Real Food Part 6

These undesirable effects were little known in the 1970s, when the Norwegians pioneered salmon farming. Quickly taken up by Scotland, Chile, and Canada (all countries blessed with long, indented coastlines), fish farming was an immediate hit. "By the late 1980s, salmon had gone from being a luxury fish to an absolute steal," writes Gina Mallet in Last Chance to Eat. No doubt that seemed like progress, but the effects on salmon, the sea ecology, and nutrition were less savory.

WILD FISH BETTER THAN FEEDLOT FISH.

Source: Artemis P. Simopoulos, "Omega-3 Fatty Acids in Health and Disease and in Growth and Development." American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Vol 54 (1991): pp. 438-63.

The insults start at birth. To stock fish feedlots, female and male salmon are anesthetized before farmers squeeze out their eggs and sperm. Like the animals on factory farms, farmed salmon is fattier than wild fish- by design. The feedlot diet of fish meal and growth-promoting antibiotics is deliberately fattening. Wild fish also get a lot more exercise, which produces firm, well-toned flesh, not the flabby, greasier version found in feedlot fish.

Wild salmon is measurably cleaner than feedlot fish. In 2004, Science published research showing that farmed salmon contains "significantly" more toxins, including PCBs and dioxin, than wild fish. Similar problems occur in other farmed seafoods. Imported farmed shrimp may contain the drug chloramphenicol. This potent antibiotic drug is used in therapeutic doses for treating serious infections in humans. The United States does not permit chloramphenicol to be used on animals or in animal feed.

Thanks to its natural diet of shrimp, wild salmon is a rich pink color. The species called sockeye is the richest in the carotenoid astaxanthin, a powerful antioxidant. Feedlot salmon, however, is naturally gray. To give farmed salmon the hue we crave, fish farmers rely on a dye called canntaxanthin. "The color is chosen from Salmofan," says Mallet, "a color swatch from the chemical giant Hoffman-La Roche."

It was first thought that aquaculture would protect wild fish, but it turned out to be the other way around. Today more than half the world's salmon is farmed, and the majestic species known as Atlantic salmon is hanging by a thread. In the icy waters of Alaska, on the other hand, where salmon farming is banned, the result is a world-famous, thriving wild salmon fishery. Crowded industrial fish are more susceptible to parasitic sea lice, which (despite routine pesticides) easily spread to wild fish. Each year, millions of salmon escape from feedlots and breed with wild fish, reducing genetic diversity.

Fish farming also causes collateral ecological damage. Feedlots produce chemical runoff from antibiotics, pesticides, and detergents, and tons of fish feces, too much to be cleared by ocean currents. In Asia, Latin America, and Africa, shrimp farming is destroying the complex and vital ecosystem found in mangrove swamps.

The industry defends fish farming as a source of cheap, high-quality protein. However, like other industrial crops, fish feedlots represent a net loss of energy. About three pounds of wild fish are consumed to produce one pound of farmed salmon or shrimp. In Against the Grain, Richard Manning describes the unfortunate logic of the industrial fish food chain.

The protein that supports this practice comes from what we call "trash" fish, such as sardines and herring . . . Many of these species, however, are not trash at all, but a key link in the ocean's food chain and an important part of local fisheries and diets in the developing world. Left to their own devices, wild fish ( especially salmon) eat the fish that factory trawlers are now scooping up and grinding into fish meal to feed to farmed fish. Absent the trawlers, local fishers in skiffs . . . would catch a few anchovies to feed local protein-starved communities. Instead, this protein is sucked up, reduced by a factor of three, and s.h.i.+pped to Red Lobsters across suburban America.

The fish we should farm are herbivores (carp, catfish, tilapia) and mollusks (oysters, mussels). But there is money in the carnivores (cod, salmon, shrimp, tuna). Happily, there are a few environmentally sound alternatives to industrial fish farms. Scotland and Ireland raise organic salmon without antibiotics and pesticides; they use lower stocking densities, organic feed, and a natural pink dye, typically made from ground-up shrimp. Scotland also offers sustainable farmed cod, and shrimp from Ecuador are certified organic by Naturland.

ECO-FRIENDLY FISH AND SEAFOOD.

Conservation organizations, including the Blue Ocean Inst.i.tute and the Audubon Society, rate fish and seafood by its abundance and the ecological impact of fis.h.i.+ng methods. Find current editions of this guide from the Monterey Bay Aquarium at www.seafoodwatch.org.

