Vegetable Oil — A Soybean’s Journey
My bizarre love of the plant kingdom has caused me to imagine the process of creating soybean oil from the point of view of the bean. The genetically modified seed is planted, sprayed with glyphosate, harvested, crushed, soaked in hexane, degummed, bleached, deodorized, and finally, fed to humans.
I took a little creative license in the story for fun. I do not believe that soybeans talk to stalks of grass. But, what is life without a little whimsy?
Chapter 1 — Just a little sprout
I remember clearly the first crack in my shell. My stem started pushing up through the heavy dirt while my roots sought purchase down into the soil. I could feel the nutrients through each hair of my roots. The ground was moist and wonderful.
Finally my stem pushed high enough, and I felt the cool air on it. The top of stem was still stuck under the dirt. I pushed and pushed before I finally figured out that I needed to pull up from the part of my stem that was already in the air.
I can’t lie, I felt pretty stupid when I realized that I needed to pull instead of push. It worked though. the top of my stem flew through the air to stand up straight, and I was officially sprouted.
I looked around at my neighbors. There were some larger sprouts that were clearly…
