Eating Promiscuously : Adventures in the Future of Food

A bold and bracing argument for the complete reimagining of the human diet by the critically acclaimed author of Just Food The human practice of farming food has failed. There are 7,500 known varieties of domesticated apples; we regularly eat about five. Seventy–five percent of the world's food derives from five animals and twelve plants. Factory farmed meat is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions (about 14 percent, larger than transportation) and consumes 75 percent of the water in drought–prone regions such as the West. We are struck in a rut of limited choices, ad the vast majority of what we eat is detrimental to our health and the welfare of the planet. But what if we could eliminate agriculture as we know it? What if we could start over? James McWilliams's search for more expansive palate leads him to those who are actively exploring the fringes of what we can eat, a group of outliers seeking nutrition innovation outside the industrial food system. Here, we meet insect manufacturers, seaweed harvesters, road kill foragers, plant biologists, and oyster farmers who seek to open both our minds and our mouths—and to overturn our most basic assumptions about food, health, and ethics. Eating Promiscously generates hope for a more tasteful future—one in which we eat thousands of foods rather than dozens—with a new philosophy that could save both ourselves and our planet. "The human practice of farming food has failed. There are 7,500 known varieties of domesticated apples; we regularly eat about five. Seventy-five percent of the world's food derives from five animals and twelve plants. Factory farmed meat is a major source of greenhouse gas emissions (about 14 percent, larger than transportation) and consumes 75 percent of the water in drought-prone regions such as the West. We are struck in a rut of limited choices, ad the vast majority of what we eat is detrimental to our health and the welfare of the planet. But what if we could eliminate agriculture as we know it? What if we could start over? James McWilliams's search for more expansive palate leads him to those who are actively exploring the fringes of what we can eat, a group of outliers seeking nutrition innovation outside the industrial food system. Here, we meet insect manufacturers, seaweed harvesters, road kill foragers, plant biologists, and oyster farmers who seek to open both our minds and our mouths?and to overturn our most basic assumptions about food, health, and ethics."--Jacket flap Humans have been practicing agriculture for only a tiny fraction of our existence—beginning to domesticate plants and animals about 10,000 years ago—and, as McWilliams sees it, our efforts have failed. Our food production systems are broken, and the vast majority of what we eat is detrimental to our health and the health of the earth. But what if we could eliminate agriculture as we know it, start over, and radically alter the human diet? If we could begin again, what would we do differently? McWilliams argues we'd be wise to take culinary lessons from the bonobo, a primate of Central Africa which eats a diet that's 95 percent plant based and 5 percent animal based. The plants are myriad—unlike the three plants that 60 percent of human calories come from. McWilliams's search for a better human diet leads him to those who are actively exploring the fringes of food, a group of outliers who are seeking nutrition innovation outside the industrial food system.... Essays