Of all the meaningless terms in the food labeling world—and there are a lot—”natural” might be one of the worst

But it’s deliberately following the letter of the law rather than the spirit; customers have a much higher expectation of a meat labeled “natural,” as multiple studies have shown.

And here I am, running pell-mell in the opposite direction.

I can't say I grew up on a farm, but only because the farm was a hundred meters away. I fed the chicken, watered the plants, picked strawberries and other fruits, helped plant tomatoes, carried the produce home - and as my father was fond of "natural", "biological", "no pesticides", I came to associate pain, fatigue, and "there is a fucking worm wriggling in my food!" with that. "Oh, don't worry, it's smaller than you!" Yes. That's exactly the issue.

It only got worse with all the expensive alternative "medicines" and supplements that some people have been pushing on me lately, and nowadays, when someone says "it's natural", the only thing I hear is "I can't say anything better about it" and "quality assurance? what quality assurance?"