Welcome to Friday’s For The Love of Food, Summer Tomato’s weekly link roundup.

This week Michael Pollan talks shrooms, fish more toxic than ever, and perfect poached eggs.

Next week’s Mindful Meal Challenge will start again on Monday. Sign up now to join us!

Too busy to read them all? Try this awesome free speed reading app to read at 300+ wpm. So neat!

I also share links on Twitter @summertomato and the Summer Tomato Facebook page. I’m very active on all these sites and would love to connect with you.

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For the Love of Food

Welcome to Friday’s For The Love of Food, Summer Tomato’s weekly link roundup. 

This week NY Times takes on industrial food, protein is more than just protein, and low fat gets an unlikely thumbs up.

Too busy to read them all? Try this awesome free speed reading app to read at 300+ wpm. So neat!

I also share links on Twitter @summertomato and the Summer Tomato Facebook page. I’m very active on all these sites and would love to connect with you.

Read the rest of this story »

“I always wanted to be that person who went to the gym regularly and ate whatever they wanted, I just didn’t know this was how you got there. That person was in me all along.”

Bonnie grew up loving all kinds of foods, especially junk food. She never liked dieting and had come to accept that she would probably always be a size 12.

Fear of developing diabetes like her father eventually prompted her to create a New Year’s resolution to try to be healthier. She slowly added exercise and changed her eating habits, and the weight began to come off until she hit a summertime plateau.

Stuck at the same weight for five months, Bonnie eventually found Summer Tomato and decided to give mindful eating a try. To her surprise she learned she was eating more than double the amount of food her body actually wanted, and that she had a true love for vegetables.

Bonnie is now comfortably a size 8, though she’s not sure what her final size will be. Although she still occasionally treats herself to fast food or sweets, her preferences have changed substantially. She’s happy where she is, but feels like her journey is just starting.

When I asked her if making all these changes was difficult she said, “It was the opposite of hard. It was the opposite of restrictive.”

Links from the show:

‘The Myth of Willpower’ (chapter from Foodist) and free starter kit

The Omnivore’s Dilemma, by Michael Pollan

Roger Goes From Hating the Gym to Loving Workouts and Loses 26 lbs Without Noticing

The End of Over Eating, by Dr. David Kessler

How to Eat Half a Donut

How to Make Cauliflower Taste as Good as French Fries

Listen:

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Listen on Soundcloud

If you’d like to be a guest on the show, please fill out the form here and tell us your story.

For the Love of Food

Welcome to Friday’s For The Love of Food, Summer Tomato’s weekly link roundup. 

This week Splenda linked to cancer, fish reduces Alzheimer’s risk, and winter tomatoes get respect.

Too busy to read them all? Try this awesome free speed reading app I just discovered to read at 300+ wpm. So neat!

Want to see all my favorite links? (There’s lots more). Be sure to follow me on Delicious. I also share links on Twitter @summertomato and the Summer Tomato Facebook page. I’m very active on all these sites and would love to connect with you.

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Those who know me know that I’m a basketball girl, not a football girl. Maybe that’s why at a Super Bowl XLI party in 2007 I found myself enthralled by a New York Times Magazine article instead of watching the game.

As my friends ate chili and drank beers I devoured Michael Pollan’s landmark essay “Unhappy Meals.” I don’t remember who won the game, but after that day I never looked at food or nutrition the same.

That afternoon was the first time I’d encountered the term nutritionism, an ideology based on the concept that we can understand the healthfulness of a food if we understand what nutrients it contains. In nutritionism calcium = healthy bones. Omega-3 = healthy brains. Saturated fat = unhealthy hearts. The delivery mechanism of the nutrients is irrelevant, all that matters is the molecules.

As a scientist and life-long dieter, I had swallowed the nutritionism ideology hook, line and sinker. But as I sat on my friend’s sofa reading Pollan’s words, my understanding of nutrition––and in many ways my whole universe––underwent a monumental and irrevocable shift.

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For the Love of Food

Welcome to Friday’s For The Love of Food, Summer Tomato’s weekly link roundup. It’s good to be back!

I included a few more than 10 links this week because they were good and, well, it’s been forever. I hope you enjoy them as much as I did.

This week the value of taking the elevator, why (you think) healthy food is less satisfying, and the best oils for cooking.

Too busy to read them all? Try this awesome free speed reading app I just discovered to read at 300+ wpm. So neat!

Want to see all my favorite links? (There’s lots more). Be sure to follow me on Delicious. I also share links on Twitter @summertomato and the Summer Tomato Facebook page. I’m very active on all these sites and would love to connect with you.

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One of the most common criticisms of my work here at Summer Tomato is that the lifestyle I promote is not available to everybody. That fresh food is a luxury only available to those with the resources to procure it and the time to prepare it.

Sadly, this is true. But it is only part of the story.

These accusations of elitism are based on the assumption that since fresh food has a higher price tag than processed food, promoting it as the best means to better health discriminates against those who can’t afford it.

Blame the science, shoot the messenger.

To get to the real problem we need to ask what sets the price tag. Why is the food from smaller farms at my local farmers market more pricey than the mass produced industrial food most people eat?

Is it because small, family farmers are greedy? Are they preying off the ignorance of rich people seeking the latest kale and beet juice trend?

Or are the prices of industrial food––even produce––artificially cheap?

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Photo by Michael Hodge

We already know that food manufacturers and the media tend to exaggerate the benefits of popular health foods, but what about all the wonderfully healthy foods they ignore?

It’s time to shine the spotlight on 10 of my favorite healthy foods that never get the attention they deserve.
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For The Love of Food

Welcome to Friday’s For The Love of Food, Summer Tomato’s weekly link roundup.

This week (also includes links from last week when I was stuck on a wifi-less flight) shivering is the new running, cheap food is elitist, and one daily soda raises heart risk even if you aren’t overweight.

Want to see all my favorite links? (There’s lots more). Be sure to follow me on on Delicious. I also share links on Twitter @summertomato,  Google+ and the Summer Tomato Facebook page. I’m very active on all these sites and would love to connect with you. (And yes, I took that pepper heart pic myself).
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For The Love of Food

Welcome to Friday’s For The Love of Food, Summer Tomato’s weekly link roundup.

This week salt gets way too much attention, age and fertility aren’t as linked as you think, and how to interpret pork labels.

Want to see all my favorite links? (There’s lots more). Be sure to follow me on on Delicious. I also share links on Twitter @summertomato,  Google+ and the Summer Tomato Facebook page. I’m very active on all these sites and would love to connect with you. (And yes, I took that pepper heart pic myself).

Read the rest of this story »