February 7, 2024 • 39 mins
Embark on a thought-provoking journey with Dr. Marion Nestle, a trailblazer in the intersection of nutrition, health, and food politics, who joins us on Chef Sense to share her profound insights and personal evolution. Witness the transformation of a molecular biology educator into a dynamic nutrition crusader, driven by a stark realization of the parallels between tobacco marketing, and the food industry's strategies. Marion Nestle takes us through her illustrious career, including her pivotal role in shaping government nutrition reports and her impactful tenure at NYU. Her dedication to improving food systems resonates deeply, reinforcing the significance of education and awareness in advancing public health.
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Chef James (00:14):
Hey everyone, welcome to Chef Sense.
I'm your host, Chef Massey.
So today on the podcast we haveDr.
Marion Nestle.
She is Paulette GoddardProfessor of Nutrition, Food
Studies in Public Health.
She holds her emeritus statusalso at New York University, in
the department which she chairedfrom 1988 to 2003.
(00:35):
She retired in 2017, but shealso has earned her PhD in
Molecular Biology and an MPH inPublic Health and Nutrition from
the University of California,Berkeley.
She has been an author, aco-author and a co-editor of 15
books total.
She has been named among thetop 10 in Health and Science by
(00:58):
Time Magazine, Science Magazineand the Guardian.
Very excited to have her on.
There's some of these books thatI have used over my time as a
piece of, you know, inspirationand knowledge and more
understanding of our big foodsystem here in the United States
.
Food Politics is one of myfavorites, along with Soda
(01:19):
Politics.
Her most recent was her memoirthat she did, which was slow
cooked, and I believe she isalso working on another one for
2025, which is a revised editionof what to Eat All right.
So thank you, Dr Nestle, forjoining us here.
Well, thank you.
Can you share with us yourbeginning?
(01:39):
What drew you into the field offood nutrition?
Dr. Marion Nestle (01:43):
I got handed a nutrition course to teach.
As I've often said, it was likefalling in love it was.
I had been teaching cell andmolecular biology, which is
extremely.
It's interesting but it'sextremely abstract.
Students have to work very hardto relate to it because you
can't see it, taste it, feel it.
(02:05):
You have to deduce everythingthat happens from the kinds of
experimental results that youget.
And here I was being handed anutrition course that was about
food and about politics andabout history and about
anthropology and everybody eatsand students related to it very,
very strongly and I thought itwas the best way of teaching
(02:28):
biology that you could everthink of.
It was just a fabulous way toteach biology.
You could teach about thecomposition of food, what
happens to it in the body, whathappens to each of its
components in the body, how foodis related to health and then
how food is related toabsolutely everything else in
society, which it is.
(02:49):
After Brandeis, I went to theUniversity of California, san
Francisco okay, 10 years and Iwas teaching nutrition to
medical students.
When that all fell apart whichit did quite dramatically, so I
think I discussed in my mostrecent book, which was a memoir,
slow Cooked I had to retrainmyself and I went to public
(03:12):
health school in public healthnutrition, and as a result of
the work that I did in publichealth school, I was able to get
a job in the federal governmentin the Office of Disease
Prevention and Health Promotion,editing the search and generals
report on nutrition and health,which came out in 1988.
This is really a long time ago.
(03:32):
So I worked for the governmentfor two years during the Reagan
administration, amusingly enough, and then went from there to
NYU where I've been ever since,living happily ever after.
So I retired officially in 2017, but I kept my office and I'm
(03:52):
still going into the office andhanging around.
I'm still hanging.
Chef James (03:57):
What an honor and a great opportunity to keep your.
Dr. Marion Nestle (03:59):
Oh, I'll say Nice, it is, it is.
Chef James (04:04):
You know, as we kind of dive into this in the sense
of our food history, that we'vekind of gone along in the United
States.
Can you discuss some points foryou and how you kind of became
that voice of concern andhopeful redirect on working the
system?
Dr. Marion Nestle (04:18):
Yeah, I tell this story in the memoir too
which was that when I had beenat NYU for a couple of years, I
got invited to speak at ameeting in Washington at NIH
actually at the National CancerInstitute and it was a meeting
on behavioral causes of cancer.
Mostly the speakers weretalking about smoking and lung
(04:42):
cancer, and then there were acouple of us who were talking
about diet, and it was kind ofan amazing experience because I
knew that smoking caused lungcancer.
I really did know that, but Ihad never heard the people who
were actively involved inanti-smoking advocacy speak
(05:05):
about it before.
One after another after anotherof these speakers showed slides
of cigarette marketing.
This was the days of JoeCampbell, of advertising that
was clearly aimed at young boys,and they showed slide after
slide after slide of cigarettemarketing all over the world
(05:29):
everywhere you could think of.
Joe Campbell was absolutelyeverywhere.
It was kind of astonishing, itwas ubiquitous, and I knew that
cigarette companies weremarketing to teenage boys, but I
never paid any attention to it.
And what this did was it got myattention Because, in
(05:51):
particular, there was one talkabsolutely memorable of
cigarette marketing to children.
I knew that this was going on,but I never paid any attention
to it.
And here they were showingpictures of Joe Campbell in
sports arenas, near schools, inplaces where kids hang out.
It was kind of amazing and itwas like a revelation to me and
(06:15):
I walked out of that meetingsaying to the other food speaker
we should be doing exactly this, coca-cola.
Chef James (06:27):
Okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (06:28):
And it was just this revelation.
And so after that I started,when I was traveling, I would
take pictures of Coke, pepsi ads, mcdonald's ads, chicken ads,
whatever.
I took pictures of foodmarketing everywhere.
I went quite a collection ofthem and started paying
(06:49):
attention to how food companieswere marketing, particularly to
children.
And then I was going to in the1990s.
I was going to meetings onchildhood obesity.
Childhood obesity was beingrecognized as an increasing
problem, and I would go to thesemeetings and every single
(07:11):
speaker at the meetings wouldsay something like how are we
going to teach mothers how tofeed their kids better?
And I thought why is this a momproblem?
Why isn't every single speakersaying how are we going to stop
food companies from marketingjunk foods to our kids in ways
(07:36):
that are absolutely insidious?
And so that kind of was whatgot me started on this.
I started writing articlesabout these kinds of things and
eventually I had enough articlesso I thought I could put them
into a book, and that was thegenesis of food politics, which
came out in 2002.
Chef James (07:56):
Okay, and which is an amazing book you talk about
so much in there and I think,like you're saying, it's a
multifaceted machine that we'redealing with on a very complex,
large scale.
It seems to be very interweavedbetween food and marketing to
children in the schools andcatching ahold of that and them
(08:21):
bringing it home to the parentsand influencing the parents at
home.
I mean, that's pretty startling.
Dr. Marion Nestle (08:27):
Well, what you want to do I mean, I'm
always saying this you need tounderstand that food companies
are not social service agencies,they're not public health
agencies, they're businesses,right, they're businesses, which
, in our present businessenvironment, requires them to
put stockholder interests aboveall other considerations.
(08:48):
And once you understand thatand get your head around it,
everything they do makes sense.
Sure, because they're justtrying to protect their products
and promote sales of theirproducts and keep government
agencies from doing anythingthat might reduce sales of their
products.
And so, of course, they'regoing to go after children.
(09:08):
Why wouldn't they?
If they can get kids to asktheir parents to buy their
product, they've got to win.
Chef James (09:15):
Right, and the other thing, too, that I think I've
heard you mention is, once theyhook that child in the school
system, they could have them fora lifetime potentially.
Dr. Marion Nestle (09:26):
Yeah, I mean, people love what they ate as
kids.
Chef James (09:29):
Right, we have food memories.
Dr. Marion Nestle (09:31):
Everybody does and you know I mean.
You could certainly change yourdiet later on as an adult, and
lots of people do.
What they realize that they'reeating a lot of junk food and
shouldn't, or if they startgaining weight and want to do
something about that.
But I think from the standpointof food companies, kids are
(09:52):
fair game.
And you know, I tell this storytoo.
