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NEW YORK — Author of the foodie manifesto “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” and, more recently, “In Defense of Food,” Michael Pollan grew up in Woodbury, N.Y., when farms still dotted Long Island. Growing up next to a pumpkin field may have influenced Pollan’s work as a food evangelist — not so much for a fruits-and-nuts regimen, but against the corporatization and general unhealthiness of American foodstuffs.
Pollan appears — along with fellow author Eric Schlosser (“Fast Food Nation”) — in “Food Inc.,” which, as one critic said, “does for the supermarket what ‘Jaws’ did for the beach.” Pollan talked food and fatness with John Anderson.
Q. What is it about America that breeds huge, overfed people?
A. It’s been our policy in this country, especially since the 1970s, to make food as cheap and abundant as possible — and to use all the levers of federal power to bring about that result. Cheap food is beloved by our leaders, ever since the French Revolution proved that spikes in food prices could cost you your head. They’ve realized that keeping food cheap is, politically, a very good thing. But what we’ve also learned is that we’ve got too much of a good thing and that cheap food is causing us a health-care crisis. Make no mistake: More than half of the $2 trillion we’re going to spend on health care is going to treat the effects of the American diet.
Q. Is there a cultural cause as well?
A. We haven’t had a strong food culture historically, telling us how to eat, so we’re particularly vulnerable to marketing messages. When Taco Bell comes along and is trying to proselytize a fourth American meal every day, the French and Italians just laugh. But Americans are like, ‘Yeah, maybe I should have another meal at 11 o’clock at night.”
Q. You must feel pretty strongly about “Food Inc.” since you’ve been doing so much on its behalf.
A. I have. Even though I didn’t make this film — it really is Robbie Kenner’s film, so I don’t feel a sense of authorship — I think it’s the best video treatment we’ve seen on these issues, and I’m very interested in promoting these issues and engaging people in this national conversation about the future of food and agriculture. So far, it’s taken place mostly in print, but the next step I think is to engage people who may not be reading all the books or all the articles. I think this film has the best chance of doing that.
Q. Isn’t someone even appearing on “The Colbert Report”?
A. Schlosser’s doing it this time. It’s his headache. I think I’m doing “Good Morning America.” And whatever else they can get. I’m really proud of the film. They did some really tough journalism, and advanced the story. It’s not just “Fast Food Nation” or “The Omnivore’s Dilemma” brought to the screen. There’s news — about the new stuff being added to our hamburgers to deal with E. coli, or about the workers at the Tyson chicken plants.
Q. Your books have done about as much as books can do in getting this issue before the public. Is there another audience out there waiting to be engaged?
A. I think this movement is just at the beginning. We’re where the environmental movement was, pre-Earth Day, before 1970. Young people, in particular, see this as their political issue. So, sooner or later, the politicians are going to take note.
Q. What do you find most discouraging about the state of American food? The menu at McDonald’s?
A. I get discouraged when I walk through the supermarket and see the sheer amount of what I call “edible foodlike substances” that don’t really deserve to be called food, which are really cheap, are making health claims and which are really deceiving people.
Q. What’s encouraging?
A. The political commitment to reform the way America eats and grows its food. And young people who have decided they want to become farmers. There’s a whole generation of young, college-educated, intelligent people who want to go back to the land. The number of farmers has gone up for the first time ever over the last five years.
Q. Do you eat anything that makes you feel guilty?
A. (He laughs) I’m a great believer in special-occasion foods. So there’s nothing I won’t eat — just not very often. I love potato chips. Cracker Jacks. I don’t eat Twinkies. But only because I don’t like them.
