Food Miles: A Thought Exercise

On Sunday, Tom baked apple pie to take to a family dinner. The apples came from one of our trees as well as a friend’s tree, so we had two different apple varieties. The pie was a hit, of course, and the best thing was that Tom baked TWO, so we have pie for dessert this whole week, hooray!

Last night, before pie (B.P.), we ate a dinner of pasta with yet another batch of homemade pomodoro sauce (the tomatoes just keep coming from the school garden). We were patting ourselves on the back because it felt like a real ‘farm to table’ dinner; the tomatoes, basil, garlic, and apples were all from our garden or nearby gardens. We felt sustainable and smug.

But then we dug deeper, and it became clear that we really had no business being smug. Let’s go through all of the ingredients, one by one, and see how our food miles stack up for this meal of pasta pomodoro and apple pie with vanilla ice cream. You may think I’ve been overly generous with the ‘grades,’ or overly harsh. Comments will be read with interest.

• All produce (tomatoes, basil, garlic, apples): From our property or from within 10 miles, all from gardens we know and love well, and that are organic and regenerative. Grade: A

• Olive oil: We get olive oil from a local CSA called Fat Gold. If we need extra before our next shipment, we buy 100% Californian olive oil. Grade: A-

• Pasta: DeCecco, imported from Italy through a New York company. Grade: F

• Parmesan Cheese: made by an organic CA dairy using raw milk. Grade: A-

• Salt: We buy Redmond salt in bulk from Utah. Grade: C

• All-Purpose Flour: King Arthur, processed in either Vermont or Washington with wheat from the middle of the country. Good company with all the right ideas on their website (committed to Environmental Stewardship, Food Justice, Community, Small Farmers) but still, nowhere near CA, and probably conventionally grown. Grade: D

• Butter: made by an organic CA dairy. Grade: A-

• Crisco: I mean, do we even have to deliberate? Who cares about the miles? It’s basically motor oil. Grade: F

• Pie Spices: Cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, allspice. Imported by Morton and Bassett of CA from all points around the globe. At least they are committed to Non-GMO. Grade: F

• Sugar: C&H, which stands for California and Hawaiian. The sugar is processed right down the road from us in Crockett, CA. It’s made from cane rather than beets, which is a point of pride for the company, but the cane no longer comes from Hawaii; it comes from Mexico, Vietnam, Brazil, or Australia. Grade: D

• Vanilla Ice Cream: made by an organic CA dairy with local cream, but with imported vanilla. Grade: C

So the food miles for our prideful local farm to table dinner are actually quite astronomical. This is unfortunate. We could do better; for instance, we could get our flour from a local farm which grows and grinds it themselves. We could make our own pasta from that flour. We could also support a local company called Community Grains that is committed to making flour and flour products from local, whole grain wheat. (We’ve done this in the past, I’m not sure why we stopped.) Tom likes to use half butter and half Crisco in his pie crust, and we could go to 100% butter. Instead of sugar, we could use our own honey. The only two things that I don’t think we can improve are the pie spices and the vanilla. But still, taking these steps would reduce our food miles significantly.

What if we add health in to the equation? It’s a little trickier, because different people have different ideas about what’s healthy. For us, this is a rather indulgent meal. And let’s be clear: I’m not talking about the pie. There’s no question that pie is indulgent, but for us, dessert is a non-negotiable. We feel happier when we include dessert in our lives. We believe in homemade dessert if at all possible, and luckily, our family has no shortage of excellent bakers. Many of our desserts involve fruit or nuts. We sacrifice in other ways so that we can have dessert without worry; for instance, 90% of the time, Tom and I eat only once per day, so we don’t have to concern ourselves overmuch about sweets, as long as they’re not the only thing we’re eating.

No, when I say indulgent, I mean the dinner itself. I think we can all agree that the fruits and veg are good for us, but we would normally eat a good deal more protein, from either lean meats, eggs, fish, or beans, and good deal less of the processed carbs. We tend to center our meals around protein and veg, with maybe some whole-grain thrown in. This meal was a bit of an outlier for us.

