Real Food.

I have yet to weigh in on the 'real food' phenomenon, so here it goes...

I am a big fan of language. Words matter to me and I try to be very measured in what I type or say. Now I don't want to get into the whole sender-receiver model of communication, but it's important that the words we say are understood by the receiver to have the same meaning. So when someone says something is hot, it's important whether the receiver thinks you mean temperature or flavor.

CNN picked up on a blogger's challenge to eat only real food for a month http://www.cnn.com/2010/HEALTH/02/23/real.food.challenge/index.html?hpt=C1

Within the article, they define real food as not processed foods. They actually say what real food isn't and not what real food is, which I think is intriguing. They define processed food as: "... any food that has undergone a change of character. For example, edamame would be unprocessed, and tofu would be processed."

No.

Processed foods are foods that have a process applied to them. This includes rinsing, chopping, heating, freezing, beating (as in sheer force aka meringue or butter), or sanitizing. Unless you eat your organic grown veggies whole without cooking them, you are eating a processed food.

Any milk that isn't raw would also be considered processed, and therefore, not 'real'.

This can't be the intended definition of real food though, right? Seems a bit too strict, paranoid, and in many instances - dangerous. What do they really mean by 'real food'?

I'll take a crack at it.

They mean guilt free, non-corporate, and pretty.

These labels that the ironically labeled foodies put forth are a complicated mix of all the vitriol and mistrust they feel about the world around them. You see, they feel the corporations are all corrupt and are conspiring to poison the masses and control them through their fake foods. Let's run down the list of these corporate supported evils, shall we?

Instant potatoes - [gasp] The absolute worst. You should be ashamed if you don't have an hour to peel and boil potatoes, then mash them with cream.
**reality** They are mashed potatoes. They're just drum dried (dehydrated) so that they are shelf stable.

American Cheese Singles - Too lazy to invest in a good cheese slicer? No self respecting foodie would be caught dead with this in their refrigerator!
**reality** Developed in Europe, American cheese is made of the melted remnants of other cheeses. It's now made in a more consistant way, but isn't technically a vat cheese. Whether sliced off a block or peeled from the plastic, American Cheese melts better than most and has a mild flavor profile, making it ideal for sandwiches.

Sugar - Did you know that sugar makes everybody fat, causes diabetes, and probably hates minorities. It's so evil, because it's processed.
**reality** I prefer to use sugar that has been inspected, purified, and separated from most pebbles, dirt, and insect parts. Sugar is a food for fermentation also, resulting in alcohol, carbon dioxide, or both. Sugar sweetens foods, helps it brown when baked, and binds free water - making it safe from certain microorganisms.

The truth.

Real food is anything you eat and digest that offers calories and/or nutrition(carbs, vitamins, proteins, fats). When you hear someone talk about 'real food', your ears should perk up and you should start asking questions. You'll almost always find hidden motives, agendas, and irrational paranoia just below the surface.

The Race To Zero.

This week (Feb. 21 - 27, 2010) is National Eating Disorder week and I thought I would share a concern I had since it goes with that theme.

A few years back, I was one of the first member's of Ohio State University's Campus Dining Services Advisory Council. The council weighed in on issues impacting the food and service there of for the 50,000+ students of OSU. Campus Dining Services had taken in $36 million in revenue for the previous year, so they fed a lot of students in their then 22 facilities. The new Union is set to open if it hasn't already and those numbers are sure to grow.

One item of business at the first meeting I attended was to discuss ways to educate the diners on so they could make responsible food choices. One idea was to post the calories per serving for every item prepared in house(prepackaged items already do this). It seemed very reasonable and I even added that they should also post the amounts of protein, fat, sodium, and carbs.

There was a nutrition student in the group, that had a concern.

'What about people with eating disorders?' She asked.

Her experience was that freshman women were already stressing over their figure and by seeing the calories per serving they'll be less inclined to eat certain foods. Anyone remember the Freshman 15? This seems like a good thing considering American's general over-consumption. She explained that they don't stop cutting calories and the people she worked with as a nutrition major were essentially eating like it was a golf match. Fewest calories wins. So instead of having a caloric goal in mind, for instance 100/200 calories less than they typically consume based on activity and body weight, they try to eat only very low calorie foods in an effort to stay as close to zero as possible. They suppliment their diets with things like mints, cigarettes, and bottled water.

