In Defense of Food, Michael Pollan proposes what we should eat in seven simple words: Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.
Part I: The Age of Nutritionism
- Nutritionism is not a scientific subject but an ideology.
- What matters most is not the food but the “nutrient.” It talks about consuming nutrients rather than eating food
- Issues with Nutritionism:
- Scientists developed food imitations (“low fat,” “low carb,” etc.) in the form of food-like substances. Nutritionism supplies the ultimate justification for processing food by implying that fake foods can be made even more nutritious than the real thing.
- Scientific experiments can be flawed and are based on unverified self reported data from participants. There hasn’t been any noticeable benefit to our health with these new dietary approaches.
- Nutritionism is good for the food business but not so much for us. Processed foodsare profitable businesses.
- We should be getting better from nutritionism, but we aren’t.
- Don’t trust those health claims from foods. We have a “healthy” label on a box of Lucky Charms cereal.
Part II The Western Diet and the Diseases of Civilization
- People eating a Western diet are prone to a complex of chronic diseases that seldom strike people eating more traditional diets. And when other people adopt this diet, these diseases soon follow.
- Start thinking about food as less of a thing and more of a relationship. The common factor of people in good health is a diet comprising fresh foods from animals and plants from nutrient-rich soils.
- If the soil is deficient in nutrients, so will the grass that grows and the cows that eat the grass and the people who drink the milk.
- We need to care about not what we eat, but what our food eats too.
- The five fundamental transformations of the industrialization of eating:
- From Whole Foods to Refined: a shift toward increasingly refined foods, especially carbohydrates – nutrients are taken away.
- From Complexity to Simplicity: the industrialization of the food chain has involved a process of chemical and biological simplification (most of our diet comes from corn, wheat, soy, and rice).
- From Quality to Quantity: not only we’re eating a whole lot more but we’re getting substantially less nutrition per calorie than we used to. We’re both overfed and undernourished. You need to eat 3 apples today to get the same iron as an apple back in 1940.
- From Leaves to Seeds: leaves provide a host of critical nutrients a body can’t get from a diet of refined seeds.
- From Food Culture to Food Science: the industrialization of our food is systematically and deliberately undermining traditional food cultures everywhere (more money in processed foods – encouraging you to eat Western diet over your traditional food)
Part III: Getting Over Nutritionism
Section 1: Escape from the Western Diet
- To escape the Western diet and the ideology of nutritionism, we have only to stop eating and thinking that way.
- Whole foods and industrial foods are the only two food groups in any useful food pyramid. Avoid any food that has been processed to such an extent that it is more than product of industry than nature.
Section 2: Eat Food: Food Defined
- Don’t eat anything your great grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food
- Don’t eat anything incapable of rotting – avoids chemical additives
- Avoid food products containing ingredients that are a) unfamiliar, b) unpronounceable, c) more than five in number, or that include d) high-fructose corn syrup
- Avoid food products that make health claims. Boldest health claims are often found on incomplete and often erroneous science.
- Shop the edges of the supermarket and stay out of the middle. In most supermarkets, processed food products dominate the center aisles while fresh food line the walls
- Get out of the supermarket whenever possible and go to a farmers’ market. The surest way to escape the Western diet is simply to depart the realms it rules: the supermarket, the convenience store, and the fast-food outlet. Shop at a farmers market or get a community-supported agriculture (CSA) box.
Section 3: Mostly Plants: What to Eat
- Eat mostly plants, especially leaves. Eat as many different kinds of plants as possible as they all have different antioxidants (prevent cancer) and so help the body eliminate different kinds of toxins.
- Plant foods—with the exception of seeds—are less energy-dense so you’ll likely consume fewer calories
- We don’t need to eat meat—with the exception of vitamin B12, every nutrient found in meat can be obtained somewhere else
- But meat is a nutritious food. Use it more as a flavor principle than as a main course, treating it as “condiment for the vegetables
- You are what what you eat eats too. Look for pastured animal foods in the market and pay the premium they typically command. Grass fed animals have healthier fats (more omega 3’s and less omega-6s and saturated fats).
- If you have the space, buy a freezer. Buying pastured meat in bulk allows you to save money and won’t significantly diminish the nutritional value of produce.
- Eat like an omnivore. The greater the diversity of species you eat, the more likely you are to cover all your nutritional bases
- Eat well-growth food from healthy soils. Look for food that is both organic and local
- Eat wild foods when you can. Wild animals/plants have more healthy omega 3’s.
- Be the kind of person who takes supplement. Be more health conscious. Take a multivitamin, especially as you get older. If you don’t eat much fish, take a fish oil supplement too.
- Eat more like your cultural ancestors. Traditional foods have stood the test of time – keeping people well nourished and health generation after generation.
- Regard nontraditional foods with skepticism. Stick with the tried and true methods vs. food scientists.
- Don’t look for the magic bullet in the traditional diet. Hard to decipher one ingredient from a diet.
- Have a glass of wine with dinner. People who drink moderately and regularly live longer and suffer considerably less heart disease than teetotalers. Experts recommend no more than two drinks a day for men, one for women.
Section 4: Not Too Much: How to Eat
- Pay more, eat less. The better the food, the less of it you need to eat in order to feel satisfied. Not all carrots are created equal.
- Eat meals. Don’t snack.
- Do all your eating at a table. Not at a desk
- Don’t get your fuel from the same place your car does. Avoid foods sold at gas stations (highly processed).
- Try not to eat alone. We eat more when we’re alone.
- Eat until you are 80% full. It takes 20 minutes before the brain gets the word that the belly is full.
- Consult your gut. Are you still hungry?
- Serve smaller portions on smaller plates; serve food and beverages from small containers
- Leave detritus on the table—empty bottles, bones, and so forth—so you can see how much you’ve eaten or drunk
- Use glasses that are more vertical than horizontal. We tend to pour more into squat glasses
- Leave healthy foods in view, unhealthy ones out of view
- Leave serving bowls in the kitchen rather than on the table to discourage seconds
- Eat slowly. Eat more deliberately and express gratitude of how you got that meal on your plate.
- Cook and, if you can, plant a garden. The food you grow yourself is fresher and better than any you can buy