Chris already has a copy, and so do I. Juraj, Alex, and Jon, have you ordered your copies yet?

I ordered mine on Friday, so should have it by Monday or Tuesday (along with Bill Simmons' Book of Basketball...uhhhhhh yeaaaaaaaah).

Got mine today. Indeed, let the reading begin!

I will order it ASAP

Love Jon

the rapini aisle of the grocery store awaits

Guess you are further than me since I don't even know what the fcuk rapini is, or are...

Got mine yesterday, started reading today. So far it's just the blatantly obvious, but much needed, messages... Eat little, eat fruits and vegetables (Chris... feel free to put in your comment about the origin and "comercialization" of the word "vegetables" here...), and if any product is doing a lot of "push marketing" to sell it's product, the claims are probably very far fetched and hide a whole sea of negatives...

So far so good though... Glad we came across this book...

So, how far is everyone so far? I'm about 130 pages in. I feel the same Juraj, in that so far most of it seems to be common sense (with more detailed and in-depth research), but unfortunately it's not common sense for most people.

I'm about halfway right now. I find the most informative part to centre around whole vs. refined grains, and how white flour is the first fast food in history. The direct link between white flour and diabetes in North American is pretty staggering. Didn't realize you guys were all so well versed in nutritional science

It is quite interesting... I am pretty much in the exact same place as you, Leo. I was just thinking while reading that about the changes that my family underwent since moving to Canada. In Slovakia, it was very much "you eat what you make or kill" type of approach, and when we came to Canada, being the poor immigrants that we were, we started off eating a lot cheap, and therefore usually highly processed food. My dad has recently noticed that since he moved to Canada, there was a steady increase in the amount of various ilnesses that he never had before, and nobody in our family has ever had. Almost all of these are related to an "overactive" immune system, and are usually labelled as "causes unknown" by the medical community. After a lot of thought, he concluded that it must be the diet, so both him and my mom are on a HUGE health binge at the moment. This is having some fairly dramatic effects on my dad's symptoms... Makes you wonder...

The other thing I have personally noticed, is how easy it is to maintain my weight in Switzerland, relative to Canada. The Swiss are extremely dedicated to keeping the food "pure". Restaurants have to disclose where the meat is from, and many Swiss will NEVER buy meat outside of Switzerland. This is because there are some strict rules regarding farming. Cows can not be locked up, and farmers actually get subsidized by the government based on the amount of time that their cows spend outside (tracked by GPS devices in some cases). Despite the fact that the Swiss smoke like crazy (still not outlawed in bars and restaurants), they have one of the highest life expectancy rates in the world... I think it's probably something to do with the diet.

I guess in the end, I can be somewhat glad about my mom's dedication to the "Seventh-day Adventist" diet I was raised with. I always hated the fact as a child that we had very little sweets in the house, and only had meat once a week... but now I am seriously thinking of going back to that.

Good read so far.

Just watched an interesting documentary that was somewhat related to this...

http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-world-according-to-monsanto/

Hello budding book club friends,

I just finished In Defence of Food. I really enjoyed the second half of the book than the first half (it got a lot more interesting and engaging for me). I'll hold off on comments until most people are done. Great book and looking forward to discussion!

I often wondered about why peanut allergies seem to be so rampant in North America. Can anybody fill me in on this? Is it due to genetic modification? What are people's thoughts about genetically modified foods? After reading this book it really makes me apprehensive (and angry) that this is going on without our knowledge.

As far as I know, there's no scientifically proven explanation for the proliferation of peanut allergies. From what I know and from what I've read in the book, it's a result of change in the foods we eat and eating patterns (ie much more processed food). And in regards to genetically modified food, I am now apprehensive about any food that isn't whole.

I'm finished as well...

With respect to peanuts, I have already read a few times that peanut alergies didn't start until they started cross-breeding the peanuts to make a more resistant strain. This was in response to either WWI or WWII, due to the food shortages that resulted. Currently approx. 2.5-2.7 of the US population is alergic to peanuts. This is approximately the same as the % of people that have a reaction to MSG... but that's another topic.

Not sure if you got a chance to see the documentary in the link I posted, but have a look from about minute 15 onwards to see exactly what was done by the FDA in terms of approving GMO's or labelling them as "GRAS"... It's pretty astounding, but very expected by me. I am not sure what the EU's current stance is on genetically modified food, but I know it used to be prohibited. When you see the presentations of the freakish corn plants growing in Mexico near the end of the documentary, that was really scarry...