Most American wild salmon comes from the Pacific. The premier species is sockeye, whose rich ruby color signals high levels of the natural antioxidant astaxanthin, but some people prefer the milder and richer king salmon. From the Lower Fraser River in Was.h.i.+ngton State comes the marble chinook, the only really regionally distinct species, which is caught by hook and line or trolling, often by Makah and Nootka tribes. The best-quality fish is frozen on the boat, ideally before rigor mortis- when enzymes begin to break down the flesh- sets in. Fish "frozen at sea" is regarded by people in the know as superior to never-frozen fish- unless, of course, you live near water and your fish goes straight from the sea to the skillet.

Here in New York City, I often buy local seafood, but I also cook wild Alaskan salmon from small independent boats, a choice I regard as socially and environmentally sound. It is certainly preferable to any farmed salmon. My red sockeye come from the Tommyknocker, the boat of Rosemary McGuire, who fishes Alaska's famous Copper River Flats. Filets and steaks arrive frozen in vacuum packs and taste of the sea. The hot smoked salmon in jars is exquisite. I also love wild Alaskan sablefish. Sometimes called black cod or b.u.t.terfish, you often see it smoked, in Jewish delis. Ivory and flaky, sablefish has a b.u.t.tery texture, delightful flavor, and 50 percent more omega-3 fats than salmon. Filets frozen at sea are superb, but for every day, I eat a lot of canned wild salmon, which is not expensive.

It's sensible to eat fatty fish two or three times a week- and when you do, be generous with the b.u.t.ter and cream. Saturated fats extend the body's supply of omega-3 fats; hence cla.s.sics like Dover sole with b.u.t.ter sauce, lobster claws dipped in melted b.u.t.ter, and creamy clam chowder. Cold-water, oily fish (mackerel, herring, bluefish, salmon, tuna) have the most omega-3 fats. A 3.5-ounce (100 gram) portion of sockeye salmon contains more than 1,200 milligrams of DHA and EPA. Sardines- a catch-all term for any young fish, often herring- contain 500 percent more omega-3 fats than tuna.

A word of caution about wild fish, however. Mercury is an environmental pollutant known to cause brain damage. Like other metals, mercury acc.u.mulates in tissue as it moves up the food chain, which means larger, carnivorous fish contain more mercury than smaller ones. Thus the FDA advises children and pregnant women not to eat swordfish, shark, king mackerel, or tilefish. But it's unwise to avoid fish altogether.

Why? The benefits of fish to mother and baby are "enormous," says Dr. Michel Odent, an expert in prenatal nutrition.17 Odent is concerned that more women fear excess mercury than understand how important fish oil is. In 2005, a study by the Harvard School of Public Health confirmed this view, arguing that the mercury warnings could cause pregnant women to eat too little fish, not only for the baby's brain but also for their own health. "I think we've got two messages," said Joshua T. Cohen, who led the research. "If you're not pregnant and you're not going to become pregnant, eat fish. If you are pregnant or you are going to become pregnant, you should still eat fish, but you should eat fish low in mercury.'18 Like the FDA, Odent advises pregnant women to avoid the big carnivorous fish, and encourages women to eat plenty of the small, fatty ones, like the anchovy, pilchard, herring, and common mackerel. Mostly herbivorous, farmed fish such as catfish, carp, trout, and tilapia are also good choices if mercury is a concern. The jury is out on tuna, a carnivore; the cautious pregnant woman might prefer to avoid it. If you don't care for fish, do take a high-quality fish oil, in capsules or liquid.

WHERE FISH KEEP OMEGA-3 FATS.

Oily fish (salmon, tuna, mackerel) store omega-3 fats in muscle. The soft brown flesh beneath salmon skin is a particularly rich source. Flaky white fish store omega-3 fats in the liver. I can buy monkfish liver, a j.a.panese delicacy, at my local farmers' market. Saute it in b.u.t.ter and put a slice on toast. The French call it le foie gras de la mer. The best supplement is the traditional favorite of old-school nannies: cod-liver oil, rich in omega-3 fats and vitamins A and D. Some brands have a mild citrus flavor. Another good choice is wild sockeye oil. All fish oil should be wild and unrefined. Quality fish oil supplements don't contain mercury or PCBs.19 Should you eat fish raw? Yes- traditional diets include a lot of raw fish. The Inuit eat mostly raw seafood and blubber, the j.a.panese love sas.h.i.+mi, the Spanish make seviche, and Scandinavians have gravlax (salmon cured with sugar, salt, and dill). These recipes make nutritional sense because polyunsaturated omega-3 fats are very sensitive to heat. According to Stoll, when you cook a piece of fish, the omega-3 fats are partially protected by lower temperatures in the middle. Nevertheless, the less heat the better. Serve salmon and tuna medium or rare, if that's to your taste, or try seviche, sas.h.i.+mi, and cold-smoked lox. I adore these dishes, but if you don't, eat fish the way you like it. My guess is that for most people, any fish is better than none.

