Do you know about the 100 Mile Diet?
Through the month of July, I wrote about the challenge of eating locally on a website called BlogHers Act Canada. BHAC is an offshoot project of BlogHers Act, where we raise awareness about monthly environmental issues all year long. I wrote there,
Eating locally is a real challenge, and some folks are taking it quite seriously. Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon are the founders of the 100 Mile Diet, a movement they started back in 2005 in an effort to eat foods only found within 100 miles of their Vancouver home. Their’s is a fabulous website devoted to the concept, tailored to both American and Canadian households.
I decided to look into the idea of eating locally a little more in-depth. What’s shown below is the 100 mile radius around our house. (You can find your 100 mile radius by using this tool on the official site.)
Reasons to buy local food include:
- Supporting the local economy of your community.
- Reducing fuel consumption, throwing less carbon into the air.
- Stay in touch with the changing seasons.
- Local food is much more fresh as it has less distance to travel.
Places to look for local food include:
- Local bakeries (as opposed to the bread aisle in your local supermarket chain).
- Nearby farms selling poultry (including eggs) or cattle raised on the farm.
- Roadside farm stands.
- Pick-your-own fruit fields and orchards.
- Farmer’s markets.
I’ll be exploring local food sources in my area over the next little while as a regular feature here on this site. Watch for the Local Food category label on my posts.
