Squeezed : What You Don't Know About Orange Juice Paperback / softback

by Alissa Hamilton

Part of the Yale Agrarian Studies Series series

Paperback / softback

Available to Order - This title is available to order, with delivery expected within 2 weeks

Description

How orange juice became a North American breakfast staple and what â€œ100% pure orange juiceâ€ means today Close to three quarters of U.S. households buy orange juice. Its popularity crosses class, cultural, racial, and regional divides.

Why do so many of us drink orange juice? How did it turn from a luxury into a staple in just a few years?

More important, how is it that we donâ€™t know the real reasons behind OJâ€™s popularity or understand the processes by which the juice is produced?In this enlightening book, Alissa Hamilton explores the hidden history of orange juice.

She looks at the early forces that propelled orange juice to prominence, including a surplus of oranges that plagued Florida during most of the twentieth century and the armyâ€™s need to provide vitamin C to troops overseas during World War II.

She tells the stories of the FDAâ€™s decision in the early 1960s to standardize orange juice, and the juice equivalent of the cola wars that followed between Coca-Cola (which owns Minute Maid) and Pepsi (which owns Tropicana).

Of particular interest to OJ drinkers will be the revelation that most orange juice comes from Brazil, not Florida, and that even â€œnot from concentrateâ€ orange juice is heated, stripped of flavor, stored for up to a year, and then reflavored before it is packaged and sold.

The book concludes with a thought-provoking discussion of why consumers have the right to know how their food is produced.