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Eating on the Wild Side: The Missing Link to Optimum Health
Goodreads Choice Award
Nominee for Readers' Favorite Food & Cookbooks (2013)The next stage in the food revolution--a radical way to select fruits and vegetables and reclaim the flavor and nutrients we've lost.
Ever since farmers first planted seeds 10,000 years ago, humans have been destroying the nutritional value of their fruits and vegetables. Unwittingly, we've been selecting plants that are high in starch and sugar and low in vitamins, minerals, fiber, and antioxidants for more than 400 generations.
EATING ON THE WILD SIDE reveals the solution--choosing modern varieties that approach the nutritional content of wild plants but that also please the modern palate. Jo Robinson explains that many of these newly identified varieties can be found in supermarkets and farmer's market, and introduces simple, scientifically proven methods of preparation that enhance their flavor and nutrition. Based on years of scientific research and filled with food history and practical advice, EATING ON THE WILD SIDE will forever change the way we think about food.
Winner of the 2014 IACP Cookbook Award in the category of "Food Matters."
Ever since farmers first planted seeds 10,000 years ago, humans have been destroying the nutritional value of their fruits and vegetables. Unwittingly, we've been selecting plants that are high in starch and sugar and low in vitamins, minerals, fiber, and antioxidants for more than 400 generations.
EATING ON THE WILD SIDE reveals the solution--choosing modern varieties that approach the nutritional content of wild plants but that also please the modern palate. Jo Robinson explains that many of these newly identified varieties can be found in supermarkets and farmer's market, and introduces simple, scientifically proven methods of preparation that enhance their flavor and nutrition. Based on years of scientific research and filled with food history and practical advice, EATING ON THE WILD SIDE will forever change the way we think about food.
Winner of the 2014 IACP Cookbook Award in the category of "Food Matters."
416 pages, Hardcover
First published June 4, 2013
531 people are currently reading
8296 people want to read
About the author
Jo Robinson
55 books36 followersJo Robinson, an investigative journalist and New York Times best-selling writer, is the author of the book, Pasture Perfect, and the principal researcher and writer for the eatwild.com web site. Jo has spent the last nine years researching the many benefits of raising animals on pasture. Her interest grew out of a previous book, The Omega Diet, co-authored with Dr. Artemis Simopoulos, that explores the health benefits of the Mediterranean diet. While researching the book, Jo learned that meat from pasture-raised animals is very similar to meat from wild game and that both promote optimal health.
Starting with this insight, she began an exhaustive search of the scientific literature from the 1960s to the present. To date, she has identified hundreds of peer-reviewed studies showing that raising animals on pasture is good for the animals, the environment, farm families, and the health of consumers. She gives talks to ranchers, government agencies, sustainable agricultural groups, and the general public around the country. Jo has been interviewed by scores of journalists and reporters about the benefits of raising animals on pasture.
Jo's book, When Your Body Gets the Blues, extended her interest in natural health to human psychology. Working with Dr. Marie-Annette Brown from the University of Washington, she developed a clinically proven, all-natural program that boosts women's mood and energy level and tames their appetite. (The book was featured in an hour-long special on PBS throughout the summer of 2003.)
Jo lives on Vashon Island in Washington State. She is developing a test garden that features plants with exceptional nutritional value that are similar to plants growing in the wild.
Starting with this insight, she began an exhaustive search of the scientific literature from the 1960s to the present. To date, she has identified hundreds of peer-reviewed studies showing that raising animals on pasture is good for the animals, the environment, farm families, and the health of consumers. She gives talks to ranchers, government agencies, sustainable agricultural groups, and the general public around the country. Jo has been interviewed by scores of journalists and reporters about the benefits of raising animals on pasture.
Jo's book, When Your Body Gets the Blues, extended her interest in natural health to human psychology. Working with Dr. Marie-Annette Brown from the University of Washington, she developed a clinically proven, all-natural program that boosts women's mood and energy level and tames their appetite. (The book was featured in an hour-long special on PBS throughout the summer of 2003.)
Jo lives on Vashon Island in Washington State. She is developing a test garden that features plants with exceptional nutritional value that are similar to plants growing in the wild.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 464 reviews
September 3, 2016
Eating on the Wild Side at first glance seems like a really cool Evolutionary History. Robinson traces the path from wild progenitors through various stages of domestication to modern fruits and vegetables. She describes how humans, through unintentional natural selection and intentional breeding programs involving hybridization, radiogenic mutation, and genetic modification, have shifted the edible parts of these crops from small, bitter, and phytonutrient dense to large, sweet, and nutritionally impoverished. It thus adds a genetic and biochemical dimension to dietary and health changes from hunter/gatherer or paleolithic diets to agricultural and modern industrial ones.
That's interesting, for one thing, because it shows that the health impacts of the modern diet might not be exclusively due to how much of various dietary components we eat, but also reflective of changes in the plants themselves. It's actually a great example of Russell's expanded concept of biotech, and I'd otherwise certainly never think of heirloom vegetables in the same way as genetically modified crops, but Robinson makes it clear that in both cases plants were changed to suit the demands of a commercial food system. Early-modern plant breeders were most definitely entrepreneurs.
So that's kind of the potential I saw in the book. That potential is made good on, a little bit, in each chapter, as Robinson discusses wild progenitors, where they are from, how they spread, and how they became the plant we know today, and what nutritional changes occurred along the way. These stories are all cursory, however, as the meat of the book consists of an obnoxious series of "variety X has 50 times more antioxidants than variety Y" statements, along with the mealy-mouthed "studies have shown that radishes may be linked with decreased risk of malady x, y, and z." Ugh.
I understand that there are reasons for this. The whole point of the book is to tell readers which varieties of vegetables have higher concentrations of phytonutrients, according to the latest research, and to summarize other medicinal findings of relevance. But it's not as though the book is set up to present that information efficiently as a reference. The tables provided are cursory and provide no actual data, while the text is definitely written to be read as a narrative. It's unclear what she's going for, but she failed.
This stylistic flaw is caused by a deeper problem in food and health thinking. Robinson premises the book on the "discovery" that phytonutrients are "good for us," blanket statement, end of story. She doesn't mention the debate about whether antioxidants, so defined, are really as good for our health as they are made out to be. The USDA went as far as taking down their database on plant antioxidant contents because they felt it was "routinely misused by food and dietary supplement manufacturing companies to promote their products and by consumers to guide their food and dietary supplement choices." So the antioxidant thing is one of many health food fad fixations. I'm not suggesting Robinson is wrong to follow the substantial literature in support of phytonutrient health benefits (specifically when consumed in whole foods, not supplements), the fact that she completely ignored the debate on the issue reflects her desire to jump in and whole-heartedly embrace her pet concept. This also leads her to take a simplistic "more is better" attitude throughout the book.
That attitude only goes so far, however, because she bizarrely considers nearly every wild food off the table for modern human consumption. She begins each chapter extolling the extraordinary nutritional content of wild foods like dandelions, chokeberries, and the wild progenitors of various fruits and vegetables, but always dismisses them as unpalatable, even when there are many ways we can prepare foods to overcome that. She suggests we eat a cup of blueberries a day, for instance, but the antioxidant content of that volume of fruit could be obtained for free from a chokeberry bush at much lower cost and volume - something that could help budget conscious consumers.
