You are what you eat

Michael Pollan's new rule

Michael Pollan has found a need to update his rules. The minimalist  set of rules: "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants." The expanded set includes such things as "don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food" and "don't eat anything with more than five ingredients on the label."

Pollan is an advocate for un-processed food, and one of the markers he used to identify highly processed foods was high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). This is not something the home cook can add to a recipe. It's manufactured using highly technical processes, and thus, when it appears on a food label, serves as a warning that the product has undergone intensive processing in a manufacturing plant.

But now that HFCS has been identified as a no-no, food companies are going back to sugar. Yet sugar is not a health food and is not particularly desirable. As Pollan says,

But to boast about your product not having high-fructose corn syrup as being some kind of virtue is really stretching it. And I think what we see here is another example of the food industry’s ingenuity in taking any critique of industrial food and turning it into the next marketing strategy. It’s a lot like the low-fat campaign, you know, which began as a government critique of food, you know, beginning with George McGovern in the ’70s saying we should eat less red meat because of heart disease. Whatever you think of the science of that, which turns out not to have been that good, it was a well-meaning campaign to improve the American diet. Industry came back and re-engineered the whole food system to have less fat in it and no fat in it. And that campaign sold a lot more food. And, in fact, since that campaign, we’ve been eating about 300 more calories a day, and we’re a lot fatter. So, you can’t—you just can’t underestimate their ability turn any critique into a way to sell food.

Too true.

As a result, Pollan has formulated a new rule: "Don't buy any food you've ever seen advertised":

And with all this new marketing based on these ideas, my new suggestion is, if you want to avoid all this, simply don’t buy any food you’ve ever seen advertised. Ninety-four percent of ad budgets for food go to processed food. I mean, the broccoli growers don’t have money for ad budgets. So the real food is not being advertised. And that’s really all you need to know.

Amen.

How does your soy product brand rate?

Okay, I had a longer post on this topic about half finished when the browser just stopped working. I can't bring myself to rewrite the whole thing.

The gist of it is that the Cornucopia Institute has issued a report detailing the practices and sourcing of various companies that produce and market soy products, such as soy milk, cheese alternatives, tempeh, soy sausages, and so on. The Institute has issued a ratings scorecard that shows you at a glance how your brand rates according to ten criteria, ranging from the source of the soybeans (most of us really don't want to eat anything that comes from China) and whether they're tested for GMO contamination to whether any soy lecithin in the product was extracted using hexane (hexane is a neurotoxin and a hazardous pollutant, yet it is commonly used in so-called "organic" foods).

You should consult the ratings scorecard for yourself, but I'll summarize briefly here.

The top-rated companies, which scored 5 out of 5 "beans" (instead of stars), were Eden Foods, Unisoya, Vermont Soy, Small Planet, FarmSoy, Twin Oaks, and Green Cuisine.

Some well-known soy companies, including Vitasoy and Nasoya, garnered only one bean. And in the zero bean category ... well, say goodbye to Boca Burgers, Gardenburger, Pacific Foods, Silk (a good rule of thumb is "If it's made by Dean foods, don't eat it"), and Soy Dream. These companies rated low for various reasons, but one of the main reasons is that they wouldn't disclose their sourcing. That, to me, indicates that they may be using soybeans imported from China. It is highly doubtful that China is following the organic standards defined by the USDA.

If you can't read the entire report--and you really should, if you ingest a lot of soy products--at least read the executive summary. 

You may not care about some of the criteria used by Cornucopia, such as whether the soybeans were procured from a family farm or a publicly-held corporation, while other criteria may seem more crucial to you. For that reason you owe it to yourself to read the full report's list of criteria. And I urge you to read the section on hexane. It's certainly nothing I want to ingest, yet it's used as a solvent to extract oils from various seeds and from soybeans (thus, it's probably left as a residue in soybean oil, and is most certainly a residue in many soy products).

