Local Delicious

While chatting about trends in organic food, my friend Sandra boldly declared, “I don’t care if it’s grass fed or spoon fed. I just want to know if it tastes good.”

She has a point. If it doesn’t taste good, the discussion ends there. However, organic meat does taste good, very good. So if that’s all you need to know, consider the issue resolved. If you still aren’t sure why you’d want to pay more to get the good stuff, you may want to know a bit more about what you’re actually eating when you sit down to that nice, juicy steak.

As I’ve become more aware of what’s involved in meat production, I’ve also become much more keen to source organic, grass fed beef for the occasions I choose to eat it.

Organic

On the organic side of the equation it boils down to this: the last thing I want entering my body is genetically modified corn, pesticides (sprayed on the corn), hormones and antibiotics, passed down to me in the form of beef.

• Cows in the industrialized meat industry are fed GMO corn.
• Corn is a grain, which cow stomachs are not designed to digest.
• Mass-produced cattle are also fed animal by-products. Note: cows are herbivores. Feeding them their kin is messed up on many levels. Remember “mad cow” disease…
• Cows are ruminants, they chew their cud. In the industrialized food process, cows are kept closely packed together and cannot lie down to chew their cud.
• Cows are kept in such close quarters and in such great numbers that disease is easily spread, hence the heavy dosing of antibiotics.
• The only priority in commercial farming is profit, so cows need to fatten up quick. That’s where the growth hormones come into play.

Cutting out the carcinogenic chemicals and going organic was a no-brainer, especially when I learned that all the nasty stuff collects in the fat of the animal. Fat is also what gives food its flavour so if you want tasty meat, you are eating fat.

Grass Fed

Then there’s the “grass fed” part of the equation. Why  not choose beef that’s organic and be done with it? Or choose “naturally raised” beef?

Well, if you’ve never seen how mass-produced cattle are raised, just wonder for a moment why it’s called “factory farming.” Really, it’s just like that. No pastoral scene of mother and calf, this.

• Grass fed cows eat grass. Not grain and not other cows. That’s more healthy.
• Grass fed means a cow has had access to grass. In a field. At liberty. With other cows, doing what cows do.
• Cows need to chew their cud to digest their food. It’s what nature intended. In a field, there’s room for a little ruminating.
• Stockyards used to be where cowboys drove their cattle after life on the open range. Now, they may live almost their entire short life there. To me, that is inhumane.
• Cows are animals, not machines. The research is very clear — they have feelings, they need to socialize, they develop bonds. Providing them an opportunity to live without undo stress seems the least we can do.

If you are still one of the few who believe the treatment of animals is no big deal, you can hold to that opinion and still recognize the value of grass fed beef. When I thought that way, I still couldn’t believe there was much nutritional value in a cow eating food it was never meant to eat, in an unnatural environment.

The Final Word

Don’t take my word for it that. You need to know enough to decide what matters to you. Just don’t stay in the dark about where your food really comes from.

The resources are endless, but here are a few to get you started:

Our Daily Bread the Movie
FRESH the Movie
King Corn the Movie
Food, Inc. the Movie
The Food Revolution by John Robbins
The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan
Ecoholic by Adria Vasil

Readers, I welcome your comments on books, movies or other resources you’ve found helpful in understanding all that goes into choosing healthy food. Please leave a comment and share…

Help us build a sustainable, resilient and healthy food system in Metro Vancouver.

There are a great many facets to creating a viable solution for  food security in our region. To that end, Metro Vancouver is developing a Regional Food System Strategy and is welcoming public input on the Draft Food System Strategy. This collaborative effort aims to create a sustainable, resilient and healthy regional food system.

Become informed about the issues, engage in the discussion, and have your opinions heard by attending one of the upcoming public events. This is your chance to share ideas and solutions in various communities throughout the Greater Vancouver Regional District.

Public Consultation Meetings
6:30 pm – 8:30 pm

Wednesday, November 3, 2010
Delta Town & Country Inn
6005 Highway 17 (at Highway 99)
Delta, BC

Thursday, November 4, 2010
Hotel Royale Ramada Inn
19267 Lougheed Highway (at Harris Road)
Pitt Meadows, BC

Tuesday, November 9, 2010
The Pinnacle Hotel at the Pier
138 Victory Ship Way
North Vancouver, BC

Wednesday, November 24, 2010
Douglas Recreation Centre
20550 Douglas Crescent
Langley, BC

Thursday, November 25, 2010
The Hilton Metrotown
6083 McKay Avenue
Burnaby, BC

Thursday, November 25, 2010
WEBINAR
12:00 – 1:00 pm (Registration required, click here)

A copy of the Draft Regional Food System Strategy and other online options for providing feedback are available on the Metro Vancouver, Regional Growth website.

