Fastest from field
February 16th, 2007 by Jim VIn the last few days I have noticed a billboard advertisement for a large grocery chain. The billboard says “Fastest from field to fruit bowlâ€, along with a picture of some fruit. Sounds nice and it has an appeal when it is around 0 degrees with a 20mph wind, but it seems wrong in the strictest sense. The fastest from field to fruit bowl is when I pick apples from my own apple trees or gather raspberries from my own property. Next fastest is when we go to the local u-pick strawberry and raspberry place to stock up for the year. Fast in the sense of “plastic†fruit picked before it is totally ripe, coming from thousands of miles away or even from another country doesn’t really sound fast to me. And then should “fast†even really be the overriding value? Shouldn’t freshness, vitamin and mineral content, and the lack of pesticide residue be more important – not to mention supporting a local family farm rather than some corporate entity that furthers the sodomite agenda? (I found a web site that indicated this grocery chain was friendly to the sodomite agenda.) I understand the desire to get food from other climates and other countries, especially knowing the limited amount of fruit that can be raised in Minnesota, and am not convinced it is categorically wrong. But it seems we need to be very careful when getting food from other countries. The farther we are removed from the farmer, the more opportunity there is for us to end up with a product that is not what we expected. I know that US producers are not always diligent to produce a quality product, but in the third world at times I have seen even less understanding of sanitation and pesticides. (Tom, chime in if you want, since I know you probably have something to add.) For example, in one unnamed country a few years ago, I and a friend went to purchase some fresh made bread. This bread was made in small shops. As we entered the shop the baker had a large bowl of dough that was ready to be rolled out. He took a canister of fly spray (Pif Paff) and sprayed a generous amount directly over the table in an attempt to kill the ever present flies. He then immediately dropped the dough onto this table. My friend immediately said “You sprayed Pif Paff onto the tableâ€. The baker looked at us with sort of a dumbfounded look and shook his head no. He then continued to roll-out the dough. Needless to say, we did not buy bread from him. My wife and I will often joke about the times that I probably ate Pif Paff. In another country I have seen whole beef carcasses hanging outside shops in 100 degree weather along dirty, dusty roads that have lots of car traffic. This area always has lots of flies and can have raw sewage running in the streets. (Good thing that this country does not have a lot of dogs running loose.) When I think of eating food coming from far away places, these images return to my mind, making me wonder if the food in question has been properly handled. I prefer to deal with a local farmer who I can look in the eye, a farmer who I can get to know enough to determine if he has the character and self-control to produce a quality product.
February 17th, 2007 at 2:40 pm
Wow!! I just had this experience last night!
I was visiting some friends who had invited me to share supper with them. They offered me a large salad containing a wide variety of vegetables. They also had a number of fresh fruits available at the table. It was an excellent meal and all the fresh foods were such a treat here in the middle of the winter.
When I commented that I haven’t eaten this amount of fresh foods since the gardens froze out, the friends looked at me kinda funny and the lady said “well, I can afford it so I don’t want to deny myself these nutritious foods” — origins unknown…………….
Now, I agree with you about the possible health risks and toxic chemicals within these southern grown and imported foods. I also agree with you about supporting local economies. I also question the morality of burning so much energy transporting fresh foods thousands of miles so that we can enjoy them in the middle of our long, cold winters.
What really struck me was the rational that “I can afford it”. It seemed that these people just assumed that simple ‘economics’ justified the action. If you can afford it then it must be right………… Where is the connection between economics and spirituality?
I’m making this out to be really onesided. My friends buy lots of organic foods—also transported thousands of miles and they grow big gardens which would be the very image of ‘local and fresh’.
February 17th, 2007 at 8:14 pm
Oh, I should explain—-I greatly desire and appreciate fresh fruits and vegetables over our longgggggggggg winter months. But by avoiding ’store-bought’, I am much more motivated to work on sustainable and local production systems.