I'm going to add that I myself am suspicious of soy generally, except for fermented soybeans. It's one of the reasons I quit being a vegetarian; too much of what I substituted for animal products was soy, with the exception of tofu (which is fermented, of course), which I didn't (and don't) like! Soy contains enzyme inhibitors that block the action of certain digestive enzymes. According to Sally Fallon and Mary Enig,

These inhibitors are large, tightly folded proteins that are not completely deactivated during ordinary cooking. They can produce serious gastric distress, reduced protein digestion and chronic deficiencies in amino acid uptake. In test animals, diets high in trypsin inhibitors cause enlargement and pathological conditions of the pancreas, including cancer.14

Soybeans also contain haemagglutinin, a clot-promoting substance that causes red blood cells to clump together.

Trypsin inhibitors and haemagglutinin are growth inhibitors. Weanling rats fed soy containing these antinutrients fail to grow normally. Growth-depressant compounds are deactivated during the process of fermentation, so once the Chinese discovered how to ferment the soybean, they began to incorporate soy foods into their diets.

There are other problems with soy as well, and while fermenting the beans eliminates most of the problems, it may not eliminate all of them.

So, as in all things related to food, choose wisely! The soy scorecard ought to help you make an ethical, healthy choice if you decide to keep soy products in your pantry.

Quick vegetarian meals, part three

[Part one can be found here; part two, here.]

As I've already written in parts one and two of this brief series, organization and planning ahead are great helps in simplifying the task of cooking day after day. I can't emphasize it enough: cook extra. Cook extra soup stock, cook extra beans, cook extra grains, cook extra pasta.

I'm not and never was a vegan, so these ideas may not be helpful to you if you eschew dairy and eggs. But here are some of the dishes I relied on time after time as quick meals:

Quesadillas: These are really grilled cheese sandwiches, but using flour tortillas instead of bread. You can use a single tortilla, placing the ingredients on one half of the tortilla and folding the other half over it, or you can use two tortillas to make a sandwich. I like cheddar cheese and hot pepper rings on mine; refried beans are also good, or serve them alongside the quesadilla. I use a nonstick pan, no oil, and just scatter grated cheese over the tortilla, followed by a couple of pepper rings. Heat until melted, and voila. You can use other fillings, too, such as onions or bell peppers.

Mexican red rice: If you have a favorite "Spanish rice" or Mexican red rice recipe, simply add garbanzo beans to the rice for a main dish.

Pasta dishes: Cook extra pasta so that you can get a couple of meals out of it. Spaghetti with pecorino romano and black pepper is quick and delicious; simply toss cooked spaghetti (or linguini or fettucine) with some olive oil, grated cheese, and plenty of black pepper. Fettucine alfredo is also fast: cook or reheat the pasta; heat 1/2 cup butter and 1/2 cup whipping cream over low heat until the butter is melted; stir in 3/4 cup grated parmesan, romano, or asiago cheese; salt and pepper to taste, and pour the sauce over the pasta. Sun-dried tomatoes and artichoke hearts make nice additions.

Fried rice: For this you need leftover cooked, cold rice. Heat some oil in a skillet and add the rice, stirring until it's heated through. Add some sesame oil and soy sauce, if you like (I do!). You can add whatever you like to this: shredded lettuce, frozen peas or snow peas, some chopped bell pepper and/or onion, chopped celery, sliced water chestnuts, an egg--the possibilities are endless.

Pizza: You can do quick pizzas by splitting a baguette, or part of it, and toasting it under the broiler, then topping it with pizza sauce and whatever else you like. Microwave it or heat it in the oven until the cheese is nicely melted. You can also use a toasted English muffin, a pita, or even a bagel half to do this.

Bean salads: Keep cooked or canned beans on hand and you can always complete a meal with a bean salad. Using different kinds of beans can be visually interesting. Simply drain, rinse, and drain again canned beans; toss them with some chopped scallions, perhaps celery and sliced black olives and/or whatever else you wish, and homemade vinaigrette (make using 3 parts olive oil to 1 part red wine vinegar, adding whatever dried or fresh herbs you wish; dijon mustard is also nice to add). Sprinkle with parmesan or feta, if you wish. Cold cooked pasta added to the beans will give you a main-dish salad. In this case, be bold with seasonings (I like to add dry or prepared mustard), as pasta can make the dressing seem bland.

