More Tips for Saving Time in the Kitchen

Recently, a friend was asking me about eating a vegetarian diet. She explained that she'd like to eat less meat and more fresh produce, but she felt like vegetables take more time to prepare with all of the cutting and chopping and cooking. Meat and boxed dinners just seemed easier.

As I've said before, cooking from scratch is an important part of being a Conscious Shopper:

• When you buy basic ingredients like oats, beans, and rice from the bulk bins, you cut back on your trash production.
• When you use fresh, local, and seasonal ingredients, you cast a vote for a reformed food system and keep your family healthier.
• And perhaps most importantly, you save money, making it possible for you to afford those fresh, local, and seasonal ingredients.

But the flip side of all these benefits is TIME. Cooking from scratch takes more time. Time that, like my friend, you may not feel you have.


I've already told you my two biggest tips for saving time in the kitchen: Keep It Simple, Stupid and Have a Meal Plan. Here are a few other ideas:

• Double and Freeze. It takes about the same amount of time to make four servings as it does to make eight, so next time you're making a soup or casserole, double the recipe and freeze half. Then you'll have a frozen meal waiting for you the next time you feel too tired to cook.
• Freeze Ahead. Similar to the previous tip, I will often make a huge batch of beans and freeze them in two cup portions (about the same amount that's in a can). Or I'll make a ginormous pot of rice, use some for dinner and freeze the rest for future fried rice meals. Individual ingredients freeze just as well as a whole casserole and can be a lifesaver when you're short on time.
  
• Plan Ahead. If you know a specific day is going to be too busy to make dinner, plan for it. When you prepare your menu, choose a meal that's quick to prepare, like burritos or grilled cheese sandwiches.
  
• Prep Ahead. I just popped my casserole in the oven, now I get to go take a nap, right? I wish...Instead I use that time to prep veggies for the next day's lunch or dinner. (Or I empty my dishwasher.)
• Learn to Love Your Crockpot. Here are a few recipes (a year's worth) to get you started.
  
• Start a Dinner Co-Op. This is an intriguing concept that I've never tried. The idea is that you find a friend to swap dinners with (preferably one who lives close to you because of that whole carbon footprint thing). You make dinner, doubling the recipe and delivering half to your friend. Then on a different night, she makes dinner, doubling the recipe, and bringing half to you.
• Go frozen. Now I personally don't buy frozen fruits or vegetables anymore simply because I don't want the extra packaging waste and I can get great local produce year round here in NC. But let's face it - we're not all Marathon Runners in every category. If you need to cut a few corners to keep your family eating a healthy diet, frozen is a better choice than canned because the produce is frozen right after it's picked, preserving it at the peak of freshness. In fact, some could argue that it's healthier to eat frozen vegetables than fresh vegetables shipped halfway across the world.

I have to admit that I'm better at dishing out these tips than I am at following them. In general, I have plenty of time to cook, and it helps that I really enjoy cooking. But a few weekends ago when I was helping out with the community gardens summit and manned a booth the same day for Earth Day, I got home after ten hours of running around, plopped onto the couch, and announced, "I don't know how people who work ever make dinner from scratch. After a whole day of work, the last thing you want to do is come home and work some more!"

I had leftover soup in my freezer that I completely forgot about and a husband who wasn't volunteering to fill in for me, so we ordered a pizza. I'm not proud, but sometimes it happens.

So working readers, what tips do you have for saving time in the kitchen?

____________________

You have hereby been challenged to go green in a year without going broke! Check out the last challenge, or view the whole list of Challengicious Mondays. Sign up for my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, and join my "Go Green without Going Broke" group on Facebook!

• image by laffy4k
• This post was shared at Works for Me Wednesday
  

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Save Time in the Kitchen by Meal Planning

A month ago, I related my K.I.S.S. method for saving time in the kitchen. Basically, the idea is that you can save time when cooking from scratch by keeping it simple: simple sides, simple meals, simple breads, simple stews...

Cooking from scratch is an important part of being a Conscious Shopper:

• When you buy basic ingredients like oats, beans, and rice from the bulk bins, you cut back on your trash production.
• When you use fresh, local, and seasonal ingredients, you cast a vote for a reformed food system and keep your family healthier.
• And perhaps most importantly, you save money, making it possible for you to afford those fresh, local, and seasonal ingredients.

But the flip side of all these benefits is TIME. Cooking from scratch takes more time. Time that you may not feel you can afford to spend.

Keeping it simple in the kitchen can save you time. And here's my other big tip for saving time when cooking from scratch:

MEAL PLAN

Do you ever have those "Oh, crap, it's 5:00!" moments? You know, those days when you're rushed, rushed, rushed, and you only have 20 minutes to get dinner on the table, and you spend 15 minutes of it staring into your fridge trying to figure out what to make. So you end up having PB&J.

Or you decide that you're going to have spaghetti for dinner, only to discover that you've run out of tomato sauce. So you eat PB&J.

A meal plan will solve your problems. No more staring blankly into the fridge - you'll know as soon as you walk in the door what you're going to make. No more running out of key ingredients...well, okay, running out of key ingredients less often. No more PB&J. (Unless you really love peanut butter sandwiches for dinner. Then by all means, stick with your current system.)

Your meal plan doesn't have to be ultra detailed. It doesn't have to be overly restrictive. It should simply be a basic guide to what you have available to eat in a given week. For example, my basic meal plan goes like this:

Monday: pizza
Tuesday: Mexican
Wednesday: eggs
Thursday: stir fry
Friday: bean burgers
Saturday: pasta
Sunday: meat

On shopping day, I get more specific about what we're going to eat on a given night. Mexican changes to "nachos." Bean burgers become "butter bean burgers with collard greens." Etc. From there, I can easily make a grocery list, ensuring that I have everything I need to cook for the week.

But just because I've said Tuesday is going to be nacho night doesn't mean I can't decide to make burritos instead. Same basic ingredients so an easy swap. Or I might decide on Tuesday that I'm not in the mood for nachos and would rather make butter bean burgers. Easy enough to swap Tuesdays meal for Fridays and still have everything I need to quickly make dinner all week.

And of course, don't forget to keep your meal plan simple. I make pizza on my bread baking day because I can use some of the bread dough as pizza crust and toss the pizza onto the bottom of the oven while the rest of my bread is baking. Once a week, we eat scrambled eggs and toast for dinner because I can get the entire meal on the table in less than 30 minutes, including chopping vegetables to add to the eggs and toasting and buttering ten pieces of bread. I also make sure to plan dinners that will take more time for days I know I'll have time.

