Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

A couple of months ago I read the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle for book club and it really made me take a closer look at the products I was buying. Since reading the book, I make an effort to buy products produced/grown closer to home and no longer by Dean Foods products, bananas and products with high fructose corn syrup. I've made a few another changes but these are the ones I consistently follow.

I no longer buy Dean Foods, also the owner of Horizon Organics, because of their practices regarding dairy products. If I am going to buy organic dairy products, I try to buy Organic Valley if I'm willing to spend a lot or I'll by the Whole Foods brand which has received decent ratings for their organic practices.

I no longer buy bananas because of how far they travel to get to me. Is it really worth all that fuel? We'll see if I can go the winter without them though. If Brian didn't like grapes so much, I probably wouldn't buy those either since they usually come from Chile.

Do I really need to buy products made with high fructose corn syrup, which is made by changing the sugar (glucose) in cornstarch to fructose — another form of sugar to extend the self life of processed foods? No. I try to stick to products that have the real stuff.

Sometimes I wonder where to draw the line. Buying organic is expensive and I wonder if it's worth it. Yes, our generation ate regular food, but food today is grown and processed much different today than 20 plus years ago.

I'll save a discussion on feed-lots for another post.