trends in Meat
Consumption in the United States,” Public Health and Nutrition 14, no. 4
(2011): 575–​83; Matthew B. Ruby and Steven J. Heine, “Meat, Morals and
Masculinity,” Appetite 56, no. 2 (2011): 447–​50; Sandra Nakagawa and
Chloe Grace Hart, “Where’s the Beef ? How Masculinity Exacerbates
Gender Disparities in Health Behaviors,” Socius (2019).
9. I write more elsewhere about the role of fathers in family food practices,
as well as how fathers’ dietary approaches reflect and reinforce
traditional gender norms and expectations within families. See Priya
Fielding-​Singh, “Dining with Dad: Fathers’ Influences on Family Food
Practices,” Appetite 117 (October 2017): 98–​108.

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 Notes

10. In the United States, the unequal distribution of food labor holds,
regardless of maternal employment status; that is, even within families
where both parents are employed full-​ t ime, mothers continue to
shoulder most of the foodwork responsibilities. See Jill E. Yavorsky,
Claire M. Kamp Dush, and Sarah J. Schoppe-​Sullivan, “The Production
of Inequality: The Gender Division of Labor Across the Transition to
Parenthood,” Family Relations 77 (2015): 662–​79; Jennifer Hook, “Gender
Inequality in the Welfare State: Sex Segregation in Housework, 1965–​
2003,” American Journal of Sociology 115, no. 5 (2010): 1480–​1523.

Chapter 12: Time and Money

1. In their 2019 book, the sociologists Sarah Bowen, Joslyn Brenton, and
Sinikka Elliott show the pressures mothers are under to provide home-​
cooked meals and the challenges they face in doing so, highlighting how
modern families struggle to confront high expectations and deep-​seated
inequalities around getting food on the table. They critique widespread
messages advocated by foodies and public health officials that reforming
the food system requires a return to the kitchen. They argue that time
pressures, money-​saving trade-​offs, and gendered norms of pleasing
others make it nearly impossible for mothers to achieve the idealized
vision of home-​cooked meals. See Sarah Bowen, Joslyn Brenton, and
Sinikka Elliott, Pressure Cooker: Why Home Cooking Won’t Solve Our Problems
and What We Can Do About It (New York: Oxford University Press, 2019);
Sarah Bowen, Sinikka Elliott, and Joslyn Brenton, “The Joy of Cooking?,”
Contexts 13, no. 3 (2014): 20–​25.
Relatedly, the sociologist Merin Oleschuk finds, in her analysis of
North American news media representations of family meals, that while
the media largely trace the “demise” of the family meal to structural
causes, they focus on individual solutions and overemphasize the agency
and responsibility of individuals — ​namely, mothers — ​for restoring the
family meal. As Oleschuk explains, “Despite determining that the
reasons families are not cooking enough is complex, news media
conclude that parents (largely mothers) must simply work harder to do
so.” See Merin Oleschuk, “In Today’s Market, Your Food Chooses You:
News Media Constructions of Responsibility for Health Through
Cooking,” Social Problems 67, no. 1 (2020): 3.
2. Gretchen Livingston, “It’s No Longer a ‘Leave It to Beaver’ World for
American Families — ​but It Wasn’t Back Then, Either,” Pew Research
Center, December 30, 2015, https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-​ t ank
/2015/12/30/its‑no‑longer‑a‑leave‑it‑to‑beaver-​ w orld-​ f or-​ a merican
-​families-​but‑it‑wasnt-​back-​t hen- ​either/.
3. Lisa Valente, “How to Eat Healthy When You Don’t Have Time to Meal
Prep,” Eating Well, September 6, 2018; John Rampton, “Twelve Ways to
Eat Healthy No Matter How Busy You Are,” Entrepreneur, May 5, 2015;
Ellie Krieger, Weeknight Wonders: Delicious, Healthy Dinners in Thirty
Minutes or Less (Boston: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2013); Carrie

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Forrest, The Quick and Easy Healthy Cookbook (Emeryville, CA: Rockridge
Press, 2019); Carrie Madormo, “Seventy-​Two Easy Kid-​Friendly Dinners
Perfect for Weeknights,” Taste of Home (blog), July 30, 2020; Amy
Palanjian, “A Week of Healthy Kids Meal Ideas (That Actually Work in
Real Life),” Yummy Toddler Food (blog), August 18, 2020.
4. When I spoke with Arjun and Sonali later, I learned that this solution
had turned out to be a long-​term one. They continued to employ their
cook for years after I met them (although they stopped in March 2020 in
light of the COVID‑19 shelter‑in‑place orders).

Chapter 14: Fluctuating Finances

1. See Anne Helen Petersen, “America’s Hollow Middle Class,” Vox, December
15, 2020; “America’s Shrinking Middle Class: A Close Look at Changes
Within Metropolitan Areas,” Pew Research Center, May 11, 2016.

Chapter 15: Becoming American

1. Increased acculturation to the United States is associated with decreased
dietary quality, in particular increased consumption of dietary fat and
decreased consumption of fruits and vegetables. See J. Satia-​Abouta et
al., “Dietary Acculturation: Applications to Nutrition Research and
Dietetics,” Journal of the American Dietetic Association 102 (2002): 1105–​18,
and I. A. Lesser, D. Gasevic, and S. A. Lear, “The Association Between
Acculturation and Dietary Patterns of South Asian Immigrants,” PLOS
One 9, no. 2 (2014): e88495.
This is particularly true among Latinx immigrants, whose kids’ diets
decrease in quality over time in the U.S. See J. Van Hook et al., “It Is
Hard to Swim Upstream: Dietary Acculturation Among Mexican-​Origin
Children,” Population Research and Policy Review 35, no. 2 (2016): 177–​96;
Ji‑Hong Liu et al., “Generation and Acculturation Status Are Associated
with Dietary Intake and Body Weight in Mexican American Adolescents,”
Journal of Nutrition 142, no. 2 (2012): 298–​305.