When Michelle Obama was in theWhite House, I went to a meeting
that she ran on food marketingto kids and there were a lot of
representatives of foodcompanies there, and after all
the speeches, which were quiteeloquent, we broke up into
(10:12):
smaller groups and in the groupthat I was in there was a high
level official of a food companyunnamed, unnamed mainly because
I can't remember which one itwas, but we're not supposed to
talk about it anyway, so it'sjust as well.
But he said, you know, he saidI wish we didn't have to market
(10:36):
to kids.
I don't think it's the rightthing to do.
I wish we could stop, but ourstockholders won't let us.
Ok, right.
I had never heard it statedquite so boldly.
I had to do this and I reallythought, in writing food
politics, that I was juststating the obvious.
(10:56):
Anybody who was looking couldhave seen it.
It never occurred to me that Iwas creating a groundbreaking
book or you know, or cutting, orcutting edge or anything like
that, and I thought I wasstating the obvious.
But it must have been goodtiming.
Chef James (11:15):
Oh yeah, and it's very, very enlightening on that
side of it.
In looking at food.
You know, addiction and obesity, I mean those are hand in hand.
I mean it's pretty prevalent inour country and with the system
you know.
Dr. Marion Nestle (11:31):
Oh, pretty prevalent is an understatement.
Chef James (11:34):
Yeah.
Dr. Marion Nestle (11:34):
Seventy percent, seven zero.
More than two thirds ofAmericans are overweight or
obese.
Forty two percent meet criteriafor obesity, but seventy
percent of American adults areoverweight and twenty or thirty
percent of kids.
Right.
So it's become normal.
That's normal in our society,and if you look at pictures of
(11:58):
classes, school classes now ascompared to school kids 20 or 30
years ago, there's just nocomparison.
Chef James (12:08):
Kids are much bigger now.
Right.
And the other thing is also thefood engineering.
You know that these, thesecompanies do, do they invest in,
you know, trying to hit thosemarkers that attract people to
the food and continueconsumption.
Right, I mean, it's called thebliss point.
Okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (12:26):
It's the point at which you can't stop
eating.
It's just so good, you can'tstop.
Chef James (12:32):
The point of no return.
Dr. Marion Nestle (12:33):
The point of no return.
And we now have a specific namefor this category of products,
that called ultra processed.
And there is now, I don't know,more than a thousand studies
that link ultraprocessed foodsto poor health, and there's even
one very, very well-controlledclinical trial that shows that
(12:55):
ultraprocessed foods inducepeople to eat more of them.
That's where the addictioncomes in, if it's addiction, but
you just can't stop eating them.
And these are deliberatelyformulated to encourage people
not to stop eating them.
Eat as much as they possiblycan, regardless of the
(13:18):
consequences, because these areamong the most highly profitable
products in the supermarket.
Chef James (13:25):
Right, and I mean even down to supermarkets.
I mean they've done a great jobof how they organize their
store.
I mean it's not like whenyou're checking out you've got
celery sticks and carrot sticksand blue cheese dressing.
Well, candies, I should say,lined up and caffeine drinks and
everything.
Dr. Marion Nestle (13:43):
Yeah, and companies pay a fortune to place
their products at exactly thatspot.
Chef James (13:48):
Right, and that's just unbelievable.
Dr. Marion Nestle (13:51):
It's.
One of the ways thatsupermarkets make money is
through what are called slottingfees, which are payments that
companies make to place theirproducts where they can be most
easily seen, because supermarketrule is the more you see a
product, the more you are likelyto buy it.
Chef James (14:08):
Right, exactly.
Dr. Marion Nestle (14:10):
Which is why drinks are everywhere.
Drinks are enormouslyprofitable.
Right, I don't know whateverhappened to tap water, but
you're right.
Drinks are enormouslyprofitable and if you go into a
store and look at the amount ofsupermarket real estate devoted
to drinks, it's absolutely vast.
Chef James (14:29):
Well, and there's also.
You have your book SodaPolitics too, which, going into
beverage, that's soda, that'shuge.
Dr. Marion Nestle (14:38):
Right, although I'm sort of, I'm doing
a new edition of my book what toEat, which came out in 2006.
And this new edition will comeout in 2025.
But the you know, 20 yearslater it's waters.
Morning.
Sugar sweetened beverages.
The amount of sugar sweetenedbeverages is declining and that
(14:59):
people are consuming is goingdown, and waters are being
substituted, and these watershave everything you could
possibly think of, including CBDand alcohol, but there must be
water and you're paying afortune for them.
Chef James (15:15):
Right, and that's you know.
That's just tragic as well.
The other question I have tooand when these companies are
coming in, you know there'sthere is what I see as a
challenge is mislabeling, orkind of construing how they
label their products too, allnatural and some of these other
things.
Dr. Marion Nestle (15:33):
Well, they label them so they'll sell Right
, and everybody wants to buysomething that's healthy.
So if there's something on thelabel that says that the product
is healthy, people are going tobuy it Right.
I just picked up a.
Cheerios is my current favoriteproduct because it used to be
(15:57):
that.
Cheerios was this boring cerealthat you gave little kids.
Right, because it wasn'tparticularly harmful and kids
and it dissolved so it didn'tchoke little babies.
But now Cheerios come in morethan 20 different options.
Right.
And my current favorite isveggie Cheerios.
Chef James (16:18):
Oh my gosh, I've never okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (16:20):
Which claims to have a quarter of a cup of
vegetables in each serving, andwhat they've done is they've
taken vegetables and powder andconverted them to powder and
added the powder back.
Chef James (16:33):
Oh my gosh.
Dr. Marion Nestle (16:35):
But if you're somebody walking down an aisle
and you think, oh, I'm going tohave vegetables, Right.
And they, oh dear.
Chef James (16:43):
And yeah, you just, it's the psychological box
checker, right.
Dr. Marion Nestle (16:47):
Oh yeah, and it absolutely works.
Chef James (16:50):
Right, right, it totally works, Wow, unbelievable
.
You know and I guess talkingabout Cheerios and manufacturers
that may have more of a globalpresence when you compare it to
a broad, or ingredients are muchdifferent in other countries
and they have their foot down onit, or they they're better
(17:10):
screening this.
I mean, can you give advice asto why?
That's just?
It's all about money.
Dr. Marion Nestle (17:18):
It's because we're Americans Right,
exceptional Americans we havemuch less stringent regulation
of the food industry than othercountries do, in part because
the food industry is not,because the food industry is so
effective at lobbying, becauseour electoral system is so
completely corrupt thatcorporations can give money to
(17:39):
elect to candidates and thencandidates are beholden to them
and they're not going to doanything that's to offend them.
And if they try to do anything,the companies are just on them
right away.
Right.
So nobody wants to take on thefood industry.
Chef James (17:58):
No, not at all.
Dr. Marion Nestle (18:00):
They just Seems anyway they avoid it.
So and then we have this FirstAmendment stuff that you know.
It's very hard for me tobelieve that the founding
fathers developed the FirstAmendment to protect the right
of food companies to market tochildren.
But that's how our courts havebeen interpreting it, and that's
(18:20):
very difficult to deal with.
Chef James (18:22):
That's very hard, Well you know.
And the other thing is too,eating, well, eating balanced, I
mean.
Dr. Marion Nestle (18:29):
It's expensive, yeah that's food
policy in action.
Chef James (18:35):
It funnels you.
It's not the dollar menuanymore, but families can go to
that.
They can't afford quality foods.
Dr. Marion Nestle (18:48):
And those are so concerned, or they think
they can't.
If they bought foods and cookedthem, they could do much better
.
But, if they think that fruitsand vegetables are expensive,
it's because they are.
Right.
If you look at Department ofCommerce figures from 1980 to
the present, these figures showvery clearly that, while the
(19:10):
price of food in general hasincreased, the price of fruits
and vegetables has increased farmore than the price of food in
general, whereas the price ofultra-processed junk foods has
increased much less.
Right and that's federal policy.
Right.
And we could fix that in aninstant if anybody was willing
to take it on.
(19:31):
Right, right.
But we don't have electedleaders who are willing to take
that on.
Chef James (19:36):
That's very hard to do, especially with a system
that it just seems like it'sevolved from generation to
generation, just continues tosnowball into what we have today
, from our beginning a long timeago, many years ago.
