How organic are you?

[Harmony08]

How much organic do you buy/eat etc? I have always been very worried about pesticides and all that but I think it is causing us to eat less fruits and veggies now and I know everyone from Dr. Oz to Nina Planck say that is not good. I try to use the EWG's pesticide list (http://www.foodnews.org/fulllist.php) and all that but I find myself wanting to relax my rules more and more. Some things are just SO much more expensive organic...rice, potatoes, dairy, beef, etc. Sometimes I feel like making DS one thing and us another but that is not very practical. Here are some of my current rules.....

Only organic milk and yogurt...more lax about butter. We seem to use so much. Whole Foods brand is relatively inexpensive and rbst free so I try to go for that.

Only hormone free/antibiotic free beef. I am now buying supermarket chicken and pork. Big step.

Avoid dirty dozen on EWG's list but eat the rest. (I have just decided to do this. Before I would only eat the bottom)

I read other things about how you should always buy organic rice and potatoes because they are so full of pesticides so even though potatoes are in the middle of the EWG' s list...I still buy organic.

What do you think? What do you do? How big of a deal do you think this all is?

[Alyantavid]

Originally Posted by Harmony08

How much organic do you buy/eat etc? I have always been very worried about pesticides and all that but I think it is causing us to eat less fruits and veggies now and I know everyone from Dr. Oz to Nina Planck say that is not good. I try to use the EWG's pesticide list (http://www.foodnews.org/fulllist.php) and all that but I find myself wanting to relax my rules more and more. Some things are just SO much more expensive organic...rice, potatoes, dairy, beef, etc. Sometimes I feel like making DS one thing and us another but that is not very practical. Here are some of my current rules.....

Only organic milk and yogurt...more lax about butter. We seem to use so much. Whole Foods brand is relatively inexpensive and rbst free so I try to go for that.

Only hormone free/antibiotic free beef. I am now buying supermarket chicken and pork. Big step.

Avoid dirty dozen on EWG's list but eat the rest. (I have just decided to do this. Before I would only eat the bottom)

I read other things about how you should always buy organic rice and potatoes because they are so full of pesticides so even though potatoes are in the middle of the EWG' s list...I still buy organic.

What do you think? What do you do? How big of a deal do you think this all is?

We buy about half organic. We buy some things like local, whole, unhomogenized milk that isn't certified organic, but they use the same practices. Most of our produce is this way as well.

We raise our own beef and honestly, I'd pick grass fed over antibiotic free. Same with pork. Potatoes we do eat organic, but we get those free.

I usually tell people to look for local sources of food, not just something at the grocery store labeled "organic" You can find lots of just as healthy food items at other places that could be cheaper.

Farmer's markets, local harvest, eat wild are all great places to get started.

[mamadelbosque]

I buy what I can organic and try not to worrt about the rest - we live in a small town and I just can't justify an hour drive to the grocery store so oour org options are limited.

[sbrinton]

We buy organic when we can afford it, especially on meat, dairy and produce that is more contaminated.

I've found that in some cases it's not a lot more expensive, but it is a lot more work. For example, we do a CSA all summer and fall that is a great value ($40 a week for A LOT of organic food), but it requires a lot of work. Going to the farm, picking, dealing with muddy produce, etc.

We buy about 1/8th of a free-range, grass fed cow each year. We buy mostly organic chicken at costco. We only buy wild salmon. On other things we eat less often (say bacon or shrimp) we don't worry about it.

We don't eat a lot of processed foods, so again when we do I don't really worry about it, because I know that like 90% of the time we're eating homemade stuff that is mostly organic.

[Cristiaz]

My family is 99.99% organic whole foods.

[CageFreeFamily]

The more we research the more organic we have become. We are 99.99% organic now and beginning to switch to growing/raising our own food to combat some of the ethical labeling issues in the organics industry.

Because part of the reason why we buy organic is environmental/ethical, we are starting to research organic fabrics now. I just found out that cotton is one of the most heavily sprayed of all crops!

[Klynne]

Originally Posted by Cristiaz

My family is 99.99% organic whole foods.

Ditto. It's super important to me that we're eating clean, nutritious food. DH isn't as hard core as I am but supports the trend.

I second the farm/local/wild suggestion. It's the perfect place to start. We buy produce from local farms that are not organic but use sustainable practices.

[Elizabeth2008]

I buy about 99% organic. I made a decision a while ago that I wasn't going to agonize over the increased cost. I am very frugal in other areas of my budget (hardly ever eat out, don't buy a lot clothes, don't do many vacations, etc). But food is one area where I put quality ahead of price always. Within reason of course. If a particular product is outrageously expensive then I may choose to buy something different entirely. Buying things local and in-season helps and it helps that I'm in California where there are a lot of farmer's markets. Usually the stuff that is really expensive is out of season or exotic so I just pass on it entirely. It also helps if I keep reminding myself that by buying organic and locally from farmers, etc. i'm not just improving my family's health, i'm also using my consumer power to reward more environemtnally sustainable farming, better treatment for animals and a better planet. Think of it as an annual charitable donation!

[babygrant]

We buy organic meat from the hudderite colony, my DH hunts and fishes, and we very rarely buy meat from the grocery store (only once every couple of months when we feel like a pork chop or something). We just started receiving CSA boxes which are 100% organic. With my CSA box I ordered a block of raw organic cheese, it's expensive but I want to try it. We can't afford organic milk for DH and oldest DS, so they do drink milk from the grocery store. Youngest DS and I drink almond milk.

[Harmony08]

Wow. I am surprised by how many of you are almost 100 % organic. If I had the money to spend on it I would. We spend zero money on clothes/eating out etc. We just don't have the money to eat all organic. We used tobe nonfat vegetarians and ate very cheap, and very little but that was not good for us and especially not for ds. I have also stopped eating so many grains, especially wheat, which makes me rely more on animal products which are expensive. I have a little produce market nearby which is somewhat local but not very organic. It is very affordable. I have been to the farmer's markets, we can't afford them. We used to get a csa box. Not very organic and very expensive. If I had my druthers I would have a garden and my own chickens and a share of a cow and all of that and someday I will. For now, we are doing our best.

[dogmom327]

We're probably around 95% but not it's not all certified organic. Much of what we eat comes from sources where the meat, milk, produce, etc. was grown organically but it's not certified.

Meat comes from local farmers (usually a quarter cow, whole pig or lamb, etc.)

Milk is raw and comes from local farm

Produce is either from our CSA box or from the produce co-op which buys from the organic produce distributor

Almost all of our remaining groceries (we are grain and bean free) come from co-ops such as Azure Standard or any of the number of co-ops a local parenting group runs.

It's expensive but for us it's an investment and one I'm thankful we can make.

[HikeMama]

We focus a lot more on all-natural and the less-processed the better than we do organic. We are vegetarians so that cuts our food cost way down. We buy hormone-free milk but almost all the milk in our area is hormone free. If I had enough money to buy organic I would. As it is, we have cut a lot of things out of our lives to be as debt-free as possible and I am not willing to go into debt to buy all organic. When the price difference isn't substantial, I might trend towards the organic. We buy a lot at the farmer's markets from local farms around here that tend to use less pesticides and save their own seed as they are small scale old school farms. One thing we don't mess around with is tofu- we buy organic tofu, because we are concerned about the GM soy and try our best to avoid GM foods because we don't want to support GMO. I don't feel guilty about our family not eating 100% pure organic food, because it's about priorities, and I think I ought to be a stay at home mom and feed my daughter all-natural than work outside the home and feed her all organic. But that's me, and we're happy with it this way.