I am reading this book and loving it although at the same time I want to stop reading it. I am now responsible for the information I now know. It's a book about a family who is trying to eat only locally grown foods and why. I'm only about a third of the way into the book but it has been a real eye opener. It was hard just going grocery shopping today. Almost all of the fruits and veggies had out of the country stickers on them. My usual shopping habits consist of going to a grocery store once every couple of weeks. In between it's Trader Joe's and farmer's markets. Although I have to admit I usually only go to farmer's markets during the summer. I don't know why. I do love them. That is definitely going to change along with many of the food choices we make. We definitely won't be eating any out of season fruits or veggies.
Here is a little taste of the book:
'Americans put almost as much fossil fuel into our refrigerators as our cars. We're consuming about 400 gallons of oil a year per citizen...
Tractors, combines, harvesters, irrigation, sprayers, tillers, balers, and other equipment all use petroleum. Even bigger gas guzzlers on a farm are not machines, but so-called inputs. Synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, and herbicides use oil and natural gas as their starting materials, and in their manufacturing...
But getting the crop from seed to harvest takes only one-fifth of the total oil used for our food. The lion's share is consumed during the trip from the farm to your plate. Each food item in a typical U.S. meal has traveled an average of 1,500 miles. In addition to direst transport, other fuel-thirsty steps include processing ( drying, milling, cutting, storing, baking), packaging, warehousing, and refrigeration. Every calorie consumed by production, packaging, and shipping far outweigh the energy calories we receive from the food.
...If every U.S. citizen ate just one meal a week (any meal) composed of locally and organically raised meats and produce, we would reduce our country's oil consumption by over 1.1 million barrels of oil every week. That's not gallons, but barrels. Small changes in buying habits can make a big difference.'
This is just a little excerpt from the book that contains informational facts and these are scattered throughout the book. The majority of the book is about the process the family went through to deliberately eat food produced in their area and to grow their own food.
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Good book if you want to be challenged.
That does sound like a good one! It's definitely difficult once you have the knowledge. I've discovered a lot in the past year and every grocery trip is still overwhelming. I do miss year-round farmer's markets. I guess you can't farm much in the snow here! Oh and strawberries. I gave them up because I know they come all the way from CA. I try to only eat organic, fair trade and I avoid fruit and veggies that are out of season because I know how they got to the shelves. I constantly read labels. Sometimes I feel like I am the only one doing all this and wonder why I am making my life that much more difficult. Sometimes I want to hide the knowledge in my pocket and go eat some strawberries with everyone else. I don't feel so alone now. You're on my side!
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