Cookbooks: 1970s to the Present: Food for Health

Budgeting for meals was not the only concern for cooks of the 1970s and early 1980s. As nutritional research made advances, scientists, the government, and consumer watchdog groups began issuing recommendations about what to feed the family. An onslaught of books on diet regimens, food additives, and healthful eating lined bookstore shelves. Diet for a Small Planet (1971) examined the American system of food production and found it lacking. The author, Frances Moore Lappé, warned against America’s wasteful process of raising meat for food while many in the rest of the world starved. Vegetarian cookbooks appeared, including the popular series by Mollie Katzen based on the recipes at the Moosewood Restaurant in Ithaca, New York. Health food stores stocked brown rice, tofu, and sprouts.