Picnic With a Twist: Good for You, Good for the Country

This Year, Throw a 4th of July Grubnic*

*grub n. healthy, local, sustainably raised food for all *grub nic n. pleasure excursion celebrating grub

It's that time of year again: time to pull out the BBQ, break out the sunblock, turn off your cell phones, and kick up your feet. As we head into the summer holiday season, we invite you to celebrate--and show your patriotism--with a Grubnic.

Here, we share the top five reasons to throw a Grubnic, a picnic with a twist. Our Grubnics include food that is as fresh, local, and sustainably raised as possible. Chef Bryant also shares tips for pulling a picnic off without a hitch, including recipes and suggested soundtracks while you're cooking and chowing. Check out more about Grub in our book, Grub: Ideas for an Urban Organic Kitchen, and at our website eatgrub.org. Send us news about your Grubnics, and we'll add them to our site.

Five Reasons to Choose Grub

Choosing Grub helps support one of the most hopeful movements of this century and is a wonderful way to show your patriotism. Here are some of the reasons we encourage you to choose Grub when you're planning this year's festivities.

1. Get a nutritional bang for your hard-earned buck. Research shows that local, fresh foods are better for you than produce that's jet-lagged and weary by the time it arrives on your plate. Seek our fresh foods from your local farmers market and visit www.localharvest.org for more leads on where to find local food near you.

We also know that choosing organic produce is one of the best ways to reduce your dietary exposure to pesticide residues, many of which our very own government will tell us are probable carcinogens, neurotoxins, and hormone disrupters.

When you choose organic meat, you're also opting out of being the guinea pig for livestock that has been raised with hormones, antibiotics, even animal waste by-products. (Among other gross-you-out facts, did you know that non-organic chicken is raised on a diet that includes arsenic-based drugs? Yuck!)

2. Want some fresh air with your burger?

Do you love America's wide open plains? Breathtaking mountains and lush national parks? One of the best ways to protect America's natural wonders is to support our organic and sustainable small farmers and ranchers who are stewards of our land. And one of the best ways to do so is to choose food from these folks and let our elected officials know that we want to keep them on the land, thriving.

Concerned about climate change? Us, too. Most of us don't make this connection, but the way we grow our food--industrial agriculture--is one of the worst contributors to the greenhouse gas emissions that are contributing to cataclysmic climate change. So, choosing Grub is another way to show your love for your country and your planet.

3. Fairness on your plate

We like to think of the United States as the land of opportunity and that's still true, for some. But for the estimated 2.5 million farmworkers and the more than 100,000 meatpacking workers who help bring us our food, "opportunity" is probably not a word on the tip of their tongue. At $8,000 annual income and with nearly a quarter of a million pesticide poisonings a year, farmworkers are among the most exploited workers in the U.S. Look for food that's been produced by workers paid a living wage, and you'll be eating our country's value of fairness, one snap pea at a time.

4. Protecting our tummies from terrorism

Ask any farmer and they'll tell you there's safety in diversity. Planting diverse crops was always the number one way to ensure an abundant harvest. In the past few decades, we've been moving away from this most basic precept about farming toward industrial monocultures, where we just grow one type of corn, potato, soybean… you get the picture. By choosing Grub, you're supporting diverse farmers growing a variety of crops and boosting your local food security at the same time.

5. "Yum" -- enough said.

This could well be the number-one reason for many of us: Fresh, whole foods also taste better -- way better.

CLICK HERE FOR CHEF BRYANT TERRY'S TIPS AND RECIPES