Food Irradiation

[Shalmanese]

I have a question about the effects of radiation on the enzymes in food. I know from brewing beer that at certain temperatures, the enzymes that convert starch to sugar are killed.  I really like dry aged beef, which basicly is a form of controlled rotting. Are the enzymes that help in the aging process damaged by irradiation?

PS, I am not a nutcase or a Luddite, but there are alot of questions that need to be raised and answered on this issue!

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Yes, there are many food processes that depend on the controlled action of microscopic orgamisms. Cheese, wine, beef, beer, bread, yogurt etc. If you want such things to happen, just don't irradiate it.

rancho_gordo: How many of us today, realistically get a chance to pick a ripe tomato from their garden? How many of us at any point in time have ever had that chance? In all likelyhood, the tomatos of yesteryear that were picked from from our gardens were maggoty, small and uneven. I think it's fantastic that you and like minded people are trying to provide the absolute best quality food you can but simple market forces dictate that only a scant minority will ever enjoy such luxuries with today's technology.

[ivan]

Don't let anyone tell you that irradiation of food causes cancer!  Quite the reverse.

So, cancer causes irradiation of food?

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Since the technology used in food irradiation was at least partly advanced by medical research... sure, you can say that.

[ChefSwartz]

[*]Don't let anyone tell you that irradiation causes food to lose its nutritional value!

[*]Don't let anyone tell you that irradiation causes all food to taste funny!

Everything you said EXCEPT these two things are correct, and these two pieces of information are COMPLETELY FALSE.

Irradiation does destroy anti-oxidants and vitamins and it does reduce texture and produce an "off" flavor.

I suggest you check your source on that info.

Irradiation DOES not necessarily produce radioactive materials, you can irradiate with an electron beam or x-ray which works with an on-off switch. Irradiation with gamma-rays from radiactive materials, mainly cesium-137 or cobalt-60, does however. But there is more than one way to radiate.

There are millions of things EVERYONE OF YOU eat on a regular basis that are irradiated mainly spices( since 1986) but the government has allowed this process since 1957. There have been amendments to the food,drug,cosmetic act of 1957 since then but you have been eating irradiated food since you were ALL babies. How do you like that?

The government is not required to label the food as much as you would think. anthing made with less than %10 irradiated product does NOT have to be labeled.

Finally I have to point yall back to an article in "What Einstein told his cook" , Robert Wolke makes some great points defending the process.

How do you define SAFETY? Is anything completely safe? No, it is matter of risk vs. reward and after thousands of scientists(not me or any of you!) have done experiments they have condoned it. Will it have side effects that we will have to deal with at a later time? ABSOLUTELY, I want someone to name a single advancement in any field that does not have negative consequences.

I want a link to ONE scientific study that shows hazard.

I dont think it exists.

The real question we should be trying to answer is how as foodies do we bring these foods back to the level they should be at. There has to be a way. There is no stopping this train. So you might as well climb aboard.

It was very hard for me to defend this process, I am JUST as sensitive

as anyone of you. I Love my fresh local organics, my heirlooms, etc. But if they can irradiate and save the quality, while saving someones life, WHO CARE'S?

Alot of you have uneducated opinions on this topic which is a bit disturbing.

RESEARCH, weigh both sides, then make up your mind.

I know its innate to think with your heart but god gave us a mind as well.

You dont have to give up your food ethics, just ADAPT!

Edited April 5, 2005 by ChefSwartz (log)

[ivan]

Of course they would, except for the Luddites.

Andie, I'd like to make a distinction between Luddites (who object to technological progress specifically when it worsens the quality of life), and Tin-Foil Hat types who are driven by an irrational mistrust of technologies they don't understand and are convinced that government agencies are conspiring to sterilize us and give us cancer.

True Luddites may embrace irradiation if, as you predict, it will benefit the small farmer. A Luddite would typically oppose the kinds of technology that benefits the factory grower and puts the small farmer out of business.