My mom has always been quite strict about our diets, and I'm really thankful to her for that. I can honestly say that there is almost nothing in that book that my parents haven't told me before or tried to apply. Including this whole "taking a trip around the outside isles of the grocerry store" etc. I was going to recommend that they read this book since they are currently on a "raw diet" craze, but after having read the whole book, I could really not see much that they haven't been telling me for 30 years now... I guess I should have listenend...

The part that really got me in the book was when I read about the fact that we esentially eat such crap food that not even insects or bacteria will eat it. Try feeding certain things to your dog or cat that you eat and you will be surprised that even though they are hungry, they won't eat it. It's scrarry stuff man... I personally still can't get over how quickly food spoils in Switzerland. I have to go to the store at LEAST 2x a week and everything I buy I have to basically eat within 2-3 days or it will go bad. This was definitely NOT the case when I was in Canada... Scarry stuff!

Good read overall... glad I read this one.

Finished the book. That was one observation that really got to me: the act of increasing the shelf life of food is essentially to remove the nutrients, that way parasites don't want it. What that means ironically is that parasites are more nutritionally minded than we are!

A while back in our household we began to put into practice the rule of never buying something where you do not recognize an ingredient. If you stay to the peripheries of the grocery aisles, that becomes a lot easier.

I still have to look at the documentary, but thanks for the link Juraj. There are a few other good books out there on the topic, namely "The Omnivore's Dilemma" by the same author, "Fast Food Nation", and "The End of Food". There's also the new movie/documentary called Food Inc.

Glad you guys enjoyed the book. Thompson, are you eating kale yet?

I really liked the book. Various anecdotes affirmed some of my doubts, and re-affirmed some of my beliefs. The following were for me the three most interesting themes/anecdotes that I took from the book (sorry, I really find it hard to keep things like this short):

1) How did we get to a point where we need professional help to do something that all species have been doing since the beginning of life on earth? It really is common sense, and I think that’s why I found the first part of the book to be a little slow (like Juraj, I was already aware of a lot of the issues he was talking about). Traditionally we have trusted our senses to smell/see if something is spoiled or rotting. But Western food tries (and does a great job) of fooling our senses. Like Len and Juraj alluded to, something just isn’t right if a Twinkie can sit in your cupboard for a year without rotting. Even the so-called “healthy” bread I eat (flax, whole grain) fools me: it takes a good few weeks for it to start to spoil, because each slice has 200 mg of sodium to preserve it.

The Western diet just keeps adjusting to food science, as opposed to addressing the broader issues. I found it interesting/depressing how Pollan mentions that there will be great marketing opportunities for how to deal/live with diabetes as opposed to tackling the roots of the problem. The same goes for the food industry. People will continue to eat shit food, as long as there is no trans-fat, or it’s whole grain, etc. When food can be altered and tweaked with the advent of a new food science discovery, something isn’t right. I can’t help but laugh at some companies’ new marketing mottos, trying to make their food appear more “real.” For example:

Wendy’s – “You know when it’s real”
McCain’s – “Good food, better life” and “It’s all good” (I went on their website, and I can assure you, it’s not all good).
Hellmann’s – “It’s time for real”

I mean honestly, what a joke!

2) I found the parts on “synergies between nutrients,” and the relationships between foods, to be very interesting. For example, it’s not so much how much fat we have, but the combinations of different types of fat. Or, if you drink coffee with your steak, your body won’t be able to fully absorb the iron in the meat. Or in Latin America, corn is eaten with beans because each plant is deficient in an essential amino acid that happens to be abundant in the other. He suggests that this could possibly help explain the “French paradox” and the Mediterranean diet, in that it could be the anti-oxidants in the wine that helps metabolize all the fats. I guess the point is that there’s no single nutrient that will help explain all the health issues of the day. It’s a combination of them, and their interaction, which is too complex to break down into a handful of nutrients, which is all the more reason to stick to whole foods. I love the idea about “taking the nutrient out of the context of food.” The beauty of whole foods is that we don’t have to worry about what’s in it. We know it’s good.

