In Defense of Food- Michael Pollan and Monica Seles

In the upcoming fall term, I intend to use the book ''In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto" by Michael Pollan as one of the readings for my course on Sustainable Living. Mr. Pollan does an excellent job of analyzing the food business and the limitations of the scientific method. Breaking food into components, creating just the components and assuming that consuming the components in pill form recreates the benefits of the whole food is a serious limitation of scientific study.

In today's NYT Ms. Tara Parker-Pope covers the book “The End of Overeating: Taking Control of the Insatiable American Appetite” (Rodale) by Dr. David A. Kessler, the former FDA chief who served two presidents and battled Congress and Big Tobacco. She writes "..During his time at the Food and Drug Administration, Dr. Kessler maintained a high profile, streamlining the agency, pushing for faster approval of drugs and overseeing the creation of the standardized nutrition label on food packaging. But Dr. Kessler is perhaps best known for his efforts to investigate and regulate the tobacco industry, and his accusation that cigarette makers intentionally manipulated nicotinecontent to make their products more addictive. In “The End of Overeating,” Dr. Kessler finds some similarities in the food industry, which has combined and created foods in a way that taps into our brain circuitry and stimulates our desire for more.When it comes to stimulating our brains, Dr. Kessler noted, individual ingredients aren’t particularly potent. But by combining fats, sugar and salt in innumerable ways, food makers have essentially tapped into the brain’s reward system, creating a feedback loop that stimulates our desire to eat and leaves us wanting more and more even when we’re full. Dr. Kessler isn’t convinced that food makers fully understand the neuroscience of the forces they have unleashed, but food companies certainly understand human behavior, taste preferences and desire. In fact, he offers descriptions of how restaurants and food makers manipulate ingredients to reach the aptly named “bliss point.” Foods that contain too little or too much sugar, fat or salt are either bland or overwhelming. But food scientists work hard to reach the precise point at which we derive the greatest pleasure from fat, sugar and salt. The result is that chain restaurants like Chili’s cook up “hyper-palatable food that requires little chewing and goes down easily,” he notes. And Dr. Kessler reports that the Snickers bar, for instance, is “extraordinarily well engineered.” As we chew it, the sugar dissolves, the fat melts and the caramel traps the peanuts so the entire combination of flavors is blissfully experienced in the mouth at the same time. Foods rich in sugar and fat are relatively recent arrivals on the food landscape, Dr. Kessler noted. But today, foods are more than just a combination of ingredients. They are highly complex creations, loaded up with layer upon layer of stimulating tastes that result in a multisensory experience for the brain. Food companies “design food for irresistibility,” Dr. Kessler noted. “It’s been part of their business plans.”..."
The NYT also has an interview with Ms. Monica Seles, the former tennis great, where she discusses her binge eating and how she learnt to cope with it.