Slowfoodusa.org

I have been learning a lot about the personal, environmental, communal benefits of buying and eating local and seasonal foods through reading Barbara Kingsolver's book, "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle". She often refers to the Slow Food Movement which I had always heard about but never really had checked into. It looks like there is a Sonoma County Chapter......

Here is an excerpt from their website:
"Slow Food USA envisions a future food system that is based on the principles of high quality and taste, environmental sustainability, and social justice – in essence, a food system that is good, clean and fair. We seek to catalyze a broad cultural shift away from the destructive effects of an industrial food system and fast life; toward the regenerative cultural, social and economic benefits of a sustainable food system, regional food traditions, the pleasures of the table, and a slower and more harmonious rhythm of life"

My Organic Black Beans

So we made Tacos for dinner tonight... again. I love tacos and recently at Trader Joes I picked up some newer, organic ingredients to swap with the ones I always used to buy. So all is good and we are cooking and I am reading the article from Time magazine, called "Eating better than Organic", in between chopping and stirring. Its about eating local over eating organic. Jennifer posted the link back in the early days of this blog... yes March. Here it is again:

http://www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,1101070312,00.html

So I went from being all proud that I am having Organic black beans to all disappointed that they were a " a product of China". How much fuel did it take to get these beans to Trader Joes and is that any better for the environment then eating just regular old, non-organic black beans from California?!?! In the article its referred to as as "environmental wash" meaning they both make a negative environmental impact, so the author, or the guy hes interviewing, says at that point just go with what tastes better, and of course price becomes part of it ( for me at least).

What are your thoughts on all of this? We live in California which is supposed to be one of the few areas that can grow just about anything, meaning we have access to a lot more locally grown foods then say New York. Do any of you buy local over organic? Of course both would be great...

I really want to look into buying more locally, there are just a lot of benefits for our environment and health and community that I was oblivious to (Im growing up I guess). I swear up until a few weeks ago an apple was just a flippin' apple! Now I want it to be organic and local and I want to walk to go get it! Not with everything obviously (do they even grow bananas here?).

Anyway, please share your thoughts on local vs. organic. I could never see myself adhering to the "100 mile diet", but I will definitely get my family to a farmers market a couple times a month...

1 a Day for 3 Months

From my HR experience I learned that for most jobs it takes about 3 months to become reasonably comfortable. I decided I want to tackle this commitment to live more earth friendly using that rule. So for the next 3 months I am going to strive to do 1 new green thing a day. I'm going to use this blog to document that. I'd love to hear new things you are trying too.

Today the new thing I did was go to a farmer's market. We went to the one in at the SR Vets Memorial Building parking lot. I would like to start buying more local produce. Local produce is better for the environment because it did not have to be transported from far away. To be honest the selection was a little disappointing. But I think that's because I have become accustom to the produce at the grocery store where it's really hard to tell what's local and in season and what has been shipped in. So I think it will take some time to learn to eat with the seasons. And we are lucky to have the option to get out of season produce. But I'm going to try to at least pay a little more attention to what's in season and buy more local produce for our family.

I found online the Time article I read that got me thinking more about where our produce comes from;

http://www.time.com/time/covers/0,16641,1101070312,00.html

(paste this into your browser, I forget the html code Calvin taught me to turn this into a link)

Also...

I really liked Sarah's idea of having a community blog. I think it would be neat if we could all post topics to start conversations. I was wondering if Nate might have any suggestions of a good way to do this. I looked at blogger but I did not see a way to do a "community blog". I'm fine sharing the password if that's the best way to go.