Reading : In Defense of Food

by Michael Pollan

"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants" (p.1)

In Defense of Food is an interesting and thoughtful examination of nutritionism's quest to refine the western diet. It makes the case for unprocessed food, the collective wisdom of traditional diets, and the sensory and social pleasure we should have, but have now lost, in eating. At times only mildly rigorous, the book still makes an excellent case for examining our atrophied relationship with our food. It certainly motivated a change in my own habits.

Pollan's message might best be summed up by a quote from Wendell Berry included in the final chapter:

"Eating with the fullest pleasure - pleasure, that is, that does not depend on ignorance - is perhaps the profoundest enactment of our connection with the world. In this pleasure we experience and celebrate our dependence and our gratitude, for we are living from mystery, from creatures we did not make and powers we cannot comprehend." (p. 196)