Wednesday, July 1, 2009

On Acai

See here for Adam Stark's latest dispatch, this time tackling the dubious qualities of the so-called "superfood" acai.

Personally, I think all foods are super, and my suspicion is always aroused when any one is singled out as a magic bullet. I never knew precisely why acai was bullsh*t, and am glad for Adam's thorough debunking.

As Michael Pollan so succinctly put it, "Avoid foods that make health claims." After all, broccoli doesn't advertise, except in this brilliant Onion article.

Again, you can read the acai piece here and an excerpt here:

Q: But I don’t care about science – it’s all sponsored by the fascist military-industrial-pharmaceutical complex, anyways! What matters to me is the shamanic healing wisdom of the indigenous peoples of the Amazon basin. Don’t they use açaí for, like, everything down there?

A: Actually, they mostly use it for breakfast. Sort of like we use grapefruit.

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