Hmmmmm
Cargill (sp?) has spoken?
Lets see, natural foods or something thats been irradiated, grown in a cage, genetically modified, grown in a vat, or scraped up off the floor and sold as filler.
Seems to me something towards the natural side is a little bit better.
Welcome to Free Republic.
Thank you for not posting a one line excerpt from your blog in order to drive hits to your blog. Thank you for posting the whole article.
Again, Welcome.
However, Whole Foods is a great American success story and I have been shopping there since they only had one store on earth.
I am not so sure I can agree with organic food being just as tasty and healthy as non-organic food. We buy our groceries from Trader Joe’s and anecdotally at least I can tell you that food is much better quality than what we get at other grocery stores. It is also a lot cheaper as well.
1) organic farming may well keep small US farms going, which means if the supply chain from South America goes bad, we might still eat
2) in addition to the hippy stuff, Whole Foods has lots of delicious and interesting ingredients that are hard to find elsewhere. Their produce section is a delight. Four kinds of kale! Baby artichokes!
3) I think moving away from hormone-injected livestock might be a good thing, though I don't understand what is bad about antibiotics
WF does carry and amazingly good selection of cheese and chocolate. I’d like to believe they are good for me but I know better.
I go to WF clones (Trader Joe’s mostly, Sunflower occasionally) because the food tastes good, and is often cheaper. All the “green” advertising around it I ignore, I really don’t care how many acres of rain forest are or are not destroyed for my food so long as it’s tasty.
Yet.
Nice piece. Could use some citation, though. Not because we don't trust you, but just because attribution gives cred.
I love the "Cargill speaks" one. WTF, hipster? WholeFood speaks?
There was a Whole Foods next to where I used to work in Portland and I loved getting lunch there. I got to the point of getting more of my food there, too. Some of the stuff can be quite tasty. It might be more expensive in some cases, but it’s a “whole” lot better (at least to my mouth it was...).
And boy! Did they ever have a cheese section, too. I like different cheeses from all over the world and they would have it, a great selection.
So, I wouldn’t be knocking a success story there...
I stop by there about once a week to purchase products otherwise not safe for me to eat when sold by "other chain stores".
What they do with the "organic" stuff is of no concern to me. I'm happy with a loaf of frozen glutenfree bread, or frozen gluten free buns. A box of highly overpriced crackers to eat along with well aged cheddar is a treat ~ but I get the cheddar at Safeway.
Depends on you what you want in a store I guess.
BTW, Safeway is now selling a frozen gluten free bread, and those Van's frozen gluten free waffles are to die for.
Food procured locally does taste better.
Who can say that a tomato, picked in Mexico days before it would otherwise be ripe, packed in a reefer for days while it ripens, tastes better than a vine-ripened tomato grown in the town in which you live?
“Green Police”
The green police, the rot the inside of my head.
The green police, they come to me and I dread.
The green police, they’re coming to feed me, oh no.
You know that junk is cheap, and those tumors ain’t nice.
And when I fall asleep I dont think Ill survive the night, (but I might).
cause they’re cooking for me.
They’re baking for me.
Every single meal; they’re making my gas foul.
All those greens inside my bowel.
The green police, the rot inside of my head.
(rot inside of my head.)
The green police, they come to me and I dread.
(come to me and I dread.)
The green police, make me ingest the insane.
Well, I cant tell lies, cause they’re cooking for me.
And when I get hungry, bet they’re trying to make me eat right.
cause they’re cooking for me.
They’re baking for me.
Every single meal; they’re making my gas foul.
All those greens inside my bowel.
I try to eat, they cook and bake, they won’t leave me alone.
They don’t take suggestions, or let me gnaw on bones.
They spy on me, I try to hide, they won’t let me alone.
They emaciate me; they’re the judge and jury all in one.
cause they’re cooking for me.
They’re baking for me.
Every single meal; they’re making my gas foul.
All those greens inside my bowel.
The green police, I think they want me dead.
The green police, fed me roughage till my butt bled.
The green police, they’re coming to feed me again.
Oh Nooooooo…
If you want to read an extremely literate and spellbinding book about where our "food" comes from, both organic and not, PLEASE read Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma.
I highly recommend the above book, because Michael Pollan actually GOES to the source of various foods in America.
Which do you personally prefer to eat? A calf who has spent its entire life wallowing in its own feces, being shot up with antibiotics and medicines to counteract the horrendous conditions, separated from its mother and living sunless and miserable and then killed and kept in semi-sanitary conditions, its muscles (which you buy on sale) filled with its own stress hormones and other growth hormones shot into it? Or a steer on a grass-fed farm who was kept with its mother for a long time, then enjoys a fresh pasture for its whole life, only being supplemented with straw in winter, getting to choose whether it grazes on a little clover patch there, a little grasses there, enjoying freedom and sunshine, no medicines or hormone shots, its muscles (which you pay more for by ordering from the farm or buying at Whole Foods) filled with natural Omega 3s which prevent disease in HIM and YOU by his natural grass-fed "sunshine" diet?
Organic is not perfect. Pollan explains the difference between huge agro plants that are organic and those that are not, and there are some similarities that are not so nice. But any way you slice it, ORGANIC is better.
Not necessarily for taste. But for HEALTH.
We humans get a lot of poisons in our processed "food," and it doesn't make you sick right there and then; it becomes you. It becomes a weaker, sicker you, more prone to chronic disease and discomforts, LONG TERM. Wherever you can, avoid these toxins, so that you don't end up with a chronic disorder or cancer.
I’m trying to figure out if this guy hates WF or organic foods or both. This is an opinion piece with no facts. I buy most of my organic stuff at Kroger because it’s cheaper than WF. I always buy organic milk because I don’t want my daughters ingesting hormones (they have enough of those already). I also get some of my stuff at Costco.
Considering that this blog called the President a thief last week, it was surprising that the Whole Foods blog generated the most responses of any entry to date.
Just to be clear, we agree that much of the foods they sell are not actually ‘organic.’ Their fresh produce can be very tasty and they have a nice cheese selection. Also, their pizza is excellent.
The point was that Whole Foods is cashing in on the ‘green’ movement and a quasi-hippie anti corporate ethic, which is a sham. Come on, Whole Foods, all the good things you do can easily be accomplished without the attitude, so get off your high horse and admit you are just a grocery store.
I believe in the free market. I believe WF should sell what they can, I believe Safe Way and other regular food stores should sell what they can. I believe people should shop where they want to shop and to he** with the “green” BS. In other words I believe in freedom to sell and/or shop at your pleasure.
It is much cheaper to ship vegetable seeds than vegetables. The very best organic vegetables are grown at home.