"Sun food" is a term used (perhaps coined) by Michael Pollan in his October 2008 editorial Farmer In Chief, an open letter to the next President of the United States.

Sun food refers to food grown the traditional way: by the power of the sun, which fed the crops that fed humans and the grass that fed livestock through the process of photosynthesis. For decades in America, food production has relied not on clean, renewable, free solar energy, but on cheap oil that powered tractors and other farm equipment, processed and transported food from as halfway around the country or the world to local supermarkets, and fed and protected crops through the use of synthetic pesticides and fertilizers. This has had many unintended consequences on the American people and the world, including a rising epidemic of obesity and other food-related health problems, staggering rates of erosion, water, and air pollution, a growing loss of biodiversity among both wildlife and food species, and the global climate crisis.

With the era of cheap oil coming to a close, it is vitally important to return food systems to reliance on the sun.

1. Grow your own.
2. Support local food.
3. Educate yourself and get involved!

1. Edible Education. Alice Waters, chef and founder of the famous Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse, recently founded The Edible Schoolyard, which aims to educate school children about the food system and healthy eating by growing organic vegetable gardens in schoolyards and using the produce in school lunches. Celebrity chef Jaime Oliver has founded a related program focusing on bringing higher quality food into British schools, and there are also efforts in the US to bring more fresh produce from local farms to school cafeterias through the National Farm to School Program.
2. Wind Farming. Many of America's best agricultural lands also have some if its best wind resources, a great source of clean, renewable energy that could also bring millions of new jobs into rural areas. Fortunately, wind turbines combine very well with agriculture, and have been a boon to farmers in states around the nation. For more, see Wind Energy Basics for Farmers.
3. Perennial Crops. One of the most remarkable (and long-term) goals of the sustainable agriculture movement is perennial crops. Wes Jackson's Kansas-based Land Institute has been working on this project, which seeks to combine the food production qualities of crop grains with the soil sustaining root systems of native prairie grasses.
4. Victory Gardens. By the end of World War Two, 20 million "victory gardens" in backyards across the nation produced 40% of the produce consumed in the country. Reviving the victory garden would improve food security and biodiversity and encourage consumption of the most local food of all: food grown in your own backyard. One effort to revive the victory garden movement has renamed them Freedom Gardens, as in freedom from foreign oil, high food prices, and dependence on others for our most basic human need.City residents can also participate, through programs like community gardens or innovative uses of space, such as rooftop gardens and vertical gardens.