The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals

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Michael Pollan's book, "The Omnivore's Dilemma", poses two big questions: The role of corn in American food and its implications for our health, and whether it is possible to be a moral carnivore. Both of these questions are important, and deserving of our consideration. And Michael Pollan is clearly a writer of talent, perhaps even of immense talent. He is a wordsmith of exception. All of this should make for a good, perhaps even great, book. Although much of the food on the industrial-organic chain is more recognizable and traceable than fast food items derived from the purely industrial chain, what goes on behind the scenes is still often harmful to the environment. For example, Big Organic sometimes requires even more fossil fuels than industrial farms to combat the inefficiency of producing a huge amount of food without using chemical pesticides and fertilizers. Eating a dinner prepared from Whole Foods-bought ingredients, Pollan weighs the evidence that organic food is more nutritious and flavorful against the cost of flying his organic asparagus into San Francisco from Argentina in January. Pollan concludes that “industrial organic” does betray the intentions behind “organic”—it’s environmentally unsustainable, pricey, and yet it offers potential benefits in health and taste. From fast food to ‘big’ organic to locally sourced to foraging for dinner with rifle in hand, Pollan captures the perils and the promise of how we eat today.” — The Arizona Daily Star I was resistant to reading this book because I’m not an omnivore, and also I thought that Pollan’s book The Botany of Desire was brilliant and I suspected I would not feel as fond of this one, which is certainly true. He does write well, but I didn’t find that this book had the eloquence or elegance of the other.

A lot of cool facts here that I never knew or took the time to care about (I never knew the mushroom was so mysterious). I would have liked him to talk more about trade, different areas' food specialties and also how preparing a meal such as his at the end seems a little too time consuming even for the outdoors enthusiast. In In Defense of Food, Pollan transitions boldly from narrative to polemic. Taking on a scientific, governmental, and commercial establishment that has focused on individual nutrients rather than the unique benefits of whole foods, Pollan offers three gentle commandments: Eat Food. Not Too Much. Mostly Plants. Tautly written and eloquently argued, In Defense of Food shows us how simple—and how strangely complicated—those three little rules can be.The surprising answers Pollan offers to the simple question posed by this book have profound political, economic, psychological, and even moral implications for all of us. Beautifully written and thrillingly argued, The Omnivore’s Dilemma promises to change the way we think about the politics and pleasure of eating. For anyone who reads it, dinner will never again look, or taste, quite the same. It's impossible to discuss these books in a vacuum, and I need to start out by making clear several assumptions: Q. You point out that there are now alternatives to industrial food, but they can be somewhat bewildering as well. Washington State University, situated in an agricultural area of Washington state, chose this book to be part of its freshman reading program in 2009 but soon canceled the program. Many in the university's community, including those who manage the kinds of industrial farms The Omnivore's Dilemma discusses, were unhappy with the selection, and there was speculation [3] that the cancellation was a result of political influence. Elson Floyd, president of WSU, stated instead that it was a budgetary issue, and when food safety expert William Marler offered to pay the claimed shortfall, the program was reinstated, and Pollan was invited to speak on campus. [4]

The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals is a nonfiction book written by American author Michael Pollan published in 2006. In the book, Pollan asks the seemingly straightforward question of what we should have for dinner. As omnivores, the most unselective eaters, humans are faced with a wide variety of food choices, resulting in a dilemma. Pollan suggests that, prior to modern food preservation and transportation technologies, this particular dilemma was resolved primarily through cultural influences.Oh those beautiful eggs! The difference is night and day- the color, the richness, the fat content." Environmental activism is very much a white, rich, western game. People who have no money and who live a hand-to-mouth existence can't afford to choose. The best way to promote conscious environmental action is by raising living standards around the world. It also reduces the rate of population growth. The simplist way to capture the sun's energy in a form animals can use is by growing grass" (p 189). "For example, if the 16 million acres now being used to grow corn to feed cows,...became well-managed pasture, that would remove 14 billion pounds of carbon from the atmosphere each year, the equivalent of taking four million cars off the road" (p 198). Economically, you put money into the hands of the right people: small businesses. As long as we givethe majority of our moneyto big corporations, they’ll be the ones in charge.

Pollan concludes that the fast food meal and the hunter-gatherer meal are "equally unreal and equally unsustainable". [1] He believes that if we were once again aware of the source of our food – what it was, where it came from, how it traveled to reach us, and its true cost – we would see that we "eat by the grace of nature, not industry". [1] On veganism [ edit ]A multivalent, highly introspective examination of the human diet, from capitalism to consumption.” — The Hudson Review It is the alliance between the producer and the consumer. The consumers can look the farmer in the eyes and see that the food is produced "with care and without chemicals." They are also keeping the moeny in the community by supporting local farmers. Pollan first investigates the industrial food chain. He starts at the supermarket, which ostensibly offers a varied cornucopia of food. However, what Pollan discovers is that the majority of the food offered in the supermarket is made from processed corn, so much so that if people are what they eat then Americans are corn. Pollan explains how corn became an American staple crop during the 1970s as a result of technological advances, the agricultural policies of the Nixon administration, and a corporate preference for cheap corn. With the skill of a professional detective, Michael Pollan explores the worlds of industrial farming, organic and sustainable agriculture, and even hunting and gathering to determine the links of food chains: how food gets from its sources in nature to our plates. The findings he reports in this this book are often unexpected, disturbing, even horrifying, but they are facts every eater should know. This is an engaging book, full of information that is most relevant to conscious living.” —Dr. Andrew Weil, author of Spontaneous Healing and Healthy Aging