100 Miles From Here

What’s the latest on the green cuisine scene? A diet on which you count miles, not calories. And not the miles you log on a treadmill, mind you, but the number of miles an ingredient travels before it hits your plate.

The 100-Mile Diet is the brainchild of Vancouverites Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon, who spent a year eating only food grown within 100 miles of their home. (Learn more about their adventure at thetyee.ca). Along the way, they gave a huge boost to local food movements all over the world.

There are many tangible reasons to support local agriculture, from farmland preservation to the ability to choose foods that are low or no-spray and still at their peak, nutritionally. But the intangible benefits that come from meeting the man who grew your apples, picking your own strawberries with the kids, and sampling a heritage tomato at a farmer’s market are just as important.

And some savvy ways you can incorporate the local food philosophy into your family life?

• Plant leaf lettuce on your balcony and have a steady supply of fresh greenery for your summer salads.
• Plant mint and use it to make tea for your children.
• Plan at least some of your meals around what’s in season locally.
• Visit a farm instead of a playground for pumpkin patches to wineries and everything in between.
• Visit Farm Folk, City Folk at www.ffcf.bc.ca for information on organic delivery services, growing your own veggies, farmer’s markets and more.

So think globally and feed your family locally. Your taste buds and your neighbours will be happier.