[slkinsey]

[*]Don't let anyone tell you that irradiation causes food to lose its nutritional value!

[*]Don't let anyone tell you that irradiation causes all food to taste funny!

Everything you said EXCEPT these two things are correct, and these two pieces of information are COMPLETELY FALSE.

Irradiation does destroy anti-oxidants and vitamins and it does reduce texture and produce an "off" flavor.

I suggest you check your source on that info.

Chef, I think you mean to say can rather than does. And that would depend on the amount/kind of irradiation.

Even assuming that some antioxidants and vitamins are destroyed by irradiation, and further assuming that these things are destroyed by irradiation to a greater extent than they would be anyway by things like sunlight and time, and further assuming that irradiation doesn't actually forestall some of the destructions of these things that would ordinarily happen over time as the result bacterial, fungal and enzymatic action, I don't think we can say that irradiation causes "causes food to lose its nutritional value" and become nutritionally worthless. Are you suggesting that an irradiated tomato would have no nutritional value? Cooking the food would seem to have a far greater effect on this score.

Similarly, I don't think there is evidence that irradiation "causes all food to taste funny." Does paprika "taste funny" because it has been irradiated? Have you tasted an irradiated tomato to verify whether it has "reduced texture" and an "off flavor?" The evidence from andiesenji, who has tasted irradiated tomatoes, seems to be that both of these things are actually improved by irradiation -- especially over time.

So actually it doesn't seem like these assertions are completely false.

[tanabutler]

rancho_gordo: How many of us today, realistically get a chance to pick a ripe tomato from their garden? How many of us at any point in time have ever had that chance? In all likelyhood, the tomatos of yesteryear that were picked from from our gardens were maggoty, small and uneven.

Shalmanese, I am dumbstruck. My mouth literally fell open at this point in your post.

By a happy coincidence, I have turned my creative energy lately to producing a blog about small farms. Though I am focusing now on the farms in Santa Cruz County, where I live, there are hundreds if not thousands of small farms across the country and around the world that produce, as they have for probably a hundred years, glorious perfect stunning delicious tomatoes. And corn. And every other stripe of vegetable, fruit, herb, nut and food you can imagine, all without the use of toxic pesticides or chemical warfare or irradiation!!!

You do not actually believe that modern farming techniques have improved on perfection, do you? Do you think anyone in their right mind will ever be nostalgia for the sour pingpong balls that pass for strawberries at Safeway, or for watery-yet-hard tomatoes that are grown hydroponically and without the benefit of soil to give them flavor?

I don't know whether to laugh or cry, when I think of all the people I know who grow tomatoes every year, in containers on the decks of their high-rise apartments if necessary, so they can enjoy the glory that a homegrown tomato is. How many people at eGullet are fanatical about homegrown ((or at least, locally farmed heirloom) tomatoes? I bet hundreds, if not thousands. And those of us who lack the means or the green thumb are pretty good at finding the good stuff at our local farmers markets.

Why do you think they call them "heirlooms"? Dictionary.com provides this definition for "heirloom": "A valued possession passed down in a family through succeeding generations."

If you think irradiation is an improvement on perfection, or if you are so afraid of your food that you imagine maggots in it (though maggots are not likely to be found in perfectly ripe produce, but the rotting/decomposing stuff), then perhaps irradiation is the way for YOU to go. (I don't understand people who are afraid of food. I cannot begin to comprehend the kind of education that went into producing someone who thinks the gardens and farms of yesteryear produced "small, maggoty, uneven" tomatoes.)

While I'm at it, let me pick apart the idea that a small tomato (strawberry, what have you) is an inferior tomato (strawberry, what have you). The best strawberries I ever had in my life were at K-Paul's kitchen in the early Eighties, in New Orleans in the first week of May. They were the size of the tip of my thumb. (I am a tall woman but I have average-sized hands...the tip of my thumb is about an inch long.)

