On bag of sugar from HyVee
 

Clean
Honest
Ingredients

What were they using before?

I forget what it is now, but I had one of those things this past week while shopping with the hubby. I think it was "applesauce made with real fruit" which sort of gave me a queasy feeling on what else would it be made of??

I'm rather amused by the Gluten Free! labels my market puts on things like steak. Yeah. No gluten in steak and no need for a sticker...

Tartan, I don't know the current standards but being in border states, when I've had the options between something grown/produced in the US versus Canada, I pick the Canadian option as being more consumer friendly.

It used to be that US farmers were allowed to put in essentially formaldehyde plugs in the trees to keep the sap running longer which was forbidden in Canada. I also like Canadian standards for sausage and meat products and will buy accordingly as well.

Iceblossom - I had no idea about the Canadian option for food. I will,not buy anything made in Mexico - which limits my tomato purchase at certain times of the year. If I lived close to the Canadian border I thunk I would do just as you do.

The gluten-free labels have gotten quite amusing indeed. I just read that people who are going gluten-free just as a choice and nit because of a medical reason aren’t doing their bodies any good at all as they are missing certain ingredients that are needed. I understand about the medical reasons, but it seems to me that the gluten-free idea is just another bandwagon people are jumping on without investigating the products. And the GF products costs more. I’m also very Leary if the term “organic” because any company can slap that name and raise the price. True organic products have very stringent rules that must be followed when growing the products - even a farm right next to an organic farm can spread the pesticides, etc. that delete the true organic product.

I always think organic foods should cost less as there is less processing and less things (herbicides/weed chemicals) used on them. They are more labor intensive though.

Years ago my daughter had a horse. The farm would sell organic manure.....the horses were de-wormed, would have had antibiotics, as well as vitamins. Thus it wasn’t truly organic. LOL.

Kind of makes you wonder. Before the sugar was made clean, etc., what did they add? Sawdust? Ground beef? Old clothes? Or maybe some even worse stuff?

When the GF craze started, my favorite grocery store slapped that label on everything! It was really funny! GF fresh veggies; tomatoes, peppers, lettuce, celery, etc.

I had never heard of this and I live in a big maple producing area. So I did some quick research. The EPA banned it's use in the US in 1982. Canada did not follow suit until almost 10 years later and banned it in 1991. According to a couple of articles I came across, apparently there were some cheaters in Quebec that were discovered about 5 years ago. I have found the best and safest is to simply go right to the source. I get my maple syrup from local producers. My husband keeps bees so I get honey straight from the hives. In the summer when we have farmers markets all over, most of my produce is bought at the farmers market. I go straight to the farmer for a lamb every year for my freezer and I get a pig every other year. I raise my own chickens (both meat birds and egg layers). We used to go up into Quebec to buy cheese form a local cheese factory in the middle of dairy country just over the border. Boy did they have good cheese! Because I simply don't have the freezer space for quarter cow, I do still buy beef from the grocery store as well as italian sausage.

Buying local at the source, if you can, is the most consumer friendly and environmentally friendly way to go.