Fresh Choices by David Joachim and Rochelle Davis is much more than a mouth-watering collection of recipes. Chock full of inspiring interviews, useful bits of "Choice Advice" and cooking tips in the form of "Helping Hands," it's an incredibly informative fresh food primer. Fresh Choices is an invaluable introduction to learning about where our produce, meat, seafood and dairy comes from and what choices we can make for healthful food, even if organically raised food is out of reach financially or geographically. Author Joachim recently shared some of his thoughts on kids, food, farming, and even candy with LIME.

LIME: As the son of back-to-the-soil gardeners, you grew up very connected to food and the earth. Do you think there is a growing desire to reconnect, and think beyond the grocery aisle to where and how our food is produced?

JOACHIM: Absolutely. Farmer's markets have enjoyed a rebirth in the past 10 years and sales of organic foods show no signs of slowing down. It's not just nostalgia for some bygone era of small time agriculture that's driving consumers to farmer's markets. In an age of avian flu, mad cow disease, salmonella-tainted poultry, and e. coli contamination of ground meats, people are starting to rely less on the mass-produced food of the supermarket and more on the quality-controlled food of the farmer's market. Consumers want the assurance of clean, uncontaminated food and they like looking into the face of the farmer who produced it. I'm incredibly fortunate to have grown up on what my parents eventually turned into a small CSA (community supported agriculture) farm. It gave me deep respect for farmers, for quality ingredients, and for well-maintained soil. It made me understand that interconnectedness of the entire food chain and our environment. The fact is that whatever is in the soil, in the water, and even in the air will eventually be consumed by small organisms, then bigger animals, and finally humans who will probably ingest some of the harmful substances that happen to have come into the food chain along the way. We're still discovering the health effects of certain environmental contaminants like mercury, PCBs, and dioxins, but there's enough research to warrant caution when buying food. It's certainly reassuring to know where your food comes from and how it was produced.

LIME: Do you think organic foods will become mainstream?

JOACHIM: Organic foods are already mainstream. Wal-Mart, America's largest food retailer, has been carrying organic food for a couple years now. By the Fall of 2006, Wal-Mart will offer the most extensive line of organic products in the country. Add that to the success of organic and natural grocery store chains like Whole Foods and Wild Oats, and it's safe to say that organic is now bona fide mainstream. Even small-town grocery stores often carry some kind of organic produce.

LIME: Did you ever eat junk food as a kid?

JOACHIM: Of course! I ate lots of candy. My brother and I would spend our allowance on video games and candy down at the 5&10 (can you believe there really were 5&10's still around? And I'm still in my 30s!). I used to love FunDip. The genius candy was a sugar stick in the shape of a tongue depressor. You licked it, then dipped the sugar stick in-what else?-packets of flavored sugar. I also liked Bottle Caps. Root beer was my favorite. I was pretty big into candy as a kid. But my favorite sugar binge was to go into our home kitchen, open the pantry, unscrew the lid of the maple syrup jug (pure maple syrup) and chug, chug, chug-a-lug. I would down about 1/2 cup of pure maple syrup at a time. It was awesome. (Confession: I still chug maple syrup occasionally.)

LIME: Remind me to pass on pancakes at Chez Joachim! How did having kids affect your food buying habits?

JOACHIM: I became much more aware of how sensitive kids are to pesticides and other contaminants in food. I started buying organic milk, organic baby food, and basically as much organic food as I could because I wanted to protect my kids.

LIME: Why is it more important to choose pure food for children?

JOACHIM: One look at the size of their bodies says it all. Here's an example: Ant poison is strong enough to kill an ant but not a human adult. Well, agricultural pesticides like DDT are strong enough to kill small pests, but also strong enough, if ingested regularly over a period of months or years, to harm a developing fetus, infant, or young toddler. Fortunately DDT is now banned, but it still persists in soil and still shows up in pesticide residue tests of vegetables like spinach. Here's the bottom line: Most pesticides aren't a big concern for older children and adults because our bodies are bigger and our brains, organs, and muscles are more fully developed. But young children are smaller, more vulnerable, and developing at such a rapid rate that contaminants like pesticides can have a negative cumulative effect on them over a period of years.