3) We should not only watch what we eat, but watch what the animals we eat, eat. Pollan mentions how animals grow faster and produce more milk and energy on a high-energy diet of grain. For a while now, Keren and I have bought the omega-3 eggs. But, the thought of feeding flaxseed to hens so the level of omega-3 fatty acids is higher in the yolks is kind of disturbing and doesn’t seem worth it. Is the cholesterol in normal eggs really all that bad if they were eaten by our great-grandparents? Or, for example, the steak that I eat tonight might be from a cow that consumed a diet of corn, industrial waste products, antibiotics and hormones. Can that really be considered whole food? He also mentions how if they eat too many seeds, they become sick, which is why they are given antibiotics. That just doesn’t seem right.

To sum up, while it may be more expensive to eat healthily, and it takes more time to prepare healthy food, if people reflect on how they spend their money and their time in other ways, it may seem a little more worth while. Keren and I soak our black beans, chick peas, red beans, etc. over night, so we don’t have to use the canned, sodium-injected brands, and can enjoy home-made falafel and bean burgers. We’ve started to make our own pizza crust (with ground flax and un-refined flour), and we’re going to try making our own bread this week. We’re not perfect, and no one is, but we find it very gratifying and enjoyable and feel better about our health (and kind of feel like we’re sticking it to the man (the man being the food industry)). If you’ve made it this far, you are probably cursing me, but I offer no apologies.

Alex, the third paragraph of your treatise reminds me of the Chris Rock bit about Doctors and how they "aint curing shit"...

check this out:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G7P4iFg048k

classic!

Freakin hilarious, but so true!

Alex, your second point is also what I took out of the book. It really seems ridiculous to think that the nutritious information on the side of packages can tell you what you should eat. I never understood how people could really think that a) those labels are accurate, b) they give you enough information for you to be able to "get the whole picture" about your diet, and c) they give you accurate information. I have never ready anything on the accuracy of the "nutritious facts" on packaging, and would be very interested to know who actually checks it, and what the findings of that study are... Does the FDA do anything in this regard?

In terms of the Omega-3's, not sure if you are aware, but studies seem to indicate that it is only the fish-based Omega-3's that have all the benefits, while the plant-based Omega-3's are still beneficial, but not nearly to the extent of the others. There was a recent article on bbc where one guy trashed the benefits of Omega-3's:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/food_matters/omega.shtml

It's funny, but my dad's doctor told my dad once that some of his health issues could be made better by Omega-3 acids and fasting (in this case, the discussion was about his rheumatoid arthritis), but that she can't officially recommend either one of those solutions because it's considered "alternative medicine", and not endorsed by the medical community in Canada and US. She also went on to say that this is somewhat common knowledge in Europe, and doctors here recommend both fasting and use of Omega-3's to treat it. I probably talked about this already when I was in Canada last summer, but when he did the 3-week "tea diet" (nothing but herbal tea), a lot of health issues disappeared in just that short amount of time... really crazy!

I still wonder about the miracle of Omega 3's... seems like everyone is jumping on the bandwagon. Isn't this exactly the same as what the guy said in the book? I.e. every 10 years or so there is some new "miracle" discovered in nutrition... Then again, why the hell would my grandma be telling me to eat fish oil??? She was right on every other account...

When looking for that bbc article, I came across BBC's page dedicated to Omega-3's...

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/food_matters/omega.shtml

Alright... time to go eat some herring...

Juraj, really interesting article. But, the first link you posted didn’t trash omega-3’s. Actually, both links you posted were the same, so maybe it’s another one you’re talking about?

Yeah, it’s funny how you mentioned the bandwagon about omega-3’s. And it’s not even every 10 years (just think of the transfat and whole grain craze over the last few years or so). What’s funny is how effective the marketing is. Any Joe-six pack could tell you that transfat is bad and omega-3’s are good, but they can’t tell you why (I’ve been guilty of this). Same goes for anti-oxidants. Like I said before, what people should be focusing on is the food, not the nutrients. With tuna, I get two servings of fish a week, but that article says that canned tuna isn't as beneficial as the fresh (obviously), and even two servings a week doesn't meet what we should be getting. I guess I'll have to get more mackerel and salmon.

And in regards to the FDA and other health organizations, I’m a little too cynical when they approve of Frito-Lay chips fried in polyunsaturated fats, and Lucky Charms and Cocoa Puffs made with whole grain.

I’d really like to try that tea fast your dad tried. I don’t know if I would do it for three weeks, but I think it would be cleansing, and beneficial to do it for a day every month of so.