As a hopeful future farmer, this information is interesting to me. I want to plant a lot of native and wild food plants, and Robinson gives the clear justification for doing so (though she also both exemplifies and decries the cultural hill I'd be working up to sell, eg, chokeberries).
Robinson's "more is better" simplisticness also causes her to overlook the huge complexity in phytochemicals. She alludes to their intended purpose occasionally, saying they're meant to defend the plant from the environment, and therefore parts more exposed to the sun's UV rays (apples high on the tree), or to the soil environment (root veggie skins) contain much higher concentrations. But many phytochemicals are meant to deter herbivory, and it is therefore somewhat counterintuitive that they would be good for our health. Of course, the answer is simple - some compounds, like anthocyanins, are plant sunblock. Others, like alkaloids, saponins, tannins, cucurbitacins, etc, are simply there to be bitter or toxic, and we generally don't eat plants with too much of those chemicals. I'm not sure what the story behind compounds like allicin, the medicinal component of garlic, or the herbal oils in mint family plants, or glucosinalates (which Robinson assures us are "good for us" just like other phytonutrients), so it would have been nice if she'd bothered to explain. It would also just much more accurately reflect the complexity of the issue - both on the plant ecology/evolution end and the human nutrition end. Both are phenomenally complex, and Robinson does them little justice.
Most of the practical information in the book concerned storage and preparation practices (the rest was about varieties; aside from peaches and nectaries, strong colors, esp. purples, mean more nutrients). A lot of this is pretty obvious: eat the skins; boiling food saps nutrients into the water, so steam instead; fresh food is more nutritious (though I didn't realize how precipitous these declines could be - asparagus loses 40% of its sweetness in a day) so eat food soon after harvest. Others are less intuitive - flash-thawing frozen berries in the microwave is better than letting them thaw gradually, since as they thaw, polyphenol oxidase consumes their phytonutrients. By destroying those same enzymes and by converting phytochemicals into more bioavailable forms, cooking berries (and carrots) also increases their nutrient value.
Perhaps the most useful tidbit concerns garlic. It is exceedingly healthy, medicinal and nutritious, containing compounds that fight infection better than peniccilin. Allicin, one of the best of these, is only formed when cell walls are broken and the precursor molecule is exposed to the enzyme that converts it. The enzyme is heat sensitive, however, so little allicin is created if you crushed the garlic and cook it immediately. Robinson recommends a 10 minute reacting period to allow allicin to form, or to just eat it raw in a hummus or pesto.
These tips, and the book in general, verge on an obsession with obtaining and retaining maximum phytochemicals. If you're consuming fruits and vegetables (which you should be), you should be aware that there is a diversity, not all varieties are equal, and that these differences can have strong effects on your health. But don't get hung up over the 20% of antioxidants you lose when you freeze broccoli, or whatever.
P.S. I think Robinson also makes a misleading mistake about glycemic indices. Most fruit sugar comes in the form of fructose. Fructose is, of course, not glucose, and it is not converted into glucose like most starches, so it doesn't spike your blood sugar. Instead, it goes to your liver to be dismantled and converted to glycogen or fat. However, while it does not immediately spike your blood sugar, fructose is still correlated with the same issues caused by that spiking: metabolic syndrome and obesity. This issue is never raised; Robinson simply gives the reader "permission" to indulge sweeter fruits as though there is no difference at all.
P.P.S. I have to take back my biting postscript - it seems that the fiber in fresh fruit slows the adsorption of sugars and therefore minimizes the spike in blood sugar they cause. So Robinson's cavalier disregard of the ill consequences of fructose is justified. http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07...
That's interesting, for one thing, because it shows that the health impacts of the modern diet might not be exclusively due to how much of various dietary components we eat, but also reflective of changes in the plants themselves. It's actually a great example of Russell's expanded concept of biotech, and I'd otherwise certainly never think of heirloom vegetables in the same way as genetically modified crops, but Robinson makes it clear that in both cases plants were changed to suit the demands of a commercial food system. Early-modern plant breeders were most definitely entrepreneurs.
So that's kind of the potential I saw in the book. That potential is made good on, a little bit, in each chapter, as Robinson discusses wild progenitors, where they are from, how they spread, and how they became the plant we know today, and what nutritional changes occurred along the way. These stories are all cursory, however, as the meat of the book consists of an obnoxious series of "variety X has 50 times more antioxidants than variety Y" statements, along with the mealy-mouthed "studies have shown that radishes may be linked with decreased risk of malady x, y, and z." Ugh.
I understand that there are reasons for this. The whole point of the book is to tell readers which varieties of vegetables have higher concentrations of phytonutrients, according to the latest research, and to summarize other medicinal findings of relevance. But it's not as though the book is set up to present that information efficiently as a reference. The tables provided are cursory and provide no actual data, while the text is definitely written to be read as a narrative. It's unclear what she's going for, but she failed.
This stylistic flaw is caused by a deeper problem in food and health thinking. Robinson premises the book on the "discovery" that phytonutrients are "good for us," blanket statement, end of story. She doesn't mention the debate about whether antioxidants, so defined, are really as good for our health as they are made out to be. The USDA went as far as taking down their database on plant antioxidant contents because they felt it was "routinely misused by food and dietary supplement manufacturing companies to promote their products and by consumers to guide their food and dietary supplement choices." So the antioxidant thing is one of many health food fad fixations. I'm not suggesting Robinson is wrong to follow the substantial literature in support of phytonutrient health benefits (specifically when consumed in whole foods, not supplements), the fact that she completely ignored the debate on the issue reflects her desire to jump in and whole-heartedly embrace her pet concept. This also leads her to take a simplistic "more is better" attitude throughout the book.
That attitude only goes so far, however, because she bizarrely considers nearly every wild food off the table for modern human consumption. She begins each chapter extolling the extraordinary nutritional content of wild foods like dandelions, chokeberries, and the wild progenitors of various fruits and vegetables, but always dismisses them as unpalatable, even when there are many ways we can prepare foods to overcome that. She suggests we eat a cup of blueberries a day, for instance, but the antioxidant content of that volume of fruit could be obtained for free from a chokeberry bush at much lower cost and volume - something that could help budget conscious consumers.
As a hopeful future farmer, this information is interesting to me. I want to plant a lot of native and wild food plants, and Robinson gives the clear justification for doing so (though she also both exemplifies and decries the cultural hill I'd be working up to sell, eg, chokeberries).
Robinson's "more is better" simplisticness also causes her to overlook the huge complexity in phytochemicals. She alludes to their intended purpose occasionally, saying they're meant to defend the plant from the environment, and therefore parts more exposed to the sun's UV rays (apples high on the tree), or to the soil environment (root veggie skins) contain much higher concentrations. But many phytochemicals are meant to deter herbivory, and it is therefore somewhat counterintuitive that they would be good for our health. Of course, the answer is simple - some compounds, like anthocyanins, are plant sunblock. Others, like alkaloids, saponins, tannins, cucurbitacins, etc, are simply there to be bitter or toxic, and we generally don't eat plants with too much of those chemicals. I'm not sure what the story behind compounds like allicin, the medicinal component of garlic, or the herbal oils in mint family plants, or glucosinalates (which Robinson assures us are "good for us" just like other phytonutrients), so it would have been nice if she'd bothered to explain. It would also just much more accurately reflect the complexity of the issue - both on the plant ecology/evolution end and the human nutrition end. Both are phenomenally complex, and Robinson does them little justice.
