does it matter?

It is absolutely forbidden.

You are getting a concentrate of what ever you put into the juicer. If it has harmful parts you getting more of that and more directly and quickly into your system. It will also effect the flavor and not in a tasteful way! I would not recommend doing it often.

If it has a thick skin, I peel the skin and juice it. Oranges and lemons, pineapple, apples. If I juice any root vegetables, or anything that has a thin skin, or a skin that can't be easily peeled, I always get organic. Might be bad, but I ain't dead yet, so take it for what it's worth...

I use a lot of mangoes and cucumbers, which I can't get organic around here, so I just peel them with my vegetable peeler first.

Debbie

Absolutely, it's fine.

- The truth is though that very little of pesticide residues in conventional food exceed safety tolerances, less than 0.27 percent according to the most recent 2011 data from USDA's Pesticide Data Program. And that 0.27 percent is before washing. [www.ams.usda.gov]
- Also the most current and comprehensive review of studies done on comparing organic and conventional food finds no nutritional advantage for organic food. [med.stanford.edu].
- Most of the studies on cancer rates and fruit and vegetables showing a protective effect were done on convetional vegetables, not organic.
- Organic food can be substantially more expensive than conventional leading less produce consumption for those on a budget.

I think there are bonafide reasons for buying organic. Pesticides have been linked to occupational threat of farm workers. They have also been linked to ecological impacts particularly the recent decline in bees that threatens the entire food supply. [www.diseaseproof.com] And it's actually this ecological impact, not the human health impact, that makes me buy over 80 percent of my food as organic.

So, to sum up, based on what I've read, I like organic for it's help for the planet. I don't believe it is that healthier or safer than conventional food, but for the ecological benefit. That said, you can juice conventional food in safety esp if you wash your produce though some pesticides like systemics aren't removed through washing.

Paul

I agree with Paul. I was joking earlier, obviously, because when someone asks if it's "okay," I would ask: what is the alternative--to drink soda? To buy a can of V-8? So conventional produce is way better any day than a Pepsi or a canned drink.

Okay. I have strong feelings and distrust about any research that says there is basically no nutritional difference between organic and conventional produce. I've known people who can tell the difference by tasting. I'm an organic gardener and my produce is way different than regular produce. It' better than store bought organic, but way better than conventional. There are basically only three "chemical" nutrients added to produce conventional produce, which is "hybridized", or "genetically modified" to grow under these conditions. Organic produce is farmed with organic fertilizers, composts, and minerals. The real nutrition is in the minerals. After eating organic produce for a long time, people are usually disappointed with some conventional produce. Some conventional products don't seem to matter as much. There is a "dirty dozen/clean 15 lists" for conventional produce that are easy to access via google. Stay away from the "dirty dozen", and embrace the "clean 15". It's good to remember that one of the issues with "genetically modified" is that the vegetables are modified to accept stronger pesticides, and herbicides such as "round up". Poland recently integrated law to forbide "Monsanto" from doing business in their country. Yea!

Enjoy organic produce while you can. I just read an article that Monsanto is starting to buy up heirloom seed companies. I would hope Monsanto wants to get a niche in the market, but I fear it is to buy the competition out of business and control the market. It seems it may be a matter of time before they figure a way to infiltrate the Organic agricultural business.

That being said, when I turned vegetarian 44 years ago, there was no access to organic produce. I worked in a vegetarian juice, sandwich, and salad place. I felt much better eating and drinking lots of fresh produce and juice than I did on my conventional diet.

I have to admit to not being 100% raw, and it would be interesting how much conventional produce affects someone who is 100% raw, and someone who is partially raw, and someone who is practicing the now popular grain base, low fat/no fat vegan diet.

My wife is from Ukraine, and having spent quite a bit of time there, I'm not sure how organic their vegetables are in the open markets. Most the produce is coming from smaller farms and it is the best tasting produce I've ever tasted. The soil is considered some of the best in the world and the produce shows it. Everything is very seasonal, and my wife avoids buying out of season. We are so spoiled here with our all seasonal and taste compromised selections.

Monsanto is a huge zillion dollar industry which is very aggressive about any competitive angle that might affect their business such as "organic" farming and "organic" market share. They have field lawyers that drive the country side to find farms and farmers that could come in their litigation sight. They would not be above "backing" research to equate conventional produce with organic produce in nutritional quality. In our present day "research" is politically and financially motivated; I do believe.

I still would like to know why Monsanto can litigate against a farmer because their seeds cross pollinate with the farmer's seeds. Why can't the farmer litigate against Monsanto for their seeds pollinating and corrupting his seeds?

I buy completely conventional food. I'm on a budget and high quality local conventional food is fresher and less expensive than either organic or non-season conventional. I'm also afraid after reading Christine Cox that organic food is more likely to make me sick because of pathogens like ecoli. [blogs.scientificamerican.com]

I like farmers markets or gardening my own. Most of the organic food I see in the store is less fresh than the conventional and substantially more expensive. It's just not much of a bargain in my opinion.

Do you want all those pesticides, fungicides and herbicides in your juice??????

