10.21.2008

Michael Pollan and the "Farmer in Chief"

Michael Pollan is our most eloquent writer on food. But he doesn't worry about recipes. Instead Pollan tirelessly explores the thicket of fact and fallacy that surround the production, distribution, and consumption of food, and posits new ideas for solving some of the ills caused by industrial farming, a problem many of us are just starting to recognize. "Farmer in Chief", his article in last week's New York Time's Sunday magazine outlines what our next president can do to begin restoring balance and responsibility to our food chain. It's fascinating reading for anyone who cares about what we eat and how it gets to our table.
While we're on the subject, I'd like to get in a plug for another of Pollan's books, "Second Nature: A Gardener's Education." It's a meditation on the meaning and practice of gardening that rehsaped some of my thoughts on what tilling the soil is all about.

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