Most of the practical information in the book concerned storage and preparation practices (the rest was about varieties; aside from peaches and nectaries, strong colors, esp. purples, mean more nutrients). A lot of this is pretty obvious: eat the skins; boiling food saps nutrients into the water, so steam instead; fresh food is more nutritious (though I didn't realize how precipitous these declines could be - asparagus loses 40% of its sweetness in a day) so eat food soon after harvest. Others are less intuitive - flash-thawing frozen berries in the microwave is better than letting them thaw gradually, since as they thaw, polyphenol oxidase consumes their phytonutrients. By destroying those same enzymes and by converting phytochemicals into more bioavailable forms, cooking berries (and carrots) also increases their nutrient value.
Perhaps the most useful tidbit concerns garlic. It is exceedingly healthy, medicinal and nutritious, containing compounds that fight infection better than peniccilin. Allicin, one of the best of these, is only formed when cell walls are broken and the precursor molecule is exposed to the enzyme that converts it. The enzyme is heat sensitive, however, so little allicin is created if you crushed the garlic and cook it immediately. Robinson recommends a 10 minute reacting period to allow allicin to form, or to just eat it raw in a hummus or pesto.
These tips, and the book in general, verge on an obsession with obtaining and retaining maximum phytochemicals. If you're consuming fruits and vegetables (which you should be), you should be aware that there is a diversity, not all varieties are equal, and that these differences can have strong effects on your health. But don't get hung up over the 20% of antioxidants you lose when you freeze broccoli, or whatever.
P.S. I think Robinson also makes a misleading mistake about glycemic indices. Most fruit sugar comes in the form of fructose. Fructose is, of course, not glucose, and it is not converted into glucose like most starches, so it doesn't spike your blood sugar. Instead, it goes to your liver to be dismantled and converted to glycogen or fat. However, while it does not immediately spike your blood sugar, fructose is still correlated with the same issues caused by that spiking: metabolic syndrome and obesity. This issue is never raised; Robinson simply gives the reader "permission" to indulge sweeter fruits as though there is no difference at all.
P.P.S. I have to take back my biting postscript - it seems that the fiber in fresh fruit slows the adsorption of sugars and therefore minimizes the spike in blood sugar they cause. So Robinson's cavalier disregard of the ill consequences of fructose is justified. http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07...
September 28, 2013
Am a little conflicted. On the one hand, some great info on selecting and processing your produce to maximize nutrition. On the other hand, I have a full time job and outside interests and cannot always guarantee I can cook my asparagus immediately upon purchasing it. So after a while, I became somewhat overwhelmed by the running tally of sins I am committing against my produce and the phytonutrients I am cavalierly letting drain from fruits and vegetables with every minute that ticks past. (Please note: this is not the fault of the author; she is just presenting facts. I might just not be emotionally or logistically equipped to deal with those facts.) In short: this might be a bit advanced for you if you are just, like, trying to eat more fruits and vegetables in general and might not be ready to hear how you're mismanaging your broccoli spend. (Also, as a person interested in wild food, was a tiny bit disappointed at the minimal amount of current-day wild food info. Other than berry-picking and a short bit in the greens section, if I recall correctly, foraging for more nutrient-rich wild food info seemed to be presented as primarily a historic activity. Might have been a great addition to have chapter on more wild food options.)
(Also an interesting take on some of the underlying assumptions in this review: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...)
(Also an interesting take on some of the underlying assumptions in this review: http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/...)
May 21, 2021
It was very well written and informative I will say that! This is one of the best books of it's kind that I have read.
From which varieties of fruits and vegetables are the healthiest to choose at the market (or grow yourself), to how to store them and prepare them to retain the most nutrients, this book covers it all.
I learned a lot,for instance
1) how cooked blueberries are even healthier than fresh.
2)how freezing broccoli kills its antioxidants.
3)how I've been buying the right kind of lettuce but storing it wrong).
4)how you get more nutrients from garlic if you let it rest for 10 minutes before adding it to any heat source
5)how beet greens can be more healthy for you than the beet themselves
6)cooking potatoes then chilling them for 24 hours turns them from a high glycemic vegetable in to a lower one.
It was packed with information, easy and fun to read. I would recommend it to any foodie or anyone who wants to know more about buying better fruits and vegetables.
This was a great Christmas present from my Brother.
From which varieties of fruits and vegetables are the healthiest to choose at the market (or grow yourself), to how to store them and prepare them to retain the most nutrients, this book covers it all.
I learned a lot,for instance
1) how cooked blueberries are even healthier than fresh.
2)how freezing broccoli kills its antioxidants.
3)how I've been buying the right kind of lettuce but storing it wrong).
4)how you get more nutrients from garlic if you let it rest for 10 minutes before adding it to any heat source
5)how beet greens can be more healthy for you than the beet themselves
6)cooking potatoes then chilling them for 24 hours turns them from a high glycemic vegetable in to a lower one.
It was packed with information, easy and fun to read. I would recommend it to any foodie or anyone who wants to know more about buying better fruits and vegetables.
This was a great Christmas present from my Brother.
August 2, 2013
Informative, interesting and surprising!
If you are anything like me, you already know we're supposed to be eating organic, you know the closer your food came from the ground (its source) the better it is for you, and you know that you should "eat the rainbow" in order to get all the essential nutrients your body needs. You especially know all this if you are a parent and are trying to give your kids the best start they can get - keeping them away from processed, fried, chemical-laced, dyed, and genetically modified garbage.
Are you ready to take your fresh food one step further? Here is your guide!
Luckily, I live in the Garden State - don't laugh! Where I live in New Jersey, I'm surrounded by farmland...but I'm not always sure what to choose when I get to the farm stand. Aren't all tomatoes made equal? (The smaller the tomato, the more concentrated its nutrients!) And, once I get it home in my organic cotton tote bag, I'm not always sure I'm storing it properly (Storing broccoli wrapped in a plastic bag with tiny pin pricks in it will give you up to 125% more antioxidants!) or cooking it in order to maintain its nutritional integrity (Carrots are more nutritious COOKED!).
Also, did you know:
• Thawing frozen berries in the microwave preserves twice as many antioxidants and more vitamin C than thawing them on the counter or inside your refrigerator.
• Ounce per ounce, there is more fiber in raspberries than bran cereals.
• Tearing Romaine and Iceberg lettuce the day before you eat it quadruples its antioxidant content.
• The healing properties of garlic can be maximized by slicing, chopping, mashing, or pressing it and then letting it rest for a full 10 minutes before cooking.
• The yellowest corn in the store has 35 times more beta-carotene than white corn.
• Cooking potatoes and then chilling them for about 24 hours before you eat them (even if you reheat them) turns a high-glycemic vegetable into a low- or moderate-glycemic vegetable.
• Beet greens are more nutritious than the beets themselves.
• The most nutritious tomatoes in the supermarket are not in the produce aisles—
they are in the canned goods section! Processed tomatoes, whether canned or cooked into a paste or sauce, are the richest known source of lycopene.
You've heard about the worst salads you can eat (hello, tex mex!), discover the most nutritious salad you can build, including a tasty recipe for vinaigrette!
For any home gardeners out there, this is a must-have book. You'll get the most from your garden and your table from Eating On The Wild Side. Full of charts, bullet points, and logical chapters, you will find this reference guide often used in your kitchen!
