The Wall Street Journal-20080202-WEEKEND JOURNAL- Books- Gastronomy

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WEEKEND JOURNAL; Books: Gastronomy

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In Defense of Food

By Michael Pollan

Penguin, 244 pages, $21.95

The first line says it all: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." By food, Michael Pollan means minimally processed fish, meat, dairy products and produce, as opposed to the thousands of over-processed, over-advertised "edible foodlike substances" that crowd supermarket shelves. Another common-sense rule: "Shop the peripheries" of grocery stores, since "processed food products dominate the center aisles" while fresh foods "line the walls." Mr. Pollan believes that affluence, pseudo-science and mass marketing have combined to create an unhealthy modern diet that breaks the "rules of nature." He also rails against agribusiness, of course, but one doesn't have to buy into all his overheated rhetoric to recognize that Mr. Pollan is on to something when he urges us to concentrate on eating "fresh foods from animals and plants grown on soils that were themselves fresh in nutrients." And then there is the culture of eating itself: According to one study, for 18- to 50-year-old Americans, "roughly a fifth of all eating now takes place in the car." Getting back to the family table -- to social dining rather than solitary stuffing -- can nourish the soul as well as the body. While Mr. Pollan can be contrarian and occasionally over the edge, his research is thorough, his style fluent and most of his advice eminently palatable.