A question that almost always comes up during cooking demos is, "Should I purchase all organic produce or does that not matter?" Unfortunately, this is not a very straight forward answer because everyone has different food budgets and access to food, which dictates purchases. In short, I do think it is better to purchase organic when you are able, but this is not a necessity.

In searching how to provide a more solid answer for patients, I came across a great website my friend shared with me, (https://www.ewg.org/). This website has great educational resources to better understand the difference between organic vs non-organic produce. In fact, there is a great resource called, ‘Dirty Dozen, EWG's 2018 Shoppers Guide to Pesticides in Produce.’ https://www.ewg.org/foodnews/dirty-dozen.php. This guide highlights 12 foods you should always buy organic and reasons why. Another good resource is called, ‘Clean Fifteen, EWG's 2018 Shoppers Guide to Pesticide in Produce.’ https://www.ewg.org/foodnews/clean-fifteen.php. This guide highlights 15 produce items that are okay to eat non-organic, along with reasons why. 

Those are just two of the thousands of resources offered on this website, designed to educate the public. EWG is an organization that focuses on educating the public in many different areas including; how to support good personal health, in addition to supporting our environment. This is a great site for anyone wanting to keep up to date on any potential environmental harms in our communities, in addition to any hazards or toxins the public should be trying to avoid.

I hope everyone takes the time to look through the site. It’s amazing, seeing all the different sources of chemicals and toxins in our communities that are really not talked about in everyday conversations. Even more amazing, is that The United States is supposed to be one of the world’s leading countries, but has clearly fallen far behind the pack in keeping its communities safe.