As many of you know, I am a gardener. I live and breathe gardening. So, I’ve been working on season extenders and planting successions with the goal of providing myself with as many types of fresh fruits and vegetables for as many months of the year as possible–with the goal fresh foods 12 months out of a year.
Using a hand built attached greenhouse to my old farmhouse, a 14′x42′ inexpensive ‘hoop’ house, row covers and a good root cellar–which I don’t have yet–I used a cool, dark corner of the basement and an electric using refridgerator— I’ve been able to provide myself with potatoes and fresh tasting carrots throughout the seasons from one harvest to the next.
The best I’ve ever done was producing my own fresh tomatoes from late June till Christmas and cucumbers from late May till Thanksgiving. We’ll plant trays of salad greens in mid-Feb. and be nibbling on our own salads by mid-March. These salad trays will produce well till the outside salad garden starts producing in late May. Of course, a number of types of sprouts also provide fresh salad greens throughout the winter. I plant sweet corn in the dirt inside the hoophouse in early April and eat fresh sweet corn by mid to late July. Succession plantings keep producing new crops of sweet corn until a heavy freeze in late Sept. or sometimes into Oct.
My apple orchard was my ‘pride & joy’ until I sold my homestead recently. Again, my apple varieties were selected to produce apple crops in succession. My first apples ripened in mid-Aug. and my last, in mid-Oct. I’ve stored these late season apples in the fridge into March and they were still good. I have no idea how long they’d store in good conditions. I’ve always finished eating before I could find out.
So, I’ve been able to provide my own apples for up to 8 months a year. Potatoes and carrots throughout the year, tomatoes and cucumbers for 6 months per year, salad greens for 8 months per year. I could probably grow salad greens thru the dark months of the winter but up until now, it didn’t seem worth the effort.
So you can see, the economics of ‘I can afford it’ and the ‘convenience’ importing fresh foods from a long distance significantly erodes the motivation to provide them for yourselves or on a local, sustainable level. But it is indeed possible to produce much of it ourselves for most of each year if we had the motivation to do such things.
But then again, maybe we weren’t created to enjoy every desire 12 months per year. “To everything there is a season and a time to every purpose”.
Ultimately, each person makes their own choices. I just hope that individuals are aware of broad impacts each choice has on the other people around us as well as on this Great Creation called Earth.
February 17th, 2007 at 10:33 pm
Steven
I greatly appreciate your comments and your willingness to supply your own fruits and vegetables. This is an area that I and my family need to work on. Our apple trees probably produce enough apples to last us through to early spring if we made the effort to store them or process them properly. Every year we freeze enough raspberries and strawberries to last through the year. I guess this is a start. We have friends who have a greenhouse and they were able to supply us fresh greens until this last cold spell started. (We trade milk for their vegetables.) It does make sense that we should be more seasonal in our eating. Those plastic tomatoes just don’t cut it in the winter. I would much rather have tomatoes canned at their peak than eat plastic tomatoes that were picked before they are ripe.
I just looked at some oranges that my wife just bought and they come from Morocco. Since I have lived in the Middle East, I am familiar with the general integrity of people in that part of the world and it does not exactly give me warm fuzzies. It especially makes me nervous when it seems that the elites in the US are willing to let us be dependent on imported food. There must be a multitude of farmers in the US that should have our support.
I agree with you that we should be very deliberate in making our food choices. Just to buy something because we can afford it is probably the wrong motivation. As you noted, there are broader impacts that need to be considered. First and foremost, in my mind, is that we need to support local production and local farmers as much as we can. In some cases supporting local farmers may require a little more effort. Typically this effort will involve canning, freezing, or drying local produce in season.
Jim V
February 18th, 2007 at 11:35 pm
Jim,
I really like this post. I think you have captured the local food issue very well. Especially the line, “should “fast†even really be the overriding value?”
I just came from a friends house where he spent the entire day preparing smoked ribs… I’ve never tasted anything so good! Quality in all respects is worth waiting for!!
Thanks again
GFJ