1:50 minutes (435.35 KB)
Phil discusses the new easy way of having organic foods delivered to your doorstep.

love fresh and slightly bitter currants

Answers to your questions about the 100-mile diet and eating locally grown food.

10:13 minutes (2.34 MB)
Phil Lempert takes you down the aisles and talks about the latest happenings in the supermarket world. He discusses General Mills and consumerism. He asks why cereal the most affordable meal to serve? How does one avoid an ice cream headache? Find out this and so much more here with the LIME's Supermarket Guru!

A trip to a farmer’s market raises the big debate: even if it's not organic, is it still a greener way to shop?

Blueberries are my favorite fruit. So it's sad to see the time come, usually in mid-August, when price of the pint containers in my local supermarket starts rising, and then they disappear from some places altogether.

Such is the cost of eating seasonally. But the benefits definitely outweigh the drawbacks. After all, even as I say goodbye to my beloved blueberries, there are other favorites coming into season. Like tomatoes and basil, for instance. I make a traditional Caprese sandwich on rustic rolls, along with some fresh mozzarella, a drizzle of good olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and a sprinkling of flaky sea salt and freshly ground black pepper. In my household, this sandwich is in frequent rotation until the season for good, juicy tomatoes is over.

My visits to the farmers’ market can be an emotional mixed bag. Nothing compares to my glee at the year’s first enticing whiff of locally grown, organic strawberries. I swear I can taste them from ten feet away with my eyes closed, especially if I’m breathing deeply. But for every sweet, familiar berry or sensuous heirloom tomato, there is mystery bounty, such as cardoons, stinging nettles, squash blossoms, and their ilk—these sexy sirens of the seasonal vegetable kingdom lure me to buy them, despite my not having a clue how to prepare and eat them.

When old fogies complain that everything was better in the good old days, we dismiss them as crotchety crackpots. But the amateur Andy Rooneys might be right about one thing: fruits and vegetables were better for us fifty years ago than they are today. Why? Because much of the produce we buy now contains fewer nutrients than it did fifty years ago.

Scientists are sounding the alarm about what they’ve dubbed “the dilution effect;” the plummeting concentrations of some vitamins, minerals and protein in our foods. And the problem isn’t limited to produce.