Pita sandwiches: Stuff a pita with fresh, crunchy veggies or sauteed veggies over a slathering of hummus (or not); drizzle with vinaigrette or use dollops of yogurt. I like pita sandwiches with tomatoes, black olives, and feta cheese, along with some sliced bell pepper and some cucumber, but of course, the filling is up to you. A pita sandwich with a cup of leftover soup makes a fine, quick meal. Nicely seasoned bean puree also makes a good component of a pita sandwich.

Burritos: If you have leftover chili, heat it, simmer liquid out of it if necessary, and use as a burrito filling topped with shredded cheddar or Monterey jack cheese. Warm the burritos in the oven or microwave to melt the cheese.

Tacos: Cook a potato or two (quite fast in the microwave), cool, and dice. Heat some refried beans, stir in the potato, and use as a taco filling, topped with shredded lettuce, diced tomato, and shredded cheese. You can add a little cumin or chili powder to the refried beans if you like.

Obviously, this is not an exhaustive list of quick meals, but it should give you some ideas. With a pressure cooker, your choices are much broader as it will make 20-minute soups possible along with quick rice dishes, whole veggies, etc.

Of course I'd like any suggestions from readers! Who isn't looking for new ideas for quick meals?

Quick vegetarian meals, part two: recipes from this blog

[Correction: Yes, I finally realized that I had included a non-vegetarian soup in my suggestions. Sorry about that! I've removed the link.]

[Part one, a general discussion of ways to make your cooking more efficient, can be found here.]

When you're thinking about quick meals, keep in mind that salad or leftover soup (including frozen portions) can help round out a meal, as can fruit and cheese at the end of the meal. Salads can include protein (cheese, hard-cooked eggs), as can creamed soups, or they can simply complement your main course.

The links below take you to quick (some quicker than others) recipes on this blog. The tabouli and lentil salads can definitely serve as a main course. Most salads (although not the fattoush) can be made at least a day ahead.

The last and final part of this series on quick(er) vegetarian dishes will feature not so much recipes as suggestions for very speedy dishes and/or for dressing up leftovers or staples like rice and pasta.

Salads:

Tabouli

Yogurt and cucumber salad

New potato and sugar snap pea salad

Spinach fattoush

Lentil salad with feta and mint

Mushroom salad

Black bean, corn, and tomato salad

Soup:

African chickpea and spinach soup

Beans:

Black bean burritos

Pasta:

Pasta with fresh tomato sauce

Eggs:

Frittatas

Omelets

Miscellaneous:

Broiled stuffed anaheims

 

Quick vegetarian meals, part one

This post is in response to a friend who asked for some fifteen-minute vegetarian recipes. I laughed and said, "Well, maybe 30-minute recipes ..." and she replied that even that would be helpful.

I was a vegetarian for nine or ten years, and believe me, it was no hardship (except, as my friend pointed out, in restaurants, which can be a problem in that you always end up having a pasta dish or the meatless pizza or some such). At the time I didn't object to soy-based meat substitutes, but today I'd balk at that, so I'm not going to include these in my menus or recipes.

Most vegetarians depend on legumes for much of their protein. I love beans, lentils, and split peas, and I relied on them for many of our meal plans. During my vegetarian years, I didn't have a pressure cooker, which was foolish of me. A pressure cooker makes fast work of dried beans, even if they're unsoaked.

But let's start at the beginning. (I want to state right here that my friend probably knows all this, and I'm just throwing it out there for anyone who hasn't stopped to consider these points.) I'm a believer in meal planning, and I plan meals covering one to two weeks. This simplifies grocery shopping, I never have to wonder "what's for dinner," and I don't rely on those nasty processed foods. I have all the ingredients I need to make dinner on a given night. It also ensures variety and gives me the advantage of being organized, so that I know I have to soak beans on Tuesday night for Wednesday's dinner. I'm not rigid about this stuff, but having a general plan works great for me.

