How do we decide what foods to eat? In recent years, this simple question has become complicated beyond belief — as supermarkets have grown to warehouse size, and as the old advice to eat foods from four food groups has been overrun by questions about organic foods, hormones, pesticides, carbohydrates, trans fats, omega-3s, supplements, health claims, extreme diets, and, above all, obesity.

Fortunately, Marion Nestle is here to tell us what's what — to give us the facts we need to make sensible choices from the bewildering array of foods available to us. With What to Eat, this renowned nutritionist takes us on a guided tour of the supermarket, explaining the issues with verve and wit as well as a scientist's expertise and a food lover's experience.

Today's supermarket is ground zero for the food industry, a place where the giants of agribusiness compete for sales with profits — not nutrition or health — in mind. Nestle walks us through the supermarket, section by section: produce, dairy, meat, fish, packaged foods, breads, juices, bottled waters, and more. Along the way, she untangles the issues, decodes the labels, clarifies the health claims, and debunks the sales hype. She tells us how to make sensible choices based on freshness, taste, nutrition, health, effects on the environment, and, of course, price. With Nestle as our guide, we learn what it takes to make wise food choices and are inspired to act with confidence on that knowledge.

What to Eat is the guide to healthy eating today: comprehensive, provocative, revealing, rich in common sense, informative, and a pleasure to read.

"According to nutritionist Nestle (Food Politics), the increasing confusion among the general public about what to eat comes from two sources: experts who fail to create a holistic view by isolating food components and health issues, and a food industry that markets items on the basis of profits alone. She suggests that, often, research findings are deliberately obscure to placate special interests. Nestle says that simple, common-sense guidelines available decades ago still hold true: consume fewer calories, exercise more, eat more fruits and vegetables and, for today's consumers, less junk food. The key to eating well, Nestle advises, is to learn to navigate through the aisles (and thousands of items) in large supermarkets. To that end, she gives readers a virtual tour, highlighting the main concerns of each food group, including baby, health and prepared foods, and supplements. Nestle's prose is informative and entertaining; she takes on the role of detective, searching for clues to the puzzle of healthy and satisfying nutrition. Her intelligent and reassuring approach will likely make readers venture more confidently through the jungle of today's super-sized stores." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

"Meticulously researched, thorough, and indispensable — Marion Nestle's What to Eat delivers on its title. It's a reliable, riveting guide to the amazing truth about what we?re sold by the American food distribution system. Refreshingly rigorous and fun to read." Alice Waters, founder and proprietor of Chez Panisse and author of The Chez Panisse Cafe Cookbook

"The industry wants you to believe there are no good foods or bad foods. Well, that's not true. And I can't think of anyone who knows the difference better than Marion Nestle." Eric Schlosser

When it comes to the increasingly treacherous landscape of the American supermarket, with its marketing hype and competing health claims, Marion Nestle is an absolutely indispensable guide: knowledgeable, eminently sane — and wonderful company, too. Michael Pollan, author of The Botany of Desire and The Omnivore's Dilemma

Marion Nestle is the most respected nutritionist in America today. Her book Food Politics was given the James Beard Award, the top award for food writing; that book and its follow-up, Safe Food are backlist classics for the University of California Press. A longtime nutritionist and former head of NYU's Department of Nutrition, Food Studies, and Public Health, Prof. Nestle lectures worldwide and was featured in the movie Super Size Me. A native New Yorker, she raised her family in California and now lives in Greenwich Village.