Two times this week, I was asked by people that have no clue that I write this blog if I have seen “Food, Inc.” I have, but what was more interesting was their response.
One person said, “I am not eating meat anymore, I am going to be a vegetarian.” The other said, “It will totally change what you eat. I have seen bacon being made and it is not pretty.” Fair enough. Slaughtering animals is not pretty, regardless of how humane it is.
My question: How has this film (or other publications like it) changed the way that you
1. Buy food AND
2. How long has that change lasted?
For me:
I read labels more
I buy more organic items
I am going to plant a garden this spring
I visit farmers markets more
I wonder what is really in my food and where it is from
However, I saw a special that featured Farmer’s Markets and one of the benefits they listed was “cheaper.” Maybe I am going to the wrong farmer’s markets, but I find them to commonly be 2x-5x more expensive. Case in point, I was at IWFM and I saw free range/no hormones, etc. chickens. The thighs were around $5 a lb. There were booths that were cheaper, but work with me here. At Costco, they are 79 cents a lb. So I can get 6.3 lbs instead of 1 lb. That is a big difference…a difference that is difficult to rationalize for a lot of people right now.
Counter point: farmers markets have many handmade and unique items that you can’t find anywhere else. I also found plenty of items that were 1x costs. Lettuce for $3.00, spices, root veggies, etc. And, you really can’t compare homemade sausages vs. Johnsonville, it is not the same product. You get the point. Regardless of the price, I am very supportive of farmer’s markets.
My point: Watch the movie, read the articles…now what? The curtain has been lifted, you know who the Wizard of Oz is. The Alice Walters types say, “Hey, wibia…if you can’t afford farmers market chicken, sell your flat screen tv and buy better chicken.” Fair enough. However, at times, it is a ton of work to make the effort. Menus are difficult to navigate, dining choices are limited, my nearest grocery store that has a respectable organic section is 25 minutes away. Plus, sometimes I need diapers, light bulbs, a birthday card and lettuce and I have a 30 minute window before my kid goes ape sh-t. So I do what I can. Am I better, yes… am I perfect (whatever that is) no.
So I am interested to see the results.
-wibia
Tags: documentary, farmers market, Food, food inc., media, movies, organic
I voted no, but I could have easily voted that I’ve made changes as well. I’ve never seen the documentaries, but I have read all the books that they are based on (Food, Inc., Fast Food Nation, Fat Land, etc.; there are reviews for some of them on this site, just click on the book reviews category on the right) and while I will say that in general my spending habits have not changed, I am at least more aware of what is available in my stores and what goes into the fast food products that I am buying and reviewing for this site. Ultimately, I think knowledge is power and having the knowledge available in mind my to have the freedom and power to decide whether I want to buy organic or stop eating fast food is the most important thing to take all out of all these documentaries. What you do with that knowledge is your own business.
That said, if organic product prices were to start to come down to the prices of those non-organic prices in the store, I would certainly start to buy organic items. I am a cheap ass after all and my wallet decides what I eat and buy more than any sort of pesticide or other chemical does.
You should look into FarmFreshDelivery.com – They home-deliver fresh organic produce, meats, and other products. They source locally when possible and you can customize your order online.
I absolutely love the service.
My husband and I changed our eating habits not because of this movie, which we have seen, but because of the heart attack he had at the age of 33. I should let you know that we probably ate at least one meal a day in cafeterias, restaurants, fast food joints of various types for at least 15 years and although he was about 50 pounds overweight he hardly would have been someone you would have thought of as excessively heavy.
What we used to see as convenience and cost effective spending I now see as amazingly expensive and dangerous. Trust me, plavix is expensive, not fruit. Shopping locally and trying to make the best choices for our family has not really cost more than we ever spent on “convenience” foods, it just takes more planning. The key to the farmers market is buying in season, adjusting recipes and cooking with what is most cheaply available, freezing as much as you can when it is the cheapest and just making more conscious decisions about what you will or will not eat. Read every label and after awhile you just know what to buy and what not to buy. All organic btw isn’t necessarily the same or automatically better for the earth or you. You have to do a lot of research before you know what is and isn’t’ worth it. I recommend the book The Omnivores Dilemma for more info on that.
It takes time but we have now stopped eating processed foods almost entirely and in a remarkably short time my husband is now down to his ideal weight and has dropped his cholesterol to rates most healthy people envy. I hate to go off on a rant but it is crazy how much hidden damage our fast food lifestyle can have on us without us knowing until it is way too late. Now that I have lived through this I like to share our story whenever I can. We eat meat about once a week now and don’t find we miss it much. (Dried beans for protein instead of meat can easily make up for your veggie expenses) but I still like to check in to sites like this to see what is going on in the world we used to visit so often. The funniest thing is when we do go out now it is so nice to have a true treat that I don’t miss our old hedonistic ways at all.
I am a huge fan of farm fresh delivery. I had it before I saw Food, Inc. but since then, I’ve started getting our meats exclusively from the farmers’ market or Farm Fresh. It IS more expensive than Costco – Gunthorp Farms provides vaccum sealed boneless skinless chicken breasts, for example, for about $5/lb. I know it’s cheaper than Costco, but the other benefits (no hormones, free range, humane living conditions, TASTE) make it worth it.
Anything where we eat the skin, I buy organic as it’s virtually impossible to get all the pesticides off of the skin.
I fully admit that I’m lucky to be able to afford to do these things as Wal Mart et al are much cheaper.
Our eating habits have drastically changed in the last year or year and a half.
As a result of having seen Food, Inc., and having read Omnivore’s Dilemma, we have cut out all of our meat product purchases from Costco, despite their low costs. We buy all our steaks/chicken at the farmer’s markets or through Farm Fresh Delivery. We also have stopped purchasing any item with corn-based ingredients, if they are not required (by that I mean high fructose corn syrup as opposed to just sugar).
I think one of the ways in which Michael Pollan succeeds in his works, is that he isn’t preaching vegetarianism, or veganism, as some may think. He preaches sensible knowledge of our food supply, and he doesn’t condemn those who haven’t adjusted their eating habits.
Couldn’t care less. Humans are atop the food chain. Take it up with God.
Oh, and I have altered eating habits recently because I found out I have incredibly high cholesterol (which means I can relate to a few of the comments above), but that in no way, shape or form is related to how the GOOD food is created. Sure, much of it isn’t even remotely pleasant, but is it pleasant when a lion sinks his teeth into the jugular of a zebra?
Organic prices have started to come down on some products, yet meat remains way too high for my tastes. In general, I think the biggest change we have made is to start reading labels more. If you cannot pronounce the word, it is probably not good for you.
The biggest change is making huge decreases in purchases of items with high fructose corn syrup. This stuff is cheap, addictive, and plain nasty. I truly believe it is so addictive, that it is a primary reasons Americans are so fat. Once you start tasting food without it, you will realize how much this stuff masks the great taste of most natural products. For those of you tight on money, here is one to try.
Go to Trader Joe’s and buy their organic Ketchup with no high fructose corn syrup using natural sweeteners. It is just slightly more than Heinz but is so much better that you with never want a bottle of Heinz again.
Funny how the poll # majority changed on this to “drastic changes” so much in a few hours – did some vegan freaks link to it and crash the poll?