Don’t Stand By While Fruit Suffers: An Open Letter to the Frozen Fruit Industry and IQF Companies

To Whom it May Concern:

The nutrition community and those committed to healthy eating are increasingly aware of the current enthusiasm for frozen fruit. Recently, in the “Science of Living a Healthy Life” issue of The New York Times Magazine, an ad touted the frozen obsession by stating that “Mother Nature put wild blueberries on earth to be frozen.” The loud voices and pretty pictures disseminated by these “pro-fro” conspirators are glossing over the facts, leaving consumers to accept tactics reminiscent of the Great Dairy Refrigeration Deception of 1922. Today, common ethics have guided our decision to be vocal on this controversial issue.  We urge consumers to consider the thoughtless inhumanity that quick freezing advances, and ask those in the frozen fruit industry to take a moment to weigh the desire to selfishly preserve taste and nutrition for our own convenience with its effect on defenseless fruits.

People didn’t always know what we know today – that wild blueberries are sensitive and unique and deserve respect, not the inhumanity of being picked and frozen. Some consumers may still be unaware that wild blueberries can live to be more than several weeks (one, recently discovered in a college dormitory, was determined to be over 5 months old), dying natural deaths by simply decaying, drying up or souring into mush. Without freezing, fruits and vegetables are able to live out their life span – they are free to languish into old age and are often eaten only when they have experienced an acceptable time of decomposition off of the bush. This is the way it has been since the beginning of time, before the introduction of the evils of individually quick freezing (IQF), and it should continue to be.

We also know that wild blueberries remember past acquaintances, and even engage in elaborate courtship rituals: they have been seen joining stems while one helps guide another along the winnowing belt. We realize blueberries actually have memories and can recall time spent in the field. They also possess sophisticated social structures: berries that remain a red or pink color often gather together as if in mutual support of one another. In fact, scientists that have devoted their lives to researching the berry say blueberries have the reasoning capacity of small children.

Only researchers who are funded by the IQF industry disagree with the assertion that fruits and veggies feel pain. These small, defenseless foods suffer when they are taken from the field and spiraled or tunneled and then blasted in a flash freezing device and subjected to unconscionable cryogenic temperatures that at worse, are terribly painful (though brief) and at best, just humiliating. Wild blueberries that are harvested at their peak thrash wildly trying to escape the harvester, and often spin incessantly in a state of confusion. In the journal Ursatt’s Science, researcher Tara Biulle described this method of freezing blueberries as “unnecessary torture.”

Further, today’s quick freezing method avoids cellular damage and prevents the formation of ice crystals on the fruit, and as a result, all the nutritional value of fresh is preserved while the fruit itself remains undamaged. This fact has been used by the pro-fro factions to convince the public that freezing is not harmful. This is not true. In reality, we know that in a time when quick freezing has become ubiquitous, wild blueberries that are pulled from their natural homes can sense imminent danger and experience several agonizing seconds of panic and dread. In short, freezing regularly condemns countless fruits and vegetables such as wild blueberries, mangoes, strawberries, even baby carrots to painful deaths.

We in the nutrition community urge all consumers to allow wild blueberries and all fruits and veggies to die either on the vine or on the shelf at room temperature, taking their nutritive value with them. That is what Mother Nature intended. In addition, we urge all compassionate consumers to walk by the frozen fruit in their grocery store, and instead, opt for foods that do not suffer outside its glass doors, such as pizzas or jalapeño poppers. Consider the dark lives these fruits and veggies lead before they reach us, and for the sake of wild blueberries and their brethren, please join us in declaring, “Freezing is for the cold hearted – not for me.”

Thank you for your time and consideration,
The Wild About Health Community

Thanks to PETA for providing us with the inspiration to speak out on this subject.

High Five Your Freezer – March is Frozen Food Month

A month that celebrates what is in your freezer? You bet. Consider that less than a century ago, before the launch of quick frozen foods, consumers were unable to take advantage of the convenience and nutritional value of fruits, vegetables, meats and fish. Today, “frozen” has truly caught on with consumers who seem poised to take full advantage of the benefits. The race is on to feed healthy foods to our kids at home and at school, and all across the country people are paying attention to rising rates of obesity and preventable diseases. As a result, the demand for available, nutritious foods has skyrocketed. Nothing comes to the rescue better than frozen foods.

In 1998, the Food & Drug Administration confirmed that frozen fruits and vegetables provide the same essential nutrients and health benefits as fresh. What’s more is that quick frozen foods can actually be better than fresh because they retain their nutritional value longer, and they don’t lose nutrients as they age during shipping and storage. Foods like wild blueberries, for example, are picked and frozen at the peak of freshness, locking in all that antioxidant power, thanks to individually quick frozen (IQF) technology, and that’s exactly how they show up on your plate. And, fruits and vegetables like frozen wild blueberries are available in stores everywhere.