5.

Real Fruit and Vegetables.

Why I Never Rebelled Against Vegetables.

FARMING is RELENTLESS; my father calls it a "vegetable-driven existence." Our season started in March, with tomato seedlings in the greenhouse. In April, we picked the always-thrilling first crop (I still love spinach for that reason), and soon after came the more glamorous strawberries and rhubarb. When the June heat hit, zucchini production exploded, cuc.u.mbers were next, and blueberries came in on the Fourth of July. In the height of summer, we picked and sold hundreds of bushels of tomatoes.

After Labor Day, we had to pick sweet corn before school, and when we came up the hill from the bus stop in the afternoon, a note on the kitchen table told us where to pick beans. By late September, we were all half praying for an early, hard frost to end our vegetable-driven days, but the cool-weather crops were still to come. In October, we lugged baskets of b.u.t.ternut squash, and our hands got numb from was.h.i.+ng turnips and collard greens in big tin buckets. For vegetable farmers, winter is a great relief, like silence after listening to jack hammers. I don't know how dairy farmers keep going twelve months a year.

You might expect a childhood like that to put me off vegetables forever. But I love everything about them: how pretty they look on the plant, picking them when they're just right, even was.h.i.+ng, chopping, and cooking them. Most of all, I love to eat vegetables; I know there are a few I don't like, but without effort I can't remember what they are. Salsify, maybe- but then I never seem to cook it properly. And white asparagus.

At the farm in high summer, abundance is the norm. The fields, the cool bas.e.m.e.nt, and the kitchen are filled with the finest varieties of the freshest vegetables you'll ever taste, and maybe that's why I eat more vegetables than anyone I know. For a salad to serve two, I use a large head of lettuce. Whatever we're having for dinner- pork loin, sauteed chicken livers, fish- I usually make at least two vegetables, often three or four. On my own, I often make an entire meal of vegetables, usually with some richer topping, like b.u.t.ter, walnuts, or blue cheese.

There's no nutritional advice more dog-eared than "Eat your vegetables," but that won't stop me from repeating it here. A heap of solid evidence shows that a diet rich in fruits and vegetables helps prevent macular degeneration, age-related decline, heart disease, and cancer. Fruits and vegetables are packed with good things, including fiber, pota.s.sium, and vitamin C, but the exciting research is on huge cla.s.ses of antioxidants like carotenoids and flavonoids. Scientists have identified four thousand different flavonoids alone; the task of learning what each one does, and how, is gargantuan.

The research tidbits emerging about phytochemicals (plant chemicals) are fun for the produce-obsessed. For example, anthocyanins, the flavonoids in blackberries and blueberries, are the most powerful antioxidants of 150 flavonoids.1 Tart cherries are another nutritional gold mine, with seventeen different antioxidants, including two powerful anthocyanins not found in blueberries or cranberries. In Michigan, they swear by Montmorency cherry juice to beat pain and inflammation from arthritis and gout. It's also delicious.

A RAINBOW OF GOOD THINGS.

Carotenoids- fat-soluble compounds that protect plants from the sun and our cell walls from attack by free radicals- are the most famous antioxidants in plants, but there are thousands of others. Here, some potent antioxidants are grouped by color, the catchy organizing principle of books like Eat Your Colors and What Color Is Your Diet? By the way, I don't use the microwave, which destroys antioxidants, enzymes, and vitamins dramatically more than conventional heat.

Yellow and green.

Spinach, peas, and avocados.

