Under the organic certification, Nicotine sulfate and Pyrethrins can be sprayed as pesticides, it strikes me as being moot exactly what the source of these chemicals are. If you can detect a difference between Pyrethrins that are extracted from plant sources and those that are coal-tar derived, it is only in your imagination.

Now just so we are crystal clear on this matter please understand that I think you are a deluded fool and an ignoramus if you are basing your selection of produce on it having an organic label on it rather than a close look at exactly what cultivar is being offered and exactly how it is grown.

As for your attempt at humor, please don’t expect to make stupid remarks in one part of your comment and expect us to know the difference when you try and crack a joke.

        DV82XL said:

…

By being blunt and direct, you mean contentious and argumentative. Perhaps I should have made my point a little more obviously, with regards the basis of comparison being different. We’re not comparing apples with apples. We are comparing massed produced, sprayed Red Delicious, and “organically” grown Cox’s Orange Pippin.

(And, just to avoid confusion, the use of apples in the example was as much analogous as it was a real example. I wouldn’t normally feel the need to point that out, but seeing as how so many missed the humour in the salt reference, subtlety seems to be misplaced here.)

My point from the beginning was that the organically certified product is of a different strain / breed / root stock to the run of the mill variety. I had originally conceeded that I had no like for like basis for comparison, a point that you have either missed, or selectively ignored.

As for organic farming methods producing a better tasting end product from the same stock, who knows. I didn’t make that claim. I stated that the economics of the matter were such that the varieties were likely different, given the different target market and factors of production. The crap that is grown to be quick to market is not the same that is grown to have an organic label slapped on it. Perhaps you know precious little about the factors that go into crop selection. I wouldn’t know if you did or didn’t, however, and I certainly wouldn’t be arrogant enough to suggest either way.

My point about the soft-skinned fruit still stands, however. Take fruit from the same seed stock, grow one with herbicides, pesticides, insecticides, or whatever else they spray, paint or drop onto them, and there will be detectable traces of chemical inside the fruit. Like for like, I’ll take the fruit that doesn’t have the taste of burning. I would be interested to know if I’m being delusional there, and still hearing lossless sound quality from my gold plugged ear jacks, or if I may have a valid point, and that the ingestion of insecticides, no matter how safe, may not be preferential.

Perhaps there is a misunderstanding in translation – After all, I refer to the UK situation, where the Soil Association is the main certifier of organic produce, and was originally a non-agribusiness institution. That they have slowly been subsumed by the major distributors (i.e. the supermarkets, not the growers), and the credibility of the certification brought into doubt, although this is tangential to my point. I realise that the article is US centric, and that there is a different balance of influence at play.

On the basis of what is available in shops, with the UK as my frame of reference, there is a marked difference in the quality of produce marked organic, than is otherwise available.

        Borganic said:

In any case, who are you to pass judgment, on a matter such as taste, which is intrinsically personal and based on individual perception. If you wish to draw parallels between those that buy food labeled as organic (on the basis of taste) to those in the audiophile crowd that buy tungsten and platinum blushed connectors (on the basis of audio quality), you might want to do so with some of the similar tools that you use to demolish the basis of their perception – such as double blind tests that show no benefit to connectors containing rare and precious metals or specious electro-magic.

Organic in the food sense would appear to have a number of definitions, but mainly appears to refer to produce that has not been subject to any intensive chemical treatments (be they organic in the pure chemistry sense or not). I believe the article points to a number of valid inconsistencies in this definition, such as the use of potash and other naturally(ish) occurring phosphates, but I don’t believe that a strong enough case has been made to denounce “organic” farming as a philosophy, either from a growers or a buyers standpoint.

Let me be as blunt and as direct as posible; if you believe after reading the main article, that anything labeled as ‘certified organic’ is different than that which is not, you are in fact struggling under the same delusions. You also know precious little about what practices impact the taste of produce.

Most cultivars come in several varieties, and have been bred to meet certain demands, one of which is that they grow to market size as rapidly as posible. When this type of produce is grown, what actually is happening is that water is being taken up and retained by the plant tissue at a rapid rate, and thus the other constituents are effectively being diluted, thus making the vegetable a bit tasteless. This is less due to the inputs of nutrients (from whatever source) and more due to properties bred in to commercial seed-stock.

In the case of some fruits, like tomatoes for example, they are also bred to be picked green so that they are firm enough to be machine handled, and expected to ripen on the way to market. There is no comparing these to a vine-ripened, tender type like ‘beefsteak’ that needs be hand picked and whose plants will yield over several weeks.

It goes on. and I could write pages of examples. So when someone tells me they prefer to buy from local truck farmers (that know they had better show up with a superior product) because of the taste, I will believe them. But ‘certified organic’ crops simply will not be better just because of the steps that are taken to get that name are not the ones needed to make better food. That was the whole point of the original post. These standards were set by agra-business, not science, not taste-tests. It is just more complex than what is being touted by this stupid certification, and if you or anyone else claims to taste a difference, it is all in your head.

Holy straw man, Batman. Perhaps I should do you the same discourtesy of discounting all that you say, on the basis of some criticism that I decide to fabricate? And then you proceed to paraphrase a point that I have already made. What group of people does that imply you belong to?

In any case, who are you to pass judgment, on a matter such as taste, which is intrinsically personal and based on individual perception. If you wish to draw parallels between those that buy food labeled as organic (on the basis of taste) to those in the audiophile crowd that buy tungsten and platinum blushed connectors (on the basis of audio quality), you might want to do so with some of the similar tools that you use to demolish the basis of their perception – such as double blind tests that show no benefit to connectors containing rare and precious metals or specious electro-magic.

Although it pains me to need to explain the organic salt reference, it’s apparent that it has been misinterpreted by all and sundry (save for Brad F). The post preceding mine (Stingray, June 12th, 2008 at 5:25 pm: When I first saw the bottle of “organic water”) was a comment on the inconsistency of use of the term organic. My reference to salt was in the same vein.

And just so that we are all on the same page: organic, in the chemistry sense, refers to a myriad of carbon, hydrogen, phosphorus etc. compounds. I don’t pretend to offer a definitive description, as I’m not a chemist.

Organic in the food sense would appear to have a number of definitions, but mainly appears to refer to produce that has not been subject to any intensive chemical treatments (be they organic in the pure chemistry sense or not). I believe the article points to a number of valid inconsistencies in this definition, such as the use of potash and other naturally(ish) occurring phosphates, but I don’t believe that a strong enough case has been made to denounce “organic” farming as a philosophy, either from a growers or a buyers standpoint.

        John Doe said:

This is a horrible website and it is full of horrible people.

You should all stop with this. What is wrong with you?

Go away! This is the worst thing I have ever read. It’s just a PR assault on the organic food world by the big companies loosing big money. Shut up! Go away!

Failtroll.

On the matter of salt, the only “organic salt” I’ve ever heard of is stuff that’s been evaporated straight out of the ocean without (or with little?) further processing. Never checked the validity of that, nor have I heard it used much. That is, take it with a grain of… salt.

        Borganic said:

I’ve always been a big fan of organic salt.

I thought he was trying to end on a humourous note…

        DV82XL said:

I stand corrected.

I have a feeling that’s not what he’s talking about at all. That would be an example of a chemical salt, yes, but this dude seems to not be caring too much about chemistry.