12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

infinity — Tue, 26 Aug 2008 23:43:12 GMT

The best way to get organic food, incl. produce, is to join a co-op. Or start one yourself. If really not so difficult as it sounds. You get a group of friends together, take turns in ordering what each of you wants from the wholesale market for your area, and take turns in being the house where the orders are delivered, from where each group member can pick up. This is a buying club. Work specifically to expand the group to where you can have membership dues which will pay the rent of a small, simple space to which your orders are delivered. Work out a roster of when each member will staff that. You have to be serious about this, responsible; you have to educate yourselves and KNOW that it's wothwhile, to protect your own health, your children's and their future, and literally save the planet from becoming so poisoned none of us will be able to live on it. I was raised on an "orthodox" diet, in a low-income family, we gradually rose up in class to working class poor; now I'm educated in natural self-health care, & belong to the Pk Slope Food Co-op (snce 1979). Take the resposibility for your own life, your own health care, and then expand that to include some other people. Good Luck! Gaye Leslie

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

Deborah.M — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 19:22:32 GMT

My husband and I only buy organic broccoli because it taste a lot better than non-organic. I buy most of my fruits and vegetables organic and I try to buy only what I need to offset cost.

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

buttns — Wed, 20 Aug 2008 00:17:52 GMT

Hi all, so much good information comes from the good Dr Merc. of course we all appreciate it and value it and use it, please dont waste our time to discredit him or any other forum participant. it is all about finding the best, most up to date info that carries truth and reliability. We surely are mature enough to take what we need and discard the rest all by ourselves eh? Keep it that way.

as to providing more information on access to produce and following his recommendations, how does that help for people in other countries, in fact most of these studies that are done are american, therefore do they actually even apply to us at all. Wouldn't our procedures be different, or slightly less or more? so how can the good Doc even begin to be responsible for the world wide web participants.. he does his best, it is up to us to be responsible for ourselves. WE ALL NEED TO BUY ORGANIC TO SHUT DOWN THE DAMAGING PRACTICES OF MASS PRODUCTION ALTOGETHER.

And you know what, yes it does cost more, but just like everything else, you get use to it, you accommodate it, and are you not worth it? This is your life, the life of your loved ones and the life and continuation of the human race and our beautiful planet, can't we afford that? To me that has become my priority. Everything else can wait.

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

berry lee — Tue, 19 Aug 2008 01:38:42 GMT

I did see that orgaic farming uses more land area per unit of food grown and thus that land doesnt absorb as much CO2 as would conventional plants on the same land area. Conclusion organic farming is not too great for global warming!! Oh! I think August is much cooler around NC and I bet part of the reason is less expesive gasoline burned!!

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

Connected1 — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 19:47:21 GMT

I'm having difficulty believing in the accuracy of the list of the fruits and vegetables that have the lowest amounts of pesticide residues.

Broccoli is on the list.

The FDA published the info. that a person should not consume over 1 pound a year of not organic broccoli.

Now it's on the safer list... I don't believe this list is accurate.

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

RachaelWinstead — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 17:47:43 GMT

Chick-Inn Keeper, I used to fight all the cabbage lopers on my Brassicaceae crops but then I quit trying to grow them in the spring when all the buggies are out mating and laying eggs. I now do a fall broccoli crop and I don't have to fight the pests near as much. In the spring, I do early veggies - carrots, onions, etc. and about the time they're all completely done producing, I re-work the beds (amend the soil) and plant my "fall" (late summer) crops. Of course I have other beds that I do all my early summer stuff - squash, eggplant, tomatoes. It's made life much easier. I used to go out with a bucket and pluck off dozens and dozens of those green wormies everyday. Exhausting! Luckily, they made a good meal for my neighbor's chickens.

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

Laelle — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 16:05:03 GMT

For those of you wanting a pocket size produce guide, you don't have to type on up yourself. The Environmental Working Group already created a PDF file of their pocket size guide. You can find it here: www.foodnews.org/.../EWG_pesticide.pdf

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

Julia Owens — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 15:36:43 GMT

If anyone wants personal help and support in making nutritional changes in the community in which you live, check the web for a local chapter of The Westin Price Foundation. They usually have a buyers club set up for hard to find items or just to make eating healthier more affordable. Examples of foods you can purchase through a buyers club - organic free range poultry, organic pasture fed beef and lamb, pastured eggs, high vitamin cod liver oil and butter oil, organic, unrefined coconut oil.

Below is an example of the resources available through my local (very well run, I might add) Westin Price Foundation. This is only a portioin of a Resource Directory listing stores in the entire region that carry all of the above mentioned foodstuffs, plus organic, local produce. Hands down, this is the best resource for you to find locally raised organic food. They also hold workshops and monthly meetings with keynote speakers to help people learn how eat as naturally as possible.

Keep in mind, not everyone can afford to eat organic all the time, or may not have as easy access to it as others, so the tip below is very helpful in determining what you might be purchasing:

How to know for certain about your produce. Look at the little stickers on the fruits and vegetables. The PLU code will tell you. The PLU code for conventionally grown fruit consists of four numbers; organically grown, five numbers prefaced by the number 9; and GM fruit, five numbers prefaced by the number 8. For example:

Conventionally grown PLU: 1022

Organically grown PLU: 91022

Genetically Modified PLU: 81022

Other strategies: Avoid hybrid fruits (usually the seedless varieties). Buy only organic produce – by definition, it cannot be genetically modified. Avoid processed foods. They also often contain trans-fats and acrylamides. If you pick an item off your grocery store’s shelves, you have a 70% chance of picking a food with genetically modified (GM) ingredients. There are no labeling requirements for genetically modified food. No studies have ever been done on how genetically modified food might affect humans. “Buying organic is currently the best way to ensure that your food has not been genetically modified.”