So, the first thing to do is to plan your meals around your schedule. A busy day followed by an evening of work or social obligations is not the time for an elaborate dinner. Save that for weekends or whenever you have the luxury of time.

Second, I can't emphasize enough how much a pressure cooker can help. I can whip up split-pea soup in under half an hour, including chopping the veggies. In the smaller of my two pressure cookers, I make risottos whose taste cannot be differentiated from the time-consuming stove-top, constant-stirring-required version. Dried beans are cooked through very quickly compared to the hours of simmering they otherwise require, and they're far superior to canned beans (cooked dried garbanzo beans, in fact, seem like an entirely different vegetable from the canned variety). Vegetable broth is done in a matter of minutes.

The slow cooker (crock-pot) is also extremely valuable, especially for the working person. I had forgotten this handy tool until one summer when I had so much to do out in the garden that I never felt like cooking at the end of the day. Putting dinner in the slow cooker before noon meant that we were guaranteed a decent meal after the busiest (and grimiest!) of days. And it doesn't heat up the kitchen much, either. Among other conveniences, the crock-pot cooks previously soaked dried beans overnight so that they're ready for the next day's meal.

Next, let's consider the meal itself. Your meal should include protein, so if you're having, say, spaghetti with marinara sauce, it's a good idea not only to sprinkle your pasta with parmesan, but also to have a side salad that incorporates feta and chickpeas, or whatever cheese and bean varieties you like. To simplify putting a balanced meal together, it's helpful to have the following on hand:

• Washed salad greens. Either buy pre-washed salad greens, or wash the greens, spin them dry in a salad spinner, lay them on paper towels, roll them up in the toweling, and put them in a plastic bag. Don't add juicy veggies like tomatoes and cucumbers until you put the actual salad together, as they will cause wilting and sogginess.
• Cooked dried beans, or canned beans. These can be added to salads and pasta (and pasta salads!) and soups and casseroles ... you get the idea. Having a bean salad in the fridge is even better; use two or three kinds of beans for variety, throw in some scallions, tomato, bell pepper, sliced black olives, celery, or whatever, and toss with a vinaigrette, and you've got lunch or a dish to round out a dinner. Add cooked pasta for a great main dish salad.
• Hummus, if you like it. Spread it on a pita, topped with some fresh veggies and/or sprouts and some good yogurt, and you've got an instant lunch.
• Cheeses that you like. These can be shredded into salads, rice, pita sandwiches, quesadillas (I'll get to that), refried beans, vegetarian chili, etc. to complete the protein in a meal.
• Hard-cooked eggs. These add protein to a tossed salad, fit well in many pasta salads, and are good to eat out of hand or as deviled eggs. I love egg salad, which can be used to stuff a tomato as well as serving as a sandwich filling.
• Tofu, if you like it. I don't, but I wish I did. It can be used in all manner of dishes, including salads, soups, stir-fries, breakfast eggs or shakes, etc.
• Better Than Bouillon, vegetarian or mushroom type. This is somewhat expensive, but even a little really strengthens the taste of soups and stews. You can also make a good mushroom gravy using fresh mushrooms and the Bouillon.

Of course, I never had all these things on hand at all times, but having some of them, at least, does make things easier when time is at a premium.

Other things to consider:

• When you cook dried beans, cook more than you'll need, and freeze the rest in some of the cooking liquid for another recipe down the line. Toss cooked beans into salads, rice dishes, pasta, soup, etc. for a protein boost.

• Cook more rice than you need for a recipe, and plan to use it as fried rice in the next day or two (more on this to come).

• Freeze leftover soup, or dishes like lasagna or eggplant parmesan, in amounts suitable for lunch or for another dinner. The freezer is your friend!

• Make veggie stock when you have time and freeze it in amounts you're likely to use for your favorite recipes.

• Think about how to use one recipe two ways. For example, leftover vegetarian chili is great as a burrito filling (just simmer the excess liquid away) or even an omelet filling.

