Have just started listening to In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto in the car. Despite Pollan not reading his own book (it’s one of my fundamental tenets, I’m realizing, that an author should read their own audio book!) it’s very very interesting. And I confess that I found The Omnivore’s Dilemma a heavy slog (and didn’t finish it).

I am charmed by the basic assertion of the first part of the book. Pollan derides the practice of “nutritionism,” which is privileging the individual nutritional components of a food above the whole food. The science is compelling, yes, but even more than that I love this, another confirmation that the whole is more than the sum of the parts. This is how I feel about so much in life; for example, people, who are so much more than their individual attributes and skills. There is so much more to a person – so much that is both strong and weak, ineffable and fleeting, that contributes to who we each are. That this is apparently true of food as well is not at all surprising, and makes me smile.