In Defense of Food

Everyone who values their health and the health of their family needs to read the books of Michael Pollan. I was completely captivated by "The Omnivour's Dilemma" and how it explored the sources of what we put into our bodies. Pollan has a good grasp of the complex relationship between plants and soil -- healthy soil grows healthy plants that help us stay healthy.

In Defense of Food, Michael Pollan's latest offering, exposes the problems with eating indiscriminately. It grabs our attention with a simple mantra that remind us of what we need to put into our bodies:

"Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants."

Pollan is clear that what most of what we believe is food is really an artificial creation of corporate ingenuity. He sets out some simple advice on how to recognize food amidst all the disguised consumables in the supermarket. Real food has less than 6 familiar ingredients, does not include high-fructose corn syrup and would be recognizable to your great-grandmother.

Gardeners need to take his advice very seriously and adapt his mantra to our situation:

"Grow food. More than enough. Always alive."

Vegetable grown with chemical fertilizers, pesticides and herbicides are not really food. I would go further. If the soil is not alive and healthy, a complete ecology rich with microbes, insects and worms, it cannot possibly grow food that is good for us. So our first responsibility is to garden in the most ecologically rich manner possible.

When we grow vegetables, we should not be stingy. Nature is abundant and generous; we should follow her example. Give away everything you do not need. Supply food banks, friends and neighbors. Freeze and can for the winter so you do not have to be dependent on supermarket produce with its bland taste and empty calories. Return everything unused to the compost heap and eventually to the soil.

Real food is alive. It partakes of the living forces of nature. When you pick a ripe tomato fresh from the vine, its rich fragrance, texture and taste are testaments to its aliveness. When you cook with living food, you feed the Life Force within you and your family. Life is within and all around us. We have to nurture and venerate this vital energy that permeates everything. To be a real gardener is to garden Life.

Reading
Michael Pollan: In Defense of Food.