Neither of the above lists exhausts the possibilities, of course, but it should give you some ideas about planning, using ingredients efficiently, and so on.

Next up, I'll post some ideas and recipes for quick meals.

Wasted food

There's a whole blog out there devoted to the issue of wasted food: wastedfood.com.

This is not a trivial issue. Some estimates are that 40% or more of the food Americans buy is thrown out--more than $100 billion worth of food per year. Let's think about that for a moment. Consider, too, the packaging that goes into all that food we didn't actually need to buy, and the carbon footprint of the industrial food system that produced that unnecessary food. Worst of all, think about the 37 million or so people in this country who are "food insecure," who could surely use some of what the rest of us so cavalierly toss out.

I've always been unhappy about throwing food away. It just seems so wrong ... When I don't get around to canning or freezing my garden produce, the guilt is terrible--even if, as my daughter points out, it's not a total waste because it goes into the compost for next year's garden. Better, I suppose, than going to a landfill. I feel just as bad wasting whatever I've bought at the supermarket.

The freezer is indispensable in cutting down on waste. Yesterday I put two pint boxes of black bean soup in the freezer; we'd eaten leftovers for lunch a couple of times, but after two or three days one starts to worry about spoilage, so into the freezer it went. Putting leftovers in the freezer means that on any given day, I have a guaranteed no-fuss, just defrost-and-warm lunch.

When we have a large cut of meat, such as a roast, I plan for the leftovers even before I cook the roast. Roast beef sandwiches, beef-and-pasta salad, barbecued beef sandwiches, beef pot pie, roast beef hash: these are all possibilities, and rarely do I have to throw out meat.

With whole chickens, it's the same: I plan to use the leftovers for another meal (chicken divan, pot pie, etc.), and I make stock out of the carcass. Often I freeze the carcass until I have the time and inclination to make broth out of it.

I use whole grains, so I take care to store them in the freezer if I know I won't use them up before they become rancid. Whole cornmeal, steel-cut oats, whole-wheat flour and the like must be used within a few months, and I surely don't want to throw anything away, so once again, the freezer is the answer. I store nuts and seeds in the freezer as well.

One of the keys to not wasting food is to not buy too much food. Seems self-evident, and yet people do buy too much. Perhaps the large bag of salad, with its lower per-unit cost, is just too good to pass up, or there's a buy-one-get-one-free sale, but for whatever reason, Americans often buy more food than they can eat.

There's also another phenomenon at work, one I saw illustrated on the British show You Are What You Eat; people buy fruits and vegetables because they know they're "supposed" to, but then the produce doesn't get eaten. On the episode I saw, the woman of the house bought fruit galore, but the entire family, including her, passed it up in favor of cookies, donuts, chips, etc.

Late last fall I found myself with several lemons that were drying out and looking rather ill, so I juiced them all and made lemonade. I find myself doing more of this sort of thing as my horror of food waste grows. Apples, peaches, and pears can be sliced and the slices dried in the food dehydrator; berries can be frozen; overripe bananas can be frozen in their skins to be used in baked goods; citrus fruits can be juiced, and so on.

Anyway, pop over to wastedfood.com for some thought and discussion on this topic. It might serve as a reminder and an inspiration to all of us who have worried about food waste.  Oh, and check out this article in the Austin-American Statesman, too.

Does your pantry need an upgrade?

I had to laugh when I read this column by Mark Bittman (author of How to Cook Everything). I laughed because most of the changes he advises are changes I've come to slowly over the past two or three years, and I wondered if I'd have gotten to where I am, or my pantry is, sooner had I read this a few years ago.

Probably not. And that's why it might be futile to link to his advice: it seems that humans have to learn everything the hard way and take their own paths to their eventual destination. Nonetheless, I hope you'll read the article and take some of his admonishments to heart. It really will improve your cooking.

I won't lie to you: I don't live by all of the "rules" Bittman lays down. He says to throw out canned stock, but I do use it from time to time (organic only, of course). He has no use for dried basil, while I use it plentifully (others before him have said that dried basil is useless, but I don't find that to be true; naturally, I'd prefer fresh, but I can definitely taste basil even when it's the dried variety that goes into my spaghetti sauce). I'm also not going to stock up on anchovies (I don't like them) or fish sauce.

