Ever just stood in the produce section of a supermarket, an array of brightly coloured super-sized fruits glistening before you, and just being stumped about what to do?
On a recent visit to the suburbs to see my boyfriend, I went to a supermarket to buy some coffee. While there, I decided to pick up some fruit for a fresh post-coffee snack. Now this supermarket is rather pricey & high end, not my bf’s regular stop, but I don’t mind it because it’s smaller and less mega-conglomeraty than its counterpart down the road.
Being a fancy store, it has a huge selection of imported and exotic fruits. But liking the idea of keeping it simple, I walked down the apple aisle, past rows of shiny red, green and yellow baseball-sized fruit.
How did they get that big? Chemical fertilizers.
Why is their skin so perfect? Pesticides.
Why are they so shiny? Wax.
No way is that going to “refresh” me after a coffee.
But lo! At the end of the aisle, there was a small organic section… with normal looking Gala apples. Hooray! The sticker on the apples even had the right organic code number (any produce sticker with a number beginning in “9” means it is certified organic). Then I saw the country of origin written in small letters beneath. Argentina.
Mmmm. Hesitation. Now I have nothing against Argentina. I love Buenos Aires. One of my best friends is from there. But does my right to avoid ingesting certain chemicals override my right to expect a piece of fruit to travel 8945 km (5558 miles) and two hemispheres, burning fossil fuels and spewing carbon dioxides along the way?
What’s more important, me or the environment? If you have asked yourself the same question, you may have already found yourself standing in the produce section of a supermarket stumped about what to do.
What’s more important, my internal environment or my external environment? Me, or the world?
Is this the choice we have to make now? As familiar as it’s become, I was face to face with the “local” vs. “organic” debate. And I know where I stand on this issue, but still, it gets me every time. And of course, there’s no ultimate right or wrong. Showers are no better than baths, just different. Local vs. organic is a huge debate and I will not try to cover it here. But I do believe that it is an individual’s right to chose what is right for themselves. And I do think that it is an issue that demands proper consideration and discussion. And maybe a few minutes reflection in the produce section.
You or the environment?
On this day, since I couldn’t have both, I shied away from organic and went with a nice bag of “Canada fancy” regular-sized golden delicious from Ontario. I mean, come on, apples? They’re so Canadian! They rival the maple and could well be on our flag. This is one fruit we can certainly eat local.
Local love.
Hi everyone! Nice to be here.
Now can I let you in on a little secret? Since moving to Toronto, there’s really just one thing I want and it’s very simple. I want to know where I can eat in this town!
Okay, maybe that’s a bit whiney. But think about it. Finding places to eat, places that serve or sell good, real food is not as easy as it sounds. The truth is I needed LocalFoody before I knew it existed. And seeing as I’m pretty typical, I’m going to make the sweeping assumption that, if you’re reading this, then you need it too.
Why do you need LocalFoody?
Well, because you care, at least most of the time, about yourself and the world around you.
You care about the food you eat.
Local food is fresh. And fresh food is tastier and better for you.
You care about the environment.
Local food is green; it doesn’t travel half the planet just to sit on your plate for 2 minutes before it’s gone.
You care about the economy.
Local food helps our farmers. They need us — and we need them. We can do our part.
You care about the future.
Local food is political. Vote with your wallet and send out the message that consumers (I prefer “citizens”, but anyway) demand access to real food!
And what is real food?
It’s food that is fresh, natural and contains ingredients you can pronounce and recognize. Real food is safe to eat; it is not full of chemical additives, artificial preservatives, pesticides, hormones, antibiotics and genetic modifications. It is food that IS food. Like grandma (bubbie, nana, mamie, oma, avo, etc) used to make.
Like I said, I want to know where I can eat in this town. And at LocalFoody, we’re going to find out. We’re going to bring the farm to the city. And we’re going to bring people to local food.
Thanks for joining us!
I’d like to introduce a new blogger we have at LocalFoody: Anne, writer and lover of good food.
A native Montrealer, Anne has happily stopped comparing her new town, Toronto, to other places, and is busy gettin’ down and dirty with the real-food renaissance that is unfolding right here.
But no matter where you are, the quality and variety of available local foods is growing. Combine this with the new pride in eating local, in going to farmer’s markets, in knowing where your food comes from and how it got to your plate, and you’ve got a delicious (… and nutritious!) food revolution.
Anne wants us to connect with good local food. She is not a chef, nor a gourmet. She is however a registered holistic nutritionist who knows her way around “good food” and why it’s good for us. (But she promises not to be a self-righteous nutrition freak about it.)
She will be writing about what’s going on in eating local, issues affecting production and distribution, the farmers, the markets, the food itself, and the eaters of it — which is all of us.
So let’s welcome Anne as she explores with us the evolving landscape of eating local, and helps us connect with the fuel and the flavours we want.
What’s most important to you when looking for organic and local food? What would you love to be able to find that you can’t? How do you decide where to shop or what restaurants to eat at? How can LocalFoody help you solve those problems? Please share your thoughts in the comments.
Thanks!
So, what is LocalFoody and why did we start it?
It all started when we were on vacation last winter. Nothing like sitting by the pool miles away from the closest Internet connection to create time and space to do some reading. “The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals” by Michael Pollan was at the top of my reading list, and it really changed the way I think about food.
From the description of the Industrial Food System, to big Organic, to Joel Salatin’s amazing Polyface Farms, I found myself driven to find out more about the local food movement and the hundred mile diet. But we were offline in Mexico. I resolved to do some online research when we got home, and find “that site” that would allow me to find good, local, organic food producers and distributors.
Well much to my surprise, I didn’t find “that site”. There was a long list of great sites that talk about Organic and local food, even a really solid directory site (LocalHarvest), but nothing that uses the power of geolocation and social networks to create a great simple-to-use web experience around finding good food.
They say that people come up with the best ideas in order to scratch their own itch. LocalFoody is our attempt to solve our own problem – a quick and easy way to find good food near us. We’re working hard, and hope the end result is useful to you, too.