Lutein and zeaxanthin help prevent cataracts and macular degeneration Orange Carrots, mangos and sweet potatoes Alpha-, beta-, gamma-, and zeta-carotene fight cancer, and beta-carotene prevents LDL oxidation Red and pink Tomatoes, pink grapefruit, and watermelon Lycopene lowers LDL and helps prevent lung disease and prostate cancer Red and purple Blueberries, grapes, red cabbage, and red peppers Anthocyanins delay cellular aging and reduce blood clots Have you noticed that most natural poisons, from hemlock to deadly nightshade to toadstools, are found in plants, not in meat, fish, and eggs? Plants are rooted to the ground and can't run from predators, so they need other defenses. Plants respond to an invasion (or prevent one) by making bitter compounds called phenolics. Insects like aphids dislike the taste of phenolics, so they abandon the plant for other food. Scientists have identified some ten thousand compounds designed to foil the hungry animals who would devour plants, including alkaloids (potatoes), tannins (tea), and oxalates (rhubarb).

"Plants produce these weapons only if they need them," writes the naturalist Susan Allport in The Primal Feast. Watercress, for example, is peppery yet sweet when young but turns bitter when it flowers, just when it needs to keep insects at bay to make seeds for the next year. The same is true of lettuce. Once hot weather hits, lettuce bolts; instead of sending tender leaves out, it shoots a firm stem straight up to prepare a seed head. As any gardener knows, once the lettuce has bolted- I love the term, which suggests fleeing the scene on short notice- it turns bitter.

Some of the bitter compounds in plants, such as strychnine (part of the alkaloid family) are toxic to humans. In large quant.i.ties, the green blush on potatoes left out in the light is poisonous, as are rhubarb leaves. But many phytochemicals are powerful antioxidants and very healthy. Bitter herbs, often represented by horseradish, have a prominent place on the Pa.s.sover plate. I like to ponder the material reasons for enduring culinary traditions, and this one certainly makes nutritional sense. All leafy greens are good for you, bitter ones especially so.

GOOD FAMILY NAMES.

When you know the value of whole plant families, it's easier to shop for the foods you prefer. If you don't fancy a stir-fry of beef and broccoli, get your phytochemicals from leek soup, roasted turnips, or watercress salad with blue cheese.

The Alliums Actually members of the lily family, onions, garlic, leeks, and scallions contain allicin, an antibiotic that fights tumors, reduces cholesterol, prevents blood clots, and reduces blood pressure.

The Aster Family The asters include lettuce, endive, radicchio, chicory, and dandelions. This would be easier to remember if you ever saw a lettuce flower; it looks like a little dandelion or wild aster. They're digestive tonics and rich in beta-carotene.

THE CHICORIES.

* Belgian endive (missile-shaped with cream-colored, yellow-tipped leaves) * Radicchio (typically round, with rich pink, densely packed, curvy leaves) * Puntarelle (wild chicory spears, dressed with oil, lemon juice, garlic, and anchovies in Italy) * Dandelion (quite bitter and worth adding to salads) THE ENDIVES.

* Curly endive (frilly, green and yellow head; also called frisee) * Escarole (a broad-leafed endive that looks like romaine) The Family Bra.s.sica Also called the mustards, Bra.s.sicas include broccoli, brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, collards, horseradish, kale, kohlrabi, mustard, turnips, and watercress. They contain beta-carotene and sinigrin, which fights colon cancer.

WATERCRESS AND NASTURTIUMS.

* Watercress (another Bra.s.sica) and the flowering garden nasturtium (family tropaeolacrae) deserve a special mention because they're too little appreciated. Watercress and nasturtium (leaves and flowers) are peppery and lovely in salads. Rich in beta-carotene and vitamin C, watercress is a mild stimulant, diuretic, and digestive tonic.

Curiously, we are the rare animal that actually likes the bitter taste of radicchio or black tea. I fear, however, that Americans raised on sugary soft drinks are losing the taste for things savory, sour, and bitter. It's pitiful that commercial salad dressings contain sugar, and even sweet corn hybrids are much sweeter than when I was little. We're not alone. In Britain, plant scientists are breeding sweeter hybrids of the brussels sprout, famous for its dour presence at Christmas lunch, but the more palatable sprouts may lack the healthy, bitter compounds.

In the kitchen, the cla.s.sic complements to "bitter herbs" such as turnip greens, frisee, and Belgian endive are rich ingredients with equally strong flavors: salty fatback and pancetta, pungent Roquefort. These toppings make nutritional sense, because the body needs fat to convert the antioxidant beta-carotene into usable vitamin A. When you make a mess of greens (as they say in the South), don't stint on the fatback; they belong together.

Thinking about our funny, plant-driven childhood, I asked my brother, Charles, what he remembered about meals on the farm, and right away he mentioned one of my most vivid a.s.sociations: red raspberries and Sunday mornings. At six AM we picked raspberries for the Takoma Park farmers' market, which starts relatively late, at ten AM. (For selling delicate produce, nothing beats a sign saying PICKED TODAY.) After the market truck left, we picked another pint or two for raspberry-studded pancakes. The syrup was simply berries boiled with sugar until they fell apart.

