
98: What Your Food Ate
06/08/23 • 71 min
“Across the board, dietary advice typically focuses on what and how much to eat, with remarkably little attention paid to how farming practices influence the nutritional quality of food and whether the “right foods” pack the nutrients they once had.”
Welcome back to another episode of Made You Think! In this episode, we're discussing What Your Food Ate by David R. Montgomery and Anne Biklé. Exploring the concept of "food chain reactions," the book unveils the hidden connections between our food choices and their environmental, social, and health impacts. Do you really know what you're eating?
We cover a wide range of topics including:
- The revival of physical bookstores fueled by social media
- How the health of our soil essentially corresponds to our health
- Why nutritional diversity is so important
- The relationship between our diets and overall well-being
- What are our food cravings telling us?
And much more. Please enjoy, and make sure to follow Nat, Neil, and Adil on Twitter and share your thoughts on the episode.
Links from the Episode:
Mentioned in the Show:
- Great Book Series (1:04)
- Barnes and Noble open 30 new stores (2:55)
- Reality Has a Surprising Amount of Detail (19:17)
- Mother Tongue Cooking Club (33:04)
- Force of Nature (57:55)
- Pluck (58:19)
- TrueMed (59:57)
- Rooted (1:09:26)
- Dutch Meadows Farm
Books Mentioned:
- What Your Food Ate
- The Three-Body Problem (5:00) (Nat's Book Notes)
- Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations (14:59)
People Mentioned:
- Anthony Gustin (15:40)
- Wendell Berry (15:48)
- Ben Greenfield (26:57)
- Justin Mares (28:21)
- Miles Snyder (33:01)
- Calley Means (1:01:34)
- Gabe Brown (1:04:24)
Show Topics:
(1:35) The revival of Barnes and Noble along with the influence that 'Booktok' has had on physical book stores.
(5:11) How different content performs on Instagram, TikTok, and Youtube. Each platform serves a different purpose whether it's for entertainment or educational.
(12:16) Today, we’re discussing What Your Food Ate by David R. Montgomery and Anne Biklé! Our food is a lot less nutritionally dense than we realize because of way that the food we eat is grown.
(14:55) The co-authors' first book talks about the importance of caring for the soil, as that's the base for everything we grow. The same food can have such different nutritional values depending on how it was grown or raised.
(20:08) Why nutritional diversity is important and how eating as nutrient dense foods as possible is really important too. When it comes to food, it's best to aim for quality over quantity.
(26:13) When we take a look at the foods we're eating, it makes sense that we may need supplements to give us our essential nutrients that may be otherwise lacking in our diet.
(28:01) What does Europe do differently than the US in terms of growing their food? We also talk about glyphosate levels in the things that we eat.
(33:35) We give a brief overview of how the government has subsidized farmers in the US, which plays a role in our food supply and what we eat.
(38:44) Do our ...
“Across the board, dietary advice typically focuses on what and how much to eat, with remarkably little attention paid to how farming practices influence the nutritional quality of food and whether the “right foods” pack the nutrients they once had.”
Welcome back to another episode of Made You Think! In this episode, we're discussing What Your Food Ate by David R. Montgomery and Anne Biklé. Exploring the concept of "food chain reactions," the book unveils the hidden connections between our food choices and their environmental, social, and health impacts. Do you really know what you're eating?
We cover a wide range of topics including:
- The revival of physical bookstores fueled by social media
- How the health of our soil essentially corresponds to our health
- Why nutritional diversity is so important
- The relationship between our diets and overall well-being
- What are our food cravings telling us?
And much more. Please enjoy, and make sure to follow Nat, Neil, and Adil on Twitter and share your thoughts on the episode.
Links from the Episode:
Mentioned in the Show:
- Great Book Series (1:04)
- Barnes and Noble open 30 new stores (2:55)
- Reality Has a Surprising Amount of Detail (19:17)
- Mother Tongue Cooking Club (33:04)
- Force of Nature (57:55)
- Pluck (58:19)
- TrueMed (59:57)
- Rooted (1:09:26)
- Dutch Meadows Farm
Books Mentioned:
- What Your Food Ate
- The Three-Body Problem (5:00) (Nat's Book Notes)
- Dirt: The Erosion of Civilizations (14:59)
People Mentioned:
- Anthony Gustin (15:40)
- Wendell Berry (15:48)
- Ben Greenfield (26:57)
- Justin Mares (28:21)
- Miles Snyder (33:01)
- Calley Means (1:01:34)
- Gabe Brown (1:04:24)
Show Topics:
(1:35) The revival of Barnes and Noble along with the influence that 'Booktok' has had on physical book stores.
(5:11) How different content performs on Instagram, TikTok, and Youtube. Each platform serves a different purpose whether it's for entertainment or educational.
(12:16) Today, we’re discussing What Your Food Ate by David R. Montgomery and Anne Biklé! Our food is a lot less nutritionally dense than we realize because of way that the food we eat is grown.
(14:55) The co-authors' first book talks about the importance of caring for the soil, as that's the base for everything we grow. The same food can have such different nutritional values depending on how it was grown or raised.
(20:08) Why nutritional diversity is important and how eating as nutrient dense foods as possible is really important too. When it comes to food, it's best to aim for quality over quantity.
(26:13) When we take a look at the foods we're eating, it makes sense that we may need supplements to give us our essential nutrients that may be otherwise lacking in our diet.
