Last week I attended my first Farmer's Market of the summer. Granted, it's not quite summer up here in Canada, but it's getting close.
If you have never been to a Farmer's Market, I can't stress enough how great these places are for people who are trying to eat healthy. When it comes to the benefits of a Farmer's Market, It can all be summed up in two words - Fresh Food.
Fresh produce, fresh dairy and fresh meat. And these days fresh anything is worth it's weight in gold.
You see, in the big money world of grocery super stores, one thing rules supreme and that's shelf life.
Companies go to great lengths to be innovative in their packaging and formulations in order to squeak another couple days of shelf life out of their products before they expire. Whether it's ultra-high heat pasteurization of dairy products, or the sodium benzoate and potassium sorbate found in almost all bottled drinks these days, the "shelf life wars" are changing the look and feel of our foods.
The longer they are on the shelf, the more likely you will buy them.
From milk to fruits and vegetables, the product with the longest shelf life wins.
However, my adopted Nutrition mantra of "The quicker it goes bad, the better it is for you" suggests that we should be buying and eating foods that have the shortest shelf life.
My reasoning for this is that we are still discovering the compounds in food that benefit our health, and I'm sure it will be sometime before we actually have an exhaustive list. The more we discover, the more we realize that many of these compounds degrade quickly, and what might be present in fresh foods may not be present in some of the ultra extended shelf life versions you find in grocery super stores.
And this is where summer Farmers Markets are a great tool.
Make it a priority this summer to do most, if not all of your shopping at farmers markets, paying special attention to pick the freshest in-season fruits and vegetables that you can find.
Finally, here are the three hidden treasures I found last weekend.
One- Goats Milk Yogurt
Why is this a hidden treasure? Well for one, it tastes AMAZING, but more importantly compare the ingredients to the leading off-the-shelf yogurt.
Goats Milk Yogurt: Pasteurized whole goats milk, bacterial cultures.
Leading Yogurt: Skim milk, cream, sugar, concentrated skim milk, fructose, milk and whey protein concentrate, corn starch, gelatin, modified corn starch, active bacterial cultures, natural and artificial flavors, locust bean gum, natural & artificial colors, malic acid.
Quite the difference!
Two- Grass Fed Meat
The rumors are true, this stuff tastes Great!
More importantly, these steaks come from cows which were allowed to graze on a pasture, as opposed to the beef from corn fed cows. The difference, (Other than no hormones and no antibiotics in their feed), is that the meat from grass fed cows is actually higher in polyunsaturated fatty acids than the meat from cornfed cows. Nutritious and Delicious
Three-Locally grown Produce
Almost all of the produce at Farmer's Markets are locally grown. Why does this matter? It matters because this means you strawberries didnt take a 1,000 mile drive to get to you.
And there you have it, the 3 hidden gems that will make me go back to my farmers market this Saturday.
BP
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