Chapter 16: Downscaling

1. See K. Leifheit et al., “Eviction in the United States: Affected Populations,
Housing and Neighborhood-​Level Consequences, and Implications for
Health,” Society for Epidemiologic Research Meeting, 2018; M. Desmond
and R. Kimbro, “Eviction’s Fallout: Housing, Hardship, and Health,”
Social Forces 94, no. 1 (2015): 2
­ 95–​324, doi:10.1093/sf/sov044.
2. Arlie Russell Hochschild, “Emotion Work, Feeling Rules, and Social
Structure,” American Journal of Sociology 85 (1979): 551–​75.
3. Marianne Cooper, Cut Adrift: Families in Insecure Times (Berkeley:
University of California Press, 2014).
4. For more about the mediating role of stress in the connection between
poverty and health, see L. I. Pearlin, “The Sociological Study of
Stress,”  Journal of Health and Social Behavior 30 (1989): 241–​56; D. M.

308

HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 308 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM

 Notes

Almeida et al., “Do Daily Stress Processes Account for Socioeconomic

Health Disparities?,” Journal of Gerontology 60 (2005): 34–​39; J. Kahn and
L. I. Pearlin, “Financial Strain Over the Life Course and Health Among
Older Adults,” Journal of Health and Social Behavior 47 (2006): 17–​31; B. S.
McEwen, “Protective and Damaging Effects of Stress Mediators,” New
England Journal of Medicine 338 (1998): 171–​79.

Chapter 17: Upscaling

1. For more about the anxiety that characterizes modern parenting, see
Claire Cain Miller, “The Relentlessness of Modern Parenting,” New York
Times, December 25, 2018; Jessica Calarco, Negotiating Opportunities: How
the Middle Class Secures Advantages in School (New York: Oxford University
Press, 2018); Suzanne M. Bianchi, John P. Robinson, and Melissa A.
Milkie, Changing Rhythms of American Family Life (New York: Russell Sage
Foundation, 2006); Susan Shaw, “Family Leisure and Changing
Ideologies of Parenthood,” Sociology Compass 2, no. 2 (2008): 688–​703.
2. Gretchen Livingston, “Stay‑at‑Home Moms and Dads Account for About
One‑in‑Five U.S. Parents,” Pew Research Center, September 24, 2018.

Chapter 18: Priorities

1. This echoes national research, which shows that intimate-​partner violence
rates are highest in the poorest neighborhoods. Similarly, residential
segregation causes low-​income families to live in neighbor­hoods where
disadvantage is concentrated, with poorer-​ quality schools, more
environmental hazards, and less safe outdoor spaces. See C. R. Browning,
“The Span of Collective Efficacy: Extending Social Dis­organization Theory
to Partner Violence,” Journal of Marriage and Family 64 (2002): 833–​50; G. L.
Fox and M. L. Benson, “Household and Neighborhood Contexts of Intimate
Partner Violence,” Public Health Reports 121 (2006): 419–​27; P. O’Campo et
al., “Violence by Male Partners Against Women During the Childbearing
Year: A Contextual Analysis,” American Journal of Public Health 85 (1995):
1092–​ 97; Vanessa Sacks, “Five Ways Neighborhoods of Concentrated
Disadvantage Harm Children,” Child Trends, February 14, 2018, www
.childt rends.org/child-​ t rends ‑ 5/f ive -​ w ays -​ n eighborhoods - ​ c on
centrated-​disadvantage-​harm-​children.

Chapter 19: Control

1. For more about the rug rat race, see Garey Ramey and Valerie A. Ramey,
“The Rug Rat Race,” Brookings Papers on Economic Activity 41 (Spring
2010): 129–​99, and W. Bentley MacLeod and Miguel Urquiola,
“Reputation and School Competition,” American Economic Review 105
(2015): 3471–​88.
2. For more about these forms of parenting, see Claire Cain Miller and
Jonah Engel Bromwich, “How Parents Are Robbing Their Children of
Adulthood,” New York Times, March 16, 2019; Ben Zimmer,

309

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 Notes

“ ‘Snowplowing’: When Parents Try to Clear All Obstacles,” Wall Street

Journal, March 29, 2019; Erin Leonard, “Snow Plowing Plows a Child’s
Character,” Psychology Today, March 26, 2019.
It’s also worth noting that as well intentioned as these parents’ efforts
may be, they have downsides, most notably kids’ mental health. More
advantaged teenagers report higher rates of alcohol and drug abuse than
lower-​income teens and clinically significant depression or anxiety at two
to three times the rate of the national average. For more information, see
S. S. Luthar, P. J. Small, and L. Ciciolla, “Adolescents from Upper Middle
Class Communities: Substance Misuse and Addiction Across Early
Adulthood,” Development and Psychopathology 30, no. 1 (2018): 315–​35. In
the Bay Area, a place of tremendously high academic standards and
tough competition for admission into top colleges and universities, there
was a string of student suicides at top high schools in the area during the
time of this research. These suicides inspired local and national
conversation about the stresses and pressures parents were inflicting on
their kids in the hopes of ensuring their success to the detriment of
students’ mental health and well-​being. For more information, see Hanna
Rosin, “The Silicon Valley Suicides,” Atlantic, December 2015.
3. For more about concerted cultivation and the accomplishment of natural
growth, see Annette Lareau, Unequal Childhoods (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 2003).

Chapter 21: Windfall

1. For more about paying families for participating in observations, see
Annette Lareau and Aliya Hamid Rao, “Intensive Family Observations:
A Methodological Guide,” Sociological Methods and Research (April 2020).