No strawberry before or since has ever tasted more like a strawberry. As a 25-year resident of California, I have suffered mightily with the nasty strawberries you find in supermarkets. These are the same strawberries Mimi Sheraton griped about, as though California couldn't grow anything better to send to the city dwellers in New York. They are huge, unripe-no-matter-how-red, sour, disgusting orbs that have to be drowned in sugar to approach palatability. They are an abomination, in my book. But gosh, they ship easily.

People are so foolish that they BUY these things, thinking they're getting strawberries. Yes, I said foolish. It's foolish to buy food that doesn't taste good. It's foolish to throw money away on an approximation of flavor. If that was the best I could do, I'd look for frozen berries or do without. (I don't have a big problem with frozen berries if that's all you can get.) People are also foolish enough to buy "Red Delicious" apples (what an ironic name that is) in supermarkets, simply because they are red and look like textbook apples. They've been in storage for ten months, in all likelihood, and have about as much brix as a packet of Splenda. Not to mention that they're mealy and gross. But supermarkets sell them because people are sheep who buy what they're told is good without questioning if they can do better.

We have fabulous berries in California, and they stay in California. They're too tender to ship without getting destroyed, so lucky us, we get them all at the farmers markets and local stores, and poor Mimi Sheraton gets imitation strawberries and blames California for not picking up the slack for the rest of the country. As if we're the ones who should be ashamed.

I am not convinced about irradiation, with all respect due to the good doctor and others who have spoken up. Something just doesn't sit well with me about it. I'm going to talk to the farmers I know, and I'll see what they have to say. Having seen their farms and eaten their tomatoes, I know when I'm in good hands.

[fifi]

Back in the late 60s, I participated in a bacterial survey of spices done by the FDA. Trust me on this. Irradiation of spices is something you definitely want. Having to get out Bergey's to identify some of the stuff we found, it scared the crap out of us.

I do want to ask that those in California, and other paradisical climes, please remember that you are the exception. In most parts of the US, the climates are often extreme so that buying locally grown all of the time would make for a lousy diet at best. And it isn't just the cold parts. Here in the Gulf Coast, you can almost watch that tomato rot before your eyes. Our farmer's market situation here is dismal. In researching the issue and discussing with a county agent, I was told that one of the problems is that during the late spring, summer and early fall, there is just too much spoilage in some parts of the state. Growing up, we always had a garden. You didn't see tomatoes sitting on the counter or window sill either, at least until we got air conditioning in the mid-50s. If the farmer that picks those tomatoes had a way to irradiate them so that what doesn't sell on one market day can be held until the next, there is less waste and more profit for the farmer, and more available for the consumer. I read somewhere a year or so ago that some of the Ag colleges are looking into some sort of cooperative effort to offer facilities for small scale farmers. I don't know the status of that.

What I can tell you with absolute assurance is that if you autoclave tomatoes and depressure too quickly, they explode! (We had this great idea for making tomato sauce. Throw whole tomatoes in big stainless beakers. Cook 'em up. Not a good idea. Do you know how long it takes to clean tomato goo out of a really big autoclave? )

[Pan]

[...]

A person who is irradiated for cancer is treated with radiation - they are not radioactive themselves, neither are fruits or vegetables.[...]

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Actually, everything is somewhat radioactive: Your computer, your body, your pen, your food, your table, your pillow. We're just talking about degrees of radioactivity. For example, most water molecules are not radioactive, but some are, because a certain percentage of hydrogen and oxygen atoms naturally have the form of radioactive isotopes (e.g. deuterium, tritium). But otherwise, your points are all well taken.

[tanabutler]

I do want to ask that those in California, and other paradisical climes, please remember that you are the exception. In most parts of the US, the climates are often extreme so that buying locally grown all of the time would make for a lousy diet at best. And it isn't just the cold parts. Here in the Gulf Coast, you can almost watch that tomato rot before your eyes.