I had originally planned this post as a list of ideas for saving time in the kitchen, but meal planning took over. So you'll have to wait for the rest of the tips on another day.

Do you use a meal plan? How does it work for you?

____________________

You have hereby been challenged to go green in a year without going broke! Check out the last challenge, or view the whole list of Challengicious Mondays.

Like what you see? Sign up for my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, and join my "Go Green without Going Broke" group on Facebook! You can also find me over at The Green Phone Booth.

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How to Store Produce without Packaging

I'm over at The Green Phone Booth today with some tips for storing produce without packaging:

Last Monday, Freakonomics had a post called How About Them (Wrapped) Apples? suggesting that packaging on foods is a good thing because "in addition to protecting food from its microbial surroundings, packaging significantly prolongs shelf life, which in turn improves the chances of the food actually being eaten." Later in the article, the author suggests that Americans waste half of all the food they buy.

The same day, Arduous took up the argument with the assertion, "If the waste trade-off is either the plastic bag for a bag of pre-washed lettuce, or an entire head of lettuce that rotted before you got to eating it, I would probably say to go with the bag of lettuce."

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Do you have any tips for storing produce?

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February Extreme Challenge

Here's your extreme challenge for February:

Give Up Processed/Packaged Foods for a Month

To complete this challenge, you can...

BABY STEPS

• Give up your biggest processed/packaged downfalls. Two types of processed foods that I just haven't been able to let go of are cold cereal and crackers. Maybe for you it's frozen pizza or ice cream. Just for one month, try giving them up.
  

JOGGING STRIDE

• Give up processed foods. Try spending a month making as much food as you can from scratch. Don't think you have time? Check out my Keep It Simple Stupid method of cooking, and later this month, I'll have more tips for saving time when cooking from scratch.
  

MARATHON RUNNER

• Give up all foods that come in packaging. Remember, it's just for one month, so push yourself to the limit. You might discover that giving up cheese makes your family miserable, or the extreme might force you to find a way to obtain cheese without packaging. Either way, you'll have a better idea of where your family's sweet spot is.

As always, you can modify these suggestions to meet your family's needs. Just make sure you:

Make a plan.
Write it down.
Post it somewhere you'll see it.

Here's what my family will be doing:

We've already purged ourselves of most processed/packaged foods. The main culprits that are still hanging around are crackers, cereal, tortillas, macaroni and cheese, and ramen noodles. Just for one month, I'm going to try feeding my family without those old standbys.

On the other hand, most of our other food packaging comes from milk, cheese, and butter, and my family will not be giving up those foods. We are mostly vegetarian, so I feel like those foods are very important for my family's health.

Will you accept the February Extreme Challenge to give up processed/packaged foods for a month? Let me know in the comments what your family will be doing.

____________________

You have hereby been challenged to go green in a year without going broke! Check out the last challenge, or view the whole list of Challengicious Mondays.

Like what you see? Sign up for my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, and join my "Go Green without Going Broke" group on Facebook! You can also find me over at The Green Phone Booth.

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End of the Week Round-up

We have two challenges rounding up this week:

• the weekly challenge: Start Using a Reusable Water Bottle/Thermos
• and the January Extreme Challenge: Stop Eating Out for a Month

How'd you do on this week's challenge?

I'm a Marathon Runner on this challenge. Except for remembering to take a thermos with me for Starbucks hot chocolate runs (which I didn't have to worry about this month because of the extreme challenge). But my solution is that I'm going to stick a couple clean thermoses in the car, so they'll always be there when I need them. Works for cloth bags, should work for hot chocolate.

a family of water bottles

Thoughts on the extreme challenge:

So if you remember, the point of the extreme challenges is to push yourself a little bit farther than you would normally go so you can find your sweet spot. If you struggled with your challenge throughout the month, you probably need to wind it back a little bit to get to your sweet spot. If you had no trouble at all, see if you can stick with it going forward.

My family had decided to...

1. Me and the kids - go the full extreme and try not to eat out all month.
2. My husband - keep up the habit of eating out with his co-workers, but they committed to only patronizing local restaurants for the month.

My big issue with eating out is the quick runs to Starbucks for hot apple cider and Krispy Kreme for hot chocolate (or to Cookout for shakes in the summer). And I admit it was tough sometimes. But I focused on making more hot chocolate at home, and for times that I really want a hot apple cider, I just need to take my own thermos in the future.

I think avoiding fast food restaurants helped us stay in the budget this month - even though we've always paid lip service to avoiding fast food restaurants, a fast food run always sneaks in somehow. I'm really going to try not to go to fast food restaurants in the future (with possible exceptions while on vacation).

I did miss eating out in general and am really looking forward to getting to go out to eat with my husband at some of our fave local restaurants. But we're going to work on bringing our own take-out containers to lessen the impact of eating out.

My husband says he had no trouble at all...except when he was traveling. That's definitely a nice thing about living downtown.

What about you?

And don't forget about this week's giveaway: ECOBAGS produce bags!

____________________

You have hereby been challenged to go green in a year without going broke! Check out the last challenge, or view the whole list of Challengicious Mondays.

Like what you see? Sign up for my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, and join my "Go Green without Going Broke" group on Facebook! You can also find me over at The Green Phone Booth.

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The K.I.S.S. Method for Saving Time in the Kitchen

The kitchen is usually my domain, and I have a hard time giving up control. But my non-vegetarian husband and I have had an agreement since the early days of our marriage that if he wants to eat meat for dinner, he gets to cook it himself. And that is why one night after I had remarked in passing that we needed a side dish to go with dinner, I sat down to a meal of sausage, eggs, and cucumbers.

My first thought: "Cucumbers are not a side dish..."

My next thought: "Cucumbers as a side dish!"

Ah, the beautiful simplicity of it. No chopping and steaming and seasoning broccoli. No peeling and cutting and mashing potatotes. No husking and boiling and scraping corn. Just a simple plate of cucumbers. Which weren't even peeled.

So the credit for the Keep It Simple, Stupid Method for saving time in the kitchen goes completely to my husband.

The idea is basically that you do things in the kitchen to keep your meals simple and therefore save time.

I know...duh, right? But when you're cooking from scratch and you enjoy cooking like I do, it's easy to let meal preparation take over your life. You thumb through cooking magazines and scroll through cooking blogs and your weekly menus get more and more complicated and then dinnertime rolls around and you've only got 30 minutes to prepare a meal that takes an hour or more.

