With a lot of interesting insights into the culture of food, I expected to like this book by Barry Glassner more than I did. I think in his attempt to cover such a wide-ranging subject, including; home cooking, grocery products, restaurants, fast food, obesity and food science, it may have been a little more than one book could handle.

Fascinating insights into how restaurants handle food critics, misconceptions about the sate of fast food and the downright unscrupulous health claims of marketers trying to sell everything from watermelon and avocado to cereal and hamburgers abounded. If you’re interests lie anywhere in understanding industrial food and the restaurant world, youll find plenty to chew on here.

But what hit home for me was the level of conflicting information on diet, obesity and the benefits and harms of certain foods (or may I should say food-like products). Someone once told me you can get an economist to say anything, so diverse are their theories and opinions on how the system works. But I’ve always felt doctors, scientists and other “health professionals” shouldn’t be swayed despite corporate funding and/or the need for publicity. However, this insidious culture appears to be alive and well among the people who purport to tell us what’s healthy and what’s not. And that makes me mad.