Fifi, I grew up in Georgia, and often visited my grandfather's friend's farm, where the tomatoes were of the drip-down-your-chin variety if you had a tomato sandwich. I don't recall "GW" (I refer to the gentleman who farmed and no one else with those initials) complaining about spoilage. But maybe big farms have more worries, especially if they are farming with chemicals.

And then, too, maybe global warming is creating more problems along these lines. The average temperate in Atlanta is, I believe, two degrees hotter on average than it was in my childhood, due to deforestation (aka "suburbs"). (Hmm, do we detect a theme here?)

I know farmers all over the country, and I am going to ask them their opinions. These folks have their finger on the pulse of something good and true. I am curious as to what they will say.

[slkinsey]

In re to tomatoes, my mother grew great ones when I was growing up in Boston (we also had chickens and kept bees, but that's a story for another time). Now that my parents are living in Houston, I don't think she has ever been able to satisfactorily raise tomatoes like she used to. The real problem she's having now is that something (we suspect rats) eats them before she has a chance to pick them for herself.

In re to the Gulf Coast, until you've been someplace like Houston in July and August, you really can't understand what the climate is like down there. Houston has, I believe, one of the highest heat indexes in the country. This is mostly due to incredibly high humidity. 90F and 90% humidity (heat index of 119) is not at all uncommon in the summer months. In fact, the average for June, July and August is temperature and humidity percentage in the high 80s. Spoilage in unrefrigerated conditions is a huge problem.

[rancho_gordo]

But Fifi, isn't there a window for growing tomatoes? January thru Spring or something like that?

Here the window for production is August thru maybe October. It's not so long. The rest of the year I eat canned (my own and store bought) rather than eat commercial tomatoes.

Shalmanese, if you want to, you can grow tomatoes and buy artisan/organic/sustainable/whatever food. It's a decision. If being in an urban environment is holding you back, I have literally dozens of internet friends who would love to help. If they can grow good tomatoes in foggy San Francisco, it can be done anywhere. If it's economics, my beans are very expensive compared to Chinese production GMO varieties picked by slave labor, but they're pennies per serving and a downright steal nutrionally compared to meat. If it's not your thing, I can accept that, but to claim eating like this is a luxury or just for a scant few isn't really fair. But it is a decision.

[ChefSwartz]

slkinsey,

No actually I meant what I said,

It DOES. When the fruit or vegetable or meat or whatever is bombarded with the radiation it breaks compounds. It is meant to break the bad ones( the DNA of pathogens, spoilage organisms, etc) but it has no way to cipher the difference. So inheirently it destroyes the good ones as well( vitamins, etc). And what holds all these things up cell walls.

also,I hardly think andiesenji is a TASTING EXPERT on this matter.

If you lined up 10 tomatoes and bombarded one with 10 million times the amount of radiation it takes for one X-ray(that is the MINIMUM dosage), and youre friend cant tell the difference, then they need to find another career choice or hobby.

The taste becomes familiar so the public doesn't know the difference. Not that the public chooses to train or use their palate to its maximum ability anyway.

On Strawberries, how much do they actually change in taste? Are we talking AROMA here or taste, because i have had straw's that are not sweet but still taste like straws. We just add a little sugar, eh? Aroma and ripeness are mostly unrelated in taste. taste is 98% smell. Yes its glorious to take a perfectly ripe Georgia peach off the tree and eat it without additional substance, but once you cook with it it becomes moot. the products we use are NEVER consistant and it is up to the chef to acknowledge through taste and compensate for these facts.

Edited April 6, 2005 by ChefSwartz (log)

[slkinsey]

also, I hardly think andiesenji is a TASTING EXPERT on this matter. If you lined up 10 tomatoes and bombarded one with 10 million times the amount of radiation it takes for one X-ray(that is the MINIMUM dosage), and youre friend cant tell the difference, then they need to find another career choice or hobby.

So she's not a tasting expert, but you are -- is that what you're saying? You're making a lot of assertions here. Have you actually compared irradiated and non-irradiated but otherwise identical foods side-by-side?

