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| Have you ever seen strawberries this big? |
Summer is here and strawberry season continues. My neighborhood market is selling them cheap; two pound boxes for $3.00. They are huge, meaty berries with glossy pelts that ripple and shine like snake skin. Firm too. They seem almost unnatural. When I was a kid and we went strawberry picking, we were lucky to come back with berries much bigger than marbles, most of which would melt in the car ride home, whereas, these strawberries appear hardy enough to withstand a round of flag football, much less 30 minutes in a warm car trunk.
Beautiful as they are, their near-bionic exterior makes me wonder…
Yes, I know that any plant species can be tinkered with to improve their survival between farm and market, and that is important when it comes to keeping food affordable to the masses, but honestly, doesn’t this seem a bit much? Would it be so bad if we had to stick with those squishy, marble size strawberries?
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| Five yolks and two egg shells. Something isn’t right. |
When I was a kid, and the teacher was explaining how the reproductive organs worked, someone in the class asked “How do twins work?” and the teacher replied “Same thing times two. It’s like a chicken laid two eggs in one shell.” and ever since that day, every time I crack an egg, I have been looking for two eggs in one shell. Never found it. Until…
Last weekend I not only found two yolks in one shell; I found three yolks in the shell right next to it. For a moment there I felt extra lucky until I got curious and cracked two more eggs and found the same thing. The whole box. All double or triple yolks. Clearly they did not all come from the same chicken; could there really be an entire farm where all the chickens lay double eggs? And if so, what do they do to the chickens to prompt such a thing? Do I want to know?
Probably not.
And that is the problem.
There is an expression that goes something like “You wouldn’t eat that hot dog if you saw how it was made.” and I know a lot of people who do not eat dogs precisely for that reason. And they are probably smart for it. But I’m not talking about hot dogs; I’m talking about strawberries. And eggs. And Lord only knows what was going on with the toast…
Were theycommercial eggs? I have never gotten a double yolk even from my own chickens…and i dont know why an egg farmer would want to give dble yolks to people because wldnt that mess up the cake mix? Im so confused.
I’ve never seen a twin egg before until my sister sent a pic of one yesterday. That’s too much of a coincidence, I wonder what’s going on with the chickens. Really glad I don’t eat eggs…
Serious? How bizarre. All these double yolks… I assume they are giving the chickens hormones to make them produce eggs faster. I’ll have to research…
Down in Nz here we get those huge strawberries offered in the supermarkets when in season.They are all looks. No damned flavour at all.
And double yockers happen quite a lot but that many in a tray, Id be worried. Unless you got a tray of the weeded out ones that the big boys dont want.
Peaches, please don’t freak about the egg yolks. In the 1960’s my grandfather had large chicken houses with layer hens. It was not unusual to find double yolk eggs. He had to “candle” the eggs and could not sale the double yolk ones. We as a family ate them and they were delicious. Some hens just lay these occasionally and it’s not unusual. I know for a fact that the eggs he sold had not be “doctored’, not had the feed they ate either. Some chicken even layed “soft shell” eggs, but that is another story!
Not all GMOs involve Roundup. GMO simply means Genetically Modified Organism. Sometimes that modification involves resistance to a specific disease, or drought tolerance, or increased protein content.
Check these out!! http://www.poultryhelp.com/oddeggs.html
http://www.slashfood.com/2007/01/04/multi-yolk-eggs/
You are right to worry. Even a main line TV host like Dr. Oz is concerned. He has had Dr. Mercola on his program several times. I checked out his web site and wish I hadn’t. I wasn’t aware there was such an organism as a GMO ( genetically modified organism). These are seeds that have been treated with the weed killer Roundup so that when insects eat the seed, the weed killer causes their abdomens to explode. Soybean and corn growers are some of the main users. What can I say, I’ll have that roasted corn with salt and pepper and a side of weed killer please.
So many of these food changes happened in the 1970’s – the introduction of corn syrup into the diet, allowing MSG to be added under the generic label spices, and GMO’s. That was 40+ years ago, which is generally considered to be a generation. Now we see autistic children and obesity in record numbers. Could it be we really are what we eat?
Mad scientists are not throwing scary powders on the strawberries to make them that large. Many varieties of fruits and vegetables get selected not much differently from the way our ancestors did. Once upon a time, a Neanderthal farmer decided to save the big, fat grains of corn to plant the following season, and ate the skinny, shriveled ones. Crop improvement researchers of today do pretty much the same. We as consumers like big and shiny things, out of season, year-round. Yes, not everybody is this way, but farmers grow what will sell. Those humongous strawberries is what the market likes to see. As long as the fruit is picture-perfect, substance and flavor go second. It’s not the farmers’ fault. It’s our collective fault for being so obsessed with perfection
I kind of think it might be the opposite – double yolkers used to be sold commonly, but supermarkets must have at some point decided people don’t like it (not standard and homogenised and predictable enough, I should think), so they stopped selling them. And once things aren’t in the supermarkets they fall out of the food vernacular.
Actually double-yolkers are perfectly natural, quite common, but it’s just that for some reason supermarkets won’t sell them and screen them out before purchasing from the farmer.
right?! AAH! scares me. i dont trust anyone or anything anymore. its all weird.
You win the award for my favorite post so far today. I was just contemplating this very topic over the weekend as I got a MARBLE sized blueberry (they are not supposed to be that big!) and also a hunky strawberry that took up my entire palm. I worry….
GROW YOUR OWN! Or make friendly with someone who does!
My neighbors & I swap prolific produce.
That is a good idea. And my neighbors are big on growing …too bad I have a black thumb!
that’s freaky. i think you’re right that they’re giving them growth hormones. my MIL brings me amish farm eggs sometimes and the difference between them and supermarket eggs is night and day.
I would have cracked that whole carton open too!
I find it weird that you bought such odd food at a market. Aren’t they renowned for selling family farmed foods?
Oh my goodness — you found the authority source! Looking at this info, it sounds like double yolks happen all the time (as my teacher had indicated all those years ago!) …however, the fact that I found a whole box filled with two and three yolk eggs seems very suspect. It was a regular commercial box of eggs — I’m sure all 12 eggs came from 12 different chickens … it seems highly unlikely that ALL of those eggs were the result of one chicken with an off-cycle, no? Weird stuff! Thanks for the links 🙂
It’s not weird to find double yolkers at a farmers market. Often supermarkets don’t want to sell them (don’t know why), so farms keep all the double yolkers and then sell them off separately. I’m surprized they didn’t make a point of it though – here they charge more for a tray full of double yolkers (so good if you’re making creme brulee!)
No kidding, right? There used to be an Amish bakery in my work building….wow, all of their food tasted a little different (not to mention better). I’m sure it has something to do with the quality of their ingredients.
Thank you so much for the info. I haven’t heard of Food, Inc. Watching it in increments sounds like the way to go. Too much bac news at once can overwhelm me and put me in one of those what’s the use moods.
I couldn’t agree more that it’s pretty disturbing what our food is made of. This is why I won’t give my toddler hotdogs…everyone thinks I’m crazy but, I don’t care. It’s sick. You should check out the book Fast Food Nation…another disturbing subject.
Have you seen the documentary Food, Inc? I have only seen bits and pieces…I have held off on renting the whole thing, but now I might look. Franken foods. Scary stuff.
Maybe that’s it — the whole tray came from the discard pile? But there were two or three triple yolks in the box too…something doesn’t add up. I hear you about the big strawberries with no flavor. I let them sit a while — they taste best just before they go spoil; whereas the scrawny old fashioned ones tasted great plucked right off the plant. I guess somethings got to give…