That is the question - With all deference to Shakespeare's Macbeth.
I bought some tomatoes and a lettuce from the supermarket the other week and again this week, but from a green grocer. The difference is astonishing!!! From the supermarket the tomatoes were tasteless and anaemic looking and the lettuce looked OK until I broke it open. The inside was full of grit and what looked like sand and the leaves were extremely discoloured around the stalk. Needless to say that it went into the compost bin straight away and I did without lettuce until I visited the green grocer, where I bought a like looking lettuce, but without all the discolouration and the greeblies and the tomatoes actually tasted a bit like tomatoes.
So, here's an exercise in futility for you!!!
When you go vegetable shopping next time at a supermarket, just have a browse around without actually buying anything. Now this is really a psychological exercise!! When you buy stuff your vision tells you what you WANT to see, not actually what you DO see. You want proof??? Try this scenario -------
When you are buying vegetables your mind has been trained to look for the best shape, colour and ideal size. This is a marketing ploy. Most crops are genetically modified so that they reach the ultimate peak when they are displayed. When you look around, everything looks perfectly suited to your idea of what you want. This is where the ploy comes in as the marketers know that you are usually pressed for time and you have a preconceived idea of what you want and they provide that idea.
Everything looks looks good and exactly what you were after, but when you get them home and have a good look, they are not always what they seemed on display. So don't buy - just look and you will see what I mean. Switch off that buying mind of yours and turn on the analytical part of your shopping brain - and you will understand what I mean.
Tomatoes are a dead giveaway: They are usually presented in trays with bottoms up, and when you turn them over, they are still green and usually blemished around the stalk end and you will find that they don't have much taste.
Truss tomatoes are another trap!! You pay through the nose for "gourmet truss tomatoes" which you will notice are all equally ripe and the same size on the truss. If you have ever grown tomatoes can you honestly say that all the tomatoes on a truss ripen equally and at the same time, with them all being the same size?? NO!!! Of course not!! The truss develops tomatoes from the stem end to the tip, therefore it is virtually impossible for them to all ripen at the same time, unless they are genetically modified.
These are tomatoes on a truss on one of my tomato plants. Notice that they are ripening from the stalk to the end of the truss and they are not all the same size. These are not ripe enough to pick, but they will never ripen all at the same time or will they all achieve the same size. If you wait for the end one to ripen, the ones nearer the stalk will be over ripe and rotten.
I bought some tomatoes and a lettuce from the supermarket the other week and again this week, but from a green grocer. The difference is astonishing!!! From the supermarket the tomatoes were tasteless and anaemic looking and the lettuce looked OK until I broke it open. The inside was full of grit and what looked like sand and the leaves were extremely discoloured around the stalk. Needless to say that it went into the compost bin straight away and I did without lettuce until I visited the green grocer, where I bought a like looking lettuce, but without all the discolouration and the greeblies and the tomatoes actually tasted a bit like tomatoes.
So, here's an exercise in futility for you!!!
When you go vegetable shopping next time at a supermarket, just have a browse around without actually buying anything. Now this is really a psychological exercise!! When you buy stuff your vision tells you what you WANT to see, not actually what you DO see. You want proof??? Try this scenario -------
When you are buying vegetables your mind has been trained to look for the best shape, colour and ideal size. This is a marketing ploy. Most crops are genetically modified so that they reach the ultimate peak when they are displayed. When you look around, everything looks perfectly suited to your idea of what you want. This is where the ploy comes in as the marketers know that you are usually pressed for time and you have a preconceived idea of what you want and they provide that idea.
Everything looks looks good and exactly what you were after, but when you get them home and have a good look, they are not always what they seemed on display. So don't buy - just look and you will see what I mean. Switch off that buying mind of yours and turn on the analytical part of your shopping brain - and you will understand what I mean.
Tomatoes are a dead giveaway: They are usually presented in trays with bottoms up, and when you turn them over, they are still green and usually blemished around the stalk end and you will find that they don't have much taste.
Truss tomatoes are another trap!! You pay through the nose for "gourmet truss tomatoes" which you will notice are all equally ripe and the same size on the truss. If you have ever grown tomatoes can you honestly say that all the tomatoes on a truss ripen equally and at the same time, with them all being the same size?? NO!!! Of course not!! The truss develops tomatoes from the stem end to the tip, therefore it is virtually impossible for them to all ripen at the same time, unless they are genetically modified.
The supermarket tomatoes are picked before they are ripe and stored until they all look so wonderful and they still will not have the true tomato taste!!
AND ..... it is most likely that they have been in cold storage for up to TWO YEARS!!! before they are put out for sale. Cold storage not only destroys the true taste of tomatoes, but also the goodness in them especially vitamin C. So you shouldn't keep any tomatoes in your fridge at any time.
Carrots are another good example of bad food husbandry. Put a pack of supermarket carrots in your crisper in the fridge and also put some that you have just pulled from the garden alongside them. You will find that in 5 or 6 days your carrots will start to go limp whereas the supermarket ones will last for weeks!!! WHY??? GM!!!!
The supermarket carrots also look straight, thick and a lovely orange colour. Take a look at your home grown ones - knobbly, forked, twisted and God only knows what else, but they taste like carrots should taste. That is the way Nature intended them to grow - NOT BODY BUILT ON STEROIDS!!!!
AND ..... it is most likely that they have been in cold storage for up to TWO YEARS!!! before they are put out for sale. Cold storage not only destroys the true taste of tomatoes, but also the goodness in them especially vitamin C. So you shouldn't keep any tomatoes in your fridge at any time.
Carrots are another good example of bad food husbandry. Put a pack of supermarket carrots in your crisper in the fridge and also put some that you have just pulled from the garden alongside them. You will find that in 5 or 6 days your carrots will start to go limp whereas the supermarket ones will last for weeks!!! WHY??? GM!!!!
The supermarket carrots also look straight, thick and a lovely orange colour. Take a look at your home grown ones - knobbly, forked, twisted and God only knows what else, but they taste like carrots should taste. That is the way Nature intended them to grow - NOT BODY BUILT ON STEROIDS!!!!
I rather imagine it is impossible to find food of the quality we enjoyed when we were young.
ReplyDeleteI agree mate, but I am still trying to bring that taste back to our table.
ReplyDelete