4 Comments

  1. On the 100 mile diet side of things, just start with stuff which you should be able to get locally. For instance honey and eggs. Basically aim for the low hanging fruit.

    In another blog entry you were talking about eating kangaroo meat, but what about eating locally raised veal from the Kiama dairy industry. One of the things about eating local at this stage is that it requires a fair bit of leg work to find out what is out there. I would recommend adding a new tab to your web site title Local Food and forget 160 km, try 50 km or so.

    Where I live 160 km includes all the way south past Kyogle (where Daley’s Nursery is located), then west to Dalby (what ever that is), north past Gympie to include Rainbow beach. It is a HUGE area. This includes peanuts from Kingaroy (which I purchase from a local health food store in peanut butter form). It also includes a number of areas with fantastic volcanic soil, e.g. Maleny, Mount Mee, Tweed, to name a few.

    This past weekend I visited an avocado and persimmon farm in Nambour. Strangely enough this was the first time I had tasted persimmons. If you have not had the chance to do so, I HIGHLY recommend it. We had the non-astringent variety Jiro. You can eat this hard or soft, its like two fruits in one. They combine wonderfully with any thing dairy (particularly ice cream).

    Anyway happy information gathering on the local food front.

    Cheers,
    Jason.

    PS The best way to eat local is not to shop at Wollies or Coles. IGA often sources local food more than the two big chains. More over if Wollies or Coles where to source something locally, they would still ship it back to a central distribution centre and then back to where came from. Talk about food miles/clicks doubling!

    • @Jason: Thanks for the thoughtful and thought-provoking reply!

      Our eggs are now sourced about 10 metres from our kitchen, so that’s nice and local :-). Same goes for beans, zucchini, basil, rosemary, and a few other things. I am planning to add a Local Food tab – I’ll start something off soon, but I’m hoping I’ll get to add a lot more to it after the local food event and the Brighton.

      I found a couple of people growing grass-fed beef locally, so that’s good. I don’t know what happens to all the Jamberoo/Gerringong calves. I wouldn’t be surprised if they are sent off to feedlots for fattening and then processed in abbatoirs a long way away, before returning to local butchers. All of the local abbatoirs I know of have closed down. If anybody reading this can give me more information, I’d really appreciate it!

      I agree that 100 miles seems like a massive area. When I first heard about the 100 mile diet, I thought it was too easy as they’d made the area so huge. It’s a sign of our messed-up dependence on cheap oil that even that is regarded as ‘local’ when it comes to food miles.

      I’ve had persimmons before, and they’re on my wish list of fruit trees. I love them!

      You’re right about the Woollies/Coles thing too. Unfortunately, we only have Woollies in Kiama and no other grocery option. We do get our meat from the butcher, though, as it’s much nicer and doesn’t have all the excessive plastic and foam packaging. There’s an IGA in Gerringong, so maybe that’s worth exploring. Thanks for lighting that lightbulb :-).

  2. Alan Key

    Hi,
    A friend of mine lives at Austinmer near Bulli and says she can source a lot of local produce. She did a cheese making course at Robertson and now makes her own cheese. Lots of work but satisfying.
    Regards
    Alan Key

    • @Alan: I’d like to do a cheesemaking course, but never seem to find the time. I doubt I’d actually end up making very much cheese, either, if I’m being realistic about it. Maybe once I’m retired :-).

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