Taff
30-Nov-2007, 10:52 AM
I was lucky enough to work on some organic farms for several months. I was not an organic crusader before and I am not after. I do find it concerning though, the treatment of animals in "dairy powerhouses", how the milk is obtained and how the animals are treated. I do try to buy organic dairy produce now, where possible.
I was lucky enough to eat organic kiwifruit every single day. At the time, I thought it was nice, but I could taste no difference over what I used to eat. Then, when I left, I bought some kiwifruit from a store. Horrendous. I know enough about kiwifruit (don't ask) to know when they are ripe....these were ripe but were simply disgusting. I tried another store a few days later and got the same result. Please also note that I was eating them *in season*. This for me was where I first noticed something about the improved taste of organic food.
But the main point of farming was the meat! I ate a lot of meat. A lot. All organic, most off the farm, slaughtered on the farm as opposed to a slaughterhouse (I was present and it was humane but not pleasant, so I dread to think what they do to those animals in commercial places). Of course, plenty of vegetables from the garden also. I also ate a lot of fried eggs per day, average of about 5 per day, fried in coconut oil. And I had a lot of chicken stock. Oh no! The saturated animal fats!
Not to mention the milk. The only milk I drunk was straight-from-cow, in other words neither pasteurised nor homogenised.
After all this, I have to wonder why I am
a) Still alive
b) Not suffering from high blood pressure (I have had it checked)
c) The same weight as before I went there
The farmers were strongly anti-lowfat. I came to realise that I need fat to fill me up and because it tastes good. Yes, I like to actually taste what I put in my mouth. Supermarkets, take note.
So when it came to shopping for solid stuff, I knew what I wanted...
The other day I went to the supermarket to buy some yoghurt. I had a bit of a hard time.
Although I didn't count, it's a fair estimate to say that perhaps 90% of what was on sale was either dead, low fat, sweetened, flavoured or all of the above. And don't get me started no soy yoghurt. Yes, SOY yoghurt.
Just trying to buy plain, simple natural yoghurt was decidedly difficult. And then I found where it was. And then I found it was out of stock.
Here is an example of the alternatives:
http://www.sainsburys.com/media/images/products/OYVO001/0000001129250_OYVO001_2_Spec2_v1_m5657756983351537 6.jpg
YES! Natural yoghurt, my mission is successful. What? It's low fat! Honestly, if yoghurt is low fat, what on earth have they done to it to get it into that state?!
Wait, there's more!
http://www.sainsburys.com/media/images/products/AFAG001/5201054080016_AFAG001_2_Spec2_v1_m5657756983353471 4.jpg
0%, "fat strained". Wuh?!
http://www.sainsburys.com/media/images/products/AYEO003/5036589200413_AYEO003_2_Spec2_v1_m5657756983356739 4.jpg
Check out the description:
This is how yogurt should be - thick, creamy and alive with flavour.
Hello! There is NO fat in it!
And another:
http://www.sainsburys.com/media/images/products/FifthDimension_8/0000001206098_FifthDimension_140x140_v1_m565775698 33572803.jpg
---
Well I think I've got my point across on yoghurt. My eyes were scanning, looking for the word "natural" and "organic" would be pretty nice also. But then it seems every product, bar the one that was not in stock, that matched my requirements was ALSO low/non fat. I was shocked. And came away empty handed.
The thing is, it's not restricted just to yoghurt. Go shopping in Sainsburys (British supermarket). Every product also has a "be good to yourself" equivalent which is low fat. I can live with that, provided there's a normal alternative I don't see the big deal. Despite my strong belief that eating low fat food does not qualify as "being good to yourself" at all.
But then I look out for organic produce. Some of this is reasonaby priced, some is not. Sainsburys have a "So Organic" range (see the top picture) which is scattered amongst the store. The problem that I see though, is that when you look at it, it turns out that not only is it organic, but it's low fat also!
I also went looking for muesli. Well, I had a similar problem! Even if something is not sold specifically as "low fat" it will often have written on the front "Less than 3% fat!" or something along those lines.
Or, on the back of the packaging. I found granola recently that looked "normal" but had a statement on the back about how it had x% less fat than other available granola. What I thought when I saw this was "where can I get some of this other stuff!".
Well, anyway, it all comes down to my main issue and that is
Why is it assumed that if we want to eat healthily we also want to eat low/non fat foods?
Is it part of the nanny state? That we cannot balance it out ourselves, that we need everything to be specifically low fat so that we don't have to go through the effort of working out whether we've had too much?
Is there really that great a demand for low fat food?
