Real Food: What To Eat And Why (2006) - Plot & Excerpts
Ok, so I love this. Please ask me to borrow it. I picked it up at a friend's house and started reading it and immediately went out and bought it. I am partial to food and nutrition writing as it is, and nutrition trends, but reading this, something just clicked. As everyone else has said, this book is basically about how industrial fats and refined foods, especially sugar, white flour, and hydrogenated vegetable oils, are what is causing Americans to have a high rate of heart attacks, cancer, and overall grumpiness. Unprocessed foods, including milk and meat and the saturated fat they come with, are good for you. I enjoyed her scientific diatribes, and to me, the statistics and studies she cited seemed sound. Other people have differing opinions about that, but statistics are like that and people see what they want to in them, so I am not going to argue against people who say her studies are wack. Her's is a philosophy that especially appeals to those of us who like government conspiracy theories, especially those theories that are actually true, like that the FDA has other agendas besides making sure you eat healthy food. My mother is a nutritionist and used to work for the ADA...she fed me frozen vegan junk food, margarine, diet sodas, etc. She still eats this way. Maybe I am just rebelling. For me-I have read about how disgusting and unhealthy the commercial meat and dairy industries are, but feel like crap when I try to eliminate those foods from my diet. That's Planck's personal experiences as well, and some people say it's annoying to have to keep reading about her experiences, but I liked that aspect to the book, even if it was just because it confirmed my own. This is the first book I have read that tells about all kinds of foods, vegetables included, and what happens to them in industrial farming. It never really clicked in my head how fucked up it is to say, do things like clean vegetables with chlorine, which is typical in our society. Those bagged salads! Chlorine! That's how baby spinach stays fresh! You like that? Well this book is filled with a lot of those little morsels sure to horrify. So I do know what NOT to eat...as far as the what TO eat part, it seems people have complaints about her explanations there. It's really expensive to eat this way, and not everyone's husband is a famous, wealthy, raw cheesemonger. However, information is never a bad thing, after reading this you are armed with the information and can choose to put your money where your mouth is, or not. I do think that eating organic vegetables, grass fed beef, pastured eggs, and all that is difficult for a lot of people and espscially families. I know just FINDING these things can be difficult. It sucks that poor people and uneducated people and especially those who are both are duped into saving money by eating shitty processed, subsidized foods. But everyone can choose to make some of the choices encouraged by Planck. Cooking for yourself is half the battle here. I think awareness is the first step to fixing what's wrong with our food and this book is encouraging in that respect. I am not convinced that if everyone did everything she said, it's even possible to produce that much healthy food, because there are just too many of us, you know? That's what got us into this mess in the first place. But I think this book is about personal choices, not solving every problem of factory farming and world hunger outright. Seriously though, do you know how hard it is to find raw milk and butter? I'm trying and it's damn near impossible.
I have read a lot of books about food lately to seek guidance about what and how to eat for optimal health. This book provides strong arguments with supporting documentation for something that I have suspected for awhile: rather than focusing on fat/low fat, good carbs/bad carbs, being carnivorous or vegetarian, it really comes down to the quality of the food you eat. Nina Planck illustrates how mass-produced, industrialized, and processed food has caused poor health more than eating supposedly 'dangerous' foods like meat or drinking whole milk. The key is to strive for quality and pure foods, i.e. grass-fed beef, free-range chickens, pesticide-free produce, unpasteurized whole milk, etc. She also suggests eating local food within its harvest season. This automatically creates a diverse and healthy diet.She devotes a whole section to addressing concerns about certain foods being linked to cancer, heart disease and high cholesterol and this was most helpful because my concerns about all three have dictated my dietary choices. I had read a lot of Planck's ideas in other food books (Omnivore's Dilemma, What To Eat, etc), but the way that she packages her argument and dietary recommendations is compelling. As someone who has been a vegetarian, a flexitarian, and pondered veganism, this book offered me another way of thinking about food. So while I won't start eating steak every night, this book has helped me open my mind to different ways of eating. Thanks to my Goodreads friend Mike who put this on his to-read list and prompted me to read this book.
What do You think about Real Food: What To Eat And Why (2006)?
Real food is better for you than industrial food. Old, traditional fats like butter, lard, and coconut oil aren't to blame for heart disease, obesity and all the other Western diseases that plague us; new, plant-based fats like canola oil and safflower oil are suspect. Whole milk is good for you; skim milk is not. Etc. I went back and forth on 2 or 3 stars for this, and settled on 3 only because 2.5 isn't an option. While I agree with Planck's premise that we're demonizing the wrong foods and need to go back to eating real food, I found the book's overall smug and sometimes preachy tone off-putting, sometimes in the extreme. And while Planck is long on dietary recommendations, she comes up short with a way to implement those recommendations. How do we make real food accessible to people who can't afford shares in a CSA, don't have proximity to a famers market, and/or don't have the time to cook from scratch? Planck doesn't seem to be concerned with that. As I read, I kept comparing this to Michael Pollan's Omnivore's Dilemma and In Defense of Food. If I hadn't read those books first, I might have enjoyed Real Food more. But because I had, I found this lacking.
—Nancy Donaghue
I hate to point out the obvious but the book spends a great deal of time discussing the various types of "fats" and without an official nutrition background by the last few chapters I found myself dog paddling a bit in the explanations of the HDL LDL ratios monosaccharides, disaccharides saturated monosaturated...I slightly coasted in general towards the end as the list grew longer in the various terms and explanations being used to get the message across to the reader.The book efinitely influenced my perception of real foods and their overall good and I found that she consistntly referenced what probably amounted to 30 or 40 differnt books, publications and studies that I otherwise would not have come across without having them pointed out. A nutrition primer that's great as general introduction.
—Lisa
if i could give this 2.5 stars, i would. the basic thesis makes intuitive sense to me and is supported in the scientific literature - "real" food is better for us than "industrial" food. fear not the butter nor the meat nor the duck fat. planck is very inconsistent about citing the scientific literature, and her monotone writing style presents JAMA articles with the same weight & merit as her mom's cholesterol story and some book she got on the sale rack at the health food store. also, i can't remember the last time i read a non-fiction book wherein the author took herself so damn seriously. chapter subheadings such as "I describe the virtues of raw milk", "In London I am rescued by farmers' markets", and "My opinion on the minor vegetable oils" really grated on my nerves.
—Jennie
