Industrial/Corn Summary The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan, analyzes the eating habits and food chains of modern America in an attempt to bring readers closer to the origin of their foods. Pollan’s blend of humor and philosophical questions about the nature of food serves both to enlighten readers about the environment from which their food is harvested and to teach readers about alternative ways of eating. In the first chapter of Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan, we are introduced to the topic of industrial corn and its origins some thousands of years ago.
Originally known as “Zea Mays”, corn started off slow in biological terms but blew up after the discovery of Christopher Columbus. Now that there was corn the settlers were free from the Natives and could now support themselves on the agriculture of corn. Now in modern times we have created new types of corns to feed humans and animals but also to create over 25000 products in supermarkets today. Pallon mentions in Chapter one the differences between American and Mexican diets.
Stating that the Mexican diet is that of a corn-based nature, where as Americans is on the other side of the spectrum eating more meats than anything. In truth it’s the opposite, it’s the Americans that are eating more corn. It all comes down to the way we feed our animals and process our foods. Americans feed their livestock with corn, and pump corn-based products into readily available food. Whereas Mexicans although they eat a wide variety of corn and grains still feed their animals with grass and sweeten with sugar cane versus corn-based sweeteners.
The Essay on Foods representing American
The United States of America is a melting pot of different ethnic cultures and hence in that respect is considered to be one of the most diverse countries in the universe. The cultural cuisine is marked by the influence of different cultures and is difficult to actually say which one stands out to be a symbolic representation of American culture. But before one can delve any further it is ...
So the Americans really do beat out the “Corn walkers”, I guess you could say they’re walking corn from the high levels of corn consumption. Pollan pulled me into chapter one with the information he provided about corn. I was enlightened by this chapter and decided to do some research of my own. I started looking into several different food and products that are corn based and animals that are corn fed. For example, corn feeds the steer, chicken, pig, turkey, lamb, and some fish, we eat; corn is in processed foods, like a chicken
nugget contains corn starch, corn flour, corn oil, as well as lecithin, mono-di- and tri-glycerides, and citric acid, which all contain corn; Corn is contained in soft and fruit drinks, alcohol, mayonnaise, mustard, margarine, salad dressing, cereal, toothpaste, cosmetics, disposable diapers, trash bags, cleaners, matches, batteries, magazine covers, linoleum, fiberglass, wallboard and gasoline (ethanol).
Needless to say, corn is everywhere! In chapter two, Pollan visits a small farmer in Iowa owned by George Naylor.
Most of the 470 acre farm is used to grow corn, to ensure a high yield rate for the season. While at the farm Pollan sets out to understand the mysteries of the Industrial Corn world and to get an in depth look at the life of a farmer’s life after corn surpluses have been put in. Last, in chapter three, Pollan visits the great grain elevator not far from the Naylor farm in Iowa. He goes in-depth with the governments funding and the living of a farmer on the subsidies.
To be perfectly honest, I was expecting “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” to be boring, overly written and full of words I could not only pronounce but did not know the meaning of but I found it to be well defined and though out in terms of the structure and sentence transitions. Many writers attempt to grab the reader’s attention with over-inflated words, when a simple description is adequate, and quite sufficient to convey the though, idea, or concept, that the book is about. I was thrilled reading about corn, which was not expected, and it made reading the book that much more enjoyable.
