How many ingredients?

I just started reading In Defense of Food, by Michael Pollan. And it got me thinking. Good food is simple. Jaques Pepin is quoted saying that his favorite dish is, "A good piece of bread with some good butter." How simple is that? Most of the dishes that I like are also very simple. Steak on the grill, Lobster, Roast Chicken. All of these have max 5 ingredients. For example, the steak would be 1. Steak, 2. Pepper, 3. Salt. Even more complex dishes like say Coq au Vin, still have about 10 ingredients.

Before I go on, I think I need to define ingredients. Strange that ingredients needs to be defined, but now that food has turned into "food science" (says Pollan) we need to make sure that when I say "butter" you don't understand "I can't believe it's not butter". The former has max two ingredients (milk, salt), while the latter has liquid soybean oil, canola,hydrogenated soybean, partially hydrogenated soybean oils, water, cream, salt, soy lecithin, vegetable mono- and diglycerides, Potassium sorbate, calcium disodium, citric acid, Natural and artificial flavors, vitamin A, Beta carotene. Let's give "I can't believe" the benefit of the doubt and say that they have a "Natural/artificial flavors" tree in their front yard. This is 16 ingredients in something that calls itself an ingredient. Obviously the former can be called an ingredient, while the other, I say, needs to be called a conglomerate ingredient (Clomgredient?). When cooking, if you want to cook healthy, choose ingredients over Clomgredients.

I think everything you consume should have fewer ingredients than a Twinkie. Let's see how many ingredients a Twinkie has. Looks like around 28. Hmmm...that's too many. Let's try something more "healthy". Ugh. Everything I look up has over twenty ingredients. Ok, let's try to put the cap at 18. I bet you could make the most complicated dishes in the world with 18 ingredients.

What do I want for dinner tonight? Hmmm...Let's say, Dry Vodka martini with olives, Cassoulet, Ile Flotante. No appetizers, I'm not that hungry.

Martini: Vodka, Olives -2 ingredients

Cassoulet : ~11 ingredients (depending on if you consider duck confit/sausage a Clomgredient or not)

Ile Flottante: ~8 ingredients

Ok, so the whole meal has 21 ingredients, 7 fewer than a Twinkie has by itself. You tell me which is health food. When you're at the supermarket, take a look at the ingredients list, and try to choose stuff with fewer ingredients. You will notice that it tastes better, and will be healthier. This is not "health food" that I'm talking about.

You want to eat chips and salsa? Tostitos for example: corn, salt oil. Salsa: Tomatoes, jalapeno, onion,salt, vineagar.

Fried Chicken? Chicken, flour, salt,pepper, oil.

Fish&Chips: Cod, flour, salt, oil, potato.

The more food you eat from ingredients and less from Clomgredients, the less you will eventually have to worry about your health.