Of all natural laws, nutrition is perhaps the least understood and most often violated. While universities and colleges offer courses in this subject, the giant food industry dominates them. The food industry is a highly organized and complex global collective of diverse businesses that together supply much of the food energy consumed by the world population. They can see to it that the textbooks for courses in nutrition are keyed to their products, textbooks that tell the students of nutrition to beware of the “food faddist.” They ridicule organically grown foods and claim that there’s no harm in the use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. They describe the mass produced, devitalized dead foods distributed through supermarkets around the world as wonderful inventions of food science.

The food industry is not working in the interest of your health. We need to stop corrupt politicians and power brokers in their corrupt vested interest practices and bring them to justice, but until we do there is something you can do right now: Think more carefully about the food you put into your body. Vote with your purchases, buy organic and buy healthy.

Here are five more reasons to buy organic foods: They taste much better. They give added value to a healthy and balanced diet. Organic fruits and vegetables aren’t covered in pesticides. Non-organic fruit and vegetables are and not all of it washes off. Even though the food industry claims that there’s no health risk from pesticide traces, wouldn’t you rather feed you and your family food that’s pesticide free? Food additives are not permitted in organic foods. There are no preservatives, stabilizers, hydrogenated fats, flavor enhancers, artificial colors, or sweeteners. There are no pesticides in organic milk, no hidden starches in organic baby food, and no residual antibiotics, growth hormones or BSE in organic meat. Buying organic foods helps the environment. Organic farming is an important way to keep ecosystems and rural communities healthy and alive.

In our modern kitchen, it won’t be hard for us to find a variety cookware made with the most technologically advance processes and materials. However, no matter how far engineers go to develop the perfect tools for the professional and home cook, they may never replace the cast iron skillet. One of the problems with using a regular pan is how some portions of food cook faster than other sections. Stainless steel or aluminum pans share hot and cold surface areas. One of the properties of cast iron is its ability to retain heat and distribute it evenly on its surface. That means when you cook with a cast iron skillet, your food will taste better because you won’t be over cooking it in one area and under cooking it in another. Iron is an important mineral in our diets. Our bodies use it to make red blood cells. It is in green leafy vegetables. But many of us don’t get enough of it in our meals. When using a cast iron skillet, you are cooking some of that iron into the food. This is not to say you shouldn’t also supplement your iron needs in other ways, but to say that cooking with a cast iron skillet may have some passive nutritional benefits.

Modern cookware is very attractive and desirable. Quality cookware makes cooking more enjoyable and easier. Quality is expensive, but if you are a good cook, then owning brand name top of the line cookware might be a good personal choice. However, the cast iron skillet performs as well as, if not better than many pans that are more expensive. Cast iron skillets are among the most inexpensive cookware you can buy. For all the benefits that it gives, it is a real bargain. The cast iron skillet has been around longer than many of the cookware we see today. That’s because cooks throughout the ages realize it can’t be beat for the way it cooks food evenly and how inexpensive it is to own and use. If you don’t already own and use a cast iron skillet, then now is the time you try it. Because when you finally do, you’re going to wonder why you hadn’t started sooner.