We grew other small fruit, too: black raspberries, blueberries, tart cherries, and strawberries. I love them all. Now we grow only one strawberry- a little thing with a short season called Earliglow- because we've never found a better one. We feel about Earliglows as William Butler, the sixteenth-century English physician, felt about strawberries. "Doubtless G.o.d could have made a better berry," he said, "but doubtless G.o.d never did."

Berry picking is a pleasant job, even when you are picking for market, and I am a fast berry picker. I also have a sharp eye for spotting wild fruit. On the farm, I know the fencerows where furry wineberry bushes lurk and where to find mulberry trees drooping with white or purple blobs. Finding berries in baking-hot suburban parking lots or running along old ca.n.a.ls is fun, too. In New York, my local mulberry tree is only blocks away, in a little park on the East River.

Plants, as we've seen, make themselves bitter out of self-defense. Berries, likewise, dress up pretty out of self-interest. The vivid crimson and blue of wild raspberries, blueberries, and cranberries must have popped out like jewels to the hunter-gatherer eye. From the plant's point of view, looking lovely draws the attention of animals, who will then eat the fruit, travel, and spread the seeds- a neat trick if you're a blackberry bush and can't walk around. For the forager, meanwhile, sapphire and ruby cl.u.s.ters are like the bitter taste of dandelions: they signify good things, including vitamin C and anthocyanins.

When I see quarts of dark sweet cherries at the farmers' market or glimpse a purple splotch in a tangled green fencerow, I smile and cheer up a little. I like to think that's my Stone Age brain, perking up.

What Is an Industrial Tomato?

WHEN WE PICTURE INDUSTRIAL MEAT, the images are unpleasant: animals crammed on concrete floors in dark barns, tails docked, getting fat on hormones- and that's about right. It's more difficult to conjure up an industrial tomato. Sure, large commercial farms probably don't look like a backyard garden, but how badly can they mistreat a simple tomato? In fact, the traditional and industrial tomato have little in common.

Before the first seed is sown, soil is sterilized with fumigants like methyl bromide, which is toxic to wildlife and people. Healthy soil is never sterile; it should be teeming with fauna, from earthworms and nematodes to microbes. Soil fertility- and thus plant health- depends on the interaction of these organisms with the soil and plant roots. A teaspoon of gra.s.sland topsoil may contain twenty million fungi and five billion bacteria, creatures who want to be fed with minerals, compost, and other organic matter. On industrial farms, however, soil life is not nurtured; it's murdered.

The seeds are different, too. Industrial varieties have traits convenient to large growers, distributors, and retailers. An industrial tomato, for example, is bred to be solid and thick-skinned, the better to tolerate mechanical harvesting, was.h.i.+ng, packaging, and long-distance s.h.i.+pping. Uniform shape and size are also important. Flavor and texture take a backseat. Gardeners and small farmers prefer great flavor to good looks, not that the two qualities are mutually exclusive.

Industrial farming also favors monocropping, but single crops, as the Irish learned the hard way with potato blight in 1845, are more susceptible to devastation by pest invasion and disease. The industrial answer is herbicides, fungicides, and pesticides to kill weeds, insects, and molds. So powerful are these chemicals, industrial farmers have dispensed with crop rotation- the age-old method for keeping pests and disease at bay- but the apparent efficiency is illusory. With this system, pests and pathogens traditionally kept in check by switching crops acc.u.mulate, thus requiring yet more pesticides.

As with factory animals, rapid, high yields are the goal on industrial produce farms. Synthetic fertilizers, especially nitrogen, make plants grow fast, but nitrogen-driven growth produces weak, watery, and overly leafy plants which are more vulnerable to insects. Furthermore, most of the nitrogen runs off, polluting streams, rivers, oceans, fisheries, and drinking water.2 Industrial farmers use hormonelike chemicals to push plants to grow bigger and set fruit faster. Almonds, broccoli, grapes, melons, onions, potatoes, snap beans, tomatoes, and other crops may be treated with growth enhancers such as AuxiGro. Rather like a steroid for plants, it promises enhanced flowering, larger fruit size, and greater yields- with what effect on texture, flavor, and nutrition, I don't know. We do know that steroids enhance performance in cattle and baseball players, and we know the extra beef, milk, and muscle come at a price. Plants have equally delicate hormonal systems.

