My Food Revolution: Great Harvest

There was something that was bothering me when I went to the grocery store. I had looked at the ingredients of many different breads and all of them had too many ingredients, and they all had either soy bean oil or canola oil. Oil, other than Extra Virgin Olive Oil, kind of skeeves me out. I've never been a margarine lover, even when it was in style. I can always taste when margarine is used, and my belief has been much like my grandfather Pop's "Don't feed me that crap!"

So when I find almost every package of bread with one of those two oils in them, I became a little disheartened. I'm not crazy, I promise, but the reason I don't like supporting soy bean oil and canola oil differ. Here's why. When Monsanto, the makers of Round Up, genetically modified the soy bean, a case appeared before the Supreme Court and it was ruled that the maker of a genetically modified seed owned that seed / product. With that ruling and majority opinion from Justice Clarence Thomas, Monsanto was able to go after any farmer who was cleaning their seed and claim that they were infringing on their product. Justice Thomas used to work as an attorney for Monsanto*, something which makes my gut kick. I don't like when justice is compromised, and I greatly feel that in that case it was indeed compromised. My beef with the canola oil is slightly different but applies to every oil other than Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Other oils use hydrogenated fats, science to get their product. Instead of using what nature gave us, butter / animal lard, we're using something man made. In recent years mother nature has shown us that our man made levies, buildings, etc. are no match for her. I believe the same to be true of food, why have food grown in pesticides when I can have food grown with soil, sunshine and water? The canola oil is from the rape seed, which they process and add hydrogenated oils to, before re-marketing it as canola oil. I don't know about you but that doesn't sound very appetizing to me.

So with all these breads on the market containing soy bean oil or canola oil, what is one to do? Using my Yelp! app on my iPhone and iPad, I typed in 'Farmers Market'. Along with the listing for all of the local farmers markets and their hours of operation there was a listing for a bread place. I hadn't thought much of it earlier today or the days prior when I had seen it on the list but remembering how the bread I have isn't what I wanted I decided to check it out. The bread company that was listed is called Great Harvest. Looking through the website I found a number of things I immediately liked, the first being that these are all franchises. I like that there are locations throughout the state where one or two people take full responsibility for the product they are offering. The second thing I really appreciated? On their website they list that they have been around for thirty years and making their bread the same way before whole grain was cool. I like that they don't give in to whatever nutritional fad is happening. And the third, and most important thing on the website? Huge free samples. Kidding, though they do offer those. The most important thing on the site was the listing of their five simple ingredients. No oils, bread made fresh daily, lasts for ten days. There's something so comforting reading that. I love that they're closed on Sundays because they are family run. It just feels right. So next week, once I've gotten rid of this bread with oils and too many ingredients to list, I'll be venturing over to try it out. Don't worry, I'll let you know my full opinion once I try it out.

To check out their website click here: http://www.greatharvest.com/index.html

*Taken from the 2008 documentary Food Inc. featuring Michael Pollan and Eric Schlosser.
**Taken from the cooking book Skinny Italian by Teresa Guidice.