Food Rules
“Eat food, not too much, mostly plants.”
Those were the words of Michael Pollan that struck a chord a few years ago in the New York Times. He suggested then — and carries it further in his wonderful new little book Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual
In Food Rules, he offers 64 “policies” to help people enjoy their food rather than be owned by it. Here are a few of the suggestions:
SECTION 1: What should I eat? (Eat food.)
Rule 2 – Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food. (She wouldn’t recognized most of the complicated food products in the grocery story that have chemical additives and are designed to push our evolutionary preference buttons of sweetness, fat, and salt.
Rule 7 – Avoid food products containing ingredients that a third-grader cannot pronounce.
Rule 13 – Eat only foods that will eventually rot.
Rule 21 – It’s not food if it’s called by the same name in every language. (Think Big Mac, Cheetos, or Pringles.)
SECTION 2: What kind of food should I eat? (Mostly plants.)
Rule 24 – Eating what stands on one leg [mushrooms and plant foods] is better than eating what stands on two legs [fowl], which is better than eating what stands on four legs [cows, pigs, and other mammals]. (Note: this is my least favorite of the rules. But I at least appreciate that he isn’t insisting on cutting out meat — just eating less of it. Same thing my doctor says.)
Rule 36 – Don’t eat breakfast cereals that change the color of the milk.
Rule 43 – Have a glass of wine with dinner.
SECTION 3 – How should I eat? (Not too much.)
Rule 47 – Eat when you are hungry, not when you are bored.
Rule 57 – Don’t get your fuel from the same place your car does.
Rule 60 – Treat treats as treats.
And, importantly, RULE #64: Break the rules once in a while.
Please tell me “dark chocolate” isn’t the same in every language.
I’m not sure if we, as Americans, are just ignoring the food rules or we just haven’t figured out what’s killing us yet.
Even though there’s only a 1% chance you’ll ever get bit by a shark, we’re still scared to go in the water. We’re scared of the bird-flu, H1N1, and flying in airplanes… but the risk of dying from one of these things is very small. BUT, I find it interesting that 2500 Americans die every day from heart disease. It is the #1 killer in the world, and instead of being scared about it we say, “Super-size me” when we order at lunch.
I guess we have a poor understand of risk and what’s really killing us.
BTW: Rule #57 was the best.
Trey – You might like #18 as well: Don’t ingest foods made in places where everyone is required to wear a surgical cap.
As a diabetic, once I got over being angry that I was one (found out at 39), the eating plan made perfect sense. If everyone followed that… I know, I know…
Loved #36 btw.
I think I can explain why so many of us have heart disease or are overweight or have high cholesterol. Eating produce is expensive. Really expensive. Additionally, our lives are so tightly scheduled so much of the time, that we have to resort to things that are quick and easy and McDonald’s and its counterparts are cheap, quick, and easy. I suspect that a lot of the fear surrounding illnesses are because we feel like we have some control over those things.
There’s you a book right there: “Break the rules once in a while.”
I think I love Michael Pollan. That book may go in my teen’s Easter basket that I am trying to convince to not be made of 67% sugar. Bless. Kristi, I agree that produce is expensive, but so are Cheeto’s, a product I put in my basket maybe twice a year when the church demands I feed junk to my teens simply because they will all be in one location (another soapbox). I buy sugar snap peas in tiny bags for almost $3, but we eat them from the bag instead of chips around here. We are all worth the investment.
I do have to confess that my 99 year old grandmother really enjoys the candy orange slices, Honey Mustard Pringles, and Coca-Cola, straight up. When I’m 99, that’s what I’ll be living on, too.
There’s got to be a rule about NOT eating in front of the TV. That leads to snacking everytime the TV is on, whether hungry or not!
Some of my favorites:
#37 The whiter the bread, the sooner you’ll be dead.
#44 Pay more, eat less.
#51 Spend as much time enjoying the meal as it took to prepare it.
Sarah S.- the people I’m talking about (and for that matter, the person that I was forced to be for quite some time when I was laid off from my job) aren’t buying Cheetos either. We’re buying ramen and rice because that’s what we can afford. We’re splurging on items from the $1 menu at fast food restaurants. We’re rarely going grocery shopping for real at all because we simply can’t afford it. The thing that bothered me the most about losing my job, other than the loss of income, was the amount of weight I gained from having to eat horrible foods. It’s something I didn’t understand until I experienced it either. I don’t want to start a fight with you. I’m a pacifist and don’t want to start a fight with anyone, but I was an educated girl that had to make poor choices because I simply could not afford anything better. I can only imagine how much worse it must be to be un/undereducated and not have the money for healthy foods. The fact of the matter is, the very fact that we can buy books about eating well says something about us that cannot be said for many of Americans. And yes, I realize that it’s not just poor people, that there are many overweight middle class and better off people roaming about our country, but I keep learning that I’m too quick to judge why someone is a certain way. That being said, I think it’s awesome that ya’ll eat sugar snap peas instead of chips. I did too, until I couldn’t even afford chips.