I call this the Race To Zero.

Posting calories makes us feel better, like we're doing what we can in the battle of the bulge. I think that battle we wage makes us unhealthier and endangers those in our society who's minds trick them into seeing themselves as bigger than they really are.

The major problem with solutions that many people post are that they are very narrow minded and not based in science and reason. Yahoo! or: thewebsiteIlovetohate! constantly posts stories about the 'worst foods'. They've had stories about the worst restaurants, appetizers, burgers, breakfast foods, desserts, salads, and the latest is fries. What makes these foods the worst? Calories, according to the articles. Every food that is demonized is demonized on calories.

So now we are posting the calories of everything while simultaneously running stories that demonize foods for how many calories are in them. What are people supposed to take from that? Calories = bad. Less calories = good. Zero calories = perfect.

Folks... Zero calories = dead.

The problem with posting calories for one item is that it doesn't take into consideration everything else the person had or will have to eat that day. The only way this can work is if people understand how many calories they need and how many calories they already had.

A very crude measurement is to multiply your weight by 11(for women) or 12(for men). This gives you a crude measurement of how many calories are necessary to maintain that body weight. So ladies, wanna know what it takes to be 115lbs??
You cannot consume more than 1,265 calories a day without factoring in physical activity.
A 200lb man by comparison can consume 2,400 calories a day and not gain.

As I said, physical activity offsets these numbers. This is why Michael Phelps can consume many thousands of calories a day. He trains in a pool 8 hours a day and his metabolism is extremely high. So there are many factors that affect weight. Girls, if you are 5'10" and at least have an average musculature, then I'm sorry, but you have no business weighing 115lbs. Consuming only 1,200 calories a day can kill you.

The numbers I gave were the absolute bottom for maintaining organ function. Standing burns calories. Sitting burns calories. Sleep burns calories. Obviously, things like; walking, running, swimming, weight training, yoga, and pilates all result in your need for more calories. You have to count the calories spent on every activity and add them up to get a realistic idea of how many calories you need.

Henry Cardello has a book called Stuffed Nation where he offers the solution of incentivizing the food industry to cut the calories in the foods they make. I think it's a novel plan but I also think we have a risk of this biting us in the ass.

Let me paint a not so rosie picture...

This plan works really well. Calories are cut by a lot...maybe 30% or more. Everyone wants the incentives and the reduced calories makes their products more profitable. It quickly becomes an R&D's version of an arms race... a Race To Zero. Tragedy strikes! It could be war, drought, early frost, a new ice age, raised ocean levels driving the populations of the world inland and leaving less farmland, whatever situation you can conjure up.

The food supply is now scarce and we are forced to ration what we have so that everyone may have some food. The problem now is the opposite; people aren't getting enough calories and they're getting sick. People's immune systems start to fail. Common colds are debilitating. Manual labor is something we no longer have the energy for. People are weakened and less able to fight in battle. We are overrun by another country. Some assimilate, many more are massacred.

Ok, so that's a crazy Mad Max extreme, but it illustrates that it's the total diet that matters most and not the calories in Outback's Aussie Cheese Fries.

So let's educate people on a diet of moderation. Stop eating when you start to feel full (not after). Try to eat a variety of things(yes, that includes meat and seafood, hippies). Save the rich foods and desserts for special occasions and spend the rest of the time eating reasonably. Go outside, run around, play a sport, get exercise. If you find you have gained weight, monitor the calories in what you eat for a week and see where you are over indulging. That's it.

So we have two extremes; obesity and dangerously thin that are getting all the attention. I suggest our social policy as it related to food and health be well rounded and based in science and education. But whatever you do, please don't turn our nation's diet into a Race To Zero.

Dear Anonymous...

This post is a response to Anonymous' comment on my blog: The Naked Truth. It became too long to not use as it's own blog post. Please re-read that blog if you haven't already and check out her full comment.

My comment about preservatives being neither good nor bad was not a comment on the functionality of the preservative (good, or else food companies would save money by not using them), but rather in terms of healthy/unhealthy. They aren't specifically bad for you, and not specifically good for you either - other than the fact that they inhibit certain microbial growth, thus making the food safer.

