Evaluating our food supply -- and how we feel about it

Photo by Randi Workman, via ksl.com

Perhaps more compelling than the question "Do we know what is in our food?" is pondering, "Do we want to know?"

My thoughts have thus ranged after a recent TV news story in my neighboring city of a woman reporting she found a snake head in a can of green beans. The woman was working with teenagers in their church kitchen to prepare a meal for senior citizens and noticed the snake head when they lifted beans out of a slow cooker. She threw the beans out and notified the store, which refunded her for the 30 cans she purchased. The manufacture  withdrew that particular lot from the marketplace.(Click here to read story.)

The gross-out potential of such a story is high (as Indiana Jones would say, "Snakes. Why did it have to be snakes?"), and unsurprisingly people flooded an online comment board with plenty of "Ewws!" and "I'm never eating green beans again!" Others shared stories of their own less-than-appetizing finds inside commercially prepared products -- such as a starling in a can of spinach and a mouse baked in bread.

Er, excuse me while I regroup.

OK, are we back?

Such anecdotes can make one swear off ever buying processed food again! Eww, eww, eww! Other commenters were nonplussed and pointed out that it's unrealistic to expect a completely clean food supply. After all, these normal-Joe commenters said, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration allows certain levels of insects in the food we buy.

Sure enough, the FDA's Defect Level Handbook lists acceptable levels of what the organization deems "natural or unavoidable defects in foods that present no health hazards for humans." It's an interesting read, although please don't do so over lunch! And while I'm always on the prowl for good Scrabble words, I could have gone my entire life without learning a new one from this document: excreta. 

Here's a sample for a pantry staple, peanut butter. Measurements in the right box indicate maximum acceptable level.

The FDA handbook glossary defines aesthetic as "offensive to the senses." No kidding.

All of this certainly motivates me to grow as much of my own food as I can. Yet, interestingly, I believe my experience raising food tempers my response and broadens my perspective. I know that snails slobber on tomatoes. I know that grasshoppers and birds -- and all sorts of things -- poop in the garden. I wash produce, cut out blemishes and move on. I've bottled apricots, handling each one individually, and still not seen the tiny white worm until it ended up floating in my sealed jar. (That time, as my first foray bottling, I threw the jar contents out, but now I would just pick out the worm.) I've pulled a daddy-long-legs off my dinner salad, no big deal. I know certain things are unavoidable even with food that I closely inspect and handle every step of the way. 

Back to the story of the snake head, consider that those people didn't notice it right away either, when they opened the can. The woman found it later when pulling the beans out of the pot. 

I don't like dwelling too much on my food and think these stories of animals in products are the memorable, icky exception to the rule. In the name of not starving I choose to give the benefit of the doubt that growers, processors and regulators are doing the best they can. In the end I appreciate these thoughts from people who chimed in on the snake-in-a-can story:

Poor-man's vacuum sealer, and freezing tomatoes

The demand of my time to preserve the garden's bounty greatly decreased when I discovered how easy it is to freeze tomatoes. There are two methods: whole without peeling (for real!), or by first blanching to remove skins.

I did the latter method for the tomatoes in these pictures. I dipped the tomatoes in boiling water for 30-60 seconds, then removed to an ice water bath. The peels slip off easily. I cored and cut the tomatoes into slices before packing into zipper freezer bags. I find that slicing helps me fit them into bags more efficiently.

My poor-man's vacuum sealer is a straw. Put the straw against one edge of the bag, taking care not to submerge into liquid. Close the zipper all the way against the straw, pushing against the bag to squeeze out air. Be careful not to splash! If desired, you can do do a final, gentle inhale on the straw to draw out any remaining air. Watch as you go so you don't suck up any liquid.

This works great to pull out air. It is especially efficient with items not packed in juice, such as green beans. You can pull the sides of the bag right next to your food, eliminating the air pockets that invite freezer burn.

I fill quart-size bags with 3-4 cups of tomato slices with their juice. Lay the bags flat on a cookie sheet and transport to the freezer. This helps them freeze flat without molding to the shelf. The tray also corrals any drips as you walk to the freezer (not that I would know about this!). Once frozen you can take bags off the tray. I like to store them upright, like books on a shelf. You could also do smaller amounts in a bag to create a thinner sheet of tomato goodness that you can easily break off when you want to throw some flavor into what you're cooking.

The other method of freezing I mentioned is to freeze tomatoes whole. First remove the core. Then place on a sheet for flash freezing (so they don't stick to other tomatoes). Place in bag once frozen. You can do the straw method to remove extra air from the bag.

When you want to use a frozen tomato, run it under warm water to gently remove the peel.

Freezing tomatoes whole is a huge time saver but does take more freezer space than blanching and slicing.

I still can tomatoes, but I don't always have enough tomatoes at once to do a full batch. And oh, the time canning takes! Freezing tomatoes instead is a fantastic option. Canning tomatoes takes more time and energy up front; freezing is simple but of course requires energy to store them. I've had them store well in the freezer for a year. No matter which preservation method -- freezing or canning -- these tomatoes are ideal for use in soups or sauces.

