Quite a few years back, I decided to try and eat only food that had come from a 100 mile radius. I wanted to see if it was possible to eat local. Here in Washington, it was surprisingly doable–but admittedly, challenging to find sources for year round food. I think if I had kept up on it for a couple of years, I would have been able to do it a little more seamlessly, but the initial seeking out the food at a million different places was kind of time consuming.
Still, I totally believe in eating local. On average, food travels 1500 miles to land on our plates. That 1500 miles requires a ton of resources, for what could potentially be found in our general area. Plus, I think local food cuts way down on food waste. It doesn’t have as much travel time, so there is less time for it to go bad before it has the potential of landing in your fridge.
I read The 100-Mile Diet: A Year of Local Eating, and it must’ve had a pretty big impact on me, because it still sits in the back of my mind pretty often. Plus, you know how whenever something is on your mind, it starts to pop up everywhere? Well, I found a FASCINATING article on treehugger this week that details a study by a professor from the University of California. The study basically looked at the available farms in each part of the United States, how many calories they produce each year, and then determined that it is possible for 90% of Americans to eat local. I am pretty sure that the study didn’t take into account variety and nutritional requirements beyond calories, but still, it’s kind of hopeful that if we could re-vamp our food distribution system, there are farms capable of providing local fare.
Obviously areas with more temperate climates are going to be able to provide the largest range of foods year round–but I also think we could change the way we plan our food supply. It used to be on us to put food up during growing season and sustain on minimal availability throughout the winter. Now, you can get anything your heart desires from across the globe {which, I’ll be the first to admit, is sometimes really awesome when you feel like a banana in the dead of winter}.
Realistically, I know that the pace and demands of our lives have changed so much over the years, that each family spending their waking hours putting up food for winter, hunting down local sources, and traveling to 3 or 4 different spots for weekly groceries isn’t really all that doable anymore, but it would be rad {I am currently working on bringing that word back} if we could get stores to start sourcing primarily from local suppliers.
How easy is it for YOU to find local food sources? Is it worth your time/cost/effort?
~Mavis
susan silver says
I guess I always am suspicious of the meat whether they processed it properly to avoid bacteria. I’m afraid of food poisoning.
Dana says
Susan,
I certainly understand that worry. Perhaps feel better knowing that small farms have been proven to be cleaner than factory farms when it comes to parts per billion of bacteria. You can look up your local area farms history with your local health inspector/farm inspector to find out what the latest report says about them.
Lady Locust says
I ‘get’ your consern, but most food poising comes from veggie based foods processed improperly in home kitchens. Think macaroni salad sitting on the counter half the day. Onions and sprouts are among the top culpruts. (This is just according to my own research & I’m not a professional ‘food scientest’.) In conjunction with Dana’s response, grass fed animals are usually healthier than CAFO &/or grain fed animals so you would actually be eating healthier.
Kathu says
I always use local fruits and veggies, either from what we grow or buy from farmer’s market during the season, veggies from a grocery store a mile away that sell Ohio grown produce. There is a local dairy that supplies nation-wide but not sure where the initial product comes from. Spring through fall, local Amish cheeses. And if I play my cards right, can find local raised chicken meat. Other meats, not so much. But now you’ve got me to thinking about …and looking into…it more. Thanks Mavis!
Lisa Millar says
I haven’t thought about it specifically – but I think a lot of what we eat in our household is local.
Lots of home grown vegies and eggs/fruit along with local beef and extras from the local fruit and veg markets go a long way.
Pineapple is tricky. I love it but can’t grow it around here! 🙂
Chocolate! Within the state but not 100kms
I don’t like shopping much so the thought of traipsing about several shops is agony.
We like chicken so I probably could do a little more work in sourcing local chicken meat rather than grabbing whatever comes out of the supermarket deli.
🙂
Shannon says
I’ve thought about this. If I had a big budget, I could eat a huge variety of fruits and vegetables, meat and fish. I could have milk, cheese, butter, cream, wheat and other grains. Honey to sweeten my food. It would be difficult to live without spices and chocolate.
Shannon says
I love the book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver on this topic.
Linda says
When I tried to eat as local as possible, coffee and chocolate were two things that were difficult to find locally. I could find both that had been produced locally but not grown. I do still try to find local items but sometimes price wins out.
Kristina says
I’m in California’s central valley, and I can get pretty much anything I want, short of some tropical fruits. Even in-season produce at our chain supermarkets here were probably grown within 100 miles. Our local supermarkets buy summer fruits directly from local farmers. Our county fair was last week and there were some serious deals (on the hoof) for market animals at the livestock auction, plus we could support local FFA and 4-H projects. I’ll bet a lot of your readers could do the same at their county fairs.
Mrs. Chow says
Most of our fresh produce and meats are local. Salt, sugar, chocolate, tea, coffee, bananas, citrus, coconuts, etc., are not local, and I think that’s perfectly ok. If everyone decided to eat 100% local and gave up those foods, millions of people around the world would lose their jobs and sink into even deeper levels of poverty. I’ve seen first-hand what new markets for some of these foods can mean to small, poor communities.