Thanks, Kristi. I so appreciate this perspective. I learned a lot from what you wrote. It’s one of the unfortunate truths: that a place like McDonald’s delivers more calories/dollar than the health food store. And the body has to have a certain number of calories.
That said, I think Sarah has an important perspective (one that’s reflected by Pollan and others): that healthy eating may get more challenging as budgets go down, but it’s not impossible.
Again, thanks so much for being honest and insightful here.
Jeanna – I agree (as long as you’re not talking about eating while Duke is in the Final Four. That’s required).
reJoyce – I loved #51, too.
Eat lunch at home or brown bag it. Far too many folks do fast food 5-7 days a week for lunch. I avoid that if possible. I can still make a brown bag lunch far faster than the lines at BK or Subway. Ketchup really isn’t a serving of vegetables.
Are you sure about that? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketchup_as_a_vegetable
Kristi (and everyone),
I bought a POUND (not a pint) of strawberries at HEB last night for $1.50. That’s much cheaper than a big mac. Buying produce that is in season (or, for whatever reason, plentiful) is key. Bananas are cheap. Collard greens and kale are cheap–and very healthy. When Texas oranges come in, they are dirt cheap–HEB was giving away a bag of them when you bought a 2$ bag of salad a few weeks ago.
Most stores have a reduced-price corner or shelf where you can find great deals from time to time. You can also find good deals on a variety of foods at places like Big Lots.
God bless us all.
I don’t wish to belabor the point, but there’s a lot more that goes into what you can buy from the grocery store than simply the price of groceries. You have to be able to get there, for example. Additionally, you might have bought a pint of strawberries for $1.50, but you can buy six meals worth of ramen noodles for that same $1.50, and when I was in graduate school and then laid off from my job, I bought those ramen noodles, not the strawberries. It’s also no secret that grocery stores in poorer parts of town don’t carry fresh produce that’s in any condition to eat, at least not as a general rule.
I’m not trying to hand out a sob story. I had a hard time for awhile, but I learned a great deal from being poor, and I was sustained by some faith in God that I simply would not have had without that experience. I just want people to understand that there’s a world outside your individual grocery store, and my individual grocery store.
My wife tolerated very patiently the summer that I read The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Pollan. I talked non-stop about the book and the interesting thoughts it provoked.
You see, at the time I was working in an R&D group at a food ingredient manufacturer. We made Sucralose and High Fructose Corn Syrup…..very bad word’s in Pollan’s thinking. I wanted to understand what the big deal was with these people beating up my industry. I even arranged for my colleagues to watch a screening of “King Corn” after reading the book since the documentary was largely based on the material.
The book made me remember the simple life of my grandfather and his small farm where he raised grass-fed cattle and enjoyed life for 90 years. I even bought into a 1/2 share of vegetable coop the following summer to do my part to support a local organic farming operation.
But what Pollan suggests is very difficult to maintain. It is more expensive and as Kristi noted, the food he promotes simply is not affordable for a large segment of our population.
I like Pollan’s ideas and his writing style. Yes, we need to be better consumers and eat smarter. But the trade-off is that we do enjoy the lowest cost of food supply in the developed world from the efficiency and expansion of the use of feedstocks such as corn and soybeans in food processing. Yes, we can do better, but the food industry isn’t entirely to blame here.
Buying enough produce for a full meal at a grocery store is definitely more expensive that junk/fast food. Pollan even understands and makes this point, as corn/soy are so heavily subsidized that they become filler material in the majority of things we purchase at the supermarket, thus making them cheaper than healthier/sparser “organic” calories.
The choice of good nutrition is a privilege, and often very inaccessible to those with low incomes in this de-agriculturalized society. I’m blessed to live in a city with year-round farmers markets, which help make healthy food more accessible and affordable. I’m also blessed to live in a place attached to a small plot of land, thus allowing my household to grow our own food, which is very cheap, provided one owns the land. Organic food truly can be cheaper, but only if someone has the right access, resources, and time.
Kristi — I think you have a great perspective and I’m glad you brought it up. You are absolutely right that a $1 chicken sandwich at McDonald’s can be an actual meal while $1.50 strawberries at H-E-B, not so much.
I do wish that those of us that have the power to choose with our dollars WOULD choose wisely so that prices would come down as far as they possibly can. But since I don’t see strawberry farms or banana trees outside of my town, there will always be costs involved in getting produce here.
Great post! I love that he tackles an important issue with humor! Great advice.
Even walmart is starting to offer a much larger selection of organic foods at walmart prices, so things are changing.
