Kim Dannies: Lifestyle & Adventure writing

The Organic Panic
May 15, 2008

Unless you’ve been living under a pile of compost, you’ve been exposed to green-media and the campaign for eating mainly organic and local foods. The locavore trend is about eating more products produced closer to home and it’s a topic dearer to editor’s healthy hearts than saturated fat. (Locavore was even ‘the 2007 word of the year’ for the American Oxford Dictionary). The organic movement once a label, now a full-blown lifestyle, is a bit more complicated what with actual standards manipulated by elected officials and all. Did you know that Walmart is going organic? This is not a good thing. Walmart, notorious for keeping costs down, is lobbying hard with deep pockets to compromise certification standards that are fragile, at best. The pressure will force the collapse of small, local producers who we currently support. It’s like discovering your evil twin weeding the vegetable patch with a weedwacker.

Personally, I love organic products and living green? after all, Vermont is the Green Mountain State. Yet, when I try to fill my shopping cart with certified organic, free-trade, produced in Vermont labels, my once healthy heart starts to beat unnaturally fast, and a peculiar ringing starts in my ears, and suddenly, I am having a full blown price tag panic attack among the biodynamic Vidalia onions. What’s a conscientious eater to do? I mean, a local 8-ounce rib-eye steak for $26.95? Organic line-caught wild Seattle salmon at $15.98 a pound? 8 ounces of Organic Valley bacon at $8.19 shipped from California? Wouldn’t I be better off choosing Vermont Smoke House bacon for less than 5 bucks, even if it is not organic? It’s an organic-locavore smackdown.

Eggs and dairy products? I can absolutely taste the difference in quality. And I buy organic-local products only (though I must admit, I didn’t start doing this until my girls moved out.). Produce? Organic produce contains 27% more vitamin C, 21% more iron, and 29% more magnesium than traditionally grown foods. Surely organic tomatoes, lettuces, and fruits taste better, but I’m not convinced that organic avocados, frozen sweet peas, and dish detergent are essential items in my cart. Doing the right thing for the local economy, for a healthy lifestyle, and for the environment? common sense tells me that a Macintosh apple from Williston are a better choice than organic Fujis from New Zealand.

With soaring food prices, sourcing summer produce from a local CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) or local farmer’s market, is the most cost-effective and healthy way to eat, short of growing your own. Locate CSA’s in your state by visiting www.localharvest.org. This would be an excellent use of your stimulus check? talk about supporting the locavore movement! Bottom line: don’t panic or grow manic over the subject of organic; awareness is about healthy choices, and stressing about food is wasted time. Simply choose the best that is available to you at the moment. If the organic produce happens to look a little beat, it’s fine to grab something fresher, give it a good rinse, and enjoy it. Eating fruits and vegetables is always good for your diet, and a little local bacon won’t hurt either.