The only thing I would change about this book - and I'm going to sound like a five year old now - is I wish there were color photos. I'm sure this would probably turn this $15 book into a $35 book, so for that reason, I'm happy it is the way it is.
Informative, interesting, and surprising.
If you are anything like me, you already know we're supposed to be eating organic, you know the closer your food came from the ground (its source) the better it is for you, and you know that you should "eat the rainbow" in order to get all the essential nutrients your body needs. You especially know all this if you are a parent and are trying to give your kids the best start they can get - keeping them away from processed, fried, chemical-laced, dyed, and genetically modified garbage.
Are you ready to take your fresh food one step further? Here is your guide!
Luckily, I live in the Garden State - don't laugh! Where I live in New Jersey, I'm surrounded by farmland...but I'm not always sure what to choose when I get to the farm stand. Aren't all tomatoes made equal? (The smaller the tomato, the more concentrated its nutrients!) And, once I get it home in my organic cotton tote bag, I'm not always sure I'm storing it properly (Storing broccoli wrapped in a plastic bag with tiny pin pricks in it will give you up to 125% more antioxidants!) or cooking it in order to maintain its nutritional integrity (Carrots are more nutritious COOKED!).
Also, did you know:
• Thawing frozen berries in the microwave preserves twice as many antioxidants and more vitamin C than thawing them on the counter or inside your refrigerator.
• Ounce per ounce, there is more fiber in raspberries than bran cereals.
• Tearing Romaine and Iceberg lettuce the day before you eat it quadruples its antioxidant content.
• The healing properties of garlic can be maximized by slicing, chopping, mashing, or pressing it and then letting it rest for a full 10 minutes before cooking.
• The yellowest corn in the store has 35 times more beta-carotene than white corn.
• Cooking potatoes and then chilling them for about 24 hours before you eat them (even if you reheat them) turns a high-glycemic vegetable into a low- or moderate-glycemic vegetable.
• Beet greens are more nutritious than the beets themselves.
• The most nutritious tomatoes in the supermarket are not in the produce aisles—
they are in the canned goods section! Processed tomatoes, whether canned or cooked into a paste or sauce, are the richest known source of lycopene.
You've heard about the worst salads you can eat (hello, tex mex!), discover the most nutritious salad you can build, including a tasty recipe for vinaigrette!
For any home gardeners out there, this is a must-have book. You'll get the most from your garden and your table from Eating On The Wild Side. Full of charts, bullet points, and logical chapters, you will find this reference guide often used in your kitchen!
The only thing I would change about this book - and I'm going to sound like a five year old now - is I wish there were color photos. I'm sure this would probably turn this $15 book into a $35 book, so for that reason, I'm happy it is the way it is.
Informative, interesting, and surprising.
February 6, 2019
My mouth waters for red bananas in Baracoa.
Who cares about Cuban bananas? Well, this book is chock full of food hacks, the science to back it up, and counter intuitive surprises.
The chapter on alliums is worth the book, and will forever change your understanding of garlic. Artichoke hearts? I've always loved artichoke hearts. Now I know that even canned, they may be the most nutritious food in the grocery store! What!?
For every food group (Apples?) she breaks down where, say, the Honeycrisp apple was developed from, why (sugar, more sugar!), what varieties of each food are the most nutritious (set that Honeycrisp back down...), how to choose the best fruit in the grocery store, and how to prepare it or preserve it for maximum nutritive value.
I just read the last chapter, on melons, to finally finish this amazing book that will be a reference book for me forever and I will hustle to everyone who will listen to me (You gotta read this....you can quadruple your phytonutrients just be choosing a different kind of lettuce...- I'll be soooo popular)
Turns out melons, and most other tropical fruits as seen in the grocery store, are sadly much less nutritious for us than many local options, like blueberries.
No wonder. In order to make it possible to ship our bananas and pineapples, etc, for such obscene distances and arrive intact, the resulting fruit is a pale shadow of the original. Those bananas in Cuba that were so darn memorable also hold hundreds of times as many nutrients as the big chalky yellows in the store. Oh, and the banana fungus of doom? Already happened! A fungus totally eliminated the last commercial banana a few decades ago. We're on our second banana breed. Who knew!?
Who cares about Cuban bananas? Well, this book is chock full of food hacks, the science to back it up, and counter intuitive surprises.
The chapter on alliums is worth the book, and will forever change your understanding of garlic. Artichoke hearts? I've always loved artichoke hearts. Now I know that even canned, they may be the most nutritious food in the grocery store! What!?
For every food group (Apples?) she breaks down where, say, the Honeycrisp apple was developed from, why (sugar, more sugar!), what varieties of each food are the most nutritious (set that Honeycrisp back down...), how to choose the best fruit in the grocery store, and how to prepare it or preserve it for maximum nutritive value.
I just read the last chapter, on melons, to finally finish this amazing book that will be a reference book for me forever and I will hustle to everyone who will listen to me (You gotta read this....you can quadruple your phytonutrients just be choosing a different kind of lettuce...- I'll be soooo popular)
Turns out melons, and most other tropical fruits as seen in the grocery store, are sadly much less nutritious for us than many local options, like blueberries.
No wonder. In order to make it possible to ship our bananas and pineapples, etc, for such obscene distances and arrive intact, the resulting fruit is a pale shadow of the original. Those bananas in Cuba that were so darn memorable also hold hundreds of times as many nutrients as the big chalky yellows in the store. Oh, and the banana fungus of doom? Already happened! A fungus totally eliminated the last commercial banana a few decades ago. We're on our second banana breed. Who knew!?
February 9, 2017
This book is mostly relevant to American consumers but useful to read to anyone who's interested in knowing a little bit about what we eat.
Before reading this book, I have never thought that there could be a less nutritional fruit or vegetable; all we hear in media is only GMO, organic and conventional produce. But this book could enlighten you about how to shop smarter.
Basically, throughout the industrialization of plants, we came out with ways of yielding more crop for less work: favoring plants that produce bigger fruits, certain color, seedless variations, with more sugar and emitting bitterness. Therefore we end up eating very sweet apples without any nutrition which could rather give you diabetes than help. Quite a radical thought, right? Because government puts a lot of money in encouraging people to eat more fruits and vegetables, therefore a typical American eats a lot of bananas and potatoes. Fruits and vegetables, wouldn't you say? But it's like a trash level in nutrition scale.
We prefer baby carrots to a full carrot, without knowing that the shavings are the most nutritious part of the carrot and not the core. We love sweet fruits but hate bitter ones, which are the most nutritious. We think raw diet is the best, but sometimes cooking might bump up the nutrition level etc.
You could learn a lot from this book, and especially, how to shop.
(I even learned that beets are like a veggie world viagra!)
Before reading this book, I have never thought that there could be a less nutritional fruit or vegetable; all we hear in media is only GMO, organic and conventional produce. But this book could enlighten you about how to shop smarter.
Basically, throughout the industrialization of plants, we came out with ways of yielding more crop for less work: favoring plants that produce bigger fruits, certain color, seedless variations, with more sugar and emitting bitterness. Therefore we end up eating very sweet apples without any nutrition which could rather give you diabetes than help. Quite a radical thought, right? Because government puts a lot of money in encouraging people to eat more fruits and vegetables, therefore a typical American eats a lot of bananas and potatoes. Fruits and vegetables, wouldn't you say? But it's like a trash level in nutrition scale.