Chapter 22: Where We Go

1. My foster siblings’ names have been replaced with pseudonyms, and
their identifying characteristics have been changed.
2. See Priya Fielding-​ Singh, “Dining with Dad: Fathers’ Influences on
Family Food Practices,” Appetite 117 (October 2017): 98–​108, and Priya
Fielding-​Singh, “Fathers Should Take More Active Role in Families’
Healthy Eating,” San Francisco Chronicle, July 17, 2017.
3. Colin Gray, “Leaving Benefits on the Table: Evidence from SNAP,”
Journal of Public Economics 179 (November 2019): 104054.
4. Patricia M. Anderson et al., “Beyond Income: What Else Predicts Very
Low Food Security Among Children?,” Southern Economic Journal 82, no. 4
(2016): 1078–​1105, doi: 10.1002/soej.12079.
5. Fang Zhang et al., “Trends and Disparities in Diet Quality Among US
Adults by Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Participation
Status,” JAMA Network Open 1, no. 2 (2018).
6. Patricia Anderson and Kristin Butcher, “The Relationships Among
SNAP Benefits, Grocery Spending, Diet Quality, and the Adequacy of

310

HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 310 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM

 Notes

Low-​Income Families’ Resources,” Center on Budget and Policy Priorities,

June 14, 2016, www.cbpp.org/research/food-​a ssistance/the-​relationships
-​among-​snap-​benefits-​g rocery-​spending-​diet-​quality-​and-​t he.
7. “Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program: Initiatives to Make SNAP
Benefits More Adequate Significantly Improve Food Security, Nutrition,
and Health,” Food Research and Action Center, February 2019, https://
frac.org/research/resource-​l ibrary/supplemental-​nutrition-​a ssistance
-​program-​initiatives‑to‑make-​snap-​benefits-​more-​adequate-​significantly
-​improve-​food-​security-​nutrition-​and-​health; Carrie M. Durward et al.,
“Double Up Food Bucks Participation Is Associated with Increased Fruit
and Vegetable Consumption and Food Security Among Low-​Income
Adults,” Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior 51, no. 3 (October 16,
2018): 342–​47; “Food Insecurity Nutrition Incentive Program (FINI),”
2015 program results, Farmers Market Coalition, 2017.
8. “School Nutrition,” Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, page
last reviewed February 15, 2021.
9. Amy Ellen Schwartz and Michah W. Rothbart, “Let Them Eat Lunch:
The Impact of Universal Free Meals on Student Performance,” Center for
Policy Research 235 (Fall 2017).
10. Jennifer L. Harris and Tracy Fox, “Food and Beverage Marketing in
Schools: Putting Student Health at the Head of the Class,” JAMA
Pediatrics 168, no. 3 (2014): 206–​208.
11. A 2015 survey by the Rudd Center for Food Policy and Obesity surveyed
over 3,600 parents and found that approximately 4 in 5 agreed that food
companies should reduce marketing unhealthy foods and drinks to kids
and 2 in 3 believed that food companies make it difficult for parents to
raise healthy kids. See Jennifer Harris et al., “Parents’ Attitudes About
Food Marketing to Children: 2012 to 2015 Opportunities and Challenges
to Creating Demand for a Healthier Food Environment,” Rudd Center
for Food Policy and Obesity, April 2017.
12. For more about the unaffordability of housing in America, see Matthew
Desmond, “Unaffordable America: Poverty, Housing, and Eviction,”
Fast Focus: Institute for Research on Poverty 22 (March 2015): 1–​6 ; Laurie
Goodman and Bhargavi Ganesh, “Low-​ Income Homeowners Are as
Burdened by Housing Costs as Renters,” Urban Wire (blog), June 14, 2017;
G. Thomas Kingsley, “Trends in Housing Problems and Federal Housing
Assistance,” Urban Institute, October 26, 2017. For more about the
Bay Area housing market, see Kathleen Pender, “One-​Third Rule Not
Always Feasible in Bay Area Rental Market,” San Francisco Chronicle, March
10, 2014.
13. Pearl Braveman et al., “How Does Housing Affect Health?,” Robert
Wood Johnson Foundation, May 1, 2011, https://www.rwjf.org/en/library​
/research/2011/05/housing-​and-​health.html.
14. Kathryn Leifheit et al., “Eviction in the United States: Affected Populations,
Housing and Neighborhood-​Level Consequences, and Implications for
Health,” Society for Epidemiologic Research Meeting, 2018.

311

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 Notes

15. Matthew Desmond and Rachel Kimbro, “Eviction’s Fallout: Housing,

Hardship, and Health,” Social Forces 94, no. 1 (2015): 295–​ 324, doi:
10.1093/sf/sov044.
16. Sandra J. Newman and C. Scott Holupka, “Housing Affordability and
Investments in Children,” Journal of Housing Economics 24 (2014): 89–​100;
Fredrik Andersson et al., “Childhood Housing and Adult Earnings: A
Between-​Siblings Analysis of Housing Vouchers and Public Housing,”
National Bureau of Economic Research (October 2016), working paper
22721.
17. Daniel Engster and Helena O. Stensota, “Do Family Policy Regimes
Matter for Children’s Well-​Being?,” Social Politics: International Studies in
Gender, State and Society 18, no. 1 (March 7, 2011): 82–​124, doi: 10.1093
/sp/jxr006.
18. See Glenn Thrush, “Here Is a Guide to Biden’s Three Big Spending
Plans — ​Worth About $6 Trillion,” New York Times, April 28, 2021.
19. For more about the positive impact of paid-​family-​leave policies, see
Katherine Policelli and Alix Gould-​ Werth, “New Research Shows
California Paid Family Leave Reduces Poverty,” Washington Center for
Equitable Growth, August 20, 2019; “Paid Leave Will Help Close the
Gender Wage Gap,” National Partnership for Women and Families, 2018;
Jacob Klerman et al., “Family and Medical Leave in 2012: Technical
Report,” prepared for the U.S. Department of Labor, September 7, 2012.

