For more than three decades, Marion Nestle has been telling people what to eat.
In the late 1980s, she edited the first “The Surgeon General’s Report on Nutrition and Health,” a landmark U.S. report on nutrition, then went on to co-write the U.S. government’s Dietary Guidelines for Americans and co-founded New York University’s (NYU) influential food studies program.
Nestle, an NYU professor emeritus, says her time in government opened her eyes to the enormous influence of the multibillion-dollar food industry on Congress. In the early 2000s, she became a critic of the food industry and an advocate for major food reforms.
In 2002, Nestle published “Food Politics” [Política Alimentar]an exposé that argued that the food industry is at the root of many of the country’s nutritional problems. The industry makes ever-increasing profits by producing ultra-processed, additive-laden foods, Nestle wrote, and then markets those foods to children and adults, while lobbying against regulations and trying to co-opt nutrition experts.
Over the years, Nestle’s straightforward nutrition advice, scathing critiques of food companies, and frequent media appearances have made it one of the most recognizable names in nutrition. In 2006, she published one of her most popular books, “What to Eat” [O Que Comer] which showed consumers how to navigate supermarkets and improve their health by deciphering food labels.
At 89 years old, Nestle, who lives in New York City and Ithaca, is still going strong. In November, he published his most recent book: “What to Eat Now: The Indispensable Guide to Good Food, How to Find It, and Why It Matters”[O que comer agora: o guia indispensável para uma boa alimentação, como encontrá-la e por que ela é importante].
We wanted to know how Nestle’s knowledge of nutrition and the food industry impacts your daily eating decisions. So we caught up with her to find out what she eats on a typical day.
What is your general approach to food?
I follow Michael Pollan’s famous mantra: Eat, but not too much, and especially vegetables. And I define foods as being unprocessed or as little processed as possible. Not ultra-processed. I think it solves everything. That doesn’t mean I’m perfect. I’m omnivorous. Like everything. I just don’t eat much, partly because metabolism slows down with age.
I eat healthily, but I’m not obsessed with it. If I have a bad eating day, I don’t worry. At this point, it’s pretty clear that I’m not going to die prematurely. What I’m eating is working for me because I’m 89 years old and I’m still here.
What do you eat for breakfast?
I drink a few cups of weak coffee with milk, without sugar, between 8 and 9 am. That’s when I write. I don’t get hungry until around 10:30 or 11 am. This is when I eat oatmeal or unsweetened cereal with one ingredient: wheat. I add a little brown sugar. I use much less sugar than is in pre-sweetened cereal and add blueberries or any seasonal fruit.
I’ve never believed any research about breakfast being the most important meal of the day. Most of them were sponsored by cereal companies.
And lunch?
My lunches are irregular. Sometimes I have a salad for lunch. Or if I’m having lunch with someone, I’ll eat whatever is in the restaurant. If I’m at home in New York, I harvest whatever is growing on my terrace. Peaches, cherries, raspberries and blueberries, lettuce and tomatoes. I can cut up some cheese or eat it with peanuts. And some bread.
And dinner?
It depends. I don’t eat much. But I like salads. I can eat salads twice a day. If I’m at home, I can have an egg, crackers and cheese. I like to make meals based on what I have available. So, it depends on what I bought, what’s in the house or what’s on the terrace. We have a garden in Ithaca, there’s a garden on my terrace, and there’s a farmers market not far from here.
I also go to many restaurants in the neighborhood.
What are some foods you love?
Fortunately, I like a lot of simple foods. I like vegetables, eggs, cheese. Like some ultra-processed foods, not many. I don’t like ultra-processed foods that have a long list of ingredients. Most don’t taste good to me. I like vegetables. I like the crunchiness, the flavors and the colors. This makes it easier to eat healthily.
But I recognize that I am privileged. I weigh the same as I did when I was in high school. I don’t have weight problems. Is it genetics? I have no idea. My father died of a heart attack at age 47. He was obese and smoked three packs a day. It’s hard to know where genetics fits into this.
Q: Do you have a favorite sweet or dessert?
Ice cream. When I’m home in New York, I try to find gingerbread ice cream. It’s hard to find. But when I find it, I buy it. My partner and I make homemade vanilla ice cream in Ithaca. There are only three or four ingredients. This has ruined other ice creams for me because a lot of commercial ice creams have all these emulsifiers that hold the ice cream together. Real ice cream will fall apart if left at room temperature and not consumed immediately. It separates and liquefies. But I like it. I think it tastes better and has a better texture than commercial ice creams that have emulsifiers. I like ice cream without the emulsifiers.
Q: What about snacks?
I like corn chips. Not very salty. Some corn chips are ultra-processed, although most are not. I also like sweets. I can have these things at home and not feel like I need to eat them all at once. Not everyone can do this.
Q: Do you take any supplements?
I don’t take supplements because I have a healthy diet. I don’t think I need them. But two in three Americans take supplements. They make people feel better — and it’s hard to argue with that. Life is difficult. If all it takes is a supplement to make you feel better, then I won’t argue with that. Whether that’s because they’re doing something or because they’re a placebo is hard to know.
But I don’t trust what’s in them. There is so much evidence that what the label says is not what is on them. Many studies have found that a notable percentage of supplements do not contain what is listed on their labels. I don’t want to put something in my body if I don’t know what’s in it. And there are things in supplements that shouldn’t be there — that’s what so many studies have found. Not true for all supplements. But it’s very difficult to know which ones are acceptable and which ones aren’t. So I don’t take any.
Do you have any advice for readers?
Eating healthy in today’s society is very difficult because you are fighting an entire food industry all by yourself — which is trying to sell you the most profitable and least healthy foods available. But one thing you can do is read food labels. There is a lot of information in them. If you’re looking at a packaged food and can’t recognize the ingredients, or if you can’t buy the ingredients in a supermarket, then it’s ultra-processed.
There are certain ingredients that are indicators of ultra-processed foods. These would be color additives, flavor additives and emulsifiers such as mono- and diglycerides, polysorbates and carrageenan, and texturizers such as agar. I always read food labels. If something has a lot of artificial additives and ingredients that I don’t recognize, then I won’t eat it.