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organic restaurant in missoula | (Read 858 times) |
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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February 12, 2010, 11:44:43 AM |
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Is there such a thing? If not, what would be the closest thing?
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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February 14, 2010, 09:26:16 AM |
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Well, if there were a scale of 0 to 10 where 0 is that they get their food from the same big truck as, say, ruby's diner .... and 10 is that everything is so organic that people that are GMO sensitive to even cooking oil could eat there ....
So, if there is this 0 to 10 scale, what might be the numbers on these restaurants? Maybe some are more of an 8 and some are more a 3?
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Caitlin Elder
Posts: 69
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February 14, 2010, 03:29:31 PM |
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The University of Montana food court has some local grown food in it, its located in the UC building. Also so does the cafeteria, the last time I was in there I remember them having signs up on some of the food that was locally grown.
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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February 15, 2010, 01:55:37 PM |
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I wonder if we can somehow get the voices of some of these restaurants to come here and tell us a bit about their organic path.
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Destini Vaile
Posts: 81
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February 16, 2010, 02:38:15 PM |
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Hey, EdibleMissoula, you have a good point. One which I am concerned with since my own children are in public school. Their school does have a garden, though it's certainly not large enough to provide food for all the children who attend there. Is it possible to start another thread that has to do with this subject? Or, more broadly, is it possible to add a whole other category on the subject of food/natural diets? I understand that much of this site is dedicated to food, but it's mostly dedicated to growing that food. I want to talk about eating it. haha!
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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February 18, 2010, 07:19:58 PM |
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Dear, um ... "ediblemissoula" (i would suggest that you change your display name to your name and then have your signature show off edible missoula!),
Since this is something that you know more about than (probably) the rest of us, maybe you can start to firm up an understanding for us. Maybe get an idea of which places are the most organic. I'm not sure how one might go about this, but I would very much like to favor restaurants that are more organic.
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Greg M Peters
Posts: 74
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February 18, 2010, 07:42:22 PM |
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Alright, I'll try at least naming the best local sourcer...
Biga Pizza. Bob Marshall, Chef and Owner, does an amazingly good job of getting as many Montana products on his menu as possible, including: wheat, oil, greens (seasonally), foraged mushrooms, pork, beef.
The Catalyst is a close second, if not tied. At least according to my entirely unofficial and arguably less then educated OPINION!!
Erika Fredrikson from the Independent did a cool article last August about local foods available in town. I'm not sure if this link is the best - it seems to start into the middle of the article, but anyway, a good resource.
http://missoulanews.bigskypress.com/missoula/soup-to-nuts/Content?oid=1137946
As far as "organic" I just don't know. But I gotta guess The Good Food Store Deli is probably the most officially organic place in town.
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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February 19, 2010, 11:18:15 AM |
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It is my obnoxious opinion that:
A) consuming more food from close by is an excellent thing. And,
B) Consuming organic food is ten times more excellent.
And having it be officially organic isn't even that big of a deal to me. The biggest part is that pesticides are not used and there is some care about having a symbiotic relationship with the planet (as opposed to an abusive relationship).
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Greg M Peters
Posts: 74
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February 19, 2010, 11:35:41 AM |
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Interesting. I've often wondered which is better. I think I've read somewhere that local is "better" then organic. I guess because of nutritional degradation and transportation costs (to the planet). But...I don't know. Clearly local and organic is the best.
Why do you believe that organic is ten times better? I'm curious 'cause I've thought about this a bunch.
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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February 19, 2010, 12:45:59 PM |
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I'm sure there are mountains of people with an opinion different from mine.
For me, I think that 80% or more of the sickness in america comes from gick that is used on our food. For years we have heard that beef is bad and it turns out that what's bad about it is the pesticides stored in the fat. Grass fed organic beef is, IMOO, one of the best things a human can eat today.
When I shop, I buy almost exclusively organic. The idea of eating the stuff that is soaked in pesticides really bothers me.
I like the idea of the local stuff. I do have some concerns about the math involved with some of the claims of less fuel. After all, a lot of the food is moved around on trains or huge trucks that get a pretty good efficiency per pound. I think it is possible that your average famers market food might not do as well as we like to think in petroleum used per pound of produce sold. In fact, I am reluctant to do the math because it might show that the stuff from 1500 miles away uses less petroleum than something from the bitterroot. I do think the economics is very good and I think the community factor and local good will is the tops! I just cringe when I hear people talk about the petroleum aspect.
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Destini Vaile
Posts: 81
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February 19, 2010, 02:48:09 PM |
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Personally, I guess it depends on where "local" is and what "organic" means. I always choose to eat locally first because I feel that a strong local economy is more sustainable and beneficial to Gross National Happiness. You do have a point about the gasoline consumption, but I do believe locally delivered food uses slightly less than nationally delivered food. Plus, with the benefits of having a local network, there are options for vendors to share vehicles to brig their food to the markets, restaurants, or grocery store. It could be a sort of delivery co-op.
Then there is the idea of organic. My concern is not so much gasoline, though that article I can't remember the name of said usage was slightly higher for national delivery. No, my biggest concern is packaging. Packaging equals a greater cosumption of resources, increased energy usage to make the packaging materials and deliver them, more plastic in the world, and more garbage. I haven't heard Le Petit claim to be organic (have they?), yet, because they don't have to worry about their bread needing a high shelf life so that it can make it through thousands of miles of delivery, they are free to use a wax paper bag to hold their bread. And it tastes fresher because it is. Mmm. In my opinion, you can't put chemical free food into a plastic container that is off-gassing for several thousand miles and will continue off-gassing for billions of years (when the sun explodes) and still call it organic.
