In The Dorito Effect, Mark Schatzker shows us how our approach to the nation’s number one public health crisis has gotten it wrong. The epidemics of obesity, heart disease, and diabetes are not tied to the overabundance of fat or carbs. Instead, we have been led astray by the growing divide between flavor—the tastes we crave—and the underlying nutrition. Since the late 1940s, we have been slowly leeching flavor out of the food we grow. Simultaneously, we have taken great leaps forward in technology, allowing us to produce in the lab the very flavors that are being lost on the farm.
Thanks to this largely invisible epidemic, seemingly healthy food is becoming more like junk food: highly craveable but nutritionally empty. We have unknowingly interfered with an ancient chemical language—flavor—that evolved to guide our nutrition, not destroy it.
Be sure to check your local listings for The Dr. Oz Show on May 18. The Dorito Effect and the topics covered in the book will be discussed by Dr. Oz and the author, Mark Schatzker.
Starred Review. "Meticulously analyzing current research involving diverse subjects such as urine-eating goats and caterpillar-consuming wasps, Schatzker casts the greatest share of blame for obesity on the ubiquity of artificial flavorings... This is a provocative new take on American eating." – Booklist