Food Rules: An Eater's Manual

by Michael Pollan

March 4, 2021 [9:00 PM — 9:30 PM]

Los Angeles, CA

I really enjoyed Michael Pollan's Netflix series, Cooked, which was based on his book. His different visual and literary documentations of food are always very intriguing and informative, creative and clever, and engaging. We're living in an era where eating is becoming more complicated with the amount of thought that goes into diets and conflicting health advice, Pollan provides a simple guide in the daily decision-making of what we eat. While I’ve been able to host entire gatherings and cook four-course meals for my friends in the past, I realized that I have been eating out more and haven’t cooked anything in the past three months (might be because I don’t get along with my electric stove), instead I’ve been doing a “Warren Buffet Diet.” I’ve been more conscious of what I eat and have discussed it when I read “Eat Your Vitamins,” however, that was more like a manual that provided a breakdown of the vitamins, minerals, and nutrients found in ingredients. This book was the exact opposite, but it’s not entirely anti-science. It exposes that nutrition science is a young science that knows much less about food than we think, it takes a more cultural approach to eating well and presents a very simple and much more straightforward guide to forming personal policies for eating that can be read in half an hour. In summary of the three categories, Pollan tells us to "eat food, not too much. Mostly plants.” and to “break the rules once in a while.” He highlights that the population following the Western-diet is a rising problem since it leads to diseases such as obesity, diabetes, and cancer, while populations eating a remarkably wide range of mixed traditional diets don’t suffer from these chronic diseases despite some cultures having diets that are very high on fats (Greenland’s Inuits), or carbohydrates (Central America’s Indians), or protein ((Africa’s Masai). These are extreme examples, but it’s to present that there’s no horrible omnivore diet, except one: the western one, which is infected with capitalism that had led us to consume things into our body that we cannot even pronounce. Pollan concludes, “If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t.”

I’m going to put all the summary rules here, just so I don’t have to go back and find the book in my library if I want to review them again, skipping a few numbers that don’t apply to me at all for limitations in my diet due to my faith background. But full disclosure, I stopped cooking or ordering out after subscribing to a healthy delivery meal plan because I simply don’t have the time anymore to think about food due to work. I just eat the tray in 15 minutes while I work and go on with the day, kind of like fueling a car while it’s speeding through the tracks.

• Food Rules

  1. Eat food.

  2. Don’t eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn’t recognize as food. 3: Avoid food products containing ingredients that no ordinary human would keep in the pantry. 4: Avoid food products that contain high-fructose corn syrup. 5: Avoid foods that have some form of sugar (or sweetener) listed among the top three ingredients. 6: Avoid food products that contain more than five ingredients. 7: Avoid food products containing ingredients that a third-grader cannot pronounce. 8: Avoid food products that make health claims. 9: Avoid food products with the wordoid “lite" or the terms "low-fat" or “nonfat" in their names. 10: Avoid foods that are pretending to be something they are not. 11: Avoid foods you see advertised on television. 12: Shop the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle. 13: Eat only foods that will eventually rot. 14: Eat foods made from ingredients that you can picture in their raw state or growing in nature. 15: Get out of the supermarket whenever you can. 16: Buy your snacks at the farmers’ market. 17: Eat only foods that have been cooked by humans. 18: Don’t ingest foods made in places where everyone is required to wear a surgical cap. 19: If it came from a plant, eat it; if it was made in a plant, don’t. 20: It’s not food if it arrived through the window of your car. 21: It’s not food if it’s called by the same name in every language. (Think Big Mac, Cheetos, or Pringles.) 22: Eat mostly plants, especially leaves. 23: Treat meat as a flavoring or special occasion food. 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]." 25: Eat your colors. 26: Drink the spinach water. 27: Eat animals that have themselves eaten well. 28: If you have the space, buy a freezer. 28: If you have the space, buy a freezer. 30: Eat well-grown food from healthy soil. 31: Eat wild foods when you can. 32: Don’t overlook the oily little fishes. 33: Eat some foods that have been predigested by bacteria or fungi. 34: Sweeten and salt your food yourself. 35: Eat sweet foods as you find them in nature. 36: Don’t eat breakfast cereals that change the color of the milk. 37: "The whiter the bread, the sooner you’ll be dead." 38: Favor the kinds of oils and grains that have traditionally been stone-ground. 39: Eat all the junk food you want as long as you cook it yourself. 40: Be the kind of person who takes supplements—then skip the supplements. 41: Eat more like the French. Or the Japanese. Or the Italians. Or the Greek. 42: Regard nontraditional foods with skepticism. 44: Pay more, eat less. 45: ...Eat less. 46: Stop eating before you’re full. 47: Eat when you are hungry, not when you are bored. 48: Consult your gut. 49: Eat slowly. 50: The banquet is in the first bite. 51: Spend as much time enjoying the meal as it took to prepare it. 52: Buy smaller plates and glasses. 53: Serve a proper portion and don’t go back for seconds. 54: Breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, dinner like a pauper. 55: Eat meals. 56: Limit your snacks to unprocessed plant foods. 57: Don’t get your fuel from the same place your car does. 58: Do all your eating at a table. 59: Try not to eat alone. 60: Treat treats as treats. 61: Leave something on your plate. 62: Plant a vegetable garden if you have the space, a window box if you don’t. 63: Cook. 64: Break the rules once in a while.