In Defense of Food

Michael Pollan says, “Eat Food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” In just seven words, he provides the best dietary advice I’ve come across, whether you care about your own health or more about that of our planet.

In Defense of Food explores our bizarre and changing relationship with Food. We are obsessed with nutrition, diets, and supplements, yet simultaneously consume a grossly unhealthy diet that is driving an epidemic of obesity and diabetes. 

Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food is also a classic, coming out in 2008. This book takes you deeper into the world of ultra-processed foods vs. whole foods—though the term “ultra-processed” wasn’t yet being used when he wrote this book. His famous “eater’s manifesto”—Eat food.  Not too much. Mostly plants. – is the tl/dr version, but if you want to learn more about how he came up with this manifesto, you’ll find it all within these pages. 

This book beautifully explains its fundamental, simple bit of advice of healthy eating known to naturopaths for centuries; eat food, mostly plants, not too much. It basically convinces you of the necessity to eat whole ‘food’ – not a bunch of processed, chemical-ridden, junk masquerading as food, but real honest ingredients. If you read the packet and don’t recognise every ingredient as being something that you might have in your cupboard, don’t eat it.

It summarises the findings of most research into healthy eating without giving hard and fast rules. Not ‘be a vegetarian’, but ‘eat mostly plants, and if… show more.

This is a follow-up with Michael Pollan’s best-selling, The Omnivore’s Dilemma. It helps answers the ever-pressing questions of what and how to eat, one meal at a time. This is one of the books that answers Mr. Pollan’s now-famous quote: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”