A while ago, in an effort to eat locally, my husband and I joined Farm Fresh To You, and we have since looked forward to each delivery with excited anticipation. Not only does it cut down on what we have to buy at the Co-Op, but also it supports local farmers and environmentally-friendly farming practices, both of which I am happy to help.

Eating local is a trend that is slowly sweeping the nation, and it’s a good one to jump in and join, if you haven’t already. Things like the recent tomato/jalapeno contamination could have been avoided (or at least contained more quickly) by eating locally.

Whether local to you means within your state, within 100 miles, or within your city, by reducing the distance between where produce grows and your plate, you’ll be helping support sustainable food systems.

If you don’t shop at a Co-Op, try it. We joined our local Co-Op after I was diagnosed with cancer so we could find pesticide-free produce. Sure, sometimes it’s a bummer not to find apples in the aisles year round, but there are plenty of in-season goodies I’ve discovered, too. Plus, there are stickers on bin stating where the produce “grew up”, so I know which farms I’m supporting and where my foods got their start.

Even if you only shop for produce at your local Co-Op every once in a while, every little bit helps. Plus, the produce is tasty and vibrant, which makes it all the better to eat!

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On August 8, Nebraska Beef issued a USDA Class 1 recall of 1.2 million pounds of beef because of possible E. coli 0157:H7 contamination, of which about 4 percent was destined for select Whole Foods Market stores in 23 states and D.C.

As a precautionary measure, Whole Foods had already voluntarily recalled fresh ground beef in select stores that use Coleman Natural as a supplier after learning that two state health departments linked illnesses to nine Whole Foods Market shoppers.

This Whole Foods Market voluntary recall was never nationwide, and any meat now sold at Whole Foods is not associated with this recall.

States in the voluntary Company recall include: Alabama, Connecticut, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Virginia, Washington D. C. and Wisconsin.

States that are not part of the recall are: Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Arizona, Kansas, Indiana, Louisiana, New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Idaho, Montana, Utah, Wyoming, Colorado, North Dakota, South Dakota and Nebraska and Canada. Whole Foods Markets stores in these states did not receive any shipments of the meat that are being targeted for recall.

The recalls come as a result of investigations into confirmed cases of E. coli 0157:H7 contamination in Virginia, Ohio, Massachusetts and Pennsylvania.

Founded in 1980 in Austin, Texas, Whole Foods Market is the world’s leading natural and organic foods supermarket and America’s first national certified organic grocer.

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What better way to combine two passions (environmentalism and chocolate) than through companies that make delicious chocolate treats that don’t impact the environment?

First up, Endangered Species, which donates 10 percent of net profits to wildlife habitat conservation projects. Their Supreme Dark Chocolate bar has 72 percent cocoa content in 3 oz., and is gluten free and vegan, and made with all-natural, shade-grown, ethically traded supreme dark chocolate. The label features chimpanzee artwork from Judi Rideout and is printed on recycled paper (see above photo). The chocolate is ethically or fair traded, guaranteeing the workers fair wages and humane working conditions. This product is also certified Kosher by Orthodox Union. On the inside of the label you can learn about the plight of the chimpanzee as well as additional information on Endangered Species Chocolate.

Green & Black’s, which was the first chocolate bar awarded with the British Fairtrade Mark in 1994, is another company that makes eco-friendly chocolate treats. I’m a caramel freak, so I’m partial to their Caramel bar, which blends classic caramel and cocoa-rich milk chocolate and add a pinch or two of sea salt to cut through the sweetness. It’s deliciously decadent and available in 3.5oz bars.

I buy both brands at my local Co-Op.

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A new Federal Trade Commission (FTC) report sheds new light on food marketing to children and adolescents. The report, “Marketing Food to Children and Adolescents: A Review of Industry Expenditures, Activities, and Self-Regulation”, finds that 44 major food and beverage marketers spent $1.6 billion to promote their products to children under 12 and adolescents ages 12 to 17 in the United States in 2006.

The report also finds that the landscape of food advertising to youth is dominated by integrated advertising campaigns that combine traditional media, such as television, with previously unmeasured forms of marketing, such as packaging, in-store advertising, sweepstakes, and Internet.

These campaigns often involve cross-promotion with a new movie or popular television program.

Analyzing this data, the report calls for all food companies “to adopt and adhere to meaningful, nutrition-based standards for marketing their products to children under 12.”