With respect to the tea diet, after day two, you're fine... I actually went on it for a week plus, and was playing soccer, hiking, no problem. To be completely honest, I had MORE energy than when I was eating. I later read that 60-80% of your body's energy is spent on digestion, so when you cut the out, even though you don't eat, you don't feel as tired. The diet also says that you should drink 500ml of pure vegetable juice (make your own or only specific "100% pure" brands recommended). This is about 200-400 kcal of energy. So if you do the math:

(recommended daily intake of 2'500 kcal x 80% reduction due to lack of digestion energy required) - 300kcal from juice =

[remember to use BEDMAS ]

about 200 kcal that you lose per day. For me, this resulted in incredible muscle definition, much more energy (once again... counter-intuitive...), a much more positive attitude, better sleep, etc. etc. etc. The only thing is that you don't have "explossive energy". So I could run in soccer for like 3 hours, but I didn't have the speed that I had off the diet. I.e. no Eli Maglov-esque superpowers...

I know it sounds like an eating disorder, but fasting only seems to be a taboo in north america and former British Empire countries for some reason. I will definitely do it again in a few weeks. Even IF there are no health benefits, I would still do it just to train my willpower! I hate being a slave to my own body so I fight tooth and nail to prevent that from happening.

So Jon hasn't even bought the book, so I think he is out for this one. Maur? Rocio? Thompson? Any thoughts? If not, I guess we'll just move on to the Screwtape Letters.

Perhaps some readers need some time to digest the contents more thoroughly. Not everyone chews as fast as you Alex

Hey man, this is a cut-throat book club. You gotta move it or lose it! Len, did you get the book of basketball yet? I'm 400 pages in.

Agreed with the move it or lose it. Comon people, we crave your literary commentary. I give you another week before Alex loses his mind.

I succumbed to the cheaper online option and have ordered both The Screwtape Letters and The Book of Basketball on amazon (they should sponsor us). Judging by their stellar reputation, I expect that both will be in this week.

I don't want to start reading the screwtape letters too early, but I am more than half-way in the book I started after "In defence of food". When is the official "kick-off" for the new book?

I would say no later than the end of this month...mine has yet to arrive

I am the same as Juraj, about half way of a book I started after in defence of food. So, starting Screwtape Letters at the end of the month would be good. I'll just arbitrarily say March 24. That's two weeks from today. Maur, are you alive?

Yes, I'm alive, and filled with shame for not having finished in defense of food yet. I've got about 40 pages left and must say the 2nd half of the book is much better than the 1st.

I've refrained from reading your comments until I finish. More to come...

We know that Bradley hasn't even bought this book yet. Any word from Thompson?

Goddammit,

Just finished the book this morning and read all of your commentaries in detail (didn't want to spoil / have my view of the book influenced before finishing).

First off, let me apologize for not finishing in a timely manner. Love the comments, and I'll basically echo most of them here.

Again, loved the 2nd half of the book. The structure is kind of neccessary: take us into the depths of the food world (which, to me, happened to be boring as hell), and then pull us up out of the rut and give us hope and motivation.

In addition to insects being more health conscious than we are, I was also struck by the idea that victims of the western diet are overfed and under-nourished. To me, this is insanity. I now look at obese people and wonder what exactly they put (or shovel) into their bodies, how much, and how useless it is to life in general. The western diet does not contribute to life, it depletes it. This type of thinking is what this book has given me.

I also liked how Pollan refers to processed foods as "food products," which sounds fake and digusting. I'll keep that in my mind at all times when deciding what to eat: Hmm, what to eat today--food or a food product?

For Rocio and me, this book comes at a good time: we've been trying to be more responsible with our eating, which I've always believed should be simply cooking from basic ingredients: I've never been afraid of butter or dousing things in olive oil or making use of the fats that come off of meat while it's being cooked. This book confirms that type of attitude, but takes things a bit further by defining "basic ingredients" more specifically, and condemning "food products" to such a degree that I now want to make a concerted effort to stray from real food as little as possible.

This book has inspired us to take things to the next level: next Wednesday, our first CSA (Community Supplied Agriculture?) basket will be delivered to our doorstep. I figure if we eat everything they give us and not let it spoil, we'll be hard-pressed to have room for processed food.

Jesus h, time to end this.

Vanessa and I started the delivery thing about 6 months ago and haven't looked back. Instead of building recipes around beef and pork (which I am prone to do) we have to focus on the veggies, which are plentiful and of a wide variety. It's good bang for your buck considering it's only $40 per week and you get a massive amount of veggies. The quality is also amazing. It forces you to eat a lot more greens (rule #3) and to get innovative with your cooking.