Harvest is different on industrial and traditional farms, too. Industrial peaches and plums taste nothing like local ones in season, in large measure because they're underripe. Industrial fruits cannot be picked ripe; they would never survive the journey, often thousands of miles, to the supermarket. Industrial tomatoes are picked "hard green" and ripened artificially with ethylene gas. They never develop the complex flavor or luscious texture of a tomato that ripens naturally, with just the right combination of acids and sugars, like a balanced wine.

Another difference between industrial and ecological produce is postharvest treatment and packaging. Most treatments are designed to make produce look fresh longer. But is it still fresh? En route to shops, produce is irradiated to kill bacteria such as E. coli and extend its shelf life. Irradiated strawberries can still look fresh after three weeks, long after an untreated berry would have spoiled. That certainly helps the supermarket produce manager, but irradiation destroys vitamins, and with every day it sits on the shelf, the berry is less tasty and nutritious. According to Public Citizen, irradiation also produces new compounds called alkylcyclobutanones, which are linked to cancer and genetic damage in rat and human cells. Groceries, meanwhile, promote irradiation as a public health measure. But I don't want sterilized food; I want food that's clean in the first place- and still alive.

How "baby" salad leaves got trendy is one of my favorite industrial produce stories. First, supermarkets offered washed leaves as a convenience to cooks. (By the way, the history of laborsaving devices in the American kitchen is not encouraging, and I doubt that people who are too busy to wash lettuce enjoy more leisure than I do.) But the prewashed cut leaves turned brown too quickly, so growers started to sell small, whole leaves, which lasted longer because they weren't cut.

This convenience to industrial lettuce growers, produce wholesalers, and supermarkets was presented as a gourmet delight- baby spinach!- but to me, it's simply immature and tasteless. Nor am I a fan of "micro" greens- and they seem to be getting younger all the time. I saw "infant" arugula on a fancy menu recently, but I prefer mine all grown up.

Adding injury to insult, cut salad leaves are often packed in Modified Atmosphere Packaging (MAP). After the leaves are washed in chlorine, they're put in bags with less oxygen and extra carbon dioxide. The result is lettuce that still looks fresh ten days to a month later.3 Unfortunately, MAP lettuce contains fewer vitamins C and E and antioxidants. Any cut lettuce loses nutrients quickly, but, as with irradiated berries, MAP lettuce still looks fresh after ten days, while untreated lettuce has withered and turned brown- a sure sign that it's past its peak and thus unsellable.

Let's return, briefly, to the unpleasant topic of pesticides. Of all the unsavory aspects of industrial produce, pesticides, though invisible, are probably the most dangerous. "The fact that spreading billions of pounds of toxic pesticides throughout the environment each year results in extensive harm should not be surprising," writes Monica Moore in Fatal Harvest: The Tragedy of Industrial Agriculture, a book of photos of industrial and ecological farms. "Yet somehow it remains not just surprising, but eternally so. This never-ending lack of awareness of the true scale of damage keeps people from challenging a.s.sumptions that societies benefit more than they lose from . . . dependence on pesticides."

THE MOST CONTAMINATED PRODUCE- AND THE LEAST Between 1992 and 2001, the USD A tested forty-six fruits and vegetables for pesticide residue. Using this data, the Environmental Working Group published a list of the least and most contaminated produce. A score of 1 represents the least pesticide residue, 100 the most.

Pesticides are bad news. Organophosphates and methyl carbamates, widely used insecticides, can cause acute poisoning, with symptoms including headache, dizziness, fatigue, diarrhea, vomiting, sweating, and stomach pain. Severe poisoning brings convulsions, breathing difficulty, coma, and death. Paraquat, a powerful herbicide, damages the skin, eyes, mouth, nose, and throat; it can destroy lung tissue and cause liver and kidney failure.

Chronic and long-term effects of pesticides include cancer, infertility, and hormone disruption. According to the EPA, 170 pesticides are possible, probable, or known human carcinogens.4 The common weed killer 2,4-D is linked to non-Hodgkins lymphoma, and lindane (in lice shampoo) is linked to aplastic anemia, lymphoma, and breast cancer. DBCP (a nematode killer) and 2,4-D reduce fertility. The herbicide atrazine is an endocrine disruptor, as is the infamous organochlorine DDT. Though it is now banned in the United States, DDT still lingers in the environment.

