Local Food
Eating locally is a great way to support your local economy and reduce your carbon footprint.
Why?
The idea of the Localvore movement is to eat food produced locally to promote sustainability. Local Eating expert, Columbia’s Joan Gussow is often quoted as saying, “A strawberry shipped from California to New York requires 435 calories of fossil fuel but provides the eater only 5 calories of nutrition.” She defines local in her memoir, This Organic Life: Confessions of a Suburban Homesteader, as "Within a day's leisurely drive of our homes. [This] distance is entirely arbitrary. But then, so was the decision made by others long ago that we ought to have produce from all around the world."
How?
There are several ways to eat locally:
+ Grow your own garden - anyone can be a gardener.
+ In an apartment or condo? Window gardens are for you! Window gardens are for you!
+ Find locally produced and sold goods under “manufacturing” or
“grocery” categories on our online business directory.
+ Join a local Cooperative (Co-op). Co-ops are local, member
owned, nonprofit grocery stores. In Chicago we have the Dill Pickle Co-op. They are now accepting memberships.
+ Join a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program. In a CSA
you prepay for fruits and vegetables by buying a share in a local farm. There
are many of these in the Midwest you can join. Many bring your basket to local
farmers markets for economical distribution to members.
+ Dine at locally owned restaurants where the Chef chooses locally
sourced cuisine.
Happy (Local) Eating!