And that's when it's time to take a breather and remind yourself:

Keep It Simple, Stupid.

Here's how:

• Simple Sides. As I mentioned above, fresh vegetables make a perfectly good side dish - especially with a heavier meal - and require almost no preparation. Fresh cucumbers, tomatoes, broccoli, cauliflower...Mmmm.
• Simple Potatoes. There are a billion and one ways to cook a potato, but I'd wager the simplest is to bake it. If you've got your oven on for any reason, toss a few potatoes in, bake for an hour, and serve them as a side dish later in the week. No peeling, cutting, or mashing required.
  
• Simple Bread. Bread by any other shape is still just bread. If you've got a perfectly good loaf of bread sitting around, don't waste time making rolls, breadsticks, biscuits, or flatbread (unless you're ultimate goal is to impress your kids). It might be shaped differently, it might even be a little boring, but it's not going to taste much different.
• Simple Stews. The simplest of all meals is the one where you throw a bunch of ingredients into a pot, simmer, and serve. It's extra nice if you can get your crockpot involved. As in this recipe for chili:

Vegetarian Chili

SERVES 4
COST: $1.17 per serving *

2 cups black beans (or 1 can)
2 cups kidney beans (or 1 can)
2 cups butter beans (or 1 can)
1 can diced tomatoes with juice
1 cup frozen corn
1 green pepper, chopped
1 onion, chopped
2 Tbsp. chili powder
1 Tbsp. parsley
1 Tbsp. oregano
1 Tbsp. basil

• Drain and rinse beans if using canned.
• Combine beans, tomatoes, corn, green pepper, and onion in a crockpot.
• Season with chili powder, parsley, oregano, and basil.
• Cook on high for two hours.
  

*Note that all costs are estimates based on prices in my area. Your costs may vary.

How do you keep it simple in the kitchen?

____________________

You have hereby been challenged to go green in a year without going broke! Check out the latest challenge, or view the whole list of Challengicious Mondays here.

Like what you see? Sign up for my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, and join my "Go Green without Going Broke" group on Facebook! You can also find me over at The Green Phone Booth.

• This post was included in the Festival of Frugality #213 at Cooking Manager, All Things Eco #86 at Focus Organic, Works for Me Wednesday at We Are THAT Family, Frugal Friday at Life as Mom, and The Carnival of the Green at Enviroblog
  

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January Extreme Challenge

Here's your extreme challenge for January:

Stop Eating Out for a Month

To complete this challenge, you can...

BABY STEPS

• Give up fast food for a month. Fast food restaurants are the biggest culprits in eating out - from the napkins, straws, and wrappers to the over-sized food choices, sodas, and factory-farmed meat. Try opting out of fast food just for one month.
  

JOGGING STRIDE

• Only eat at locally-owned restaurants for a month. Even if you're dining habits still result in lots of trash and food waste, at least you'll be supporting the businesses in your community and maintaining your city's individuality. You could also take this challenge a step further and support only restaurants that serve local, sustainable, and organic dishes by searching the Eat Well Guide.
  

MARATHON RUNNER

• Only eat home-cooked foods for a month. You can do it! Go a whole month without eating out.

As always, you can modify these suggestions to meet your family's needs. Just make sure you:

Make a plan.
Write it down.
Post it somewhere you'll see it.

My husband and I have completely different weaknesses when it comes to eating out. Of the two of us, I'm a billion times more likely to be in the car with three grumpy little people and suddenly realize, "Oh, crap, it's lunchtime." My husband, on the other hand, goes out to a sit-down restaurant once a week with his co-workers and orders something meaty. That ritual is one of the few times my non-vegetarian husband gets to eat meat, and it's important to him. I like to see my man happy.

So our plan is...

1. I'll be going the full extreme and trying not to eat out all month.
2. My husband will keep up the habit of eating out with his co-workers, but they've committed to only patronizing local restaurants for the month.
   

Will you accept the January Extreme Challenge to stop eating out for a month? Let me know in the comments what your family will be doing.

____________________

You have hereby been challenged to go green in a year without going broke! Check out the latest challenge, or view the whole list of Challengicious Mondays.

Like what you see? Sign up for my RSS feed, follow me on Twitter, and join my "Go Green without Going Broke" group on Facebook! You can also find me over at The Green Phone Booth.

• Photo by ebruli
• This post was included in the Festival of Frugality #212
  

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Quick Tip: Fruit/Veggie Swap

A few months ago, I picked up a used copy of Fresh Choices: More than 100 Easy Recipes for Pure Food When You Can't Buy 100% Organic by David Joachim and Rochelle Davis. I'm still testing it out as a cookbook. Sadly, it doesn't contain any glossy pictures of delectable dishes, one of my main qualifications of a good cookbook. But so far, the recipes we've tried have turned out very yummy.

But as a resource guide, I have returned to this book again and again. Besides the recipes, each chapter is packed with information about why you should buy organic foods and what to do if you can't.

The premise behind Fresh Choices is that the positive effects of eating a nutritious and diverse diet, especially large quantities of fruits and vegetables, far outweigh the negative effects of consuming conventionally grown foods. So if you can't afford to buy 100% organic, or if organic foods just aren't available where you live, you should focus on avoiding foods with the highest pesticide residues and instead consume more of the "cleaner" foods.

For example, the author describes a situation where he was developing a recipe for strawberry-stuffed french toast. But strawberries are on the EWG's Dirty Dozen. The solution was simple: use blueberries instead. Blueberries test much lower for pesticide residue but are comparable nutritionally.

All of the recipes in Fresh Choices use produce with lower pesticide residues and specify when you need to buy the organic version of the product. But you can accomplish the same thing in your own recipes using a couple of handy tables included in the book. When a recipe calls for an ingredient that you know is high in pesticides, swap it out for something that is nutritionally comparable. For example:

Fruit Swap

Swap peaches for canned peaches, grapefruit, tangerines, U.S. cantaloupe, or watermelon to get Vitamins A and C

Swap apples for bananas, grapefruit, kiwi, tangerines, or watermelon to get Vitamin C

Swap strawberries for blackberries, blueberries, grapefruit, kiwi, tangerines, or U.S. cantaloupe to get Vitamin C

Swap U.S. cherries for blackberries, blueberries, grapefruit, kiwi, tangerines, or U.S. cantaloupe to get Vitamin C

Swap Chilean grapes for U.S. grapes (in season from May to December) to get Vitamin C

Swap pears for bananas, grapefruit, kiwi, tangerines, or watermelon to get Vitamin C


Vegetable Swap

Swap peppers (sweet and hot) for asparagus, broccoli, brussels sprouts, carrots, romaine lettuce, or tomatoes to get Vitamins A and C

Swap celery for broccoli, carrots, radishes or romaine lettuce to get carotenoids

Swap spinach for asparagus, broccoli, brussels sprouts, cabbage, chard, or romaine lettuce to get Vitamins A and C and folic acid


Related Posts:

• Seven Reasons to Eat Organic
• I Need...Organic Food
• 12 Strategies to Save Money on Organics
  

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Go See Food Inc.

