Monday, January 07, 2008


IN DEFENSE OF FOOD
Michael Pollan Penguin US$21.95 (Hardcover, also available in paperback)

Penguin Books took a whole page ad in the New York Times on Thursday (around $150,000) so I decided I should check it out. Then Borders had it for 30% off so of course I had to buy it! I hate to think about the weight of my luggage for the ride home…….

The advertisement for the book had the headline “A New Way to Eat in the New Year” with the following 12 points listed:

1.Don’t eat anything your grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.
2.Avoid foods containing ingredients you can’t pronounce.
3.Don’t eat anything that will not eventually rot.
4.Avoid foods that carry health claims.
5.Shop the peripheries of the supermarket; stay out of the middle.
6.Better yet, buy food somewhere else: the farmer’s market or CSA (community-supported agriculture).
7.Pay more, eat less.
8.Eat a wide diversity of species.
9.Eat food from animals that eat grass.
10.Cook and, if you can, grow some of your own food.
11.Eat meals and eat them only at tables.
12.Eat deliberately, with other people whenever possible, and always with pleasure.

I haven’t read the book yet, apart from the author’s introduction which starts
“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants”.

So more later once I have read the book but meantime here is the review by Janet Maslin that appeared in The New York Times a few days ago.

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