About This Project

1. Since its founding in 1971, CSPI has advocated for clearer federal
nutrition advice, food and menu labeling, improved school food, and
less food and beverage marketing, specifically to children. It also has
research arms, which inform aspects of its advocacy work.
2. For the report generated from this research, see Priya Fielding-​Singh,
Jessica Almy, and Margo Wootan, “Sugar Overload: Retail Checkout
Promotes Obesity,” Center for Science in the Public Interest, 2014.
3. In this book, I mainly refer to parents’ income backgrounds. However, in
the original research design, I used a composite measure to determine a
family’s socioeconomic status that combined parents’ education and
household income. High-​socioeconomic families had at least one parent
with a college education and a household income above 350 percent of
the poverty line. In middle-​socioeconomic families, both parents had at
least a high-​school education and a household income between 180 and
350 percent of the poverty line. Some of these families had parents with
a college or associate’s degree. In low-​socioeconomic families, neither
parent had more than a high-​school degree, and the household income
didn’t exceed 180 percent of the poverty line. For reference, students in a
family of four qualify for free lunches if their household income is
$31,525 or less and reduced-​price lunches if their household income is
between $31,526 and $44,863. In this study, a family of four was classified
as middle-​socioeconomic if its household income was between $44,863

312

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 Notes

and $85,050. A family of four was classified as a high-​socioeconomic

family if its household income exceeded $85,050. Within each
socioeconomic bracket, I interviewed roughly equal numbers of self-​
identified Black, Asian, Latinx, and white families. For more information
about the sample, see Priya Fielding-​Singh, “A Taste of Inequality: Food’s
Symbolic Value Across the Socioeconomic Spectrum,” Sociological Science
(August 2017).
4. While most families in my study with two parents were headed by
different-​sex couples, I also interviewed a handful of same-​sex couples.
However, given the small number of these families within my sample — ​
and, accordingly, my uncertainty about to what degree these families’
experiences were reflective of other same-​sex couples’ experiences — ​I
made the decision not to include their stories in the book. For research
on housework, foodwork included, among same-​sex couples, see Abbie E.
Goldberg, “ ‘Doing’ and ‘Undoing’ Gender: The Meaning and Division
of Housework in Same-​Sex Couples,” Journal of Family Theory and Review
5, no. 2 (2013): 85–​104.
5. I had every single interview I conducted transcribed verbatim. I had
interviews that I conducted in Spanish transcribed in Spanish and then
translated to English. I triangulated these transcription data with my
field notes to reconstruct scenes for the book.
6. When I was ready to write this book, I read and reread every interview
and field note several times. As I wrote, I prioritized my firsthand
observations and secondhand information that had been confirmed by
multiple family members. Once the book was written, I recontacted
Nyah, Dana, Renata, and Julie and read them relevant portions of the
book to check factual details. I used the qualitative-​ data-​analysis
software Dedoose for all analyses of interviews and field notes for peer-​
reviewed academic publications whose arguments and findings provided
a basis for this book. In writing the actual book itself, I did not use
qualitative- ​data software.

313

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 314 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM
 Index

accomplishment of natural growth, Baldwin, James, 86

213 Barnard, Neal, 290n2
adolescents beverage industry
activities of, 74–75 advertising and marketing of, 43,
food industry marketing to, 301n2 301n2
food preferences of, xii, 104–5, deregulation of, 295n5
108, 110, 142, 145, 154, 158, 216, government support for, 295n4
220–21, 232 research as marketing tactic,
mental health of, 310n2 296n5
obesity rates of, 291n6 biases, xvii, 7–8, 266, 279
quality of diet and, 9, 20–21, Biden, Joe, 256, 262–63
59–61, 63, 64, 216, 269 Blacks
adults. See also fathers and fathering; economic inequality and, 11–12
mothers and mothering; in ethnographic research, 271–72
parenting foods associated with, 116, 118–22,
obesity rates of, 291n6 123, 124, 126
agriculture, government subsidies household wealth of, 12
for, 295n5 inclusive image of body size, 217
American Academy of Pediatrics, mothering ideologies of, 303n3
301n2 racist stereotypes of, 84–85, 116,
American Dream, 11, 252 119, 125–28
American Families Plan, 262–63 segregation of, 69–70, 121
American Heart Association, 290n2 type 2 diabetes and, 292n11,
American Indians 304n1
food access on reservations, women and weathering
297–98n11 hypothesis, 27
type 2 diabetes and, 292n11 body-image issues, 217
American individualism, 85, 254–55 body mass index (BMI)
American Psychological Association, limitations of, xxiii, 289n2
301n2 pediatrician visits and, xiii, xxii,
Asian-Americans, type 2 diabetes 215–16, 217, 218, 220
and, 292n11 Bornstein, David, 297n10

HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 315 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM

 Index

Bowen, Sarah, 303n3, 307n1 Christopher, Karen, 302–3n3

breastfeeding Civil Rights Act, 12
challenges of, xii–xiii Collins, Patricia Hill, 303n3
responsibilities of motherhood concerted cultivation, 213
and, 97, 215, 216 consumer culture, 300–301n4
Brenton, Joslyn, 307n1 Cooper, Marianne, 185
COVID-19 pandemic
Cairns, Kate, 108 economic and racial inequities in,
CalFresh, 298n18 12–13
calories food insecurity rates and, 52–53,
energy-dense, satiating foods and, 256, 257
53 food scarcity and, 249–51
overconsumption of, 9, 291n6 outsourcing strategies and, 308n4
prices for nutritious foods and, 51, culture. See also dietary acculturation
53 defining of, 85
CalWORKs, 298n18
Center for Science in the Public daily consumption, foods for, xv
Interest (CSPI), 267, 312n1 Daniel, Caitlin, 103
Centers for Disease Control (CDC), defensive-mothering ideology,
104 302–3n3
chain stores, checkout aisles of, Desmond, Matthew, 181, 299n1,
267–68 300n3
checkout aisles, research on, 267–68 diabetes. See type 2 diabetes
children. See also adolescents; dietary acculturation, 170–71, 172,
feeding children 174–76, 308n1
diverging destinies for, 11, Dietary Guidelines for Americans
292–93n13 (DGA), 8–9, 257, 290n2
food industry marketing and, 47, dietary restrictions
91–92, 258–60, 301n2, 311n11 food insecurity and, 53
food preferences of, xii, xx, 56–57, junk food and, xix, 100
64, 93–94, 100, 103, 104, 106, plant-based diets and, 59–61, 63,
107–8, 110, 117, 137, 150, 163, 64
171, 172, 174, 195, 210, 215, 229, Double Up Food Bucks, 256
234–35 Dow, D. M., 303n3
food preparation skills of, 133, downscaling, mothers’ downscaling
206, 229 of expectations, 185, 186,
happiness of, 65–66, 74–75, 187–88, 190, 192, 194, 199, 211,
81–82, 88, 89, 96, 244, 247 224, 227–28
obesity prevention campaigns,
47–48 eating disorders, 217–18
obesity rates of, 48–49, 127, 128, Eaton, S. Boyd, 290n2
291n6 economic inequality
organic-child ideal and, 108–9 culture-of-poverty argument and,
quality of diet and, 9, 103, 150, 215 84–85
satiety of, 102–3, 105, 106, 107, 110 intergenerational transfer of, 11,
windfall child rearing, 88 16, 292n13

