Twinkie, Deconstructed: My Journey to Discover How the Ingredients Found in Processed Foods Are Grown, Mined (Yes, Mined), and Manipulated into What America Eats
by Steve Ettlinger
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Book Summary Information
Author: Steve EttlingerEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Original Language); English (Unknown); English (Published)
Published: 2008-02-26
ISBN: 0452289289
Number of pages: 304
Publisher: Plume
Book Reviews of Twinkie, Deconstructed: My Journey to Discover How the Ingredients Found in Processed Foods Are Grown, Mined (Yes, Mined), and Manipulated into What America Eats
Book Review: Drier than a Twinkie, but more palatable.
Summary: 4 Stars
Twinkie Deconstructed is an exhaustive research effort into the sourcing of each ingredient on the Twinkie label. Each ingredient gets its own short chapter, covering a little about how it is made, and providing some historical background. Some chapters were fascinating, mostly for their shock value. For example, the iron in enriched flour is scooped from the bottom of steel mill acid baths! Many chapters were interesting, in that they paint a consistent picture of the north american continent as a surprising source of raw materials, dotted with mills, factories, and processing plants to handle it all. But many chapters fall flat. How many times can one read about the plant tours provided by coy corporate tour guides before you start skipping whole sections? In my case, about 15.
My biggest complaint about the book overall is that many concepts are not adequately explained. Basic chemical terms like "catalyst", "emulsifier", "hydrogenation", etc are introduced without much explanation. I was hoping to learn more about food science than I did. Descriptors from the culinary arts are also left blank. For example, an explanation of the phrase "crumb", used to describe the quality of a cake, would have helped. A few extra paragraphs in each chapter would have done the trick.
Lastly, as noted by many other reviewers, don't expect any editorializing about whether Twinkies are good or bad, from a nutritional, environmental, or cultural perspective. This book is about the tangible properties of processed food.
More Twinkie, Deconstructed: My Journey to Discover How the Ingredients Found in Processed Foods Are Grown, Mined (Yes, Mined), and Manipulated into What America Eats reviews:
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Summary of Twinkie, Deconstructed: My Journey to Discover How the Ingredients Found in Processed Foods Are Grown, Mined (Yes, Mined), and Manipulated into What America Eats
A pop-science journey into the surprising ingredients found in most common packaged foodsLike most Americans, Steve Ettlinger eats processed foods. And, like most consumers, he didn't have a clue as to what most of the ingredients on the labels mean. So when his young daughter asked, "Daddy, what's polysorbate 60?" he was at a loss-and determined to find out.
From the phosphate mines in Idaho to the oil fields in China, Twinkie, Deconstructed demystifies some of the most common processed food ingredients- where they come from, how they are made, how they are used-and why. Beginning at the source (hint: they're often more closely linked to rock and petroleum than any of the four food groups), we follow each Twinkie ingredient through the process of being crushed, baked, fermented, refined, and/or reacted into a totally unrecognizable goo or powder-all for the sake of creating a simple snack cake.
An insightful exploration of the modern food industry, if you've ever wondered what you're eating when you consume foods containing mono- and diglycerides or calcium sulfate (the latter a food-grade equivalent of plaster of paris), this book is for you.
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