In the tradition of literary muckrakers, Benjamin Lorr’s The Secret Life of Groceries exposes the true cost of cheap food. Weaving history, statistics, experiences and interviews, Lorr investigates the sourcing, production, distribution and sales of retail food products. The most compelling chapters focus on the people tethered to an industry that maintains margins of 1.5% as food prices have fallen nearly three-fourths over the past century.

You might imagine that of the five senses, taste and sight would be the most frequently invoked in a book about groceries, but Lorr’s book hits you hardest through the nose .. Lorr, though, is not on an Upton Sinclair quest to nauseate readers into changing their consumption habits. Instead, The Secret Life of Groceries is a deeply curious and evenhanded report on our national appetites.

Lorr explores how the food we buy (never mind whether we actually eat it) is a proxy for our values. And as those values turn into personal choices — as well-meaning as they might be — we are complicit in the cruelties of the broader food system.

...readers may find a dangerous urgency—especially amidst COVID-19-related stay-at-home orders—to the deep psychological dependency on a well-stocked supermarket. Lorr’s exploration of the systems and individuals that create the modern grocery store will move readers to ask far more probing questions about what they’re putting on the table. For fans of Michael Pollan’s work and Michael Ruhlman’s Grocery (2017)..

...horrifying.

Lorr offers a stark perspective.