Environmental Working Group’s Guide to?Good Food on a Tight Budget?

Stretching your dollars to get a month’s worth of healthy, filling food is a challenge. Environmental Working Group assessed nearly 1,200 foods and hand-picked the best 100 or so that pack in nutrients at a good price, with the fewest pesticides, contaminants and artificial ingredients.?This guide stems from EWG’s work over many years to create their?Shopper’s Guide to Pesticides in Produce, which highlights fresh fruits and vegetables low in weed-killers and bug-killers.?Inside the guide you’ll find simple tips for eating well,?quick lists of best foods?, tasty?recipes, easy tools for?tracking food prices?and planning your weekly?menu?and a blank?shopping list?to help you stay on budget.

GMA Forced to Disclose Secret Funders of Campaign to Defeat GMO Labeling in Washington

After the Washington Attorney General filed suit against the Grocery Manufacturers Association (GMA) for violating state election disclosure requirements, the lobby group Friday published a list of their major donors.As was the case with funding that narrowly defeated the citizen initiative in California that would have required labeling, many of the food manufacturers funding the opposition own some of the largest and most prominent brands in natural and organic food.?The October 18th?disclosure?by GMA, totaled to over $7 million. Click here to find out which companies donated money to prevent GMO labeleing.

NY School Goes Vegetarian, Student Test Scores Improve

A public school in Flushing, NY that was the first in the nation to offer a 100 percent vegetarian lunch menu?reported recently?that students have improved attendance, test scores and energy in the wake of the change.?Students are still allowed to brown-bag, but the overwhelming majority?about 90 percent?of students are choosing the veggie-based cafeteria food, which includes organic roasted tofu, braised black beans and falafel.?P.S. 244 in Queens, NY is reporting better student test scores and lower obesity rates six month after implementing a vegetarian-only lunch menu. ?After one semester, the number of students at the school who were classified as overweight and obese dropped 2 percent.?The school went vegetarian because the plant-based choices were superior to the meat-based ones offered by the city.?Students also attend weekly nutrition classes where they learn about making smart food choices, he said. Teachers also let students whose energy is lagging to take breaks that allow them to get up for a minute and be active.?The school,?P.S. 244,?created the vegetarian menu with the help of the?New York Coalition for Healthy School Food.