It's interesting how everything is either health food or junk food to some people. How do you define health food. Does one serving have to provide specific quantities of every nutrient? Does it have to be low fat, sodium, calories, sugar? If so, are you prepared to show me sound, peer reviewed science that fat, sugar, sodium, and calories of any quantity are bad? Healthy is another loaded term and very much depends on the person and a tally of everything else they have eaten that day/week. For instance, if you are short by a certain amount of fat, protein, and calories... a Snickers bar could complete your diet. In this case, it would have positively contributed to your health and can be considered healthy.

p.s.
Today's clickable link will lead you to the American Center on Science and Health and a study/experiment headed up by Dr. Ruth Kava PhD, R.D. which tried to analyze nutrient intake, and in one instance, see if weight loss was possible on a McDonald's only diet for 30 days.

The Naked Brain: activism minus science.

The winner of the 2010 TED gift is Celebrity Chef Jamie Oliver. TED stands for Technology Entertainment Design and is a nonprofit foundation that features lectures and presentations by many of our species greatest minds. TED presentations focus on science, technology, and humanity. I love their site and have spent entire days watching people demonstrate cutting edge technology. I watched Bill Clinton give a very inspiring speech as he accepted his TED gift. The TED gift is a financial award that the winner can apply to their research or cause.
"I wish for your help to create a strong, sustainable movement to educate every child about food, inspire families to cook again and empower people everywhere to fight obesity"

OK. This sounds great, right? Everyone wants families to cook more and everyone wants little kids to not be so fat, and everyone wants to be sustainable. Whew! I feel all warm and bubbly inside already.

But what does that actually mean?

Sustainable is the most loaded, overused term in the modern era(2nd only to 'fresh'). It should mean that what you do(grow, produce, manufacture) is used in such a way that the component parts that make up what you do are replenished at a rate that keeps pace with what you are doing.

Sustainable logging means that you plant trees to replace what you cut and more trees are ready to harvest before you run out of trees.

Sustainable manufacturing is a little more tricky: I think it's using sources of renewable energy to produce items that are made with recyclable materials.

Sustainable food should mean that, like trees, you are planting what you take. But then people say, 'Well, fertilizers can pollute, so it can't be sustainable if you use those.' Then other people say, 'Hey, this food is trucked 500 miles, so it isn't sustainable.'

It's such a loaded term and what I think people really think it should mean is this: Sustainable means I don't feel guilty anymore.

Jamie Oliver also says he wants to create a movement to educate children about food. His wish is for a movement. His goal is more activism. His wish isn't that children get educated about food, his wish is for a movement. That is fairly important.

Jamie Oliver is a brand. You can assign a value to him as an entity, based on ratings for cooking shows, endorsement deals, cookbook sales, etc. What a brand such as him really needs is a cause... a movement.

My original intent was to separate fact from fiction concerning his movement, but as I investigated, I noticed that there aren't really facts involved, so I will consider the actual idea and theme of his movement.

The title of this blog is a clickable link that goes to Oliver's site where you can see this all for yourself.

So here is what I get from his movement:
Nutritious School lunches using local, sustainable, real food.
Families that prepare meals at home.
Educating kids about food.
Fighting the scourge that is obesity [grrr!]

First off, I'm a little confused by the school lunch program to be honest. Is the goal to provide food since the kids are stuck there for 6-8 hours? Or is the goal to provide complete nutrition, as if the only food they get is at school? This makes a huge difference, by the way. If the idea is that this has to be enough food in case they aren't fed at all at home, then you need much more calorie dense and nutrient dense foods. If you're just providing food to as one meal out of several then you don't need as many calories and it can be just enough to satiate hunger without making the kid tired after lunch.

Jamie Oliver takes several shots at processed foods. The following is from his School Food Charter:
"Don’t just look for the USDA symbol. How many ingredients do you recognize? How many are adding nutritional value to the food? Remember, real food, cooked fresh, doesn’t need additives, preservatives, or anything artificial. Processed food is often full of these things."

Oh boy... First off, he equates the goodness of food with the number of ingredients. Then he makes a statement about real food being fresh(another loaded term) which means that processed foods aren't real. His line of logic then concludes with a statement demonizing preservatives. He's also playing on people's lack of education about food science. It would be impossible to make this arguments stick if people knew what the preservatives were for and that they really are harmless.

