What do we choose to eat and where does it come from?
Author Michael Pollan sees this as one of the most pressing questions in a nation assaulted by diet fads and overrun with food-related health crises.
America, as we well know, is a culinary melting pot. And that’s a beautiful thing. The land of plenty offers us nearly countless meal options: cuisines as ostensibly diverse as lasagna, tacos and the ever-glorious hamburger. But, when we daily borrow dishes from many food cultures, have we lost track of the time-tested traditions that identify and sustain us? What are the consequences?
In The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan examines the current state of an American food chain riddled with special-interest economics, and an American consumer bent on instant gratification. As he uncovers the history of agriculture in our nation, he travels to industrial farms and feedlots, critiques the successes and shortcomings of the organic movement, and attempts to determine what healthy eating means for himself, Pollan issues a bold, if painfully eye-opening, call to action for today’s consumers.
In an age of epidemic heart disease, obesity and cancer, his investigations couldn’t be more necessary or fascinating. After all, how many of us understand the type of processing our food undergoes before it reaches the supermarkets’ shelves? Few Americans can find the time to read, much less understand, the intimidating lists of ingredients in their foods. Few now can even find the time to cook.
If we are what we eat, who are we? Never before have we needed a book like this as much as we do today.
But The Omnivore’s Dilemma isn’t for weak stomachs. In places, Pollan’s revelations are downright disgusting. And scary. Pollan details American agriculture’s dangerous dependence on petroleum, the questionable conditions of slaughterhouses and concentrated animal feeding operations, the obscene political influence of corporate powerhouses like Cargill and ADM, and the devastating environmental consequences of our yield-based farm subsidy system. The book will surely leave many readers sick to their stomachs and shaking in their boots.
Still, Pollan’s work is a must-read for all truly conscious eaters. Anyone who’s ever wondered the significance of “corn-fed” beef or the meaning of “organic” will struggle to put the book down. It will be harder still to stop thinking about it, even during the tenderest bites of that Fountain Dining Hall cheeseburger.
To be fair, The Omnivore’s Dilemma isn’t all shock and gloom. In his search, Pollan encounters some priceless eccentrics, including one self-described “grass farmer” who raises and butchers his own cows, chickens and pigs in a wonderfully innovative and self-contained life cycle on a small patch of land in Virginia’s Shenandoah Valley.
And Pollan ends his work on a triumphant note. As he hunts and gathers what he determines is the perfect meal, the author must overcome his city-bred fears and squeamishness. Pollan’s descriptions of the struggle and satisfaction of feeding himself, of seeing each step of his personal food chain, will no doubt leave the reader asking: How have I missed out on this for so long?
