This article is so interesting, I think everyone should read this. I am considering now getting his book,
The Omnivore's Dilemma. It was easy to give up meat but this guy concentrates on all the horrible
frankenstein foods we consume here in America. Anyway here are a list of rules Michael Pollen suggests we follow for health:
1.
Eat food. Though in our current state of confusion, this is much easier said than done. So try this: Don’t eat anything your great-great-grandmother
wouldn’t recognize as food. (Sorry, but at this point Moms are as confused as the rest of us, which is why we have to go back a couple of generations, to a time before the advent of modern food products.) There are a great many
foodlike items in the supermarket your ancestors
wouldn’t recognize as food (Go-
Gurt? Breakfast-cereal bars? Nondairy creamer?); stay away from these.
2.
Avoid even those food products that come bearing health claims. They’re apt to be heavily processed, and the claims are often dubious at best. Don’t forget that margarine, one of the first industrial foods to claim that it was more healthful than the traditional food it replaced, turned out to give people heart attacks. When Kellogg’s can boast about its Healthy Heart Strawberry Vanilla cereal bars, health claims have become hopelessly compromised. (The
American Heart Association charges food makers for their endorsement.) Don’t take the silence of the yams as a sign that they have nothing valuable to say about health.
3.
Especially avoid food products containing ingredients that are a) unfamiliar, b) unpronounceable c) more than five in number — or that contain high-fructose corn syrup.None of these characteristics are necessarily harmful in and of themselves, but all of them are reliable markers for foods that have been highly processed.
4.
Get out of the supermarket whenever possible. You won’t find any high-fructose corn syrup at the farmer’s market; you also won’t find food harvested long ago and far away. What you will find are fresh whole foods picked at the peak of nutritional quality. Precisely the kind of food your great-great-grandmother would have recognized as food.
5.
Pay more, eat less. The American food system has for a century devoted its energies and policies to increasing quantity and reducing price, not to improving quality. There’s no escaping the fact that better food — measured by taste or nutritional quality (which often correspond) — costs more, because it has been grown or raised less intensively and with more care. Not everyone can afford to eat well in America, which is shameful, but most of us can: Americans spend, on average, less than 10 percent of their income on food, down from 24 percent in 1947, and less than the citizens of any other nation. And those of us who can afford to eat well should. Paying more for food well grown in good soils — whether certified organic or not — will contribute not only to your health (by reducing exposure to pesticides) but also to the health of others who might not themselves be able to afford that sort of food: the people who grow it and the people who live downstream, and downwind, of the farms where it is grown.
“Eat less” is the most unwelcome advice of all, but in fact the scientific case for eating a lot less than we currently do is compelling. “Calorie restriction” has repeatedly been shown to slow aging in animals, and many researchers (including Walter
Willett, the Harvard epidemiologist) believe it offers the single strongest link between diet and cancer prevention. Food abundance is a problem, but culture has helped here, too, by promoting the idea of moderation. Once one of the longest-lived people on earth, the Okinawans practiced a principle they called “
Hara Hachi Bu”: eat until you are 80 percent full. To make the “eat less” message a bit more palatable, consider that quality may have a bearing on quantity: I don’t know about you, but the better the quality of the food I eat, the less of it I need to feel satisfied. All tomatoes are not created equal.
6.
Eat mostly plants, especially leaves. Scientists may disagree on what’s so good about plants — the antioxidants? Fiber? Omega-3s? — but they do agree that they’re probably really good for you and certainly can’t hurt. Also, by eating a plant-based diet, you’ll be consuming far fewer calories, since plant foods (except seeds) are typically less “energy dense” than the other things you might eat. Vegetarians are healthier than carnivores, but near vegetarians (“
flexitarians”) are as healthy as vegetarians.
Thomas Jefferson was on to something when he advised treating meat more as a flavoring than a food.
7.
Eat more like the French. Or the Japanese. Or the Italians. Or the Greeks. Confounding factors aside, people who eat according to the rules of a traditional food culture are generally healthier than we are. Any traditional diet will do: if it
weren’t a healthy diet, the people who follow it
wouldn’t still be around. True, food cultures are embedded in societies and economies and
ecologies, and some of them travel better than others: Inuit not so well as Italian. In borrowing from a food culture, pay attention to how a culture eats, as well as to what it eats. In the case of the French paradox, it may not be the dietary nutrients that keep the French healthy (lots of saturated fat and alcohol?!) so much as the dietary habits: small portions, no seconds or snacking, communal meals — and the serious pleasure taken in eating. (Worrying about diet can’t possibly be good for you.) Let culture be your guide, not science.
