In Defense Of Food January 5, 2008
Posted by Greg Jerome in Books, Economics, Environment, Health.trackback
“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” That is the guiding principle behind Michael Pollan’s book, In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto. I have never reviewed a book before I read it, but I was lucky enough to hear the author on NPR’s Science Friday yesterday discussing his new book; the interview is 35 minutes and fascinating, listen while your are making dinner tonight!
Pollan’s idea is that we need to return to eating real food, not “foodlike substances” that we find in the center aisles of the grocery store. If your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize it as food, don’t eat it. If it has more than five ingredients, don’t eat it. If you can’t identify some of the ingredients, don’t eat it. We need to eat foods that are natural, made of real ingredients, and probably require some real cooking.
This is a real progressive issue for many reasons. Corporations are making us sick by selling us band food, are ruining the environment with unsustainable farming practices, are driving local farms out of business, and leading to huge medical bills as we try to fix the problems that these garbage foods cause. If we eat real food we will be healthier, support sustainable agriculature, support real farmers, and maybe even save some money.
I have been trying to each healthier for several years, following these basic principals which I had read from a variety of sources. My guiding principal has been, don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t eat. This makes it so easy. I avoid almost all processed food. Be honest, what place in your diet do potato chips, brownies, soda, white bread, and ritz crackers have? None of those are real food, and they are not going to make you healthy.
If you don’t believe me, better yet if you do, just try it. For three days, one week. Eat like it is 1900. You will be amazed at how much better you feel. You won’t get tired after lunch, you won’t feel sluggish after dinner. You won’t eat a meal and be hungry again in an hour. You will have more energy and just feel better. When you try real food you feel like everything you used to eat gave you a stomach ache. I know I will never go back.
That writer has a point. The feeling I get after eating fresh, naturally grown fruits and vegetables is amazing. Since salt is used as a preservative in so much of the foods we eat many of us are probably walking around dehydrated most of the time. After eating fresh fruits and veggies I feel hydrated and more energized, not to mention more mentally focussed. Constantly eating healthier, however, involves retraining your body and many of us do not have the discipline to go through that kind of physical change. Eating healthy also involves planning ahead much of the time as it is so easy to eat junk when you’re away from your kitchen. Healthy options are few virtually everywhere you go these days and they are often more expensive. It would be convenient if there were a Whole Foods on every other corner to compliment the plethora of chain restaurants that sell fattening, salty, high-in-cholesterol foods.
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