So, I've never been a health-nut. I've always gotten frustrated when parents ban sugar from their kids, and the organic thing has always seemed like a ploy to charge more money for food. However, Joseph and I are reading a book called "In Defense of Food" by Michael Pollan. It is so interesting and has really made me think twice about what I eat. I've resolved to eat as little processed foods as possible, and am willing to spend a few extra bucks on organic milk and eggs.
Here's an excerpt from the inside cover:
"Food. There's plenty of it around, and we all love to eat it. So why should anyone need to defend it? Because most of what we're consuming today is not food, and how we're consuming it- in the car, in front of the TV, and increasingly alone- is not really eating. Instead of food, we're consuming "edible foodlike substances"- no longer the products of nature but of food science. Many of them come packaged with health claims that should be our first clue that they are anything but healthy. In the so-called Western diet, food has been replaced by nutrients, and common sense by nutrition..."
It's so true. In health classes, we're trained to read labels on food products but not how to take whole food ingredients and actually cook with them. Have you ever noticed how tasteless mass-produced cheese is? That's because it is seriously lacking in nutrients. Even our whole foods have been affected by industrialization. We have to eat the equivalent of 3 apples to get the same amount of nutrition that that one apple had 60 years ago. Much of today's diseases, including diabetes, cancer, and heart disease are more prevalent in diets where processed foods and industrialized agriculture have taken over.
I could go on... but I'll stop. :) You'll just have to read the book.
