Being the devout organic shopper that I am, I've occasionally gotten into debates with friends about the benefits of buying organic vs. conventional food. They often snicker, "Is it really worth your 'whole paycheck'?" And my argument has always been that it doesn't have to be your "whole paycheck" if you shop smart, not everything you buy needs to be labeled "organic," and ultimately, yes, I'd rather spend more on my food in the short-term, because I see it as an investment in my long-term health. But researchers from Stanford University seem to have a bone to pick with that argument.

They combined data from 237 studies and examined a wide variety of fruits, vegetables, and meats over the course of four years for signs of health benefits from adding organic foods to the diet. Their sweeping conclusion? Organic food isn't necessarily more nutritious than non-organic. Unfortunately, the study didn't take into consideration the real reasons people like me go organic.

Hey ladies, are you still looking for Mr. Right? A man who's smart, sensitive (but strong), funny, adventurous, easy-going ... and preferably looks like Alexander Skarsgard? (Or, you know -- IS Alexander Skarsgard.) Well, let me tell you where you won't find him: The brand new "man aisle" at one NYC grocery store. That's right, the "man aisle."

What, pray tell, might one find in such a gender-specific spot as this? Well, the most obvious and clichéd choice would be to guess that the shelves are stocked with such macho must-haves as chips, barbecue sauce, razors, condoms and booze. And if that's what you guessed ... you win! (God knows what you get for a prize. Beef jerky, perhaps? Just kidding, you get nothing. It is the MAN aisle, after all! AHAHAHAHA!)

Anyway, I'm not kidding about the razors and booze and stuff.

Have you heard about this horrible, widespread summer drought? The Midwest is experiencing the worst drought since the Dust Bowl of the Great Depression. Folks, it's that bad. It looks like nearly a third of our country's corn crops could be completely shot. I feel for our farmers!

And if you're wondering if that's going to affect your grocery bill -- YEP. We could see higher prices at the supermarket later this year, especially for cereal and anything else made with corn and/or soybean, which means ... well, pretty much everything past the produce aisle. It's not just cereal and processed foods that could rise in price. Guess what else will get expensive ...

Every so often when you're grocery shopping, do you ever think: This would be so much more fun if I were naked? Well, one grocery store sure thinks so. For their grand opening, they offered up to $276 in FREE groceries to the first 100 people willing to shop naked.

Two hundred people took them up on their offer.

That's right, 200 people were willing to shop naked in exchange for free groceries. Has it really come to this? No, Channing Tatum did not show up. (SIGH.) However, if you stick with the NSFW video below long enough, you will be rewarded with some cute buns there toward the end. (1:50 mark, just skip ahead, trust me.)

It's time for another bagged salad recall! What's it been, a month or two? (Yes, almost to the day.) Well fortunately, today's recall is relatively small: Dole is recalling just over a thousand cases of bagged salad sold  at Kroger and Walmart stores. Listeria showed up in random testing for the batch. The salads were sent to Georgia, Kentucky, North Carolina, South Carolina, Tennessee, and Virginia.

And phew, so far no reported illnesses! So let's make sure it stays that way -- more specific information about the recalled bagged salad below the jump. The salad shouldn't be on store shelves anymore, but you never know.

People who know me well know I'm kind of a nut about meat. I mean, I love meat (love, I LOVE MEAT!) but I'm picky about it. I'm one of those annoying people who obsessively reads food packages and asks a million questions at restaurants. But I don't think I'm being unreasonable. I just want my meat to be drug-free.

And most meat in America isn't drug free. Most of it is raised with antibiotics -- not because the animals are sick but because antibiotics help animals grow bigger, faster. It means cheaper meat, but it also means we're breeding antibiotic superbugs at an alarming rate.

And meat that makes us all sicker is just not delicious to me.

So there's the ideal of family dinner: You've cooked a perfectly delicious and nutritious meal, all from scratch, and you had two totally uninterrupted hours to do that cooking. And then there's the reality: You ran by the grocery store on the way home from soccer practice/piano lessons/work and you have three seconds to whip up dinner before you have to leave again for parent/teacher conferences or maybe your second job.

So a few shortcuts every once in a while are helpful -- but maybe you don't want to serve frozen pizza every night.

Here are a few nifty cooking time-saver products I've run across recently. Use these and you're still technically cooking, but that cooking just got a hell of a lot easier.

I know peanut butter. Peanut butter is a dear, dear friend of mine. Creamy, salty, and stick-to-your-gums thick, it satisfies my hungry belly and gives my inner child a warm hug. But peanut butter has been keeping a dark secret, and I just don't know if I can love it like I used to.

Researchers have found traces of flame retardants in peanut butter.

Peanut butter, how could you? I feel so betrayed! I always saw you as a safe comfort food (for those of us without peanut allergy), but suddenly you're starting to look dangerous. What I want to know is, exactly how dangerous are you?