Which Fruits and Veggies Have The Most and Least Amount of Pesticides?

Fruits and veggies should be the mainstay of any healthy diet, but the pesticides can be a turn-off to many, and with good reason since pesticides are toxic. Obviously organic is the best way to go to ensure a pesticide-free fruit or vegetable, but it can be expensive and isn't always an option. But at least now there's a list of the fruits and vegetables that contain the most and the least amounts of pesticide, so we can make better choices.

Do you know which is the worst offender, as far as pesticides go?

According to Environmental Working Group (EWG), ironically, it's that fruit we're supposed to eat once a day to keep the doctor away- yes, the almighty 'forbidden fruit' apple has the greatest amount of pesticide residue even after washing and peeling it. So if you have the choice, you should opt for organic apples, if at all possible.

After apples comes celery (which I'm not fond of), but some of my favorite fruits and veggies made EWG's dirty dozen list:

3. strawberries
4. peaches
5. spinach
6. nectarines-imported
7. grapes-imported
8. sweet bellpeppers (meh)
9. potatoes
10. blueberries-domestic
11. lettuce (what's salad without lettuce?)
12. kale/collard greens

Peaches, strawberries and blueberries? Say it isn't so! The three fruits that top my cereal, on my cereal mornings. Am not happy about this at all.

EWG also has a list of the 15 cleanest- or the ones with the least amount of pesticides. They suggest not eliminating fruits and veggies altogether, but encourage people to choose the recommended 5 servings from the Clean 15, if you can't go organic. Thankfully there are some good ones to choose from including onions, mangoes, watermelon and sweet potatoes. 

You can find the full list of 53 fruits and veggies here.

Greenpeople.org - resource for saving dollars on all things green

I came across greenpeople.org in Prevention Magazine today. It's an extensive resource for "eco-friendly and holistic health products", a site I know I'm bookmarking for the future.

If you are looking to save on organic fruits and veggies they list local food buying clubs and co-ops by zip code and state, city and even country.

Food buying clubs, if there are any near you, are a great way to save up to 35% on organic foods. Members purchase the produce in bulk directly from farmers and meet every week or 2 to divide it all up. According to Prevention Magazine the cost ranges from $40 to $50 for 2 weeks. That seems like quite a savings, especially for those who have families. There are supposedly 10,000 buying clubs across the country.

Greenpeople.org doesn't seem to list any of the larger health food chains, like Whole Foods and Wild Oats, but those are easily located via their specific web sites.

They also have listings from clothing to travel to holistic medical practitioners, and it also happens to list the best (and my favourite) website for veggie restaurants (and health food stores) across the nation and the world: happycow.net.

You never know what you'll find on these kinds of sites.