However, it did feel very summery and as we are now well into fall, it’s nice to enjoy summer meals while we can, and we ate the hell out of it.

This was an interesting thought exercise for us, and I think we learned a lot about how lax we’ve gotten on the local eating front. I could make excuses for it (we’re very busy, the kids are out of the house so we’re eating differently, we’ve started to cut corners in other ways since so much of our produce comes from either our own garden or my school garden), but all of those are just that - excuses. I am newly recommitted to spending our food dollars locally as much as possible. After all, this is one of the best ways to ‘vote’ for the kind of food systems we want - by putting our dollars into the food systems we aspire to have - which are rich in local farms, local grocers, local providers, and local businesses. We need to do better.

All the Trails

We’ve always been a family of hikers and walkers, but since the pandemic began, our daily excursions have become quite sacred to us, whether in our neighborhood (blessed by many regional open spaces with great hilly walks) or in the greater Bay Area. We have been using an app called Gaia in the last year, which records our walks, and also shows us the many trails we have yet to travel (the free version is great). This has allowed us to find trails that we didn’t even know existed, and especially on weekends, we tend to go further afield to find new favorites.

One thing that has become so clear to us is that the Bay Area is littered with extensive trail systems, some maintained by local park systems, and some by state parks or even national parks. These are all non-profit groups, often dependent on volunteers to establish or maintain trails. We are so thankful for all of these organizations, and all the people, who make this kind of recreation possible.

We have long been supporters of East Bay Regional Parks. Many of these parks are free to enter, but supporting them by purchasing an annual pass is great. Individual memberships run $60 for a year (the price of three movies, or 10 fancy coffees). A family membership is $105. The wonderful thing about EBRP is that they have an extensive system which includes urban trails and parks, as well as more suburban parks. This promotes equity in the outdoors and makes these open spaces accessible to everyone, which is something that is really necessary.

EBRP also oversees two of the longer, linked trail systems we often find ourselves using. The California Riding and Hiking Trail is mainly a Contra Costa County trail system that links Mt. Diablo with Martinez, and will encompass 16 miles of trail. The Martinez-Concord section is already completed and will link to Mt. Diablo State Park in the future. The East Bay Skyline National Trail is part of the 1968 National Trail Systems Act. It begins at the Alvarado staging area in Richmond, and ends at the Proctor Gate station in Anthony Chabot regional park. We’ve hiked most of both of these trails and have found them quite interesting.

Other local trail systems include the scenic San Francisco Bay Trail, which is a planned 500 mile walking and cycling path around the entire bay, going through all nine counties, 47 cities, and seven major bridges. 350 miles are already in place. This project is also restoring wetlands around the Bay. They have a really cool navigational map that shows existing trails (whether paved or dirt) and planned trails. We’ve walked much of this trail system, too, including two bridges, and always enjoy these walks on days when it’s prohibitively hot in our neighborhood and we need the cooling influence of the Bay. The Bay trails are often flat, as well, offering an easier but longer walk, and there is always good wildlife viewing with shorebirds.

The Bay Area Ridge Trail, however, offers a completely different kind of hiking experience, taking walkers over the peaks that ring the Bay. This trail was the vision of William Penn Mott, Jr, who was Director of our National Park Service as well as EBRP and California State Parks. He wanted a 550 mile trail encircling the ridges of the Bay Area. 393 miles of trail have been established and they are all great, challenging miles! They have some neat trail maps and tools which include ‘curated’ trail adventures such as wheelchair accessible loops, or training ridge to bridge trails for those who want a challenge.

There is an interesting state trail system that we are just recently learning more about. This is the Mokelumne Coast-to-Crest Trail, which is planned to go all the way from the Bay to Yosemite. Currently three sections are complete: the East Bay/Contra Costa County section, the Camanche-Pardee Reservoir section, and the Upper Mokelumne River Canyon section. We have been on the Contra Costa section many times, as it winds through and over Mt. Diablo, Black Diamond, and Contra Loma parks. We are hoping to eventually get to the sections east of here and explore those, as well.