We prefer baby carrots to a full carrot, without knowing that the shavings are the most nutritious part of the carrot and not the core. We love sweet fruits but hate bitter ones, which are the most nutritious. We think raw diet is the best, but sometimes cooking might bump up the nutrition level etc.
You could learn a lot from this book, and especially, how to shop.
(I even learned that beets are like a veggie world viagra!)
December 3, 2013
I'm in favor of almost any book that encourages people to delight in eating fruits and vegetables. Eating on the Wild Side looks like a great resource for gardeners, and gives lots of buying and cooking info for a wide range of plant foods. But having said that, I have a few caveats for those who might look to this book as the last word on the issue (and I've seen it cited quite a few times). Despite touting antioxidants, no mention is made that how they function in the human body is unknown/controversial, or that the ORAC database has been removed because of concerns about its misuse. There is also no visible rationale for the foods chosen for discussion: it looks like all the big ones are there, but on reflection, where is eggplant? celery? etc. Does the author think they less good for you? Why? And there are factual errors as well -- two leap to mind: 1) The idea that plant proteins must be carefully combined at each meal was disproven almost as soon as it was proposed, and Robinson does a disservice to repeat it; and 2) There are lots of studies on microwaving broccoli and other vegetables, some showing it causes nutrients to be lost and some showing that more nutrients are preserved (how much water is added is one factor that may affect results), but she has latched onto the idea that broccoli's nutritional value will be destroyed in the microwave and never gives a balanced view, nor does she discuss the issue with regard to any other vegetables. Finally, the author usually writes as though antioxidants alone determine the value of a food, and of course there's much more to it than that. So be inspired by this book to eat well, but don't rely on the details.
March 25, 2022
Fascinating overview of the cultivation and farming of fruits and vegetables with information on how to choose and cook modern fruits and vegetables to get the most nutrition (as, sadly, plants aren’t as nutritious as they once were). I especially appreciate the summary at the end of each chapter with the important points such as buying blue corn over yellow or white or leaving garlic to sit around after chopping it for 10 minutes to make it more nutritious. I am putting my name back on the list at the library so I can read it again. There were also some 🤯facts. For example potatoes 🥔 are not native to Ireland or the US (eg Idaho) they’re actually from 🇨🇱 Chile (!!)
I will say that even after 15+ years eating only whole plant foods, and not eating anything “processed” (except hot sauce and mustard) and being the type of person who goes to a farmers market/gets a CSA; I found it overwhelming at times to hear how I so often “did things wrong” for example, you have to cook broccoli right away—immediately after it’s been cut or it dramatically loses nutrition. I don’t know I’ll ever be able to “optimize” some of the facts presented here; my family & I may just have to settle for eating asparagus and broccoli that has degraded in nutritive value — but hey! It’s still better than French fries.
I would love to see informational videos on each of these on curiosity stream or Netflix. The visuals would be terrific and helpful to the masses.
I will say that even after 15+ years eating only whole plant foods, and not eating anything “processed” (except hot sauce and mustard) and being the type of person who goes to a farmers market/gets a CSA; I found it overwhelming at times to hear how I so often “did things wrong” for example, you have to cook broccoli right away—immediately after it’s been cut or it dramatically loses nutrition. I don’t know I’ll ever be able to “optimize” some of the facts presented here; my family & I may just have to settle for eating asparagus and broccoli that has degraded in nutritive value — but hey! It’s still better than French fries.
I would love to see informational videos on each of these on curiosity stream or Netflix. The visuals would be terrific and helpful to the masses.
June 10, 2017
Журналистка Jo Robinson написала книгу о том, какие варианты фруктов и овощей стоит есть, чтобы получить наибольшее количество полезных веществ, основываясь на мета-анализе большого количества исследований.
Она описывает историю одомашнивания растений, дает рекомендации о том что выбирать в супермаркете, какие сорта наилучшие для выращивания (только для американских сортах) и как хранить те или иные растения. Конечно же некоторые вещи были не новыми или были подтверждением того, что я знала с детства, но очень много чего поразило.
Например, я узнала, что:
- одомашнивание многих овощей и фруктов привело к значительной потере полезных веществ, потому что в ходе селекции люди предпочитали самые сладкие варианты, в то время как большинство фитонутриентов будут вместе с кислым, горьким, вяжущим вкусом.
- салат айсберг не рекомендуют включать в диету для для кроликов, потому что в нем очень мало фитонутриентов
- современные сорта кукурузы, которые очень сладкие, появились в результате мутации после того, как на кукурузу сбросили ядерную бомбу (в ходе эксперимента с ядерными бомбами)
И много чего другого. Конечно, книга научно-популярна, поэтому в некоторых местах возникают вопросы к автору, или кажется, что информации недостаточно, но эта книга станет отличным справочником для меня.
Она описывает историю одомашнивания растений, дает рекомендации о том что выбирать в супермаркете, какие сорта наилучшие для выращивания (только для американских сортах) и как хранить те или иные растения. Конечно же некоторые вещи были не новыми или были подтверждением того, что я знала с детства, но очень много чего поразило.
Например, я узнала, что:
- одомашнивание многих овощей и фруктов привело к значительной потере полезных веществ, потому что в ходе селекции люди предпочитали самые сладкие варианты, в то время как большинство фитонутриентов будут вместе с кислым, горьким, вяжущим вкусом.
- салат айсберг не рекомендуют включать в диету для для кроликов, потому что в нем очень мало фитонутриентов
- современные сорта кукурузы, которые очень сладкие, появились в результате мутации после того, как на кукурузу сбросили ядерную бомбу (в ходе эксперимента с ядерными бомбами)
И много чего другого. Конечно, книга научно-популярна, поэтому в некоторых местах возникают вопросы к автору, или кажется, что информации недостаточно, но эта книга станет отличным справочником для меня.
June 30, 2025
This book was fascinating. With modern science we have the ability to determine which varieties of fruits and vegetables are the most healthy. Surprisingly, it isn’t always the heirloom varieties. In general a good rule of thumb is the more colorful it is, the higher its levels of antioxidants and phytonutrients. However, there are exceptions, such as the white- fleshed peach is actually more nutritious than its yellow- fleshed counterpart. This book is very helpful in describing the best ways to shop for produce as well as the best methods to prepare the produce for optimal nutrition. If you enjoy growing your own fruits and vegetables like I do, a bonus is it lists the varieties you can grow that are the most nutrient dense.
March 3, 2019
I love books about food, but this one was information overload. It felt like a bit too much to remember. Go for the dark colored fruits, except for when you need to go for the light colored ones. Store this one in the fridge, and that one on the counter. Cook this one, but eat that one raw.
Quotes:
To this day, the nutritional content of our man-made varieties has been an afterthought. A plant researcher for the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) can spend years perfecting a new variety of blackberry or apple without ever measuring its phytonutrient content or its effect on blood sugar. If the variety is attractive, pleasing to eat, productive, and disease resistant, it is considered a triumph. Meanwhile, our bodies hunger for the nutrients that we have left by the wayside.
One of the new food rules states that we should shop by color, selecting varieties that are red, orange, purple, dark green, and yellow. Although richly colored fruits and vegetables are among the most nutritious, there are dozens of exceptions to the rule. White-fleshed peaches and nectarines, for example, have twice as many bionutrients as yellow-fleshed varieties
Most berries, for example, increase their antioxidant activity when you cook them. Believe it or not, canned blueberries have more phytonutrients than fresh ones—provided you consume the canning liquid. Simmering a tomato sauce for hours—the traditional Italian method—does more than blend its flavors; it can triple its lycopene content. Cooking carrots whole and then slicing or dicing them after they’ve been cooked makes them taste sweeter and increases their ability to fight cancer.