So how we combat that, it'svery hard to do.
Like you said, people caninvest in certain things.
(19:58):
For people that may have areaswhere they can do a home garden
or they can do certain things.
It's hard to try to build thatin but it won't have the time to
do it.
Dr. Marion Nestle (20:10):
Well, I explained to parents who are
having difficulties gettingtheir kids to eat healthfully
that they're fighting an entirefood system on their own.
Right.
That's pretty hard to do andthe food system is big.
It's more than one and a halftrillion dollars in the United
States if you count restaurantsand alcohol.
Chef James (20:30):
Right In production.
Dr. Marion Nestle (20:32):
Oh, it includes production.
Chef James (20:34):
I found it very interesting.
You had mentioned, like theproduction of I don't know if
that was food and beverage to,what a typical nutritional
intake is for somebody likecalorically.
Dr. Marion Nestle (20:47):
Oh yeah, we have twice the calories that we
need as a population.
Food is enormously overproducedin the United States, to the
extent of being twice what weneed, which means that there's
an enormous surplus of food.
And remember, the purpose offood companies is to sell that
(21:08):
food.
So they're doing everythingthey possibly can to sell that
food and one of the strategiesis to get people to eat more.
Chef James (21:17):
Right, and that comes down to portion.
Dr. Marion Nestle (21:19):
It's not that hard to do.
Chef James (21:20):
Right.
Well, and again, talking about,on my side, being a chef, I get
concerned because my commitmentto the person coming into my
establishment using local,knowing my farm or knowing the
food and portion size, is acommitment on my end that I'm
(21:41):
serving clean, it's a state ofmore products and kind of being
that voice, because otherwise,you know, I don't want to shame
it, but you almost kind of feellike a food drug dealer in a way
, because I know how to add acidfat, sweet texture to my plates
where people really they thriveoff of it, you know.
(22:03):
And not to mention some of thefoods, when you call it on each
your menu Like I think we talkedabout before, it was its food
memories you can pull peopleemotionally into a dining
atmosphere and they're off tothe races, you know.
You throw some alcohol in thereand you're really winning the
game.
Dr. Marion Nestle (22:21):
You know the races right.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah Well, food is one oflife's greatest pleasures, you
know.
It's one you get to haveseveral times a day.
It's pretty great.
Chef James (22:32):
Oh well, yeah, it's fantastic, of course.
So there's things that you know.
They've gotten smaller too.
Dr. Marion Nestle (22:37):
Yeah, and that's food.
Companies are doing that forprice reasons rather than
anything else, yeah, exactly.
But anything that would reduceportion size would help.
I'm always saying you know, ifthere's one concept I could get
across, it's that largerportions have more calories.
It's hard to say it with astraight face, but in fact it's
(22:59):
not intuitively obvious.
People are eating more andthere's lots and lots of
evidence that people startedeating more in response to food
industry marketing efforts inthe 1980s and 90s and we're
seeing the results of that now.
People are overweight.
Chef James (23:19):
Right.
Can you describe, in the senseof you know, comparing a meal
plan from what a typicalAmerican male or female would
eat, compared to maybe a broad,like certain countries where
that balance for them iscompletely different?
I mean, we do overeat, we eatheavier here.
Dr. Marion Nestle (23:38):
Oh, is there any question about it?
People come to the UnitedStates.
They can't believe the size ofthe portions.
They just can't believe it.
I mean I've been, you know,okay, I don't eat so much
anymore.
I'm in the stage where mymetabolism is really declined,
but I'm astounded by what goesfor a single portion, even if I
(24:01):
buy a salad, If I buy a preparedsalad, I can have that salad
for three days.
Right, yeah, they're massiveBecause it's so big and if I go
to a restaurant I couldn'tpossibly order an appetizer in
an entree.
Right.
That would be far too much toeat, and if I order an entree,
(24:25):
I'm still going to be takingsome portion of it home.
I just can't believe that thereare people who eat that much.
And yet I go to restaurants andI see people eating 23-ounce
steaks.
Chef James (24:38):
Yeah.
Dr. Marion Nestle (24:39):
I couldn't imagine what they are, and you
know, a 23-ounce steak has a lotmore calories than a 3-ounce
one.
Chef James (24:49):
Yeah, exactly.
Dr. Marion Nestle (24:50):
What can I say?
Chef James (24:52):
It's unfortunate.
Right, right.
And it seems so logical and theanswer seems so easy.
You know, eat less, move more,look at the center of your plate
, focus on that, have balance.
And you know, I think withsocial media too, they've.
Just food is in a whole anotherrealm now.
Dr. Marion Nestle (25:13):
Yeah, but I mean, the idea of eat less, move
more is absolutely impossiblein today's food environment.
So to advise somebody to dothat without giving them a lot
of social support is reallydifficult.
And you know, I think it'sessential for people to
understand that they're beingmarketed to constantly.
(25:33):
Right Marketing is so good thatthey don't notice it, just like
I didn't notice it.
Right.
You know, if I didn't notice it,lots of other people didn't
notice it either, and you areconstantly barraged not only by
advertisements, which are easyto see, but also by subtle, much
more subtle, cute way thatsupermarkets are organized the
(25:57):
fact that food is absolutelyeverywhere.
The example that I just love togive is when I came to NYU in
the late 1980s, there were signsall over the library saying you
can't bring food in here.
Now there are two cafes and,and you know, vending machines
(26:17):
everywhere.
And even looks bookstores,remember.
I mean, you have to be able toremember when bookstores
wouldn't let you in.
Right For the coffee.
Now they have coffee bars orStarbucks inside a bookstore.
That's a huge change and that'sa marketing strategy.
(26:37):
Right.
Food is there.
You'll eat it.
Clothing stores Yep, I meanit's.
It's astounding.
Chef James (26:44):
And you used to never be able to do that.
And now you have Door Dash, youknow, have all this access that
you don't even need to leaveyour house, and the pandemic did
that.
Right, right.
Everything's in a to-go box andit's right there for you.
Dr. Marion Nestle (27:00):
Right, and you know constant delivery, so
it couldn't be easier.
And if you're not, you know.
And if you're not cooking yourown food, you really are not
controlling the amount thatyou're eating or what's in the
food or the quality of theingredients.
You know for that you have todo it yourself, and a lot of
(27:20):
people find it just as easy.
And because of the way thepricing goes, a lot of people
have enough money to eat out allthe time.
Chef James (27:29):
Right, right and you're just, you're kind of
buying into that system.
You know, and what'sinteresting too on my side that
I and I know that you guaranteedaware of it, but I found it
coming along that a lot of thefood manufacturers, on the
hospitality side of things,these large brand hotels and
(27:49):
corporate systems that I used,had buying programs and they
were linked, they're linkedright into you know perks, you
know compliance percentage,rebate percentages, where if I
am compliant at 80% or higherwith this large, this large
distributor and those contractsare signed, then I get a
(28:12):
kickback, not to mention amanufacturer rebate.
So if I'm going to use thispork product or this major, you
know chicken product from thishuge company, so everybody's
like linked into this thing.
Dr. Marion Nestle (28:24):
Well, you know, as I said, everybody's in
business.
This is business, you know, andpublic health is not a goal of
the business.
You know, there are somebusinesses that are these big
corporations, but I don't thinkthey're very credible.
I mean, I have my doubts abouthow well they work.
But you know, and the worldeconomic form is always saying
(28:47):
things like, corporations haveto take social values into
consideration.
Yeah, right, yeah you know thisrequires a big, a big change in
the way that Wall Streetevaluates corporate health and
the effect of what is called theshareholder value movement,
which started in the early 1980sand has absolutely taken over
(29:10):
in the United States.
Those effects are welldocumented.
That's when manufacturing movedout of the country, okay.
That's when everybody startedusing imported cheap labor.
That's when you know a lot ofthings happened that have been
very bad for the country, Ithink.
(29:32):
Yeah it's bad for the Midwest.
Chef James (29:35):
Right, exactly, wow, they're not going to embrace
some level of change in thesense of these.
You know the complex ag system,when you know they have to
change their systems, the waythey treat poultry and livestock
, the way they, you know, treatillnesses and how that all
happens in those.
