Taste Life! The Organic Choice [Paperback]

Five stars plus a heart! -- Lex Ticonderoga, Today's Books

Just in time for summer crops! The top people in organic food, a couple dozen of them, share their thoughts on this growing option. A fellow from Washington State's Skagit Valley covers the history and business of growing. Another, product development and marketing. A mother details her concern for her family. Others corroborate how chemical-free gardening works. Thoughts on farmer-earth relationships, cooking organic food, it's all here. And the emeritus folks get equal billing. Sir Albert Howard, a turn of the century Brit who helped poor farmers in India feed themselves without chemicals. About J.I. Rodale, the patriarch of the nutrition publishing empire, who picked up on Howard;s experience and began an American movement. The Dust Bowl events of the 30's sounded an alarm. Others read Rachel Carson's Silent Spring and reacted. Good soil is alive with organic matter. This humus teems with nutrition. But large scale farming the past 150 years has dropped the humus content of some soils to 1 percent. Organic farmers and related colleagues fixed that. Here's how, in a book "written both for the patient, forebearing earth and its hungry inhabitants." And it's not just a marketing plan, with a logo on a label. "If you process the life out of the grain, you can't call a loaf of bread organic, even if it is made from organically-grown wheat." Full of pull-quotes and pithy comments in the margins. Pieces from TV's Food Network, Cornell University, scientists. Includes the poem "This Compost" by Walt Whitman. My goodness, the goodness is here! -- Jay Bail, The Book Reader

Written by over a dozen of the foremost leaders of the organic food movement with quotations from many, many more! Michael Ableman is an international photographer and an organic small farmer for over seventeen years. He is the author of "From the Good Earth" (Abrams, 1993) and "On Good Land" (Chronicle Books, 1998). Dr William Albrecht was the chairman of the Department of Soils at the Univeristy of Missouri in the 1950's where he published an incredible amount of research on agriculture favorable to natural and sustainable means. Britt Bailey, M.S., is an environmental scientist at the Center for Ethics and Toxics and a co-author or "Against The Grain" (1999, Common Courage Press). Lady Eve Balfour is affectionately known as "Mother Earth" for her role in founding the Soil Association of England in 1946 and for her acclaimed book, "Living Soil" (1943).

Leslie Cerier is an organic chef and the author of "The Quick and Easy Organic Gourmet" (Station Hill Openings, 1996. Professors Jerry Combs, John Duxbury and Ross Welch all teach at Cornell University and are internationally known for their work in nutrition and sustainable agriculture. Trish Crapo is a writer who helps her husband run Dancing Bear Farm, a 24 acre organic farm in Leyden, MA. Frank Ford is a long-time organic farmer and the founder of Arrowhead Mills food company. Frank was named the 2000 "Man of the Year" by the Organic Trade Association. Grace Gershunny, M.S., has been involved in the organic movement as a grower, a gardener, a magazine editor (Organic Farmer), a trade association founding member and as a government organic standards coordinator. Wendy Gordon, M.S., is the executive director and co-founder of Mothers and Others, a NY-based consumer organization focusing on "healthy, safe and evironmentally sound" consumption patterns.

Sir Albert Howard is widely regarded as the Father of the worldwide Organic Food movement. Gene Kahn is the founder of Cascadian Farms and a long-term organic food grower. Frederick Kirshenmann, Ph.D., helped to found Farm-Verified Organic, a private certification agency, and now serves as its president. In addition, he maintains a farm of over 3000 acres using biodynamic and certified organic agriculture. Marc Lappe, Ph.D., is the director of The Center For Ethics and Toxics and the co-author of Against the Grain (1999, Common Courage Press) as well as many other health and science-related books. Dana Pratt, M.S., is a homemaker and winner of an essay contest entitled "Why I Consume Organic Foods".

Bargyla Rateavers, Ph.D., started the West Coast Organic foods movement and taught the first university level course on organic methods in agriculture, She is the co-author of the "Organic Method Primer". Robert Rodale, the son of J.I. Rodale was the president of Rodale Publishing and prodigious writer and proponent of organic agriculture. Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird are co-authors of "The Secret Life of Plants". And P. Marc Schwartz is an organic food consultant who helped found the Organic Growers' and Buyers' Association and also started Little Bear Trading Company.

Edited by author and long-term health proponent, David Richard, and master gardener and registered nurse, Dorie Byers.