Food Inc.
directed by Robert Kenner

Rating: *****

I hesitated to write a review of Food Inc. simply because there are already so many reviews out there by journalists who are far better at writing reviews than I am. But then I thought of the family and friends who read my blog and no other green blogs and who aren't likely to be found doing Google searches for "Food Inc. reviews." What if they hadn't heard what a fantastic documentary this is? And what if no one has already told them they have to go see this film?

So I sat down to write a review and found myself faced with a problem. Is there a word that means the opposite of writer's block? In trying to write this review, I found myself so full of things to say that I couldn't organize anything into a coherent thought. All of the ideas and images from the film wanted to spill out of my brain more quickly than my typing fingers could handle, but the thoughts were disjointed and unconnected, and I quickly realized that I was giving the entire film away without doing it justice.

While writing this blog for the past year, I have read and researched and learned all about our broken food system, and I would have described myself as pretty informed. Even so, I walked away from this film knowing more than I had before. Food Inc. sums up the entire argument beautifully in 94 minutes - touching on everything from fast food to CAFOs to corn to obesity to GMOs to diabetes to abused farm workers to e-coli to so much more.

Food Inc. is everything a documentary should be. I teared up within the first fifteen minutes, felt like throwing up later in the film, and left the theatre deeply moved and inspired to continue fighting for changes in our food system.

So in the end, I've decided that the best thing I can say: Go see Food Inc.

Find the nearest theatre and go see it as soon as you possibly can. And then come back here, and let's talk about it. I know you will have plenty to say.


Related Posts

• Book Review: In Defense of Food
• How Industrial Ag Is Like Boston (But Should Be More Like Salt Lake City)
• Eat Conscious and Local
  

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12 Strategies to Save Money on Organics

Earlier this week, I offered some suggestions for adding more organics to your grocery cart. But if you're a budget conscious shopper, you might still be having trouble looking beyond the price. Organics are definitely more expensive than conventional products, so first I want to offer some strategies for saving money on organics, and then I'll touch briefly on why organics are more expensive.


12 Strategies to Save Money on Organics

Strategy #1: Be a smart shopper. I've already listed some ways you can save money on your grocery bill by not following my example. Other smart shopping strategies include keeping a price book, making a list, stocking up when items are on sale, using coupons, and buying store brands.

Strategy #2: Waste not, want not. Avoid letting food go to waste before you use it, and eat up leftovers.

Strategy #3: Find amazing deals with bulk bins, the bins of grains, nuts, and dried fruit at Whole Foods and other natural food stores. I wish I could buy everything from a bulk bin!

Strategy #4: Buy in bulk. If you can't find it in a bulk bin, buy the largest size you can find. But remember to keep your eye on the unit price! Sometimes, the bigger package has an inflated price.

Strategy #5: Choose less expensive fruits and vegetables. Around here, greens and sweet potatoes have the biggest nutritional bang for your buck.

Strategy #6: Eat less meat (especially cow). A serving of organic beans from a can is about $0.30. An organic egg costs about a quarter. A serving of the cheapest organic ground beef I've seen is $0.75.

Strategy #7: Buy a share of a cow. If you're not keen on going completely vegetarian, you can save money on your meat products by buying a share of a cow directly from a farmer. Search for local farms at www.eatwild.com. I've also heard of cow-shares for dairy products.

Strategy #8: Join a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture). Pay a fee at the beginning of the year and get a share of the farm's produce. Two years ago, my family paid $400 to participate in a CSA for roughly 20 weeks. So for $20 a week we got a cooler full of fresh, organic fruits and vegetables and a dozen farm-fresh eggs. You cannot match those prices at the grocery store!

Strategy #9: Join a buying club, a group of people who place huge orders directly with food distributers, saving costs by buying in bulk and cutting out the middlemen. The biggest supplier of natural and organic foods to buying clubs is United National Foods. I don't have any experience with them, but I have successfully found some savings on organic grains and legumes through a buying club with members of my church. They order from Walton Feed.

Strategy #10: Pick your own fruits and vegetables. If you do the harvesting work yourself, you can typically save a lot of money. Find an organic pick-your-own-farm near you by visiting www.pickyourown.org.

Strategy #11: Plant a garden. Go beyond harvesting and do all the work yourself. If you have limited space, use the square foot gardening method, and focus on those varieties that will give you the greatest yield with the least work. Save even more money by growing from seed. And make sure you use sustainable gardening techniques!

Strategy #12: Raise your own chickens or bees. With a little work, you can have your own fresh eggs and honey. And if you're really committed, you could also save money by raising your own goats, pigs, or even a cow.


3 Reasons Organics Cost More

1. Scale. Growing crops without pesticides and chemical fertilizer is more time-consuming and labor intensive and generally has to be done on a smaller scale. All of these factors increase costs.
2. Niche Market. So far, the organics industry has been catering to a niche market made up of people who are willing to pay more. In some cases, organic foods are priced higher to match the expectation of it as a "luxury" item.
   
3. Subsidies. Conventional industrial ag receives massive subsidies from the government. Organic farmers do not. Marion Nestle, author of What to Eat, explains:

Until the latest farm bill, which has a small provision for promotion of organic agriculture, organic farmers received not one break from the federal government. In contrast, the producers of corn, soybeans, wheat and cotton continue to get $20 billion or so a year in farm subsidies.

Industrial agriculture also benefits from federally administered marketing programs and from cozy relationships with congressional committees and the USDA. In contrast, the USDA considers fruits and vegetables "specialty crops." This kind of food politics shows up as higher prices in the grocery store.

The first reason is an integral part of organic farming, but the other two reasons can be changed. And this is the point I want to emphasize most:

If more people buy organics, the prices will drop.

I truly believe that. Every time you go to the grocery store and every time you eat, you are casting your vote about the nature of our agricultural system. If you want to see changes in the price of organics, find a way to afford at least some of them now. Save money by using energy wisely, choosing better transportation, and buying less, and shift your savings to your grocery budget.