316

HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 316 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM

 Index

racial inequality intersecting with, research interview process and,

11–12, 292–93n13 272–75
rise in, 11, 13, 21–22 research observation process and,
Edin, Kathryn, 299n1 275–80
Elliott, Sinikka, 303n3, 307n1 restaurant meals of, 45, 54, 55,
emotion work 64–66, 298n17, 299n1
concept of, 183–84 structural solutions for, 260, 263,
mothers’ emotion-work strategies, 264
184–85, 190, 192, 210, 237 supermarket shopping of, 45–46,
empathy 49, 54–55
judgment contrasted with, xvii unhoused families, 208–10,
policy reforms and, 264, 266, 282 227
radical empathy, 7–8 fast food
environmental pollutants and children’s preferences for, xii, 94,
contaminants, exposure to, 261, 104, 163, 195, 210
262, 292n13 fathers’ opinions of, 136, 137,
ethnicity. See racial and ethnic 140–41, 163
minorities food industry’s marketing of, 43,
European welfare states, social safety 45
nets of, 292n12, 293n14 mothers’ opinions of, 42, 110, 112,
extensive-mothering ideology, 113, 140–41, 142, 153, 171, 184,
302–3n3 196, 214, 229
unhoused families and, 208–9
families. See also higher-income fathers and fathering
families; immigrant families; absent Black fathers, 84
lower-income families; middle- on fast food, 136, 137, 140–41,
income families 163
contexts of food access, 20, 49–50, meal planning and cooking,
253 133–39, 162, 163, 199–202,
dietary differences across 305n4, 306n5
families, 46–47, 48, 49–50, 51, responsibilities of, 22, 37, 97, 131,
297n9 133–34
ethnographic research on, 20–23, stay-at-home fathers, 199–202
26, 241, 268–80, 312–13n3, feast-or-famine cycle, 53
313n4 federal nutrition-assistance
factors in eating habits, 5 programs, 251, 255–56. See also
federal policies supporting, SNAP
262–64 Federal Trade Commission, 301n2
food budgets of, 54–56 feeding children
food insecurity and, 52–53, 59, autonomy and, xix
105, 229 challenges of, xii–xiii, xvii, xxii,
food spending patterns of, 51, xxiv
298n17 ethnographic research on,
home-prepared meals created by, xv–xvii, 5–7, 20–23
44–45, 54, 196, 197, 198, 199, as high-stakes parenting endeavor,
235–36, 237, 264 xiv

317

HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 317 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM

 Index

feeding children (cont.) geographic access to healthy

intensive-mothering ideology and, foods, 17, 18, 20, 47–50, 242,
97–99, 100, 109, 134, 156, 195, 268, 297n9, 297–98n11, 298n12
198, 236, 265 nutritional inequalities and,
metrics of, xiii, xxii–xxiii 252–53, 268
mothers as food providers, 22, food and diet. See also dietary
97–98, 100, 131–34, 138–39, restrictions
141, 142, 144, 158, 215–17, 254, biases on, 7–8
259, 264–65, 307n1, 307n10 cultural practices and taste,
mothers’ control of, 213–16 118–19, 186, 258, 274, 297n10
ripple effects of, xiv–xv, xix inequalities affecting, xiv, 8, 16,
Fielding-Singh, Priya 39, 229
breastfeeding experiences of, information on, xvii
xii–xiii meanings of, 20, 77, 154, 252–53,
family background of, xviii–xxi, 273
13 memories of, xix, 18–20, 40,
foster siblings of, 13–16, 248–49, 44–45, 169, 173, 277
281 mothers’ food-related rules and,
mothering experiences of, 46, 94–95, 98, 99, 100
xiii–xiv, xxii, xxiii, 281, omnipresence in daily life, 276
282 plant-based diets, 59–61, 63, 64
pregnancy and childbirth racial associations of, 116,
experiences, xi–xii 118–22
racial ambiguity of, 274 racist narratives about, 116, 119
finances. See also economic as source of stability and refuge,
inequality 16
of higher-income families, 76, 77, Food and Nutrition Act of 2008,
107, 110, 113, 147–48, 149, 151, 298n18
153 food choices
of lower-income families, 70, autonomy in, xix, xx, xxi
76–77, 81, 86–87, 101–3, 110, factors shaping, 20, 57, 65, 142–43,
162, 167–68, 180–82, 183, 268, 273, 275
186–87, 190–91, 227, 243, 244, geographic access to healthy
250, 280 foods, 17, 18, 20, 47–49, 242,
of middle-income families, 154, 268, 297n10
157–58, 159, 160, 161–66, 247 judgment of, 264, 266, 282
problems with, 3–5, 101 price as determinant of, 17, 18, 20,
food access 50, 51, 54, 55, 57, 65, 242, 268,
concept of, 46–47, 297n10 297n10
contexts of, 20, 49–50, 253 symbolic value of, 65–66
families’ subjective perceptions of, food deserts
49–50, 224 definitions of, 46, 297n10
food deserts and, 46–47, 50, 229, diet quality and, 297n9
252, 268, 297–98n11, 298n12 elimination of, 48
food insecurity and, 52–53, 59, food access and, 46–47, 50, 229,
105, 229, 251, 252 252, 268, 297–98n11, 298n12

318

HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 318 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM

