A few months, I watched Michael Pollen on Ted give an excellent presentation on the planet from the plant’s view. How plants seduce bees into pollination, how plants seduce us to eat them, and how through understanding this it is possible to redesign how we approach, eat, and grow food. Shortly thereafter, I picked up the book Omnivore’s Dilemma, and within a week I had ripped through its 400 pages. I have previously read Fast Food Nation, The Jungle, and a few others that looked at the food chain in America and while each of those provided some excellent information and insights, Pollan took a very different approach that I think will have a much more lasting impact on me and how I will look at food in the future. Where Pollan does a great job in my view, besides his visual wiring, is that he shows that we have moved from a previously sustainable and net positive system to one that is simply exploiting and unsustainable. Rather than write a book on his fears, and on some research, Pollan takes readers on a journey that takes us to the corn fields, an organic farm, on a hunting trip for pigs, foraging for mushrooms, picking fruit in Berkley neighborhoods, and swimming for abalone. It is an adventure that ties together a lot of ideas, some Darwinian, some vegetarian, some philosophical.. In the end, we wrap up with a dinner with friends that would make any foodie salivate. Where Pollan’s account is important is that we see just how the human race has turned its back on mother nature’s basic concepts and resources. Rather than create sustainable food chains, we have learned how through the use of chemicals, pesticides, corn syrup, and oil we can assemble a year round supply chain of food for everyone shopping at a Safeway, Whole foods, or Wal-Mart to take advantage of at anytime. Environmental slant aside, Pollan also shows that through all of this we are actually damaging ourselves as well. Pollutants enter the water, beef contains higher level of fats, sea salts are contaminated.. and in the end, we are taking all this in and seeing higher levels of diabetes, cancer, etc. Click these links to learn more about Michael Pollan, Omnivores Dilemma, or his new book In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto.