Omnivore's Dilemma: Chapter 5

In this chapter of Omnivore’s Dilemma Pollan looks at corn and the production of processed food. Most of the corn that enters our bodies isn’t actually eaten as corn. Wet mills turn corn into the building blocks for large companies to make processed food. This whole process is invisible to consumers, taking place in “sealed vats, pipes, fermentation tanks, and filters” (86). Although he is not allowed in the processing plants, Pollan does get to visit the Center for Crops Utilization Research at Iowa State University. Here new uses for surpluses of corn and soybeans are developed. In wet mills, kernels are broken down in a process like digestion, “complex food is reduced to simple molecules, mostly sugars” (87). Different from the digestion that takes place in animals, there is no waste at the end of this industrial process. One thing produced is high-fructose corn syrup, now the most valuable food product made from corn.

Processing food has been happening forever. By salting, drying, and pickling, we are able to prevent food from going bad and to eat foods from different seasons and locations Following World War II, processing food went beyond preservation. Now, almost all processed food contains either corn or soybeans in some form.

Nature has made it so that companies’ profits can only grow so much. Prices of raw materials (like corn) will continue to fall, but the amount each consumer can eat stays fixed. Growth in the food industry can only come as a result in growth of population. For food companies to make more profits they can encourage people to spend more in proportion to the cost of production and/or get people to eat more food.  Cheap corn helps companies achieve both.

This chapter reminded me how much our food production has moved away from nature and towards both science and economics. Companies are focused on the bottom line. For them to be more profitable, they need to find ways to produce more food for less money, often at the expense of quality and health. The General Mills cereal headquarters is so far from what I think food production should be like. Essentially food is coming from board meetings and laboratories instead of nature. Before, finding a way to process food was a necessity for survival. Now food is being processed in new ways simply so that corporations can make profits.  

What does it mean for our health that so much of our food comes from corn?

How much further can processing food go? Will there ever be a point where we stop trying to alter food even more?