 Index

supermarkets and, 46–48, 49, 252, food stamps

297n9, 298n12 food purchases and, 64–65, 299n1
food environment living alone incentivized by,
American food environment, 44, 298–99n19
172, 189, 254, 267–68 food waste, 103, 107
causes of unhealthy food food workers, 5, 105
environment, 295–96n5 foster-care system, 13–14
context of, xiv, xxiii, xxiv, 20 France, social safety net of, 292n12
obesity linked to, 296n6
processed foods and, 254, 295n4 Gardner, Christopher, 290n2
Food for Thought (2018), 290n2 gender norms, 22, 96–97, 132–35,
food industry 184, 273, 305n4, 307n1. See also
advertising and marketing of, fathers and fathering; mothers
43–44, 47, 91–93, 96, 153, 201, and mothering
258–60, 264, 268, 296n5, 301n2, Geronimus, Arline, 27
311n11 Gini coefficient, 292n12
deregulation of, 109, 295n5 grocery shopping
government support for, 255, mothers teaching healthy choices
295n4 in, 41
interests of, 254–55, 264, 282 types of supermarkets and, 45–46,
research as marketing tactic, 54, 55, 60, 61, 89–90, 93, 112,
295–96n5 113, 242
food insecurity
COVID-19 pandemic and, 52–53, Haspel, Tamar, 296n6
256, 257 Hays, Sharon, 96, 306n6
evictions and, 182 health-care access
food access and, 52–53, 59, 105, disparities in, 10, 11, 12–13, 181,
229, 251, 252 292n13, 304n1
poverty line and, 52, 244 metrics of health inequities,
food pantries xxii–xxiii
COVID-19 pandemic and, 251 universal coverage and, 262–63
lower-income families and, 45, 53, Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of
56, 101, 105, 255 2010, 47, 257
social comparison and, 224, 226 healthy eating. See also nutritious
food purchases. See also grocery diets
shopping definitions of, 42–43, 119, 127–28,
priorities of, 4–5, 63, 64–65, 289–90n2
299n1 discourse of, 294n1
SNAP as supplement for, 50–51, financial insecurities and,
52, 64–65, 225, 256, 273 162–64
food scarcity food insecurity and, 53
COVID-19 pandemic and, 249–51 gender norms and, 134–35
effects of, 248–49 images of, 118
for lower-income families, 52, immigrant parents and, 169,
101–2, 250, 251 170–73, 175, 308n1
food-specific policy reforms, 255 knowledge of, 83, 209, 210, 294n2

319

HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 319 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM

 Index

healthy eating (cont.) 211, 220, 229, 232–33, 236–37,

mothers’ promotion of, 40–42, 46, 265
61–62, 83, 93, 100, 106–7, outsourcing strategies of, 149–51,
136–41, 150–51, 152, 184–85, 308n4
193, 294n1 spending patterns for food, 51, 55
price and proximity as factors in, symbolic deprivation for children,
17, 18, 20, 51, 54, 55, 57, 242, 268 300–301n4
scales for measurement of, “teaching moments” about food,
290–91n4 46, 107–10, 152, 154
stress and, 137, 141, 158, 193, 215 types of foods purchased by,
time as factor in, 142–47, 149, 151, 45–46, 50, 73, 108–9, 113–14,
165, 166 148
Healthy Eating Index, 9 Hillview Central High School,
Healthy Food Financing Initiative, 269–71
48 Hispanics, 217, 292n11
Healthy Incentives Pilot program, Hochschild, Arlie, 183
256 household wealth, racial disparities
heart disease, 13, 295n5, 296n5 in, 12
helicopter parenting, 212 housing instability
higher-income families affordable-housing crisis, 261, 262
abundance of food on display, evictions and, 167, 181, 182, 204,
72–73 228, 262
activities of adolescents, 74–75 housing reforms and, 263
effect of windfall of cash on diets, of lower-income families, 181–82,
241–42, 245–46 183, 187, 208–10, 261–62
fathers’ upscaling of expectations, hypertension, 304n1
199–202
financial resources of, 76, 77, 107, immigrant families
110, 113, 147–48, 149, 151, 153 access to federal benefits, 255
food as status symbol, 111–17, 123, dietary acculturation of, 170–71,
212 172, 174–76, 308n1
mental health of adolescents, financial resources of, 167–69,
310n2 172–73, 175–76, 179
mothers’ control and, 211–15, 216, healthy eating and, 169, 170–73,
217–22, 230, 310n2 175, 308n1
mothers’ emotion-work strategies, inequalities. See also economic
184–85 inequality; nutritional
mothers’ food-related rules and, inequalities; racial inequality
46, 94–95, 98, 99, 100, 105–10, feeding children and, xiv
211, 214 food and diet affected by, xiv, 8,
mothers’ priorities, 204–5, 211, 16, 39, 229
212 integrated-mothering ideology,
mothers’ social comparisons to 302–3n3
other families, 229–37 intensive-mothering ideology
mothers’ upscaling of feeding children and, 97–99, 100,
expectations, 193–99, 202, 204, 109, 134, 156, 195, 198, 236, 265

320

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financial resources for, 99–100, 205 food deserts and, 46–47, 48, 252
gendered demands of, 96–97 food pantries and, 45, 53, 56, 101,
offshoots of, 302–3n3 105, 255
unachievable standards of, 97, food scarcity and, 52, 101–2, 250,
100, 265–66, 282 251
intimate-partner violence, 309n1 free and reduced-price school
inventive-mothering ideology, 302n3 meals and, 60–61
health issues of, 71, 180–81, 183
Johnson, Lyndon B., 84 housing instability of, 181–82, 183,
Johnston, Josée, 108 187, 208–10, 261–62
junk food knowledge of healthy eating and,
allowances for, xxi 83, 209, 210, 294n2
dietary restrictions and, xix, 100 lack of conversations about dietary
fathers’ attitudes toward, 137 health, 46
minimizing children’s exposure mental health issues of, 71–72
to, 258 mental health of adolescents,
mothers’ attitudes toward, 42, 53, 310n2
80–81, 83, 84, 85, 86, 88, 89, mothers’ control and, 213, 214
93–95, 98–99, 214, 221 mothers’ downscaling of
Smart Snacks mimicking, 104 expectations, 185, 186, 187–88,
symbolic meaning for lower- 190, 192, 194, 199, 211, 224,
income families, 261 227–28
mothers’ emotion-work strategies,
Katz, David, 290n2 185, 190, 192, 210
keto diets, 290n2 mothers’ priorities, 203–10, 211,
Kuka, Paula, xxiii–xxiv 214, 309n1
mothers’ social comparisons to
Lamont, Michèle, 85 other families, 223–29, 233
Lareau, Annette, 213 nutritional inequalities and, 10,
Lein, Laura, 299n1 17, 50, 291–92n11
Let’s Move! campaign, 47–48, 127 optimism as survival strategy, 182,
Lewis, Oscar, 84 183
life span disparities, 10 SNAP used by, 50–52, 63
living wage, 260–61, 263 spending patterns for food, 51, 55,
lower-income families 62, 64, 80–81, 83, 84, 85, 86, 88,
defensive-mothering ideology 98–99, 142–43, 299n1
and, 303n3 stereotypes of children’s diets,
effect of windfall of cash on diets, 61–62, 214, 223
241–45, 246 structural poverty and, 84
familial support and, 225–26, 227 symbolic indulgence for children,
financially irrational decisions of, 243–44, 261, 300–301n4
84, 87–88 as target of phone scams,
financial stresses of, 70, 76–77, 81, 78–79
86–87, 101–3, 110, 162, 167–68, types of foods purchased by,
180–82, 183, 186–87, 190–91, 45–46, 50, 63, 80–83, 93–94,
227, 243, 244, 250, 280 98–99