LIME: If I let my child eat fresh, locally grown Oregon strawberries that are sprayed with a fungicide at harvest am I dooming her to unknown future illnesses?

JOACHIM: No. The real health impact comes from repeated ingestion over a period of years. Eating a sprayed strawberry here and there is not likely to have a significant health effect on your child (or you). But you have to put a kid's diet in the context of their overall health profile. If your child has allergies or other health complications, a small amount of pesticide or other food contaminant may be less tolerable for them.

LIME: Fresh Choices suggests knowing what foods are seasonal and local, and therefore safer choices for our kids and for the environment, and offers options for when seasonal and local are not available. Are there some simple "rules" to follow at the grocery store when thinking about options for less harmful ingredients?

JOACHIM: Let's unpack that a bit. It's important to know that buying "seasonal and local" doesn't necessarily guarantee that your food is safer. You can buy locally grown, heavily sprayed produce all year long and ingest plenty of harmful pesticides along the way. The most compelling reasons to buy local are to support your local economy and small family farms rather than huge multinational agriculture conglomerates, and to reduce the environmental impact of long-distance food importing. The reason to buy seasonal is to get the most plump, luscious, flavorful produce available and because most seasonal produce is grown nearby rather than shipped from another climate. As for food safety, the "organic" label is the best assurance you have that your food grown without the use of pesticides. There are other labels, too, such as "Protected Harvest" that give reasonable assurance that the food was grown without pesticides. Many of these are explained in Fresh Choices. You can also check out the eco-labels website for definitions of "nearly-organic" and "beyond-organic" labels.

LIME: Do you feel that more people would choose organic foods if they were less expensive, or do you think the majority of us are too busy to think about it?

JOACHIM: Price is always a big concern for consumers. Yes, more people will buy organics foods if the prices are low. Organic food prices are coming down as the market expands. Wal-Mart will bring the prices down even further.

LIME: Do you think that agribusiness will find a way to undermine organic farming?

JOACHIM: It already has. Agribusiness has co-opted the organic movement and is now mass-producing organic food. That's the trouble with the USDA organic food label. It is defined very narrowly as food that is produced without the use synthetic pesticides, petroleum- or sewage-sludge-based fertilizers, bioengineering (genetic modification), or irradiation. That's it. End of story. The official USDA definition doesn't say that organic food has to be produced locally, or seasonally, or on a small family farm, or that its producers can't exploit their workers, or that animals have to roam free, or that the food is free of other environmental contaminants. Organic meat, poultry, eggs, and dairy products are defined simply as coming from animals fed 100 percent organic feed and given no antibiotics or growth hormones. That's it. Period. It doesn't say the animals are "free-range," or treated well, or living in clean conditions. "USDA Organic" is very narrowly defined and with the rise of the organic food market, agribusiness has gotten in on the game in a very big way. Many food companies now have a line of organic foods. We now have what is best called "mass-produced organic food." This isn't all bad. It does mean that more grain and animal feed is being raised organically rather than conventionally. But it does open the door to the weakening of organic regulations as agribusiness lobbies hard to bring down the costs of producing organic products.

LIME: I'm hearing burblings of an organic backlash—that it's more important to buy locally than organic, or that the organic methods are restrictive to farmers who choose to farm responsibly, but not certifiably organic. What gives?

JOACHIM: It all goes back to the USDA's definition of organic. Now that mass-produced organic food is available, people who understand the narrowness of the definition are choosing to buy food that is more than simply "grown without pesticides." They know that most small farmers take better care of their soil and their animals than do huge producers of factory-farmed organic food. Plus, the organic certification documents are now geared toward huge producers, making it more costly, time-consuming, and difficult for small farmers to get certified. My best advice for consumers is to buy produce from farmer's markets and ask the farmers how they farm. Do they rotate crops to enrich the soil? How do they keep pests off the plants? Are animals raised on pasture or in houses (how many per square foot)? Are they given antibiotics or growth hormones? How far does the farmer go to ensure the health and vitality of their farm, the plants, and the animals? It may very well be that the "uncertified" food you buy at a farmer's market is grown with greater care for the environment and for the food itself than the mass-produced certified organic food you buy at a supermarket.