Watermelons become more nutritious if you leave them out on the counter for several days before you eat them. Potatoes can be stored for weeks or even months without losing any of their nutritional value, but broccoli begins to lose its cancer-fighting compounds within twenty-four hours of harvest.
Compared to spinach, one of our present-day “superfoods,” dandelion leaves have eight times more antioxidants, two times more calcium, three times more vitamin A, and five times more vitamin K and vitamin E.
The most nutritious greens in the supermarket are not green at all but red, purple, or reddish brown… Choose the most intensely colored lettuces—preferably red or dark green—that also have the loosest arrangement of leaves.
When cooking spinach, steam it or cook it in the microwave. Do not boil.
For even more health benefits, look for a newcomer on the supermarket shelves—unfiltered extra virgin olive oil.
If you eat garlic raw, you don’t have to worry about short-circuiting the production of allicin… To get maximum amounts of allicin, slice, mince, or press the garlic and then let it rest for ten minutes before exposing it to heat.
Our modern corn differs from its native ancestor more than any other edible plant.
Steam, grill, or microwave corn; do not boil it.
We have not only “depurpled” corn and carrots, we have removed the anthocyanins from a number of other fruits and vegetables as well, including broccoli and cauliflower. The green, yellow, orange, and white varieties of produce that predominate in our supermarkets do not come close to the healing properties of their purple-hued and red-hued ancestors.
Currant tomatoes [are] the superstar of tomato nutrition [and] are now sold in most large supermarkets.
Processed tomatoes, whether canned or cooked into a paste or sauce, are the richest known sources of lycopene. The reason is that the heat of the canning process makes the lycopene more bioavailable.
In a 2011 survey of the top one hundred antioxidant-rich foods in the United States, canned kidney beans and pinto beans were ranked first and second, respectively. They had a greater ORAC value than blueberries, black plums, red wine, red cabbage, spinach, and green tea.
Lab studies show that you would have to eat six yellow-fleshed Flavorcrest peaches to get the same antioxidant benefits as in one white-fleshed Snow King. The same is true for nectarines.
The Australian Kakadu plum has more vitamin C than any other food analyzed to date.
In a 2008 University of California survey of a variety of types and brands of fruit juice, lab tests showed that Welch’s Concord grape juice had a higher ORAC value than all the other juices tested, including acai juice, a Brazilian interloper that can cost a hefty six dollars more per quart.
A 1990 study determined that blood oranges grown in California have a darker flesh color and as much as thirty-five times more anthocyanins than those grown in Florida and Texas.
Tangelos have more phytonutrients (especially flavanones) than most sweet oranges.
Juice that was made from concentrate had, on average, 45 percent more flavonoids than juice that had never been concentrated.
Adding a squirt of lemon to your teacup or teapot before you brew green tea increases the amount of the phytonutrients in the brew and also enhances your ability to absorb them.
Ripe limes are yellow, not green. The darkest green limes in the store are the most immature and will have the least juice.
Guavas are more nutritious than bananas, pineapples, papayas, and mangoes. Red-fleshed guavas are the most nutritious of all.
Keep a watermelon on your counter for several days and it will have 50 percent more lycopene than it did when you bought it.
November 1, 2023
Very informative, I enjoyed this more than I expected
June 29, 2018
It was a very interesting read. She goes into great depth about the history of the fruits and vegetables we eat. I am looking forward to incorporating her tips into my eating.
January 8, 2014
Well... clearly this was someone's life work, or at least part of a life's work, and probably functions best as a reference book. It wasn't great reading, and what felt like efforts to make it better reading (casual style, occasional personal anecdotes) weren't really effective for me. Some of the science struck me as iffy--after another reviewer mentioned that the book advocates food-combining for "complete proteins" I no longer felt guilty about how I should read every word because I would be missing out on important information (though I never came across the reference myself), and while the goal always seems to be "health" (rather than "anti-aging"), still, some of the rhetoric was on the side of books and magazines that seem to think we should all have the goal of never getting old, never getting wrinkles, and never dying.
So after the first couple of chapters I skimmed, and I'm glad I did. If I were a gardener or farmer, I'd be more likely to own this book and take it off the shelves for reference once in a while when deciding what varieties to plant.
I did read the "points to remember" tl;dr summary at the end of each chapter, and found that the main points were actually not the touted "surprises" at all. Most of them go along with current conventional wisdom (eat fresh, eat soon, eat more--produce, that is). And no matter how many more "antioxidants" I might get, I'm not going to start eating canned beans over dried beans (very short-sighted advice, that--there are many reasons not to eat canned beans; think of the landfills, to begin with) and I'm NOT going to buy a microwave so I can microwave my broccoli.
So after the first couple of chapters I skimmed, and I'm glad I did. If I were a gardener or farmer, I'd be more likely to own this book and take it off the shelves for reference once in a while when deciding what varieties to plant.
I did read the "points to remember" tl;dr summary at the end of each chapter, and found that the main points were actually not the touted "surprises" at all. Most of them go along with current conventional wisdom (eat fresh, eat soon, eat more--produce, that is). And no matter how many more "antioxidants" I might get, I'm not going to start eating canned beans over dried beans (very short-sighted advice, that--there are many reasons not to eat canned beans; think of the landfills, to begin with) and I'm NOT going to buy a microwave so I can microwave my broccoli.
December 9, 2015
Excellent information. I learned things I wish I had known sooner.
I am going to change what I buy and some things about storing and preparing.
Each chapter is a different group of food like an apples chapter and a grapes chapter. The author describes the phytonutrients in each item, how they affect the body, health benefits, anticancer properties, and more. For example garlic helps thin the blood, montmorency cherries lessen pain. She tells how to store and cook foods to get the most phytonutrient benefit.
She tells how to select produce. For example try to buy apples that are red on most sides rather than red on one side and light yellow/orange on another side. The red side was exposed to the sun. A bite from the red side gives you more phytonutrients than a bite from the yellow side. Select limes that are toward the yellow color rather than dark green.
She talks about pesticides. In light of E-coli risk, she says to rinse and scrub canteloupes but don’t use detergent since the skin absorbs the soap.
My biggest regret is that many items were not discussed. For example, popped corn, sweet potatoes, nuts, chocolate/cacao, mushrooms, and the effects of fermenting (like sauerkraut - fermented cabbage).
I listened to the audiobook which has a helpful PDF you can download. But I was so taken that I also bought the physical book as a reference going forward.
AUDIOBOOK NARRATOR:
The narrator Erin Bennett was excellent with good sound recording equipment - so I didn’t hear her breaths.
DATA:
Unabridged audiobook length: 11 hrs. Book copyright: 2013. Genre: nonfiction, food.
I am going to change what I buy and some things about storing and preparing.
Each chapter is a different group of food like an apples chapter and a grapes chapter. The author describes the phytonutrients in each item, how they affect the body, health benefits, anticancer properties, and more. For example garlic helps thin the blood, montmorency cherries lessen pain. She tells how to store and cook foods to get the most phytonutrient benefit.