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MacKendrick, Norah, 108 interpretations of good

Martínez-González, Miguel, 290n2 mothering, 96–100, 113–14,
masculinity, 134–35, 305n4 126, 128, 152, 154, 158, 196–97,
Mead, Lawrence, 85 205, 214, 222, 237, 247, 264–66,
middle-income families 281–82, 302–3n3
compromises of, 152–55, 156, 158, lack of legal protections and
159 supportive policies for, 96
effect of windfall of cash on diets, loss of child and, 33–34
241–42, 246–47 responsibilities of, xi–xiii, xxii, 22,
financial insecurities of, 160, 32–35, 38, 53, 76–77, 97–100,
161–66 109, 131–34, 141, 215–17, 254,
financial resources of, 154, 265–66, 306n6
157–58, 159, 160, 161–66, 247 single mothers, 25–27, 28, 29–32,
food as status symbol and, 115–17, 52, 62–63, 85, 89, 99, 106–7,
123, 162, 193–94 115–17, 142–44, 190–92, 263,
household debt of, 160–61 299n1, 302n3
mothers’ food-related rules and, societal scrutiny of, 99–100, 214,
94, 152 215–20, 237
mothers’ upscaling of stay-at-home mothers, 139,
expectations, 194 146, 197, 199, 219, 233,
“teaching moments” about food 234–37
and, 116–17, 154, 161 time scarcity and, 142–46
types of foods purchased by, unhoused mothers, 208–9
45–46, 53–54, 55, 154–55, 161 working mothers, 139–40, 144,
mindsets, 184 152–53, 197, 199, 233–35,
mortality, role of unhealthy diet in, 307n10
10 Moynihan, Daniel Patrick, 84
mothers and mothering Moynihan Report, 84
accountability of, xiii–xiv, xxii, multigenerational homes, 89–90,
95–96, 100, 302–3n3 132–33
children’s happiness and, 65–66,
74–75, 81–82, 88, 89, 96, 244, National Food Desert Awareness
247 Month, 48
emotion-work strategies of, National School Lunch Program,
184–85, 190, 192, 210, 237 256
food industry’s marketing to, neighborhoods, segregation of, 21,
96 69–70, 113, 121, 309n1
food preferences of, 105 Nestle, Marion, 296n5
healthy eating promoted by, nutritional inequalities
40–42, 46, 61–62, 83, 93, 100, causes of, 17–18, 47, 50, 252–53,
106–7, 136–41, 150–51, 152, 268, 297n10
184–85, 193, 294n1 emotion work and, 184
intensive-mothering ideology ethnicity and, 10
and, 96–100, 109, 134, 156, 195, food access and, 252–53, 268
198, 205, 236, 265–66, 282, food deserts and, 47, 268
302–3n3 metrics and, xxii–xxiii

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racial and ethnic minorities and, price of, 45, 54, 55

10, 291–92n11 racial stereotypes associated with,
reforms addressing, 264, 266 125, 126
socioeconomic status and, 10, 11, outsourcing strategies, 149–51,
12–13, 17, 50, 257 156–58, 308n4
nutritious diets. See also healthy
eating parenting. See also fathers and
components of, 8–9, 42, 289–90n2 fathering; mothers and
discourse on, 201–2, 264 mothering
financial incentives promoting approaches to, 212–13
purchase of, 256 challenges of, xxiii–xxiv
food access and, 252–53 children’s bodies as feedback on,
as fundamental human right, 254 xiv, xxiii, xxiv
images of, 118 concerted cultivation, 213
kale and, 118, 121, 122–24 consumer culture and, 88,
prices of, 51 300–301n4
role in overall health and well- context of, 95
being, 10, 42 helicopter parenting, 212
scales for measurement of, physical cultivation, 213
290–91n4 resources of, xxiii, 39
school meals and, 257–58 responsibilities of, xxiv
rug rat race and, 212
Obama, Barack, 257 snowplow parenting, 213
Obama, Michelle, 47–48, 127 undocumented parents, 51–52,
obesity 173, 207–8, 255, 298n18
cost of processed foods and, personal responsibility
295n5 narrative of, 254–55
feast-or-famine cycle and, 53 social responsibility and, xiv, xxiv,
food environment linked to, 96–97, 254–55, 264–65, 266,
296n6 282
food industry’s marketing tactics Petersen, Anne Helen, 160
and, 296n5 physical cultivation, 213
hunger coexisting with, 53 plant-based diets, 59–61, 63, 64, 104
Michelle Obama’s Let’s Move! poverty line
campaign to end childhood culture-of-poverty argument,
obesity, 47, 127 84–85
obesity rates in adults, 291n6 families living below, 23, 312n3
obesity rates in children, 48–49, food insecurity and, 52, 244
127, 128, 291n6 full-time workers living below,
rates of, xiv, 291n6 62–63, 260–61
Oldways, 289–90n2 middle-income families’
Oleschuk, Merin, 307n1 proximity to, 160–61
O’Malley, Keelia, 297n10 mothers’ priorities and, 205
organic foods SNAP and, 51
motivations for eating, 59, 63, structural solutions for families,
108–9, 111–12 260, 263, 264

