Monday, October 1, 2012

"Dirty Dozen" Link

http://www.webmd.com/food-recipes/news/20110613/apples-top-12-foods-with-most-pesticides
Here's the list they give: (on the WebMD site they also give you the clean 15)


  1. Apples
  2. Celery
  3. Strawberries
  4. Peaches
  5. Spinach
  6. Nectarines (imported)
  7. Grapes (imported)
  8. Sweet bell peppers
  9. Potatoes
  10. Blueberries (domestic)
  11. Lettuce
  12. Kale/collard greens 

Give Your Produce a Bath!

Happy Monday Free-Eaters!
It was a busy last week for me, but I am ready to bring more interesting info to you all today!! As you know, Fall is upon us, and therefore the return of my Fall Favorite, the Honey Crisp Apple has occurred! Now, it isn't always easy to find Organic Honey Crisp, so I decided to try soaking them in apple cider vinegar to remove residual pesticides and toxins! It was amazing to see what seeped out of the apples after only 15 minutes in their kind of stinky bath! As a test I also soaked an organic Gala apple simultaneously. White residue was on the outside of the non-organic apples (which I happily scrubbed away) and my little organic gala showed no change whatsoever! Super neat to see!

So, to do this soak you add 1/4 cup of vinegar (I used gluten free apple cider vinegar that I had on hand) to a sink full of water and soak for at least 15 minutes. I would soak apples for longer seeing that they are subjected to the most pesticides and other harmful toxins and top the list of foods found with the most pesticides. I will attach a link that list the other "dirty dozen" foods. While I recommend still buying organic for the most sensitive of us Free-Eaters, this vinegar bath is a good trick to just clean produce in general. It removes harmful pesticides and dirt, but also, due to its acidic nature, kills a lot of bacteria that can be lurking on the outside of your produce in a safe to consume manner. A large number of people get sick from bacteria on the outside of produce that doesn't get rinsed throughly and can be transferred form slicing into fruits and veggies or consuming them with skin on. Remember, this vinegar bath will not help with GMO produce because its insecticidal and pesticidal nature is genetically embedded in the produce not sprayed on.

Hopefully, this simple method can help you all eat free of worry about germs! Keep eating freely and enjoy fruits and veggies freely ;)
More to Come,
Mary :)