Eat food...

That was Michael Pollan's basic message at Abravanel Hall last week. Introduced as a "food chain journalist," Pollan spoke to a full house of admiring foodies. It was a predictable crowd ranging from Gen Y to Yuppies. We were the key element of diversity - I was the only one in the hall wearing a tie.

But the topic was food, and Pollan gave us some good reminders and some simple rules:

Avoid products that your grandmother would not recongize as food. (Does this include All-Bran?)

Avoid foods that make health claims.

Avoid foods with hyphens (low-fat, non-fat, low-cal, etc.)

Avoid foods with more than five ingredients.

Avoid foods that won't spoil (those Twinkies will stay soft for years).

Avoid shopping in the middle of the store (where high-margin packaged food products scream their health claims) - and shop the quieter periphery (a condition Pollan refers to as "the silence of the yams.")

In answer to a question from the audience, Pollan recalled that for dinner the night before the lecture he had cooked up some whole wheat pasta and stir fried (in olive oil) some peppers and a few other vegetables.

Pollan was on Thursday. So the choice of a restaurant for our Friday night date was a little more complicated than usual. In the end, we opted for Noodles & Co. where we could get some pasta and peppers, grilled chicken, and a fresh green salad. Then we went to Costco...