These are old, tired arguments from the food hysterics. Processed food is bad and it isn't real, and there are things in it we don't immediately understand, so that makes it bad. Preservatives are neither good nor bad. They're preservatives.

Processed food is real and uses the same methods you would use in the kitchen, just mechanized for mass production. Example: instant mashed potatoes.

What do you do when you make mashed potatoes? Peel and cut potatoes, boil potatoes to cook them, mash the potatoes, and mix in seasonings and cream.

What does a factory do to make mashed potatoes? Peel and cut potatoes, boil potatoes to cook them, mash the potatoes, and mix in seasonings and cream. They just go the additional step of drying the mashed potatoes and packaging the powder.

Do you test your mashed potatoes for micro organisms? Do you have others thoroughly inspect your kitchen for cleanliness and safety every day? No? The factory does.

I'm concerned that Jamie Oliver is simply taking old arguments that weren't based in science and is repackaging them to help sell his brand. After all, a family learning to cook, is going to need cookwear, and a cookbook or an instructional dvd. Mr. Oliver takes digs at processed foods, but look what he has on his site here: http://www.jamieoliver.com/cupboard



Hmm.. That stuff looks familiar. Can't quite put my finger on it, but I feel like I've seen that before. I don't see how he has the time to cook all of this food at home and package it for sale. Surely, he doesn't use contract food manufacturers(private labels) to make a product line and put his name on it.

Hypocritical and completely tone-deaf.

He also advocates eating on plates and using metal utensils. Who's going to pay for this?
His plan would essentially turn school cafeterias into 3 star restaurants for children that eat there for a half hour and usually at around 10AM. You want proper table settings? Fine. You will also need to hire additional personelle and you'll need to buy a Hobart C-line dishwasher to accommodate the volume of dishes. You'll need more staff to work longer hours chopping, sauteing, simmering, and roasting food. These are real culinary skills, so you'll need to bump up the pay to attract the talent that can actually pull this off. You want local, raw ingredients? Then you need to contact local purveyors and get more deliveries, more often, and you will pay a premium for it.

Not only does Mr. Oliver not consult food science and nutrition experts on his plans, but check out the people on his must see list.
He lists Marion Nestle, Michael Pollan, the movies Food Inc. and Two Angry Moms, and The Centre For Science In The Public Interest (not really science).

What I gather from all of this is that Jamie Oliver is at the very least, misguided about food issues and falls into the same trap many other well intentioned, misinformed folks fall into. More than that, Jamie Oliver is more concerned about his brand than children, evidenced by his TED gift acceptance speech where he states that his wish was for a movement...not for specific changes. This gift coincides perfectly with his new ABC series Food Revolution and compliments his books, dvd's, cookware, and yes, even his line of processed foods.

Can we please return to science and reason as a means to shape policy?

Stop Breaking Their Bell's.

Many people have been outraged over Taco Bell's new Drive Thru Diet ad campaign, but I think they are heading in the right direction.

We have this vision of what we think is the right way to live in this country. We have this for exercise, for morals, for ethics, and for food.

When it comes to food we tend to demonize and shun. How many times have you said or heard someone say, 'I'm being sooo bad' in relation to food? We have a certain level of guilt over things we eat. A lot of us, myself included, eat too much. What many people do in response to that is to completely shun.

'I stopped drinking pop.'
'I don't eat meat.'
'I don't eat anything processed.'

People shun out of guilt and misinformation. These people DO lose weight in many cases, but may be misled as to why. Pop is 170 - 200 calories a can. Meat(protein) is 9kcal/gram while carbs are I think 4kcal/gram, so not eating meat cuts out a lot of calories. 'Processed' - which is a loaded term - tends to have high caloric values as well. When people lose weight, they lose sight of that and think that it's because those foods were bad and now they are on the good graces of the food gods. It isn't the MSG or HFCS that makes us overweight, it's the extra calories.

OK, so on to Taco Bell...

The ad basically states that by eating certain items on the menu instead of other items, they can lose weight. It really depends on how much you were going there before and what you were ordering. So they aren't lying, it just depends on a couple factors. I do think this is a reasonable and realistic approach to weight loss for many people.

