One of the big international foodie events, the Oxford Symposium on Food and Cookery, starts tomorrow, 9/8. The topic this year is Food and Morality

• Food and quality – should food be good?
• Food and safety and the environment – should food be clean?
• Food and justice – should food be fair?
• Food and human nature – is it right to take pleasure in food?

and the keynote speaker is Ruth Reichl. The Co-chairs of the program are notable food writers Paul Levy and Claudia Roden. Many of the topics are of particular interest to our readers – ‘ecotarianism,’ organics and consumerism, meat-eating and vegetarianism, eating local, and there’s even one session devoted to Jewish perspectives, at which yours truly is participating. I’m especially intrigued by one of my co-panelists Susan Weingarten’s topic ‘Eating People is Wrong: Cannibalism and Charoset.’ Wouldn’t you be intrigued, too? See the whole list of papers here. I had wonderful dinner table conversation with participants tonight over Jain vegetarianism, Michael Pollan, Irish Jewish foodways, Catholic Bavarian saints festivals, and selling olive oil and wine. I’ll have more to report later.