On the other hand, I couldn't agree more when he encourages the use of dried beans instead of canned, homemade salad dressing instead of the bottled variety, and homemade bread crumbs and croutons instead of packaged. And I haven't used bottled lemon juice in ages--it's quick and easy to cut a lemon in half and squeeze it through your fingers to filter out the seeds, so why bother with the inferior stuff?

So take a look and see whether your pantry needs an overhaul. I guarantee that making even a few of the changes Bittman recommends will make a difference in the taste of your (already fabulous I'm sure!) home-cooked meals.

How does your brand of organic milk rate?

That organic milk in your refrigerator may not be what you think it is: truly organic, produced by pastured cows raised humanely by farmers concerned with sustainability and maintaining a healthy environment.

Big Agriculture wants in on the lucrative organic milk business, and they don't mind bending, or even ignoring, the rules. It's up to us, the consumers, to understand the difference between, say, Horizon milk and actual organic milk. It's up to us to help maintain the integrity of the label "organic" on the milk carton. It's up to us to help keep small farmers on their land in the face of the almost overpowering clout of agribusiness.

As Cornucopia's report says,

. . . consumers should also recognize that an increasing amount of milk used in certain organic dairy products is coming from factory farms that are employing suspect practices that skirt organic regulations and negatively impact human nutrition and the health and well-being of livestock. Nearly 20% of the name-brands now available on grocery shelves scored a substandard rating. And a growing number of new factory farms—housing thousands of cows in confinement conditions—are in development because of strong organic commodity prices, growing consumer demand, a shortage of certified organic milk, and a reluctance by federal regulators to enforce the current organic rules.

In other words, some so-called organic milk comes from factory farms.

For the Cornucopia Institute, the two biggest issues in judging the integrity of the organic label on dairy products are whether the animals are really pastured, and whether calves are raised on the farm or are brought in as conventional animals

that might have been managed using prohibited materials (milk replacer/cow's blood, antibiotics, conventional feed containing potential pesticide contamination, genetically engineered feed, poultry manure, etc.).

If replacement calves are brought in, the organic regulations say that these animals "should be certified and managed organically from the last third of gestation." Alas, the factory farms don't really care what the regulations say.

The five-cow rating goes to those brands that come from farms that maintain complete control over their products and receive 100% of the profits from the sale of such products. These farms adhere strictly to sustainable, organic practices. The four-cow rating goes to excellent products marketed by larger companies who nevertheless buy from small farmers or from a supplier who deals directily with small organic dairy farms. Companies in the lower ratings have a questionable commitment to organics.

Forget about Aurora and Horizon--but then, you knew that, right? I switched from Meijer organic milk once I saw the ratings. The milk I last bought doesn't appear on Cornucopia's list (Grass Point), so I'd really like to know more.

You can see the ratings here. Check them out, and see whether your organic milk purchase really supports small, ethical dairy farmers--or some soulless CAFO somewhere.

[I have no idea why the font has deviated from the usual. Sigh.]

 

Farm-to-School gets a boost in Michigan

Here's a welcome bit of news: my state, Michigan, recently took steps to make it easier for schools to purchase locally grown food for school cafeterias. In doing so, the state joined 16 other states that already have taken steps to encourage farm-to-school programs.

Agriculture is an important sector of Michigan's economy, but small farmers, like their counterparts throughout the U.S., have a tough time surviving in this era of mega-farms, CAFOs, and globalization. If schools use local foods in their cafeterias, not only will children have healthier options, but farmers will also benefit by having a new source of income.

House Bills 6365, 6366, and 6368 promote farm-to-school food by (1) relaxing bidding regulations so that schools can more easily obtain local foods; (2) directing the state Departments of Education and Agriculture to facilitate connections between farmers and school food programs; and (3) encouraging planned construction of new schools to consider including kitchens capable of producing fresh, healthy meals and also accommodating hands-on learning.

