Hello All! 🙂
I’m new here but wanted to chime in as food politics are near and dear to my heart!
I won’t go into nitty gritty details but I would encourage everyone to put your dollars into organics and definitely check out the mentioned ‘dirty dozen’ lists but also watch the GMO lists and realize that the ‘dirty dozen’ changes each year.
I used to not eat organics only because I couldn’t afford them but dearly wanted to. Pesticides were yuck. Easy enough and I wanted the best for my family and myself.
Now, I realize the game has changed significantly over the last 20 years or so with the public unleashing of the GMO food. I also realize that we don’t have much longer to actually hide behind the ‘organic’ label from these genetically modified, damaging, untested foods since the government has allowed partial and full deregulation in the use of these crops both for human and crop use (what food source animals eat so still for human use by default).
In other words, pesticides are now the less of the evils, in a twisted way. I would also encourage folks to do their own research into the matter but do not allow yourselves to be comforted by words from ‘officials’ who have something to gain. Always check the agenda of the person doing the talking. I also realize that speaking to a group of homeschooling ladies, I am speaking to a group of women who put more time into thinking about just about everything they do so hopefully, that last is something that goes without saying.
I no longer eat much of anything that isn’t organic. I watch my children like a hawk and try not to fall apart inside if they eat something that isn’t ‘clean’, knowing that I feed them an exceptional diet the rest of the time. We have a very limited budget but that is what our money goes into.
Ideas for eating more cheaply:
I eat a very strict Paleo diet so for me, no grains, no beans, no dairy although I use some heavy cream, occasional slight hard cheese and high fat, moderate protein, lots of veggies, no refined sugar, nothing artificial, as organic as possible.
-I buy organic, grass fed beef by purchasing an entire cow from a local farm. It costs me about $3.65/lb. You can’t beat that price in any grocery store, even for the cheapest, nastiest meat and yet, this is top quality, grass fed, organic. You don’t have to buy it an entire cow at a time. I just happen to a. have a large family and b. our diet contains a lot more protein than most. I also intend to can some beef for my emergency preps I’m working on.
-I’m working on expanding my mother’s vegetable garden to at least triple it’s size. We go through a lot of veggies and I also intend to can and dehydrate.
-I think one thing that the Paleo style of eating has taught me that was more enlightening than just about anything else: If I only have crap food available to me, I simply don’t eat it. Of course, this doesn’t apply for my kids but it doesn’t hurt the adults in my family at all. Our diet lends itself pretty easily to intermittent fasting due to being extremely low carb.
-Lastly, check out azurestandard.com They are a co-op farm place with a rather unique set up but if they deliver to your area, you will have the option to get some of the BEST prices on organics around! Be sure to check out their bulk prices for things. Getting set up with them can be a slight pain but it’s totally worth it.
I’m always too wordy but I hope this helps 🙂
