Everyone knows how hard it can be to maintain a healthy diet. But what if some of the decisions
we make about what to eat are beyond our control? Is it possible that processed food is
addictive like drugs or alcohol? Motivated by these questions Pulitzer Prize-winning
investigative reporter Michael Moss began searching for answers to find the true peril in our
food. In Hooked Moss explores the science of addiction and uncovers what the scientific and
medical communities--as well as food manufacturers--already know which is that food can in
some cases be even more addictive than alcohol cigarettes or drugs. Our bodies are
hard-wired for sweets so food manufacturers have deployed fifty-six types of sugar to add to
their products creating in us the expectation that everything should be cloying we've evolved
to prefer convenient meals so three-fourths of the calories we get from groceries come from
ready-to-eat foods. Moss goes on to show how the processed food industry has not only tried to
deny this troubling discovery but exploit it to its advantage. For instance in a response to
recent dieting trends food manufacturers have simply turned junk food into junk diets filling
grocery stores with diet foods that are hardly distinguishable from the products that got us
into trouble in the first place. With more people unable to make dieting work for them
manufacturers are now claiming to add ingredients that can effortlessly cure our compulsive
eating habits. A gripping account of the legal battles insidious marketing campaigns and
cutting-edge food science that have brought us to our current public health crisis Hooked lays
out all that the food industry is doing to exploit and deepen our addictions and shows us what
we can do so that we can one again seize control--