We've gone too far. Songbirds are missing, frogs are sterile, and our bodies may already bear the signs of misadventures with powerful poisons. Farmers and their children have higher rates of cancer and birth defects. All these chemicals were designed to kill, after all. One way to reduce your exposure to such nasty things is to eat produce raised with organic or other ecological methods. But what does organic mean? And when does it matter?

I Learn How to Answer the Question: Are You Organic?

WHEN WE FIRST SOLD at farmers' markets in 1980, they were brand-new to the Was.h.i.+ngton, D.C, area and pretty new in other American cities, too. New York City's fabled Greenmarket had opened only a few years before, in 1976. People were just getting used to having farmers set up shop in suburbs and cities. It was all new to us farmers, too, of course, but we did our best- even us nine-year-olds. Pictures of me at our motley stand from the early years reveal in embarra.s.sing detail how much we had to learn about display and marketing. We did explain that producer-only farmers' markets (as they're known in our world) were for local farmers to sell homegrown foods, but local foods was not yet in the lingo or understood to be a good thing.

The word organic was very much in vogue, however. We heard the same question over and over: are you organic? We stumbled over various answers, most of them probably beginning like this: "No, but . . . " This reply, as you might imagine, failed to satisfy. First, it sounds defensive. Second, some customers, quite reasonably, were seeking organic produce certified by an independent party, not verbal a.s.surances from a barefoot farm kid.

We felt stuck. We couldn't- and wouldn't- use the word organic because we were not certified organic by the state of Virginia, but people wanted to know how we grew our vegetables. One day at the Arlington farmers' market, I was typically flummoxed, when a friendly customer made what must have been an obvious suggestion: that we describe our methods on signs, something like NO PESTICIDES or OUR CHICKENS RUN FREE ON GRa.s.s. Excited, I went home with this idea, which my mother took up with typical editorial intensity, and now our sign boxes are br.i.m.m.i.n.g with information.

We had always used ecological methods, such as mulching to keep weeds down, and we grew most crops without any pesticides, but when we first started farming, we also used some chemicals. We sprayed the weed killer Roundup on pernicious Johnson gra.s.s, herbicides on corn, and fungicides on melons (melon leaves prefer dry weather, but Virginia is humid). Soon we gave up all those poisons, but I can still smell the metal cupboard where we kept them. Next time you find yourself in a garden supply store, go to the chemical aisle, and you'll know the dreadful odor I mean.

How much should you worry about the chemicals on produce? Allow me to answer in a leisurely way. When I was little, we ate a lot of industrial produce. In the summer, of course, we ate our own vegetables, but in the winter we bought large bags of industrial fruits and vegetables at Magruder's, the family-owned, local chain famous for good prices. Every day, we ate a large green salad, a fruit salad, or both. My mother insisted.

These days, apart from the occasional mango or avocado, I buy local produce from the farmers' market all year. There are many organic growers, but less than half of my produce is certified organic. I should buy more organic and ecological produce, but for various reasons, I don't. Certain items, like ecological apples and pears, are scarce, and with the huge quant.i.ty of produce I eat, price is a factor. Happily, the non-organic growers I know are well shy of industrial. Still, I do miss eating our own vegetables- all well-chosen varieties, grown on mineral-rich soil with strictly ecological methods.

If you can't find or afford ecological produce, eat plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables anyway. You may be sure that most studies showing the benefits of diets rich in fruits and vegetables were done on industrial produce. It is sensible to wash industrial produce, but peeling is a tough call. Most of the pesticides are found in, or just under, the peel. So are the vitamins and antioxidants. I simply don't know which is the lesser evil.

When I'm deciding how to spend my food money, I use one other rule of thumb: the higher up the food chain, the more important ecological methods are. Thus I spend good money on gra.s.s-fed and pastured meat, poultry, dairy, and eggs, but I am less fussy about fruits and vegetables. That's because chemicals acc.u.mulate at the top of the food chain, especially in fatty tissue. If there is pesticide residue in, say, a stick of industrial b.u.t.ter, it comes from the many bushels of industrial corn and grain the cow ate.

National organic standards implemented in 2002 made some small organic farmers feel threatened by large-scale organic farming. There is no reason to worry. The new organic rules, if somewhat weak in places, put the spotlight on clean food, and that's valuable. Organic means food was produced without synthetic fertilizer, antibiotics, hormones, pesticides, genetically engineered ingredients, and irradiation. In shops, where the consumer is one or more steps removed from the farmer, the organic label is a legal guarantee.

