The Omnivore's Dilemma: The Search for a Perfect Meal in a Fast-Food World (reissued)

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Immigration, trade, inequality, and taxation problems present themselves daily, and they seem to be intractable. Pollan finds that this movement morphed into a booming industry as it became increasingly popular and mainstream. In particular, Pollan engages closely with the work of Peter Singer, the world’s foremost philosopher of animal rights.

Many of the organic farmers Pollan encounters developed their political ideals from the radicalism of the 1960s, which saw small-scale, sustainable farming as a way of maintaining a healthy relationship between humans and the world around them. The organic movement began as an alternative, countercultural protest against industrial food in the late-60s, and it was characterized by localized, off-the-grid, back-to-the-land hippie ideas. He also goes behind the scenes at a poultry farm that purports to be free-range, though it actually only offers its chickens a tiny, bare, unused plot of land.The corn that isn’t used to feed cows is sent to refineries, where it undergoes complicated processing to turn it into various edible and non-edible materials, most frequently high-fructose corn syrup. He also becomes skeptical of vegetarianism, a movement which steadily gained ground beginning in the 1970s, as a result of increasing ethical and environmental concerns about the eating of meat. In telling the stories of four familiar species, Pollan illustrates how the plants have evolved to satisfy humankind’s most basic yearnings. His farm guru is Joel Salatin, an independent-minded small farmer who runs Polyface, his small family farm in Virginia.

Pollan sets out to trace major American food sources like corn, which he follows from one end of the food chain to the other in a journey that takes him from farms to fast-food restaurants. For example, Big Organic sometimes requires even more fossil fuels than industrial farms to combat the inefficiency of producing a huge amount of food without using chemical pesticides and fertilizers. Apprenticing himself to a succession of culinary masters, Pollan learns how to grill with fire, cook with liquid, bake bread, and ferment everything from cheese to beer.

Pollan’s perfect meal is completely inefficient and unsustainable as a consistent practice, however—the other end of the spectrum from the unsustainable fast food meal. The authors add, interestingly, that the same thing occurred in parts of Germany, Spain, and Norway that fell victim to the “China shock. Whereas most humans think we are Darwin's most accomplished species, Pollan convincingly argues that plants — even our own front lawns — have evolved to use us as much as we use them.

Because food systems are, in the end, oriented around producing commodities necessary for life, Pollan notes that an important criterion in comparing and evaluating them is their efficiency and utility, but that much of the American economy only measures this in terms of profit. Michael Pollan’s Food Rules began with his hunch that the wisdom of our grandparents might have more helpful things to say about how to eat well than the recommendations of science or industry or government. Salatin’s system compares favorably to the previous two, and the resulting meal is markedly more delicious and likely more nutritious as well. The corn industry harms the environment with its reliance on a huge amount of fossil fuels that go into producing its fertilizers, and the unnatural system of growing only one crop damages the planet because it requires chemicals to eliminate all other species on cornfields.Pollan’s food-focused investigative journalism joins a long line of non-fiction works in this genre, beginning most famously with Upton Sinclair’s The Jungle (1906). He is the author of eight books, five of which were New York Times bestsellers, and he has won numerous awards, including being named to Time’s list of the 100 most influential people in 2010. The Omnivore’s Dilemma was also adapted into a popular young readers’ edition designed to make his analysis of the food system accessible to younger people.

Here, he discovers the enduring power of the four classical elements—fire, water, air, and earth— to transform the stuff of nature into delicious things to eat and drink. In doing so, he explores the implications of the choices Americans make within the modern food system, ultimately seeking to answer what Americans should eat, for their own sake and for the sake of the planet. The meal is a carefully curated masterpiece that he shares with friends, and together they have a direct connection to everything they’re eating.is born on a ranch in South Dakota, and he is sent to a feedlot in Kansas at the age of six months, where he is fed a corn-based diet.