Produce proud local lobbyists have coined their own phrase and created a community of online devotees for a diet which reduces the intake of foods that travel ‘miles to mouth’.
A Locavore can be a meat or mushroom eater who seeks supplies from local sources. The miles less traveled movement originated with local-food enthusiasts Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon who on the first day of spring, 2005, chose to reduce their foods frequent flyer miles with a simple experiment. For one year,they would buy or gather their food and drink from within 100 miles of their apartment in Vancouver, British Columbia. The 100-Mile Diet was born.
Within weeks, reprints of their blog had appeared on sites across the internet. Then came the media, from BBC Worldwide to USA TODAY to the CBC. Now hundreds of individuals and grassroots groups are joining in, launching their own 100-Mile Diet adventures.
Melissa Larson of Seattle, for example, led her neighborhood in a month long experiment inspired by the book.
Larson who loved the superior flavour of the local produce did it by shopping at farmers markets.
It’s easy to add local foods to meals; making the commitment to eat only locally can be tough.
For Larson, an obstacle was giving up bread, as some ingredients don’t grow within 100 miles. (She occasionally ate locally baked bread.) Chocolate, coffee, tea and many processed foods such as frozen pizza and bottled fruit juices are no-nos. A challenge indeed but one worth considering since statistics show when the average North American sits down to eat, each ingredient has typically travelled at least 1,500 miles from farm to plate!
So, try this: Start off by vowing to make one meal a day out of mainly local foods, suggests Larson, who oversaw the experiment for a neighborhood organization called (Sustainable Ballard). That’s enough to make the connection between what you eat and the effect it has on the community.
For more info:
To find nearby farmers markets, farms and other sources of local foods, type in your ZIP code at Food Routes or Local Harvest.
To find a Community Supported Agriculture program you may join, go to: Local Harvest CSAs.
Learn more about The 100-Mile Diet
Listen to an interview with Michael Pollan, author of “Omnivore’s Dilemma,” who argues that we should think globally and eat locally.
Sources: The Daily Green
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