From Local Farms to Corner Stores: Increasing Access to Healthy Foods

With an eye to the future, a federally-funded program is underway that is designed to help Americans eat healthier foods and fend off ailments stemming from obesity, including heart disease and diabetes by bringing together retailers, farmers, and consumers. Seattle’s Healthy Foods Here (HFH) program operates synergistically.

Carrots for Carrot Cake: Where Do They Come From?

Kim Antieau is on a quest to trace all the ingredients for her homemade carrot cake, from ground to place, and write a book about it. In this excerpt from The Carrot Cake, Kim talks about what she discovered about carrot production.

It All Began With An Apple (or Was It a Pear?)

Farmers and orchardists who clearly love the land and the fruit and vegetables they grow are discovering creative ways to make unique products that consumers seek out and are willing to pay a premium for. We profile five Washington orchards ranging from Broetje Orchards, a very large commercial and organic orchard, to four small artisan growers and producers of a variety of organic tree fruit including apples, pears, and stone fruit.

Product Profile: Mazama Juice Cider

We took a “drive about” to apple country and met John and Beth Sinclair at their organic orchard in Twisp WA. They grow Honey Crisp apples on 8,000 trees in the Methow Valley of Washington. GoodFood World heartily recommends their sweet cider!

Nature vs. Nutritionism’s False Hope

How many times have you heard this question, “With all the scientific information we now know about nutrition, how come Americans are heavier and unhealthier now than ever before?” The answer is the same as it ever was: because we overeat, we eat a ton of crap food, and don’t sufficiently exercise. We know it and we’ve known it for a long time.

Disappearing Nutrients

OK folks, I’ll admit it; I certainly thought the shiny red tomatoes and strawberries in the plastic clam shell boxes seemed to taste less and less like those I remember as a kid. I thought it was just the idealistic glow around childhood memories. But no; it turns out that our conventional fruits and vegetables really are losing some of their nutritive value.

Product Profile: Fresh Strawberries

Every spring we’re seduced into buying one – just one – box of strawberries at the market. They always look so beautiful: large berries, bright red, the leaves still attached and fresh… Open the plastic clam shell that displays those berries in all their voluptuousness; like Botticelli’s Venus on the seashell. Hold that little beauty in your palm – OK, stop salivating! Make that first slice right through the center…

Seattle’s First Strawberry Farmers

Strawberries have been grown in Puget Sound since the early 20th century, primarily in Bellevue (directly across Lake Washington from central Seattle) and on Bainbridge Island, located in Puget Sound. It was Japanese-American immigrants that pioneered the first strawberry farms.