Those you know those feed lotsand everything like that it's
(29:55):
there's a huge shift all the wayup that would have to take
place.
Dr. Marion Nestle (30:00):
Well, you would think there would be more
pressure for that shift, becausewe need to have agriculture
done more sustainably.
The climate change impact ofthe way we're producing food is
much too high and these thingsare going to have to change.
And that's not going to be easyfor the companies that have
been making money doing thingsthe way they are, but that's
(30:22):
what we have to do.
You just wish you had agovernment that would push this
along a little bit more.
Chef James (30:27):
Right and that would protect the people more.
Sure, you know, looking atforeign countries, was that in
Latin America or Mexico, wherethey were starting to, actually,
governments were stepping in tokind of protect the people and
actually put labeling on?
Dr. Marion Nestle (30:42):
Yeah, it's all over Latin America, because
the countries in Latin Americacan see what happened in the
United States and they areterrified that if their
population gains weight, they'regoing to be dealing with type 2
diabetes at a level at whichthey cannot afford.
They don't have the healthcaresystem that will take care of it
(31:06):
.
They don't have enough moneyfor hospitalizations.
The idea of dealing with thatlevel of type 2 diabetes in the
population is just absolutelyterrifying, and so their public
health.
People are trying to dopreventive measures Now, I think
8 or 10 countries in LatinAmerica that have warning labels
(31:28):
on ultra-processed foodproducts.
I was in Mexico last fall.
I was kind of amazed to go intoa supermarket.
Half the products in thesupermarket have black warning
labels on them.
Wow.
Saying that they're high insugar, salt or saturated fat or
calories or artificialsweeteners or other things that
(31:50):
they would prefer that peoplenot eat.
So what that tells you is youcan't go into a packaged food
aisle and buy that stuff unlessyou're putting your health at
risk.
And these warning labels are soobvious that even people who
are illiterate or kids who can'tread or people who don't read
(32:13):
food labels.
You just see them.
The education is out that youshould avoid these products and
that's working to some extent,but some of the countries also
have restrictions on marketingto children.
Mexico has just passed a lawthat the foods that are sold in
(32:33):
schools have to be levels ofnutrient quality, something
we've never been able to do herevery well.
There's a lot going on in LatinAmerica.
That's very exciting.
Chef James (32:43):
That's great, I guess for me, here we are in the
United States, there's a lot ofpride involved and maybe some
smokescreen involved over theyears, and it's like we take
pride in saying we're the bestor we're going to come to the
rescue, and we're not reallyeven coming to the rescue of our
own food system here in our owncountry.
Dr. Marion Nestle (33:01):
No, and we don't have a healthcare system.
That's the part that's reallyalarming is that we don't have a
functional healthcare system sothat when people develop these
chronic diseases that arerelated to diet not just type 2
diabetes but heart disease andcancers and more higher
susceptibility to things likeCOVID-19, they're more talented.
(33:25):
I mean, it's really bad and youwant to prevent that, if you
can prevent that.
Chef James (33:32):
They seem like they're pretty good bedfellows
between our food system andmedical.
Dr. Marion Nestle (33:38):
The medical system.
Yeah, yeah, I mean in the sensethat there are food companies
that make products that makepeople sick and then they also
make products to make themhealthier, so they get it both
ways.
Chef James (33:52):
Right, yeah, okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (33:55):
But yeah.
Chef James (33:55):
I mean.
Dr. Marion Nestle (33:56):
I think if you were looking ahead and
saying what do we need to do tomake Americans healthier, which
it seems to me would be good foreverybody, Absolutely.
Everybody would benefit forthat, then you would have to
completely redo the food systemso that we have an agricultural
system that focuses on publichealth rather than corporate
(34:17):
health.
Chef James (34:18):
Yeah, exactly Right.
Dr. Marion Nestle (34:20):
Is that politically feasible?
I doubt it.
Chef James (34:23):
Yeah, I agree.
Wow, well, and I know, as we'retalking about combating this
and its portion size, and flipthat container over and really
look at your ingredients.
Do you have any other ways thatpeople can combat this and be a
part of constructive change forthemselves?
Dr. Marion Nestle (34:43):
and their community.
Yeah, I mean, there arethousands, literally thousands
of organizations in the UnitedStates that are working on food
issues.
They're very easy to find.
You just type in food advocacyand whatever the name is of your
location and they pop up.
I mean, and they're reallyliterally thousands.
(35:05):
So you pick your issue and youcan join organizations that are
working on these issues.
You can advocate yourself, youcan write your congressional
representatives.
That really works, by the way.
Chef James (35:18):
Oh wow, that's great .
Dr. Marion Nestle (35:20):
Yeah, I mean not that many people do it, and
if people do, then they payattention, and I think starting
at the local level is reallyuseful because you can see
immediate returns, whereastrying to deal with federal
government is pretty tough thesedays.
Chef James (35:37):
Right, yeah, exactly Okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (35:40):
You can join a school board, you can join a
city council.
You can do a lot at the locallevel to make sure that people
have enough food, that peoplehave healthy food.
Okay.
But there's an educationalcampaign that school food is
done.
Well, School food.
Even though there are federalrules about what can and cannot
(36:02):
be served, the implementation ofthose rules is extremely local
in my experience.
Wow Okay.
So on a school basis, if you'vegot cooks in the school who want
to make healthy food for kids,they're doing it and the kids
are eating it.
Right.
But if you don't care about it,then the kids are getting junk
(36:22):
food.
It varies a lot, so I thinkthere's lots that can be done at
the local level.
That's great and it's worthdoing.
It's absolutely worth doing.
Chef James (36:33):
Okay, no, that's wonderful.
Thank you for your advice onthat.
You know, and I was looking atdiets and different programs for
people to use.
How do you feel about those?
I mean, as long as you stickwith them and you're dedicated,
they work.
I mean, is that?
Dr. Marion Nestle (36:47):
Well, you know, I'm of the.
The world is divided intolumpers and splitters.
Chef James (36:53):
I'm a lumber.
Okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (36:55):
I have to admit it, I'm a lumber, and so
for me, diets are so simple.
I thought the journalistMichael Pollan can do it in
seven words.
Wow.
So food not too much, mostlyplants, and the only thing you
need to know about the food partis that he means foods that are
not ultra processed.
Okay.
(37:16):
So we minimally processedregular foods that haven't been
industrially produced and withimpossible lists of ingredients.
If you're real food and you'rehaving plant foods in your diet
and you're not overeating,you're fine.
You don't have to worry aboutanything else.
Chef James (37:37):
That's amazing.
Okay, what do you think aboutthe blue zones?
Dr. Marion Nestle (37:40):
Well, you know I'm in the movie.
Chef James (37:44):
So I'm not.
Dr. Marion Nestle (37:45):
I'm not exactly a completely objective
observer.
Okay, you know, I mean it's funand what.
What Dan Buettner found wasthat people are doing just what
you know what eat food not toomuch, mostly plants and be
physically active, and thattakes care of it.
You have a good social supportsystem.
Right, what everybody's beensaying for years you want to be
(38:09):
healthy and live to a ripe andhealthy old age.
You have a reasonably healthydiet.
You're physically active,you've got things to do and
you've got a community.
You're all set.
Yep.
You can't do any better thanthat, but that's all you have to
do.
Right.
And for me, the eat food nottoo much.
Mostly plants leaves you anenormous amount of room for
(38:32):
delicious food.
Absolutely, you can have reallygood food and follow us.
Chef James (38:39):
Yeah, you can Yep, absolutely.
Dr. Marion Nestle (38:42):
And it doesn't mean no junk food, it's
just minimal.
Chef James (38:48):
Moderation.
Dr. Marion Nestle (38:49):
Yeah, perceive with caution.
We're Americans, we don't dothat.
Chef James (38:53):
Exactly, yeah, yeah, looking at you know everything
you've done again I just I wantto appreciate you and thank you
so much for being really such apivotal and huge piece to
sharing our food history.
You know, and supporting anddoing everything you can, all
your many years for change,being that voice you know.
(39:15):
Thank you, Dr.
Nestle, for your time.