Well, you could buy organic produce and bulk items with your own containers. Works well. However, large companies have skewed and simplified the meaning of organic. These days it usually just means mono-cultures that aren't sprayed with pesticides. (I can't imagine that people in Southern California could grow chemical free food if they wanted to, considering the amount of air pollution alone. That's just my personal opinion though. No scientific studies as far as I know.) The current definition of organic is not really an effort to encourage responsible growers, this is exclusively about making money. Of course, I'm glad these large farms that were already in place are not spraying so many chemicals anymore. I will buy an organic tomato at the grocery store over non-organic if they have been delivered from about the same distance, but the insincere representation bothers me and I feel that the name organic lost it's meaning several years ago. The only real way to know what you're getting is to know your grower or meat supplier and the best way to do that is to buy local.
All of this sounds like I'm being self-righteous and would never touch a non-local and organic meal! Nope. Although I've made a lot of headway in cutting down on packaging, especially plastics, yesterday I bought a carton of yogurt and a carton of "organic" soymilk that probably contributed to clear cutting of the Amazon forest. Still, I would like to get to the point where I can have those all local/organic meals on a regular basis. I just prefer to have local first because local often strives to be organic here in Missoula and mostly because I feel more connected to my community and to the food I'm eating. Studies have shown that when your mind feels more connected to your food, your body actually absorbs more nutrition! Talk about an incentive for eating responsibly. 
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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February 20, 2010, 09:31:10 AM |
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A loaded semi truck uses much less fuel per pound of cargo than a pickup truck or a van or an SUV. And I've participated in some farmers markets from the farmer perspective. And a lot of times a box truck is used, but the box truck is only 10% or 15% full when it arrives and 5% to 10% full when it leaves.
Okay, so next we mix into the picture something like spud: delivery to somebody's home once a week. The math works out that it does save fuel, and has an overall lighter footprint in many ways. There are 70 orders, the van is filled for "route K" which is a collection of houses in the same neighborhood. Far more efficient than 70 people making a trip to the grocery store.
So, I really like the idea of eating food that has a lower petroleum footprint, but just because it came from 50 miles away instead of 1500 miles away does not, unfortunately, mean that it has a lower petroleum footprint. On a related note: there are some CSA's in the seattle area where the food is grown in the neighborhood and delivered by BICYCLE! Is this an awesome fit for missoula or what?
But, of course, ultimately, nothing has as good of a petroleum footprint as a garden. Hats off to the thousand gardens project.
As for eating local: another big upside is that you can visit the farm and find out if they are aligned with your principles.
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Greg M Peters
Posts: 74
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February 23, 2010, 10:14:47 AM |
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This is interesting. In part, I think Destini is right on. As Paul says IMOO, industrial agriculture has co-opted "organic" resulting in industrial organic. Michael Pollan writes about this a bit. BTW his new book "Food Rules" is pretty cool and cheap- only 8 bucks.
I also think that supporting local economies is crucial. Irrespective of the petroleum needed to bring food to market, local money spent locally grows in a way local money spent at safeway can't. I worked on a farm in Whitefish for two summers, it wasn't certified organic because certification is expensive and arguably political. They didn't use pesticides (I remember swatting moths with a badminton racquet for a few hours one afternoon), and they used organic fertilizer. Their products were as organic as any that come with the label, even if they weren't "organic." So there's nuance to this discussion.
I also think Paul is right and we can trace much, if not all, of our disease to pesticides and herbicides on our food. But I think there are a lot of chemicals that we use in addition to food gick that cause many of those diseases too. Importantly, organic methods reduce the nasty effects on the rest of earth - and that's huge. So many ecosystems are on the verge of collapse, largely due to chemicals that end up in the environment - a lot of the fertilizer, pesticides, herbicides etc. are washed right off the fields and into the creeks after the first watering.
So, to bring this together...To help the earth at large, organic is certainly the way to go especially knowing that many products aren't available locally (in Montana at least). But to help your community, buy local!! Paul's point about knowing the farmers, touring the farm, and even lending a hand is important too. To co-opt a quote from Forest Gump - "organic is as organic does" and you can find unofficially organic food grown locally by good people.
Ultimately you have to do your homework and learn how your food is grown as best you can.
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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August 30, 2010, 12:47:25 PM |
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Where is "red bird"?
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Robert Sunset
Posts: 25
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August 30, 2010, 01:11:12 PM |
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I hear they are building some kind of organic restaurant in the same building as the Missoula Food Co-Op on the west side of town near Lowell School. I thought it was supposed to open last month but they are still hammering away over there.
Might be something to check out.
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paul wheaton
Administrator
Posts: 5600
missoula, montana
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August 30, 2010, 05:34:32 PM |
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I hear they are building some kind of organic restaurant in the same building as the Missoula Food Co-Op on the west side of town near Lowell School. I thought it was supposed to open last month but they are still hammering away over there.
Might be something to check out.
Do you know who might really know? I could send them an email.
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Emma Olson
Posts: 22
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Yesterday at 10:24:16 AM |
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Red bird is on Higgins, near the Wilma. It is set back a bit into an old building. They do have very good appetizers which change relatively often, leading me to believe that they use seasonal if not completely local organic food.
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 articles by paul wheaton: [diatomaceous earth] [raising chickens] [lawn care] [Sepp Holzer] [cast iron] [flea control]
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