lolly

I am not an animal rights activist.  I love to eat meat and can't imagine a diet without it.  Lately though, I've been reading up on where it comes from and even watched 'Food Inc.' a couple of weeks ago (I would totally recommend it if you haven't seen it!).  Anyway, I just read an article from Mother Earth News that reminded me of some of the reasons I've started reading labels a little closer.  It's just scary to me to think that we don't actually know everything that is in our food, especially meat.  When I buy a package of meat, say ground beef, I expect it to be ground beef and nothing else.  But, I'm learning that there are things in it that aren't specified even on the label.  Recently I've started noticing that the ground beef that I buy at Costco doesn't smell good while I'm browning it...it kind of smelled sour.  I even returned it once because I was convinced it had gone bad (even though I had come straight home and put it in the freezer)!  Anyway, after watching 'Food Inc.' I decided to start buying the organic ground beef at Costco and I've noticed a remarkable difference in the smell while I'm cooking it.  Ok, maybe I'm paranoid, but I'm not the only one who noticed that smell.  We had guests over that time when I cooked some that I ended up returning and I had to change what I served them for dinner becuase we were all grossed out by the sour smell!  Who knows, maybe that was a bad batch, no one was brave enough to taste it, but I'm sticking by my new convictions anyway.  I don't trust the FDA and their labeling omissions.  They don't make it mandatory for meat packers to tell us what is in the meat they sell so I just won't buy it!  I have a right to know what I put into my body thank you very much.  Not to mention what I offer my kids! 

So, I just had to rant about this.  Read for yourself and make your own educated choice.  I know that organic food (meat AND produce) is usually much more expensive, at times twice as much...but then I realize too that we have an abundance of food in our culture and maybe my family doesn't even need to consume quite so much.  I've started cooking with a lot more legumes and rice and making things from scratch too and the kids love that.  Maybe it's time we get back to a more earth reliant diet...someday we might see some change at the top if demand becomes higher.  Read that article and pass it on!