Thoughts after watching a food documentary

[bcla]

I grew up in central Illinois: corn & soybeans as far as the eye could see. 99.99% of it belonged to Monsanto or whatever before it was even planted, to be used in Monsanto's myriad uses. But that one thousandth of a percent of it winds up in the beds of pickup trucks about this time every year and gets sold by the side of the road (along with tomatoes, peaches, watermelon, and whatever). If you've never had roadside corn (as I call it), go to central Illinois and get you some. it's crisp, sweet - NOM NOM NOM! Ten thousand times better than that flavorless mush you buy at the grocery store.

I live the San Francisco Bay Area. I know it gets a reputation for being a lot of big cities surrounded by suburbs, but the majority of land in the area is rural. We live near a regional park where ranchers have cattle grazing permits. There's commercial farming in every county except maybe San Francisco. The strange thing about Silicon Valley is that it used to be known more for fruit growing than for electronics, and there are still a few fruit orchards left even among all the tech companies. We of course have Napa Valley.

And one of the things I remember doing was going out to pick cherries. There are a few places with U-pick farms, but the best known is Brentwood. It's mostly cherries, but the sweet corn they grow there is so good.

And the really odd thing about the farmers markets is that they're not necessarily the local farms. Yeah we might get strawberries from the Salinas Valley, but the majority of the ones we see around here are from the Central Valley. I think their costs are lower and they prefer to sell in a more affluent area that maybe their local farmers markets around Fresno or Visalia.

 

[Westcoastwild]

Lots of places have co-ops!

No. I mean, it can be part of the co-op thing. But there's a specific term they used to describe the actual activity. I think it's CSA- community supported agricultural system.

I'm familiar with co-ops, those are really common where I grew up, but I hadn't heard of the subscription thing before. It can be set up a variety of different ways but basically it's a way for the producer and consumer to share the risk jointly.

 

[rastahomie]

I live the San Francisco Bay Area. I know it gets a reputation for being a lot of big cities surrounded by suburbs, but the majority of land in the area is rural. We live near a regional park where ranchers have cattle grazing permits. There's commercial farming in every county except maybe San Francisco. The strange thing about Silicon Valley is that it used to be known more for fruit growing than for electronics, and there are still a few fruit orchards left even among all the tech companies. We of course have Napa Valley.

And one of the things I remember doing was going out to pick cherries. There are a few places with U-pick farms, but the best known is Brentwood. It's mostly cherries, but the sweet corn they grow there is so good.

And the really odd thing about the farmers markets is that they're not necessarily the local farms. Yeah we might get strawberries from the Salinas Valley, but the majority of the ones we see around here are from the Central Valley. I think their costs are lower and they prefer to sell in a more affluent area that maybe their local farmers markets around Fresno or Visalia.

At the Soulard Farmer's Market in St. Louis, most of the food was (probably, as far as I can tell) grown across the river in Illinois, where the ground is much more forgiving. Undoubtedly greenhouses, too, else the place would have to close down in the winter.

"Local" is open to interpretation. I'm sure 99.99% of the Soulard food is trucked in from at least an hour or more away.

 

[Pea-n-Me]

Yeah. My mom has a decent sized farm - several hundred acres, much bigger before my grands passed, and they had dairy cattle. All these people drinking non-treated, non pastuerized milk don't get it. And this was a local, organic, conservation award winning farm. It was still gross as hell. Cows are in general. Don't drink raw milk folks.

Reminds me of god only knows how many more beans I've got to break tomorrow.

You literally could not pay me enough to drink raw milk.

 

[gillep]

A new thing I've seen with goats is "renting" them out to clear brush and grass, and that sort of thing!

Yes, I used to live in TX and there was a large goat and donkey farm near our development, I met the owner once and he supplied goats and donkeys (sold not rented) to all of the cattle farmers and horse ranches, as he said that goats and donkeys tend to prefer to eat things like weeds and brush, and left the grass for the cows and horses which helps the ranchers to keep the weeds and other undesirable plants in check.

 

[cmarsh31]

I think it's called a Co-Op, or something like that.