Dr. Marion Nestle (39:18):
Well, thank you so much.
This has been fun.
Chef James (39:21):
Yeah, all right, everyone, that is a wrap.
You can check us out if youlike that.
Subscribe Also the InstagramChef Massey.
Just keep it simple, chefmassey.
com, have a good one.
Bye for now.
Hey everyone, welcome to Chef Sense.
I'm your host, Chef Massey.
So today on the podcast we haveDr.
Marion Nestle.
She is Paulette GoddardProfessor of Nutrition, Food
Studies in Public Health.
She holds her emeritus statusalso at New York University, in
the department which she chairedfrom 1988 to 2003.
(00:35):
She retired in 2017, but shealso has earned her PhD in
Molecular Biology and an MPH inPublic Health and Nutrition from
the University of California,Berkeley.
She has been an author, aco-author and a co-editor of 15
books total.
She has been named among thetop 10 in Health and Science by
(00:58):
Time Magazine, Science Magazineand the Guardian.
Very excited to have her on.
There's some of these books thatI have used over my time as a
piece of, you know, inspirationand knowledge and more
understanding of our big foodsystem here in the United States
.
Food Politics is one of myfavorites, along with Soda
(01:19):
Politics.
Her most recent was her memoirthat she did, which was slow
cooked, and I believe she isalso working on another one for
2025, which is a revised editionof what to Eat All right.
So thank you, Dr Nestle, forjoining us here.
Well, thank you.
Can you share with us yourbeginning?
(01:39):
What drew you into the field offood nutrition?
Dr. Marion Nestle (01:43):
I got handed a nutrition course to teach.
As I've often said, it was likefalling in love it was.
I had been teaching cell andmolecular biology, which is
extremely.
It's interesting but it'sextremely abstract.
Students have to work very hardto relate to it because you
can't see it, taste it, feel it.
(02:05):
You have to deduce everythingthat happens from the kinds of
experimental results that youget.
And here I was being handed anutrition course that was about
food and about politics andabout history and about
anthropology and everybody eatsand students related to it very,
very strongly and I thought itwas the best way of teaching
(02:28):
biology that you could everthink of.
It was just a fabulous way toteach biology.
You could teach about thecomposition of food, what
happens to it in the body, whathappens to each of its
components in the body, how foodis related to health and then
how food is related toabsolutely everything else in
society, which it is.
(02:49):
After Brandeis, I went to theUniversity of California, san
Francisco okay, 10 years and Iwas teaching nutrition to
medical students.
When that all fell apart whichit did quite dramatically, so I
think I discussed in my mostrecent book, which was a memoir,
slow Cooked I had to retrainmyself and I went to public
(03:12):
health school in public healthnutrition, and as a result of
the work that I did in publichealth school, I was able to get
a job in the federal governmentin the Office of Disease
Prevention and Health Promotion,editing the search and generals
report on nutrition and health,which came out in 1988.
This is really a long time ago.
(03:32):
So I worked for the governmentfor two years during the Reagan
administration, amusingly enough, and then went from there to
NYU where I've been ever since,living happily ever after.
So I retired officially in 2017, but I kept my office and I'm
(03:52):
still going into the office andhanging around.
I'm still hanging.
Chef James (03:57):
What an honor and a great opportunity to keep your.
Dr. Marion Nestle (03:59):
Oh, I'll say Nice, it is, it is.
Chef James (04:04):
You know, as we kind of dive into this in the sense
of our food history, that we'vekind of gone along in the United
States.
Can you discuss some points foryou and how you kind of became
that voice of concern andhopeful redirect on working the
system?
Dr. Marion Nestle (04:18):
Yeah, I tell this story in the memoir too
which was that when I had beenat NYU for a couple of years, I
got invited to speak at ameeting in Washington at NIH
actually at the National CancerInstitute and it was a meeting
on behavioral causes of cancer.
Mostly the speakers weretalking about smoking and lung
(04:42):
cancer, and then there were acouple of us who were talking
about diet, and it was kind ofan amazing experience because I
knew that smoking caused lungcancer.
I really did know that, but Ihad never heard the people who
were actively involved inanti-smoking advocacy speak
(05:05):
about it before.
One after another after anotherof these speakers showed slides
of cigarette marketing.
This was the days of JoeCampbell, of advertising that
was clearly aimed at young boys,and they showed slide after
slide after slide of cigarettemarketing all over the world
(05:29):
everywhere you could think of.
Joe Campbell was absolutelyeverywhere.
It was kind of astonishing, itwas ubiquitous, and I knew that
cigarette companies weremarketing to teenage boys, but I
never paid any attention to it.
And what this did was it got myattention Because, in
(05:51):
particular, there was one talkabsolutely memorable of
cigarette marketing to children.
I knew that this was going on,but I never paid any attention
to it.
And here they were showingpictures of Joe Campbell in
sports arenas, near schools, inplaces where kids hang out.
It was kind of amazing and itwas like a revelation to me and
(06:15):
I walked out of that meetingsaying to the other food speaker
we should be doing exactly this, coca-cola.
Chef James (06:27):
Okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (06:28):
And it was just this revelation.
And so after that I started,when I was traveling, I would
take pictures of Coke, pepsi ads, mcdonald's ads, chicken ads,
whatever.
I took pictures of foodmarketing everywhere.
I went quite a collection ofthem and started paying
(06:49):
attention to how food companieswere marketing, particularly to
children.
And then I was going to in the1990s.
I was going to meetings onchildhood obesity.
Childhood obesity was beingrecognized as an increasing
problem, and I would go to thesemeetings and every single
(07:11):
speaker at the meetings wouldsay something like how are we
going to teach mothers how tofeed their kids better?
And I thought why is this a momproblem?
Why isn't every single speakersaying how are we going to stop
food companies from marketingjunk foods to our kids in ways
(07:36):
that are absolutely insidious?
And so that kind of was whatgot me started on this.
I started writing articlesabout these kinds of things and
eventually I had enough articlesso I thought I could put them
into a book, and that was thegenesis of food politics, which
came out in 2002.
Chef James (07:56):
Okay, and which is an amazing book you talk about
so much in there and I think,like you're saying, it's a
multifaceted machine that we'redealing with on a very complex,
large scale.
It seems to be very interweavedbetween food and marketing to
children in the schools andcatching ahold of that and them
(08:21):
bringing it home to the parentsand influencing the parents at
home.
I mean, that's pretty startling.
Dr. Marion Nestle (08:27):
Well, what you want to do I mean, I'm
always saying this you need tounderstand that food companies
are not social service agencies,they're not public health
agencies, they're businesses,right, they're businesses, which
, in our present businessenvironment, requires them to
put stockholder interests aboveall other considerations.
(08:48):
And once you understand thatand get your head around it,
everything they do makes sense.
Sure, because they're justtrying to protect their products
and promote sales of theirproducts and keep government
agencies from doing anythingthat might reduce sales of their
products.
And so, of course, they'regoing to go after children.
(09:08):
Why wouldn't they?
If they can get kids to asktheir parents to buy their
product, they've got to win.
Chef James (09:15):
Right, and the other thing, too, that I think I've
heard you mention is, once theyhook that child in the school
system, they could have them fora lifetime potentially.
Dr. Marion Nestle (09:26):
Yeah, I mean, people love what they ate as
kids.
Chef James (09:29):
Right, we have food memories.
Dr. Marion Nestle (09:31):
Everybody does and you know I mean.
You could certainly change yourdiet later on as an adult, and
lots of people do.
What they realize that they'reeating a lot of junk food and
shouldn't, or if they startgaining weight and want to do
something about that.
But I think from the standpointof food companies, kids are
(09:52):
fair game.
And you know, I tell this storytoo.
When Michelle Obama was in theWhite House, I went to a meeting
that she ran on food marketingto kids and there were a lot of
representatives of foodcompanies there, and after all
the speeches, which were quiteeloquent, we broke up into
(10:12):
smaller groups and in the groupthat I was in there was a high
level official of a food companyunnamed, unnamed mainly because
I can't remember which one itwas, but we're not supposed to
talk about it anyway, so it'sjust as well.
But he said, you know, he saidI wish we didn't have to market
(10:36):
to kids.
