Those familiar with contemporary famine relief scenes may have chanced upon one of the more ubiquitous products in refugee camps and feeding centers. Plumpy’Nut, a French-manufactured sachet of peanut paste, dried milk, oil, sugar, as well as a number of essential vitamins and minerals, is meant to be kneaded in the packet before being opened and consumed. If reasonably tasty—often described as a more cloying sort of peanut butter—this quality is not its primary draw. Rather, three sachets are “prescribed” each day to children suffering from severe malnutrition in the absence of more varied and fulsome foods.

Less well-known, perhaps, are the many other objects and foods that govern daily life in spaces of hunger, like the relief food “Corn-Soy-Blend,” a bag of protein-fortified maize meal offered to slightly better-fed but still malnourished children. Aid workers distinguish between children better-suited to Plumpy’Nut or CSB through the use of a bright...

You do not currently have access to this content.