She tells how to select produce. For example try to buy apples that are red on most sides rather than red on one side and light yellow/orange on another side. The red side was exposed to the sun. A bite from the red side gives you more phytonutrients than a bite from the yellow side. Select limes that are toward the yellow color rather than dark green.
She talks about pesticides. In light of E-coli risk, she says to rinse and scrub canteloupes but don’t use detergent since the skin absorbs the soap.
My biggest regret is that many items were not discussed. For example, popped corn, sweet potatoes, nuts, chocolate/cacao, mushrooms, and the effects of fermenting (like sauerkraut - fermented cabbage).
I listened to the audiobook which has a helpful PDF you can download. But I was so taken that I also bought the physical book as a reference going forward.
AUDIOBOOK NARRATOR:
The narrator Erin Bennett was excellent with good sound recording equipment - so I didn’t hear her breaths.
DATA:
Unabridged audiobook length: 11 hrs. Book copyright: 2013. Genre: nonfiction, food.
October 26, 2013
I was delighted to receive a copy of this book through Goodreads. The histories of each type of vegetable or fruit are interesting reading. Finding out exactly how to maximize the nutrients for each is practical knowledge that can immediately be put to use. A summary of these helpful tips is at the end of each chapter. Also at the end of each chapter is a list of varieties with comments on their corresponding nutritional value. Unfortunately, no data is included with these notes and the number of varieties mentioned is very small. Also, no mention is made of which varieties or even which vegetable types are likely to be genetically modified. This is a huge omission in this book.
There are some recipes in the book, but they are interspersed with the text so would be very hard to find if you go to the book looking for a specific recipe. References for each chapter are listed which is useful for further reading. This edition does not have an index which is a major shortcoming, but it is an advance reading copy, so the final edition may have an index.
Overall I really enjoyed reading this book, but it is poorly organized and would be difficult to refer back to as a quick reference when you're at the farmer's market or even in your kitchen when looking to optimally store or prepare your produce.
There are some recipes in the book, but they are interspersed with the text so would be very hard to find if you go to the book looking for a specific recipe. References for each chapter are listed which is useful for further reading. This edition does not have an index which is a major shortcoming, but it is an advance reading copy, so the final edition may have an index.
Overall I really enjoyed reading this book, but it is poorly organized and would be difficult to refer back to as a quick reference when you're at the farmer's market or even in your kitchen when looking to optimally store or prepare your produce.
February 18, 2014
In Eating on the Wild Side, nutrition researcher Jo Robinson turns the produce aisle into a medicine cabinet. She has sorted through massive quantities of food studies to reveal the fruit and vegetable superstars and how to select, store and prepare them to maximize absorption of vitamins, minerals, fiber and antioxidants.
Each fruit and vegetable is introduced with a description of its wild ancestor and a brief history of its domestication and resulting nutritional changes. Some cultivars have retained more of the wild nutrients than others. Robinson discusses the cultivars most available in U.S. supermarkets or farmer's markets, the relative merits of each, and when canned or frozen versions may serve as well as fresh.
I learned, for example, that purple carrots are the richest in bionutrients, and for all carrots, nutrients are more available if the carrot is cooked rather than raw. The best practice is to steam the carrots whole and slice them after. She also recommends eating them with a little oil or fat.
At the end of each chapter, Robinson provides a chart of recommended types and varieties of the fruit or vegetable for shoppers and home gardeners, as well as a good-better-best summary.
This book is highly useful. I have it out from the library but intend to purchase a copy to keep as a reference.
Each fruit and vegetable is introduced with a description of its wild ancestor and a brief history of its domestication and resulting nutritional changes. Some cultivars have retained more of the wild nutrients than others. Robinson discusses the cultivars most available in U.S. supermarkets or farmer's markets, the relative merits of each, and when canned or frozen versions may serve as well as fresh.
I learned, for example, that purple carrots are the richest in bionutrients, and for all carrots, nutrients are more available if the carrot is cooked rather than raw. The best practice is to steam the carrots whole and slice them after. She also recommends eating them with a little oil or fat.
At the end of each chapter, Robinson provides a chart of recommended types and varieties of the fruit or vegetable for shoppers and home gardeners, as well as a good-better-best summary.
This book is highly useful. I have it out from the library but intend to purchase a copy to keep as a reference.
February 6, 2015
What an excellent book! Readable and yet well-researched, this is the book to consult if you want to get more 'bang for your buck' in terms of nutrition from your vegetables and fruits.
There were some surprising exceptions to the general rule of thumb "fresh is best". Generally though, most vegetables and fruits are more nutritious the sooner you can eat them after they're harvested. It's prompted me to shop at least twice a week for my fruit & veg rather than once a week. Although I've long relished the freshness of produce sold at farmers markets, the research confirms what I suspected, that fresher food is more nutritious.
Oh yes - and that old rule-of-thumb of choosing deeper coloured vegetables and fruits for greater nutrition? Generally, it's accurate. There are some unexpected exceptions, like golden raisins versus dark raisins.
This book is written for the American market, so it lists varieties by their American name - but the information is still useful for other countries. There are recipes too, I'm planning to try the Armenian lentil soup.
There were some surprising exceptions to the general rule of thumb "fresh is best". Generally though, most vegetables and fruits are more nutritious the sooner you can eat them after they're harvested. It's prompted me to shop at least twice a week for my fruit & veg rather than once a week. Although I've long relished the freshness of produce sold at farmers markets, the research confirms what I suspected, that fresher food is more nutritious.
Oh yes - and that old rule-of-thumb of choosing deeper coloured vegetables and fruits for greater nutrition? Generally, it's accurate. There are some unexpected exceptions, like golden raisins versus dark raisins.
This book is written for the American market, so it lists varieties by their American name - but the information is still useful for other countries. There are recipes too, I'm planning to try the Armenian lentil soup.
April 11, 2015
We all know that eating fruits and vegetables are good for our health but we might not know that some of the modern fruits and vegetables have much less nutritional value than others.
Our ancestors have been eating wild fruits and vegetables for generations. And these wild fruits and vegetables provide us with plenty of nutrients for us to fight all kinds of diseases for survival. However, recent advancement in agriculture has made growing these fruits and vegetables more efficient, look prettier and taste better without much consideration on their nutritious values, particularly the amount of phytonutrient which is vital in helping us combat many diseases. This book provides you with good knowledge on how you can best pick the vegetables and fruits that provide the most nutrition and most of the time still enjoy their delicious taste.
I read it on a kindle version borrowed from the library but I will get a hardcopy and serve as a reference as I know I will refer to it from time to time.
Our ancestors have been eating wild fruits and vegetables for generations. And these wild fruits and vegetables provide us with plenty of nutrients for us to fight all kinds of diseases for survival. However, recent advancement in agriculture has made growing these fruits and vegetables more efficient, look prettier and taste better without much consideration on their nutritious values, particularly the amount of phytonutrient which is vital in helping us combat many diseases. This book provides you with good knowledge on how you can best pick the vegetables and fruits that provide the most nutrition and most of the time still enjoy their delicious taste.
I read it on a kindle version borrowed from the library but I will get a hardcopy and serve as a reference as I know I will refer to it from time to time.
February 13, 2016
This book gives good histories of many fruits and vegetables that we eat. While I knew of the contribution of the new world to the world's diet there were many things that I did not realize came from the new world. In America the Apple was greatly modified and it is not so great a stretch to say that Apple Pie is American.