Photo by Mjorge


Related Posts:

• Seven Reasons to Eat Organic
  
• The Poor Man's Dilemma: How to Save Money When Living Paycheck to Paycheck
• How to Afford Making Your Home Energy Efficient

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I Need...Organic Food

Yesterday, I listed reasons why you should think about adding more organic foods to your grocery cart, and today I'm going to give some suggestions for how to get started. As I've said before, I don't think you can suddenly wake up one morning, snap your fingers, and say, "Voila! I'm green!" Going green is a process, and you can take it slowly if you need to.

Certified Organic Defined

So first of all, what does that organic label mean? The USDA has defined organic crops as those "raised without using most conventional pesticides, petroleum-based fertilizers, or sewage sludge-based fertilizers. The NOP [National Organic Program] regulations prohibit the use of genetic engineering, ionizing radiation, and sewage sludge in organic production and handling."

For animal farms to be certified organic, the animals "must be fed organic feed and given access to the outdoors. They are given no antibiotics or growth hormones."

A couple other things to note:

• Products labeled "100 percent organic" must contain only organically produced ingredients.
  
• Products labeled "organic" must consist of at least 95 percent organically produced ingredients.
  
• Processed products that contain at least 70 percent organic ingredients can use the phrase "made with organic ingredients" and list up to three of the organic ingredients or food groups on the principal display panel.

What Certified Organic Does Not Mean

As I said yesterday, the system for certifying organics is not perfect. The purpose is to protect the consumer, so you know what you're purchasing when you see the "organic" label. But the organics program is mainly concerned with health issues and is less concerned with sustainability or other environmental issues. For instance:

• Certified organic is not the same as grass-fed or pastured. Animals on certified organic farms must be given "access" to the outdoors, but the form or amount of that access is vague.
• Certified organic does not mean small farm. Becoming certified is costly, which means that many small farmers are financially excluded from certification.
  
• Certified organic farmers can only use certified seed, so their options about varieties to grow are limited. People who prefer heirloom varieties are probably not going to find much choice when shopping for certified organics.
• Certified organic restricts the use of pesticides and chemical fertilizers but does not provide specific guidelines for sustainable farming practices.
  

Because of these and other considerations, I think it's less important to look at the label and more important to know your farmer. Ask the farmers at your local farmers market about their methods for pest management and fertilization, and make an informed decision, even if they're not certified.

Another option is to look for the label "Certified Naturally Grown," a certification system created by a non-profit in New York focusing on small organic farmers but following the same standards as the USDA program.


Now that You're Ready to Go Shopping...

BABY STEPS

• Start with the Dirty Dozen. According to the Environmental Working Group, these are the fruits and vegetables that have the highest pesticide residue. They include peaches, apples, sweet bell peppers, celery, nectarines, strawberries, cherries, lettuce, imported grapes, pears, spinach, and potatoes.

• Look for organic baby food. Studies have indicated that young children, and especially babies, are more susceptible to the negative effects of pesticide exposure than adults.
  

JOGGING STRIDE

• Switch your animal products to organic. Levels of chemical toxicity get more concentrated the higher you get up the food chain. Additionally, factory-farm produced meat, poultry, dairy, and eggs are full of extra yuckies like antibiotics and hormones. For more information about dairy and eggs, check out my posts I Need...Dairy and I Need...Eggs.
  

MARATHON RUNNER

• Green your grocery bill. Look for the organic label on all of the foods you eat.
  

Tips for the Budget-Conscious

The steps I listed above are prioritized by pesticide exposure and other health concerns. However, if health is not your primary reason for choosing organics and you are on a limited budget, here are some alternate suggestions and observations:

• Produce: Often, organic fruits and vegetables on sale can rival the cost of conventionally grown produce. If you're on a limited budget, keep your eye out for sales on organics since often they aren't included in the sales flier.
• Beans, Rice, and Oats: Organic beans, rice, and oats from the bulk bins at a health food store or Whole Foods are similar in price to their conventionally grown counterparts elsewhere, and in many cases they are cheaper. So although from a health standpoint, buying the organic versions of these products might be a low priority, you can actually switch to organics very painlessly in these categories.
• Meat, Dairy, and Eggs: Organic meat, dairy, and eggs can be double the cost of their conventional counterparts. This is a larger price gap than I've noticed between any other organic products, and while I think it's important to purchase these products, if your budget is limited, you might want to save the organic switch in this category for last.
  

In a few days, I'll provide some more tips for the Budget Conscious.


Where I'm At

Most of the items on my grocery list now carry the "organic" label. I could do better with produce, but very few of the farmers at my local farmer's market carry organic produce, and I have decided it's more important to me to support my local farmers when I can than to buy organic. If I buy it at the grocery store, it's organic.


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• Book Review: In Defense of Food
  

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Seven Reasons to Eat Organic

This post was included in the Carnival of the Green #186 at Conserve Plastic Bags.

For years, I had a hard time getting over the price hurdle of organics. The only reasons I'd ever heard for avoiding pesticides were health-related, and I tend to tune out when people step onto their "This is really bad for your health" soapbox. Let's face it, everything is bad for our health. It's overwhelming! You don't even want to know what I learned the other day about cell phones...

So if health was the only reason to switch to organics, I would have kept on saying that the price wasn't worth it. But since starting this blog, I've learned that there are plenty of other reasons to choose organics over conventionally grown produce and factory-farm raised meats. Maybe one of these will appeal to you:


1. Organics taste better. Many top chefs prefer using organics in their cooking and restaurants, citing superior quality. I can't say I've noticed a taste difference in all organic products, but I can vouch for organic cheese over conventional cheese. And if I had known how much yummier organic sugar is over conventional sugar, I would have started buying that years ago.

2. Organics pack a nutritional punch. Recent studies have found that organic foods contain more nutrients than conventionally grown and raised foods, including Vitamin C, iron, zinc, and cancer-fighting antioxidants. Nutrient-rich soil equates to nutrient-rich plants, which leads to healthier animals and healthier people.

3. Organics protect soil quality. Years of monocropping and intensive use of synthetic fertilizers depletes soil quality and leads to massive topsoil erosion. On the other hand, sustainable farming methods generally used by organic farmers - such as rotating crops, planting cover crops, and composting - protect and replenish the nutrients in soil.

