Foodies around the world will rejoice that someone has finally come to their defense. No more confusion around what you should eat or how you should eat it, author Michael Pollan lays out simple instructions on how to live a more healthy life: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. These three simple statements form the central thesis of his latest work In Defense Of Food: An Eater's Manifesto.
However, just to be clear, this is not a diet book, or another nutritionally based argument in favor of whole wheat bread, butter versus margarine or an oregano oil infused lifestyle. Rather In Defense Of Food could very well be called the anti-diet book. Instead, in this innovative (for North Americans, not for the rest of the world) approach to eating, Pollan advocates for individuals to exercise their right to vote by fork. He invites readers to “…join a movement that is renovating our food system in the name of health…”.
The first few chapters explore how we got in our current North American food mess, from an overly nutrient-based analysis of food, to the advent of supplement cultures, bad food science, and perhaps even at fault, is the sheer excess of food available to North Americans. This abundance has fostered a culture of careless, perfunctory eating, explains Pollan.
Yet, he explains, we are now facing an unfamiliar dilemma in America, we are the human beings who manage to be both overfed and undernourished. Today Americans spend more than half of their food dollars on meals prepared outside the home while consuming a diet half of which is mostly sugars in one form or another.
If the soil is sick or in some way deficient, so will be the grasses that grow in that soil and the cattle that eat the grasses and the people who drink the milk from them.
In Defense of Food asks us to consider rethinking our relationship with food, instead of viewing food as just a thing, perhaps we need to think more of a food relationship, reconsidering the entire interconnectivity of the food chain. “If the soil is sick or in some way deficient, so will be the grasses that grow in that soil and the cattle that eat the grasses and the people who drink the milk from them,” Pollan explains. Which brings the reader to the central manifesto In Defense Of Food:
Eat Food simply means not to eat anything your great-grandmother (or great-great-grandmother) would not recognize as food. Avoid foods that have ingredients that are unfamiliar or unpronounceable to you. Pollan encourages us to “shake the hand that feeds you”. Know thy farmer.
Mostly Plants refers to consuming the majority of our diet from leaf plants. Pollan believes, as omnivores, humans should eat a wide range of food, but in slightly different portions that North Americans are accustomed to. He encourages individuals to think of meat as the condiment as opposed to the main course: vegetables not as garnish but as the central component of the meal.
Not Too Much is about eating until you are about 80% full. Eat the best quality food possible, paying more for quality as opposed to consuming quantity. Americans spend a smaller percentage of their income on food that any other industrialized society. Eat slowly; enjoy food, preferably with good company.
Order this book on Amazon.com In Defense Of Food: An Eater's Manifesto
Visit: http://www.michaelpollan.com/
Publisher: Penguin Press
244 Pages
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