... want to do something that "homemade".  Look where the product's inventor lives (SF Bay area) what a marketing gimmick, so it's being sold in stores on the west coast.  Snork. Pancakes in a can, organic.  And the can is recyclable !

because they are worried about the planet, and some people are worried about their own health.

There is a weekly farmers market from May through October. It is extraordinarily popular. There is also a local food co-op and a for profit health food store in the area. In season, the food co-op carries local produce from the same farmers as sell at the farmers market along with produce from much further away. I don't know about the health food store, but I assume that it is similar there. However, the co-op also sells produce and processed food from other areas. Most shoppers prefer to buy local if possible, just for the taste value alone which is clearly superior. The nearest regular supermarket is a few miles outside of town, and it has an organic section.

I used to be in the wholesale and manufacturing side of the organic and natural food business as well as having been a grower, so I know a fair bit about organic standards. When I ask the produce people at the co-op about how they know if the food is organic, they simply rely on the distributor and the local farmers and, under careful questioning by me, have no idea what those standards are, so I am less than convinced that if something slipped through from a questionable supplier that they would have the knowledge or the interest to catch it. They do at least label where everything comes from, and if it's organic, transitional, or neither.

That said, I prefer that the big growers have a way in, because then they have an interest in seeing organics maintained and funded, rather than as competition to be legislated out of existence. It also creates a larger marketplace for organic food which will pull in more entrepreneurs, even if you get stuff like "pancakes in a can" along with other processed organic food. Organic farmers, IMHO, are in no danger of running out of customers, as the organic slice of the produce market is growing at a much faster clip than commercially grown produce in general.

But the organic standards, like liberty itself, will require eternal vigilance to maintain. 'Twas it ever thus.

And it seems you are, then I strongly recommend you read Omnivore's Dilemma, which I linked to above. Pollan makes the point that we shouldn't be looking at it as organic vs. inorganic, but as sustainable vs. non-sustainable.

You can have a small farmer who rotates his crops well, plans things out, changes what he grows with the weather, and yes, uses a few pesticides. Likewise you can have huge agri-business doing organics, who pump the soil full of nitrogen to such a degree that it needs a few years of rest to recover, and the local streams need a while to recover after all the runoff from the over-fertilizing (with natural minerals) done to the organic crops. One - and I'll give you a hint, it's the first one - is better both for you and for the environment, yet isn't strictly "organic."

There's also the logistics of agri-business organic products: most are grown on the same farms as their non-organic counterparts, if not right next to them. So you'd hit one field with pesticides, but the field next to it you wouldn't - and it would be certifiable organic, despite absorbing the run-off of the pesticide field, sharing the same contaminated groundwater, and almost certainly getting a healthy dose of pesticides from the wind blowing the particles over.

The moral of his (and I guess my) story is that if you want organic, you need to eat local. Talk to the guy you're buying your things from, who's ideally the guy that grows them as well. As how he farms. Pay that bit extra to help out small farmers. If you're lucky and find a good supplier, go visit the farm.