For as long as we can remember, when we were hungry, we go to the grocery store and buy whatever we wanted to eat. We gave little thought to where it came from, how it got there, or who produced it. Initially, it was the American farmers and ranchers who grew those vegetables and raised beef, pork, and poultry. They would then load their harvest on trucks and take it to market to sell.
In today’s modern society, more and more of our food is produced in large, “factory style” facilities that have no resemblance of the family farms of years ago. It is also imported from countries that have little, or no, concern about the quality of the end product. Vegetables are sprayed with chemicals to preserve them, to enchance color, or to kill any pests they have. Animals are tightly packed in large feed lots, or grow houses, and are fed grain that is not a part of their natural diet, given lots of antibiotics and hormones, to grow them as big as possible, as fast as possible. Ultimately those same chemicals, hormones, and antibiotics end up in the food we eat every single day.
That’s why it’s imperative to find, and support, a local farmer or rancher who genuinely cares about the quality of the food they produce. You may not be aware but there is a global, grassroots, movement underway designed to improve the overall quality and health benefits of our food. From organic farmers growing fresh fruits and vegetables to small producers using regenerative agriculture to raise the best available beef, pork, and poulty.
Pudgy Pastures 