I am trying to think of the word. I can't. But it's possible that your local farms have some kind of subscription program. Like milk and egg futures. I found out last year that the local farms do that. You "subscribe" and then you pick up your share at a central location, and sometimes they deliver to your house. I had no idea that was even a thing.

Anyway, you may want to ask around. There could be an entire farm goods delivery system right under your nose.

I guess I need to do some internet digging! Thanks for the inspiration!

We've gotten our veggies, meat, etc from a CSA - community supported agriculture. Some years from a single farm, other years using a more co-op model that has produce from multiple farms.

 

[Westcoastwild]

I'm of several minds about the food industry as it exists today. On the one hand, it's (almost certainly) bad for the environment, involves its share of animal cruelty, robs food of much of its nutritional value, and it's decimated the traditional family farm

On the other hand, fewer people are malnourished today than at any time in history, thanks to the economics of scale in mass-produced, factory farming. So there's that.

I would love to eat nothing but organic, farm-to-table food. I would also be paying four, five, six times what I pay right now for food, to say nothing of having to drive a hundred miles to the nearest functional farmer's market, probably twice per week.

If every last American decided tomorrow to eat only organic, farm-to-table food, entire industries would be devastated. Much of the economy in the Midwest would disappear, leaving tens of thousands of people unemployed and thousands of farms to go fallow. The governments of Illinois, Iowa, Indiana would be bankrupt.

It's a pipe dream.

Yep. And the thing is, it isn't possible everywhere even if Americans just decided to do it. I've lived in places like you described. There is really no benefit to driving 100 miles for farmers market, and I could not have afforded to do so at the time anyway.

Also agree about about the starvation thing. Any food is better than no food. I think folks tend to forget that cities used to be working farms. "Eating local" used to be the only way to live. Pigs and chickens lived in NYC. You couldn't transport meat and produce very far before refrigeration.

 

[amberpi]

No. I mean, it can be part of the co-op thing. But there's a specific term they used to describe the actual activity. I think it's CSA- community supported agricultural system.

I'm familiar with co-ops, those are really common where I grew up, but I hadn't heard of the subscription thing before. It can be set up a variety of different ways but basically it's a way for the producer and consumer to share the risk jointly.

We use CSA and co-op interchangeably almost unless you're using the full name. Depends on the economics of how it's set up but both are largely used the same. We don't have the big co-ops like you'd have on brooklyn. Tons of csa/co-op box deliveries. Both very prominent here.

 

[Westcoastwild]

We use CSA and co-op interchangeably almost unless you're using the full name. Depends on the economics of how it's set up but both are largely used the same. We don't have the big co-ops like you'd have on brooklyn. Tons of csa/co-op box deliveries. Both very prominent here.

Ah, I see. Not interchangeable here. Everywhere has a co-op. Not every co-op does CSA.

 

[amberpi]

In the summer, while I can't pick, I'm slave labor for my moms farm. Between having fragile lungs due to my accident and some seriously terrible allergies, no one will put me in the garden. I have broken and canned/frozen 4 bushels of beans, a crap load of corn on the cob, basil, and I'm just waiting to start canning tomatoes. Other than avocados, I'm not sure I've bought a veg in a month, but of things like squash we just grow enough for the summer.

 

[amberpi]

Ah, I see. Not interchangeable here. Everywhere has a co-op. Not every co-op does CSA.

I mean, we've got the BIG co-ops but that's industrial stuff here.

 

[rastahomie]

In the summer, while I can't pick, I'm slave labor for my moms farm. Between having fragile lungs due to my accident and some seriously terrible allergies, no one will put me in the garden. I have broken and canned/frozen 4 bushels of beans, a crap load of corn on the cob, basil, and I'm just waiting to start canning tomatoes. Other than avocados, I'm not sure I've bought a veg in a month, but of things like squash we just grow enough for the summer.

I'm thinking about taking up canning! Mrs. Homie and I are talking about starting a backyard "farm," complete with a compost bin and everything. There will be a yuge learning curve, though. And we'll have to buy the soil and grow out of rain barrels, like her dad does, since the ground in the backyard is poison to all but grass, trees, and weeds. But we'll get there.