LIME: Sometimes I think kids know more about environmental and nutrition issues than their parents, with some school programs focusing on childhood obesity and global warming. But kids don't have the resources to change things. What are some ways you think kids can shape the way their families eat?

JOACHIM: Kids can always make a stink and parents will listen. Kids can ask their parents: Are these strawberries organic? Or, Mom, why are we eating strawberries in January? Don't strawberries have a short season only in June? Kids can have an enormous influence on what foods their parents buy. If kids need more information on making good food choices, they can go to Generation Green.

LIME: It all feels very exhausting, I can't carry this much information in my head! Do you have a handy guide that I can take with me to the store?

JOACHIM: Yes, actually! We produced a shopping pamphlet that encapsulates all the food buying advice in Fresh Choices. It's small, lightweight, and easy to take to the market. You can get one by contacting info@generationgreen.org.

LIME: Now back to the fun stuff, what's a Joachim family favorite that we can make for our kids too?

JOACHIM: Our kids (7 and 3 years old) love edamame. I buy organic frozen edamame and simmer it in water with a tablespoon or two of tamari (soy sauce) and a splash of toasted sesame oil. Drain it and toss with a few pinches of coarse (Kosher) salt. A fun snack to eat with your hands. Our kids also love fried rice, burritos, and pizza (all homemade of course).

LIME: Is there a question you wish someone would ask you, and what is the answer?

JOACHIM: I wish someone would ask me to dinner. The answer is Yes.


Jicama Fennel Salad with Lime Orange Dressing

The anise-flavored fennel and citrus in this salad really wake up the tastebuds. So does the peppery bite of watercress! If you can't find fresh watercress in the herb section of your grocery store, use a torn-up head of
buttercrunch lettuce. And, in that case, you might want to double or triple the hot pepper sauce for extra kick.


1 small jicama, peeled and cut into 2" long matchsticks (about 3 cups)
1 medium fennel bulb, trimmed and cut into 2" long matchsticks (about 3 cups)
3 large organic seedless navel oranges
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Juice of 1 lime
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon ground fennel seed (optional)
1/4 teaspoon hot pepper sauce (or more to taste)
1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 bunches watercress, stems trimmed
1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
1 tablespoon sliced almonds

In a large bowl, combine the jicama and fennel.
Peel and section two of the oranges. Cut each section into quarters and add to the bowl. Squeeze the juice from the remaining orange and the lime into a small bowl. Whisk in the oil in a thin steady stream until incorporated. Whisk in the salt, nutmeg, ground fennel seed (if using), hot pepper sauce, and black pepper. Pour over the jicama and toss.
Divide the watercress among 6 salad plates. Top with the jicama mixture. Pour any remaining dressing evenly over the salads and sprinkle each with the basil and sliced almonds.

Makes 6 servings.

Helping Hand: To trim fennel, cut off the stems and fronds where they turn pale green and the white bulb begins. Save the stems and fronds for another use (toss them into a stock or sauce for a delicate anise flavor; the fronds also make a beautiful garnish). Trim off the base of the bulb and cut it in
half through the base. To make curved matchsticks, cut or pull off the naturally crescent-shaped slices from the core of each half. To avoid the somewhat bitter membranes in the oranges, make "supremes" out of the sections. Start with the whole orange and cut off 1/2 inch from the top and bottom just to expose the flesh. Stand the orange on one of the cut
sides and cut off the peel all the way around the orange. Stand the rindless orange on end and run the knife on either side of each segment in a V-shape to remove each segment from its surrounding membrane. Put the resulting
orange flesh or "supremes" in the bowl and squeeze any juice from the cut scraps.

Reprinted with permission from Fresh Choices by David Joachim and Rochelle Davis (Rodale, 2004)