Let's face it folks, many of you are out the door w/out breakfast in the morning, hit a Starbucks drive thru on the way to work, out to eat for lunch, and everybody in your family is scattered going to practices, and games, and working different shifts come dinner time. You probably eat out a lot or eat a lot of frozen dinners/hot pockets and whatnot. Most people preach diets that involve steady meals, mostly eaten at home with some thought and planning put into them. But is that realistic for your life? Ideally, I would suggest planning the weeks menu, using the last off day before the next week as a grocery/prep day so you can quickly and easily make a planned meal every day of that week. Who can honestly commit to that?

Let's think about Jared from Subway for a moment. Remeber when you first saw him holding up his trophy fat pants? What were you thinking?

'Holy shit, I've got to eat more Subway!'

Why did Jared's diet work? Three C's: cutting calories consistently. When he went to Subway, he got one of the same one or two different subs the same way and he walked more. The calories he started taking in were less and they were less consistently. So every day he was running a calorie deficit. Every time that deficit hit 3,500 calories, Jared deducted a pound.

Many diets start off by cutting calories but are too militant, too fast. People get crazy hungry(hungry like the wolf, I say...well, me and Duran Duran) and then go overboard because everything in there body is screaming EAT!!! Jared was consistent. He probably could have cut way more, and shunned everything, but then his diet would have crashed.

OK, back to Taco Bell again... seriously.
If eating a meal or two at Taco Bell interests your taste buds and if the things you would get on the menu are less calories than what you honestly would eat anyway, then you can lose weight. However you can do this with any food. As a matter of fact, Ozzy Osbourne did this on the first season of The Osbournes on MTV. During an episode, Ozzy mentions being on a Chipotle diet, where he'd stock up on his favorite burritos and eat them every day. He would only eat half a burrito at a time and he said he lost 10 pounds. Bam! Chipotle diet. Hell, you could do a Twinkie diet if you really wanted to: All the Twinkies you want as long as the total calories consumed at the end of the day is at a 400 calorie deficit. I guarantee you will lose 1 pound every 8-9 days.

Legit issues with the diet(Taco Bell, not Twinkie) is that it doesn't factor in total fat consumption or sodium. Here's the thing though, were you watching those things before? No? Then worry about the pounds first then fine-tune the diet to factor in nutrients and sodium/potassium.

Takeaway (take out?) Message.
So the diet isn't bullshit, it just depends on what you were eating to begin with. Ricky Gervais does a great joke about a man that weighed 1,000 pounds and was about to have gastric bypass surgery. By the way, if we can live even for a couple years at 1,000 lbs then can we really call 300+ lbs morbidly obese? Really? Anyway, the guy talked about how he ate 9 pie n chips a day. Ricky's line was (while raising his hand) 'Ooh, ooh, I have an idea... 8 pie n chips.'

So quit bustin' the Bell's balls, will ya?

p.s.
I predict a trend in the coming year will be reduced sodium. This is good, but as with calories, the goal is not zero. Calories are units of energy and you need a certain amount to keep the organs running. Don't believe me, ask Tracy Gold. Sodium plays a role cell fluid opposite of potassium. I would think that we may start seeing some functional foods promoted that contain elevated levels of potassium.

Debating an Etch n Sketch & Feeding a Mannequin...

Right off the bat, let me say this: I had the pleasure speaking to @follownathan on Twitter the last few days and today(Friday), I called him and did a recorded audio interview. The interview went well, aside from my rambling and my voice, which annoys even me. Also there was a feedback that, thankfully, didn't translate to the recorded audio but it did trip me up a couple times and caused me to lose my line of thinking. My blog title is the link to Nathan's website where you may hear the roughly 30 minutes of audio.

Just a note: my blog titles are usually clickable links relating to things that I'm talking about.

Normally, the people I talk to about food science and the food industry are receptive to what I have to say. Even when they disagree, they hear me out, ask follow up questions, and walk away with a better understanding of the subject at hand and more receptive to hear/reading/seeing more to educate themselves. That's how it should go, and most of the time, that's how it is... most of the time.

I've dealt with a couple people over this last week that approached the discourse with a certain amount of disrespect and immaturity. In both cases, they were convinced they were right and it seems like nothing will ever convince them otherwise.