How does the CSA thing work? Len, you told me a bit about it, but I can't remember some details. For example, what if I hate turnips and squash, do you have any choice/can I request certain vegetables, or do they keep sending them? Or is it like a box of chocolates: you never know whatcha gunna geeeeit (on a weekly basis)? There's certain veggies that I eat every week, but there's others that I wouldn't want to eat every week.

From the ones we looked at, it's more like a box of chocolates. Not sure if they take requests or not. For example, there's a 100% local CSA that runs only during the summer months, and you get whatever is in season / harvested at any given time.

Nice! Currently watching Alan Alda on Scientific American talking about food, culture, and how family members in the US have gone obese while relatives from the same family in Mexico are healthier. Made possible by viewers like you.

We've never made any special requests, but i understand you can ask them not to give you one thing and just double up on another. I would say we got sick of garlic scapes the most...ended up purreeing it with a bunch of other unwanteds, made for a thoroughly boring soup. Other than that it's all pretty good stuff

I can't remember if I mentioned it, but after reading Pollan and doing a little research, I discovered how terrible margerine actually is (I've read that it's a couple ingredients away from being plastic). Inspired by Michael Pollan's exercise of leaving a Twinkie on his counter for a couple of years, I decided to open up my tub of Becel margerine and leave it on our counter. I did that February 15th and as of April 30 (today), absolutely nothing has changed (it's maybe a little darker shade of yellow, like when you leave butter out for a few hours and it has that sweaty look). Not a single bug has gone near it nor has the consistency or anything else about it changed in the slightest (no mold, no nothing). Needless to say, we are never buying margerine again.

I am simply baffled by the fact that you are baffled... Is this not common knowledge???

Also, is it the salty kind? Salt is used as a preservative so even salted beef jerkey will likely last about the same amount of time with just two ingridients: beef and salt. In fact, the natural way of preserving food was to either a) smoke it, b) salt it, or c) pickle it... this was before we had E252's and all that crap.

You should take that into consideration when conducting any future experiments.

I'm not sure what makes this common knowledge?

Common knowledge: "salting" is used to preserve meats.

Not so common: Leaving a tub of margarine out for a month and a half would result in no change in appearance and attract 0 pests.

What does the margarine's saltiness have to do with anything? Are you saying that the same experiment with salty butter will yield the same result?

Wait a minute--people still eat margarine?

I would expect that the results are similar. That's the only reason why you can buy salted margarine and butter to this day. I mean think about it. What other purpose would it have? You can always put salt on your butter if you prefer the taste, but you can't "unsalt" it. So why salt it in the first place? It all started with trying to preserve the butter, and then people got used to the taste... (at least that's what "the history of salt" book tells me). I mean, how else could you preserve butter before fridges were invented? Yet, somehow, people managed to have butter all throughout the year before electricity was invented...

In Slovakia, we also salted butter when we were making it, but for the sole purpose of having it last longer... Everyone preferred the unsalted version because it was known to be "fresher". We would smoke the meat for the same purpose, but I don't think you could really use the "smoking" technique on solidified fat. Never tried though...

So try it with salted butter as well. I personally don't usually refrigirate salted butter because it doesn't go bad before I use it, and it's nice and soft when I do want to use it... Mind you, the butter here is also sold in much smaller quantities, so you don't have to buy a giant brick of it. I also never put ketchup in the fridge either, and a few other things. Ketchup won't go bad no matter how long you leave it out. That's what baffles me a little...

This whole "putting stuff in the fridge" seems really more like paranoia to me. If you live in hot climates with a lot of bugs and ants around, sure... you gotta keep it in a sealed container (fridge is good for that), but otherwise. Not sure how a drop in temaparture by about 10 degrees would magically kill off the bacteria. Slow down the growth, yes, but unless it's below freezing, it won't kill it. And even below freezing won't kill all. There is plenty of stuff that just becomes "innactive" below 0, but not dead. So just because you don't see the bacteria and fungus, doesn't mean you're not constantly eating it.

Anywho... my prediction is that it would last much longer than you think, but probably not as long as margarine. Afterall, it's basically vegetable oil. Do you also put your bottle of olive oil in the fridge after opening the bottle? Balsamic vinegar? etc?