Heinz Owns You

I wasn't being paranoid after all! (Not on this topic, anyway.) Turns out most of the organic products we buy at the supermarket are actually made by huge international conglomerates. Read it and weep.

Courtesy of Phil Howard at Michigan State University

This doesn't mean that the products are necessarily any less healthy than we thought, although we don't know anything about how or where these foods are processed. But it does mean that buying Odwalla drinks feeds the same corporate machine that has plagued our schools with Coke machines, and I'm not fond of that idea.

What should we do about this? The first answer that comes to mind is to buy as much local food as possible, and to buy as many whole foods (like produce) as possible, so the big guys get as little of our money as possible. But that doesn't mean we're going to stop buying Muir Glen canned tomatoes or Morningstar hot dogs altogether. We are human (and Americans), after all.

Generation Next

It's so gratifying to see the enthusiasm of our son, almost three years old, in growing, harvesting, and eating his own vegetables. He still talks about the calendula seeds he planted in tiny little pots back in April, marveling at the fact that they're now flowering. Every visitor to our house gets a fresh-picked lettuce leaf thrust into their faces before they even reach the front door. He's so proud.

Today we filled a salad bowl with snap peas in the humid June drizzle. When we went inside for lunch, I cooked a grilled cheese sandwich while he transferred every last pea to his own little plate. Now that is a rousing endorsement.