In Defense of Food book discussion (chapters 6 - 10)

Chapter 9. Bad Science - Nutrition science is a sticky wicket to say the least. It's impossible to distill one nutrient at a time, without ignoring how those nutrients interact with others in a food when digested. This sort of scientific reductionism works wonders in other areas of scientific research, but when it comes to nutrition, it can be a disaster. Because people don't just eat nutrients, they eat foods and each person metabolizes food differently. There are too many chemical compounds in a food to be able to determine, with much assurity, that it's one compound over another that is healthier. There isn't much risk in this sort of reductionist thinking when you are eating whole foods. But if the goal is to distill out the components (like polyphenols or carotenoids), can you really substitute those for "real food"? Are the benefits the same? Chapter 10. Nutritionism's Children - "Thirty years of nutritional advice have left us fatter, sicker, and more poorly nourished. Which is why we find ourselves in the predicament we do: in need of a whole new way to think about eating." So, now what? All this has left the American eater confused and anxious about what's safe to eat and what we should or should not be eating. High carb, low-fat? High protein, low-carb? There's even a new eating disorder called Orthorexia nervosa, which is an obsession with healthy eating.

In Defense of Food book discussion (Part II)

This week's book club post is the third installment of the In Defense of Food discussion posts. Part II Chapter 1. The Aborigine in All of Us - In 1982, Kerin O'Dea ran an experiment on ten Aborigine volunteers in Western Australia. She wanted to see if temporarily returning these individuals to their traditional lifestyles would reverse the health problems they had incurred since they moved out of the bush and started partaking in a more Western lifestyle. Since leaving the bush, all ten members of the cohort had developed type 2 diabetes and elevated levels of triglycerides in their blood (a risk factor for heart disease). The Aborigines returned to their homeland and went back to their increased activity levels and traditional foods acquired via hunting and gathering. These methods resulted in a very large variety of foods consisting of foodstuffs such as fish, shellfish, birds, turtles, crocodile, yams, figs and

honey among other things. These individuals had gone from a Western diet consisting of flour, sugar, rice, carbonated drinks, alcohol, powdered milk, cheap fatty meats, potatoes, onions and other fruits and vegetables. The end result was that, after seven weeks, all had lost weight (an average of 18 pounds), lowered their blood pressure and their triglyceride levels had returned to normal. Additionally, all the metabolic abnormalities of type II diabetes were either greatly improved or completely normalized. The thing that is amazing is that it only took seven weeks to reverse the damage done. What does this mean for the rest of us? Can you extrapolate the results of individuals adapted to a specific environment and dietary habits and apply it to Westerners? Did reading this chapter give you a sense of hope that the issues with the Western diet can be reversed if we adhere to a diet consisting of non-processed whole foods? Chapter 2. The Elephant in the Room - In this chapter, Pollan is referring to the pattern of eating what we call the Western diet as the elephant in the room. The effect of this diet is that people suffer substantially higher rates of cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes and obesity. So, when individuals adopt the Western diet, these problems creep up all too quickly. In other words, immigrants from nations with low rates of chronic disease acquire these health issues quickly. In 1939, Weston Price published the results of his research in working with isolated populations. As a dentist, he noted that people who ate a traditional diet needed no dentists whatsoever. He found little or no evidence of chronic disease, tooth decay or malformed dental arches. One thing that he found was that these groups were eating substantially more amounts of vitamins A and D. Price's conclusion after years of research was that modern civilization had sacrificed much of the quality of food in the interest of quantity and shelf life. Interestingly, he found that groups that ate diets of wild animal flesh (or milk, meat and blood of pastured cattle) were generally healthier than agriculturalists who relied on cereals and other plant foods. In general, it would appear that humans can thrive on a variety of different diets, but the Western diet isn't one of them. What does this mean for you? Are you willing to stay on the standard Western diet and continue risking heart disease, diabetes, cancer and who knows what else? Has reading this made you decide to eat better or confirmed your actions if you already are eating a healthy diet? If you want to get off the Western diet bandwagon, do you know where to start?

