I know you’ve already heard that the Oxford English Dictionary declared “locavore” their word of the year, and the four women who coined the term should feel pretty good right now. Now it’s our job to make sure that the word begins to describe more and more people, rather than to exclude anyone. It’s food, after all, let’s keep it fun!
Over at Culinate, Melissa Helquist has an interesting article about why she chooses to eat locally when she can, but doesn’t choose to join her local locavore movement in challenges or special awareness months. She refers to the September Eat Local Challenge, and talks a lot about folks who chose to give up coffee, sugar and alcohol that wasn’t locally produced.
Certainly, many people (a la Kingsolver and MacKinnon and Smith) do choose to forgo “exotic” ingredients that have no business growing in the Northern Hemisphere. But that’s sexy and makes good TV (or headlines in the lifestyle section of your local paper, at least). A lot of us who consider ourselves locavores simply try to make better choices about the things we can get locally, which, over time, have been sourced out. We also choose to eat in season, another important, but much less sexy aspect of eating locally. If the green beans and broccoli that I eat every week can be had from the farmstand across the street rather than across the country , why not put some of them aside for winter? The same produce has traveled a lot more miles to get to the shelf of my supermarket in February. And if I can’t get green beans locally, I also have to plan to eat a lot more squash and root veggies during the cold months.
Helquist herself spent a lot of time this summer making her own butter and preserving foods, but doubts the effect her efforts have on the crazy food system, and considers her energies better spent elsewhere,
My opting out of the industrial food system doesn’t do anything for people who have no other choice but to purchase and consume the most calorie-dense foodstuffs in the grocery store: the corn-laden junk foods that are ultimately subsidized by the Farm Bill.
She urges us to consider some very important questions,
What compels Americans’ food choices? How can we get large-scale producers to reconsider their unsustainable practices? Could we put our energies towards starting a local co-op so that we are able to support local growers but also benefit from economies of scale?
I have to agree that these are the important questions, and they are the very questions that led me to consider trying to eat more locally and seasonally. The first step toward getting the attention of large-scale producers is to vote with my food dollars, after all.
But BirdsEye, GreenGiant, Purdue and Kraft certainly won’t miss my $125 each week. The message will be heard, though, when more and more folks vote, too. So the last thing any local, seasonal eater really wants to do is make people think the only way they can make a dfference is to give up sugar and coffee. Nor can we send a message that, if you haven’t given those things up, then you must not care about sustainability, energy conservation, or that you are (heavens!) not a sophisticated foodie!
Anyone who’s tried to lose weight will tell you that, if forced to give up everything you love, you’re more likely to give up altogether. If we tell people the only way they can make a difference is by growing and producing their own food, then we risk alienating people, rather than convincing them.
Instead we can take a cue from the One Local Summer and Dark Days Challenges. Why not try to eat locally at least once a week? As Kingsolver says, in Animal, Vegetable, Miracle,
If every U.S. citizen ate just one meal a week (any meal) composed of locally and organically raised meats and produce, we would reduce our country’s oil consumption by over 1.1 million barrels of oil every week. That’s not gallons, but barrels. (p. 5)
Notice she says “meats and produce.” Every region of this country has indigenous meats and produce. It’s probably easier than most people think to find them.
Seasonal, local eating can make a difference. Buying exotic ingredients comes with important choices (organic, fair trade, responsibly farmed), but is not mutually exclusive to being a responsible consumer. For me, it comes down to common-sense, and it’s the tagline for my little blog, here: If you can buy it locally, you probably ought to.
Brava!
Very well stated! One thing to remember, too, is that if it was grown locally and not trucked half way around the world, it probably tastes better. We’ve made the switch to local produce this year and I will never go back! It is so much tastier and it’s just the right thing to do.
Eating seasonally is an adventure too. I’ve branched out beyond my big 8 or 10 things I used to eat when shopping at the supermarket and tried all kinds of things. Some I’ve loved (the mushy persimmons, yellow watermelon, rutabaga) and some I haven’t liked so much (sunchokes, white watermelon).
Shopping locally is a tasty adventure everyone should do – if not for the environment, then for your tastebuds. 🙂
thank you for articulating this so well! Small changes can make big differences.
To Heiquists’s point: I do think that our energies buying local food are having a positive impact on our food system such that the working poor will be positively affected. We are bringing to light the stupidity of financially supporting poor nutrition and thus poor health through subsidies. And, every small farmer I know donates significant quantities of fresh, high quality, seasonal food, mostly vegetables, to food pantries and soup kitchens. Our dollars are what allows them to do that. Yes, it is indirect, and I often think we could do more. But we’re talking about food dollars, and the fact that we get to take such positive action while doing something as normal, necessary, and fun as eating is very very wonderful.
That’s the point I’ve been trying to make – if you can buy it locally, you probably ought.
Ah – so well stated, brava!
Risking redundancy, very well said.
