Books : In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto

Binding: Hardcover
Dewey Decimal Number: 613.2
EAN: 9781594201455
ISBN: 1594201455
Label: Penguin Press HC, The
Manufacturer: Penguin Press HC, The
Number Of Items: 1
Number Of Pages: 256
Publication Date: January 01, 2008
Publisher: Penguin Press HC, The
Studio: Penguin Press HC, The
Sales Rank: 206

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Editorial Review:

Product Description:
What to eat, what not to eat, and how to think about health: a manifesto for our times

"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." These simple words go to the heart of Michael Pollan's In Defense of Food, the well-considered answers he provides to the questions posed in the bestselling The Omnivore's Dilemma.

Humans used to know how to eat well, Pollan argues. But the balanced dietary lessons that were once passed down through generations have been confused, complicated, and distorted by food industry marketers, nutritional scientists, and journalists-all of whom have much to gain from our dietary confusion. As a result, we face today a complex culinary landscape dense with bad advice and foods that are not "real." These "edible foodlike substances" are often packaged with labels bearing health claims that are typically false or misleading. Indeed, real food is fast disappearing from the marketplace, to be replaced by "nutrients," and plain old eating by an obsession with nutrition that is, paradoxically, ruining our health, not to mention our meals. Michael Pollan's sensible and decidedly counterintuitive advice is: "Don't eat anything that your great-great grandmother would not recognize as food."

Writing In Defense of Food, and affirming the joy of eating, Pollan suggests that if we would pay more for better, well-grown food, but buy less of it, we'll benefit ourselves, our communities, and the environment at large. Taking a clear-eyed look at what science does and does not know about the links between diet and health, he proposes a new way to think about the question of what to eat that is informed by ecology and tradition rather than by the prevailing nutrient-by-nutrient approach.

In Defense of Food reminds us that, despite the daunting dietary landscape Americans confront in the modern supermarket, the solutions to the current omnivore's dilemma can be found all around us.

In looking toward traditional diets the world over, as well as the foods our families-and regions-historically enjoyed, we can recover a more balanced, reasonable, and pleasurable approach to food. Michael Pollan's bracing and eloquent manifesto shows us how we might start making thoughtful food choices that will enrich our lives and enlarge our sense of what it means to be healthy.

Amazon.com Review:
Amazon Significant Seven, January 2008: Food is the one thing that Americans hate to love and, as it turns out, love to hate. What we want to eat has been ousted by the notion of what we should eat, and it's at this nexus of hunger and hang-up that Michael Pollan poses his most salient question: where is the food in our food? What follows in In Defense of Food is a series of wonderfully clear and thoughtful answers that help us omnivores navigate the nutritional minefield that's come to typify our food culture. Many processed foods vie for a spot in our grocery baskets, claiming to lower cholesterol, weight, glucose levels, you name it. Yet Pollan shows that these convenient "healthy" alternatives to whole foods are appallingly inconvenient: our health has a nation has only deteriorated since we started exiling carbs, fats--even fruits--from our daily meals. His razor-sharp analysis of the American diet (as well as its architects and its detractors) offers an inspiring glimpse of what it would be like if we could (a la Humpty Dumpty) put our food back together again and reconsider what it means to eat well. In a season filled with rallying cries to lose weight and be healthy, Pollan's call to action—"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."--is a program I actually want to follow. --Anne Bartholomew

Customer Reviews

Average Rating: out of 5 stars

Rating:

- Against 'nutritionism'
Michael Pollan, professor of journalism at Berkeley, is a prolific writer on food and food-related issues, which have drawn much attention in the United States in recent years. After his more historical and philosophical works, "In Defense of Food" is a practical guide to and defense of food. To be precise, food as opposed to processed, additive-filled, can-conserved and/or microwavable goo that passes for food in most of our Western supermarkets.

Pollan uses a pleasant style and a usefully ... Read More

Rating:

- In Defense of Food a Winner
The book was a requirement for a college class. This was the easiest purchase of material yet! No searching in a bookstore or standing in lines. Just get on the computer and click...it's done. The book arrived quickly, was very reasonably priced, and in great condition. I see an A in my future.

Rating:

- What & How We Should Eat
I already knew I would like this book before I read it. What food items we see advertised on television and what colorfully and cleverly packaged items we find in mass quantities on our grocery store shelves is not really food. To quote the author-Instead of food, we are consuming "edible foodlike substances"-no longer the products of nature but of food science. I have believed for years that we have over processed and over industrialized our diets. If you really want to learn some cold hard facts, check ... Read More

Rating:

- Shame on the reader!
Love the book, despise the reader, Scott Brick. Talk about a condescending, drippily sarcastic, over-pronounced performance - it's not listenable. Pollan's voice in my head when I read the book was reasonable in spite of its strong message. Brick makes it as nasty as right wing radio. What a waste of money and time.

Rating:

- Eat better, live longer
Here's a quick synopsis, but I strongly recommend you read this book and formulate your own opinions.

Don't shop supermarks..but if you must, stay outside of the middle aisles. Keep to the produce/meat/dairy sections which undoubtedly are located on the perimeters. Eat organic, if you can and your budget permits. Organic vegetables/fruits contain more micronutrients than those that are laced with pesticides and grown in chemically enriched soils. Utilize your local farmers' market, keep money ... Read More

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