There are two interesting interstate trails here, one being (of course!) the Pacific Crest Trail, which runs from the Mexican border to the Canadian border, through California, Oregon, and Washington. We have been on a very short section of this trail when hiking in Yosemite, but other than that, this trail has been beyond our reach, as it runs through the interior mountain ranges and is primarily in wilderness. It has long been a dream of mine to hike this trail, and maybe we’ll have more time in the future to section hike portions of it, at least.

Another interstate trail which I have just recently discovered is the Juan Bautista de Anza trail, which is part of the National Park System and is a National Historic Trail. It runs through Arizona and California, following Juan Bautista de Anza’s route in 1775 as he established (colonized?) a settlement in San Francisco bay. I don’t know how much we should be celebrating the takeover of land from California Native Americans, but while we don’t need to honor questionable historic activity, we should certainly learn about it and face the truth of it, and what better way to do that then to walk those same paths?

The final trail that I want to bring to your attention is the American Discovery Trail, which runs from the West Coast to the East Coast, 6800+ miles of continuous multi-use track. It does run on some roads, but the organization is working to make the trail completely off-road in the future. It is not a wilderness trail, like the Pacific Crest Trail. It passes through cities, towns, farmland, and wild areas. It is meant to be a voyage of discovery of our country as a whole. On the website, you can find the trails in your state (if it passes through your state); the California portion starts in Pt. Reyes National Seashore, and goes right over Mt. Diablo, over to Lake Tahoe, so we’ve found ourselves on this trail many times.

We are lucky to live in the San Francisco Bay Area, a place that celebrates outdoor living year-round. That doesn’t mean the conditions are always idyllic (see my previous post), but it does mean that we are provided with a lot of opportunity to get out into nature, and explore. We have come to realize that this is extremely important to us, and it will dictate how we move forward into retirement (which isn’t happening anytime soon, but that doesn’t mean we don’t think about it). We don’t necessarily see ourselves living in California forever, but we do want to live in a place that offers a lot of outdoor recreation, no matter the season. That might mean that we need to get good at snowshoeing! But that’s years in the future, anyway. Right now, we are just happy to have plenty of adventures located right outside our front door.

PS: If you like to hike and get outdoors, and you’re looking for a new adventure, let me know - Tom and I have plenty of suggestions for great walks all over the Bay Area!

Bat Talk and Walk

Last night, we had the most incredible experience: We traveled to a local wetland area to learn about bats and see their nightly exit from their 'cave.' The area where we went is part of the Yolo Basin Foundation, an organization based in the Yolo Bypass Area, which is very interesting in its own right. In between Davis and Sacramento, there is a long overpass built over a 17,000 acre wetland area. This area is designed to flood in the winter months when we get all of our rain. In the summer, it dries up, but there are pockets of wetness and bogs, and there are many farmers who grow rice in those places. There are also natural wetlands that attract many species of migrating and native birds. Any time you drive highway 80 from San Francisco to Sacramento, you go over this area. There are always interesting things to look at, from sunflower fields to rice fields, to herons and egrets. 

We've driven over this area hundreds of times but never driven off of it to explore the wilderness area, which is open dawn to dusk each day. We finally saw it last night when we went to the Foundation to learn about and view bats.

The bats we saw were mainly Mexican Free-tailed bats, though we also learned about Pallid bats and Big Brown bats, which also live under the overpass. Mexican Free-tailed bats are tiny, like 3-4 inches long in body, and eat lots of agricultural pests, which makes them quite a boon to the Central Valley. The farmer who grows rice in these fields, who allowed us to venture on to his property, reports that he uses zero insecticides on his crops, even though rice is a crop notoriously predated upon. The bats do all the work for him.

terrible picture, but she just wouldn't cooperate. 