I admire organic farmers, large and small; they're committed to clean methods and willing to subject their farms to independent scrutiny. But many of us- farmers and eaters alike- don't need the organic label. Farmers like my parents, who sell at farmers' markets or to chefs, can explain directly to buyers why the food is superior to industrial produce. Moreover, many farmers use ecological methods that may even exceed the organic standards. For example, they promote healthy plants by adding major nutrients such as calcium, trace elements from sea water, and beneficial microbes to the soil. Cattle farmers raise beef on gra.s.s, which yields more nutritious beef than feeding cattle organic grain. But the organic standards don't specify a gra.s.s diet. It is up to farmers raising gra.s.s-fed beef to tell their story, and that is exactly what they are doing, just as we told our story at farmers' markets twenty-five years ago.

WHEATLAND VEGETABLE FARMS.

LOUDOUN COUNTY, VIRGINIA.

Our thirty-five acres of vegetables, melons, small fruits, flowers, and herbs are grown without herbicides, insecticides, or fungicides. Since 1980 we have used ground limestone, compost, cover crops, mulches, and a nontoxic, seawater-based foliar fertilizer as our only sources of plant nutrition. Each season we hire college students to help us seed, transplant, mulch, irrigate, pick, load, and sell our crops at twelve producer-only farmers' markets.

- Chip and Susan Planck.

We sorely need more research on the nutritional value of industrial and ecological produce. With healthy soil, ecological produce should contain more vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. At the University of California, Alyson Mitch.e.l.l compared vitamin C and healthy polyphenols in strawberries, corn, and marionberries (a type of blackberry) grown with organic, sustainable, or conventional methods.5 The organic and sustainable methods consistently produced higher levels of both nutrients. Unsprayed marionberries and corn had 50 to 58 percent more bitter-tasting polyphenols than conventional produce.

Local food tastes better. Does organic food taste better, too? Sometimes. The important factors of flavor are soil health, variety, maturity, and freshness. Out of necessity, most big organic producers use the same varieties as industrial farmers, pick them underripe, and s.h.i.+p them a long way. It's good that large organic farms don't pollute the rivers, but the tomatoes are tasteless. In Britain, the main commercial strawberry, Elsanta, is known in the trade as the "three-bounce berry." St.u.r.dy Elsanta may be, but it doesn't taste very good, even when it's grown without chemicals. Farmers who care about good food grow varieties with superior flavor, pick them at peak maturity, and sell them fresh. When I hear someone say, "Organic tomatoes taste better," I think, "Which tomato, grown where?"

Farmers have expanded the traditional seasons for local foods with techniques such as row covers, heated greenhouses, unheated hoop houses, and long-season varieties. In New York, I can eat greenhouse salad leaves in snowy January. Tomatoes grown in heated greenhouses- either in a liquid nutritional formula or in soil subst.i.tute- appear in the spring, well before field tomatoes, and ever-bearing strawberries are available all summer. For all these foods, we are thankful.

Yet I prefer fruits and vegetables grown outdoors in proper soil in peak season. Soil, which varies from farm to farm, gives produce its flavor and nutrients. That's terroir, the French idea that the features of a particular spot- soil type, minerals, moisture, frost- impart special character to the grapes and thus the wine. Environmental stresses- wind, rain, insects- also yield st.u.r.dier and more robustly flavored plants. It's a kind of character-building theory of flavor. Hydroponic tomatoes are insipid because they have no terroir and no character. If you buy tomatoes out of season, look for those grown in proper soil, often in unheated hoop houses.

Local foods are more diverse than what you find in the supermarket produce section. At my local farmers' market, there are dozens of tomatoes and more than a hundred apple varieties, but supermarkets carry just a few. The eighteenth-century Newtown Pippin, native to the Newtown Creek in what is now Queens, New York, is a superior dessert, cider, and storage apple, but it has been replaced by the rock-hard, often underripe, and less tasty Granny Smith. In October 1785, Thomas Jefferson, who grew 170 varieties of fruits at Monticello, wrote James Madison from Paris, "They have no apples here to compare with our Newtown Pippin."

This lovely apple- now being revived by the equally delightful Ed Yowell, who leads the New York City convivium of Slow Food- has modern fans, too. "The green-skinned, yellow-fleshed Pippin is both sweet and tart; crisp and tender," says Peter Hatch, director of the Monticello gardens. "The citruslike aroma- some describe it as piney - lingers in the mouth like a dear memory."