Comments on: Poll: Seasonal Food

By: Mallika

Mallika — Fri, 09 Mar 2007 09:06:09 +0000

Great debate. With me convenience wins over seasonality any day. While sniffing vegetables at snail pace in a farmer’s market sounds lovely, I am more likely to be doing a supermarket trolley dash, guided by recipes and not seassonal produce. We have enough to worry about already.

EEEk. I am in a small minority in the poll!!

By: scott

scott — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 18:15:14 +0000

Brilynn: Great point, and it’s one that comes up again and again. I think the idea behind “go local” is that the items which can and are grown locally, are bought locally too.

Bonnie: Great point about the food miles. There’s a farm shop near me which takes pride in all the “0 Food Miles” produce.

Michelle: I go to ours whenever I remember. And I love it, too!

tigerfish: I agree, the world is nothing without variety.

Trig: I’d allow users to add their own answers, but I could see the poll going a little crazy if I did. Great points though – and I know you didn’t mean to start the debate intentionally! Sorry!

Rowena: You are indeed lucky. I wish my garden was big enough!

iCookFood: veg box schemes are a great idea, thanks for bringing that up!

Freya: True. I love imported stuff myself – it’s just the carrots etc that are imported (when they grown great right here) that is crazy.

bazu: You had to make it complicated. I’ve heard that point of view before, too – but I feel the implications of endorsing it could lead to all kinds of produce traveling all over the place. Great comment, though.

Katie: Maybe your first one was swallowed by my spam filter (sorry!). It’s so true that seasonal eating adds diversity – you look forward to the next big thing coming into season.

Susan from Food “Blogga”: It’s a great bonus. Asparagus is well worth looking forward too, as is squash. Peaches I have to get imported unfortunately.

By: Susan from Food "Blogga"

Susan from Food "Blogga" — Thu, 08 Mar 2007 04:12:10 +0000

It could be because I live in Southern California, but I definitely eat seasonally. Asparagus in the spring, peaches in the summer, squash in the fall, and cauliflower in the winter. It just feels and tastes right. Plus, I get to know the farmers well, which is an added bonus.

By: Katie

Katie — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 20:50:49 +0000

I don’t think my comment made it through cyberspace.
We try to eat from the local producers. We’re in a small community and everyone sells from the farms. I think seasonal eating adds an overall diversity to a diet and I like the idea of eating foods that haven’t been stored and then ‘flash’ripened.
Great articles and comments.

By: bazu

bazu — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 19:17:07 +0000

P.S. I also agree with Peter Singer that the localness of local food does not point to an inherent value. Why should the [relatively] rich and heavily subsidized European or American farmer get your food dollars vs. a third world farmer, for example? I realize that that is a horribly reductionist example, but it’s just to get my point accross. Overall, I agree with Trig’s point, we should think globally when food ethics is concerned and buy the food (local or not) that best satisfies the myriad criteria that that entails.

It makes my head spin!

This is in no way saying that I’m against local foods or local farmers (especially small ones). Just that I recognize that there are a lot of issues at hand that don’t have a blanket solution.

By: bazu

bazu — Wed, 07 Mar 2007 16:37:05 +0000

While I voted "yes, it's worth it" I think there is room for reasoned debate on the matter. A great resource for information is Peter Singer's book "The Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter"- where he argues that, among other things, sometimes food from far away actually has LESS environmental impact than locally grown food. He talks about the fact that if you drive in your car for 45 minutes to a local market, you've used up relatively more fossil fuel than if you bought the same thing that was shipped by boat from thousands of miles away. Even worse is if you are in a cold climate and your local farmer uses fossil fuels to raise local produce (heated greenhouse, etc.)

By: Freya

Freya — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 15:02:02 +0000

As far as local seasonal produce goes, I try to source that from the local farmers markets because it keeps them going. I also buy eggs and meat as organically as I can too. However, as pointed out, there are certain exotic fruits that you can’t buy here whatever time of the year, or soft fruits that have a short season over here, so I do buy them from the supermarket but buy FairTrade produced items when and where possible. Short of living like our ancesters did (i.e. without the luxury of more exotic imported produce), I think this is the best that anyone can do.

By: iCookFood

iCookFood — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 11:34:42 +0000

Some friends started the Rusper Vegetable Company 9http://www.ruspervegetables.com/) for this reason. Not necessarily organic produce, but rather seasonal and sourced locally. It certainly cuts down the carbon cost of your veg.

I actually don’t live anywhere near, so I only get my vegetables from them when down there for a meeting, but a lot of it is so much nicer than those from my local sainsbury’s.

There are a number of box schemes like the Rusper Vegetable Company serving different local areas, so people should be encouraged to find and use them.

By: rowena

rowena — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 08:48:43 +0000

I count myself very lucky because there are a lot of seasonal/local produce available to me PLUS I can also choose to buy organic produce sourced from a 3rd world country (i.e. Equosolidale bananas in favor of Chiquita), in protest of big companies if I want to. But the one thing that I’m especially grateful for is the fact that I have my own plot of dirt in which to grow my own vegetables.

By: Trig

Trig — Tue, 06 Mar 2007 07:35:55 +0000

I didn’t mean to start a big controversy, just to say that I mave mixed views on the subject. Bonnie makes a great point, which I hadn’t really thought about. In a post I’ll put up tonight when I get back from college I mention the fact that my fish was sourced from sustainable stocks in Iceland. But I failed to notice that it had to be shipped to the UK. On the other hand, as Brylinn says, I don’t want to retreat to localism and miss out on the great produce that the rest of the world has on offer. What prompted this and what I really don’t like is the globalisation of cuisine as with top restaurants in Australasia, Asia and America all service Modern European Cuisine and not looking at their own produce, spices, etc. I don’t want the world to all be separate, but nor do I want the world to be the same. I just want it to be different and enjoy the differences.

I can’t vote in the poll Scott, because it doesn’t really give me the right choices. I want a “yes, but…” option.