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Title details for Pandora's Lunchbox by Melanie Warner - Available

Pandora's Lunchbox

How Processed Food Took Over the American Meal

by Melanie Warner
Ann Marie Lee
Audiobook
1 of 1 copy available
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1 of 1 copy available
If a piece of individually wrapped cheese retains its shape, color, and texture for years, what does it say about the food we eat and feed our children? Former New York Times reporter and mother Melanie Warner decided to explore that question when she observed the phenomenon of the indestructible cheese. She began an investigative journey that took her to research labs, food science departments, and factories around the country. What she discovered provides a rare, eye-opening—and sometimes disturbing—account of what we're really eating. Warner looks at how decades of food science have resulted in the cheapest, most abundant, most addictive, and most nutritionally devastating food in the world, and she uncovers startling evidence about the profound health implications of the packaged and fast foods that we eat on a daily basis.

From breakfast cereal to chicken subs to nutrition bars, processed foods account for roughly seventy percent of our nation's calories. Despite the growing presence of farmers' markets and organic produce, strange food additives are nearly impossible to avoid. Combining meticulous research, vivid writing, and cultural analysis, Warner blows the lid off the largely undocumented—and lightly regulated—world of chemically treated and processed foods and lays bare the potential price we may pay for consuming even so-called healthy foods.

  • Creators

  • Publisher

  • Awards

  • Release date

    April 29, 2013

  • Formats

    • OverDrive Listen audiobook

      • ISBN: 9781452693217
      • File size: 258061 KB
      • Duration: 08:57:37

  • Languages

    • English

  • Reviews

    • AudioFile Magazine
      Narrator Ann Marie Lee's animated reading conveys the fascinating and sometimes frightening process that raw food goes through to become convenience products on supermarket shelves. Lee's sultry voice makes for an easy listen, even though she mispronounces a couple of foreign foods and attempts a less than impressive New Zealand accent. Her lilt and vocal modulations are more successful with an English accent, which adds to the versatility of her performance. Lee's articulation and narrative flow highlight the author's investigation of the food companies, chemicals, and chemistry involved in the manufacture of our foods, particularly the central paradox of food processing that places nutrition and convenience at odds. M.F. (c) AudioFile 2013, Portland, Maine
    • Publisher's Weekly

      Starred review from June 24, 2013
      This eye-opening expose of the food industry in America was conceived after Warner, while working as a journalist for The New York Times, made a trip to the supermarket and purchased a rather unhealthy amount of packaged foods in an attempt to see what would happen to them once all the expiry dates came and went. The results, as she states, were rather anti-climactic as she discovered that the foods were pretty much the same. But this left her asking one question: What do expiry dates really mean, and is “food” really food anymore? Narrated by Ann Marie Lee, this absolutely fascinating—and rather infuriating—look at what society is really eating is a must for any responsible adult. Lee’s delivery is simple and understated. She lets the shocking discoveries speak for themselves and her tone mirrors that of the text: she sounds like a concerned citizen who simply wants to know why we are being misled about what we eat. A Scribner hardcover.

    • Publisher's Weekly

      February 18, 2013
      Warner takes readers on an investigative journey into the history, current practices, and future trends concerning food processing and additives. We meet characters like Harvey Wiley, the "founder of modern food regulation," whose legal briefs helped ban dangerous additives like borax and formaldehyde in the United States, and James Lewis Kraft, whose 1914 processing technique created cheese that could be "kept indefinitely without spoiling." She covers the history of soy, from its early uses as fertilizer and livestock feed to the development of soybean oil for frying food, this despite containing toxic aldehydes that have been linked to serious medical conditions. Warner visits a soy protein plant, describing the processes through which we get our faux meats, before we reach her own refrigerator where she discovers her supermarket guacamole contains amigumâa gelling agent used in cosmeticsâwhich a food scientist theorized was made with an avocado facial mask recipe. Other topics include the origins and effects of synthesized vitamins, shortcomings of the FDA, the manufacturing of artificial flavors, and new innovations in "healthy processed foods." Warner's thought-provoking study does an excellent job presenting the facts without sensationalizing, and offering common sense solutions to those seeking to make better food choices.

Formats

  • OverDrive Listen audiobook

subjects

Languages

  • English

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