The speaker, a naturalist who works with bats, had examples of each of these bats with her and showed them to us under a camera that projected the image onto a large screen. These bats were brought in for rehabilitation (for instance, the one above had her wing damaged by a cat) and are not able to be released into the wild. They don't permanently live in these display cases, this was just for our benefit. It was so interesting to see these bats up close and discover the beauty and delicacy of their wings, their downright adorable faces, and the large ears. Our naturalist had a special machine that could 'hear' the echolocation the bats were making, which is beyond the range of our own hearing. It was so cool to hear those clicks! We were all riveted. The naturalist explained what the bats eat, how they live, and why they live under this overpass, which is basically because it so perfectly mimics cave environments. Which, by the way, are in short supply - habitat is disappearing for many bats, because of human interference and loss of insect life. Pesticides affect the creatures that eat insects, of course, and that includes both birds and bats.

After our talk, we drove out to a super-secret place under the overpass, through the farmer's rice fields. He was growing domestic rice, which is short and chartreuse-y green, and also wild rice, which is tall and has a huge inflorescence tinged with red from the pollen. It's a gorgeous crop.

After driving about a half hour on the twisty-est roads imaginable around bogs and ponds and groupings of reeds and rice, we came to our spot.

There were about 30 of us in our group, and we went to this spot because for some reason, the bats have chosen that tree in the distance as their exit point. About 250, 000 bats live under this overpass, and there are three exits, but this one seems to be the one most of them choose and we were told to expect three 'ribbons' or waves of bats. The naturalist said they exit at a similar time each night but that it wasn't exact and so we would just wait until something happened, and it didn't take long before we noticed, all along the underside of the overpass, a great rushing of wings. The bats fly for awhile under the overpass until exiting at this tree. So suddenly you notice an enormous shadow of wings rushing down the channels of the overpass, like some great hoard of locusts, and then they burst out into the air.

And then they start to fly in this curve, going out over the fields, and eventually they rise up into the sky and disperse in groups.

The line of bats went on and on, and then there was a break, and a second ribbon appeared, and then a third. We saw hawks sitting in trees nearby, waiting to snatch a bird from the ground if it fell. We watched the clouds of bats grow higher and further away (they can hunt up to 50 miles away from their cave). Meanwhile huge dragonflies were hovering around our heads and formations of geese skimmed the overpass. Suddenly we noticed more 'rushing' and out came a fourth ribbon, very rare, and then later another ribbon, the 5th, which caused our naturalist to text her husband in disbelief.

We just stood and stared. It was like a miracle. I've seen bats on the wing at night in various places (and I hope desperately that we have them at home), but I've never seen something like this. It was incredible.

The way the bats flew made me think of sine curves, and it reminded me that sine curves happen all around in nature, in the ocean waves, in sounds that we hear, the sunrise/sunset pattern, our heartbeat. It made me think about the great Creator of our universe who makes even daily things look like poetry. Sometimes you just have to stop for minute and experience the Divine, which is so easily found in nature.

These talks and walks go on all summer, before migration in the autumn takes the bats to who-knows-where (none are tagged, so no one knows). They are sold out for the season except for Sept 21, and you can get your tickets HERE. If you can't go this year, put in on your calendar for next year; you don't want to miss this experience.

"Greenwashing" at Farmers Markets

Piggybacking on my post about buying real honey a couple of days ago, here's another scam of which we need to be aware. Yesterday I received my monthly copy of Mother Earth News magazine. In the 'news' section, there was a brief article titled "How to Ask the Right Questions at a Farmers Market." This is in response to the problem of greenwashing, which is unfortunately becoming more and more prevalent. I first heard about this only about six months ago, but it seems that it's now a common problem. And since I frequently encourage you to buy locally from Farmers Markets, I think it's important that you know there is a dark side.

Greenwashing: "Disinformation disseminated by an organization so as to present an environmentally responsible public image."

