I'm a Foodie

If you ever find yourself in front of me in the grocery store checkout line, I'll admit it, I'll be judging you. There is so much you can learn about a person by the groceries that they buy. Maybe that's why I always thought it be fun to be a grocery checker.....I'd spend all day dreaming up the recipes that the customers were buying ingredients to prepare. Anyway, sometimes I get excited by what I see laid out before me on the grocery belt; other times, I'm disgusted. Like for instance, the other day I was behind a lady who was buying 5 bags of white hot dog buns, a 12 pack of orange soda, some sort of fake juice, a box of Nutragrain bars and a whole bunch of other non-nutritious food items. There were definitely NO veggies and NO fruit..... This leads me to my next thought...

I'm very frustrated with the state of the American food supply today. You can find any sort of health claim that you want on the food labels (a lot of them with definite fine print that most consumers don't know about!!) It's no wonder the general population is so confused when it comes to nutrition! We see the word "grain" in "Nutragrain" and assume that = health. Plus various companies are added all sorts of supplements/fortifications to unhealthy foods to make them seem "good for you." You can now get vitamins in your pop and fiber in your ice cream! What's up with that!? Granted, certain types of fiber are very good and necessary for you as they may play a role in preventing many different diseases. But not all fiber types are equal and I'm afraid to admit that a lot of us are being dooped.

So to go along with this topic, I've recently become very excited about the idea of participating in a produce delivery service (CSA--community supported agriculture). There are a number of different farms in the area that have CSA programs where you pay a certain amount to have a whole box full of fresh local produce delivered weekly to your door. It's all seasonal so you never know quite what is coming but a lot of them provide recipes for the varieties of produce include. Some of the farms I'm interested in include http://www.fullcirclefarm.com/ourcsa.html or http://www.newrootsorganics.com/about.html. For my birthday this year (18 days people!), I'd be super excited about receiving this service for a week, a month (or even better for the remainder of summer!) Ahh yes, a box full of vitamins and fiber-- the way we were to get it.