You'll never eat the same way again!August 29, 2008 2 out of 2 found this review helpful
This is a non-fiction account of the history behind the food we eat. This book describes the great industrial food complex and advocates local, organic foods. Extremely well-researched and well-presented. This was a compelling book and will likely convince you to change your eating habits.
A real education!August 25, 2008 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 byproductsAugust 21, 2008 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 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 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.