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processed foods school administrators, role in

families’ use of, 43, 53, 54, 153–54, families’ eating, 5
166 School Breakfast Program, 256
food environment and, 254, schools
295n4 food industry and, 295n4
food industry’s marketing of, 44, food provided in, 5, 47, 60–61,
92–93, 153 104, 171, 226, 229, 256–58, 260,
government subsidies for 304n3
production of, 295n5 weight of children tracked by, 217
prices of, 51 Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher
public health narratives, 64, 299n1 Program, 24, 187
Pugh, Allison, 88, 300–301n4 slavery, cumulative effects of, 84
Small, Mario, 85
racial and ethnic minorities, and Smart Snacks in Schools, 104, 108
nutritional inequalities, 10, SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition
291–92n11 Assistance Program)
racial discrimination, 121, 304n1 eligibility for, 51–52, 54, 226, 255,
racial inequality, economic 256, 298n18, 298–99n19,
inequality intersecting with, 299n20, 304n3
11–12, 292–93n13 food purchases supplemented by,
racism 50–51, 52, 64–65, 225, 256, 273
environmental racism, 304n1 increasing benefits of, 260
legacy of systemic, structural snowplow parenting, 213
racism, 11–12, 121 social justice, food and health as
weathering hypothesis and, 27 issues of, 47, 127, 252
radical empathy, 7–8 social media, food industry
Ramey, Garey, 212 marketing on, 301n2
Ramey, Valerie, 212 social responsibility, and personal
resilience, 29, 118, 188 responsibility, xiv, xxiv, 96–97,
restaurant employees, 105 254–55, 264–65, 266, 282
Rose, Donald, 297n10 social safety net, 11, 13–14, 260, 273,
Rudd Center for Food Policy and 281, 292n12, 293n14
Obesity, 311n11 socioeconomic status. See also
rug rat race, 212 higher-income families; lower-
rural regions, food access in, income families; middle-
297–98n11 income families
consumer culture and, 88,
same-sex couples, 313n4 300–301n4
San Francisco Bay Area determinants of, 312–13n3
Black families in, 69–70 food as status symbol and, 111–17,
COVID-19 pandemic and, 249 122–24, 162, 193–94, 212
economic inequalities within, 21 nutritional inequalities and, 10,
ethnographic research on families 11, 12–13, 17, 50, 257
of, 271 rise in economic inequality, 11
student suicides in, 310n2 upwardly mobile families, 115–17,
Schnell, Martin, 270 122

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soul food, 118–21, 123, 124, 196, qualitative element of, 145–46,
304n1 148–49, 151, 166
Southern cuisine, 304n1 toxic stress, exposure to, 292n13
special occasions, foods for, xv transportation, car access, 49, 50
Spector, Tim, 290n2 Trump, Donald, 47, 257
standard American diet (SAD), 8, type 2 diabetes
9–10 cost of processed foods and,
stress 295n5
chronic stress, 190 COVID-19 pandemic and, 13
effect on health, 304n1 dietary advice for, 290n2
financial stresses, 70, 76–77, 81, economic inequities and,
86–87, 101–3, 110, 161–65, 292–93n13
167–68, 180–82, 183, 186–87, lower-income families coping
190–91, 227, 243, 244, 250, 272, with, 180–81
280 nutritional disparities and, 10,
gender norms and, 132 291–92n11
healthy eating and, 137, 141, 158, Southern cuisine and soul food
193, 215 associated with, 304n1
social comparisons and, 233,
237 undocumented parents
toxic stress exposure, 292n13 daily realities of, 173, 207–8
student-loan debt, 160–61 lack of access to public benefits,
sugar industry, research as 51–52, 255, 298n18
marketing tactic, 295–96n5 unhoused families, 208–10, 227
supermarkets USDA
food deserts and, 46–48, 49, 252, on food deserts, 46, 48, 49
297n9, 298n12 school-provided meals and,
food marketing in, 91–92 257
research on checkout aisles, upscaling
267–68 fathers’ upscaling of expectations,
types of, 45–46, 54, 55, 60, 61, 199–202
89–90, 93, 112, 113, 242 mothers’ upscaling of
Supplemental Security Income (SSI) expectations, 193–99, 202, 204,
payments, 28, 299n19, 299n20 211, 220, 229, 232–33, 236–37,
Sweden 265
de-gendered domestic labor in, urban areas, food access in,
305n4 297–98n11
social safety net of, 292n12
Szabo, Michelle, 305n4 Vasquez, Nicola, 269–70
veganism, 59–61, 63, 104
Task Force on Childhood Obesity, 47 vegetarianism, 135, 148, 206
teachers, role in families’ eating, 5
Teigen, Chrissy, 198 weathering hypothesis, 27
time weight issues
healthy eating and, 142–47, 149, dietary choices and, 38–39
151, 165, 166 mothers’ control and, 215–21

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weight issues (cont.) interpretations of good mothering

pediatricians’ monitoring of, xiii, and, 96–97, 99, 214
xxii, 215–16, 217, 218, 220 thinness associated with, 127–28,
rates of overweight adults, 291n6 217
societal standards of beauty and, type 2 diabetes and, 292n11
xxi Wilkerson, Isabel, 7
Weight Watchers, 218 Willett, Walter, 290n2
whites windfall child rearing, 88
foods associated with, 118–19, 123, Women, Infants, and Children
124, 126 (WIC) benefits, 51–52, 226, 256,
household wealth of, 12 273

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 About the Author

Priya Fielding- ​Singh is an assistant professor in the Department

of Family and Consumer Studies at the University of Utah,
where she researches, teaches, and writes about families, health,
and inequality in America. She earned her PhD in sociology
from Stanford University and completed her postdoctoral train-
ing as a National Institutes of Health Fellow in Cardiovascular
Disease Prevention at the Stanford University School of Medi-
cine. She lives in Salt Lake City with her husband and daughter.

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HowOtherHalfEa_HCtextF1.indd 328 9/10/21  2:19:47 AM