The Commission obtained the data for this report through compulsory process orders requiring financial and marketing information from beverage manufacturers and bottlers; producers of packaged snacks, baked goods, cereals, and prepared meals; makers of candy and chilled desserts; dairy marketers; fruit and vegetable growers; and quick-service restaurants.

The report finds that approximately $870 million was spent on child-directed marketing, and a little more than $1 billion on marketing to adolescents, with about $300 million overlapping between the two age groups in 2006.

Marketers spent more money on television advertising than on any other technique ($745 million or 46 percent of the 2006 total.) But for most food products, they employed the full spectrum of promotional techniques and formats when advertising to a young audience: themes from television ads carried over to packaging, displays in stores or restaurants, and the Internet.

That same year, cross-promotions tied foods and beverages to about 80 movies, television shows, and animated characters that appeal primarily to children. In total, the companies spent more than $208 million, representing 13 percent of all youth-directed marketing, on cross-promotional campaigns. For some food categories, such as restaurant food and fruits and vegetables, cross-promotions accounted for nearly 50 percent of reported child-directed expenditures.

For example, characters from Superman Returns and Pirates of the Caribbean appeared in ads that were shown in movie theaters; and on television, product packaging, the Internet, and in-store displays. According to the report, food marketers created special limited-edition snacks, cereals, frozen waffles, and candies “in honor” of these movie characters.

In cross-promotional campaigns, television ads and packaging often directed viewers to a Web site where they could enter a sweepstakes to win a related premium, such as movie posters, character action figures, and cash. Consumers might also be directed to “advergames” (video games advertising a product), free downloads such as screen savers and ring tones, podcasts, and online video episodes known as “Webisodes.”

The report finds that, although there is room for improvement, the food and beverage industries have made significant progress since the FTC and the Department of Health and Human Services co-sponsored the Workshop on Marketing, Self-Regulation & Childhood Obesity in 2005.

The report cites the Children’s Food and Beverage Advertising Initiative, launched by the Council of Better Business Bureaus (CBBB) in 2006, for taking “important steps to encourage better nutrition and fitness among the nation’s children,” by changing the mix of food and beverage advertising messages directed to children under 12 and encouraging them toward healthier eating and better physical fitness.

To date, 13 of the largest food and beverage companies – accounting for the majority of food and beverage expenditures directed toward children – have adopted the initiative, pledging either not to advertise to children under 12, or to limit their television, radio, print, and Internet advertising to foods that meet specified nutritional
standards.

In addition, several major food and beverage companies have adopted the Alliance for a Healthier Generation guidelines, which are designed to lower the caloric value and increase the nutritional value of foods and drinks sold in schools outside the school meal program.

The report recommends that all companies that market food or beverage products to children under 12 adopt meaningful, nutrition-based standards for marketing their products – standards that extend to all advertising and promotional techniques, including, for example, product packaging and in-store marketing.

Companies also should improve the nutritional profiles of products marketed to children and adolescents, whether in or outside of schools; cease the in-school promotion of products that do not meet nutritional standards; and improve the quality and consistency of the nutritional criteria adopted for “better for you” products. The report also recommends steps to enhance the Council of Better Business Bureaus’ initiative.

Finally, the report recommends that more media and entertainment companies restrict the licensing of their characters to healthier foods and beverages that are marketed to children, so that cross-promotions with popular children’s movies and television characters will favor more nutritious foods and drinks. Media companies also should consider limiting ads on child-directed programs to those that promote healthier foods and beverages.

The Federal Trade Commission works for consumers to prevent fraudulent, deceptive, and unfair business practices and to provide information to help spot, stop, and avoid them.

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As if I haven’t harped on Stevia enough already, there’s one more way I get a lot of mileage from my little Stevia bottle.

Rather than buy a bunch of lemons when I’m in the mood for fresh lemonade, I turn to ReaLemon, which is 100 percent lemon juice from concentrate. I get it at my local Co-Op (although I know they also carry it in just about every grocery store). It’s packaged to look like a real lemon in a cute yellow plastic bottle.

To make my version of what I like to call Lazy Lemonade, I add ice to a glass, squeeze the lemon in, add a few drops of Stevia, add water, and then adjust to taste.

I’ve also tried it with ReaLime, and that’s also quite tasty. 