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

DrMom5 — Mon, 18 Aug 2008 08:30:38 GMT

Regular bananas upset my stomach. Organic bananas don't. Eggs are the same way. Been that way since I was a toddler in the late 1950s. Don't know what they were doing to the chickens back then. (Maybe it's a corn-fed problem.) At any rate, the rest of the family gets regular bananas and I eat only the organics.

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

bill7581 — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 23:16:42 GMT

While awareness and education about pesticide use is great - it is perhaps less than half the concern. Fertilizers are perhaps even more important since, by volume, they tend to be much greater and in the soil. Does anybody have a suggestion what questions to ask farmers to better qualify organic farming methods?

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

ribrob — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 18:00:55 GMT

Hello - I am very baffled about butter. Dr Merc says above the butter is the worst of all non-organics. However, he had elsewhere said that it is more important for beef to be free range (grass-fed) than to be organic. In the UK one can only get either organic non-free-range, or non-organic free range (Anchor brand from New Zealand). I hope Dr Merc or someone can answer this dilemma! More generally, organic meat is as common here as gold dust in rubbish bins.

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

otter1133 — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 17:46:31 GMT

In re 2fit4u's 8/16 suggestion re soaking fruits and veggies in bleach water or veggie wash, from healingtools.tripod.com/H2O2.html:

Vegetable Soak: (CLOROX sub.): Add 1/4 cup of 3% Hydrogen Peroxide (H2O2) into a gallon of Cold Water. Soak light Vegetables (Lettuce, etc.) 20 minutes, thicker skinned Vegetables (like Cucumbers) for 30 minutes. Drain and dry, (they keep LONGER too). If time is a Problem, you can spray the Vegetables with straight 3% Hydrogen Peroxide, let stand for a couple of minutes, rinse and dry.

I'm just getting into using H2O2 so I haven't experimented with the above to know if it would do as 2fit4u says: "After a few minutes you can smell the herbicides and pesticides in the room! " I definitely would love to see if H2O2 would do the same - I'd rather use oxygen than chlorine!

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

Rainbowpsl2000 — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 13:29:56 GMT

My goodness, with all this pesticide going into our enormous food supply, it makes one want to give up eating. Organic is hard to find and especially in a wide choice. I have always been fortunate with health but several months ago I started getting heartburn with just about everything I ate. I figured it was change with age and kind of endured it with the help of an acid control tablet. Then I had ordered the coconut oil and started taking my daily dose as advised by Dr. Mercola. After one day I got Montezuma's revenge and it attacked my whole system with the expulsion of black and green watery bowels. This lasted for three days and I thought I had some kind of flu bug. After it was all over... no more heartburn, and it has been six weeks. I am a salsa and spice eater with food... no more heartburn. So, what I am wondering here is, would an agent that supplies cleansing to the body be of benefit in regards to these pesticides and toxins that we consume in our fruits and veggies and meat. I mean how can we totally avoid this? Not everyone has the money to afford them and sometimes they just aren't available anyway.

Dr. Mercola recently gave information that fungus causes cancer. Well wouldn't pesticides create some form of a fungus, being that they are a foreign substance to the body? I would think so. Again, I am curious as to these body cleanses, like a liver cleanse, an intestinal cleanse, or is it too late and they lodged in other places? Gee this sure is terrible that we have to worry about things like this, all because of money -greed mongers. My husband used to spray all his fruit trees with a mixture of soap and water and we never had bad fruit or disease. Insects do not like soap! How inexpensive and safe could that be? This method also works on landscape and home plants. 1TBSP of New Dawn to a half gallon of water. I just love Dr. Mercola and all his researched information, in my estimation he is the saint of info. Dr. "Guru" Mercola !

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

Julieanne — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 09:13:57 GMT

Jen47

"Do you spray the crop or the pest?"

You spray the pest which is on the crop! Pyrethrum, especially, has to hit the pests directly, and breaks down quite quickly. Dryacide (diatomaceous earth) doesn't, but will wash off in rain. I don't know if either of these will affect crickets (locusts?), though pyrethrum kills most pests, as long as it comes in contact with them.

re: 12 Foods You Don't Have to Buy Organic

Don Fletcher — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 05:41:47 GMT

I observe that some land is not really a good fit for organic farming, where organic farming is presumed to be directed as the main food source for a local community.

If for instance land has a very high pH, say above 8.4, there will be a list of plant nutrients that will not be readily available, and that also applies to human nutrients... one gets almost no selenium in plants grown in high pH soil. This can be important if you try to grow most of your own food, and your land is high pH.

Now there are some soils that are poorly supplied with magnesium or sulphur, copper. The attempt to provide a proper diet on land that is deficient in any of these micro-nutrients will result in nutrient deficiencies, not just those individual elements, but the compounds that are produced with those elements. Now these are in general not the main fertilizer components N P K. But it may not be practicable to produce food of good nutritional quality with any plant nutrient deficient.

Even the P (phosphorus) in our fertilizers is often over applied because of high pH soils. P becomes progressively less available as pH goes up. So, we will have to avoid using land that is deficient in micro-nutrients, or high pH, or we will have to adjust soil pH (down) or add micro-nutrients. It is often a mistake to add micro-nutrient without first adjusting high pH, since there is often enough nutrient locked up by high calcium levels.

My own land is border line... right at pH 8.4, and so would not produce appropriate organic produce. I really have to adjust pH down, as with sulphur, magnesium sulphate, copper sulphate. And I know that people who insist on purely organic methods, this is heresy... I should abandon this land.

Note that in the list of foods based on pesticide levels, the PPM column was not the sorting column. It should have been.

The number of different pesticides involved is irrelevant. PPM and specific toxicity to humans do have significance So reorganize that list.