(28:01) What does Europe do differently than the US in terms of growing their food? We also talk about glyphosate levels in the things that we eat.
(33:35) We give a brief overview of how the government has subsidized farmers in the US, which plays a role in our food supply and what we eat.
(38:44) Do our ...
Previous Episode

97: Country Driving: A Chinese Road Trip
“The Chinese people had invented the compass, paper, the printing press, gunpowder, the seismograph, the crossbow, and the umbrella; they had sailed to Africa in the fifteenth century; they had constructed the Great Wall; over the past decade they had built their economy at a rate never before seen in the developing world. They could return a rental car with exactly three-eighths of a tank of gas, but filling it was apparently beyond the realm of cultural possibility.”
Welcome back to another episode of Made You Think! In this episode, we're covering Country Driving, a captivating memoir by Peter Hessler that explores the transformation of China through the lens of its rapidly changing roadways and the people who navigate them.
We cover a wide range of topics including:
- The modernization of Chinese infrastructure
- Negotiation culture in China
- Exceptionalism and believing your culture is superior
- The most popular automobiles in America
- How conditions for laborers have gotten so bad
And much more. Please enjoy, and make sure to follow Nat, Neil, and Adil on Twitter and share your thoughts on the episode.
Links from the Episode:
Mentioned in the Show:
- Slate Star Codex reddit thread (0:32)
- Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History (2:48)
- Monthly car payments in America (42:35)
- 2022's best selling cars (46:05)
Books Mentioned:
- The Fish That Ate the Whale (0:11) (Nat's Book Notes)
- Energy and Civilization (5:42) (Nat's Book Notes)
- On China (21:52)
- Cobalt Red (28:57)
- The Dictator’s Handbook (36:15) (Nat's Book Notes)
People Mentioned:
- Sam Bankman-Fried (0:39)
- Dan Carlin (2:48)
- Henry Kissinger (21:51)
Show Topics:
(0:00) There are some books that can arguably be just a blog post, but we feel this is not the case for Country Driving.
(3:35) Country Driving gives insight to what 'Made in China’ means, as we often don't consider the human labor side of the items we own.
(6:59) While there are large amounts of ambition and hustle in Chinese culture, is it sustainable and truly for the good of the individual, or is it simply for their own survival?
(9:16) “In China, much of life involves skirting regulations, and one of the basic truths is that forgiveness comes easier than permission.”
The central government in China and how enforcement happens moreso on the group level. We also discuss whether people throughout the world are innately the same and how our culture plays a role in how we act under certain circumstances.
(15:33) Negotation culture in China and the patience it takes to draw decisions out until the last possible second. Nearly everything is a negotiation in China, whereas in America, there isn't a whole lot of negotiation.
(20:56) Invasion of the Mongols headed by Genghis Khan. As different groups arrived to China, they eventually got absorbed into the current culture.
(24:26) One of China’s strengths is the ability to absorb outside cultures. As new figures came into power, they adopted the previous regimes. We also talk a...
Next Episode

99: Roosevelt’s Last Adventure: The River of Doubt
“The ordinary traveler, who never goes off the beaten route and who on this beaten route is carried by others, without himself doing anything or risking anything, does not need to show much more initiative and intelligence than an express package."
Welcome back to another episode of Made You Think! In this episode, we're discussing The River of Doubt by Candace Millard, a story that follows the expedition of Theodore Roosevelt as he explores the Amazon river in Brazil. Though faced with many hardships along the way, Roosevelt finds purpose in this monumental journey after losing the 1912 election.
We cover a wide range of topics including:
- The explorer spirit and the drive to explore the unknown
- Theories of how long humans have been in the Americas
- How the crew was able to form relationships with uncontacted tribes
- The progression of travel methods in comparison to the early 1900s
- What were in the cards for Roosevelt and Rondon after they returned
And much more. Please enjoy, and make sure to follow Nat, Neil, and Adil on Twitter and share your thoughts on the episode.
Links from the Episode:
Mentioned in the Show:
- The Amazon Rainforest may have been shaped by humans (22:35)
- Reliving Shackleton’s Epic Endurance Expedition (27:41)
- Kayaking from California to Hawaii (29:00)
- Joe Rogan with Dan Flores (31:19)
- Affirmative Action ruling (36:42)
- 14 Peaks (52:32)
- The Alpinist (55:34)
- Meru (56:40)
- Candiru fish (1:02:27)
- Concorde's New York to London flight (1:17:44)
- United goes Supersonic (1:19:05)
- Adventure Capitalist (1:21:04)
Books Mentioned:
- The River of Doubt
- The Comfort Crisis (6:26)
- Coyote America (31:22)
- What Your Food Ate (32:57)
- The Creative Act (1:19:47)
People Mentioned:
- Cândido Rondon (13:54)
- Graham Hancock (25:48)
- Dan Flores (31:20)
- Jimmy Chin (58:03)
- Henry Hudson (1:12:34)
Show Topics:
(1:09) In this episode, we're talking about The River of Doubt. After losing the 1912 election, Roosevelt traveled to Brazil to explore the Amazon river, which was largely unknown at that time.
(4:17) The explorer spirit and the urge to explore something that people haven't seen before. While there's not much else for us to discover for the first time on earth, there are still many unique things to go see that only few have.
(8:52) Roosevelt and the crew seemed to underestimate what they were getting into, and though underprepared, it ended up being an overall success.
(14:21) We talk a bit more about Rondon and his backsto...
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