Organic

PieSusan

Tortes Are Us
Super Site Supporter
Where do you stand when it comes to buying organic fruits and vegetables, hormone free milk, cage free eggs, free range chickens and beef such as that from Niman ranch?

At first, I read the rules and regs regarding "organic" and I wasn't sold but the more I read about our food industry the more I am inclined to want to go that route and have started to. I also intend to continue to buy more local and to eat with the seasons.
 

bigjim

Mess Cook
Super Site Supporter
I buy a lot of organic produce as it is generally superior in quality. Summertime the vegetable stands are open, and I do not pay much attention to organic or not. Free range chickens are way better tasting. Especially local producers.

When you consider the millions of tons of food consumed in the US, and the number of cases of contamination, I think we do pretty good.
 

QSis

Grill Master
Staff member
Gold Site Supporter
Well, I don't usually buy organic stuff because it's more expensive and I can't taste the difference.

I am willing to be enlightened, however. :)

Lee
 

SilverSage

Resident Crone
I grow a lot of my own herbs and vegs. They are definitely organic.

But the stuff I buy in the store varies. I prefer organic, but sometimes I can't justify the price difference. If it's not too much more,I go organic, but it the difference is great, I stick with the regular stuff and wash it real well.
 

Sass Muffin

Coffee Queen ☕
Gold Site Supporter
Fortunately I live in an area where just about anything I want is organic.
We have farms around here who sell their produce fresh when it's in season.
There are also plenty of chicken and turkey farms who have their product either in-store, or you can go directly to the supplier.
I love organic milk (I think it lasts longer) and I do buy organic, free range eggs.
 

Sass Muffin

Coffee Queen ☕
Gold Site Supporter
I wonder.
Is there such a thing as an organic orgasm?
Probably so.
I bet they happened a lot in the 60's. LOL!
 

buckytom

Grill Master
i don't know about organic orgasms, but you won't even get close if your magnesium is low. have a nice dinner of almond crusted halibut florentine, then gimme a call, lol.

you find out a lot about nutrition when you get crippling cramps around your ribcage and back muscles like i was experiencing last year.

gotta love the dr. oz show for the orgasm info, though. :respect:

back on topic and just to be accurate, you cannot add chemical fertilizers, weed killers, pesticides or other synthetic soil modifiers to your garden if you want to call it organic. this needs to be kept up for several years before you can consider the food organically grown so as not to have come in comtact with any of the aforementioned sythetics.
also, you'd need to start with organic seeds which would exclude any gmo seeds, seedlings, or other organisms. hybrids are ok.

i buy organic if it seems worth it for taste. things like carrots and bananas come to mind. now, there isn't a huge difference in taste, but for the extra 20 or 30 cents per pound, why not? it's still better. people are too often penny wise but pound foolish.

as far as free range chickens go, it's a scam for the most part. a gigantic shed full of thousands of chicks open their doors to let the little beasts out onto a small, poop covered patio for an hour a week, not many of them actually making it outside, and they get to call them free range.

not exactly like a little chick in a cowboy outfit riding a tiny horse as i've pictured.
 

Adillo303

*****
Gold Site Supporter
OK - Chicken question. How about those places where your chicken is live when you go in the front door? Has anyone ever bought chicken like that? If so, how was the taste compared to meat case chicken?
 

SilverSage

Resident Crone
In Florida, especially the coastal areas, the soil is so poor that it's almost impossible to grown your own anything without lots of soil additives. But I found an easy way to do it organically.

They're called Earth Boxes. It's a self-contained garden. You buy the box, then you have a choice of getting the soil, etc either regular or organic. The actual research center for Earth Box and Blake, the inventor, are 3 miles down the road from me. So I get my seedlings right from him. Each year I seem to add another box. Right now I have tomatoes, lettuces, herbs, peppers all doing well. I couldn't keep the bugs out of the arugula, and lost it rather than spray it.

Our growing seasons are different here because of the heat and the summer rains (hurricane season). So we can almost have stuff growing year-round.

The only thing I put in the ground are pineapples, but I lost all of those this year in the freeze. I'll start putting more in, but it will take several years before they fruit.

These pics are about a month old so the tomatoes are much bigger now.
 

Attachments

  • 000_0004.jpg
    000_0004.jpg
    131.1 KB · Views: 134
  • 000_0006.jpg
    000_0006.jpg
    169.6 KB · Views: 133

lilbopeep

🌹🐰 Still trying to get it right.
Site Supporter
OK - Chicken question. How about those places where your chicken is live when you go in the front door? Has anyone ever bought chicken like that? If so, how was the taste compared to meat case chicken?
when i was a child my aunt would go to a poutry shop in passaic i think. (they left the head and feet on she said it made the best chicken soup) whatever she made with that chicken was always fantastic!! my mom also went to a poultry shop. all the ones I knew of are gone.
 

joec

New member
Gold Site Supporter
Where do you stand when it comes to buying organic fruits and vegetables, hormone free milk, cage free eggs, free range chickens and beef such as that from Niman ranch?

At first, I read the rules and regs regarding "organic" and I wasn't sold but the more I read about our food industry the more I am inclined to want to go that route and have started to. I also intend to continue to buy more local and to eat with the seasons.

I prefer it though not always available. I buy from local growers as much as possible and haven't eaten a supermarket chicken in well over 35 years now. I've found a local Amish supplier that grows chickens as nature intended without all the crap added to make them grow faster. Even the meat looks different in that it is real white in color not yellow and they are normal sized. I buy beef and pork the same way from another local that even raises the grasses they feed with not pesticides are antibiotic treated animals. I might add they actually age all meat the proper way before selling it. I generally buy a half steer and pig ever 6 months or so with extra cuts in quantity. Now if I could talk then into lamb but they have no interest in it.
 

Maverick2272

Stewed Monkey
Super Site Supporter
Everything we grow in our garden is organic, after 11 years here we have never used any chemicals or synthetics in our soil. We used prairie plants to turn the soil from clay like to nice and rich and black. Took about 4 to 5 years to get it real good.
During the summer we have great farmers markets around here. Don't know if most of them are organic or not, but buying local does help save on the cost of fuel to ship stuff here.
There is one organic guy at one of the markets where we can get organic eggs and milk that is hormone free and non pasteurized. Apparently you can do that as long as you don't go over state lines. We also get our whole bean coffee there from a guy that roasts it himself. Great stuff.
 

FryBoy

New member
Just because you buy fruits and veggies directly from a farm or a farmers' market doesn't mean that they're "organic," as that term is commonly understood, meaning free of pesticides, hormones, artificial color, and other additives, which after all are generally added on the farm. Whether those things are harmful is debatable, but it's clear that on balance they have done more good than harm by making highly nutritional food more readily available to more people at lower cost. Still, given my druthers, I opt for organic IF the price is competitive -- which it rarely is -- even though I don't think that the trace amounts of non-organic chemicals remaining in most fruits and veggies is likely to be harmful.

OTOH, here's something to consider:

http://www.webmd.com/add-adhd/news/20100517/common-pesticides-double-kids-adhd-risk
 
Top