We are becoming smarter and more selective consumers, and this means that producers have to come up with new ways to get us to buy their products. It's now quite common at the local Farmers Market to 1) have vendors who are not farmers at all and have no affiliation with the farm, 2) have produce that is grown by large commercial and conventional farms re-sold under the guise of small and local, and 3) have produce with misleading labels. 

It really stinks that we have to navigate the markets, once a safe space, with a more discriminating mind, but guess what? That's how much power your food dollar has. Never think that your everyday buying habits are not making change, because they are, so much so that the big companies have to figure out ever sneakier ways to trick you. 

My own personal Farmers Market, right outside the back door

We'll talk about other options besides the Market too, but first, the Cornucopia Institute, a non-profit out of Wisconsin ("promoting economic justice for family scale farming"), has created a handy printable guide for you to take to the Market with you. It has a list of questions for you to ask the vendor, which will help you determine whether the food is really local, if it's in season, if it's organic. As I've often said here, if you talk to the farmer, you'll learn all you need to know, and this guide will help you to do that. Real farmers are so happy to answer your questions, so happy to talk about the work they are doing, because they are proud of it and proud of their product.

By the way, local small farmers often can't afford the official organic certification. Don't let that stop you from buying from them. Many of them limit the use of chemicals because it's simply a best practice; if you talk with them, they'll be happy to tell you about it. 

Remember the seasons, too. If it's December and your local market has tomatoes, you should be suspicious. However if it's May and your local market has tomatoes, that farmer just might have a heated greenhouse and a very clever touch. You'll know if you talk to them. If you don't know what's in season right now (and how could you help but be confused when you can buy most produce any time of year in any big store?), there are lots of good guides for figuring that out. For instance, you could go to The Seasonable Food Guide and type in your state to find out what's in season during each month. It says that right now, in California, in early January, there are nearly 70 items I can buy that are in season. (Granted, when I type in Minnesota, there are only 14 choices. But still! 14! Pretty amazing in that climate. Some are stored items like sweet potatoes.)

Now I have a confession to make. I actually don't love shopping at Farmers Markets. Most of it has to do with a sort of impulse I feel about wanting to buy something from everyone. I get all weirded out by the vendors watching me look at their produce and then not buying something.I've been to countless markets and I nearly always feel it, especially in the dead of January when the offerings are small (as they should be!) and farmers are probably hurting. Going in there and asking questions of them makes me even more uncomfortable. It feels like asking them to prove themselves. But here's something I know is absolutely true: If I were selling my produce at the market and someone came up and started asking me questions, I'D BE DELIGHTED. I'd be so thrilled to talk about my farm and how I do things. Goodness why do you think I write this blog? Basically to brag about what we grow here! So if a vendor is reluctant to talk to you, well then, you're right to be suspicious.

However! If all of this just makes your skin crawl and you just can't do it, there is another option; you could connect directly with the farms in your area. CSA boxes are a great way to get the produce directly from the farm, delivered right to your door (sometimes there is a pick-up location). You simply sign up with the farm to receive a box of whatever they have growing every week, every two weeks, or every month. Sometimes they ask you to purchase a few months right up front - this is good for them because it gives them the resources they need to buy seed and supplies. It gives them a guaranteed income. And you get a box of great stuff on the regular. 

I'll tell you what, it'll force you to cook what's in season, with new produce that you may never have cooked before. Many of the farms include recipes in their boxes so that you have some ideas to start with. It's a fun adventure! And since these CSA farms offer visits and tours, you'll be able to see firsthand the operation and have the confidence in knowing you're buying the good stuff. You can often even volunteer work time to lower the price of your subscription, which gives you the added benefit of learning what it takes to put food on your plate. 

The amount of different things you can buy from subscription is huge - eggs, wine, dairy - I even bought my parents a fish subscription one year from a local Sacramento River Fish Farm. I think they'd tell you how fun it was to get different kinds of fish every month!  As I've written about here before, we even had a meat subscription for a time from a local grassfed operation. It was great. 

