Apples easily would make my #1, too. I work in the chemical agriculture industry and I have had co-workers over the years spanning many different workplaces that wouldn't touch apples without cleaning the heck out of them or peeling them. Thiabendazole (fungicide) and azinphos methyl (pesticide) are commonly used...especially thiabendazole which is pretty much an industry standard. Thiabendazole on apples isn't really a huge concern, but it's the amount of thiabendazole used across so many produce+meat industries that's more of a concern along with apples being a place where you're going to get the biggest dose of it. Even though it's hard to get a major exposure to thiabendazole, it's easy to get it almost every turn you make in the food system for foods that are prone to fungal/mold issues and animals who are treated with thiabendazole for parasites. It's rather boring and mostly safe in common exposure...but there's a lot of it in our food system opening up some people to higher exposure even if it's not many people. It's one of those chemicals that needs a bit less cross-industry usage. You're also going to find carbaryl used on too many (imo) apple crops even if it's use is in decline...and this is one you don't want to regularly ingest even if it's small amounts. There's safer options than carbaryl out there. It's used on a small portion of apple crop production (10-ish%, tops), but it should be much closer to 0%. There's other chemicals used in orchards, but azinphos methyl and carbaryl are ones that I am not a fan of. Thiabendazole is a concern because of how much of it is in our cross-industry food supply and is a minor concern compared to azinphos methyl and carbaryl...but there's many that would like to see less of it used so much. This post was edited by nc-crn on Wed, Apr 30, 14 at 1:27

I contacted the author of "The Dirty Dozen" and he didn't know it was gone. He said it looks like the whole site is gone so he is going to do some investigation into it. I will keep you posted if I hear of it being put up again. Alexa

irawon, thanks for the comments. Don't know if I would consider Northern Exposure an upright, it is a sport of Elegans so similar habit. They had one at MN Landscape Arboretum that was a monster(pic below), though I suspect they may have started with more than one plant. My NE had a nice leap in divisions (added 7) this year, so I'm expecting it to spread a bit by season's end as the leaves stretch for the sunlight. I've let Sweet Woodruff go for the most part, it doesn't seem too hard to remove.... it's getting in the pathways now and I slowed it down quite a bit with a shuffle hoe. Neighbor removed some trees so one section is getting more sun....waiting to see if SW sulks in the sun. So far no difference, but we have had a very wet June, so will see with the heat of July. Paul

No, I don't wash coins or money, although I know they are very dirty, but I also don't put them into my mouth, it's not an equal comparison to something I eat. My lettuce doesn't get washed until I'm ready to use it, it lasts longer if it goes from the garden to the fridge and doesn't get washed until then. I do dry the leaves in my brand new salad spinner, a big OXO that I got at Goodwill for $2.99, the same time I bought Makayla her $8 bread machine. Bananas I don't eat at all, they are mushy and disgusting. Well, I will eat one if it's very green, very firm, sliced very thin and covered in Hershey's syrup, but that's the only way. Since I think most of the government safety guidelines are way past what it necessary, I figure if they say tap water is good enough, it most certainly is. If there was any chance, even the most miniscule, that tap water wasn't enough, there'd be warnings everywhere. That does depend, though, on whether or not your tap water is safe to drink. Annie