What happened to consumer choice? Why does it appear that low fat foods encroaching on normal foods?
And, why do they assume that if we're looking for organic produce, we also want it to be low/non-fat?
I was lucky enough to eat organic kiwifruit every single day. At the time, I thought it was nice, but I could taste no difference over what I used to eat. Then, when I left, I bought some kiwifruit from a store. Horrendous. I know enough about kiwifruit (don't ask) to know when they are ripe....these were ripe but were simply disgusting. I tried another store a few days later and got the same result. Please also note that I was eating them *in season*. This for me was where I first noticed something about the improved taste of organic food.
But the main point of farming was the meat! I ate a lot of meat. A lot. All organic, most off the farm, slaughtered on the farm as opposed to a slaughterhouse (I was present and it was humane but not pleasant, so I dread to think what they do to those animals in commercial places). Of course, plenty of vegetables from the garden also. I also ate a lot of fried eggs per day, average of about 5 per day, fried in coconut oil. And I had a lot of chicken stock. Oh no! The saturated animal fats!
Not to mention the milk. The only milk I drunk was straight-from-cow, in other words neither pasteurised nor homogenised.
After all this, I have to wonder why I am
a) Still alive
b) Not suffering from high blood pressure (I have had it checked)
c) The same weight as before I went there
The farmers were strongly anti-lowfat. I came to realise that I need fat to fill me up and because it tastes good. Yes, I like to actually taste what I put in my mouth. Supermarkets, take note.
So when it came to shopping for solid stuff, I knew what I wanted...
The other day I went to the supermarket to buy some yoghurt. I had a bit of a hard time.
Although I didn't count, it's a fair estimate to say that perhaps 90% of what was on sale was either dead, low fat, sweetened, flavoured or all of the above. And don't get me started no soy yoghurt. Yes, SOY yoghurt.
Just trying to buy plain, simple natural yoghurt was decidedly difficult. And then I found where it was. And then I found it was out of stock.
Here is an example of the alternatives:
http://www.sainsburys.com/media/images/products/OYVO001/0000001129250_OYVO001_2_Spec2_v1_m5657756983351537 6.jpg
YES! Natural yoghurt, my mission is successful. What? It's low fat! Honestly, if yoghurt is low fat, what on earth have they done to it to get it into that state?!
Wait, there's more!
http://www.sainsburys.com/media/images/products/AFAG001/5201054080016_AFAG001_2_Spec2_v1_m5657756983353471 4.jpg
0%, "fat strained". Wuh?!
http://www.sainsburys.com/media/images/products/AYEO003/5036589200413_AYEO003_2_Spec2_v1_m5657756983356739 4.jpg
Check out the description:
This is how yogurt should be - thick, creamy and alive with flavour.
Hello! There is NO fat in it!
And another:
http://www.sainsburys.com/media/images/products/FifthDimension_8/0000001206098_FifthDimension_140x140_v1_m565775698 33572803.jpg
---
Well I think I've got my point across on yoghurt. My eyes were scanning, looking for the word "natural" and "organic" would be pretty nice also. But then it seems every product, bar the one that was not in stock, that matched my requirements was ALSO low/non fat. I was shocked. And came away empty handed.
The thing is, it's not restricted just to yoghurt. Go shopping in Sainsburys (British supermarket). Every product also has a "be good to yourself" equivalent which is low fat. I can live with that, provided there's a normal alternative I don't see the big deal. Despite my strong belief that eating low fat food does not qualify as "being good to yourself" at all.
But then I look out for organic produce. Some of this is reasonaby priced, some is not. Sainsburys have a "So Organic" range (see the top picture) which is scattered amongst the store. The problem that I see though, is that when you look at it, it turns out that not only is it organic, but it's low fat also!
I also went looking for muesli. Well, I had a similar problem! Even if something is not sold specifically as "low fat" it will often have written on the front "Less than 3% fat!" or something along those lines.
Or, on the back of the packaging. I found granola recently that looked "normal" but had a statement on the back about how it had x% less fat than other available granola. What I thought when I saw this was "where can I get some of this other stuff!".
Well, anyway, it all comes down to my main issue and that is
Why is it assumed that if we want to eat healthily we also want to eat low/non fat foods?
Is it part of the nanny state? That we cannot balance it out ourselves, that we need everything to be specifically low fat so that we don't have to go through the effort of working out whether we've had too much?
Is there really that great a demand for low fat food?
What happened to consumer choice? Why does it appear that low fat foods encroaching on normal foods?
And, why do they assume that if we're looking for organic produce, we also want it to be low/non-fat?