What are the dirty dozen and clean 15 fruits and vegetables? Ever heard of them? Well now is the time to learn about them. Read along to find out.
Dirty Dozen
The Environmental Working Group (EWG) has a very extensive site that really explains what they are doing. They even have an app that you can download so you can pull up the list when you are in the store shopping. Every year they come out with a new list and it does change slightly.
The primary premise is to alert you about what are the worst offenders as far as pesticides that are sprayed on fruits and vegetables. I try to buy organic when shopping but sometimes our budget won’t allow that. I would definitely buy organic for the ones listed above since they are the worst of the worst. Next week I will be going a post explaining the produce codes that you find on produce.
Clean 15
The above lists the 15 cleanest fruits and vegetables. Going with the budget scenario above, if you didn’t have the funds to purchase organic all the time, these 15 you could purchase conventionally instead of organic since they are the “cleanest” of the fruits and vegetables.
Tested for but not on either list
EWG tested the following fruits and vegetables but they did not fall on either the dirty dozen or the clean 15 list; so they fall in the middle:
- Tomatoes
- Winter squash
- Celery
- Potatoes
- Cherry Tomatoes
- Lettuce
- Tangerines
- Cucumbers
- Broccoli
- Summer squash
- Plums
- Eggplant
- Raspberries
- Grapefruit
- Snap Peas
- Oranges
- Cantaloupe
- Bananas
- Cauliflower
What I personally do for my family is I grow as much of what I can above and preserve it the best I can. If I can’t grow it, I support a farmer who does. I buy in bulk from Azure and either freeze dry or freeze what I can so I don’t have to worry about shopping the stores. And, we try to eat in season. Meaning, I’m not going to the supermarket to buy strawberries in January. I will get them in season (June/July in my area) and eat them then when they are fresh and preserve/freeze extra to eat in the winter months.
Anyway, if you want more information check out EWG’s website to find many more resources. I hope this sheds a little light on the dirty dozen and clean 15 for fruits and vegetables.
