Book Review: In Defense of Food

Quick: What’s the first word that comes to mind when you think of chocolate cake? If you’re like the average American, guilt will be one of the first words that comes to mind. (Interestingly, the French tend to associate celebration with chocolate cake.)

It seems that we’ve lost the ability to enjoy our food.

This guilty, obsessive, worrisome relationship that we North Americans (I’m assuming Canadians eat very similarly to Americans here) have with food is the focus of Michael Pollan‘s latest book, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto. I enjoyed his The Omnivore’s Dilemma thoroughly, and wondered if he could match it with this one.

He did.

In Defense of Food critiques our eating culture in a way that provides a commentary on our whole industrial, consumer way of life. Pollan suggests that nutritionism, the approach to food that emphasizes nutrients and elements in it (like fat or carbohydrates) has sapped the joy from our eating and has actually made us less healthy in the end. As an example, he discusses the collapse of the fat hypothesis, which for years has had many of us searching for low-fat alternatives to food:

… we have good reason to believe that putting the nutritionists in charge of the menu and the kitchen has not only ruined an untold number of meals, but also has done little for our health, except very possibly to make it worse. … What the Soviet Union was to the ideology of Marxism, the Low-Fat Campaign is to the ideology of nutritionism — its supreme test and, as now is coming clear, its most abject failure. (40)

Pollan’s analysis of our food, from the way we grow it to the way we prepare and eat it is fascinating. And terrifying, as he points out how the Western diet is uniquely designed to phenomenally increase cancer, heart attack, stroke, and diabetes.

But thankfully it’s not all doom and gloom. Pollan offers some succinct, witty policies to help us navigate our escape from the Western diet. The policies are organized around his three rules, which are to:

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

Eat Food

Pollan’s discussion of how and why we are not eating food today, and why food needs defending, is in itself enough reason to read the book. His advice to eat food has some corresponding policies:

• Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food. This policy alone would identify things like nondairy creamers and Twinkies as not food.
• Don’t eat anything incapable of rotting. Again, Twinkies, which never go stale, are therefore not food.
• Avoid food products containing ingredients that are (a) unfamiliar, (b) unpronounceable, (c) more than five in number, or that (d) include high-fructose corn syrup. The loaf of bread that I wondered about last week? It included ingredients that were unfamiliar, unpronounceable, and more than five in number. Three strikes — it can be declared not food.
• Avoid food products that make health claims. There are two compelling reasons for this policy. First, for a food to make a health claim, it must have a package, which means it’s probably highly processed. And second, the underlying nutrition science is so tenuous as to make that claim improbable. Avoid it.
• Get out of the supermarket whenever possible. Shop at farmers’ markets or participate in the increasingly popular program of buying a garden share in a local (organic) farm. Actual food can be found there.

Mostly Plants

• Eat mostly plants, especially leaves. While scientists still disagree about what precisely in plants makes them good for us, they all agree that plants are probably really good for us and certainly can’t hurt. Plant foods are less energy dense than most other things we might eat, and therefore eating a plant-based diet will help us consume fewer calories, which itself is protective against many diseases.
• You are what what you eat eats too. The quality of the meat we consume is directly dependent on its diet. Pastured beef, for example, is lower in fat, higher in healthy fat, and higher in vitamins and antoxidants than its corn-fed counterpart.

• Eat well-grown food from healthy soils. Foods grown in healthy soil have appreciably more nutrients in them. It would be easiest to say “eat organic,” but Pollan refrains from doing so for two reasons. First, many foods that are labeled “organic” may in fact be highly processed or only marginally organic. And second, there are many excellent farmers whose care for their soil and crops has not yet yielded the “organic” certification — their work should not be discarded.
• Have a glass of wine with dinner. Healthy dietary patterns tend to include a glass of red wine with meals.

Not Too Much

• Pay more. Eat less. One of the concerns for many of us about adopting an organic-based diet is the cost. Raising food organically is more time- and labour-intensive, and yields less … therefore it’s more expensive. But rather than saying we can’t afford it, Pollan suggests that we should spend the money and then just eat less food, which will be healthier for us all-around.
• Eat meals. Eating together allows us to enjoy food more, and encourages us to eat less.
• Do all of your eating at a table. And Pollan emphasizes that a desk is not a table. Neither is the glove compartment or cup holder in your car.
• Consult your gut. This means learning to pay attention to those internal cues. This is something that North Americans find really difficult; we tend to eat until the plate is empty or a commercial comes on.
• Cook and, if you can, plant a garden. Not surprisingly, cooking meals is a good way to avoid consuming highly processed convenience non-food meals. And working with a garden gives us a new appreciation for food and the people who grow it, with the additional benefit of enjoying fresh food in season.

Just a note: I’ve shared some of Pollan’s policies that were most memorable to me; there are more in the book, some of which may resonate more with your situation.

Bottom Line: Should You Get It?

Yes! In Defense of Food is both thought-provoking and encouraging. It’s likely to be one that crops up often in discussion as more and more people are reconsidering the food that they’re eating. If you’re someone who likes to have books on hand to give to people to read, then this will be one you’ll want to add to your shelf. Otherwise, get a copy from your library and be prepared to take lots of notes.

It’s just that good.