Food for Life, Tim Spector

December 2023

I interviewed Tim Spector for a Twixmas/New Year 2024 piece for The i Paper, which you can read here.

I am SO conflicted by things like the Zoe programme. It does feed into diet culture and I know so many people who are obsessed by it - and yet also so many people who have been helped by it, who knew so little about nutrition before having a go etc.

And I can’t bring myself to get fully on board with the anti-diet activists - I consider myself one - who say the answer to beating diet culture is to ignore that some foods are healthier than others full stop. Sure, with all my resources, I can make this approach a good expereince fro my child, by making all foods available to her, but that’s just not the case for so many families who are struggling with obesity and its lifelong chronic consequences.

While I do know that living under the threat of a diet and restrictive eating patterns is no fun (and the rest…), how can I say it is better or worse than living with the painful health conditions of ignoring what we eat to a debilitating extent?

Anyway, this book is a good read, packed with eye-opening insights as well as useful advice.

Good luck!