Michael Pollan – In Defense of Food - Intro

For my friends and family, I would like you to read this book, however, it may not fit into your schedule. This book has changed my way of thinking about food and I want to absorb it even more, so I’m going to re-read it and post summaries of it here on my blog. I’m realizing that so many of our guidelines about eating are based on outdated recommendations and that’s why we have such a problem with our school lunches, and why people like Jamie Oliver is starting a “Food Revolution”.

If you’d like to know about this Michael Pollan guy, here’s a link to his website. http://www.michaelpollan.com/about.php He’s a journalist and has written about the food system for some time.

In the introduction to In Defense of Food he talks about why he wrote this book. He’s done a lot of research on the history of the Western Diet and the details are fascinating! In summary, we westerners, particularly Americans, have lost confidence in what we choose to eat. We have stopped looking at food as food, and think of it more at nutrients. We depend on scientist to tell us what to eat. An orange is not an orange, it’s a source of vitamin C, never mind the other benefits to eating an orange that isn’t in a vitamin C pill.

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants. That’s the short lesson of this book. He’s not telling us what to eat, just getting us to think about the choices we make. We are caught in between the food scientists telling us what to eat (no butter, marg…oops! No marg, butter) and the “thirty-two-billion-dollar food-marketing machine that thrives on change for its own sake.” This country’s industrialization of the food system began in the 60’s and it’s taken this long…over 40 years…to get back to basics. Food chemistry creates flavors that make things taste good, like that chicken sandwich from your favorite fast food joint; the feed lot chicken doesn’t have much flavor or nutrition, but they add it so you think it’s good and wholesome food. It’s not! There is so much added flavor, sugar, corn syrup and fat to our food, and the labels are so confusing, most of us just give up and eat whatever.

It seems ridiculous that there is need for a book to be written, with the first rule “Eat Food”. It seems obvious, of course we eat food…but we don’t…we eat foodlike substances. Through this book you’ll see what I mean. It’s really changed me and I hope you enjoy it too!

My Take on the Health Care Law

To be honest I wasn’t sure how I felt about the health care bill. Everyone being forced to have health insurance…I just wanted to be able to see my doctor when I needed to and be able to afford it. Like a couple years ago when I had a sore throat I wanted to be sure it wasn’t strep throat. I knew my doctor’s office charged $65 for a visit and then the test and medication would be even more, so I went to one of those “Take Care” clinics in Walgreen’s. Turns out that they charge $75 if you don’t have insurance! I was thinking that $25 - $35 would be reasonable. The nurse in the take care clinic wouldn’t even LOOK at me, at my face, never mind my throat, once she found out I didn’t have insurance! It was horrible. So I’m not a big fan of what the health insurance companies have done to our medical services, and I wasn’t thrilled about all of us being at their mercy.

But a thought occurred to me the other day…they have to pay for everything for everyone. They can’t turn you down or shut you off, they can’t drop you or pick and choose what they will cover anymore. Our health is their responsibility…our health is their responsibility! The largest lobbying group in the country will have an interest in our HEALTH…are you getting it yet? They will WANT US TO BE HEALTHY! They’ll want us to eat better and get more exercise so they won’t have to pay out so much… and they will make it happen. That is my theory. All the people working to get people to eat more fruits and veggies, and less factory farmed (which is less nutritious anyway) meat, and less sugar and less fat – from Alice Waters to Michael Pollan to Morgan Spurlock – will now have the health insurance companies looking to them for guidance. This could be the best thing to happen to this country ever. Studies prove that better nutrition, like better school lunches for example, decreases bad behavior in children. Then they are less likely to become “the bad kid” in class, and they’ll have more confidence, and are more likely to succeed. They won’t turn to drugs and thuggery and won’t get arrested and will become respectful members of society. Not that those problems will completely go away, but it will not be the norm like it is today. Good nutrition could also help with ADHD and lots of other disorders as well.

Call me an optimist, but I think I’m on to something here. I don’t like the idea of someone telling me I MUST have insurance, I’d rather pay as I go, at a reasonable rate, and have insurance only for emergencies and trauma, but if this law does what I think it will do, and the insurance company’s lobbyists are more powerful than the food industry lobbyists, then Jamie Oliver will really think he’s a miracle worker with his food revolution because that type of thinking will spread in no time. Look for it in about 2-4 years. You heard it here...I think first.