I just ordered more wheat from a local place near us in the Capay Valley, Full Belly Farm. They aren't really set up for that kind of thing, but I've developed a relationship with them over time and they are happy to send me wheat every six months or so. It just took one phone call that first time to set that up, and they've been so accommodating. We've also been there several times, to eat a fabulous Mother's Day dinner, to pick up organic straw, and just to visit the farm. They have an open door policy. That's the kind of transparency you want! Many, many family farms are doing CSA boxes now, and one great place to figure out who is in your area is Local Harvest. Just put in your zip code and find out what farms are near you!

I'm sorry that we all have to be so discriminating when it comes to our food, and not just at big supermarkets, but also at the small Farmers Market. But it's just one more step in making sure we are eating the very best produce available, and sending a message with our purchases, too.

Seasonal Eating: Does it Matter?

I've always rather disliked folks who were legalistic about food. "Sorry, can't have flour, I'm gluten free right now." (I've been gluten free, for long periods of time, shouldn't I be more understanding?) "Sorry, can't have meat at the moment, I'm trying out vegetarianism." (I was a vegan for a year of my life, so should be more sympathetic, for sure.) "I'm off desserts, no sugar for me, do you know how bad sugar is for you?" (Yes, I do. And yes, you're probably right. Now go soak your head, you remarkable paragon of self-control.) 

And on and on. It makes cooking for people very difficult. And I have an enormously picky daughter, so I have had to figure out work-arounds for many years and several thousand meals. It makes going out to eat difficult too, as almost no one place can satisfy everyone's special food needs.

But I have a confession to make. I am one of those people.

It was made extremely clear to me the other night, out for dinner with friends. We were at a perfectly nice restaurant, and I was perfectly prepared to get off my high-food-horse for a night and enjoy myself. But one look at the menu, and I found myself climbing right back into the saddle. Wild Shrimp Scampi, with grape tomatoes? Dungeness crab cakes with a sliced cucumber salad? Pappardelle with cherry tomatoes, sweet basil, eggplant, and zucchini? Come on, now, I thought to myself. It's early April. Are we really eating 'Freshly prepared and artfully presented California cuisine" as the menu advertised? Ok, wild Pacific shrimp, that's good, that's fairly local, I'm ok with that. But grape tomatoes? Do you know when grape tomatoes ripen in my garden,a scant ten miles from this restaurant? They ripen at the end of June. We might be lucky to get a handful in mid-June. Dungeness crab cakes, sure, it's probably frozen crab meat, nothing wrong with that. But sliced cucumber salad? Those cucumbers are coming from Chile or Mexico for sure. And zucchini? I mean, who are we kidding, here?

I made the mistake of saying something out loud to our friends. These are folks that I adore, admire, and respect. But the answer I got was something along the lines of, "There's really no reason to beat yourself up about this. This food is readily available everywhere, anytime, and what does it matter if we eat it?" I was deep into my second gin and tonic (and I don't drink very often, so you can imagine I wasn't quite at my witty best), so I confusedly nodded and said a very weak, "yeah." Way to stand up for your beliefs, Elizabeth.

And yet, if I had been in my usual (ahem) clear state of mind, and been able to articulate my reasons for not eating this out-of-season (even in sunny California) food, wouldn't I just have made everyone at the table uncomfortable? Wouldn't I have become, yes, THAT person, the one with the lists of 'things I DO NOT EAT?" Wouldn't I have been putting my feelings off on to everyone else, and wouldn't they have felt guilty for eating whatever the hell they wanted to eat? Very likely, yes. And I don't want to be the bummer at the table. In fact, I'm a big proponent of zero shame when it comes to food. We've all been shamed enough in our lives, thank you very much, about what we do and do not eat; my companions do not need me to add to that. 

And yet.

What does it hurt if we don't eat seasonally?

In an article in the UK Guardian from 2014, the reporter wrote about the results from a 2000-person poll, conducted by the BBC. Out of those 2000 people, only 5% could say when a blackberry was ripe; 4% a plum. All this when 86% of the folks said they shop seasonally and think it's important. I think the results of a similar poll over here in the US would probably be even worse. 

