I just finished an enjoyable book from author and journalist Michael Pollan. It is called IN DEFENSE OF FOOD: AN EATER’S MANIFESTO. I don’t agree with a number of assertions in the book, but I believe it is worth repeating Pollan’s Twelve Commandments for Serious Eaters.
- Don’t eat anything [somebody’s] grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food.
- Avoid foods containing ingredients you can’t pronounce.
- Don’t eat anything that won’t eventually rot.
- Avoid food products that carry health claims.
- Shop the peripheries of the supermarket; stay out of the middle.
- Better yet, buy food somewhere else: the farmers’ market or CSA.
- Pay more, eat less.
- Eat a wide variety of species.
- Eat food from animals that eat grass.
- Cook, and if you can, grow some of your own food.
- Eat meals and eat them only at tables.
- Eat deliberately, with other people whenever possible, and always with pleasure.
Obviously it wouldn’t be wise to become a slave to these Twelve Commandments, but is a good reminder of how I want to be eating in 2008!
