"We all like different food, but everybody needs to eat! How Are We Alike and Different? Find out in My food, Your food, Our food."--

Various foods from all over the world.

"Is Italian olive oil really Italian, or are we dipping our bread in lamp oil? Why are we masochistically drawn to foods that can hurt us, like hot peppers? Far from being a classic American dish, is apple pie actually . . . English? "As a species, we're hardwired to obsess over food," Matt Siegel explains as he sets out "to uncover the hidden side of everything we put in our mouths." Siegel also probes subjects ranging from the myths--and realities--of...

Join an award-winning anthropologist for an exploration of the evolution of the human diet and its relationship to our bodies.

Over the past several decades, globalization has homogenized what we eat, and done so ruthlessly. The numbers are stark: Of the roughly six thousand different plants once consumed by human beings, only nine remain major staples today. Just three of these—rice, wheat, and corn—now provide fifty percent of all our calories. Dig deeper and the trends are more worrisome still: The source of much of the world’s food—seeds—is mostly in the control...

Dozing off while contemplating Grandpa's unusual vacation, Kate dreams about Chewandswallow, where it snows popcorn and rains sandwiches and the fate of falling food intrigues her.