OK, so is it actually better not to eat some things if not Organic???
Maybe this question is being answered in a couple of the threads here right now, but I have been thinking about this. I have seen several people note that they either buy items on the top contaminated list organic or not at all. I think for awhile, I actually stopped eating veggies with a bit of a mindset that they were bad because contaminated with pesticides. The goofy thing is, I did that and continued to eat meat and dairy that was not organic. (duh).
Anyway, so, is it really better for me to not give my kids strawberries than to give them conventionally grown strawberries? DS will drink a smoothie with bananas and strawberries with flax seed and sometimes fresh squeezed OJ, carrot juice, and spinach thrown in, but is not so interested in a blueberry smoothie or something else. My kids love strawberries! I can buy a 5 lb bag of organic strawberries for $15 at my co-op or $6 for conventionally grown CA strawberries from Costco. It's hard to justify a whole $9, YK??? I try to buy organics when I can, and there are a lot of things that the price difference is not so drastic that I can justify, but, WOW! What about apples? They almost only eat them peeled, anyway. So, should they just be eating different fruit?
__________________ Jody
Mama to two boys (5-10-98 and 6-01-01), and two girls (11-18-03 and 1-11-07)
OK, OK I just took another look at the organic thread, and I think I have my answer. I think I need to come to terms with the idea that there is a particular price to pay for "real" food and it isn't even worth doing the comparisons.
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I will address the strawberry issue because I have put a lot of time and effort into strawberries and their consumtion in my house. We get frozen strawberries in Organic only. But fresh strawberries, it depends on where they are grown. If they are grown in OR or WA then most likely they will not have the level of pesticide that the high/low food list is talking about. If they are grown in other states or espically Mexico or Chili DON'T GET THEM. It is a common practice in these places to put their strawberry plants in tubes and gas them 6 - 10 times before they are picked. It is just gas and not liqud so it is not as documented as say wheat etc because there is never any "liquid poison" ON the strawberry. But when something is sitting in that much toxic gas... well there is TONS of residue and it is better to not eat them. Hence why when I get them frozen I always get them organic because you can't really find out where they were grown (Packaged in CA does not mean Grown in CA).
Apples are a non issue here. I don't buy them non organic at all. Not even to peel them. Alex eats two organic apples a day. (Granny Smiths) They range in price from $2/lb to $.89/lb. We get them no matter what. I am trying to get involved in Asure Standard to get O Granny Smiths for him by the box, but so far have had little luck finding a group to make the $400 minimum for a drop place.
We have a farm that sells June Bearing Strawberries in the summer time here, and I do a U pick at their farm. I have talked with the growers about their practices and they spray a liquid pesticide during the flowering stage of the plants to kill of one kind of bug and then don't spray or use pesticide the entire fruiting season. This is a farm that is less than 40 minutes away. I go there, and pick my strawberries that I freeze in the winter about once every two years.
I have a Blueberry place that has a similar practice where the pesticides are never on the fruit. I go there every year and get about 20 Lbs of blueberries.
I take one trip a year to get Cherries, Peaches and Apples from the other side of the mountains where they grow in this state (aboud 4 hours away). The cherries and apples are organic... the peaches are not certified, but have similar practices to the ones above.
Tomatos I grow and get organic from local farmers and then can them. When we have to get pasta sauce (I didn't make any last year and have needed to buy it all winter) I always get oraganic.
If I don't know where they are grown and how, I don't get any of the foods on the high pesticide list non-organic. It is not worth it in my mind to test out their chemicals on my kids.
HTH
Val
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Yes, there are foods I won't feed my children if they are not organic. Stawberries, grapes, and apples top the list. They eat a lot of fruit and it either has to be organic, unsprayed local, or on the low pesticide residue list.
Here are the lists that Val posted, and what I actually do:
These are the HIGHEST in pesticide residue
Only buy these organic:
1) Peaches -I buy organic only
2) Apples - organic only
3) Strawberries - organic only
5) Nectarines - don't really buy
5) Pears - organic only
6) Cherries - buy once a summer for DH, not organic
7) Red Raspberries - don't really buy
8) Imported Grapes -organic only
9)Bananas - both organic and non-organic (and other sites have listed bananas as lower)
Vegetables
1) Spinach - organic only
2) Bell Peppers - organic only
3) Celery - organic only
4) Potatoes - mostly organic, occasional non-organic baby potatoes
5) Hot Peppers - organic only
And the lowest:
Foods that tend to be low in pesticides
EWG analysis of the latest government test results shows that the
following fruits and vegetables have the least pesticide contamination
among conventionally-grown foods.
Fruits
1) Pineapples - not organic unless cheaper than conventional
2) Plantains - don't buy
3) Mangoes - whichever I can find
4) Watermelon - both
5) Plums - organic (and I read that all stone fruit should be organic)
6) Kiwi Fruit - organic
7) Blueberries - don't buy
8) Papaya - rarely buy
9) Grapefruit - not organic
I will address the strawberry issue because I have put a lot of time and effort into strawberries and their consumtion in my house. We get frozen strawberries in Organic only. But fresh strawberries, it depends on where they are grown. If they are grown in OR or WA then most likely they will not have the level of pesticide that the high/low food list is talking about. If they are grown in other states or espically Mexico or Chili DON'T GET THEM. It is a common practice in these places to put their strawberry plants in tubes and gas them 6 - 10 times before they are picked. It is just gas and not liqud so it is not as documented as say wheat etc because there is never any "liquid poison" ON the strawberry. But when something is sitting in that much toxic gas... well there is TONS of residue and it is better to not eat them. Hence why when I get them frozen I always get them organic because you can't really find out where they were grown (Packaged in CA does not mean Grown in CA).
