Build a Green Library: The Omnivore's Dilemma by Michael Pollan

This is the second post in a series-read the first post here-about recommended reading, for building a green library in your home.

What should you have for dinner? And, more importantly, where did it come from and what all went in to that food? In The Omnivore's Dilemma: A History of Four Meals (2006, Penguin Press), his seminal book about food and eating in the early 21st century, Michael Pollan helps answer both questions by tracing four meals in three separate food chains-industrial food, organic food and food we gather ourselves-from start to finish. He takes a close look the source of each separate dish in a meal, drawing some very eye-opening conclusions that will forever change the way you look at the food on your plate.

Pollan argues that the way we eat-and what we eat, ultimately-is our most profound connection with the planet and its systems; however, the modern industrial agriculture machine serves to homogenize everything and create a huge disconnect between us and the sources of our food. Agriculture-and, by extension, nature-has been co-opted by corporate and political interests, driven by the bottom line first and the way evolution has designed the natural world to work second.

This does not bode well for us, ingesting the laboratory , or for the animals that are fed through the machine as quickly as the man-made system will allow.This is exemplified by Pollan's analysis of his industrial meal, which came from McDonalds, which, as it turns out, is built on one monocultural crop: corn. Everything in industrial agriculture is built on it, going far beyond the sweet yellow kernels on the ear or in the freezer section of your local grocery store. And not just its myriad by-products like high fructose corn syrup, xantham gum, corn starch, citric acid and corn meal (just to name a few), but as feed for cows, pigs and chickens.

Unfortunately, cows (for example) are designed by nature to eat grass, so eating corn makes them sick, necessitating a ritualistic regimen of antibiotics, which, when combined with cocktails of growth hormone and even old cow parts, creates an extremely fast-growing, homogeneous but not very healthy animal. Yum.

But the real culprit of this remains corn, which has risen to the top of the industrial ladder through a series of evolutionary and political twists and turns, and, while it's a fine food to eat as a vegetable, it goes miles beyond that in industrial agriculture. Aside from feeding the cow that's now the burger, it is blended in to the bun, holds together and breads the McNugget, sweetens your soda, and more. The meal is not very good and the consequences of consuming it are worse for the food chain. For the uninitiated, it's not a pretty picture.

It gets better from there, though; Pollan's shocking account of industrial food is meant to do just that, and the shock value is made more stark by his account of the other, more harmonious food chains. Grass replaces corn as the catalyst for growth, and the system swings back into a more linear, remarkably efficient way to grow that mimics nature's design. Antibiotics and hormones are out and a pastoral system of careful organization and optimal management are in, and the results are hugely different and almost all positive.

Unfortunately, they are limited to that farm's locale; you can't eat like this at Whole Foods, and, though "big organic" is far better than your run-of-the-mill conventional food, while "organic" means no pesticides, "big" means more fossil-fuel-intensive transportation, and the diesel fuel leaves an unfortunate aftertaste (not to mention a huge carbon footprint) in Pollan's mouth.

Without getting in to the more grisly details of the hunter-gatherer section, it's safe to say this is the most planet-healthy way to eat, and while there is no shortage of "dilemma" with tracking, killing and processing your own animals, it offers another option, another section of spectrum, to how you choose to connect yourself and your food to the planet.

Ultimately, Pollan presents a truly fascinating study of our food, where it comes from, and what drives its production. It's thorough, enlightening and thought-provoking, and we can't recommend it enough. Read it, and your plate at dinner will never look the same again.

Difficulty level: Moderate