You are currently browsing the category archive for the 'Food & Cooking' category.
I have been trying to reduce my food miles by buying things from local suppliers and as far as meat and vegetables are concerned I’ve been doing very well. Cheese and eggs I’m also succeeding with, although I’ve found I still can’t cook without tinned tomatoes so there are things I still have to work on.
Groceries
Fish, however, is a whole new problem. First there was the issue that I have never cooked that much with fish, so my repertoire of recipes is a bit limited. I’m solving this by getting rid of all the meat out of my freezer, buying some fish and then it’ll be all I have around to cook with.
The other problem, and one that’s more important to me, is where I get the fish from. With meat I get from a local farm shop I know where it’s grown-up and more or less what it’s eaten. This should be the same for fish. There are, after all, plenty of rivers and lakes around. Sadly the market for local fish died out a long time ago, and now people have the perception that the rivers and lakes are dirty, so convincing someone to buy local fish is far more difficult.
Currently I’m exploring my options, although I think the result is going to be that I’ll have to get sea trawled fish which has driven into the area. Hopefully I can find someone who at least sells from a sustainable supply in the same way that Fishes does.
When I started to move to more locally grown food, as a way of reducing my carbon foot print (and I do wonder if it should be called a carbon foot print at all, because it’s more about the damage I do to the planet rather than just the carbon I produce), I understood that some of the things I’m used to eating would have to go (or be reduced) and I’d start to learn more about how modern food is made. What I never expected is to have too many head slapping moments, when something very obvious is pointed out to me.
Groceries
This week I have come to understand two things: in the natural world, chickens want a break from laying eggs; the way instant coffee is made seems to be energy heavy.
With regards to the latter of these mini revelations, I still need to do some more research, but I think the upshot will be that instant coffee is band from the house. There is a coffee percolator in the kitchen so it shouldn’t be too difficult to get fresh coffee, or even the beans to grind. All it’ll mean is that a cup takes a bit longer to make.
The first point, that hens don’t lay eggs all year round, surprised me. I’ve lived my life in modern countries and while I knew about all those chickens packed together in sheds, being forced fed and having their eggs carried away on conveyor belts. Heck, of course I know that some plants and animals go into hibernation during the cold months, yet it never occurred to me that those little hens don’t want to lay eggs every month. Not until the lady I get the eggs from every week said that she’d run out that Friday because the hens were malting and not laying as much.
Now I feel bad for the little blighters so I’m going to think of ways I can live without eggs (for months on end it seems). It’s either that or I make plenty of cakes and freeze them. Oh, but that uses more energy. Damn.
7-Up with milk. I came across an advert from the 1950s for this drink (here)and it’s not as bad as you would expect. In fact it’s rather nice. A bit like cream soda.
This then gave me the urge to starting trying other fizzy canned drinks with milk. The list of combinations is both endless and scary. I’ve now done Lilt (which was much like 7-Up, but with more of a pineapple taste) and next on the list is Vimto. After that, however, there is going to be Pepsi, Coke and Dr Pepper. Hopefully there won’t be an upset stomach as well.
Spam
And mint, and red Thai curry paste. This is one of the new food combinations I’ve been trying out.
The mix of the three flavours works really well together which isn’t surprising as mint and chilli appear in many recipes and sugar can be used to temper spicy foods.
Once I’d had fun playing with the different options, comparing green and red curry pastes as well as rosemary rather than mint (that didn’t work for those who are interested), I started looking on what I could use it in (although eating it on its own rather nice). Stir-frying rice in the mixtures was rather good.
After the failed attempt to buy anything from the local farm shop (see here), last weekend I finally got to view their wares. To help in my attempt to be as environmentally friendly as possible I cycled to there and back, taking a small rucksack with me to carry any purchases.
Groceries
As I already had plenty of meat in the freezer what I needed was a selection of vegetables. The choice was excellent, covering the normal things I expected: mushrooms, potatoes, bell peppers, onions and tomatoes. They also had many other root vegetables in stock, both a cheese and meat counter and a bakery (which I never looked in on because I’d already bought too as much as I could carry.
What surprised me even more was that the prices were cheaper than those of the local supermarket. A very nice discovery and I’ll be going back again.
After realising that buying fruit and vegetables from local grocery stores is no better for my carbon foot print than making the purchases from a supermarket (see here), I decided to visit a farm shop near my home.
