Healthy Organic Foods - Is The Hype Worth It?

Healthy organic foods used to be easily recognizable. Generally, they were much smaller than their chemically enhanced counterpart, and significantly more expensive. For many people, buying organic simply wasn’t worth it. Nonetheless, the availability of organic products sparked a realization among consumers – they now had a say in how their food was handled.

As the demand for healthy organic foods increases, the differentiating factors have begun to level out. Prices are increasingly becoming more competitive, and the quality and quantity of healthy organic foods is improving. This is good, but it can make shopping a little trickier. Just this weekend I was surprised at the register when the price of my bananas was almost double what I normally pay. What happened? I picked the organic instead of the non-organic. They looked exactly alike and I wasn’t paying attention.

Some may ask, what’s the big deal whether something is organic or not? The truth is it’s a personal choice. Some believe that chemicals in our food have affected our bodies in ways that wouldn’t have occurred otherwise. It’s certainly no secret that the human body is significantly larger than it used to be. Could it be an effect of the growth hormones fed to the original food product?

Part of the attraction to healthy organic foods is the consumer knows that the food they are consuming is subject to very specific guidelines – such as meat being “free range” or grown without chemical pesticides and fertilizers. In an ideal world, everyone would have access to healthy organic foods. Unfortunately, most of us live on a budget and may opt for non-organic to keep the cost down. If you’re on a budget, skip over organic fruits and vegetables that you can peel, like oranges and bananas. Once you’ve discarded the peel, you’ve also discarded the chemicals. Instead, opt for organic items like apples, where you can eat the peel. No matter what you buy, make sure that you clean it thoroughly when you get home.