A tip for space-saving flash-freezing

First of all, what is flash-freezing?

It is the process of freezing select food items in a single layer, such as on a cookie sheet. Once frozen, the items are transferred to a sealable plastic bag or other airtight container. The main benefit of flash freezing is that items can be stored close together in the bag, but can be removed in desired portions without the entire clump sticking together. 

Whole berries, sliced fruit, peeled bananas, peppers and tomatoes are easy to freeze. (Bananas work best with wax paper spread on the sheet first.) Other vegetables, like green beans, need to be blanched first. Blanching halts enzyme action, and is done by briefly boiling vegetables (beans, for instance, for three minutes), and then immediately plunging into ice water for double that time. The blanching step freezes vegetables at their most colorful peak.

But back to my tip. The only disadvantage of flash freezing is you need a lot of flat area in your freezer. I like to stack cookie sheets to consolidate space.

Find two objects of identical height and put them toward the edges so the tray above it will be balanced. You want something taller than the items on the sheet to ensure air circulation and obviously, so they are not crushed. Here I have used two yellow cups. Then stack your other sheet on top, for a double-decker space-saving flash-freezing option. Whew, that's a lot of hyphens!

After a few hours in the freezer, or overnight, transfer the items to your container. Another tip is to use a straw to suck out all the air from a zipper-style bag (oh no, not again) as you seal it closed. Easy-peasy. (sigh)

What do you freeze best?

Food Storage Seeds

Many of you know that we are big fans of heirloom seeds here at Backyard Farming. We were at the store the other day and we saw a can of heirloom seeds that you can put in your food storage. We have seeds that we bought a few years ago in our freezer, but I like the idea of buying them canned. The seeds we saw said tehys are good for 4 years. The nice thing about heirloom seeds is that you can harvest the seeds from your fruits and vegetables and then plant them the next year which gives you a perpetual garden. This is not something you can do with most hybrid varieties. I decided to see what I could find online in regards to similar products and here are a few I found. Backyard Farming not affiliated with any of these sites. Our intention is not to endorse any particular site but instead to give some ideas for what is out there.

Patriot Seed Supply

• 20 varieties of hardy heirloom survival seeds passed down from our forefathers.
• Survival seeds rated for 5+ years of storage at 75F, longer at lower temperatures.
• No hybrids, GMOs, or outdated survival seeds. All harvested seeds are reusable.

 Emergency Essentials

• They allow you to harvest your own seeds, giving you the ability to plant a garden from year to year.
• Seeds have been specially dried to just the right level for long term storage.
• At 65-70°, they will store for up to 4 years.
• Hermetically sealed in E-Z Lock Reusable Triple-Layered Foil Bags.

Preparedness Seeds

•   16 large seed packets sealed in a #10 can.
•   Plants nearly 3/4 acre of Garden.
•   Will keep up to 4 years if stored at 66 to 70 degrees and much longer if kept colder
•   All Non-hybrid, open pollinated varieties

Would you consider adding something like this to your food storage? Have any of you bought something like this in the past and then used the seeds? I would be curious to know how they worked for you.

~Michael~

Tomato Tip

Last year Michael and I planted 16 tomato plants! Our house was overflowing with tomatoes and I LOVED IT. This year because we moved into the apartment and I was lazy, I never planted any tomatoes. I should have planned ahead and planted in pots. I really regretted this later, but was resigned to the fact that I would be buying all our tomatoes from the farmers market and grocery store this summer. To my surprise, our good friends Dave and Janis came to our rescue with THREE tomatoes plants! I was ecstatic. Each morning I really enjoy going out on the balcony,  watering my plants, and saying hello to my cute little green tomatoes.

This little guy keeps jumping up to our two story balcony and likes to hang out in my plants. He jumps at me almost every day, and scares me to death. Do you think he is going to injure my plants?

And now for the tomato tip:

With 16 tomato plants, we were constantly eating tomatoes. But, we always had enough left over that they would go bad, but not enough to really do something with like make tomato sauce or salsa. 

If you have that same problem, here is the solution! 

Simply take the excess tomatoes and freeze them! Here are the steps you will need to take:

Step 1: place them in boiling water for 30 seconds to loosen up the skin.

Step 2: take them out and put them in an ice bath, to stop the cooking process.

Step 3: The skins should just slide off, so slip off those skins.

Step 4: Chop, dice, cut, puree or whatever your plans are for the tomatoes.

Step 5: Place them in a freezer bag making sure you get out as much air as possible.

Step 6: Freeze

UPDATE: Maybelline, a faithful backyard farming reader, left a comment saying that you don't need to blanch and peel the tomatoes before freezing (even better, right?) Just run them under warm water and the skins should peel right off.

Keep accumulating and freezing tomatoes until you have enough to make your favorite salsa, tomato sauce, tomato paste, or any other recipe you need a lot of tomatoes for. You may want to write on the freezer bag how many cups of tomatoes are in there. It will make it easy to know when you have reached your goal.

~marisa