How far would you drive to shop for organic foods?

[hellokitty]

I'm just curious. We are crunchier than your avg family, and try to go organic as much as possible. The problem is that other than a few very small health food stores and the luck of the draw on what the regular grocery store has for organics, we have a particularly difficult time finding organic meat and fresh produce. I would have to drive almost 1.5 hrs each way to go to either a whole foods or some other bigger organic food store. I can try to join a local buyers co-op to get organic dried/frozen goods that meets once a month. However, for meats and fresh produce either you can buy rotten produce (yes, the organic, "section" at our meijer is basically a bunch of rotten produce), or you have a very small selection with no variety at all.

How far would you drive to shop for organic foods?

PS- CSA is not an option here, we participated in one two yrs ago and it was a bad experience, and unfortunately it is the only CSA within a 2 hr radius from us.

[tiapam]

I would try to go once a month for the meat and then freeze it. I like my produce fresh so if I had to choose between fresh and organic, well fresh would win.

We are not terribly organic here, but we do buy organic beef from Costco. I like the way it is packaged. Here it is $12 for three 1 lb. pkgs.

Also, what about mail order?

[wellyes]

I was about to post the same thing - mail order would be a really good option for you, especially for meat. Niman Ranch would be a good starting point,. It's not cheap, but the meat is excellent quality and raised humanely AND no 3 hour round trip required!

I can also recommend the book "The Way We Eat" by Peter Singer, which goes right to the heart of your question, I think: looking at our food choices from an both ethical and environmental perspectives. He actually visits places like Niman Farm and reports on what it's like there, which was my favorite part of the book: actual hands-on experience with mass food producers. Singer is mostly a vegetarian, and is known for being a bit ivory tower (he is a Princeton ethics professor) - but in this book, he's very practical.