Is health food worth the cost?

I was gonna talk about one of my favorite shows today (Red Dwarf, see http://www.reddwarf.co.uk, shameless plug) but I found out today that my Dad has the on-set of type 2 Diabetes. Now I know that my title might be a little misleading, due to the fact that, yes health food is good for your body, but I am talking about the cost of the production and purchasing it seems a little distorted. I was reading the list of foods that my Dad can and cannot eat, which was given to him by his doctor, and it made me start wondering about the "cost" of health foods.

One of the healthier foods in question is bread. He cannot have white bread, but whole wheat is just fine. Now when you look at the price difference between white bread and wheat bread, you think well wheat costs more because of the whole grains and the overall quality of the bread. You may be right on the quality part but the whole grains...Hmmmm, just think about it. White bread has enriched flour, now being that the bread is white, the flour has been bleached and processed within an inch of it's life. During the bleaching and processing all the "good" nutrients were either destroyed or greatly lessened, so they have to "enrich" the flour with vitamins and minerals to replace the ones that got bleached out. Seems kind of redundant doesn't it.

Now with that being said, Whole Wheat breads or Whole Grain breads do not endure this kind of torture. There wheat's and grains are left intact, no bleaching and no over processing, and some don't even use preservatives. I do believe that there are still some vitamins and minerals added though.

What gets me is this, with what seems like more work to make White bread than to make Wheat or Whole grain bread, why the hell does the Wheat and Whole grain breads so damn much more!

The same thing goes for all this "Organically" grown and raised shit! You have all these damn fruits and vegetables being labeled as "Organic", no pesticides, no chemicals! Well if you don't use pesticides, or chemicals it should cost less to produce the stuff!!

The more I think about it, it makes me think that the growers, producers, and sellers of all the health foods are all in cahoots to pull a fast one over on the general public. I do believe they are doing a good job of it too! I think until people take a stand, and realize that they are getting ripped off by these people, they are going to keep charging ridiculous prices for all this shit!!

Now I'm not saying that health food is a bad thing, I think everyone should eat healthier (myself included) especially the people who really need it (like those with medically necessary conditions, i.e. my Dad) but they shouldn't have to pay ungodly high prices for these "miracle" foods just because these fuckers who make and market the shit want to make a quick buck on the health food band wagon!

I guess until everyone (or at least the ones that are able) starts taking some initiative and growing their own "Organic" fruits and vegetables, and making their own bread (I myself have done so) will have to keep their wallets fat, to keep everyone else in business.