Safe Zucchini

Bill Marler's piece listing farmers' markets towards the top of his top ten food safety challenges of 2009 has generated quite a few responses, including a wonderful piece in The Ethicurean.

I wrote something about it for the Green Fork Blog, talking about the increased risk of unsafe food that goes hand in hand with mass production. I acknowledged that small scale food production doesn't necessarily mean that a product is safe, but I still feel more comfortable buying my food from someone who visibly takes pride in their work.

The folks at Barf Blog were singularly unimpressed, maintaining that I'd drank too much of the local food kool-aid. They want hard evidence, like soil samples and data on water quality. I wrote a response to their piece, but they declined to post it. I respect their work, but the experience made me wonder about their agenda. In any case, here's the meat of that response which didn't see the light of day:

A few years ago I bought a batch of zucchini from a local farmer. When I cooked it and served it, several customers said that it tasted bitter and upset their stomachs. I spoke to the farmer about it. She was disturbed and did some research, and learned that when hot weather is followed by a cold snap, zucchini can become bitter and cause an upset stomach. We had, in fact, just had some very hot weather followed by an unseasonably cold spell. She printed a sign about it and began a dialogue with her customers. I took responsibility, she took responsibility, and we all learned something.

I've bought thousands of pounds of zucchini from that farmer since then, and there's never been another problem.