What's in the Name?

Friends,

I took this information word for word from elmwoodstockfarm.com Elmwood is where I received a lot of training as a farmer. They are located in Georgetown KY. If you have any friends that live in that area, Elmwood is by far the best CSA farm around. Check out their website.
What's In a Name?
Often we are asked questions at the farmers market about organic, or what does sustainably grown mean, or what is all-natural? Does grass fed mean no grain was fed, but aren’t weed seeds considered grain? There are many terms in food marketing to describe production principles, sometimes even willful intention to confuse the public and throw the scent off your understanding. So let’s try to clear some of this up.

Organic is owned by the USDA and denotes a strict set of guidelines, that are overseen by a 15 member Board, administered by a certification agency, with third party inspections for verification. This is a thorough and tedious process that involves verification of every input and an audit process. Only producers, stores or products that are certified organic can legally use the word as a descriptor.

Sustainably Grown- This means the farm or processor decides what they consider sustainable and make you think it is almost organic. Who knows?

Natural- USDA allows food products to use this term for meats when nothing was added to the product after it was harvested. There is no oversight about how the animal was raised with regard to antibiotics, genetically modified grains, hormones, or animal welfare issues.

Cage Free, Free Range, Free Roaming are terms for laying hens that are loose in a ‘house’ that often contains thousands if not tens of thousands of birds that share an egg laying box with other hens but never go outside nor have space to exhibit their “chickenness” as Joel Salatin would say.

Pastured Poultry- Layers, broilers or turkeys that have access to pasture and consume plants, insects, and can scratch in the dirt for dusting or can exhibit their chickenness.

Grass Fed- There is an American Grassfed Association that is wrestling with growers and consumers about any grain in the diet. The issue for cattle and sheep is when feeding grain, it changes the pH of the digestive system, therefore altering the fatty acids in the meat in a way that tends to be less healthy for us to consume.

Locally Grown- For large grocery stores this generally means an eight-hour truck drive from the distribution center, not sure about the farm location.

Certified Angus Beef means the animal was all or mostly black and meets a certain meat quality standard. This gives a consistency in the marketplace, but says nothing about how the animals were raised.

“USDA Organic” is the gold standard of truth in labeling for food merchandising. And we are proud to bring it to you weekly.