¡Join the fight!
Here's my new dilemma....
How do I sit down at the table with my mom and eat the food that I know I don't feel comfortable eating anymore? Here are my questions:
- Would it be best for me to arrive at my parents, with my own food in hand?
- Do I make dinner for everyone instead, every meal, every day?
- What do I do when my dad wants to take us out to dinner? I don't trust restaurants (until I can find out which ones feel the same way about food as I do).
- What about thanksgiving when relatives bring dishes over like a potluck? I don't want to act strange and refuse their food, but I do want to refuse their food.
- Do I make the change gradually and just not worry if I have to eat their food occassionally?
- Do I try to educate my family and be okay if they choose not to make the same choices as I am?
Since I have started thinking about what I eat, I am faced with a few dilemmas these days. I am currently visiting my parents, who live 4 hours away from me in West Palm Beach,FL. They consider themselves healthy eaters, but there is nothing humane or chemical free on their shopping list. The house is stocked with food, vegetables, fruit, canned meat, frozen meals, etc. (all bought from big agribusinesses).
How do I sit down at the table with my mom and eat the food that I know I don't feel comfortable eating anymore? I don't want to come across as a food fanatic, but I just can't eat meat from a CAFO farm or eggs from chickens who have been raised inhumanely or eat vegetables & fruit that aren't organic, after I've seen how many pesticides they are sprayed with (from an airplane, for God's sake). There is recent news that in Loxahatchee, (45 min. away) a bunch of people are getting cancer and it might be a cancer cluster.
I explained to my parents that I've been researching the food we eat and had a very eye opening experience in the past few weeks. I told my mom that I make sure to buy free range eggs and am joining a food co-op, so that I can buy local, organic fruits & vegetables. She lived in Gainesville in the 70's and had plenty of friends who lived an organic lifestyle then. She understands what I'm doing. She breast fed, when most elite people were feeding their kids formula.(She told me her mother looked down on her for breastfeeding). She knows, but convenience has gotten the best of her. She may just be blind, like I was to the chemicals, the processing, the treatment; blind to where the hell does this food even come from, anyway?
I would love some suggestions from people who have been doing this for a while.
Thanks.
Luchadora_Felina
Comments
The Luchadora's Dilemma
I've never been a strict purist when it comes to my food choices. Maybe it's because I started down the local/organic path in the early nineties when such choices were few and far between in restaurants and groceries, but I've never tried to do this 100%.
When I'm home? When I'm buying for my kids? When it's available to me while traveling? Yes, I'm very dilligent about getting what I want, especially my certified organic produce. Love it.
As for visiting family, I really prefer not to rub their noses in my politics. In the past, most of my family members haven't lived near stores that offered local, organic, sustainable foods, so me soapboxing would do no good anyway. My approach has always been to keep things positive, and to speak about my food choices only when asked and to eat what I'm offered politely.I think it's important to respect other people's food choices, and their work in the kitchen, of course.
The things that are hard for me to eat, though, are conventional pork and chicken. I've visited CAFOs and "processing facilities," so it's reeeeally hard for me to eat those items if they're conventional (or if they're not heavily spiced, flavored). I mean, I can smell that damn poultry operation when I walk past a rotisserie chicken in a Big Box grocery sumermarket. Makes my stomach roll.
Also, having seen with my own eyes how absolutely important Fair Trade is to coffee communities in Nicaragua, I find it very hard to drink non-Fair Trade coffee. I'm almost 100% pure on that one.
Cook for them...
My husband and I offer to cook for almost anyone who asks us to, or who has seen our twitter/facebook status' and thinks our food looks good. We always check for any foods that other people avoid and then plan a meal with ingredients from the farmer's market and Earth Fare. When we eat together with anyone whether they are family or friends, we do share with them where the food that we brought came from (even if it is a pot luck and we didn't prepare all of the food). We will also ask about where their food is from, politely, and if if is something we would no longer purchase ourselves, we eat just a very small portion and fill up on veggies and other more acceptable food choices. As I've said before we're not as strict on the "organic" thing, so I am much more likely to fill my plate with any veggie options rather than a meat product that was most likely not humanely raised. I am becoming much more of a purist as far as my meat, and have even told some friends that I am eating a "mostly vegetarian" diet, which at least assure that there is some dish with veggies available to eat.
Also as far as restaurants, unless it is one that I have researched and which agrees closely with my food philosophy, then I stick to the vegetarian options (which nearly every restaurant has nowadays) because at least they didn't have to feed inedible corn to the veggies to make them grow. Also I have found that in my area since there are a lot of farms/farmer's markets, many restaurants will get at least the seasonal produce from local venues. So then, knowing what is in season at the time, there is a good chance that I can find something that is at least semi-local on a restaurant menu.
My husband and I are still pondering how to approach the BIG holiday meals such as Thanksgiving and Christmas, but I am pretty sure we will at least offer to help with the shopping and cooking so as to have some say in what goes into those meals as well :)
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