This is completely at odds with how science works. It should start with a curiosity about something in the world that you can test...a hypothesis. This can be skeptical, but it's usually a scientists nature to be skeptical, so it shows in the design of the study, not in the hypothesis. We tests a hypothesis by eliminating all but one variable. We record all possible data in a consistant manner, report on that data, publish that report in a scientific journal, and other scientists (skeptics) try to duplicate the study and see if the results reproducable. If so, then until proven otherwise, this is accepted as fact. If not, then the experiment is tweaked to try to eliminate more variables, report more data, and tighten up the controls to reduce the chance of error.

That is science. When an idea survives the scientific method, a fact is born. At this point, it is the responsibility of any remaining skeptics to prove it's wrong , not for the scientists to prove it's right. Now imagine you are talking to someone less than mature about some study and it's outcomes. What do you do if they keep saying, 'No, that's wrong. Prove it. Prove it again.'?

We had #agchat on Tuesday and I hope it went well. I got a comment in before it was running too slow for me to follow. Many of you had a chance to interact with and I had an interaction with @culinaryhatchet.

My interaction was saying that on the whole, more people prefer grain fed beef to grass fed. This is a fact based on a test that Cornell did. I think it was a single blind forced preference taste test. I also mentioned that a grain diet offers a more complete nutrition, while grass fed is entirely dependent on the nutrient levels of the pasture land. Most of the time, some kind of supplements are necessary.

This person had a major fit and demanded to see proof. He's/she's right unless I can prove him/her wrong. I did as far as taste goes, but I never found an actual study for the remark about nutrition. My logic there was the fact that the roughage is sampled and tested with dairy cattle. You need to know the nutrient level of the silage so you can put what's missing in the feed you order. But anyway, the person never believed me. I also hit him/her with the fact that grass fed have a 50% larger carbon footprint. He/she wanted to know who I was working for. I guess in his/her mind, if you work for someone that supports the view you have... then your view doesn't count.

This is a fundamental fallacy in a scientific debate. Science has no employer. Just because a guy for the National Pork Council makes a statement about pork being safe, doesn't mean he's lying. He can be lying, but who he works for doesn't matter. There is this accepted idea that everything and everyone is in on some sort of fix. Somehow, everything is a conspiracy.

I'm getting off track here.

Many of you interacted with @culinaryhatchet in good faith that you were having an honest and helpful dialogue, that your views were respected and that person was listening to what you said as you were listening to them.

I found that @culinaryhatchet has a blog and posted excerpts from the #agchat discussion. Many of the remarks made were catty in nature and made me think that @culinaryhatchet is the type of person that reads those entertainment weekly's and makes catty comments about what the people in the pictures are wearing.

Here's some of what this person put in his blog:
'On to the players and their Tweets:

#agchat is hosted by Michele Payn-Knoper, principal of Cause Matters Corp.

#agchat is a “weekly moderated conversation on Twitter for people in the business of raising food, feed, fuel, fiber.”

Hmmm… distinct omission of “consumer.” And that’s how I felt on #agchat.

Last’s night’s topic was “Antibiotics and their use in food production.” A topic about which I am most passionate.

Question 1: Can someone explain why we use antibiotics in livestock?

Great question! Time for some honest answers…(NOTE: not in chronological order, well, except for the first one.)

First answer: AgriBlogger (Chuck Zimmerman is the professional agriblogger, farm podcaster and President of ZimmComm New Media): For the same reason we use them in people. Doesn't that make sense?

Pure genius. NOT.'

'Time for some honest answers' Classic conspiracy theory. Only the answer he/she wants to hear is good enough, all else is a lie in his/her mind.

Of course, even though I was unable to participate, I wasn't immune to his/her vitriol.
'This guy is easily the most annoying person in #agchat (other than me), plus you just have to love his explanation samvance (Sam Vance Cincinnati, OH; Edible Intelligence OSU degree Re: Food Science & Tech. Also sarcastic/smells of cookies): anti-bio's used for herd/farm/food safety. You can't process an animal that is already dead or sick.

I think his blog name, Intelligence is an oxy-moron. '

I'd like to point out that you need two things for an oxymoron, so no... Intelligence is not an oxymoron.

