Organic for Your Budget

sparrow13

sparrow13

Cathlete
Hey All:

Thought this list might be useful to some. It's from Big Green Purse, and basically breaks down produce into "high levels of pesticide residue, buy organic" and "low levels of pesticide, not as urgent to buy organic" categories. The idea is that if you have a tight food budget but want to buy organic you can stretch your dollars by splitting your produce between the two categories.

ORGANIC PURCHASE PRIORITIES
apples
carrots
celery
cherries
cucumbers
grapes
green beans
hot peppers
lettuce
nectarines
oranges
peaches
pears
plums
potatoes
raspberries
spinach
strawberries
sweet peppers

NOT SO URGENT
asparagus
avocados
bananas
blueberries
broccoli
cabbage
cantaloupe
cauliflower
eggplant
grapefruit
honeydew
kiwi
lemon
mangoes
mushrooms
onions
papayas
pineapples
frozen sweet corn
frozen peas
sweet potatoes
tangerines
tomatoes
watermelon
winter squash

HTH!

Sparrow


"The winds of grace are always blowing but it's you who must raise your sail." - Sri Ramakrishna
 
Thanks for posting the list. That is how I shop. I buy only the priority items organic. Other produce get sprayed with an organic produce wash and rinsed well.
 
we don't have a whole foods or other health grocery store here. So my regular grocery just has a small organic area and I just get whatever I can that is organic. I would probably HAVE to prioritize tough if they had everything cause I'd go broke! I usually really want organic apples & carrots though cause we go thru alot of those.
 
Jess, can you get those locally? A lot of local farmers *are* organic but can't afford the exorbitant fees associated with using the organic label. Just a thought, you could check around with farmer's markets etc.

Sparrow

"The winds of grace are always blowing but it's you who must raise your sail." - Sri Ramakrishna
 
oh I do find apples and carrots. they usually have those. I don't know about any farmers markets. were kinda in the middle of no where. but I should look into it ;) thanks!
 
This list scares me. We go through tons of produce (3 teenage boys) and I can't afford to buy organic. I do try to buy produce in season at the farmer's market when I can, but that's not often. Sometimes I think they are better off eating junk because I worry about the amount of pesticides they could be consuming.

I wash everything well before it's eaten - is that good enough?

Erica
 
>I wash everything well before it's eaten - is that good
>enough?

Unfortunately, no. Peeling helps more, but it also reduces nutritional value and fiber (and there are some items of produce that nobody would peel--grapes? Strawberries?).

Dr. Fuhrman recommends definitely buying spinach, strawberries and celery organically.

Here's a list of the 12 most contaminated items of produce, ranked by pesticide contamination (200 is the highest contamination level):


Strawberries 189
T2 Green and red bell peppers 155
T2 Spinach 155
4 Cherries (USA) 154
5 Peaches 150
6 Cantaloupe (Mexico) 142
7 Celery 129
8 Apples 124
9 Apricots 123
10 Green Beans 122
11 Grapes (Chile) 118
12 Cucumbers

These 12 foods alone make up 50% of ones pesticide exposure.

But animal products contain the most toxic contamination, because animals eat contaminated plants, and the toxins are concentrated in their flesh.
 
<But animal products contain the most toxic contamination, because animals eat contaminated plants, and the toxins are concentrated in their flesh.>

Wow, I did not know this. I wish we could just ban all pesticides and contaminants so we'd know our food supply is safe. Is that so much to ask???

x(
 
Don't forget about rice as a must for buying organic. Rice is one of the biggest culprits when it comes to being infested with pesticides. (surprisingly so!!!)
 
>Don't forget about rice as a must for buying organic. Rice
>is one of the biggest culprits when it comes to being infested
>with pesticides. (surprisingly so!!!)

I had no idea about that! I do buy organic rice in bulk from the co-op though, so it's all good. :)

Just as a point of interest, there was a kaffafle at one of the farmer's markets here last weekend because a local farmer was giving free 2 ounce samples of his wheatberry juice. Two - two! -health inspectors swooped in and made him stop, saying it was potentially unsafe. I could go on a libertarian rant here about my choice to eat/drink what I want where I want but I'll sidestep that and mention how hilarious it is that the gov wants us to believe it is keeping us "safe" from the evil small farmers while pushing all kinds of crap and junk science on the public. Not to mention the seemingly continuous national outbreaks from bad meat, bad spinach, bad tomatoes, bad jalapenos....

Sparrow

"The winds of grace are always blowing but it's you who must raise your sail." - Sri Ramakrishna
 
I wish more of my local markets would wake up to this. It's so easy to buy organic apples, but I haven't seen organic cherries ANYWHERE! x(
 
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