I ignored most of the "phyto-nutrient" information. Choosing ones diet strictly on levels of phyto-nutrients and not also on taste is to me a mistake.
Overall an interesting book.
I ignored most of the "phyto-nutrient" information. Choosing ones diet strictly on levels of phyto-nutrients and not also on taste is to me a mistake.
Overall an interesting book.
February 7, 2017
Easy read, surprisingly engaging, very practical information.
July 21, 2025
I enjoyed this book so much! I knew I loved the art of food, but I discovered I also love the science of food. This book was a combination of three subjects I love: health, history, and gardening. I took so many notes, but here are a few highlights. Our most nutritious fruits and vegetables are often the most deeply pigmented, with a few exceptions to the rule. The first hunter gatherers collected their favorite varieties based on taste rather than nutritive value, then the earliest farmers and plant breeders focused on taste and ease of harvest, and many fruits lost more of their phytonutrients. More recently, fruits and vegetables are bred for shelf storage and appearance, and so taste has suffered greatly as well. This book contains a wealth of information, including how to select fresh vegetables with both the best taste and the most antioxidant value at the grocery store, the best varieties for planting, tips for storing and preparing, and how to limit pesticide ingestion. A few changes I have already made based on advice in this book are to press garlic ten minutes before adding it to a hot pan (it develops allicin, garlic's main active ingredient that is antibacterial and cancer fighting) and make potatoes a day ahead and refrigerate overnight (to lower their glycemic index). I also want to stop removing as much of the white pith off my orange pieces, but I don't think I'm going to start eating the skins of my sweet potatoes, even though they are more nutritious than the flesh. The author made it clear that choosing the most nutrient dense options should not supercede our enjoyment of the food.
March 8, 2024
Five stars because what I learned impacted my lifestyle directly, and I will apply this knowledge for the rest of my life. It is the next step into a more nutritious lifestyle after you have mastered the basics of “eat more fruits and vegetables; less processed food”. Still very practical, and logical, unlike some health trends that can be very extremist.
Book talks about what varieties of fruits and vegetables, within each type of food, are the most nutritious. It talks about how to select, store, cook, and consume each type. I loved how practical the advice is, informing what varieties can be found and should be chosen in regular supermarkets, in specialty markets, and in farmers markets or for your own garden.
The book also talks about history and roots (pun intended) of each food, and about humans impact on the evolution of the plants we eat. Very scientific in the history, nutritional content, and health benefits of fruits and vegetables. Although I did not verified the sources, references for each chapter are provided.
Book talks about what varieties of fruits and vegetables, within each type of food, are the most nutritious. It talks about how to select, store, cook, and consume each type. I loved how practical the advice is, informing what varieties can be found and should be chosen in regular supermarkets, in specialty markets, and in farmers markets or for your own garden.
The book also talks about history and roots (pun intended) of each food, and about humans impact on the evolution of the plants we eat. Very scientific in the history, nutritional content, and health benefits of fruits and vegetables. Although I did not verified the sources, references for each chapter are provided.
March 9, 2019
3.5 stars
Finally finished this today my just skimming through the chapters and reading the summary for each topic. This isn’t really a book that you want to sit down and read straight through. Although it is well researched and has a lot of useful information, it’s more of a reference book than anything. Excellent tips on how to maximize nutrients in you produce by A) picking out specific variations at the grocery store B) proper storage instructions and C) best cooking methods to avoid denaturation of vitamins and minerals.
I highlighted chapters that contain produce that I buy the most. I do believe some information in this text should be taken with a grain of salt and not all of it will be beneficial or even relevant to the average American.
Finally finished this today my just skimming through the chapters and reading the summary for each topic. This isn’t really a book that you want to sit down and read straight through. Although it is well researched and has a lot of useful information, it’s more of a reference book than anything. Excellent tips on how to maximize nutrients in you produce by A) picking out specific variations at the grocery store B) proper storage instructions and C) best cooking methods to avoid denaturation of vitamins and minerals.
I highlighted chapters that contain produce that I buy the most. I do believe some information in this text should be taken with a grain of salt and not all of it will be beneficial or even relevant to the average American.
May 19, 2021
Overall, this was an interesting book and it was fun to hear about the evolutionary history of many of the fruits and vegetables that we eat in the US, and I appreciated that when Robinson gave recommendations for healthier varieties of produce, she talked about not only what you can find in the grocery store, but also mentioned varieties that you can plant in a garden as well.
That being said, two major things that I noticed as I was listening: Robinson advocated combining plant proteins to get "complete proteins," which I know has since been disproven (maybe this book was published before that?). She also cites the theory of orange carrots being specifically bred to honor William of Orange as actual history, with no mention of the fact that there's really no evidence to back this nice origin story up. So... interesting? But how much can I actually trust all of the information in the book? I don't know.
That being said, two major things that I noticed as I was listening: Robinson advocated combining plant proteins to get "complete proteins," which I know has since been disproven (maybe this book was published before that?). She also cites the theory of orange carrots being specifically bred to honor William of Orange as actual history, with no mention of the fact that there's really no evidence to back this nice origin story up. So... interesting? But how much can I actually trust all of the information in the book? I don't know.
February 21, 2021
This is a really remarkable book, a history book, nutrition guide, shopping guide and recipe book. It is fascinating to read about the origins of modern fruits and vegetables and how they evolved over time, sometimes thousands of years. It is also useful as a guide to picking the most healthful varieties of fruits and veggies along with how to store and keep them. For home gardeners, it has tips on what varieties to plant. The extensive amount of research required to write the book is also evident. It is thorough, detailed, informative, and also very readable.
October 12, 2018
I can’t decide how I feel about this book. On the one hand it contains a lot of important and helpful information (which makes me dislike it a little because of the guilt I feel knowing I’m not eating a perfect diet), and on the other hand it got a little boring just reading it straight through. I think It would be best to own a hard copy of it to refer back to on a regular basis, rather than the audio version like I listened to. Overall, I would recommend it but as more of a reference book.
January 17, 2019
I was skeptical at first because this seemed like a it was going to tell me how we need to consume copious amounts of granola in order to live to be 200 years old. And it does to a certain extent. But I really enjoyed this from a food historian and a gardener perspective.
Each plant is broken down into sections, with a brief history of what the anchestoral plant looked like, how it has changed over time, what you should look for when picking produce in your run-of-the-mill supermarket and farmer's market, and how to prepare the food for the most nutritional output. She goes over a lot of the different varieties of plants you can get for your home garden and which ones might be the most nutritious.
I will say that the research is rather cherry picked, with generally small sample sizes.
Each plant is broken down into sections, with a brief history of what the anchestoral plant looked like, how it has changed over time, what you should look for when picking produce in your run-of-the-mill supermarket and farmer's market, and how to prepare the food for the most nutritional output. She goes over a lot of the different varieties of plants you can get for your home garden and which ones might be the most nutritious.
I will say that the research is rather cherry picked, with generally small sample sizes.
March 20, 2021
Solid, educational (definitely picked up some gardening tips), but holy moly the formula got quite dry when reading cover to cover. I had to put it down several times and switch books to refresh my attention span.
Very good reference book, though
Very good reference book, though
November 26, 2018
Skip the introduction (very hippie and kinda off putting) but the rest of the book is readable, fascinating, and useful. Wish it had a chapter on peppers, though.
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