Farmers Market Greens vs. Packaged Salads: The Safety Showdown

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April 24, 2012
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As the child of two doctors, horror stories of e-coli on spinach permeated my family's dinner table conversation on a fairly regular basis. I cannot adequately describe the terror that still overcomes me at the sight of a standard plastic salad container. Growing up, we raised our own lettuce - somehow knowing where the food came from made us feel safer. Yes, our newly harvested mesclun mix was covered in dirt, but it was our dirt.

Recently, I have begun to re-examine my fear of industrially raised baby-greens. Is it rational? Probably not. A new piece from NPR looks at the relative safety of local and packaged greens. The conclusion may not be what you are expecting. 

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Are Local Salad Greens Safer Than packaged Salad Greens? from NPR

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pmurphy
I love nothing more than a summer tomato (maybe add some balsamic, basil, and home-made mozz). In my free-time, I cook, read about cooking, farm, read about farming, and eat. Food is a basic necessity, but good food ought to be a fundamental right.

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1 Comment

ATG117
ATG117 April 24, 2012
Very interesting article. I think many people assume, as did i, that locally grown necessarily means safer and better for you. This raised issues I never considered.