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Ever wonder why garden and farm stand produce tastes so much better?
Award-winning nutrition journalist Michael Pollan, author of “In Defense of Food” 'Penguin 2009), says in his book that supermarket produce travels an average of 1.500 miles before it reaches your local store. To accommodate travel distance and time, growers pick their produce weeks before it’s ripe. Since it’s not ripe, taste and nutrients have not fully developed.
The unripe produce goes into storage until it’s time to ship. Often, it's treated with preservatives to keep it from spoiling during storage. When it reaches its destination, it’s treated again, but this time with ripening agents. Local farmers, he says, have no need for preservatives? or ripening agents. Sunshine does the ripening, and their produce is picked ripe or just a few days from ripe.
Then there's the question of pesticides. In most cases, he said, local farmers grow their produce without pesticides because they’re eating it, too, and just like you, have concerns about pesticide residue. Bug control is more often by mechanical means, like row covers, or picking off pests byhand When local farmers do use pesticides, they tend to use a lot less than mega farms.
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