Monica says
I have went to a few different Farmer’s Markets where I live in Cincinnati (and surronding suburbs) and have had the problem of people selling the fruits tell me they, the fruit/veg, were not local. They were in fact from South Carolina, Georgia, etc. In these cases I have smiled and moved on but what if they had not told me where they were from? I would be eating food I thought was local but in reality it is not. I know this is not true with all vendors at Farmer’s Markets, some or most are local. I also question the availability of some fruit/veg. I find it curious when tomatoes are available but it is no where near time for them to be grown much less ripe. I know, they can be grown in greenhouses. I guess I need to read more on this topic to fully understand. I. I was just wondering if anyone else has experience this?
Lisa B. says
We have local Farmers’ Markets and CSA farm shares where I live (WI), but recently I have been trying a new local business that allows customers to order locally-grown/produced food online, with weekly delivery to your home. The food comes from many different producers and this service makes it really easy to buy locally because the company does all of the “leg work” and works directly with the producers. There’s enough variety available (dairy, produce, meat, pantry staples) that we’ve been able to skip some trips to the grocery store and I really think we could do most of our food shopping this way if the business operates year-round. Most of the items are healthy, some are organic, and the prices are as reasonable as visiting the Farmers’ Market or buying the same products at the grocery store. I think it’s an interesting business model and hope it really takes off.
Cindy Hagen says
We do a lot of local food here in Montana (we’re very rural, so I’m considering local anything I can drive to in a day). It’s amazing what you can find once you start looking and talking to people. I live on a ranch that produces beef so the freezer is always full of our home-grown beef. I barter with neighbors for goat milk and eggs in exchange for my home-grown vegetables and baked goods (and chores). We order a whole hog to split with in-laws from an amazing family and 1-2 dozen whole chickens from another amazing farmer each year (on the bottom line it “looks” more expensive but considering I can also get the fat, bones, organ meats, etc and everything cut anyway I want it, it actually averages out to less than what good quality single cuts would be- I’m a serious convert to buy a whole or 1/2 animal and learn to cook it all). The quality is amazing and I have a really hard time eating grocery-store meats now. Friends and family know I’m always looking for other ideas and so if they hear about a resources, they send it my way. I’ve been able to get great cherries from a gal whose cousin brings them down from NW Montana each year and another connection has family who takes orders for apples, peaches, and pears from their orchard in Washington. Is it extra work to locate sources, yes! But I love making those connections. Another resource that has been amazing is http://www.localharvest.org . It’s a great place to find resources in your area. We fill in the gaps with grocery store and Costco purchases. I think it’s wonderful to live in a time and place where we can all make the choice of what works best for our families, wallets, and schedules! I would add though, that supporting a local producer is a great way to build community and relationships, keep money in that community, and having the peace of mind knowing where your food comes from.
Julie says
Most of our diet is local. We grow most of our own vegetables and some of our fruits, we get meat from a farm that’s only a few miles away. I buy grocery store milk — I’m not ready to do raw — and cheeses. Some things, though, are not available locally and we are not willing to give them up: coffee, chocolate, pineapple, bananas, tea, shellfish.
I, too, found Animal Vegetable Miracle interesting.
Janice says
Living in a “foodie” area of Vancouver Island gives us lots of local choices including fruits, vegetables, eggs, honey, sea salt, dairy, wine and even tea. I have a garden and my husband hunts and fishes and we are lucky to have friends that have excess blueberries, strawberries and chicken they are happy to share with us. It’s a very informal “trade” of fish for whatever they have. Nothing is ever weighed and it’s just basically friends sharing with friends and everyone is happy in the end. To eat local year round in our area would certainly require a lot of freezing and canning of in season fruit. It would be doable but I love the variety that eating some things from other countries allows us and yes, those exports are extremely important to developing countries.
tc says
I am lucky enough to live in central California, I have farmers markets everywhere, a fabulous local co op health food store all within 5 miles of my house. I love my co op as the staff is awesome, the health products amazing as is their knowledge. Plus I get loads of veggies and fruit too ripe to sell, so I dehydrate it, make fruit leather, can it and bake pies for the staff, give them fruit leather. I share with neighbors (just exchanged fruit leather for her fresh organic apples (more fruit leather and apple sauce), she makes the best jam in the world too. Just processed 10lb of avocado’ given free, mashed it up with lemon, froze it and will share with neighbors.
Once you start offering things you make to neighbors they share theirs, no one keeps tabs, you give what you have and what you can, one neighbor takes care of our chickens when we are gone, mends my jewelry, sews simple things and I make all kinds of dishes always too much for the two of us and I make sure she has meals often so she doesn’t have to cook. I wish I had more neighbors and friends sometimes.
Why not try a food swap night once a month?, everyone brings containers to take home a portion of the large batch of food someone made.
I make so many soups that we don’t have the freezer space for so it would be great for me to find people to swap with.
I hate to waste anything so my magazines go to a neighbor whose mother is in a nursing home for alzhheimers patients, they love getting the different magazines that the home can’t provide.
I think it might harder for those in less productive states than CA but sharing and caring brings out the best in people, it just takes one person to start it all up.
