6.12.2008

question about eating locally

Many of us, myself included, are trying to buy and eat more locally grown and produced food. I'm not attaching myself to any set plan, such as the now-popular 100 Mile Diet, as that strikes me as yet another "how to eat" book, albeit one with a social conscience. But it is something I'm trying to work more into my life, and I'm looking for ways to expand on the theme.

But some things don't make sense to me. If you are really sticking to an all-local diet, what do you do in the winter? Do you can and preserve fruits and vegetables during the warmer months, for winter consumption? That's something that most modern people are not going to do. In my own life, I can put that aside in the "not going to happen" category.

Do you not eat fruits and vegetables all winter? That wouldn't be a very healthful eating plan. Our ancestors might have "put up" fruits and vegetables, but they also didn't eat a balanced diet.

Even in the warmer months, there are foods we North Americans grew up eating that have never been local. I'm not thinking of foods once considered exotic that are now available in supermarkets everywhere. I'm thinking of foods we've always considered ordinary in my lifetime and my mother's, such as oranges.

In the northern latitudes, will you give up eating citrus fruit? Inland, will you not eat seafood? While I very much intend to eat more locally - and I've been trying, on a small scale - these are changes I would not make, as they would be so personally unhealthy.

One of my nieces is an organic/conscious-eating chef, and is learning about working in the farm-to-table movement. But she lives in California. It's easy to cook and eat locally there; in fact, that's a primary reason she close to live there. Living in Ontario, how could I possibly eat locally, and healthfully, in the winter?

If there's some basic tenet I'm missing, please forgive my ignorance, and educate me and other readers.

Allan and I are out today, so comments will sit in moderation for a while, but we'll get them through as soon as we can. Thanks in advance.

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