A long time ago, back before the Industrial Revolution and before stores like Wal-Mart existed on every street corner, there was a much different perspective on a person’s food. If you wanted a certain vegetable or a specific fruit, you would either have to grow it as one of your own crops, or go to the local market to see if it is available for sale from another local farmer. Meat, well you know how they used to get their Christmas Eve ham right? Yep, out to the backyard with a shotgun.
There was no dependence on corporately owned farm land or federally supervised slaughter mills. You knew exactly where it came from and every detail of how it became food.
Today, the supply must comply with the population’s demand; requiring mass amounts of the product must be produced at one time that still need to stay “fresh” enough to go all the way across the country into the delivery truck that drops it off to that H.E.B. down the street. The strawberries that your great, great, great grandfather’s farm used to grow could never stay fresh long enough to meet that criteria and still be edible. So, how could these companies get the job done? Well, they sought help from the same thing everyone turns to for facts and answers. Science!
Chemicals and were added to plants to protect them from insects and different chemicals helped them retain fresh-like qualities. Hormones were injected into animals being raised specifically to be slaughtered. This helped the animals become stronger, tougher, allowing the meat to be more suitable to please consumers once it finally reaches the grocery store aisles.
As stomach-wrenching as this may sound, people in the U.S. along with many other places across the world consume food that has been scientifically enhanced. However, everyone once in a while you find someone, not only with knowledge of the current food situation, but whom also decides to do things “old-school”.
At several locations all over the Houston area, there is a restaurant chain known as Ruggles (no, not Muggles like in Harry Potter, although the mix up is quite understandable). According to their website, they guarantee “organic, all-natural, hormone-free, preservative-free products that are always delicious.” After an appetizer, such as the Organic Spinach Dip or the favorite House-Made Organic Hummus, anyone would notice their instant approval of the restaurant’s food. It is almost like discovering the savory flavors of how food used to taste; back in the days before science “enhanced” everything.
It is more common to see places using organic ingredients when it comes to vegetables or grains but rarely does one actually get to taste all-natural meat. Ruggles’ cows may lose in a fist fight to the cows of say, XXXXX’s cows, but that is just because Ruggles didn’t juice them up with a bunch of steroids. Their burgers are tender and savory, just as a burger should be—no chemicals needed in this case.
A lot of people don’t realize how good a plant known as hemp actually is for one’s health. The benefits go on and on. Many of Ruggles dishes include this ingredient. At the Ruggles Grill location they have an Organic Hemp Seed Crusted Lamb Racks dish and an All Natural Buffalo Burger that comes on a house made hemp bun.
Another hemp dish both the Grill and Ruggles Green serve is the delicious Uncle Fred’s Hi-Protein Hemp Brownie. This thick, chocolately dessert beats out any preservative-filled cheese cake by a long shot. It is accompanied perfectly by their house made organic vanilla bean ice cream. Another fantastic choice of desserts is their Tres Leches, which melts away in your mouth.
Their reasonably-priced dishes start kind of an immediate addiction. In fact, a speedy revisit will be needed to fulfill one’s desires for this exquisite, all-natural food.