Dr. Norman Walker, one of the medical experts on juicing in the 20th Century, said that most pesticide residue is strained out in the juicing process. To me the main difference between organic and commercial produce is the nutrient content. However, now that WalMart even carries organics and now that the organic labeling isn't as trustworthy as it used to be, one has to be careful. Produce can be grown without harmful pesticides and be called organic, even though it's grown in depleted soil. If the soil and growing environment isn't healthy, the plant won't be healthy, as it gets a lot of nutrients from the soil. It won't be bad for you, just won't have all the nutrition you might think it has. Also sitting in plastic wrapping during long shipping processes robs nutrition too. I'm fortunate to live in a city with lots of local farmer's markets, and a lot of people are growing hydroponically now too, so fresh greens are available all year round. I volunteer at an aquaponics place, and get some wonderful stuff. Eating local produce from reliable organic farmers is the best. However, buying produce at WalMart, if nothing else is available, is still far better than eating junk. So whatever you can afford, whatever access you have, just start there and do not lament. Because digestion and absorption is better when we eat with a calm, unworried mindset. Stress about what you're eating creates harmful chemical reactions in the body.

Tack local-grown onto your list of must-haves. Even organically grown fruits and vegetables have diminished nutritional content if they are harvested in a region far from your home market. If they picked the food when ripe, it would be spoiled by the time it reaches you, so they have to pick early.

It's a pain to buy ripe-harvested produce because you will make several trips to the market, but you receive more nutritional benefit and better tasting food.

Organic produce, atleast where I live is expensive. Doing a juice fast with the price of organic produce is next to impossible to do.

nick2788 Wrote:
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> Organic produce, atleast where I live is
> expensive. Doing a juice fast with the price of
> organic produce is next to impossible to do.


Do you live in the USA? If not, then you might have some point. But I can get organic produce for a song, at least for certain items. Get organic carrots from Trader Joe's--only .89 a pound (.99 for Whole Foods' juicing organic carrots). WF's is good about organic greens averaging $2.49 a bunch. I just scored some organic celery at my produce market for .79 a package! I weighed one and it was over a pound! Trader Joe's has organic apples @ $2.49 for two pounds.

lol, your explaination of how good you have it when it comes to food cost come off a little bit sassy. Well actually a little bit narrow and rude. Not all places have that pricing structure or a trader joes.

Here in Oahu, Hawaii, it cost me 4 dollars a pound for celery, zuccini, lettuce, and most everything and 5 dollars for a bunch of spinach. and lol 10 dollars a pound for many other produce goods. I pay about 2 dollars for a sweet potao. plz excuse my spelling errors.

Believe me, I miss the days where I lived in Cali and produce was reasonable enough for every meal to be a gourmet masterpiece.

I prefer and purchase organic produce whenever I can. That said, it's a shame if the perception is that trace amounts of pesticides that may be present in conventional produce poses enough of a risk to increase cancer risk. Just to state the obvious, conventional produce also contains the important phytochemicals which there is data to show protects against cancer relative to those who eat less (conventional) produce. In contrast, little to no data in human health trials to show real cancer risk, just exposure. Exposure isn't risk. Our body eliminate pesticide residue.

I'm not advocating eating conventional produce over organic. I'm saying if good local seasonal organic produce eludes you either in terms of price or availability, your next best move (apart from growing your own) will be to look for local in season conventional produce carefully washed in vinegar and hydrogen peroxide (3 percent) separately and rinsed.

Getting the best fruits and veggies you can is the most important thing. And I think personally, that locally and in season for me are ahead of organic, but organic is a close second. You may see it differently

Paul



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 03/24/2014 03:38PM by pborst.

vibrantpurelife Wrote:
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> lol, your explaination of how good you have it
> when it comes to food cost come off a little bit
> sassy. Well actually a little bit narrow and rude.
> Not all places have that pricing structure or a
> trader joes.
>
> Here in Oahu, Hawaii, it cost me 4 dollars a pound
> for celery, zuccini, lettuce, and most everything
> and 5 dollars for a bunch of spinach. and lol 10
> dollars a pound for many other produce goods. I
> pay about 2 dollars for a sweet potao. plz excuse
> my spelling errors.
>
> Believe me, I miss the days where I lived in Cali
> and produce was reasonable enough for every meal
> to be a gourmet masterpiece.

First of all, I acknowledged that some people do NOT live in the USA. Yes, technically HI is part of America but outside the continental states and therefore different.

Believe it or not, many people are "narrow" (as you described my comments) even when they live amid produce markets. They are stuck on the chain groceries they are used to when eating SAD. Some people have the erroneous belief that Whole Food's is so expensive that you can't get anything there. While that might be true for many items, I listed organic produce that is below other stores. Trader Joe's sometimes doesn't even have as good prices. And its parent company is Aldi's, is starting to get organic produce and is in HAWAII! Whole Foods has stores in HI--do they charge more than the mainland?

I don't assume that people are doing everything they can to find the best prices and best variety.

Yes, it matters. I haven't read any other posts in response to your question but I'm sure you sparked a heavy debate. Of course you've also probably been told about the pesticides, waxes, etc. on conventional produce. Ideally, you want organic BUT juicing is so amazing for you, even if you have to use regular produce, still do it. Peel it first though.

littlemisstwilight Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> does it matter?

Yes. Inorganic tends to develop more anti-nutrients in the foods, ie, things like higher phytic acid, higher alkaloid levels etc due to pesticides. And organic v's non-organic can have great differences in nutrient levels, but not always.

www.thesproutarian.com