Dear Mr. Pollan...

Dear Mr. Pollan,
I have spent my last two vacations reading your books in an attempt to figure out the "healthiest" way of eating. I read your second book In Defense of Food during my spring break, more out of convenience than anything else since it was already on the Kindle and I was avoiding my inevitable fate of diving into Salman Rushdie's Midnight's Children. But I was fascinated. All of the research you did about the American culture of nutritionism and why traditional cultural cuisines (Italian, French, Greek) are healthy because of how the foods are eaten together and not because of their individual elements of fat, fiber, or polyphenols was earth-shattering to me.

Once I got back from school after graduation, I made a quick turn around and headed straight for the beach with your first book The Omnivore's Dilemma in hand. I didn't really know what to expect, but I assumed that it would be the foundational research that prompted you to write In Defense of Food. Frankly, I'm glad that I read In Defense of Food first, because I felt a bit...helpless at the end of The Omnivore's Dilemma.

Not to say I didn't love reading it. I felt like I was there with you in Iowa on George Naylor's corn fields, and your stint working with Joel Salatin at Polyface Farms prompted me to plan a field trip to the farm with my dad to see the whole operation for myself. The Omnivore's Dilemma has made me an even more conscientious shopper and eater than In Defense of Food did, and even though I'm not eating meat for health reasons, your book made my hyper-aware of the consequences of how we raise and feed our own food - you took "you are what you eat" to an entirely new level.

While researching Polyface Farms and grappling between the ideal of eliminating all "edible food-like substances" and the reality of not living on a beyond organic farm, I stumbled upon your third book Food Rules, and I'm so glad I did. It synthesized all of the advice and guidelines that you addressed  in your previous books into 64 easy-to-reference "rules" that can help anyone navigate everything from the vending machine to a Whole Foods Market.

But my question is this - How do I eat like this without being "that girl"? My family is already planning for when I'm out of town (Monday!) so that they can make ribs, steak, and cheeseburgers to their heart's content, and I don't know where the line is between being a conscientious eater and a pretentious hippie who preaches about healthy eating. I have no desire to evangelize about eating the kinds of whole foods you define in your book, but I would really like to do my best to eat that way myself.

So maybe my solution is to write an indirect letter to you on my blog and drop the names of all of your books so whoever reads my blog might be intrigued to read your books and then everyone will eat the way I would ideally like to eat, but please, I'm a realist. There's going to be a day when I'm on a road trip and the best thing to eat is a Clif bar from the gas station, and there's going to be a day when I really want to eat some delicious ribs hot off the grill at a tailgate. How do you deal with this? You're a food guy and you've obviously seen more of the underbelly of the food world than I have, so I want to know how you do it. As you say after you make "The Perfect Meal" at the end of The Omnivore's Dilemma, it's too time consuming and unreasonable to eat like that for every meal of every day. So if you would be so kind, I would love to know how you eat on a day-to-day basis. When do you make compromises, and when do you stick to your guns? When is your hunger hungry enough to eat corn-fed beef, and when do you eat an apple in July just because you want an apple, even though it is not in season?

So yes, you have confused me about every piece of food I go to put into my mouth, but I guess it's okay if it's the kind of confusion that accompanies a broader worldview. I would be very grateful for a reply, so maybe I should send this in the mail.

Sincerely,
Katie