[slbunge]

You know, as long as we are on tomatoes, I think that discussion of irradiation and making a connection to that being needed to make heirloom tomatoes economically viable for widescale sale is sort of pointless. Supermarket tomatoes are what they are because they were bred to be packaged and shipped long distances. Their flesh being firm is absolutely intentional. Their shape being nearly perfectly uniform aid both the ability to package efficiently and to pick easily. To some degree, they are what they are because of consumer's concept of what a tomato should be (big, round, red, unblemished, smooth, etc).

Irradiation doesn't make it easier for an heirloom tomato to arrive from Mexico (or even from three states over) in-tact. Nor does it make the tomato more regularly shaped. Nor does it make it easier to pick or grow. Nor does it even out the color or blemishes on the skin.

This is true beyond tomatoes, just using them as a vivid example because of their fragility.

I think that irradiation will likely just provide improvement in defense against mold and bacteria and certainly longer storage-life for the same damn tomatoes I don't like already. They can then be shipped in from Thailand instead of trucked in from Mexico.

For me, this is an economic issue (I say that because I think the technology is actually safe) that I imagine will have marginal impact on the way I eat. The delicate fruits and vegetables I love will still be a pain in the neck to get to market and I will decide if the price is worth brining it to my table. However, I think this does bring up issues about where we really want our food being produced and is the drive for cheaper and cheaper food (that people in the US certainly value less and less) really what we want.

[jsolomon]

If they can ship ripe blackberries and raspberries, they can ship ripe tomatoes. Packaging technology is there. Don't toss in that red-herring argument, please.

[cdh]

I'm all for the option to use irradiation being made available. I don't believe that it should be banned, outlawed, stigmatized with a radiation hazard sticker that would unfairly torpedo it's market acceptance, etc.

I imagine that it will prove effective on some products and less so on others. I think that the market will dictate where it is used. If it does open a competitive front against the bred-to-ship varieties of some produce, then all the better. If it doesn't, then the plant breeders are justified in what they've done.

All I care about is improving the chances of getting better quality food at a better price point. If that means that supply of good tomatoes goes up when they're irradiated and don't rot (and hence lowers their price), then good. If good tomatoes start to taste like bad tomatoes after they're irradaited, then at least I'll have the choice of bad tomatoes that are bad in different ways.

For those who have ready access to perfection, as Tana does, then yay for them! Maybe irradiation will help others get access to the same, or something closer to it than is available to them now.

Speaking as somebody who has grown heirloom tomatoes for the past few summers here in meteorologically messed-up southeastern Pennsylvania, I'd point out that my tomatoes have in no way approached perfection... but they're still fun and taste good enough for me... even if the [drought/flood] afflicting the area at the time has made them seriously suboptimal.

What I really care about is getting irradiation that will increase the shelf life of the obscure citrus fruits I buy like Seville oranges that are only available for a month or two each year. Nothing bugs me more than finding a Seville orange that has gone all powdery blue on the outside overnight. IF irradiation can kill those mold spores, then the more power to it!

Edited April 6, 2005 by cdh (log)

[andiesenji]

I am not a "tasting expert" and never said I was.

However, I was born and raised on a farm in western Kentucky and we had an extensive kitchen garden with several varieties of tomatoes and since I grew up in the 40s, they were all "heirloom" but to us they were just the tomatoes that grew best in our area.

Over the years since then there has rarely been a time that I have been without a garden of some kind, always with tomatoes and always the best tasting and usually grown from seeds saved from the previous crop, occasionally a new one added when it was recommended or I tasted one I liked.

I have tasted tomatoes taken from the same plant, some irradiated and some not and there was not a whit of difference even after they had been kept, without refrigeration, for 8 weeks.

I have taken part in tasting competitions as a judge of fruits and vegetables, fresh and canned, at our local fair. I know what I want in a tomato or strawberry or whatever. I drive up to Tehachapi for blackberries, because they are better than any I can buy commercially, even at Farmer's Markets.

