With texts selected by noted restaurant critic Mimi Sheraton, this series will explore an aspect of our culture that often gets taken for granted: food. Food provides both nourishment and pleasure, of course, but under the surface of each meal lies a series of complex interactions and entanglements. Working with histories, novels, and journalism, this series exposes some of the issues that lie on our plates. Texts include historical accounts, novels, and narrative nonfiction. The Third Plate Dan Barber Chef Dan Barber takes the reader on a series of journeys to where our food is sourced — and in the […]
The Third Plate
Chef Dan Barber takes the reader on a series of journeys to where our food is sourced — and in the process creates new insight into ways we can eat better and create more sustainable food systems.
Diet Cults: The Surprising Fallacy at the Core of Nutrition Fads and a Guide to Healthy Eating for the Rest of Us
This critique of various “diet fads” examines the rhetoric and faults of each, ascribing “cult” status to them — for they all claim to be the “one true way” to eat healthy.
The Road to Wellville
Boyle’s comic novel satirizes the health craze of the early 20th century, poking fun at such practitioners as John Harvey Kellogg, founder of the famous cereal company. But Boyle forces us to ask: how different are we from these characters of a century ago?
In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto
Michael Pollan is concerned that the focus on nutrition and food science has replaced old-fashioned healthy eating, leading to his mantra: “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”
Diet for A Small Planet
Diet for a Small Planet was at the forefront of the movement in the 1970s that lead to a rethinking — both in terms of health and environmental impact – of our diets and relationship to food.
Food Politics: How the Food Industry Influences Nutrition and Health
Marion Nestle’s contemporary classic exposes how corporations and food companies influence politics in order to improve their bottom lines – no matter what the cost to the health of ordinary Americans.
The Jungle
Sinclair’s classic novel of turn-of-the-century Chicago focuses on the exploitation of immigrant workers and unsanitary conditions at the city’s famous stockyards and slaughterhouses.
