Good to Eat: Riddles of Food and CultureWhy are human food habits so diverse? Why do Americans recoil at the thought of dog meat? Jews and Moslems, pork? Hindus, beef? Why do Asians abhor milk? In Good to Eat, best-selling author Marvin Harris leads readers on an informative detective adventure to solve the worlds major food puzzles. He explains the diversity of the worlds gastronomic customs, demonstrating that what appear at first glance to be irrational food tastes turn out really to have been shaped by practical, economic, or political necessity. In addition, his smart and spirited treatment sheds wisdom on such topics as why there has been an explosion in fast food, why history indicates that its bad to eat people but good to kill them, and why children universally reject spinach. Good to Eat is more than an intellectual adventure in food for thought. It is a highly readable, scientifically accurate, and fascinating work that demystifies the causes of myriad human cultural differences. |
From inside the book
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... lives in an exasperating pursuit of more meat and other animal products. Why? One might suppose that the Polish government would be trying hard to get people to be satisfied with the dietary status quo. Yet rather than argue that the ...
... live by bread alone.” Wheat contains all of the essential amino acids, but to get enough of the ones that are in scarce supply a man weighing 176 pounds (80 kilos) would have to stuff himself with 3.3 pounds (1.5 kilos) of whole wheat ...
... live on fibrous plants, an animal must spend most of the day eating. Some of the great apes display many of the characteristics of animals that are adapted to a high-fiber, nutritionally unconcentrated diet of leaves and woody plants ...
... live a long time before these diseases break through the body's defenses. What has made it possible for us to live long enough for this to occur? In the rush to reduce the toll of heart disease and cancer, some of us may be in danger of ...
... live as long as there are Hindus to protect the cow.” Hindus venerate their cows (and bulls) as deities, keep them around the house, give them names, talk to them, deck them with flowers and tassels, let them have the right of way on ...
Contents
13 | |
19 | |
47 | |
The Abominable Pig
| 67 |
Hippophagy
| 88 |
Holy Beef USA
| 109 |
Lactophiles and Lactophobes Milk Lovers and Milk Haters
| 130 |
Small Things
| 154 |
Dogs Cats Dingoes and Other Pets
| 175 |
People Eating
| 199 |
Better to Eat
| 235 |
References | 249 |
Bibliography | 258 |
Index | 275 |