We recently began buying the Hound Dawg puppy cookies to supplement his little pepperoni inspired treats. He loves them!
Even though it was my idea to buy them, I think they are expensive. They are good though, made with cane sugar, molasses, flour, spices and no weird unpronounceable things.
The Dawg thinks they're yummy. Well, the are yummy. Yes, I did try them. (Yes, I am THAT person...)
This week, I needed to use up some applesauce and I thought dog cookies sounded like a wonderful thing to try. I found a great Peanut Butter and Applesauce Dog Biscuit Recipe over at dogtipper.com. So far Hound Dawg thinks these are pretty good too. They are. (Yes, I tried them too. Hey, I made them.)
I think convenience will still occasionally beat out economics in our future "dog cookie/biscuit buying versus baking model" but I'm very glad to have a fun, easy and fairly fast way to make wholesome treats for the pooch. Overall, they truly are much less expensive than the store bought goodies and I like being able to cut whatever shapes I like.
The question might be asked, "Why go to this much trouble over dog treats?" The answer, "We like that Hound Dawg!" Plus, recently we did a not entirely scientific or well controlled experiment/taste test with the Dawg and he pretty definitively told us he likes his cookies.
Here we have another truly horrifying look at the big business factory farm model in the United States. How I wish that awareness of the inhumane and unhealthy ways we produce meat would truly hit the mainstream.The only thing truly likely to change big business practices is backlash from the consumer and a hit to the bottom line. As long as mainstream America views humane food procedures as the domain of the "flakes", "granolas", and "hippies" the big business model will always look to profit over health and safety. Legislation would help but again big business tends to find work-arounds.
Here's how I've begun to deal with this issue in my life. How I, trying to be The Practical Omnivore shop for meat. I've started researching the brands I buy to see if their claims match up with production. While I don't live in an area where it is easy to find free range anything, I look for companies that promise their animals are grain fed without antibiotics and that that have free access to food and water at any time. This means I buy chicken that isn't free range but the chickens do not spend their lives crammed in little cages, percolating in their own feces. I've started eating buffalo from time to time because I trust the production company. Very occasionally, I buy mainstream meat when I need a certain cut that I cannot buy within my own list of "approved" brands. I do that with great reservation.
All of this means that I'm also making a choice to spend a little more on most of the meat that comes into my house. It also means that I have to shop at more than one store for the brands I desire. Having a small deep freeze helps in this as I can stock up when I'm in the stores and lessen my number of trips and the amount of gas I use. For me, it's been well worth it. I find the quality of meat generally higher and I feel much better knowing that my dinner was treated ethically before it came to my plate.
When I watched Food Inc. the "Steak and Taters Guy" was very concerned. I remember him walking through the room and saying, "I hope this doesn't mess up my hamburgers", one of his favorite meals. Well, it hasn't. I've just become much more aware of where my food comes from and learned more about what things I'm willing to sacrifice to feel good about what I eat. It's a journey I'm still on, balancing cost with what seems right but it's been well worth it.
When I moved to South Mississippi, I was intrigued by the citrus trees. I'd never lived in a climate warm enough to support citrus. Soon after beginning work at the library, the offerings started pouring in. It seems that many people with satsuma trees, oranges, and tangerines often have more produce than they can absorb. What better place is there to take that surplus than to the staff at the local library. YUM!
Two years ago, thanks to another friend at the library I discovered Meyer Lemons. Again, YUM! The Meyer is a cross between a lemon and some type of orange, introduced to the U.S. in 1908. So, it's been around awhile but it's fairly new to me. A good Meyer lemon is much larger than a lemon bought at the grocery store, with a deep yellow color, and a beautiful tangy scent.
Last spring, I bought a Meyer Lemon tree. It came with blossoms intact and many made it through it's transplant into my soil. I spent the next several weeks anxiously watching to see if the blossoms would set, hopeful that I'd get some lemons in my first year of lemon tree ownership. By the end of the season, I had eight lemons. I'll admit they weren't the best specimens, a little small for Meyer Lemons, but the flavor, just right!
I spent about $35 on my tree. I got eight lemons. This means, that if you don't factor in my labor of watering, fertilizing, extra costs for the "good" soil I planted the tree in, and not to mention periodic checks for lemon growth those lemons were worth about $4.38 each. Uhm... slightly higher than market value. However, when you balance that price with the absolute joy of picking my own fruit, right outside in my own yard, knowing that after I planted the tree no chemicals were added to the growing mix of my lemons, I'm thrilled. Of course in future years, provided conditions are right, the cost of my lemons should drop dramatically.
This year, I was thrilled to use my own lemons for the lemon drink I made when my family celebrated an early Thanksgiving meal at my house last Saturday. It's very fulfilling to have parts of the meal provided from the bounty of your own efforts. The cornbread dressing was partially seasoned with lemon thyme I grew and the salad was picked in my own garden. For me, this type of circular motion is very pleasing, to produce and consume products of my own labor.
Bonus offering of the day:
As I started writing about lemons, I couldn't get this song out of my head. Enjoy.
This morning, on the local TV news site, I saw an interesting interview/article about a local High School Government Class. For context, it's important to remember that here in Mississippi, we are the "largest" of the fifty states which is pretty impressive for a state that actually ranks 32nd among the 50 in actually land area. In Mississippi, we are winning the fat race.
I often, sarcastically say to friends, "Mississippi is finally first in something." Now don't get me wrong this is my adopted state and it's been good to me. I have wonderful friends here and love the area. It's like family, I can criticize but you sure better not unless you live here (or have lived here).
How does this relate to the local government class? The instructor took his students on two trips, one to a grocery store and one to the unnamed fast food joint of the Golden Arches. They were tasked in the market to find vegetables for one dollar. Then, at the fast food restaurant they were asked to buy food for one dollar. When they got back to class they compared their shopping.
In the interview about the project, government teacher Hardy James said, "For the first time in probably, in human history, what we eat makes us sick. That's really kind of crazy. And there are government policies behind these cheap, high-calorie, low-nutrition foods."
I'm very impressed that this high school government class is discussing the politics of food. The interview goes onto state that the "goal of the lesson was to get students to question what's in their food and who should be to blame for the spike in obesity and diabetes". Fascinating stuff, at least for me. I'm not one to say the government should regulate what we eat, but it's hardly even a question that the US Government hand in hand with big industry tweaked the way we use food, produce food, and view food. (Read Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma for a discussion on corn and how it drives our food market.) If you're interested in watching the video of this shopping experiment, check it out Here.
