Summary Of In Defense Of Food

Michael Pollan in his novel “In Defense of Food” describes how the idea of healthy eating has shifted from focusing on wholesome foods to worrying about nutrients. In chapter one “From Foods to Nutrients,” Pollan outlines a makeshift history of the evolution of “nutrients.” Sometime in the 1980’s our view on health and food changed dramatically from previous generations. People began to focus on so called nutrients in a food—such as “cholesterol” and “fiber.” Soon, the amount of certain nutrients in a food became more important than the quality the food as a whole. As Pollan explains, nutrients are not a new concept. In the early 1800’s William Prout discovered three nutrients essential to the human diet. Expanding on Prout’s research in 1842, Justus Von Leibig believed he had created a formula to replace food which—when tested on infants—failed. Later in 1912, Casimir Funk identified a set of micronutrients—called “vitamins”—believed to promote health.

In 1977, based on the idea that fat and cholesterol intake is linked to heart disease, the Senate Select Committee on Nutrition released a set of guidelines urging Americans to eat less red meat and dairy. This resulted in major backlash from the industries producing these products, forcing the committee to rethink their strategy and only suggest guidelines for the intake of the nutrients—such as saturated fat—instead of the entire food. The fixation on nutrients continued to grow after 1977, sparking the era of what Pollan calls