Jennifer says
I love all the bartering people have commented about. I live in Marin County, CA, which is just north of the Golden Gate Bridge. I would be able to have a well-rounded diet within 100mi pretty easily because of the range of climates in our local area. We are sorta near the coast, yet within 40 miles or so of us the climate is much warmer. The rural/coastal areas in our own county have farms of various livestock. And I’m aware of local honey, raw and pasteurized dairy including cheese. Of course we live near the bay and the ocean, so could get seafood and salt. Not sure about wheat for flour, but it’s plausible–the Sacramento area is about 100mi away and they could grow wheat there. Fruits and veggies are easy to find at farms or farmers markets if not at local grocers. We actually plan to buy land in oregons willamette valley to retire there. As climate changes more and more, further into the PNW is where the temps and rainfall will be the sweetest more than likely.
Lady Locust says
Love this post and comments. If only I could grow my own coffee:) We grow and preserve most of our own food. And yep, we both work full-time away from home. It is do-able. We got tired of all the chemicals, sugars, grains, and GMO soy added to the food available to purchase. We also purchase grass-fed meat – more local food – woohoo! It is a process and doesn’t happen overnight. It has taken us about 3 years to figure out how much of each item we eat in a year.
CathyB says
I live in Alaska and while there is not as much local food here as I would like, there is quite a variety available when you start looking. There is even a group here committed to eating as local as possible. One couple did a year long AK-only food challenge for a year and blogged about it. Of course we are known for fish and seafood – salmon, crab, shrimp, oysters, halibut, rock fish, clams – these are readily available but are not much cheaper than the lower 48. Many Alaskans fish for these things themselves and try to put large quantities of fish in the freezer over the summer. Many also hunt for moose and caribou as sources of red meat.
I have also found a couple of AK sources for buying beef, pork, lamb and rabbit. Last year we got a side of beef from one AK beef producer who has cattle that have run wild and free-range on an island for 50 years. The animals eat the grasses and natural vegetation on the island and pretty much live without any human interaction. No vets, no antibiotics, nothing. Once a year they bring a butcher/processor boat out to the island and butcher the number of cattle needed to maintain a healthy population and fill the orders that have been placed.
Barley is the main grain that is grown in the Delta Junction area of Alaska. Many baking products have been made and marketed from barley – everything from livestock feed to barley flour to pancake mix. Palmer area is known as the garden belt and many farms there produce vegetables in the summer; especially carrots, potatoes and the famous giant cabbages. This area also has a local dairy that sells milk in most of the supermarkets.
We try to grow a big garden in the summer, but we also enjoy the local farmer’s market. There is really a lot of variety and it is all local. As a whole, Alaska definitely imports most of its food and that will probably never completely change; but there is an amazing amount that can be produced here that most people do not realize!
Jen L A says
This is our 3rd summer that we have raised our own meat. We are on 10 acres and we raise pigs, lamb (1 year only) and meat chickens. We have several chickens and ducks for eggs. Next year we are looking into a cow for meat. My husband hunts and fishes, we we also have venison, bear and fish from nature. On rare occasion I buy a lunch meat (sometimes I just crave a hoagie) and hot dogs ( we are trying to get a better recipe for homemade hot dogs). Sometimes I get a seafood items as well. However 97 percent of our meat is our own. That I love. It’s work, but it’s great.
Over the summer I do garden and can. yesterday I canned 14 quarts of my own chicken stock from butchering our own meat birds. I will be doing more next week. Also jams and vegis in plenty. I increase garden size every year, but some things I don’t grow well, like beets. Weird. So I buy those in bulk at farmers markets. I prefer those frozen though. With 3 freezers in the house for meat, I do try and can as much as I can ( ha ha) but when I canned beets they taste like dirt
We had a local store open that sells local produce. Around the store are signs with the mileage from the store to farm. It is really awesome. Sadly it is more expensive but I do try to go at least once a month and but s few things because I support the cause. I am in a rural area, so it’s the first store like that around.
Angie Smith says
I LOVED that book, too! I live in Utah. In the winter, we can grow…icicles. So local eating isn’t very easy when I am used to eating fresh produce any time of year that I want it. I am working on eating more seasonally and locally in spite of that. I have started growing kale because it can be planted the earliest and lasts the latest into the cold weather. I can buy fresh milk, cheese, meat, honey and wheat from local farmers, and we have the RealSalt mine here, too. This year, I am growing a lot of tomatoes, peppers and onions so I can attempt to make and bottle my own salsa and maybe even some pizza sauce to use through the winter. I am also growing lots of potatoes this year, as well as experimenting with a few sunflower seeds and dry beans so we can maybe grow more of those things in the future. I will still be buying some things that I can’t get locally: molasses, cacao, oils, organic sugar, butter, etc. Like you, the local eating ideas in that book have stuck with me for years.
Angie Smith says
I just realized that your book looks different from the one I read: “Plenty: Eating Locally on the 100 Mile Diet” – but it was written by the same people. I loved learning about their experience, and I was very jealous of the wide variety of local food available in Washington state. 🙂
Mavis Butterfield says
For some reason that particular book has a lot of different covers.