So what do rational, science minded, sane people do when confronted with such a person?
Take a deep breath, be patient, and don't give up.

Invite @culinaryhatchet to tour your farm.
We also need to share research studies.
Don't hide who you work for.
Admit when something you say is incorrect or where a company you work for has gone wrong.

Most of all, don't engage in debate when you are unsure of where it's going. Take a minute and be a little measured when you speak/tweet. Be professional. Keep links to studies that prove your point. Use tabbed browsing, it is your friend. If there isn't a study, explain the science and why something can't be the way someone is convinced it is. Don't lie.

We have to be at our best when engaged in conversation about food and ag issues.. Make sure you are drawing a distinction between an opinion and a fact.

And like I have been saying(borrowed from Al Franken):
We are entitled to our own opinions. We are not entitled to our own facts.

Food Rules For Idiots.

I was catching up on episodes of The Daily Show and Monday's guest was the infamous Micheal Pollan. He was on to promote his new book, "Food Rules". This book is a continuation of his other food related work, which is light on science/facts and heavy on oversimplified advice based on a false premise.

The book is meant to be a series of quirky do's and don'ts that will help you lead a healthier lifestyle. One example of a rule he gave to Jon Stewart was not to eat any cereal that colors your milk. It sounds very sage-like and quaint but is not based on science.

What is he saying? Is he saying that the food coloring used is harmful to your health? Is he saying that those foods tend to be higher in calories? Is this another high fructose corn syrup warning? He isn't clear, but to leave to be sure, allow me to settle each of these issues.

HFCS.
I've already been over this. it's the same as sugar. No worse.

Calories.
Too many calories are bad for anyone's health. The problem comes in demonizing a specific foods. It's not a specific food and it's not one meal, it's all meals over a long time. It takes 3500 calories to make a pound and many pound to cause health problems. An adult will burn at least 1800 calories in a day and up to several thousand more if they are very active or have high metabolism. A 3,000 calories Aussie Cheese Fries appetizer from Outback Steakhouse isn't something you should eat every day, but it isn't intrinsically bad. If you haven't had those, by the way, please do and be sure to share! It will have be a great source of fat, sodium, starch, protein, and other vital minerals/nutrients. A bowl of cereal, on the other hand, might have 200 calories including the milk. You have to eat a lot of cereal for it to make you fat. If I were trying to gain weight, it would be very low on my list of foods to eat.

Food coloring.
No credible studies link ailments to the use of food coloring, certainly not in the quantities used in production. This is one of my examples of the Illusion of Fact. it's said enough that people don't question the information, they just assume it's true because people are still saying it. 'Oh sure, everyone knows that.' is the response that you can get to these statements that aren't even true. Actually, Pollan's entire career of food writing can be attributed to this phenomenon.

This interesting exchange came up in the interview where Jon Stewart asked if there is going to be some big finding that shows food industry leaders lied and withheld info about how bad their food is just like with the tobacco industry. Part of Michael Pollan's response was to say that Food Science is very sophisticated.

I find this to be a very remarkable admission on his part. The context of the question was about proof of danger to the public health. He is either saying that food science is over his head or that 1,000's of food scientists the world over are involved in a vast conspiracy. He's making a ton of money doing this, folks. This isn't just a hobby for him.

He has the means to go to UC Davis in California, or to Cornell in New York, or even to my Alma Mater, Ohio State and learn from world class food science departments. He doesn't. Michael Pollan chooses to be willfully ignorant about food science. Think about it; what happens when he learns that what he's been telling people isn't true? He has now built a career on his claims about food and the food industry. He would be ruined. No more appearances on Good Morning America or The Daily Show, or Conan. His credibility would be shot.

And make no mistake, his credibility would be shot to hell because he is wrong about food. I think I should start an online petition for one of the schools I listed to give him a free ride scholarship so he can be a food science student. I'd love to see his face when they burst his bubble, and believe me, it will get busted early and often. I've seen it in students that have similar beliefs about food. Usually, they'll assert themselves and very matter-of-factly make some statement about food that they know to be true. The class pauses before the professor very calmly and patiently shows how that is false. And the instructors won't belittle them at all. They'll use math or draw pictures of chemical structures or refer to studies that they have been privy to and slowly the misinformation, like so much plaque on the brain is removed.