Editorial Reviews:
Product Description
A New York Times bestseller that has changed the way readers view the ecology of eating, this revolutionary book by award winner Michael Pollan asks the seemingly simple question: What should we have for dinner? Tracing from source to table each of the food chains that sustain uswhether industrial or organic, alternative or processedhe develops a portrait of the American way of eating. The result is a sweeping, surprising exploration of the hungers that have shaped our evolution, and of the profound implications our food choices have for the health of our species and the future of our planet.
Customer Reviews: Read 440 more reviews...
A real education! August 25, 2008
D. Folz (Blacksburg, VA)
Pollan presents this discussion in an easy-to-read format and gives the reader a well-rounded story. I highly recommend this book and hope that more agriculture schools and nutrition classes use it in the classroom.
Corn and its byproducts August 21, 2008
Amy L. Cousino
This book contains a clear accounting of the farming of corn and the use
of corn to make corn syrup and other corn products used in human foods,
and the problem with the destruction of farming soil and pollution of
the environment with fertilizers used to increase the yield per acre of
corn. The Author does not address the problem with adding corn by-products to our dog and cat foods, among which are the basic indigestibility of corn in these animals, and the problem of pet illness that results from the feeding of pet foods with corn products in them.
This is a great book. To learn more about pet nutrition please
go to www.amiespetcuisine.com, and see HOW TO COOK FOR YOUR PET.
Calling all Corn People - READ THIS BOOK! August 21, 2008
Karen Franklin (El Cerrito, CA, USA)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
I read this book a little while ago and didn't have time to review it, but the essential messages keep popping into my consciousness as I go about my day-to-day life. Before reading this book, for example, I had never realized that Corn has cunningly taken over the world and turned us all into "Corn People." Pollan's simple plan - to make three meals - turns into an exploration of all things wrong with the modern industrial food production and delivery system. Pollan's prose is wonderful and his thinking nothing short of brilliant. Even if some of his ideas are not completely original, as some critical reviews argue, this is still a remarkable book that will enrich your life - and the world, if enough people read it.
How an omnivore became a carnivore ! August 18, 2008
Victorian (LaCrosse, WI)
This is a fascinating book on how we eat, how our food companies feed us and how the ruthless business efficiency of corporations has created an expoitative food chain with tremendous social, economic, environmental, health and moral problems for us now to resolve. Michael Pollen describes the genesis of four meals and how government policies, marketing by food corporations, restaurants and insatiable demands by the consumer has created this unsustainable food chain in which every one is suffering:the land, the animals, environment, the consumer. As epidemics of obesity, type II diabetes, heart disease and cancer rage in America everybody is searching for an answer. Unfortunately Michael Pollen's book does not succinctly provide that answer (although it does make some oblique reference to it)
Homo sapiens came out of the jungles about 10,000 years ago and started agriculture and domesticating animals, but for millions of years before we were hunter-gatherers. Males hunted animals and failed nine out of ten times and the family survived on whatever the female and children gathered with their bare hands: fruits, roots, seeds, succulent leaves. So how does this biologic omnivore become an industrial age carnivore eating meat at each and every meal? and how did we end up eating far more than we need to? We have been eating meat for ages, but meat was expensive until the beginning of 20th century. We ate predominantly a relatively unprocessed plant based diet with some meat every now and then. People did physical hard work to earn a living and used up the calories they consumed. There was no significant heart disease in the 19th century.
So the real dilemma is how to turn this gluttonous carnivore back into a true biologic omnivore. This book highlights that vexing issue of today.
That is my take from this book.
Omnivore's Dilemma August 15, 2008
T. Stevens (Boston, MA United States)
A very interesting book which fairly considers, defends and challenges all eating habits from vegans to junk-food junkies. Micheal Pollan does an excellent job of tracking down the history of food laws & policies in the U.S. and revealing how that history impacts our national eating habits today. Most of all I liked the ending, which wasn't doom and gloom but rather a positive recounting of the author's own completley home-made meal. He seemed to really challenge himself, and ultimately enjoy himself, while writing this book.
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