I don't think it's the rightthing to do.
I wish we could stop, but ourstockholders won't let us.
Ok, right.
I had never heard it statedquite so boldly.
I had to do this and I reallythought, in writing food
politics, that I was juststating the obvious.
(10:56):
Anybody who was looking couldhave seen it.
It never occurred to me that Iwas creating a groundbreaking
book or you know, or cutting, orcutting edge or anything like
that, and I thought I wasstating the obvious.
But it must have been goodtiming.
Chef James (11:15):
Oh yeah, and it's very, very enlightening on that
side of it.
In looking at food.
You know, addiction and obesity, I mean those are hand in hand.
I mean it's pretty prevalent inour country and with the system
you know.
Dr. Marion Nestle (11:31):
Oh, pretty prevalent is an understatement.
Chef James (11:34):
Yeah.
Dr. Marion Nestle (11:34):
Seventy percent, seven zero.
More than two thirds ofAmericans are overweight or
obese.
Forty two percent meet criteriafor obesity, but seventy
percent of American adults areoverweight and twenty or thirty
percent of kids.
Right.
So it's become normal.
That's normal in our society,and if you look at pictures of
(11:58):
classes, school classes now ascompared to school kids 20 or 30
years ago, there's just nocomparison.
Chef James (12:08):
Kids are much bigger now.
Right.
And the other thing is also thefood engineering.
You know that these, thesecompanies do, do they invest in,
you know, trying to hit thosemarkers that attract people to
the food and continueconsumption.
Right, I mean, it's called thebliss point.
Okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (12:26):
It's the point at which you can't stop
eating.
It's just so good, you can'tstop.
Chef James (12:32):
The point of no return.
Dr. Marion Nestle (12:33):
The point of no return.
And we now have a specific namefor this category of products,
that called ultra processed.
And there is now, I don't know,more than a thousand studies
that link ultraprocessed foodsto poor health, and there's even
one very, very well-controlledclinical trial that shows that
(12:55):
ultraprocessed foods inducepeople to eat more of them.
That's where the addictioncomes in, if it's addiction, but
you just can't stop eating them.
And these are deliberatelyformulated to encourage people
not to stop eating them.
Eat as much as they possiblycan, regardless of the
(13:18):
consequences, because these areamong the most highly profitable
products in the supermarket.
Chef James (13:25):
Right, and I mean even down to supermarkets.
I mean they've done a great jobof how they organize their
store.
I mean it's not like whenyou're checking out you've got
celery sticks and carrot sticksand blue cheese dressing.
Well, candies, I should say,lined up and caffeine drinks and
everything.
Dr. Marion Nestle (13:43):
Yeah, and companies pay a fortune to place
their products at exactly thatspot.
Chef James (13:48):
Right, and that's just unbelievable.
Dr. Marion Nestle (13:51):
It's.
One of the ways thatsupermarkets make money is
through what are called slottingfees, which are payments that
companies make to place theirproducts where they can be most
easily seen, because supermarketrule is the more you see a
product, the more you are likelyto buy it.
Chef James (14:08):
Right, exactly.
Dr. Marion Nestle (14:10):
Which is why drinks are everywhere.
Drinks are enormouslyprofitable.
Right, I don't know whateverhappened to tap water, but
you're right.
Drinks are enormouslyprofitable and if you go into a
store and look at the amount ofsupermarket real estate devoted
to drinks, it's absolutely vast.
Chef James (14:29):
Well, and there's also.
You have your book SodaPolitics too, which, going into
beverage, that's soda, that'shuge.
Dr. Marion Nestle (14:38):
Right, although I'm sort of, I'm doing
a new edition of my book what toEat, which came out in 2006.
And this new edition will comeout in 2025.
But the you know, 20 yearslater it's waters.
Morning.
Sugar sweetened beverages.
The amount of sugar sweetenedbeverages is declining and that
(14:59):
people are consuming is goingdown, and waters are being
substituted, and these watershave everything you could
possibly think of, including CBDand alcohol, but there must be
water and you're paying afortune for them.
Chef James (15:15):
Right, and that's you know.
That's just tragic as well.
The other question I have tooand when these companies are
coming in, you know there'sthere is what I see as a
challenge is mislabeling, orkind of construing how they
label their products too, allnatural and some of these other
things.
Dr. Marion Nestle (15:33):
Well, they label them so they'll sell Right
, and everybody wants to buysomething that's healthy.
So if there's something on thelabel that says that the product
is healthy, people are going tobuy it Right.
I just picked up a.
Cheerios is my current favoriteproduct because it used to be
(15:57):
that.
Cheerios was this boring cerealthat you gave little kids.
Right, because it wasn'tparticularly harmful and kids
and it dissolved so it didn'tchoke little babies.
But now Cheerios come in morethan 20 different options.
Right.
And my current favorite isveggie Cheerios.
Chef James (16:18):
Oh my gosh, I've never okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (16:20):
Which claims to have a quarter of a cup of
vegetables in each serving, andwhat they've done is they've
taken vegetables and powder andconverted them to powder and
added the powder back.
Chef James (16:33):
Oh my gosh.
Dr. Marion Nestle (16:35):
But if you're somebody walking down an aisle
and you think, oh, I'm going tohave vegetables, Right.
And they, oh dear.
Chef James (16:43):
And yeah, you just, it's the psychological box
checker, right.
Dr. Marion Nestle (16:47):
Oh yeah, and it absolutely works.
Chef James (16:50):
Right, right, it totally works, Wow, unbelievable
.
You know and I guess talkingabout Cheerios and manufacturers
that may have more of a globalpresence when you compare it to
a broad, or ingredients are muchdifferent in other countries
and they have their foot down onit, or they they're better
(17:10):
screening this.
I mean, can you give advice asto why?
That's just?
It's all about money.
Dr. Marion Nestle (17:18):
It's because we're Americans Right,
exceptional Americans we havemuch less stringent regulation
of the food industry than othercountries do, in part because
the food industry is not,because the food industry is so
effective at lobbying, becauseour electoral system is so
completely corrupt thatcorporations can give money to
(17:39):
elect to candidates and thencandidates are beholden to them
and they're not going to doanything that's to offend them.
And if they try to do anything,the companies are just on them
right away.
Right.
So nobody wants to take on thefood industry.
Chef James (17:58):
No, not at all.
Dr. Marion Nestle (18:00):
They just Seems anyway they avoid it.
So and then we have this FirstAmendment stuff that you know.
It's very hard for me tobelieve that the founding
fathers developed the FirstAmendment to protect the right
of food companies to market tochildren.
But that's how our courts havebeen interpreting it, and that's
(18:20):
very difficult to deal with.
Chef James (18:22):
That's very hard, Well you know.
And the other thing is too,eating, well, eating balanced, I
mean.
Dr. Marion Nestle (18:29):
It's expensive, yeah that's food
policy in action.
Chef James (18:35):
It funnels you.
It's not the dollar menuanymore, but families can go to
that.
They can't afford quality foods.
Dr. Marion Nestle (18:48):
And those are so concerned, or they think
they can't.
If they bought foods and cookedthem, they could do much better
.
But, if they think that fruitsand vegetables are expensive,
it's because they are.
Right.
If you look at Department ofCommerce figures from 1980 to
the present, these figures showvery clearly that, while the
(19:10):
price of food in general hasincreased, the price of fruits
and vegetables has increased farmore than the price of food in
general, whereas the price ofultra-processed junk foods has
increased much less.
Right and that's federal policy.
Right.
And we could fix that in aninstant if anybody was willing
to take it on.
(19:31):
Right, right.
But we don't have electedleaders who are willing to take
that on.
Chef James (19:36):
That's very hard to do, especially with a system
that it just seems like it'sevolved from generation to
generation, just continues tosnowball into what we have today
, from our beginning a long timeago, many years ago.
So how we combat that, it'svery hard to do.
Like you said, people caninvest in certain things.
(19:58):
For people that may have areaswhere they can do a home garden
or they can do certain things.
It's hard to try to build thatin but it won't have the time to
do it.
