I believe it is important to learn where your food comes from. I love going to the farmers marking and finding vendors such as Ayrshire Farmers for my eggs, meat and veggies - who I know and trust. After all these recalls- does it make you start to wonder? Did you know 50% of eggs for all 50 states comes from 5 states? With the out break in salmonella in over billions of eggs ones can only starting thinking about how this happened, the mass production of food these days and what we can do to stop it. As Josh Viertel writes about eggs - "In fact, there are so many unpleasant realities in this story, that we still don’t know exactly which elements contributed to the presence of salmonella—cramped cages, mouse droppings, dead insects, chicken feed containing chicken bone meal. But it’s not just a story about eggs, of course." Josh goes on to talk about Slow Food and their campaign to demand better control of more accountability from our food industry to ensure the health of all Americans.

The Inedible Egg video below is just one part of Slow Food USA's Egg campaign for better control and more accountability in our food systems. Among its demands, Slow Food is calling on government to:

• Hold corporations and their leaders accountable for knowingly letting tainted products enter the food supply.
• Ensure that the USDA and the FDA communicate better with each other.
• Simplify food safety regulation and focus attention on notoriously bad actors.

Crucially, the group is calling for government to differentiate its approach to regulation and inspection when it comes to small and family farms, as opposed to large, industrialized operations. Arguing that the decentralized, less-intensive nature of small farms mean the risks of mass outbreaks is greatly lessened, while the potential impact of restrictive legislation are greatly increased due to economies of scale, Slow Food is calling for legislators to support an amendment to food safety legislation that exempts small farm and food facilities and farmers who directly market their products to consumers, stores or restaurants.

The Story Behind Your Food: Learning from Salmonella : Slow Food USA

Interesting Articles on the Egg Recall from Politico and Treehugger