4. Organics protect water quality. Chemical fertilizer run off causes algae overgrowth, leading to huge ocean "dead zones" (areas where the water on the ocean floor has so little oxygen that marine life can no longer survive there). Scientists estimate that there are now 400 dead zones in the ocean, covering a combined area half the size of California. Additionally, chemical pesticides and intensive livestock farming contribute to water pollution.

5. Organics promote biodiversity. Industrial farming focuses on a handful of crops, choosing the varieties that are hardiest and stand up to shipping rather than those that taste best. Many organic farmers, on the other hand, grow a variety of plants, including heirloom varieties with interesting colors, textures, and tastes.

6. Organics support small farmers. Although more and more large, industrial-type farms are becoming certified organic, most organic farms are still small-scale, independently owned, and family run. Keep in mind that not all farmers that use organic farming techniques are certified organic. Becoming certified is a cost many struggling small farmers can't afford. So ask your local farmers about their methods for pest control and fertilization, focusing more on sustainability and less on certification.

7. And, oh yeah, organics are grown without all those unhealthy chemicals. Some studies have indicated that children are especially vulnerable to the harmful effects of pesticide exposure because their bodies are still developing and they eat more for their size than grown-ups. (My five-year-old and four-year-old generally eat more calories a day than I do, and they are walking sticks!)

I'm not going to pretend that the organics system is perfect. In many ways, Big Organic Ag is treading along the well-worn path of traditional Industrial Ag. (An organic CAFO is still a CAFO, and "organic" junk food is no healthier than any other junk food.)

But organics are one step toward fixing our messed-up agricultural system, and it's a step we need to take if we want a better future for our children and for the planet.

Photo by thebittenword.com


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How Industrial Ag Is Like Boston (But Should Be More Like Salt Lake City)

In a way, industrial agriculture reminds me of cities on the East Coast. They started out with a little settlement here, a little settlement there, a little settlement farther on. After awhile, they built roads connecting the settlements. Sometimes the roads took a detour around some farmer's cow pasture. Sometimes they jaunted off toward the mill or the river. Sometimes they looped around to gather together a bunch of outlying settlements. Often the roads intersected at a central point and spiraled outward like a great interconnecting spiderweb.

If you look at an aerial view of an Eastern city like Boston, Philadelphia, DC, even New York, it's a big jumbly mess of roads and neighborhoods - arguably a beautiful mess full of character, but a mess nonetheless. The streets are narrow, bursting with congestion, and inevitably you will get lost your first time there.

Contrast that with a Western city like Salt Lake City, Denver, or Milwaukee. These were planned cities. They started with a few blocks in a grid pattern, and as more people came, more blocks were added. The streets are wide, the addresses directional, and the traffic flows with greater ease.

Industrial agriculture reminds me of an Eastern city because it has sprung up in a jumbly mess, reacting to specific, immediate needs without anticipating the future.

Without pretending to be an expert on the subject, here is a brief history of what I know about industrial agriculture:


How Industrial Ag Is Like Boston

Before industrialization, agriculture depended on the whims of Mother Nature and the labor-intensive work of farmers. In the latter half of the 19th Century, scientists discovered that certain chemicals aided plant growth when added to the soil and that certain other chemicals wiped out pests and weeds. Many of these same chemicals were used in munitions manufacturing during World War II, and after the war, chemical companies turned their research from weapons to chemical fertilizers and synthetic pesticides.

Use of fertilizers and pesticides freed farmers from the necessity of crop rotation and diversity, and they began specializing in only a handful of crops - particularly corn and soy - encouraged and subsidized by the federal government. Innovations in antibiotics and vaccines also allowed farmers to take animals off the land and cramp them indoors, and cheap oil coupled with improved shipping methods enabled farmers to ship their crops over vast distances. In a short time, farms transformed from diverse microcosms to vast monocultures.

As agriculture became more efficient and mechanized, fewer people were needed to maintain it. In the past 100 years, the number of farmers in the U.S. has dropped from two out of every five Americans to two out of a hundred. As small farms disappeared, large farms gobbled up their land so that now most of American agriculture is concentrated in the hands of a very few.

The goals of industrial agriculture were to increase efficiency and productivity while decreasing costs, and with these goals, industrial ag has been extremely successful. Despite the ever-growing world population, food for most people is prevalent and cheap.

But consider the unintended consequences: Loss of biodiversity. Degradation of topsoil. Pollution of land, air, and water. Confinement of animals. Massive farms controlled by only a few.


How Industrial Ag Could Be More Like Salt Lake City

I think it's time to take a step back and ask ourselves, "Is this what we want our city to look like?"

It might be too late for Boston, but in the case of agriculture, I think we still have time to redesign the city. Do we want a jumbly mess with no eye to the future, or do we want an agricultural system with a plan - one that shows concern for its impact and seeks for sustainability? Is cheap food worth the price we are paying?

Industrialization has swept us along so speedily toward comfort and ease that we haven't taken the time to plan. But the path we are on cannot hold up long term. We need to pause, reconsider, and redesign, until we have created a system that will carry us far into the future.


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Book Review: In Defense of Food

In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto
by Michael Pollan

Rating: ****

Synopsis:

In his previous book, The Omnivore's Dilemma, Michael Pollan took a detailed look at the American diet, revealing that most of what we eat has its root in corn and oil, and that the organic label is not all it's purported to be. His book has been called a wake up call for the hungry and left many people asking, "Now what am I supposed to eat?"

In Defense of Food is Pollan's answer to that question, and the first three sentences of this book sum it up: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." Those sentences describe Pollan's philosophy so concisely, you could almost get away with not reading the rest of the book. Almost.

The problem is that those statements need some explaining, so Pollan spends the next 200 pages fleshing out what he means when he says, "Eat food" (real food, not the processed food that makes up most of our diet), "Not too much" (focus on quality rather than quantity), "Mostly plants" (more leaves than seeds).

Pollan begins by ripping apart food science, or what he calls "nutritionism." He asserts that the method we use to analyze food (categorizing its parts into fats and carbohydrates, nutrients and micronutrients) is flawed, and as we as a culture have succumbed to the ideas of nutritionism, we've actually become less healthy, replacing much of the traditional foods our ancestors ate with food-like substances fortified with the supposedly essential nutrients.

Pollan suggests that rather than dividing foods into their various parts, we should focus on the whole food, eating more plant-based foods, eschewing processed foods, and enjoying food as a social and cultural action.


My Opinion:

Pollan's ideas here are very similar to Nina Planck's Real Food, and both books could be summarized with the suggestion to eat more traditional foods. Pollan's book also had similar flaws to Planck's, particularly cherry-picking research to support ideas and overlooking lack of exercise as a huge factor in the Western diseases (obesity, diabetes, heart disease).