Anything that makes better tasting foods available is A-OK in my book.

[slbunge]

If they can ship ripe blackberries and raspberries, they can ship ripe tomatoes.  Packaging technology is there.  Don't toss in that red-herring argument, please.

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I wasn't trying to toss in a red-herring argument. I was simply trying to point out that irradiation of food doesn't turn the system on its ear and make heirloom tomatoes (or peaches or plums) instantly available. There are all sorts of forces at work.

[ivan]

I have tasted tomatoes taken from the same plant, some irradiated and some not and there was not a whit of difference even after they had been kept, without refrigeration, for 8 weeks. 

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Yes, but you probably tasted them using the traditional "put in mouth" method. Now that we know that taste is 98% smell, the proper way to taste a tomato is to shove it up your nose. I'm still learning to distinguish some of the more subtle variations, but using the shove-up-nose method I can tell the difference between a Sweet-100 and a Brandywine with my eyes closed.

[Smithy]

What I really care about is getting irradiation that will increase the shelf life of the obscure citrus fruits I buy like Seville oranges that are only available for a month or two each year.  Nothing bugs me more than finding a Seville orange that has gone all powdery blue on the outside overnight.  IF irradiation can kill those mold spores, then the more power to it!

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Boy, howdy. It isn't just the obscure citrus. I weep at the loss of quality in oranges, mandarins, tangelos, and to some extent grapefruit (lemons seem to be an exception) from the present packing process. It isn't that they're being picked unripe as the stone fruits are; citrus is sturdy stuff and doesn't have to be picked early to survive shipping. Something happens in the packing plant - whether it's the fungicide to kill the bugs, or the wax that's applied afterward, I don't know - that blunts the smell and flavor so the poor things come to market tired-smelling and -tasting. I've noticed this in the organically grown citrus as well as the standard crops, so it must be common to both packing processes. If irradiation can keep that blue mold from growing (it really does happen overnight, but not on every orange) so the fungicide and wax can be avoided, more people would know how oranges are really supposed to taste.

[fifi]

Yeah . . . As they say, it isn't the heat it is the humidity. You can move a couple of hundred miles or less inland and not have the same problem. When you have dew points around 78 degrees F, and sometimes even higher, you have the perfect environment for fungi and rot bacteria to thrive with no help at all. I have had a bucket of tomatoes bought from a roadside stand turn to goo in less than 24 hours because I left it on the porch. Same thing will happen to peppers and eggplants that I have picked from my garden and left on the porch overnight.

When I get back to gardening, I would love to have a countertop irradiator.

I used dew point instead of relative humidity because that means more to me. Dew point is the temperature at which water will condense out of the water vapor contained in the air.

[fifi]

But Fifi, isn't there a window for growing tomatoes? January thru Spring or something like that? 

. . . . .

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(Sorry guys. Roadrunner got wacked by Wiley Coyote so I have been off line for a while and playing catch up.)

No. That isn't how it works. We still get cold snaps during the winters and sometimes hard freezes, particularly inland. My new digs are actually on a peninsula that sticks out into Galveston Bay and is really a microclimate somewhere between zone 9 and 10 according to the county agent. I have seen plumeria trees in yards. Banana trees regularly bear fruit. But, due to the cold snaps, folks started putting out the tender plants like tomatoes, peppers and eggplants starting a couple or three weeks ago. You may get fruit set up until July. Then it gets too hot. If you take care of your plants you can sometimes start to get a bit more fruit when it starts to cool down in late September. That is if a hurricane hasn't blown your plants away. What we have of "winter" is used for lettuces, root crops, cabbages and such.

The other problem is the bugs. And not just the ones that actually eat the fruits. There are many that make an unobtrusive puncture that doesn't really harm the initial quality but does let in rot organisms. Between those, surface molds and the high humidity, you have extremely perishable fruit.

