How to Buy Apples

I’ve learned the hard way that at least some organic apples may be unsafe to eat. Since last summer, I’ve experienced neurotoxicity after eating organic apples from organic grocers, farmer’s markets, and restaurants in Oregon and Washington. Since apples are on the short list of foods included in the Vega diet, and since other patients on that diet have been having similar problems of late, I’ve worked out a way to get safe apples.

Step #1: Fall in love with apples that have hidden beauty

Modern apple production is designed for apple sellers who want apples to look good, stack well, and last forever, and for buyers who desire apples that look appealing to conventional consumers. Those apples conform to an industrial age ideal. They’re uniform, large, brightly colored, waxy, and free of blemishes. They may not be safe, nutritious or delicious.

So, if you go into a grocery store and see a beautiful pyramid of shiny, perfect-looking apples that you find attractive, look again. Apples that are uniform or conform to a commercial ideal are ugly. Learn to see it. Educate your perceptions so that when you encounter foods that are safe and nutritious you will recognize them.

Step #2: Learn to love the blemish

When did you last see a worm in an apple? I bit into one fifty years ago. It wasn’t that bad. Really! The only harm it did me was the harm I did myself by freaking out.

Did your grandmother quilt? If she did she may have included intentional flaws for good luck. See flaws in your apples as signs of the loving hand of nature.

Step #3: Accept cost and loss

Pay more. Don’t by apples that last forever. Accept that safe apples will sometimes spoil. Be happy to compost them knowing that they won’t poison your compost.

Homework: listen to George Jackson’s song “One bad apple” (don’t spoil the whole bunch girl) by the Osmonds or Jackson 5 or Aaron Carter. If you like it, take it as your apple-buying theme song.

Step #4: Do your own certification

Certification is a social processes, not a biological one.

That’s critical, so I’m going to repeat it: certification is a social process that may or may not reflect biological realities.

Certification begins with taking best guesses, accepting them as real, and making political compromises. Then the guesses are codified to create a new status quo that is enforced and that inadvertently prevents new learning. Remember alar? As with DDT, our modern methods of analytic thinking put the blame on the chemical rather than the chemical approach. Organic certification is a modern system with all of the same flaws as conventional certification. It’s a bridge system. It may be a good temporizing measure with respect to safety and sustainability, but it’s a modern system and is therefore subject to paradigm capture. As long as it lacks a means for grounding itself in biological realities—including human health—it will fall short of the emerging paradigm.

The new natural certification by small local producers is better. It gets you closer to the possibility of personal responsibility—yours and your orchardist’s.

Step #5: Find an orchardist you trust and buy direct

Fortunately, sensible farmers and eaters saw this coming. Chances are good that you have access to an orchardist through community-supported agriculture or farmer’s markets. Seek out the orchardists and talk with them. Ask them what they do.

Choose an orchardist the way you would a doctor. Be alert for those with the skills to listen and learn. Seek out thoughtfulness, grounding, life experience, full disclosure, and common sense. Be wary of orchardists who are dazzled by molecular biology or chemistry. They may lack grounding in daily life.

If you can’t connect with an orchardist, see if you can find a local coop or grocer who displays unwaxed fruit in containers and see if they can help you.

Step #6: Support your orchardist by becoming a loyal customer

We rely on farmers. We literally put our lives in their hands. In turn, they rely on us. If we don’t support them, they can’t practice their art and we can’t procure safe, delicious, nutritious foods.

While you’re at it, if you can afford to eat out, support any local restaurants that make the effort to serve safe food. If you’re shy, see if you can get over it; you really do have to trouble the chef to find out exactly what’s in the food. A savvy chef would give you a comment card, as per the Maria Hines restaurants.

Step #7: If you’re interested, investigate the problem in your area

Everybody I’ve talked to is pretty sure that any problem must be someone else’s responsibility. Orchardists point to the apple sizer, which coats fruit with a dip that may be dirty. This is consistent with Dr. Vega’s recommendation that patients can eat apples safely if they peel them. As far as I can tell, though, the distribution system predated the current wave of poisoning. So while post-orchard contamination may be an important problem, there may be at least one problem in addition.

I suspect that the newer neonicotinoid biocides are getting into apples through birds or bees that visit apple flowers. The observations in favor of this hypothesis are: 1) the spread of neonicotinoids and the toxicity of organic apples are both recent; 2) The neuritis I get after eating apples is similar to what I get from flowers and other pollen- and seed- related foods; 3) an orchardist whose apples I can eat takes steps to avoid over-pollination (interestingly, he says that some people can’t tolerate particular varieties of apples—presaging more problems for GMO apples.)

If you find out anything, please share!

Wishing you happy holidays and homely apples and safe eats!

Next Time: Safe eats  I’ve found in Ashland, Portland, and Seattle