Groceries
Here, I thought, I will be able to get produce that has been grown on the farm, has hardly travelled and has a vague chance of being freshly picked. To be honest, I couldn’t think of a downside to this. Maybe I’d be paying slightly more, but then I wanted to start supporting my local economy and this was an ideal way to do it.
One afternoon last week, after realising I didn’t have anything in the fridge I could cook dinner with, I made the decision that this would be the day to try out my plan. It was late afternoon and I was already in the car so the extra couple of miles would hardly matter. When I pulled into the farm shop drive, however, I hit my first stumbling block: it was closed.
The time was 17:15. It was a Thursday. Not, I would suggest, an unusual time to be purchasing food to cook for dinner. I’m sure most people who shop on a weekly basis get their food on the way home from work, so surely it would make sense to be open during the commuting hours. Even more odd was that the farm shop was open from ten in the morning. I can’t think of that many people who would take an hour or so out of work to get vegetables.
I have never worked in a shop, but it strikes me as sensible that it should be open during the times when the customers are going to want to buy things. Opening on Christmas Day in a Christian country, for example, is probably not going to produce a lot of sales.
Fortunately the farm shop is open at the weekend, so I am going to cycle over there and see what is available. Sadly, for this particular day, I had to go to a supermarket which was open until 20:00.
As part of my quest to reduce my carbon foot print and the food miles I incur, I have been looking at where I can buy fruit and vegetables from: local stores as opposed to a super market. (See here for more details.)
Groceries
One of the other questions I’ve had is where do I get all my other food supplies from? Cans of chopped tomatoes, dried pasta, spices etc. The same companies supply to most retailers and the supermarkets offer them at slightly cheaper prices. There is also the problem of transport. I can only carry a few tins, so if I want to do one, monthly, shop I would need to use the car.
The question that then begs is, what’s better, me driving to the local shop, or getting the supermarket to deliver my goods as part of their run? I can’t be the only one who is puzzling over these problems, but there doesn’t seem to be any easy way to put all the different factors into the calculations. Maybe companies should start publishing the average carbon footprint of their transport. That would be a good start as I could then compare it to the environmental impact of driving the car for a short distance.
I haven’t been to a supermarket for years. Not because of any great environmental concerns, but purely because I am fortunate enough to live in an area where I can have my shopping delivered once I’ve selected it from the web site.
Groceries
I have, however, been thinking about changing this practice. I’m still very happy with the service I receive but as I attempt to change more of my life style to reduce my carbon footprint there is good reason to change my shopping habits so that I am supporting the small, local, grocer instead of the large corporate.
The selection and quality at the local stores is more than adequate for what I want: fruit and veg’. What made me pause for thought were the stickers on the various items indicating they had been grown in such far flung places as Mexico and Argentina. By buying this produce I am helping the smaller retailers, which seems like a good thing, but my food miles are going through the roof. If I shop at the local supermarket I could be putting the small guys out of business but at least some of the things I buy are from the country I live in.
For the time being I’m a bit unsure what to do, but I have decided to look into other options.
There’s nothing worse than being lured in and then slapped around the face and this is exactly what fruit teas do to me.
They start off with wonderful names which draw on the memories of succulent berries and ripe fruits. The thought of juices that will make your cheeks suck in with acidic pleasure. Buoyed on you place the tea bag in the cup and add boiling water. Your nose is assailed by orchard scents and you begin to salivate at the thought of the drink to come.
Rose Fruit Tea
Finally, after circling the cooling cup for many minutes, you take the plunge expecting the rich fruit flavours to wash over your tongue.
What you get is tepid water that tastes as if it once trickled past a couple of dead leaves from a raspberry bush. You tumble from the mountain of expectation to land head first in a puddle of tea whose mild colour matches the washed out flavour precisely.
And still, the next time someone makes themselves a grapefruit and lemon tea you will find yourself wondering if the one you last tried was just a bad batch, because, wow, does that cup of yellow coloured water smell good.
The global recession is having a most fortuitous side effect – restaurants aren’t as full.
Restaurant Food
Okay, so if you’re in the restaurant business this is not good news, but for those of us who’ve always wanted to get into the top eateries, now is the time. No longer will you need to be a celebrity to avoid the four month waiting lists in New York and London. Now you can just phone up on the Wednesday and be enjoying your soupcon of cumquat terrine on the Sunday. If only the pay cut hasn’t left you without any spare cash. Bugger!