 

[Westcoastwild]

I mean, we've got the BIG co-ops but that's industrial stuff here.

I was researching the CSA thing and I think it's pretty likely that it's less co-op based (organized by farmers) and more community based (community members recruit farmers) where I currently live. It apparently can be either. In my hometown, anything along those lines is farmer driven. But where I live now, the community/consumer is a much more powerful force.

 

[bcla]

Yep. And the thing is, it isn't possible everywhere even if Americans just decided to do it. I've lived in places like you described. There is really no benefit to driving 100 miles for farmers market, and I could not have afforded to do so at the time anyway.

Also agree about about the starvation thing. Any food is better than no food. I think folks tend to forget that cities used to be working farms. "Eating local" used to be the only way to live. Pigs and chickens lived in NYC. You couldn't transport meat and produce very far before refrigeration.

I don't know about that. There's the legend about the Hangtown fry, an egg breakfast dish made with oysters and bacon. The story goes that a condemned man in Placerville, California (Old Hangtown) wanted to delay his execution by asking for a last meal of stuff that would take days to reach Placerville from near San Francisco. Either that, or he wanted his last meal to be supremely expensive.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hangtown_fry

 

[amberpi]

You literally could not pay me enough to drink raw milk.

Nope, nope. My hipster friends are idiots about this crap.

 

[Westcoastwild]

I don't know about that. There's the legend about the Hangtown fry, an egg breakfast dish made with oysters and bacon. The story goes that a condemned man in Placerville, California (Old Hangtown) wanted to delay his execution by asking for a last meal of stuff that would take days to reach Placerville from near San Francisco. Either that, or he wanted his last meal to be supremely expensive.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hangtown_fry

Legend is the keyword there lol.

Hangtown fry may be the only way I will not eat oysters. I tried it once. Ew.

 

[Happyinwonerland]

Slightly different, but I was hugely disappointed in Supersize me. If you want to know the impact of that kind of food, you change only the food you eat and check the results. You don't force feed yourself when you're not hungry and deliberately avoid the regular exercise you get. Multiple variables screw up the experiment.

Have you seend Fat Head? The director eats nothing but fast food for a month, and loses 12 lbs.

 

[amberpi]

Yep. And the thing is, it isn't possible everywhere even if Americans just decided to do it. I've lived in places like you described. There is really no benefit to driving 100 miles for farmers market, and I could not have afforded to do so at the time anyway.

Also agree about about the starvation thing. Any food is better than no food. I think folks tend to forget that cities used to be working farms. "Eating local" used to be the only way to live. Pigs and chickens lived in NYC. You couldn't transport meat and produce very far before refrigeration.

Love this juxtaposition. Just about anywhere in tn you can find a farmers market (now is it spendy in the city with organic honey sticks or out in the country with people trading hogs is a different matter). We have the land and canning supplies to survive the apcolyse and we're not preppers. By we, I mean my folks. And even they aren't full time farm folks. Mom pays people to work her land besides her acre garden plot. The woman will can for days and then stop and get her nails done. It's weird. They have salt in huge supply but people forget how much salt is required to preserve food.

 

[Westcoastwild]

Love this juxtaposition. Just about anywhere in tn you can find a farmers market (now is it spendy in the city with organic honey sticks or out in the country with people trading hogs is a different matter). We have the land and canning supplies to survive the apcolyse and we're not preppers. By we, I mean my folks. And even they aren't full time farm folks. Mom pays people to work her land besides her acre garden plot. The woman will can for days and then stop and get her nails done. It's weird. They have salt in huge supply but people forget how much salt is required to preserve food.

Lol. I grew up with family that was like that, mostly the older generation. Totally took it for granted, too. I really didn't know how little most people know about farming or cooking until I moved away to college.

And now the people I know who can and cook from scratch are hipsters who have rediscovered the "art". Cracks me up.

 

[wilkeliza]

Grew up showing cattle (yep that's a thing) and visited many factory farms. A lot of these documentaries find the worse run farm of all of them and says that is how they all are run which is not the case. I buy meat from brands I trust. Sometimes that is through the co-op on freshdirect and other times the local product at our grocery store.