On any given Sunday walking the streets of New York City you are bound to find yourself among the dominating sub population group known as “the brunchers”. Whether it’s at 2pm with sunglasses on drinking a bloody mary to cure last nights hangover, or at 11am wearing ballet flats and pearls; it is a tradition for all walks of life. Fortunately for me, one of my friends celebrated her birthday last week and birthday brunches are a popular reason for the pancake indulging I took part in. I love to brunch. And while I am not one of those people yet who has the “same place every week with the same friends” ritual, I go when I can and quite frankly I do well at it. I went for the whole grain blueberry pancakes. Fresh blueberries were in the batter so there was no blueberry compote (that looks- like-blueberry-jelly syrup that pretends to make your pancakes blueberry but is really just sugar and most likely artificial). I had them with strawberry butter, a mimosa, and a cup of coffee. I am caffeine free but the coffee was organic, and if you have never tasted organic coffee I insist you run out and grab a cup. There is a noticeable difference in taste. For a special celebration and in the name of organics, I enjoyed a cup (and that mimosa).
Organic food has to fight hard for its approval with the average consumer since it is so often affiliated with being overpriced. Others think organic means it is a “health food” so that it probably tastes different, or cardboard like. Not many people simply know the truth about organics. When you buy organic food it means that no pesticides, herbicides or other chemical fertilizers were used on the soil or in any part of the production process. The company adheres to strict national guidelines that the USDA has set in regards to the production, processing and handling of the food, and they are inspected routinely to make sure they are consistent in these practices. Also, organic food cannot be genetically modified. There is no doubt that organic food is better for our planet, better for our bodies, and better for our food system, but you’re right: they are more expensive. Even though the organic business is growing every year, there are still substantially less organic farmers in America then there are conventional. The less supply but growing demand is one cause for the price mark up, but it is the extra labor and not as popular farming methods that take more time and care that round out the reasons. A ton of paperwork goes into becoming certified organic as well, and it is expensive for farmers to obtain the certification. This means two things: 1. There are a lot of farmers out there practicing organic who cannot afford the certification therefore potentially losing business from consumers who only trust the label. And 2. There are many “big agriculture” companies who can always afford certification for some of their products, but it does not mean the company as a whole practices organic throughout. An example of this would be the Kashi company.
What once was small and occupying little shelf space in food stores, Kashi has grown to one of the leading brands I see in my wholefoods market. They have 24 different types of cold cereal alone, in addition to the crackers, cereal bars, oatmeals, cookies, pizzas, frozen dinners, and frozen waffles they make. They market themselves as a health food company focused on whole, natural ingredients that are better for you and the earth. Kashi has been around for a long time, and eventually was bought by Kellogg. All the big companies are buying up the small organic ones because they are noticing the trend early: organic is in, and if we want to survive then we need stock in this. You wouldn’t know it by looking at a box of their cereal, but Kellogg owns Kashi now. Kashi cinnamon harvest cereal has the USDA Certified Organic label which means that they by law are producing this cereal under the organic guidelines that have been set. However, Kellogg is not a company dedicated entirely to organic farming practices. Other kashi cereals you will notice now such as berry blossoms, and honey puffs cereal do not have the label. They are not being processed under the same standards that the cinnamon harvest cereal is. If you have known of Kashi all this time it would be easy for you to not be aware of who their new boss is, and perhaps not think twice about picking up any box of cereal from them. After all, they are a healthy company. If you are not looking for that organic label it may be easy to assume any product of theirs is OK, but that is just not the case. If you want organic, you need to look for that label.
If you have the purchasing power to buy organic all the time, then there is really no good reason not to. However, if you are finding yourself wanting desperately to switch to organic purchases, but on a dollar menu budget; there are ways to prioritize. There are the foods I would suggest to always go organic with, and then there are the foods that we can spare. The “always” foods? Milk and dairy products. I would never consume milk or yogurt that is not organic. My reasons including unsanitary factory farms, my disagreeing of the conventional corn feed our cows are given, and of course Recombinant bovine somatotropin (rBST ): the artificial growth hormone given to cows to increase milk production. I want my foods as close to nature as possible, and cows make BST on their own. The rBST is the synthesized man made version of the hormone that is given to up production. I find this unnatural, potentially unsafe, and in my opinion just kind of gross. If I ate meat, I would only eat organic, grass fed meat for similar and additional reasons. Dairy and meat to me is just too darn important to continue eating these groups conventionally. If affording organic meat all the time is too expensive, my advice is to simply eat less of it.
After dairy and meat I turn to fruits and vegetables with thin skins, or outsides that we consume. Examples include grapes, apples, tomatoes, celery, carrots and lettuce. We want these foods especially pesticides free because we eat them as they are and easily consume what lies on the surface of them. Foods with thick skins that we do not eat: avocado, eggplant, mango, watermelon, oranges and bananas would be on my list of foods we can spare. The skin of a banana is thick, and we throw it away before eating. Pesticides on a banana are not making it into our body as easily as pesticides on our lettuce. Finally, one last place you can go conventional is your seafood. Start thinking like a savvy consumer: how does anyone know if your fish is organic? Fish and seafood come from the ocean where there is no real way to track what they have encountered: pesticides, chemicals, floating garbage, whatever. So while buying fish, don’t waste your money on the package promising anything “extra”. There are no set guidelines for organic seafood because the government understands there is no possible way to guarantee it. However, I do suggest wild over farmed fish any day of the week.
If you want a diet that is chemical free, care about the sustainability of our soil, or both: then you should be eating organic. The concept is growing as more people begin to understand what it means, and this may mean eventually one day organic food can be the “norm” and not cost as much to supply. Every purchase matters, so make the switch where you can.
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