In Defense of Food book discussion (Part II:

chapter 3)

This week's book club post is the fourth installment of the In Defense of Food discussion posts. Since the third chapter of Part II is so obscenely long, this discussion will encompass one chapter only. Don't say I didn't warn you. Part II Chapter 3: The Industrialization of Eating: What We Do Know - In this chapter, Pollan discusses the relationship of food with nature. As a species we have adapted to different environments and different foods based on its availability. One example he uses illustrates the relationship between cows and some humans who have the ability to digest cow's milk beyond weaning age that occurred about five thousand years ago. This provided a nutritional benefit for those who possessed the gene to digest the milk as it provided a "terrifically nutritious new food source" and was beneficial to the cows as it created a symbiotic relationship with humans. The relationship between plant foods and the animals that eat them are complex as the plants are dependent on the spreading of seeds to proliferate. In turn, animals learn what foods are suitable based on color, taste and smell of ripeness. Detecting these signals is a whole lot easier when you have developed a relationship with a food over many years. It becomes a lot harder when manufactured foods are available that mimic "real" food with artificial flavors and synthetic sweeteners because the relationship was originally between the eater and whole foods, not with nutrients or chemicals. Do you think that it matters what food history humans have had? Is there really a difference between foods grown in nature or ones created in a lab if they have the same nutritional components and values (protein, carbohydrates, fats, etc.)? Do the sci-fi fantasies of taking a pill for all your nutritional needs ever seem plausible given the information you've read? Section 1. From Whole Foods to Refined - Since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution, refined foods have been de rigueur. They imparted not only more prestige (due to the expense), but better digestibility and a shelflife heretofore unseen. Flour and rice could now be stored for months and shipped over long distances. The drawback is that, with the removal of fiber among other things, the conversion to glucose was quickened when digested. The other problem with these gorgeous white powders and grains was that they were nutritionally worthless. They merely provided a quick energy rush in the form of calories, but not much else. After reading this section are you more inclined to seek out and purchase brown rice and whole wheat flour over white? Or do you already do so? Section 2. From Complexity to Simplicity - With the advent of chemical fertilizers, modern foods have been grown on a distillation of a few major

macronutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium aka NPK) and little else. As a result, produce grown in this environment has lost some of its nutritional components. Why is this so? Well, for one, harsh chemical fertilizers depress or destroy the natural biological activity of the soil (microbes, earthworms and fungi), leaving the plants to subsist largely on a simple ration of NPK. This chemical diet also leaves the plants susceptible to pests and disease. The addition of pesticides affects the quality of the plant as well. The tendency of modern plant breeding has consistently selected for industrial characteristics (such as yield or ability to transport) over nutritional quality. Additionally, plants grow considerably quicker under chemical fertilizers and are unable to uptake as many nutrients in such a short period of time. Another issue is the rise of monoculture farming. Roughly two-thirds of the calories we eat come from four crops: soy, corn, wheat and rice. This is an issue because humans, as omnivores, require somewhere between fifty and one hundred different chemical compounds and elements in order to be healthy and it's unlikely we are getting all of them from such a limited diet. Were you aware that so much of your diet is a product of soy and corn? Will you pay more attention to your food choices in trying to achieve a balanced diet? Section 3. From Quality to Quantity - Our food system is at the point where the focus is on increasing yields and selling food as cheaply as possible. With the rise of "super-sized" meals, enormous portions and restaurants such as Claim Jumper that pride themselves on food gigantism, it's no wonder Americans are getting heavier. (For example, Claim Jumper's Ore Cart, I Declair and Chocolate Motherlode Cake are all obscenities of consumption.) Add in the fact that our food has less nutrition per calorie, one needs to eat more in order to gain the proper amount of nutrients. As a result, people on a Western diet are overweight and malnourished. When buying food or meal-planning, do you take into consideration the nutritional components of the food you eat or do you think of it in terms of the food pyramid? Will you focus on getting a wider range of fruits and vegetables in your diet and will you choose organic foods to help supply those missing nutrients? Section 4. From Leaves to Seeds - This section goes into great detail regarding the benefits of omega-3 fatty acids versus the potentially harmful effects of omega-6s. I won't reiterate it as there's a lot of information there, but suffice it to say that we are eating more seeds and less leaves and, as a result, we aren't getting enough omega-3s. A growing number of researchers believe that the Western diet is grossly deficient in omega-3s. Section 5. From Food Culture to Food Science - The gist of this section is the fact that industrialization of food (i.e. the Western diet) is systematically

and deliberately undermining traditional food cultures everywhere. Do you think it's too late to maintain traditional food cultures or is the draw of the novelty and glamour of the Western diet too hard to resist with its emphasis on sugars and fats?