Grads

Grads

Just in time for your holiday shopping list, a new book from Larry Olmsted (MALS’06), Real Food/ Fake Food: Why You Don’t Know What You’re Eating & What You Can Do About It, published by Algonquin Books. (Read an excerpt from his book at dartmouthalumnimagazine.com.) The “why” you don’t know is truly appalling, but Larry also provides precise information on how to avoid many substitutions, scams and possible poisonings. While doing all of this, he manages to make his book not only informative but also very entertaining. He describes his travels around the world as he investigates real and fake cheese making and olive oil and wine production. Just about every page reveals food facts that will frequently amaze or, possibly, repel you.

The European Union has protections in place that can be trusted to tell where something is made, how it is made and what goes into it. This is not true in the United States, where even basic definitions of words are up for grabs, as far as the food industry is concerned. You might assume that natural, grass-fed, pure or 100-percent all mean something good and healthful. I would like to issue a spoiler alert for a few of my favorite of Larry’s examples proving this not to be the case. Consider the natural maple and oatmeal products where the natural flavoring is derived from anise or fenugreek, usually chemically extracted, in spite of the cute little syrup jug depicted on the package. Then there are the 100-percent beef hotdogs, where it is easy to assume that the 100-percent modifies the word “hotdogs.” This is not true. The 100 percent actually modifies the word “beef.” You are assured that the beef is all cow. Of course, you can always read the ingredient list on the package label, if you can see it. I have been very carefully reading these lists, which are usually found right next to the nutritional information. However, the type is usually much, much smaller. I assume this means you are not supposed to be able to quickly scan the list before buying the product or that there are just so many ingredients that there is no other way to fit them all onto the package.

Larry also explores the world of restaurant food, where you will never really know the degree of correspondence between what you order from the menu and what you are served. As an example, there is the fake, fake lobster you may have eaten. Though you know what a lobster looks like, and you can see them swimming in restaurants’ tanks, if you order lobster bisque or lobster roll, you may end up not eating lobster at all. According to Larry’s research, abundant Chinese crawfish are transshipped and relabeled as langostino, also not a lobster, and then bought by restaurants that sell them as lobster. Then there is the Kobe beef, raised only in Japan, which was served in restaurants for the price of a week’s groceries even when all beef from Japan was banned during the mad cow disease era. Larry refers to this as “faux-be.”

I hope that I have convinced you this is a book of essential reading. It will horrify you, delight you, engross you and educate you about the weird ways of the world of food. Also, having some really good cheese on hand will help when you start salivating.

Larry is currently a visiting lecturer at Dartmouth, where he teaches nonfiction writing. His first book, Getting Into Guinness, was published by Harper Collins in 2008. Being Larry, he worked at setting or breaking three world records in the process.

—Jane Welsh, 175 Greensboro Road, Hanover, NH 03755; (603) 643-3789; m.jane.welsh.gr.@ dartmouth.edu