dirty dozen

We've been eating organic as much as possible for a few years now. I have chronic gastrointestinal issues and try to keep my food as clean as possible, it may or may not make any difference to my health but I feel like it does. I've been free from medication for years now, managing my disease with food and sleep.

Organic food is expensive. Our co-op made things easy and affordable, but that's not happening these days*, so I've had to change my shopping ways. I've found stores where you can find affordable organics around the city; No Frills carries a surprising amount of organic products (all from President's Choice), IGA has decent organic produce, Choices is where we're buying our fish and meat when we buy it (we've cut down dramatically on meat and fish), Whole Foods can be surprisingly well priced at times (their sales are really great) and Famous Foods is fantastic for bulk grains.

I've really enjoyed reading Food Matters by Mark Bittman, The Omnivores Dilemma by Michael Pollan and In Defense of Food, also by Michael Pollan. These books helped change my eating habits, to confirm my thoughts on natural and unprocessed food and to educate me on the state of the farming industry.

The dirty dozen is a list compiled by the Environmental Working Group that comes out once a year listing the top twelve fruits and vegetables that you should try your best to buy organic. I've put the list together with some illustration and some info pulled from an article from The Daily Green.

* I went to a very interesting meeting with the farmers, investors and co-op members on Thursday. It was really sad to see and talk to the farmers and to better understand what they lost and the horrible impact that the bankruptcy has had on them. There are plans to start the co-op again in some manner, we will sign up again if it does get off the ground as this time there will much more information and transparency in terms of how the co-op is run and how monies are spent/divided.