But Kristi is right, especially about food deserts in the inner city. I live just outside downtown Nashville, and folks in my neighborhood eat what they can afford, and have transportation to get to. We have a small overpriced grocery within walkig distance with very poor produce choices. The other option for groceries is a gastric station.
I give a lot of people rides to a grocery store that’s about 2 miles away… Which is technically walkig distance, but not close enough to go to frequently and pick up a weeks worth of
groceries (if you could figure out how to carry them).
We grow veggies and fruits in our garden, and try to give away as much as possible. We also try and purchase organic, grain fed, no hormone foods… But even on a middle class income and just 2 people, it is difficult. And I find myself eating at mcdonalds cause I can get a chicken sandwich, fries, and large drink for 3 bucks. Our economic systems and communities nudge us in negative directions ad has been noted above regarding transit and corn subsidies (where are the free market folks on the corporate farm welfare?)
and to whomever mentioned stawberries… Go buy them and freeze them if you can. Wholesale price dropped from 1 dollar a pound to .25 a pound due to over supply. Farmers in Florida are actually burnif crops cause they are beig forced to sell at a loss right now. All that to say, 1.50 a pound of stawberries is NOT normal.
Not trying to be cantankerous, but I really don’t get people saying, “O, I can drive through McDonald’s for $3, much cheaper than healthy stuff.”
No. It’s not.
You can buy rice, beans, and greens ALL VERY CHEAP ALL THE TIME and cook them up together. If you have an egg (very cheap also–about 15 cents) that will go well with it.
You can easily feed three people for the $3 price of a McDonald’s obesity special.
If convenience is an issue, you can buy the cheap ramen, add some greens (even the ones “reduced for quick sale”) and and egg and eat much cheaper than McDonald’s.
If you are not fighting the ObesityIndustrialComplex, you’re not going to win.
My favorite rule is the one about not eating anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food! There’s nothing better than the home-cooked taste of a big pot of veggie-chicken stew; a bacon, lettuce and tomato sandwich; or a nice helpin’ of beans and cornbread. YUM!
Edgar- One of the best things I have is my education, which affords me the ability (finally, after a long period of joblessness) to get off work at 5, to not have to work on Saturdays, and to not have to work at a physically exhausting job for minimum wage. Additionally, that education means that I know what healthy eating is, because some one had taught me. When I lived in a terrible part of town during gradutae school because I had no money, I met many people who had no idea about healthy eating, and I discovered that the grocery stores stocked the items that would be purchased, which generally did not include produce, or rice that didn’t have bugs in it. Also, there’s the time factor: when you work 50-60 hours a week at a phyiscall demanding job, you start to choose quick foods over anything that takes even ten minutes to prepare. There’s so much more that goes into the food decision than just money.
These are probably my last words on the topic, but it stands to reason that if we’re passionate enough about something to discuss it with strangers on a blog, which probably doesn’t include much of the financially and educationally disadvantaged, then perhaps the beat things for us to do would be to help people who don’t know and who don’t have access to what we know.
O.K. I see the point of all of this. My question still remains: Is tobacco still a green, leafy vegetable? If so, I’m allright!
First off, Mike, have you watched Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution? One of my really good friends here in DC is from Huntington, WV and attended some of the schools he’s working at and man, that show is great.
Second, I’d like to second what Kristi is saying and recommend that this is just one reason why it’s so important the church advocates on behalf of the poor. Having lived in the inner city out in San Francisco, having grown up in poverty in TX, and now living in the city and teaching children who come from mostly poor families out in Washington DC, I’ve learned a lot about the adversities that poor communities face. There is a significant gap in food education between poor families and more upwardly mobile classes, as well as a significant gap in resources available to them. For instance, in the Bay Area, there’s something called “The Oakland Breakfast” which consists of Red Hot Cheetoes and Coke, and most grade-school kiddos eat that all the way from the wee hours of the morning on into the late afternoon. The Food and Liquor stores, which used to house fresher produce, caught on to this trend and began replacing vegetables on the hydrated veggie racks with bags of chips and other popular items that the children bought. So whatever the case, the cycle’s just reinforced.
But again, this is why it is so imperative that church communities ask themselves what it means to help the poor? Everyone says they want to do that, but how far away do they live from them? Helping folk is the last thing you in a long labour of love and relationship building. I believe that some of that starts with relocating to places where people are suffering and trying to be in relationship with those communities, become a part of the, so you can help to stimulate change within those communities.
The biggest improvement you can make to your diet (meaning food intake, not weight loss plan) is to cut WAY back on carbs – especially things like bread, pasta, and potatoes. Get your carbs primarily from fruits and vegetables. NOT from grains or tubers – especially not refined flour. If the ingredient says “enriched” flour it means they took out ALL of the nutritional value, then added a tiny bit back.
As an MI survivor (had my heart attack while jogging), you can believe that I have researched this deeply – and continue to do so!
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=128621057