How the Upper Crust Eats

Food as a status symbol

Katherine Mangu-Ward from the November 2006 issue

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And Pollan gets it. He writes: "Of course! Joel saw himself as more of a Luther than a Lenin; the goal wasn't to blow up the Church but simply to step around it. Protestantism also comes in many denominations, as I suspect will the future of food. Deciding whether that future should more closely resemble Joel's radically local vision or Whole Foods' industrial organic matters less than assuring that thriving alternatives exist."

But time and time again, Pollan functionally turns up his nose at first-class seats for the organic revolution because he prefers to fly only on private jets. Whole Foods isn't good enough; only local markets will do. While Pollan writes about what's happening in Lear jets across America, the real revolution is taking place in commercial coach class. Normal grocery shoppers no longer have to agonize over the choice between settling for mealy apples or springing for the pricier exotics like mangoes or hothouse strawberries. These days even the most run-down corner grocery offers shoppers apricots, cartons of blueberries, and ripe cherries out of season. Soon Wal-Mart shoppers might even be able to get an organic pineapple if the mood strikes them. This explosion in choice for the American people is heady stuff—but for some reason, the most Pollan can muster in response is mild hostility bracketed by a general lack of interest about broader social implications.

They say it's not fair to criticize an author for the book he didn't write, but in Pollan's case, the problem is the book he almost wrote. Pollan chronicles the whole spectrum of food issues in such charming, reasonable, colorful prose that the reader longs for him to help unravel some of the messy (and ubiquitous) questions about America's food politics and food culture. Instead, he gives us 400 pages of fantastic reportage in the service of a question that troubles only a small subculture of ethical eaters, all the while pretending to answer a question asked by everyone: "What's for dinner?"