Nevertheless, I enjoyed Pollan's book more than Planck's because she focused so heavily on meat-eating. Pollan does not advocate a vegetarian diet (although he doesn't discount it), but instead he supports eating meat from pastured, healthy, well-treated animals.

Still, I thought a lot of this book was overly-wordy and repetitive, as if Pollan really didn't have much to say on the subject. And because of that, I think most people could skip the first two sections of the book and only read the last, where Pollan details his eating philosophy.

In fact, for those too busy to read this book, I'm going to go ahead and give you the Clif's Notes version. Here's what/how you should be eating:

• Don't eat anything your great grandmother wouldn't recognize as food.
• Avoid food products containing ingredients that are a) unfamiliar, b) unpronouncable, c) more than five in number, or that include d) high-fructose corn syrup.
• Avoid food products that make health claims.
• Shop the peripheries of the supermarket and stay out of the middle.
• Get out of the supermarket whenever possible.
• Eat mostly plants, especially leaves.
• You are what you eat eats too.
• If you have the space, buy a freezer.
• Eat like an omnivore.
• Eat well-grown food from healthy soils.
• Eat wild foods when you can.
• Be the kind of person who takes supplements.
• Eat more like the French, or the Italians, or the Japanese, or the Indians, or the Greeks.
• Regard nontraditional foods with skepticism.
• Don't look for the magic bullet in the traditional diet.
• Have a glass of wine with dinner.
• Pay more, eat less.
• Eat meals.
• Do all your eating at a table.
• Don't get your fuel from th same place your car does.
• Try not to eat alone.
• Consult your gut.
• Eat slowly.
• Cook and, if you can, plant a garden.

This was another book where I felt like I already knew too much about the subject for it to grab me. I need some suggestions for a really thought-provoking, pushing-the-limits-of-new-ideas kind of book...


Next up on my reading list...Cradle to Cradle by William McDonough

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I Need...Chocolate (don't we all...)

This weekend brings two important events: Saturday is World Fair Trade Day and Sunday is, of course, Mother's Day. What a perfect combination! I can't think of a better way to celebrate Mother's Day than with lots of delectable fair trade and organic chocolate.

Chocolate by any other name...

...might taste as sweet, but if it's not USDA certified organic chocolate, you're also ingesting a generous helping of synthetic pesticides and chemical fertilizer. After cotton, conventional cocoa is grown with more pesticides than any other crop.

The story behind chocolate that's not certified fair trade is even less appetizing. Six chocolate manufacturers process 50% of all the cocoa in the world, giving them the ability to dictate cocoa prices. A high demand for cheap chocolate means the cocoa farmers are paid next to nothing; according to Green America, "the average cocoa farmer will generally earn only $30 to $100 a year."

Struggling in extreme poverty, many farmers choose to keep their children out of school to help on the farm, sometimes in hazardous conditions such as spraying pesticides on plants without wearing proper protective gear. Other farmers resort to slavery - child slave labor has been documented in the Ivory Coast, Nigeria, and Cameroon, where most of the world's cocoa is grown.

So show your mother you care by giving her chocolate that's good to the planet and helps farmers support their families, send their children to school, and not use slavery.

Fair Trade or Organic?

Lucky for us, we don't have to make this tough decision. There are plenty of chocolate brands out there that are both fair trade and organic, including Equal Exchange, Theo, Rapunzel, and even Trader Joe's store brand. You can find these at your local food co-op or natural foods store, and I've even seen Endangered Species chocolate (fair trade but not organic) at mainstream grocery stores.

Other Ways to Celebrate World Fair Trade Day

• Besides chocolate, you can find fair trade coffee, tea, herbs, fresh fruit, sugar, rice, and vanilla in the U.S.
• Cadbury's Dairy Milk Bar has gone fair trade!!! But only in Engand. :( Thank Cadbury for this important step forward and let them know we want fair trade Cadbury products here in the United States by adding your name to this letter from Green America.
  
• Find a World Fair Trade Day event near you by visiting www.worldfairtradeday09.org or googling "World Fair Trade Day" and the name of your city.
• If you live in the Triangle area, here are some celebrations around here:

• Ten Thousand Villages
• Location: Raleigh and Chapel Hill stores
  
• Time: 10am - 7pm
• Description: A day long celebration of fair trade! Enjoy free samples of chocolate and other fairly traded foods, register for door prizes. Join coffee drinkers around the U.S. as we try and break the record for the World's Largest Coffee Break at 3:00 p.m. Take our fair trade quiz and earn 20% off your purchases.

• Fair Trade Coffee Break at the Earth Fare Cafe
• Location: Raleigh
• Time: 8am - 10pm
• Description: Larry's Beans, a fair trade organic coffee roaster in Raleigh NC, has partnered with Earth Fare and will be featuring Costa Little Ricky that day for $ .50/cup and one pound bags for $7.99 all week. Sales support farmers in Bolivia, Mexico, and Ethiopia.

• Fair Trade Day Celebration at One World Market
• Location: Durham
• Time: 10am - 6pm
• Description: With delicious Fair Trade food samples, FREE prizes for everyone who participates in the geography game, and live music, featuring Viswas Chitnis and Chris Johnson. Help break the record for the World’s Largest Coffee Break at 3pm. FREE admission.

Photo by miss karen

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Greening My Grocery Bill

One of my early goals for this blog was to green my family's diet. Organic and natural foods are some of the aspects of going green that really do cost more (as opposed to energy efficiency, driving less, and eating less meat, which will all save you money), but I felt like it was important to find a way to afford to feed my family as many healthy foods as possible.

Over the past few months, I've slowly been making smarter and smarter choices about what my family eats. But I've been having trouble getting myself to outright commit. Every month, I say, "This month we're going to buy all organics or locally produced foods." And then I walk into Whole Foods and I chicken out, declaring, "I can't really afford this store!"

But despite my chickenheartedness, I've been doing a lot of research, and my research says I can go organic and still stay within my overall budget.

Check Out My Super Obsessive Research Skills

I am the most obsessively organized person I know, and to prove that point, I offer this evidence: my price book.

I'll write in more detail later this week about price books, but I wanted to go ahead and offer mine for public perusal. So in case you're interested, here's how to navigate it...

