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.

Time for A Change

I'm making a change. I'm going to lose weight.
Why? I am sick of being chunky. I am sick of worrying about what I'm going to wear to any given gathering. Trying to find the magical outfit that will make me look and feel skinnier than I am. Wondering if I'm going to be the fattest one there. Going on vacation and looking at all the cute bikinis while I wear my oh so cute cover-up. Going shopping and knowing that it will be a miracle to go into the cute stores and find a size 14. Wearing and XXL from Target. Shopping with friends and just looking at shoes and earrings. Feeling like a frumpy mom.

I just finished reading Conversations with God and during the conversation it states that if you don't like what is going on in your life, just choose again. Up to this point I have chosen to be fat. Simple as that. I haven't really exercised in 6 months (while I have used the excuse that I had a foot injury that required surgery 2 months ago, I could have done some other kind of exercise and didn't). I have eaten whatever I wanted. Really the miracle is that I'm not bigger than I am! I won't say the time has been wasted however. I was really muddled in the brain by all the different diets I've tried in the past. Just being, without worrying about dieting has helped me regain a sense of what is normal eating and what my health priorities are.

So, now I'm ready to choose again. I am going to choose health. I am going to choose healthy, whole, preferably organic and local foods cooked in simple ways. I choose to move my body. I choose to regain a body that I can be proud of. I choose to weigh less than 150 lbs. I choose to wear a size 1o or smaller. And I choose not to freak out about it along the way.

So that is what I've chosen. The next question is obviously how? Tomorrow I am going to go back to Weight Watchers. I've done it before and lost 15 lbs before I got pregnant the second time. I am going to do the Core program, not counting points for the most part, just eating from an extensive list of healthy whole foods. The accountability of the weigh ins as well as the support from the meetings will really help me, I believe. R pays the equivalent in a gym membership each month, so I don't feel guilty , AT ALL, spending the money on myself (something I have used as an excuse not to rejoin in the past). I also plan to work up to running again. I am going to head out every morning from 7-8 to walk for the next month. In January I will begin to phase in running again. By May I'd like to run a half marathon in Ogden Canyon.

The when is that I'd l ike to hit certain goals along the way. I haven't worked them all out yet, and will post when I do, but I'm shooting for 145 lbs by June 2008. That's five pounds a month, just over 1 lb a week. Totally doable.

I'm going to my first meeting tomorrow. I will begin posting my stats then.

Well, okay, I have to admit I am truly a delinquent blogger. But NO MORE! I have a lot to say and since no one around here really wants to here it I will just spew it all out into cyber space for any poor sap that unintentionally happens into it.

I'm doing extremely well with my first resolution, to walk 1/2 hour every day. I'm up to 45 minutes now and have signed up for the Salt Lake Marathon 1/2 marathon walk April 21st. I'm really excited! I truly love to walk! I have purchased 4 Leslie Sansone walk at home DVDs and I love them. Yes, she's a little too perky and normally I distrust people who are just so damn happy. But she has big thighs, and for that I love her. Plus they are pretty fun to do. They remind me of doing aerobics in college. Plus I can do them whenever I want.

The other two resolutions, um, not so much. But I still PLAN to do them.
So am I getting skinnier as a result of all this walking? Maybe a little bit. But here comes the simplify part-- I don't really care. I am done worrying about being super skinny and perfect. Sure, most my friends are magazine worthy. Oh well. I am done worrying about trying to ever be that hot. I'm me. And I'm a good me. Sure we have a big beach vacation coming up in August--I still don't care.

I just finished reading Intuitive Eating and I love it! It makes soooo much sense. I am just going to focus on eating normal, for me. I'm going to focus on quality food and really really enjoying it and stopping when I'm full. Sounds pretty simple, eh. I will probably have more to say about Intuitive Eating as time goes by, I haven't been this excited about NOT dieting since, well, ever.
I've also decided to dress myself in fashionable for me clothes and stop waiting until.... I deserve to look good. I maybe 20 pounds overweight, but I'm still really quite pretty if I do say so myself.

I can't really think of anything simpler than just being myself and enjoying my life regardless of my weight.