What I think about when I look at my vegetables
On Friday mornings our week’s vegetables are delivered, and every so often I reflect on how strange that is. These veggies are grown about an hour’s drive away on an organic farm in Quebec, but come from seeds from all over the world, and end up at our door. Just think of the flows! They are simultaneously ultra-natural (”Our vegetables taste like vegetables are supposed to taste!”) and ultra-cultured (”unusual and flavourful vegetables for the discerning palate”) and always “better“.
I think about how hard it has been getting used to eating only what grows locally at any given time of year. There were weeks this winter we ate nothing but root vegetables, tubers, onions and chard. Now I find myself excited when I open the basket and see something like fresh rosemary or mushrooms, and I’m finally getting to the point where I no longer have to search the net to identify certain leafy things. I actually think of vegetables as staples now - and I look forward to the coming days when all we eat are tomatoes and I see fruit again.
Eating like this not only changes the way I think about food, but also about my body. I’ve had to start thinking of a balanced diet in longer time-frames, and I’ve gotten better at understanding how my body changes over days and seasons. I’m also reminded that this is an available and affordable privilege of ours - even when it means the greatest part of our income is spent on shelter and food. The veg cost more, and meat, eggs and dairy even more so. And this cost makes me think of the labour involved, of the time and bodies that make it happen.
(But then I think of Dole plantations and wish I could eat avocados and bananas every day like I did as a kid. Sigh.)
Update 28/05/05
Anthropology of Food, Local Food Issue, December - January 2005
including
Local organic food initiatives and their potentials of transforming the local food system (pdf)
Also Matt Jones comments