But, how are we supposed to know when a strawberry is in season? I mean, really. They're available year-round in the grocery store. Even organic strawberries are in Whole Foods 365 days of the year. Cucumbers? Peppers? The same. And we all know those insipid pale tomatoes in the store in January can't possibly be good, but by golly, they're there if we must have them. Very few people grow their own food, or if they do, it might be limited to an apple or lemon tree, or a pot of herbs. How are our children supposed to know when it's time to eat blueberries? How do they learn these cycles if we don't teach them?

There are lots of reasons for eating seasonally, and knowledge of farms and of farm cycles is but one of them (though I would argue that it's more important now than ever, considering farming is a profession that most of us don't have any experience with, and might be the absolute most important one). Here are a few others.

1) Fruit and vegetables taste better, and are at the peak of their nutritional content, when picked and eaten ripe. It's no mistake that an August tomato, dripping with juice, satisfies on a level a January tomato cannot. It's full of itself, it is the very essence of what a tomato is supposed to be. The redder a tomato is, the more beta-carotene it contains. As a sweet pepper moves from green to red, it increases beta-carotene 11 times, and has 1.5 times the vitamin C. Most foods begin to lose nutrition immediately after harvesting. Spinach and green beans lose two-thirds of their vitamin C within a week after harvest, according to UC Davis. Think about that peach that has traveled from tropical climes to get to you: It's been picked before it was ripe, and even though it will soften on its week-long journey, it will not ripen further. Is that worth it? It's lost nutrition and never even had a chance at full flavor.

2) Fresh food is cheaper. When you pay for produce to be shipped from South America or Mexico, you are paying a premium for the cost of bringing it across the world to you. How much did that lamb from New Zealand really cost you? It's a fact that we can buy more, better, fresher produce if we just buy locally.

3) Eating fresh and local food reduces the energy needed to grow and transport it. Think of the environmental costs of eating beef from Argentina, instead of buying an animal that was raised in your county. Are you willing to have that footprint on your conscience, when the same item is so readily available here? For things that don't grow in your area, I could understand it - coffee, chocolate, bananas. But just because we want asparagus or an orange in July doesn't mean that we should be able to get it.

4) Things taste better when they are only available within a short window of time. Cherry season. Tomato season. Crab season. Oyster season. Corn season. Artichoke season. There's a reason we look forward to these times. Or, rather, there was once a reason. In my twenties, I dated a man who bought a pound of cherries every day during cherry season, and ate them constantly. His motto was, when they're here, eat them! and I remember thinking that was a very different way of eating. He's a doctor with the CDC, so I imagine his advice is good from a health standpoint. But even more, think of how good a fresh ripe cherry tastes, when we haven't had one for 10 or 11 months. A little delayed gratification is a good thing.

These are just a few reasons, and you may discover even more. I really don't want to be the bummer at your dinner table, and my goal isn't to make you feel bad about what you're eating. Rather, I'd just like us all to start thinking about it, rather than mindlessly consuming. How to know what's ripe in your area at what time? There's a neat website called Sustainable Food Table, which you can access here: just put in your state and the time of the year for which you're searching, and find what's ripe in your area. It's not infallible; it has no distinction between Northern and Southern CA, for instance, and there are things ripening in San Diego that are months away here. But it's a start. 

And, of course, the very best way to find out what's ripe locally is to visit your local farmers' markets. It'll be readily clear what's available to buy, and you may be surprised at the things you find. You might need to learn how to cook or prepare a new vegetable, like celeriac or rutabagas. (You know my philosophy on that, right? Lots of olive oil and salt, and a long slow roast, will improve almost any vegetable.) And that sounds like an adventure!

So enjoy, and have fun figuring out what grows in your area at what time. Who knows, you might be motivated to start a cold frame or two in the winter, just so you can have fresh arugula.