8.
Cook. And if you can, plant a garden. To take part in the intricate and endlessly interesting processes of providing for our sustenance is the surest way to escape the culture of fast food and the values implicit in it: that food should be cheap and easy; that food is fuel and not communion. The culture of the kitchen, as embodied in those enduring traditions we call cuisines, contains more wisdom about diet and health than you are apt to find in any nutrition journal or journalism. Plus, the food you grow yourself contributes to your health long before you sit down to eat it. So you might want to think about putting down this article now and picking up a spatula or hoe.
9.
Eat like an omnivore. Try to add new species, not just new foods, to your diet. The greater the diversity of species you eat, the more likely you are to cover all your nutritional bases. That of course is an argument from
nutritionism, but there is a better one, one that takes a broader view of “health.” Biodiversity in the diet means less monoculture in the fields. What does that have to do with your health? Everything. The vast
monocultures that now feed us require tremendous amounts of chemical fertilizers and pesticides to keep from collapsing. Diversifying those fields will mean fewer chemicals, healthier soils, healthier plants and animals and, in turn, healthier people. It’s all connected, which is another way of saying that your health
isn’t bordered by your body and that what’s good for the soil is probably good for you, too.
-Michael
Pollan (article in the New York Times) here is the link to the article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/28/magazine/28nutritionism.t.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5070&en=41a13b78e5cb87fb&ex=1176436800
This is from Isa and Terry's new cookbook Veganomicon, which is outrageous. This pie is pretty outrageous also, it was so rich, nobody would have believed it was made out of tofu, but I did not tell anyone.......................... Whenever non-vegans hear the "T" word they usually put their forks down, so I did not mention a thing. I will make this again and again especially when I want to impress people with rich, decadent vegan cooking.
Here I made Black Eyed Peas Croquettes with mushroom gravy, green beans and mashed potatoes. I got this recipe from VwaV, my fave most worn down cookbook. I really don't know what I would do without this book. Of course this meal was A+ as are the rest of the recipes in this book.
My pal at work and I were discussing chicken fingers and how much she loved them. I told her I could tofu fingers that would be even better so I tried these, one batch was baked the other was fried. As you all know Eat To Live is my nutritional bible so I usually don't fry things that is why in the pictures above the plate with only two fingers are the ones that were fried, the other plate were the ones that were baked. The baked ones came out so much crispier then the fried, but the fried did taste a little better. I think I prefer the baked version that was very crispy, we loved them with barbecue sauce and honey mustard dressing
This is a dressing I got from the Eat To Live website it is called Ginger Almond Dressing and it goes like this:
This is a fabulous recipe I got from the Dr. Fuhrman Eat To Live website. This recipe is called Tomato Barley Stew, of course I had to change it a little bit. Also I made some polenta then fried it on a nonstick skillet. I served the soup over the polenta and we both loved it.
I made some tacos out of TVP, black beans, Bearitos seasoning, cabbage, tomatoes and my guacamole. It was really good, it has been awhile since I ate a beef taco but tonight I felt very nostalgic of my high school days when Taco Bell Beef Tacos were a source of excitement. I made the guacamole with pressed garlic, onion powder (I was lazy), cilantro, black pepper, lime juice and a little salt. I was debating whether or not to get vegan gourmet cheddar and Toffuti sour cream but fortunately after reading Michael Pollan's article today I decided against it. He said, "if your great grandmother would not recognize it as food then don't buy it," I guess Toffuti and vegan gourmet fall perfectly into that category plus they are expensive. Also keep in mind I did use TVP, which is rare, but I feel I needed the protein boost.
The dressing on this salad has to be one of the most amazing dressings I have ever tasted. It is called Casinera's Cesar Dressing, I got it from the Eat To Live website. Here are the ingredients:
I got the Real Food Daily cookbook the other day, I wish I could go there to eat, the menu looks incredible. I decided to make the blackened tempeh and the black bean and corn salad. It was so good. I did not add any oil to the marinade, it does not need it. I did have to spray the tempeh with olive oil in order for it to brown and crisp in the oven. I do love this cookbook but there is so much oil in all of the recipes, I don't think there is a need to add 1/2 cup of oil to every marinade, I just substitute veggie broth. 