Dr. Marion Nestle (20:10):
Well, I explained to parents who are
having difficulties gettingtheir kids to eat healthfully
that they're fighting an entirefood system on their own.
Right.
That's pretty hard to do andthe food system is big.
It's more than one and a halftrillion dollars in the United
States if you count restaurantsand alcohol.
Chef James (20:30):
Right In production.
Dr. Marion Nestle (20:32):
Oh, it includes production.
Chef James (20:34):
I found it very interesting.
You had mentioned, like theproduction of I don't know if
that was food and beverage to,what a typical nutritional
intake is for somebody likecalorically.
Dr. Marion Nestle (20:47):
Oh yeah, we have twice the calories that we
need as a population.
Food is enormously overproducedin the United States, to the
extent of being twice what weneed, which means that there's
an enormous surplus of food.
And remember, the purpose offood companies is to sell that
(21:08):
food.
So they're doing everythingthey possibly can to sell that
food and one of the strategiesis to get people to eat more.
Chef James (21:17):
Right, and that comes down to portion.
Dr. Marion Nestle (21:19):
It's not that hard to do.
Chef James (21:20):
Right.
Well, and again, talking about,on my side, being a chef, I get
concerned because my commitmentto the person coming into my
establishment using local,knowing my farm or knowing the
food and portion size, is acommitment on my end that I'm
(21:41):
serving clean, it's a state ofmore products and kind of being
that voice, because otherwise,you know, I don't want to shame
it, but you almost kind of feellike a food drug dealer in a way
, because I know how to add acidfat, sweet texture to my plates
where people really they thriveoff of it, you know.
(22:03):
And not to mention some of thefoods, when you call it on each
your menu Like I think we talkedabout before, it was its food
memories you can pull peopleemotionally into a dining
atmosphere and they're off tothe races, you know.
You throw some alcohol in thereand you're really winning the
game.
Dr. Marion Nestle (22:21):
You know the races right.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah Well, food is one oflife's greatest pleasures, you
know.
It's one you get to haveseveral times a day.
It's pretty great.
Chef James (22:32):
Oh well, yeah, it's fantastic, of course.
So there's things that you know.
They've gotten smaller too.
Dr. Marion Nestle (22:37):
Yeah, and that's food.
Companies are doing that forprice reasons rather than
anything else, yeah, exactly.
But anything that would reduceportion size would help.
I'm always saying you know, ifthere's one concept I could get
across, it's that largerportions have more calories.
It's hard to say it with astraight face, but in fact it's
(22:59):
not intuitively obvious.
People are eating more andthere's lots and lots of
evidence that people startedeating more in response to food
industry marketing efforts inthe 1980s and 90s and we're
seeing the results of that now.
People are overweight.
Chef James (23:19):
Right.
Can you describe, in the senseof you know, comparing a meal
plan from what a typicalAmerican male or female would
eat, compared to maybe a broad,like certain countries where
that balance for them iscompletely different?
I mean, we do overeat, we eatheavier here.
Dr. Marion Nestle (23:38):
Oh, is there any question about it?
People come to the UnitedStates.
They can't believe the size ofthe portions.
They just can't believe it.
I mean I've been, you know,okay, I don't eat so much
anymore.
I'm in the stage where mymetabolism is really declined,
but I'm astounded by what goesfor a single portion, even if I
(24:01):
buy a salad, If I buy a preparedsalad, I can have that salad
for three days.
Right, yeah, they're massiveBecause it's so big and if I go
to a restaurant I couldn'tpossibly order an appetizer in
an entree.
Right.
That would be far too much toeat, and if I order an entree,
(24:25):
I'm still going to be takingsome portion of it home.
I just can't believe that thereare people who eat that much.
And yet I go to restaurants andI see people eating 23-ounce
steaks.
Chef James (24:38):
Yeah.
Dr. Marion Nestle (24:39):
I couldn't imagine what they are, and you
know, a 23-ounce steak has a lotmore calories than a 3-ounce
one.
Chef James (24:49):
Yeah, exactly.
Dr. Marion Nestle (24:50):
What can I say?
Chef James (24:52):
It's unfortunate.
Right, right.
And it seems so logical and theanswer seems so easy.
You know, eat less, move more,look at the center of your plate
, focus on that, have balance.
And you know, I think withsocial media too, they've.
Just food is in a whole anotherrealm now.
Dr. Marion Nestle (25:13):
Yeah, but I mean, the idea of eat less, move
more is absolutely impossiblein today's food environment.
So to advise somebody to dothat without giving them a lot
of social support is reallydifficult.
And you know, I think it'sessential for people to
understand that they're beingmarketed to constantly.
(25:33):
Right Marketing is so good thatthey don't notice it, just like
I didn't notice it.
Right.
You know, if I didn't notice it,lots of other people didn't
notice it either, and you areconstantly barraged not only by
advertisements, which are easyto see, but also by subtle, much
more subtle, cute way thatsupermarkets are organized the
(25:57):
fact that food is absolutelyeverywhere.
The example that I just love togive is when I came to NYU in
the late 1980s, there were signsall over the library saying you
can't bring food in here.
Now there are two cafes and,and you know, vending machines
(26:17):
everywhere.
And even looks bookstores,remember.
I mean, you have to be able toremember when bookstores
wouldn't let you in.
Right For the coffee.
Now they have coffee bars orStarbucks inside a bookstore.
That's a huge change and that'sa marketing strategy.
(26:37):
Right.
Food is there.
You'll eat it.
Clothing stores Yep, I meanit's.
It's astounding.
Chef James (26:44):
And you used to never be able to do that.
And now you have Door Dash, youknow, have all this access that
you don't even need to leaveyour house, and the pandemic did
that.
Right, right.
Everything's in a to-go box andit's right there for you.
Dr. Marion Nestle (27:00):
Right, and you know constant delivery, so
it couldn't be easier.
And if you're not, you know.
And if you're not cooking yourown food, you really are not
controlling the amount thatyou're eating or what's in the
food or the quality of theingredients.
You know for that you have todo it yourself, and a lot of
(27:20):
people find it just as easy.
And because of the way thepricing goes, a lot of people
have enough money to eat out allthe time.
Chef James (27:29):
Right, right and you're just, you're kind of
buying into that system.
You know, and what'sinteresting too on my side that
I and I know that you guaranteedaware of it, but I found it
coming along that a lot of thefood manufacturers, on the
hospitality side of things,these large brand hotels and
(27:49):
corporate systems that I used,had buying programs and they
were linked, they're linkedright into you know perks, you
know compliance percentage,rebate percentages, where if I
am compliant at 80% or higherwith this large, this large
distributor and those contractsare signed, then I get a
(28:12):
kickback, not to mention amanufacturer rebate.
So if I'm going to use thispork product or this major, you
know chicken product from thishuge company, so everybody's
like linked into this thing.
Dr. Marion Nestle (28:24):
Well, you know, as I said, everybody's in
business.
This is business, you know, andpublic health is not a goal of
the business.
You know, there are somebusinesses that are these big
corporations, but I don't thinkthey're very credible.
I mean, I have my doubts abouthow well they work.
But you know, and the worldeconomic form is always saying
(28:47):
things like, corporations haveto take social values into
consideration.
Yeah, right, yeah you know thisrequires a big, a big change in
the way that Wall Streetevaluates corporate health and
the effect of what is called theshareholder value movement,
which started in the early 1980sand has absolutely taken over
(29:10):
in the United States.
Those effects are welldocumented.
That's when manufacturing movedout of the country, okay.
That's when everybody startedusing imported cheap labor.
That's when you know a lot ofthings happened that have been
very bad for the country, Ithink.
(29:32):
Yeah it's bad for the Midwest.
Chef James (29:35):
Right, exactly, wow, they're not going to embrace
some level of change in thesense of these.
You know the complex ag system,when you know they have to
change their systems, the waythey treat poultry and livestock
, the way they, you know, treatillnesses and how that all
happens in those.
Those you know those feed lotsand everything like that it's
(29:55):
there's a huge shift all the wayup that would have to take
place.
Dr. Marion Nestle (30:00):
Well, you would think there would be more
pressure for that shift, becausewe need to have agriculture
done more sustainably.
