Right On: Score One for Fruits and Veggies
It’s been a while since I’ve read any news that made me happy, but this Times article left me with a warm fuzzy feeling.
I have immense sympathy for those Americans struggling with weight problems, and I don’t believe that there’s any easy way to lose weight. But I strongly believe that the fastest and surest way to improve your health by eating is to eat a diverse a array of fresh and unprocessed foods, and I am happy to see that many Americans are starting to agree with me.
At least so far, science is losing to nature when it comes to our diets. For generations, Americans have thought – with the vigorous encouragement of agribusiness – that advances in food science would lead us to the perfect foods: ones that taste good, keep us slim, and provide us with all the nutrients we need.
Well, we haven’t yet, and we don’t seem to be very close. Every year there’s a new element of food to be avoided and a new nutrient to be added to our drinks and cereals and yogurts. And every year, we hear about how last year’s science missed the mark.
No one, however, disputes the value of the humble carrot or the stalwart banana. Almonds will always be good for us and whole grains will always be the right choice. Fruits and vegetables already beat margarine and Olestra, and they’ll be around long after sucralose and aspartame are forgotten. And I don’t see this changing anytime soon. Science may build a better mousetrap, but I doubt they’ll make a make a better mango.
And so a message to Archer Daniels Midland: Bring it on, baby. Our carrot can take on your chemicals any day.
I picture monks in brown robes, tending a garden at the monastary of Michael Pollan, chanting, “Eat food … Not too much … Mostly plants … Eat food … Not too much … Mostly plants …”
If you haven’t already, you’ve got to read “The Omnivore’s Dillemma” and “In Defense of Food”. I didn’t start believing in the power of real food because I read those books. But Pollan laid out the case for it so well it’s hard to argue.
Quite right, Drew. And my thinking is so in line with Pollan here, that I probably should have given him some credit.
I may actually put together a Pollan-dedicated post one of these days, but in the meantime, FJ readers, know that he is one of my heroes.
Amen to everything said here. An interesting post could also be written on the ideological underpinnings of the current fad of paleo-lithic dieting, and whether or not such a diet has any merit, along similar lines of argument. I’ll think about that.