Plant breeders, challenged to create more nutritious crops, face seemingly radical choices that constitute a 'breeder's dilemma'. In the search for higher yields and lower farming costs, have breeders inadvertently selected for crops with reduced nutritional quality? To create foods that keep pace with our growing understanding of what constitutes healthy diets, plant breeders may need to make a significant shift away from traditional selection criteria. Subsidizing crop nutritional value rather than yield could be an important and economical driver for this shift in perspective.