The climate change impact ofthe way we're producing food is
much too high and these thingsare going to have to change.
And that's not going to be easyfor the companies that have
been making money doing thingsthe way they are, but that's
(30:22):
what we have to do.
You just wish you had agovernment that would push this
along a little bit more.
Chef James (30:27):
Right and that would protect the people more.
Sure, you know, looking atforeign countries, was that in
Latin America or Mexico, wherethey were starting to, actually,
governments were stepping in tokind of protect the people and
actually put labeling on?
Dr. Marion Nestle (30:42):
Yeah, it's all over Latin America, because
the countries in Latin Americacan see what happened in the
United States and they areterrified that if their
population gains weight, they'regoing to be dealing with type 2
diabetes at a level at whichthey cannot afford.
They don't have the healthcaresystem that will take care of it
(31:06):
.
They don't have enough moneyfor hospitalizations.
The idea of dealing with thatlevel of type 2 diabetes in the
population is just absolutelyterrifying, and so their public
health.
People are trying to dopreventive measures Now, I think
8 or 10 countries in LatinAmerica that have warning labels
(31:28):
on ultra-processed foodproducts.
I was in Mexico last fall.
I was kind of amazed to go intoa supermarket.
Half the products in thesupermarket have black warning
labels on them.
Wow.
Saying that they're high insugar, salt or saturated fat or
calories or artificialsweeteners or other things that
(31:50):
they would prefer that peoplenot eat.
So what that tells you is youcan't go into a packaged food
aisle and buy that stuff unlessyou're putting your health at
risk.
And these warning labels are soobvious that even people who
are illiterate or kids who can'tread or people who don't read
(32:13):
food labels.
You just see them.
The education is out that youshould avoid these products and
that's working to some extent,but some of the countries also
have restrictions on marketingto children.
Mexico has just passed a lawthat the foods that are sold in
(32:33):
schools have to be levels ofnutrient quality, something
we've never been able to do herevery well.
There's a lot going on in LatinAmerica.
That's very exciting.
Chef James (32:43):
That's great, I guess for me, here we are in the
United States, there's a lot ofpride involved and maybe some
smokescreen involved over theyears, and it's like we take
pride in saying we're the bestor we're going to come to the
rescue, and we're not reallyeven coming to the rescue of our
own food system here in our owncountry.
Dr. Marion Nestle (33:01):
No, and we don't have a healthcare system.
That's the part that's reallyalarming is that we don't have a
functional healthcare system sothat when people develop these
chronic diseases that arerelated to diet not just type 2
diabetes but heart disease andcancers and more higher
susceptibility to things likeCOVID-19, they're more talented.
(33:25):
I mean, it's really bad and youwant to prevent that, if you
can prevent that.
Chef James (33:32):
They seem like they're pretty good bedfellows
between our food system andmedical.
Dr. Marion Nestle (33:38):
The medical system.
Yeah, yeah, I mean in the sensethat there are food companies
that make products that makepeople sick and then they also
make products to make themhealthier, so they get it both
ways.
Chef James (33:52):
Right, yeah, okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (33:55):
But yeah.
Chef James (33:55):
I mean.
Dr. Marion Nestle (33:56):
I think if you were looking ahead and
saying what do we need to do tomake Americans healthier, which
it seems to me would be good foreverybody, Absolutely.
Everybody would benefit forthat, then you would have to
completely redo the food systemso that we have an agricultural
system that focuses on publichealth rather than corporate
(34:17):
health.
Chef James (34:18):
Yeah, exactly Right.
Dr. Marion Nestle (34:20):
Is that politically feasible?
I doubt it.
Chef James (34:23):
Yeah, I agree.
Wow, well, and I know, as we'retalking about combating this
and its portion size, and flipthat container over and really
look at your ingredients.
Do you have any other ways thatpeople can combat this and be a
part of constructive change forthemselves?
Dr. Marion Nestle (34:43):
and their community.
Yeah, I mean, there arethousands, literally thousands
of organizations in the UnitedStates that are working on food
issues.
They're very easy to find.
You just type in food advocacyand whatever the name is of your
location and they pop up.
I mean, and they're reallyliterally thousands.
(35:05):
So you pick your issue and youcan join organizations that are
working on these issues.
You can advocate yourself, youcan write your congressional
representatives.
That really works, by the way.
Chef James (35:18):
Oh wow, that's great .
Dr. Marion Nestle (35:20):
Yeah, I mean not that many people do it, and
if people do, then they payattention, and I think starting
at the local level is reallyuseful because you can see
immediate returns, whereastrying to deal with federal
government is pretty tough thesedays.
Chef James (35:37):
Right, yeah, exactly Okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (35:40):
You can join a school board, you can join a
city council.
You can do a lot at the locallevel to make sure that people
have enough food, that peoplehave healthy food.
Okay.
But there's an educationalcampaign that school food is
done.
Well, School food.
Even though there are federalrules about what can and cannot
(36:02):
be served, the implementation ofthose rules is extremely local
in my experience.
Wow Okay.
So on a school basis, if you'vegot cooks in the school who want
to make healthy food for kids,they're doing it and the kids
are eating it.
Right.
But if you don't care about it,then the kids are getting junk
(36:22):
food.
It varies a lot, so I thinkthere's lots that can be done at
the local level.
That's great and it's worthdoing.
It's absolutely worth doing.
Chef James (36:33):
Okay, no, that's wonderful.
Thank you for your advice onthat.
You know, and I was looking atdiets and different programs for
people to use.
How do you feel about those?
I mean, as long as you stickwith them and you're dedicated,
they work.
I mean, is that?
Dr. Marion Nestle (36:47):
Well, you know, I'm of the.
The world is divided intolumpers and splitters.
Chef James (36:53):
I'm a lumber.
Okay.
Dr. Marion Nestle (36:55):
I have to admit it, I'm a lumber, and so
for me, diets are so simple.
I thought the journalistMichael Pollan can do it in
seven words.
Wow.
So food not too much, mostlyplants, and the only thing you
need to know about the food partis that he means foods that are
not ultra processed.
Okay.
(37:16):
So we minimally processedregular foods that haven't been
industrially produced and withimpossible lists of ingredients.
If you're real food and you'rehaving plant foods in your diet
and you're not overeating,you're fine.
You don't have to worry aboutanything else.
Chef James (37:37):
That's amazing.
Okay, what do you think aboutthe blue zones?
Dr. Marion Nestle (37:40):
Well, you know I'm in the movie.
Chef James (37:44):
So I'm not.
Dr. Marion Nestle (37:45):
I'm not exactly a completely objective
observer.
Okay, you know, I mean it's funand what.
What Dan Buettner found wasthat people are doing just what
you know what eat food not toomuch, mostly plants and be
physically active, and thattakes care of it.
You have a good social supportsystem.
Right, what everybody's beensaying for years you want to be
(38:09):
healthy and live to a ripe andhealthy old age.
You have a reasonably healthydiet.
You're physically active,you've got things to do and
you've got a community.
You're all set.
Yep.
You can't do any better thanthat, but that's all you have to
do.
Right.
And for me, the eat food nottoo much.
Mostly plants leaves you anenormous amount of room for
(38:32):
delicious food.
Absolutely, you can have reallygood food and follow us.
Chef James (38:39):
Yeah, you can Yep, absolutely.
Dr. Marion Nestle (38:42):
And it doesn't mean no junk food, it's
just minimal.
Chef James (38:48):
Moderation.
Dr. Marion Nestle (38:49):
Yeah, perceive with caution.
We're Americans, we don't dothat.
Chef James (38:53):
Exactly, yeah, yeah, looking at you know everything
you've done again I just I wantto appreciate you and thank you
so much for being really such apivotal and huge piece to
sharing our food history.
You know, and supporting anddoing everything you can, all
your many years for change,being that voice you know.
(39:15):
Thank you, Dr.
Nestle, for your time.
Dr. Marion Nestle (39:18):
Well, thank you so much.
This has been fun.
Chef James (39:21):
Yeah, all right, everyone, that is a wrap.
You can check us out if youlike that.
Subscribe Also the InstagramChef Massey.
Just keep it simple, chefmassey.
com, have a good one.
Bye for now.
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