The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan is a look into food as we know it. He explores where the food we eat comes from and attempts to answer the age old question of what exactly should we eat? I particularly liked that the author doesn’t criticize what choices people make. The book is written in a way to inform the reader of what exactly goes into producing the food we consume. Pollan leaves it up to the reader to choose what is best for them. There are three main sections to The Omnivore’s Dilemma: Industrial, Pastoral, and Personal. Pollan illustrates each section with a meal or two - fast food eaten in a car (industrial); industrial organic TV dinners and beyond organic chicken and vegetables eaten with family (Pastoral); and a final meal that was hunted and gathered with friends (Personal).
Where exactly does our food comes from? For at least the 90% of food that has been industrialized over the years the answer is quite simple: corn. Unless it is 100% grassfed, the meat that we eat is corn raised; most of our drinks are sweetened with corn; as well as most of our fast food. Beef and lamb were not intended to be raised on corn, yet since we have an over abundance of corn, due to government subsidies and policy, it is much cheaper to have corn raised animals in feed lots. This leads to health issues for the animals, leading to a dependence on antibiotics in agribusiness. By simply raising our animals on grass we can avoid the unethical treatment of animals, creating nasty antibiotic resistant microbes, negative environmental impacts, and poor health for the omnivores who are eating the animals.
A society that is so heavily reliant on corn causes many problems. Americans consume more corn than any other country and also have an alarming obesity rate. Many experts believe this is no coincidence. In a Chicken McNugget from McDonald’s there are 38 ingredients, 13 of which are derived from corn. The burgers have added corn sweetener in them, and the cattle itself was raised on corn to reduce costs. Forty-five out of sixty of McDonald’s products contain corn derivatives. Environmentally, it’s important to know that corn uses more fertilizer than any other crop. At the end of World War 2 the U.S. government had a surplus of ammonium nitrate, previously used in explosives and nerve gas. Now those same nitrates are used as fertilizer and are poisoning the ground water.
Pollan also talks about the industrialization of organic food. Unfortunately, although the organic movement has gained a lot of steam, the producers have begun to adopt a lot of methods used in industrial agribusiness, losing sight of the organic food movement’s anti-industrial roots. I have to say however; with as much popularity as organic food has, it is quite hard to remain non-industrial. Pollan also visits local farms where the crops are harvested and grown non-industrially. These farms are slowly diminishing and it’s getting harder and harder to find food that isn’t industrially produced.
Lastly, the final chapter of Pollan’s book is about personally harvesting food for yourself. He attempts to prepare a meal using ingredients that only he has hunted, gathered, or grown. With some help, he hunts for feral pigs, searches for wild mushrooms and abalone, makes a salad from his garden, bakes bread completely and entirely from scratch, and even cooks desert. Obviously this route is completely impractical in today’s world, but reading about his adventure opened my eyes to exactly what it would take to cook a meal without any industry at all. It’s quite astonishing how much we rely on the industrial food system.
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