In Defense of Food (a review)

I just read In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan. Last year I read his book The Omnivore's Dilemma and LOVED it! So I was really excited to read this new book. I realize I'm kind of a geek to get so excited about social commentaries about food as well as the food economy. Guilty. I still love them though.

So he starts out by explaining why another book about food. In the Omnivore's Dilemma he goes into extreme detail to map out food systems. But he never did say what it is he now eats after doing all this research about how our food gets to our table. So in this book he does. He basically boils it down to "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." This reminds me of Marion Nestle's advice, "Eat less. Move more. Eat lots of fruits and vegetables. Go easy on the junk". Which is advice I have taken straight to heart.

The book is broken down into 3 parts. The first explains how we have gotten away from eating foods, and now worship the cult of nutritionism which is instead eating nutrients. So instead of eating carrots because we like carrots, and we know that carrots are good for us, we eat carrots because we are trying to get more beta carotene. And then we may wonder if we really need to eat the carrots and instead take a beta carotene supplement. Then we wonder why we just aren't that healthy. We talked about this in my advanced nutrition class last year. My professor pointed out that nutritionists have found that supplements usually fail to do what a good balanced diet does. We obviously don't know everything about what is in food and how the body digests food. The sum of the parts don't equal the whole.

Section 2 talks about the Western Diet. He goes into how most traditional diets, whether vegetarian, mostly meat, high fat, low fat or anything else, have tended to have populations with far less incidence of disease. Pretty much any diet is healthy but the Western Diet. But maybe that is because we have gotten away from eating real food and instead eat a lot of refined foodlike substances that are primarily made of corn, wheat or soy, repackaged artfully to seem like different types of food. It looks like a diverse diet, but it's not. And of course there is the conspicuous absence of fruits and vegetables. Lots of meat (raised on corn,wheat and soy), lots of processed foods packed with refined starches (corn, wheat and soy), lots of sugar (more corn), trans fats (corn, soy) and salt. We are plagued with excess calories and still we are
undernourished, a feat not really thought possible before.

Section 3 goes into the basic "rules" or guidelines he follows as a result of his research. 1) Don't eat anything your grandmother wouldn't recognize. Go-gurt anyone?
2) Avoid food with ingredeints that are a) unfamiliar b)unpronouceable c)more than 5 in number and d) include high fructose corn syrup.
3) Avoid foods that make health claims (I mostly agree with this, but I love me some Cheerios). 4) Shop the perimeter of the store
5)Get out of the supermarket if possible and instead patronize farmer's markets, CSAs or grow a garden.
6) Eat mostly plants, especially leaves.
7) Remember you are what your food eats too
8)If you have the space, buy a freezer.
9) Eat well grown food from healthy soils.
10) Eat wild foods when you can
11) Be the kind of person that eats supplements, but then don 't.
12) Eat more like the French, or the Italians, or the Japanese, or the Indians, or the Greeks...(those who have traditional diets tend to be healthier)
13) Don't look for the magic bullet in a traditional diet (enjoy your food, don't just eat...dine.)
14)Have a glass of wine with dinner
15)Pay more, eat less.
16) Eat meals. Don't snack and graze your way through the day.
17) Do all your eating at the table.
18)Don't get your fuel from the same place your car does.
19) Try not to eat alone.
20) Consult your gut. (Stop eating if you are full. If the food makes you feel like crap, don't eat it).
21) Eat slowly.
22) Cook. And if you can plant a garden.

I've spent many, many years reading nutrition books and the latest diet books. For a little while I felt totally messed up. I've got lots of fitness fanatic friends. I've got friends that follow strict diets. I've tried them myself. About a year and a half ago I decided I was done. No more diets, not more diet books, no more latest nutrient, no more supplements. I just wanted to eat. And at first I let myself just eat a lot of crap. Did I gain weight? Not really. I've been about the same weight for 2 years. Then I read the Omnivore's Dilemma and decided that my gut feeling that organic foods really are the best idea for health and the planet. Then I read Marion Nestle's book What to Eat. I loved that she is a nutritionist but has a totally common sense approach to food. I made my New Year's Resolution: Eat LOADS of fruits and vegetables. I've done pretty well so far. Recently I have decided I am ready to try to lose the 20 lbs I need to shed. And the seduction of weight loss products started to creep back in. Should I do a cleanse? Should I talk to my doctor about weight loss medications? Should I give up starchy foods? And then this book reminded me of what I really think the key to weight loss is: Eat less, move more, eat lots of fruits and vegetables, go easy on the junk. Eat food, not much, mostly plants. It's a simple as that.