Standard Pages (they don't change often)

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

Food and propaganda

We have a lot of truisms thrown at us daily when it comes to food. Some are quite nebulous - "ginger builds your immune system" - and others are just accepted as valid. For example, that the premium paid for produce bought at a Whole Foods is justified for quality, as opposed to say, a Walmart. But is it?

Colby Krummer writes at the Atlantic, where produce from both Walmart and Whole Foods were used to prepare restaurant quality meals, and subjected to blind tasting among different judges. Some of whom are avid food activists of a sort. The results were by no means unanimous, but surprising.

-----spoiler below -------







Diners frequently chose produce from Walmart as better tasting than the items from Whole Foods (albeit to some surprise and chagrin). Granted, it was just one test, but it was telling.

Bear in mind, though, that the Walmart produce can often be as expensive as the Whole Foods stuff.

1 comment:

  1. Wow, that is some Walmart! Seriously, most walmarts have poor selection when I have shopped there and while packaged or non perishable foods tend to have great prices, I agree the fresh food is very expensive. Same with Target. I buy certain things from Whole Foods (buffalo, cheese, some breads, some seafood, granola) and the rest from Kroger, HEB, or farmer's markets. Not Central Market, though. Thaat place drives me crazy and my foodie friends think I am crazy for not shopping there.

    ReplyDelete