I divided my grocery budget into several categories and gave each category its own sheet. On each sheet, I recorded the estimated amount of each item that I use a year, the lowest price I've seen for each item, and the total cost of each item per year. On the far right of some sheets, I calculated the cost per unit of each item (for example, flour costs $0.06 per cup). I did this so I can calculate how much it costs to make some of my recipes.

Food Storage: $1,187.24

My food storage section is divided into three categories: oats/rice/pasta ($210.70), baking and cooking supplies ($594.14), and beans/nuts ($382.40). Almost all of the prices recorded are from Whole Foods. I was surprised to find that Whole Foods had the lowest prices on almost every item I buy, especially those I could get from the bulk bins. The main exceptions were a few items I can get through a buying club at my church.

Personal Care/Cleaning: $633.78

I know many people don't include personal care products in their grocery budget, but I always have. Again, most of these prices are from Whole Foods, although I've been ordering a few things from Amazon to save money.

Farmers Market: $2,460

I visit my farmers market weekly to buy almost all of my produce as well as milk, eggs, and honey. My husband has also talked me into buying grass-fed beef from the farmer's market every now and then. If we were able to have a garden, chickens, or bees, I think this amount could be significantly reduced.

Whole Foods: $2,398.66

This sheet refers to the weekly perishable items that I buy, including soymilk, cheese, butter, bananas, etc.

Kroger: $1,128.49

The last sheet includes some items that I couldn't find an organic version of (or like with baking soda, it doesn't come in "organic"). It also includes my 80/20 compromise with myself. There are just some not-exactly-healthy foods that my family is not willing to give up, either because of convenience or because we enjoy them too much. Some of these things, like juice and goldfish, I plan to phase us out of eventually. But frankly some things, like Coke and cereal, are here to stay. Everybody should be allowed a vice or two.

And the grand total is...$7,808.17 a year, or $150.16 a week

That means I should be spending about $600 a month during a four-shopping-trip month and $750 during a five-shopping-trip month. That's about how much I've been spending anyway, even not buying all organic or natural products.

My price book doesn't include any herbs, spices, or extra yummies (like chocolate chips), but it also doesn't include the potential to get some items on sale or with coupons. So overall, I think it's a pretty good estimate of how much our green grocery bill should be.

So what do you think? Is $150 a week for a family of five reasonable for greening our grocery budget?

Photo by cesarastudillo

This post was included in the Festival of Frugality #193 at The Canadian Finance Blog.


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Book Review: Real Food

Real Food: What to Eat and Why
by Nina Planck

Rating: ***


Synopsis:

Nina Planck's advice about eating could be summarized with the simple statement: "Eat traditional foods."

As a manager of farmers markets in London, DC, and New York City, Planck had the opportunity to compare meat, milk, fruit, and vegetables from small farms using traditional farming methods to foods from industrial farms. Her experience led her to determine that a diet of "real food" is healthy (including raw milk, red meat, lard, and other foods commonly deemed unhealthy) while asserting that modern, industrial food is the true culprit for many of our modern health problems, particularly obesity, diabetes, and heart disease.

To support her assertion, Planck presents a well-researched comparison of the nutritional values of traditional versus modern foods. Her research illustrates why butter is better than margarine, why pastured meat contains more vitamins than industrial meat, and why we should not be afraid of the incredible edible egg.

Beyond the nutritional analyses, Real Food is a fascinating look at the history of the food industry, charting how we moved from farm-fresh foods to the processed food industry we know today. Two examples that stuck with me:

• Butter from pastured cows is naturally yellow. When margarine was first invented in the late 19th century, the margarine makers tried to compete with the dairy industry by dying the margarine yellow. "With the help of friendly politicians, dairy farmers put a stop to yellow dye, and five states with dairy muscle even forced margarine makers to dye it pink, apparently intending to make it look ridiculous. Undeterred, margarine makers responded by selling the white blocks with a packet of yellow dye to mix in at home. This, presumably, would fool the family - if not the cook."

• Describing how eggs became taboo, Planck relates, "In 1968 food scientists met to sort out a safe amount of cholesterol to consume. Some were opposed to the very idea, while others firmly believed dietary cholesterol had a significant effect on blood cholesterol, and after much haggling they reached a compromise. The average intake of cholesterol was about 580 milligrams per liter of blood. Halving that, they settled on 300 milligrams - a political solution." Eggs contain 270-something milligrams.
  

Planck's overall conclusion is that we should return to eating the foods our grandparents ate: "Unlike industrial food, real food is fundamentally conservative. It is the food you already know: roast chicken, tomato salad with olive oil, creamed spinach, sourdough bread, peach ice cream. To me, that's a relief. When you rule out industrial foods altogether, it does simplify things a bit."


My Opinion:

A friend of mine recommended this book to me but then added as an afterthought, "As I'm typing, I'm remembering that she is an ex-vegetarian, and thinks that meat is important, so I don't know that you'd agree with her on everything." I think that statement, although written by a friend before I even read the book, could summarize how I feel about Real Food.

Planck was a vegetarian/vegan in her late teens and early twenties. She states that during her vegetarian years, she gained weight and generally felt unhealthy. When she started eating meat again, she lost weight and felt better. That experience led her down a path of nutritional research, culminating in her philosophy of eating.

I think her experience is valid, but I've also been a vegetarian for 11 years, have been able to maintain a healthy weight through three pregnancies, and have never felt unhealthy. Additionally, because of her assertion that vegetable oil (as a modern innovation) rather than saturated fats is one of the true culprits causing obesity, diabetes, and heart disease, you would have to conclude that vegetarians and especially vegans would have higher rates of those diseases because they would use more vegetable oil, less butter, and no animal fats. But how many fat vegetarians do you know?

Because much of her ideas were premised on her experience with vegetarianism, I read the rest of the book doubtfully. I completely agree that pasture-raised meat and eggs are better than industrial, that we should eat lots of fruits and veggies, and that we shouldn't be afraid of butter. But about other things, I'm not so sure. Raw milk, for instance. Or lard.

I also think that Planck's insistence that real foods don't cause heart disease could lead people to feel like they can eat as much meat and potatoes (slathered in butter and cream) as they want. But personally, I think that the biggest cause of obesity is simple overeating, and we have to remember that the traditional diet was combined with traditional hard work that kept people slim and fit. A meat and potatoes diet combined with sitting on your butt all day is not going to prevent obesity.

Since finishing this book, I find myself every now and then thinking about some of Planck's ideas. But whether or not it will change anything about the way I eat remains to be seen.


Next up on my reading list...In Defense of Food by Michael Pollan

Read more...