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Speaking of sugar, there’s one item (besides baked goods) in which Stevia will not do, and that is the highly addictive phenomenon known as Kettle Corn.

If you’ve never before tried this sweet-and-salty popcorn made with granulated sugar, salt, and oil, walk–no, run!–to your nearest fair, amusement park or open air market, where you will most likely find a Kettle Corn vendor preparing the delicious stuff.

In the close but no cigar vein, you can also find Kettle Corn in the microwave popcorn section of your local supermarket.

Or DIY with one of these recipes:

Kettle Corn
Sweet and Salty Kettle Corn

But to me it’s kind of like salads and/or sandwiches, both of which always tastes better when someone else makes them. You haven’t ad Kettle Corn until you’ve bought it freshly made and piping hot from a vendor.

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When it comes to tomatoes, all are most definitely not created equal.

And if you’ve ever had an heirloom tomato, you know exactly what I’m talking about.

Right now, my local Co-Op is overrun with big, beautiful heirloom tomatoes in all shapes and sizes.

According to Wikipedia, the list of heirloom tomato varieties includes:

Big Rainbow – One of dozens of large fruited yellow tomatoes with red swirls, having a mild, sweet flavor.

Blaby Special – A red fruited cultivar grown in the village of Blaby in Leicestershire until just after World War II.

Black Krim – A dark red to brown cultivar often cited in seed catalogs as being from the “island of Krim” in the Black Sea, better known as the Crimean peninsula in Ukraine (Crimea is known in Ukrainian as Krim).

Brandywine – A large fruited pink (red flesh, clear skin) variety produced on vigorous potato leaf foliage plants.

Cherokee Purple – One of the very first known “black”, or deep dusky rose colored cultivars.

Green Zebra – Often called an heirloom, it is not.

Hillbilly – See Big Rainbow, above.

Jubilee – A heavy yielding, golden fruit.

Lillian’s Yellow Heirloom – One of the few bright yellow fruited varieties, and the only one with potato leaf foliage, this is a delicious, full flavored tomato that is very meaty, with few seeds. It tends to be a late season variety.

Mortgage Lifter – The enormous pink tomatoes are sweet and tasty.

Traveler, syn. Arkansas Traveler – An open pollinated pink tomato in the 6 ounce range. Another cultivar commonly referred to as an heirloom, although by most definitions it is technically not.

Call it what you will, but I like any heirloom fresh off the vine, washed, cut, and sprinkled with salt and pepper with a drizzle of olive oil on top!

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To me, cherries are the best fruit ever. They’re fun to eat, good for you, and sweet enough to be considered a dessert. In fact, one cup of cherries is only 87 calories, and is a good source of choline, a nutrient in the B vitamin family.

Other stone fruits are equally tasty and offer their own unique benefits.

According to the USDA National Nutrient Database, one cup of sliced apricots is 79 calories and had both vitamin A and beta-carotene. One medium nectarine is only 62 calories and a good source of potassium. One medium peach is a mere 58 calories and also contains potassium and vitamin A. And one cup of sliced plums is 76 calories and contains vitamin A.

Stone fruits are everywhere right now–at the grocery store, at the Co-Op, and even highlighted on some restaurant menus.

Now that you know my stone fruit obsession (cherries)…what’s yours?

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The newly-launched channel Planet Green is taking “Bam!” to a whole new level with Emeril Lagasse in the new show “Emeril Green”. The show, which airs Monday through Thursday on Planet Green, will focus on seasonable, sustainable food and will be shot on location at Whole Foods.

Six episodes will debut on Monday, July 14 from 8-11PM (ET).

To find out how to watch Planet Green channel where you live, click here.

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Green beans are in abundance right now, and whether you choose traditional green, yellow (called wax beans) or even purple, they are bound to be the sweetest and freshest of the season.

When choosing green beans, go for long and skinny over short and plump, as the longer beans tend to be sweeter and crisper than their stumpier counterparts. If the beans “snap” when broken in half, and look bright and moist, snap them up!

To cook green beans to perfection, trim the stem ends and leave the wispy string end intact. Add salt to the cooking water when boiling or steaming to help them stay bright in color.

Then rinse and enjoy!

Or try one of these recipes:

Skillet Green Beans and Peppers
Green Beans with Lemon
Green Beans with Sage and Pancetta

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