Consumers have discovered the facts about nutritional value, and they are demanding food that is available year round without nutritional sacrifices. A rising interest in competitive prices and low waste has only contributed to the budget stretching trend known simply as frozen. So go ahead and give your freezer a little love this month by stocking it with the benefits of frozen!

You can also join the fun by entering a $10,000 sweepstakes sponsored by the National Frozen & Refrigerated Foods Association. Check it out at EasyHomeMeals.com.

Berry Accessible – All Winter Long

We commend Real Age for touting alternate ways to get the cancer-fighting, anti-aging benefits of berries during the long cold winter. They suggest freeze-dried as an alternative to fresh. But don’t forget frozen. Frozen can have advantages over freeze-dried (quick freezing helps them to retain their shape) and also retain all the nutritional benefits!

Benefits of Frozen on CBS: Foods that Go “Above and Beyond”

“Get them frozen!” was the call from Frances Largeman-Roth, Senior Editor at Health Magazine, when she visited CBS’s Early Show recently to talk about women’s health. “They are cheaper, and just as good as fresh,” she reported about superfood list-topper, wild blueberries. Wild blueberries made the exclusive America’s Healthiest Superfoods for Women list which highlights only the foods that experts agree deliver mega-benefits when it comes to energy boosting, fat busting and disease prevention.

The list is made up of foods that go “above and beyond” Largeman-Roth said, working double-time to provide ways for women to be smarter, leaner and stronger. Her support for frozen is great advice for those of us who want convenience and nutrition year round. (You can read a previous post about why frozen is just as good as fresh.[link to frozen post])

Largeman-Roth also stressed that it’s wild that fits the bill: wild blueberries have a higher concentration of nutritional value than their cultivated counterparts.

View the Superfoods video at CBS.com.

Frozen Bombshell: Why Nutrition No Longer = Fresh

Whether your cupboards look like Dr. Oz has set up shop in your kitchen, or the puffy pastries and cheesy chips give away your nutritionally-challenged status, we all struggle with affordability and availability of healthy foods. How can we better integrate nutrition into our lives?

We must making healthy eating easier. This demand for year-round availability of nutritionally potent food at good prices seems to have caused a change in thinking about what constitutes healthy eating. For some, this change in thinking may not be news, but for others the shift could be seismic.

For decades, nutrition was synonymous with fresh food – it seemed to be the only way to enjoy the nutritional benefits of fruits and vegetables. It meant fresh from the tree, vine, plant or ground. It meant high nutrient content – the best thing you could put in your mouth.

Fresh is great, that’s true. But here’s the snag: often what we think of as fresh – unfrozen, unpackaged fruits and vegetables available in the produce section of the supermarket – has been subject to weeks in delivery trucks. Travel and transport to deliver fresh food to your local market may mean weeks off of the vine, tree or plant. Furthermore, by the time you put your selection in your cart, bring it home, and consume it, several more days have gone by.

Not only are our choices limited to seasonal and productivity shifts in the produce aisle, but when you eat “fresh” are you really eating fresh?

A New Kind of Fresh

A 2009 State Indicator Report was recently released showing that no state in the nation is meeting objectives for recommended amounts of fruit and vegetables. Access and availability figure prominently on the list of challenges in reaching nutritional benchmarks. Taking advantage of frozen fruits and vegetables could serve as the key to overcoming these barriers.

It may go against our intuition, but thanks to advances in technology, frozen is just as good as fresh. In 1998, the Food & Drug Administration confirmed that frozen fruits and vegetables provide the same essential nutrients and health benefits as fresh. For example, fruit is quick frozen at the peak of ripeness (allowing it to be picked at the perfect time, not prior to its peak in efforts to prevent spoilage). This “individually quick frozen” method (known as IQF) allows for the fast preservation of taste and nutrition, and the fruit can remain frozen for over two years without losing flavor or nutritional value. (That means an IQF wild blueberry has all its antioxidant power locked in until its ready to be used!)

For those unfamiliar with the nutritional value and convenience that frozen fruits and veggies provide, it can seem like a whole new way to shop. The frozen food aisle can serve as an extension of the produce section, offering good, healthy food, season in and season out.

Toward a Healthier Budget

More and more, consumers are tuned into to nutritional value: we can’t afford to make nutritional sacrifices, but at the same time, food budgets are tight. Interest in frozen fruits and veggies may also be driven by a concern about stretching budgets. Frozen means competitive prices and low waste – fruits and veggies can be purchased in bulk sizes, and portions are available in the freezer whenever they are needed.

The Bottom Line

If you are still waiting for summer to get a brief taste of healthy foods, it’s time to change your thinking. You need to make nutritionally potent fruits and vegetables a priority every day of the year. Nutrition is no longer synonymous with fresh: when it comes to getting your fruits and veggies, make frozen your secret nutritional weapon!