There are many more details included in the bills--do read the article linked for more information. It's very exciting to me that Michigan is finally getting serious about farm-fresh foods for its school kids.

Funny honey, honey laundering, and other crimes against nature

If you like honey--and many of us have switched to honey for baking and other sweetening needs--you need to be aware that not only is there some counterfeit honey being sold in the U.S., but also honey that's been "laundered"--like drug money--and honey containing banned antibiotics.

As usual, China is the major culprit in all cases. Honey from China may contain traces of chloramphenicol, an antibiotic Chinese beekeepers use in their hives to prevent disease. Chloramphenicol has been banned by the FDA for use in any food product. Two other antibiotics, iprofloxacin and Enrofloxacin, have also recently been the cause of import alerts issued by the FDA.

Knowing that the U.S. has rules in place against the use of chloramphenicol in food products, and also desiring to avoid U.S. tariffs and inspections, China often "transships" honey: honey is shipped from China to another country and then from that country to the U.S., with bogus papers and export labels.

According to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer,

honey brokers, bee experts and foreign customs officials say they're suspicious that seven of the top 12 countries appear to be exporting far more honey than their domestic bees produce or their export agencies acknowledge. These countries include Vietnam, India, Thailand, Russia, Taiwan, Indonesia and Malaysia.

[snip]

Countries that have few if any commercial beekeepers, such as Singapore, are now exporting significant quantities of honey, records show. That includes the Grand Bahamas, which has been listed as the country of origin for honey shipped into Houston, authorities say.

"I have a difficult time seeing the Grand Bahamas as a major honey producer," said David Westervelt, a Florida state apiculture inspector. "It's an island. You move bees on there and they'll die."

And then there's the question of what's actually in the bottle that's labeled "Honey." If it came from China or India, it may not much resemble honey after having been

put through an ultra-filtration process that is meant to remove contaminants. Honey is heavily diluted with water, then repeatedly boiled and filtered until it returns to a more natural consistency. Those who have tested and tasted the filtered brew said the process can completely remove all traces of contaminants, "including the color."

But there's a downside.

"In the process of taking out the chemicals, they also take out all the good qualities of the honey. What the consumer is left with is a very low-quality, sweet product -- but certainly not honey," said Mark Brady, president of the American Honey Producers Association.

"If it is cheap and packers can use it to blend into other dark, cheap honey to make it lighter in color and taste a tad better, the ignorant general consumer is none the wiser. Caveat emptor," he warned.

Additionally, the honey may be adulterated with sugar or syrups. Unfortunately, the U.S. has no standards as to what constitutes honey, so it's impossible to take legal action. Got that? No legal definition or standard as to what constitutes honey.

You should also be aware that there is no such thing, according to those in the honey business, as U.S. organic honey. Honey bees travel far and wide, up to two and a half miles, so that they are pretty much always in the vicinity of pesticides and other pollutants. It IS possible to buy organic honey produced in Canada or Argentina, but the U.S. is too heavily developed for organic honey to be a possibility outside of, one imagines, some isolated area that would yield only enough honey for a few local people.

Also, "U.S. Grade A" and other such claims on the label are completely meaningless, as the USDA does not grade honey nor have any such standards. 

So, caveat emptor, honey-lovers. Your best bet, of course, is to buy honey locally. You can usually find locally produced honey at farmer's markets--I'd want to speak to the seller and get a feel for whether the honey is really produced locally--and sometimes from local stores or farm stands that stock local produce and items like locally collected and processed maple syrup and honey. We buy our honey from Honeyflow Farm, where a customer can actually see a glassed-in hive with the bees hard at work, and where the honey comes out of a big barrel and flows into the container the customer brings. (The Farm has a mail order business, as well, offering containers of honey.)

I've said it before and I'll say it again: I want to know where my food comes from, and I want to know what's in it. That's why, wherever possible, we're locavores, and that's why we cook from scratch. When people mess with a natural ambrosia like honey, you know we're living in a really dysfunctional world.