American Feast's Founder Answers: What is Sustainable Food?

Oct. 16, 2009 - PRLog -- What does sustainable food mean exactly?  Many agree that when it comes to farming, cooking and eating, sustainable is a good thing, but definitions vary depending on who you ask.  Someone wrote that it is simply good food from people you know, but if you ask the folks at American Feast, the response gets considerably more detailed.

Jeff Deasy, American Feast's founder and president, writes, "The most sustainable food producers are family farmers and the family-owned businesses that have a personal connection to the land they work and the artisanal food they create. People preparing foods using recipes passed down from previous generations and those they developed themselves want to use the freshest natural ingredients available. The best family farmers and ranchers see themselves as stewards of the land. They want that land to be healthy and productive when they pass it on to a new generation."

Mr. Deasy compares those family-scale operations to big, corporate agribusinesses running factory-style farms with a hard eye toward reducing the costs of production.  Poisonous pesticides and chemical fertilizers are used to maximize the yield per acre with insufficient regard for the environmental consequences. Growth hormones and antibiotics are given to animals to fatten them, but their use poses a threat to human health. He says that factory farms sacrifice flavor to cultivate produce with tough skins in order to survive packing and shipping to supermarkets, and fruits and vegetables are picked before they are ripe to lengthen shelf life.

Says Mr. Deasy, "Locally grown vegetables and fruits harvested within hours of landing on your table just can't be beat for the vibrancy of their flavors. The longer the time between the harvesting of a crop and getting it to your table, the more plant cells break down and sugars turn to starches. The result is less vivid flavor and the loss of important nutrients. Get fresh produce from a sustainable farm and you get it at its best."

The giants of agribusiness see the genetic modification of seed, grain and animals as a means to greater profits. Most family farmers and small ranchers don't want to use a lot of poisonous pesticides and other dangerous chemicals because their families live on the land they work. They prefer natural methods of farming and believe those methods produce the healthiest and best-tasting food. They maintain that growth hormones and antibiotics produce freakish animals, not good eating. Many small farmers have no access to genetically modified seeds and grains and don't want to use them anyway.

It's not just nutritious eating, a healthy environment, and great taste that make sustainable food desirable. Family-owned farms, ranches and small businesses are vital to a sustainable economy. Keeping families on their land and earning a fair living preserves a rich heritage, sustains communities and supports the country's best traditions.

American Feast's web site is dedicated to giving visitors a great selection of regional foods produced in a sustainable manner. Those foods have won countless awards in local, national and international competitions against the best artisanal foods the world has to offer. American Feast delivers foods from family farms and small creative kitchens straight to the doors of its customers. Items published on American Feast's Sustainable Food Blog, the "Food News" section of the company's web site, urge readers to celebrate local and seasonal foods by buying fresh directly from the farmers in and around their communities.

Mr. Deasy says, "If we all do our bit by making smart choices we'll get to enjoy feasting on the bounty from 'the breadbasket of the world' for a long time to come!"

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American Feast champions food from sustainable farms over food from factories and slow food over fast food. By working with entrepreneurial families we deliver an imaginative mix of culinary delights from the USA's most creative kitchens and family farms.