Prêt-à-Manger: why the French have their cake and eat it, too.

Even if you weren't aware of the rising intensity of debates over food politics in recent years, the face-off between Sarah Palin and Michelle Obama probably caught your attention. One of Michelle Obama's most high profile acts as First Lady was to plant an organic food garden on the White House lawn—ironically later found to be contaminated by sewage-sludge-based fertilizer, rendering the lovingly grown vegetables off limits. The launch of the Obama Foodorama (the First Lady's foodie blog) and "Let's Move" (Obama's cause célèbre child anti-obesity campaign) soon followed. Palin's subsequent attacks on Obama's "interference" in personal food choices culminated in her visit to a Pennsylvania primary school, where Palin publicly proffered cookies to schoolchildren, in a presumed attempt to warn them of nanny state "food police."