Friend or Foe?

It's easy to get really skeptical about the entire food industry while attempting to alter our families diet to resemble the 1950's staples.  For example, I am fairly convinced that the healthiest milk for my family would be organic, grass fed, low-temp pasturized, non-homogenized whole milk.  In other words - milk straight from the cow with the addition of low-temp pasturization.  Well, that milk is not sold anywhere in the county.  It is simply not available.  The best option is organic whole milk ($6.79 a gallon).  There is one store that sells organic milk from grass fed cows but the store is 10-15 miles from my house and they charge $12 a gallon for that milk.  Not practical or affordable.

Other frustrations lie in purchasing meats.  I found a source of local grass fed beef but there is no local option for free range chicken in the county (that I am aware of at least).  I probably should check with an amish farmer but I haven't yet.  There are a lot of amish farms close to our house but it is a little awkward to just stop by uninvited with 3 kids in tow.

So again, not easy to access meat or dairy in it's natural form.  Frustrating.

Of course finding highly processed food is not only easy, it is cheap. Even more frustrating.

Before I shake my fists at the food industry entirely though I must remind myself that commercialization of our food is somewhat necessary.  If you don't believe me let me tell you a story about my Grandma, known as GG in our house!

In 1958 GG was a young mom of 4 kids 6 and under.  Times were tough.  Living in rural Kansas they had been trying to support the family by farming were struggling so my Grandpa went back to work.  To supplement the families income they bought 1,000 chickens.  Yep, 1000!!

So, each day in addition to making butter after milking the cow (Grandpa milked the cow, grandma made the butter) my Grandma was responsible for washing and sorting 700 eggs!!!  Can you imagine?

In addition to making butter and cleaning 700 chicken eggs a day,  Grandma was also tending a VERY large garden, canning food, sewing all of the clothes for the family, cooking everything from scratch, all while tending to 4 kids 6 and under.  Yikes!!

I asked GG if they ever butchered the chickens and if Grandpa was the one to clean them.  She said they did occasionally butcher a chicken but that was "women's work!"  Ha!!

Can you imagine a group of today's 30 year old women butchering chickens and cleaning 700 eggs a day.  Me neither!


So, I don't completely hate the food industry but I do hope we find a way to make "real" wholesome and organic food cheaper and easy to access.