My sister and I and our mother and grandmother before us have always gardened as close to organically as possible. They were some of the first subscribers to the Rodale Press publications. I have blended many buckets of pyretherin daisies to try to save a crop. I hated to do it because, even though that is a "natural" insecticide, it will kill bees just as effectively as what you can buy off the shelf. But, for purposes of this thread, once you get it grown and picked you aren't out of the woods yet. If there was a chance of preserving crops after picking while retaining the quality, I would have a lot better chance of getting something to eat out of the garden. In order to stay as organic as possible, the usual strategy is to plant twice as much as a sane person would and plan on losing a significant portion to bugs and rot.

The point being, many climates are just not as easy to deal with as some others. Having a tool like irradiation in the kit could make life a lot better for producers and consumers alike.

[ChefSwartz]

ivan,

The taste comes from the act of chewing and swallowing, the water soluble particles are released into the nasal cavity through the back of your throat.

Sarcasm is cute at first but in a real discussion its just annoying.

I know I backed you into a corner. But way to fight back the only way you know how.

I am no expert on tasting the difference I have researched quite in depth though. but, how clever, I made the assumption none of you were, without even knowing. Huh

cat got your tounge?

i specifically asked for educated opinions, and most of what Ive read has been bleeding heart, and back in the day, nonsense. Dont get me wrong you are entitled to your opinion, just not in an EDUCATED forum.

-peace

Edited April 6, 2005 by ChefSwartz (log)

[ivan]

ChefSwartz, "sarcasm" is a bit strong for my flip and irreverant comment, but what I was making fun of was your completely unscientific and arbitrary statement that "taste is 98% smell". That is preposterous on the face of it.

Why do you begin a thread soliciting opinions and then dismiss those opinions out-of-hand? Andiesenji's observations are cogent, considered, well-informed and based on personal experience. Your response was rude and unwarranted.

Edited April 6, 2005 by ivan (log)

[andiesenji]

But Fifi, isn't there a window for growing tomatoes? January thru Spring or something like that? 

. . . . .

←

(Sorry guys. Roadrunner got wacked by Wiley Coyote so I have been off line for a while and playing catch up.)

No. That isn't how it works. We still get cold snaps during the winters and sometimes hard freezes, particularly inland. My new digs are actually on a peninsula that sticks out into Galveston Bay and is really a microclimate somewhere between zone 9 and 10 according to the county agent. I have seen plumeria trees in yards. Banana trees regularly bear fruit. But, due to the cold snaps, folks started putting out the tender plants like tomatoes, peppers and eggplants starting a couple or three weeks ago. You may get fruit set up until July. Then it gets too hot. If you take care of your plants you can sometimes start to get a bit more fruit when it starts to cool down in late September. That is if a hurricane hasn't blown your plants away. What we have of "winter" is used for lettuces, root crops, cabbages and such.

The point being, many climates are just not as easy to deal with as some others. Having a tool like irradiation in the kit could make life a lot better for producers and consumers alike.

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The heat here in the desert is very tough on many plants, as is the wind which, when combined with 100+ temps (temps up to 115 are common), can cook a plant in an hour.

The solution is shade cloth and a misting system.

The shade cloth is on home-made frames (made by one of my neighbors) that is sort of like the "convertible" top on an old buggy. The rods that support it are pushed into the ground at varying angles so the wind (usually out of the west) is blocked as is the overhead sun.

Combined with that are sets of misting or fogging nozzles that throw out a fog, using surprisingly little water, and effectively cooling the area by 10 to 15 degrees.

This allows tomatoes, peppers, eggplant and curcubits to bloom continuously through the hot spells.

Some plants like the direct sunlight but the wind is damaging. For those we just use shade cloth wind screens stapled to 3 posts which can be pushed into the ground easily with the "V" of the center post facing the direction from which the wind is blowing.

Spending all this time and money on produce may sound odd to some people but the quality is far superior to anything I can buy and this is the sole reason I do it.

If I had that countertop irradiation appliance it would be in constant use.