Apples are a non issue here. I don't buy them non organic at all. Not even to peel them. Alex eats two organic apples a day. (Granny Smiths) They range in price from $2/lb to $.89/lb. We get them no matter what. I am trying to get involved in Asure Standard to get O Granny Smiths for him by the box, but so far have had little luck finding a group to make the $400 minimum for a drop place.
We have a farm that sells June Bearing Strawberries in the summer time here, and I do a U pick at their farm. I have talked with the growers about their practices and they spray a liquid pesticide during the flowering stage of the plants to kill of one kind of bug and then don't spray or use pesticide the entire fruiting season. This is a farm that is less than 40 minutes away. I go there, and pick my strawberries that I freeze in the winter about once every two years.
I have a Blueberry place that has a similar practice where the pesticides are never on the fruit. I go there every year and get about 20 Lbs of blueberries.
I take one trip a year to get Cherries, Peaches and Apples from the other side of the mountains where they grow in this state (aboud 4 hours away). The cherries and apples are organic... the peaches are not certified, but have similar practices to the ones above.
Tomatos I grow and get organic from local farmers and then can them. When we have to get pasta sauce (I didn't make any last year and have needed to buy it all winter) I always get oraganic.
If I don't know where they are grown and how, I don't get any of the foods on the high pesticide list non-organic. It is not worth it in my mind to test out their chemicals on my kids.
HTH
Val
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Kbsmama
OK, OK I just took another look at the organic thread, and I think I have my answer. I think I need to come to terms with the idea that there is a particular price to pay for "real" food and it isn't even worth doing the comparisons.
This is me now. There are some things, no matter the price, we buy organic, period. Apples being the main one. I am trying to find organic bell peppers as we eat a lot of those. We do not eat many strawberries so I buy them frozen. We do eat a lot of blueberries and I can get them really cheap organic and frozen. (My girls will only eat them frozen.) Others, I buy organic if I have the money and non-organic if we NEED them and I don't. Onions, avocadoes are two examples.
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Michelle
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For us it is hard to justify buying organic from the grocery store all the time because it is shipped in from the mainland. So yeah it is organic but picked possiable weeks ago and still unriped or just way to expensive.EX. $4 a small head of lettuce, 8$ a gallon of milk, 7$lbs for tomatoes. We love eating organic when we lived in Oregon it was so availible that how could you not. So we buy local non-spray product instead. Usually Costco will have some stuff that is organic and we buy it up. If it is on sale we stock up and yes there are certian things that we always by organic regardless of the price. Apples is one of them even thought they are $5 a LBS
I CAN'T WAIT TO MOVE BACK TO THE MAINLAND!!!!!!!
For us it is hard to justify buying organic from the grocery store all the time because it is shipped in from the mainland. So yeah it is organic but picked possiable weeks ago and still unriped or just way to expensive.EX. $4 a small head of lettuce, 8$ a gallon of milk, 7$lbs for tomatoes. We love eating organic when we lived in Oregon it was so availible that how could you not. So we buy local non-spray product instead. Usually Costco will have some stuff that is organic and we buy it up. If it is on sale we stock up and yes there are certian things that we always by organic regardless of the price. Apples is one of them even thought they are $5 a LBS
I CAN'T WAIT TO MOVE BACK TO THE MAINLAND!!!!!!!
Yes we are definately spoiled here with all the wonderful LOCAL and ORGANIC! You have any plans of coming back yet?
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***Jennifer***
Mama to Max (3/2000) and Maizy Grace (9/2002)
Happy Fall!
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Heads up... if you have a safeways near you they carry there own brand of Organic food. I couldn't believe it! I went crazy. Also if you have a Sam's Club by you there once again i found fabulous deals on organic food. EX> 12 stoneyfield organic yogart for $8. That is mainland prices. i am thrilled!! I didn't buy produce at any of these places but other things i stocked up on!!!.....
Jen- we do plan on moving back hopefully soon but now that sam has this screenwriting job we have to wait and see. But when we do come back we are planing on living in Ptld. I can't wait to go to the farms and wonderful markts there again. AAHHHH!
P.S. I can't believe how big the kids are! There are so sweet
I would say that it depends on where the non organic food comes from, and whether they care about thier land. We do buy some foods locally from small places that are not certified organic. Pesticide use is minimal.
Ask the local people how they farm. I have found the road side folks are very eager to share their ways. I also like the fact that the food is picked the same day, often mintues, before I purchse it. There is nothing quite so nice as summer corn from husks still warm from the sun.
There is a lot of great info in the book, Buying Organic. It gives lots of insight about US pesticide use.
I'd not buy anything from Chile, say. I also think eating in season is very a very good strategy. I am able to store local squashes, apples, pears etc. for quite a while through fall and some of the winter. I don't think it's critical to health to eat strawberries all year long if you live in Vermont, for instance. Think about foods that store well. You don't need a CA avocado in January if you live in Massachusetts and have acorn squash you picked in Sept and stored well. These things are nice, and we all enjoy them, but they do come at an environmental price, and I can't fully forget that the New Zealand kiwis I adore, have come via a long, polluting journey. Oh, I eat them, but it's easier for me to enjoy the local lettuce, which I can do guilt- free. Yeah...I worry a lot about all of my choices.
Not that I will give up the New Zealand kiwi indulgence totally. ;-)
Jody
and Sam, 8 
I went crazy. Also if you have a Sam's Club by you there once again i found fabulous deals on organic food. EX> 12 stoneyfield organic yogart for $8. That is mainland prices. i am thrilled!! I didn't buy produce at any of these places but other things i stocked up on!!!.....
~AMY ~ 
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