Don’t delay, your comments deadline is November 30, 2010.

Most of us believe that if we’re buying organic eggs, they are automatically going to be better. Better for us because the chickens are given good quality feed and not dosed up on hormones and drugs. And better for the chickens because they are treated more humanely. After all, that’s what “organic” stands for, right?

Sadly, not always. Yet again, making the choice for artisan farming over industrialized farming means making the better quality choice.

The Cornucopia Institute has just released it’s organic egg report and scorecard, Scrambled Eggs: Separating Factory Farm Egg Production From Authentic Organic Agriculture. It’s an eye-opening revelation for those of us who thought we could avoid the downsides of corporate agri-business — a.k.a. industrialized or factory farming — by choosing food based on an organic label alone.

There truly is no substitute for knowing the farmer you buy from.

When I first landed a plot in my community garden I loved the idea that I could meet and learn from others with a common interest and more experience than I. What I’ve come to realize is that we have more than a community within the garden, we are a community outside of the garden too. When I see those folks in other parts of the neighbourhood or about town, my community has extended. And that just makes me happy.

Then I started learning about all kinds of cool organizations that people in my community are involved with. Groups doing cool things to address facets of the interwoven issues around food security and food quality (it’s pretty hard to find a pressing issue that isn’t in some way related). And then I started seeing them collaborate and share ideas, share information. You know, creating all kinds of networks.

If you care about local food and the many issues that are interconnected and entwined within it, there’s bound to be an organization who cares about the same things you do. I encourage you to consider putting a few drops of whatever resources you have into the bucket of making the world a better place, whatever your pet project.

Soil, water, air, animals, poverty…you name it, there’s a food connection.

“All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.” – Edmund Burke

I attended the October 14th Food and Beers series presentation, Can the City Feed Itself, where the assembled crowd heard each of the four panelists describe what ingredients their “recipe” for regional food security would include.  (For comprehensive coverage see Ten Ingredients for a Healthy Food Economy at The Tyee.)

After the presentation I chatted with a couple of local farmers about their thoughts on the local food economy. Loren of AppleBarn Pumpkin Farm and Jerry and Audrey of Gelderman Farms are an integral part of our local food chain and have firsthand knowledge of the challenges and opportunities we have to improve food security in our region. Mostly, though, they just want to focus on farming responsibly and getting a living wage for their efforts.

We covered a lot of ground in our conversation, but one of the things that came up and has stuck with me is the idea  many people hold that “big farm bad, small farm good.” Where it gets messy is when we try to define exactly what qualifies as  big or small, and is that the real issue?

Then the Globe & Mail called and wanted to know what I think about industrialized food. It would be easy to say industrialized (a.k.a. big) bad, local good. Except that’s not exactly true.

Local can be big. Small can be environmentally unfriendly. Plus local and small isn’t necessarily any better if it’s locally engineered rather than real food.

After a bit of consideration I’ve clarified in my own mind that size is not the issue, it’s all about attitude and behavior, which come in any size.

I was first attracted to supporting local food producers many years ago at artisan/craft fairs where people would sell homemade goods like jam, candy and baked goods. These food artisans were just as creative and put just as much passion into each creation as  other artists do into their work, whatever the medium.

It’s that artisan quality that is the opposite of industrialized food, rather than a question of how big a production plant or farm is.

For me “Industrial” includes all the things that we associate with a more mechanized society — machine-made, technology-focused, assembly lines,  massive scale, dehumanized, profit over quality. In farming this includes packing animals into inhumanely small and crowded cages and paddocks, using environmentally unfriendly chemicals as fertilizer and pest control, and monocropping.

“Artisan” on the other hand has a more personal, individual feeling — hand-made, personal craftsmanship, a sense of personal pride in quality, and a human rather than a machine behind the product. On the farm this includes things like hand-weeding, organic pest control, grass-fed livestock and agricultural biodiversity.

Many of our local farmers are true artisans, putting their hearts and souls into producing quality food they can be proud of. The farms may become get big, if that’s what it takes to make a living, but they will always remain artisans to me by their personalized and responsible approach to farming.