I don’t consider myself an in-your-face locavore either. I’ve never admonished anyone for eating food with a more interesting passport than mine. I’m choosing to do this for all the wonderful reasons there are to do this. I keep a blog to document my findings and solicit help (as in, anyone know where to get such-and-such in my foodshed?).
Sometimes it works out better than others. I’m relatively new to local eating, so there is still quite a bit of worldly food in my freezer and cupboards. I’m not throwing it out. Much of it went to a food bank and the rest will be consumed by me, over time.
Again, being new to the scene, I haven’t done much in the way of putting by. What I did freeze, I mostly squandered on my Thanksgiving guests. Their compliments were well worth it. So, I will probably be eating some far away foods over the winter.
In this short space of time, my food decision method has irrevocably changed. I now always ask where something came from and will usually choose the closest. I will continue to (re)learn seasonality and apply that to my choices. My oranges will come from Florida because it’s closer than California and I will eat them in November and December because that’s when they’re in season. But I will eat them, even though I live in Connecticut because I need the vitamins, I like the taste, and they will never grow here naturally.
It’s a complex system, this eating business and I am not going to solve it in a quarter of a year. I am grateful to have stumbled upon the locavore movement (thank you Kingsolver) and I consider it a lifelong journey. I am grateful to all of the other blog-keepers for their insights, know-how, and enthusiasm.
Happy Thanksgiving to all.
Anita: Thank you!
Green Bean: As so many have pointed out, and I wish I said it in my original post, damn it, fresh, local food TASTES GOOD!
Sara: We can change the world, one yummy bite at a time.
Wendy: You make that point well.
G+N: Thanks!
Debbie: If it’s in the cupboards already, it’s totally fair game. I’m thinking of a post-holiday cupboard-cleaning menu-planning project. Use up what you can in your cupboards, and buy only essentials needed to make stuff with what you have. I’m considering posting about that here – a New Year’s resolution of sorts!
Kim,
Very well said! You put into words many of the thoughts floating around in my head…
Going to extremes (like giving up coffee and wine! eek!) does make a point though, and it’s probably good that some high-profile locavores are doing it. But, I don’t think it’s the way to convince the ordinary person to make changes. Instead I think when a person sees a neighbor, co-worker, friend, etc. making changes little by little, that person is much more likely to change their own habits. For example, since I started shopping at the farmer’s market instead of a regular grocery, many of my friends/family have started doing so as well! Little by little, change will come!
Anyone who’s tried to lose weight will tell you that, if forced to give up everything you love, you’re more likely to give up altogether. If we tell people the only way they can make a difference is by growing and producing their own food, then we risk alienating people, rather than convincing them.
Exactly! Great points here. I’d also like to remind folks that that trade in exotic ingredients and spices probably goes as far back as the neolithic – it is by no means a modern invention.
I believe there’s nothing wrong with including interesting seasonings or even the odd exotic main ingredient into your diet – I just believe that, for our family, we want to keep that to a minimum if we want to feel good about what we’re eating and ensure we are getting top nutrition for our food dollars spent.
The good news is, I’m finding that we can often still have the flavors we want, but with mostly local ingredients – if we take the time to seek them out and keep an adventurous outlook on using them.
Teresa: The trouble with all or nothing is that it’s nothing but all trouble! It’s amazing how many local food basics can be obtained within one’s own foodshed. Just replacing what you can with ingredients available locally makes using spices, oils and dry goods not seem so anti-environment!
hi kim, just found your blog. loving it.
i have just started my own blog and my own attempts to eat more local food. i am having up days and down days.
today seems to be a down day. just went to visit an organic cafe near my home which sells organic local produce twice a week. this is provided by a welfare organisation that helps poor communities to grow vegetables. i was so excited, thinking i had found the solution to my local quest for fresh produce, plus it has the benefit that the money goes back to the poor communities who grew it… but then i was chatting to the owner of the cafe (who also stocks organic products imported from all over the world) and he was saying that this organic produce market probably has quite a high carbon footprint. this is because the welfare organisation drives all over the city stopping at the various small gardens to pick up little bits and pieces of poduce…
the cafe owner was of the opinion that we are never going to reduce our carbon footprints in any significant way on our own and that we need to streamline our transport systems rather.
this little exchange got me all anguished about why i am on such a mission to eat local. what difference can i make? why should i put my boyfriend and i through all this missioning, if it’s really for nothing. your post above has re-inspired me a little. thanks 😉
(aspirantlocavore.wordpress.com)
Kim, just found your blog through Donna’s challenge. What you write here makes so much sense to me. Neither I nor my family are ready to give up oranges, for instance, just because they can’t be grown in Illinois, but buying local vegatables and fruit, eggs and beef, is not hard at all and makes sense as far as transportation costs. Little changes, gradual changes are so much more doable than drastic and draconian changes.
Small steps are better than no steps!
[…] (although I will miss you, dear reader! & I hope you’ll still keep your eye on my blog!). Here is a great blog entry on locavores to start you […]