Michael Pollan’s best-selling 2006 book The Omnivore’s Dilemma was a remarkable exploration of the food we eat and where it comes from. Perhaps the country’s most influential thinker on food, Pollan showed us how the food industry compromises our health and undermines the role of food in our community. He urged us to take responsibility for our diets, seeking out natural foods from local sources. Part journalist and part philosopher, his unique ability to deliver first-rate research in fascinating stories and ideas has changed the way readers shop, cook and eat. 

Pollan’s 2008 follow-up, In Defense of Food, is in part a response to the question his readers posed after reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma:  So then, what can we eat? In short, his answer is this: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."  He expounds on this seemingly simplistic advice with a book-length "eater’s manifesto," which aspires to bring genuine food back to our table rather than the pre-packaged, nutrient-laced foodstuffs that pass for food on grocery store shelves nationwide. Along the way he turns our conventional eating wisdom on its ear with such nuggets as, "If you’re concerned about your health, you should probably avoid products that make health claims," taking fad diets and nutritionism to task for its flawed and reckless science. 

Admittedly, it’s all quite frightening and infuriating to read Pollan’s claims that our food has been hijacked by commercial interests, though ultimately his aim is "to help us reclaim our health and happiness as eaters." Pollan is as impassioned, upbeat and inspiring as ever in this book, and he ends with suggestions for how to get the most enjoyment — hence nutrition — from your food: eat slowly, at a table, meals rather than snacks, not alone, preferably food you’ve prepared or grown yourself. He reassures us that common sense is still the best guide to our eating habits, and once you ingest his ideas, food-gathering will become more than a mindless routine, and eating more than a task of survival. Like great books and ideas, eating too can be an art.

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