In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto
By Michael Pollan
Publication Year: 2008
Type: Non-fiction
Genre: health, food, self-help
Read on 2021-08-19
★★★★☆
This book was a revelation. I love a book that peels back the lies marketing and Hollywood have shoved into our brains, and this book really does that for food. The three main tenets are: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.", but I highly recommend reading the book for a thorough break down of what this means, and how insidiously the food and agricultural industry in contemporary Western society tells us the opposite. Pollan provides amble research and history alongside practical suggestions for how to eat better and in the way we are actually meant to. In particular, he demonstrates how so many of the diets and buzzwords around food and nutrition are truly all fads, from the campaigns against fats and later carbs to new and rebranded diets like intermittent fasting and paleo that are still just gussied up fad diets. He advocates for an intuitive, simple, and culturally inclusive way of eating that is practical and that I found very healing as someone who suffered and struggled a lot with food as a girl and teenager who was on Tumblr in the 2010s (if you know you know).
I never read Omnivore's Dilemma back in the day but I'm sold on Michael Pollan now. Can't wait to dig into to his other books.
