Month One of our Local Diet:

January is maybe the worst time to start a local diet in Kansas. We knew this going in, but started anyway. I was really idealistic and thought that if we just sent out enough emails we would find someone with some kind of produce they would want to sell us...potatoes, squash, apples, onions, something. Well, we found apples. Before we found apples we gave in and went to the grocery store and got produce. This is our first cave since January 1st. On New Year's Day we made our way to Jako Inc. over in Haven. Ken has a little store where he sells raw dairy goods, raw honey, eggs, apples (and apple products), popcorn, and meat. We made our first big purchase and headed home. (Picture)
Two weeks into our diet and I thought my kidneys were going to blow up. Way too much meat, cheese, and bread. This is basically what our diet was. This is when we decided to compromise and go to the store. We are still eating eggs everyday, but who is going to complain about that? So far, not us.
We are not totally local yet. We are emptying our cupboards. Our food is growing in creativity as our supply dwindles. It is getting very exciting as we progress. Our attachment to food is already different. When we used to think of doing something special on the weekends, going out to eat was an option, and is no longer available. We can't stop and get a snack anywhere anymore when out running errands. Indulgences are using our baking supplies to make great muffins or cookies. We are really figuring out what subbing honey for sugar does to a recipe. For now we still have sugar in the cupboard, so we use it some, but not always. Also, we just had waffles with no syrup, just honey and butter. It was awesome! I think it is my preference.
I have been toying with different ways to integrate produce into our diet locally. We still have gift cards to Bed, Bath, and Beyond from our wedding in September so I went and got one of those counter-top AeroGardens. It totally weirds me out. You don't use any soil, just store bought "nutrients." We aren't sure yet if we are going to keep it and give it a try or not, but I did get seeds for lettuce and cherry tomatoes if we end up wanting to. This ties into our ethical dilema, though. Where are those seeds from? Are they little freaks of nature created in a lab somewhere so they will grow short enough in one of these space saver greenhouses? Then, I thought I would get a sprout growing kit from tribest. This is also weird. No soil. Call me picky, but I feel like if I am going to integrate growing into my life I want there to be soil, and I want to know where the seeds come from, and I don't want to have to continue to buy seeds. Produce should reproduce. So, for now, we are starting a high-tunnel over on our land, and will hopefully be growing outdoor produce in the next month or so, and then comes Spring, Farmers' markets, and growing season. We should be in the home stretch if we can just figure out where our morals and health needs meet. Then, our biggest issue is keeping up with what comes in. Canning, dehydrating, freezing. It all makes me a little nervous, but it will be so exciting and rewarding.
The other thing that we are contemplating is where to stand on issues such as baking soda, powder, yeast, etc. Since baking soda and baking powder are made synthetically, we are going to use what we have left, then live without them. My feelings on yeast are that it is not really necessary to add yeast to our diet, but if we end up growing some hops this summer and making our own yeast, then we will use it. 'Til then, we will use what we have left, and decide when we are out whether or not we "need" it. We have ordered a raw cookbook, so this should take care of our cravings for treats in a healthy way. It will be interesting to try to combine local ingredients and raw food preparation. We may have hard times ahead of us. Luckily, we have plenty of tea to drink. (This is what I have turned to lately, since there a few things I am craving that we don't have.)

Where do they come from?

Baking Soda: "The baking soda we use for cooking is all made artificially. You add salt (sodium chloride) and limestone (calcium carbonate) in ammonia- the limestone is there to produce CO2 gas."

Baking Powder: "Baking Powder is a leavening agent that consists of a combination of baking soda, cream of tartar, and a moisture absorber (like cornstarch). It has the action of yeast but it acts much more quickly. It's used in batters where there is no acid present. such as many baked goods: cookies, cakes, pastries, pies, quick bread, etc.
It makes these types of food products voluminous by allowing gas formation when an acid comes into contact with it and/or when it's heated. Baking powder acts immediately upon addition of water, therefore a filler (usually cornstarch) is added to absorb the moisture and prevent premature activity."

*answers from wiki.answers.com

A New Diet for a New Year - Eating Local in Wichita

Hello, friends and strangers. My name is Danielle McCoy, and I, along with my husband, Mike, and my son, Elijah, am going to impart on an adventure of eating locally for a year. This means that we are going to strive for 100% of our groceries to come from farmers within 100 miles of us. The reason for this blog is to give a real account of what we will have to sacrifice, change, and do in order to get and prepare our food; and to show people how gratifying and diverse our diet can be. We would also like this blog to open up discussion about concerns for the food system. Together we will all find the utopian eating situation that gives us, the earth, and animals optimum health, happiness, and sustainability.

We have a vision for how our food and farming industries could have developed and it is a far cry from what they are now. Mike and I share a passion for revitalizing and reforming the way people interact with and think about their food. There is so much to change, but in order to get to where we want to be, we need to know where we are. That is what we expect to learn with this local diet. At the end of this year we, and you, will know what is grown here, what should be added to our local industry, and better know how to access those things.

In order for our world to be where it should be in its relationship with food we need more farmers and more food producers. We need to break down the massive producers into more local sectors. Buying from your neighbor creates a more stable food chain, economy, and a healthier environment. I understand that in this modern world not every household is going to have a housewife who bakes fresh bread, milks the cow, and tends the garden like it used to be, but we can get the same freshness that came along with that lifestyle. Some of you never want to be part of raising your own food. That is fine, but do support a healthy food system. And for those of you who do want to raise your own food, or raise food enough for others...thank you.


Our Diet

The rules and regulations of our diet:

1. All new groceries that come into this home have to be grown and/or made within 100 miles of us.
2. If we travel somewhere we can eat out, but need to make at least one of our meals, while there, local.
3. We can use the spice rack that we have in our home. We will not buy anymore herbs, unless local, but we can receive herbs from our friends over seas.
4. There may be a serious issue with leaving coffee and chocolate behind, so...for the safety of ourselves, our marriage, our child, and those we might encounter...we may indulge in such things as long as they are Fair Trade, Organic, and Sustainably harvested.
5. If others invite us out to eat or over to eat, we will go and eat what is served. We will, also, leave a Wichita Food Co-op card or sticker at every home or restaurant we attend. Just a friendly suggestion :)
6. We are allowed tea. We will try to get local teas, but if this option is unavailable, we will go the Fair Trade, Organic, Sustainable route.
7. Elijah is allowed to make his own rules.

Why we feel this diet is important.

We have already explained a little bit about why we are doing this diet, but let's get into the real guts and glory of the issues at hand...

Why local?
A great deal of the money that is paid for our food is paid for the petroleum it takes to ship, process, and package it. Why do we grow sunflowers in Kansas, send them on a semi or train to Indiana to turn them into oil, then send the oil to Montana to package it, and then send the final product back to the shelves of Kansas to sell? Does this seem to make sense to anyone? It makes sense to the corporate owners of our food supply who control the way the final product comes to be. And it makes sense for the small farmer who cannot afford to get all of the licenses and pay all the fees it would cost to do the packaging himself. This is what happens when things become too centralized. We begin to see monocropping, and crazy production chains like the one described. Buying local gives farmers in our area the incentive to choose smaller, more diverse crops, more sustainable growing practices, and gives the agriculture world a whole new market to expand on. If we had local processing and packaging plants all over the world, our food chain and the environment would look a lot different.

By buying local you give farmers a chance to earn what they deserve. No longer are they subject to what Wall Street says corn or soybeans are worth. The farmer tells you what he needs for that food in order for him to live a healthy life, and in order for him to continue to produce food for you. Is there any fairer form of trade? This is a good way to combat the migrant workers' injustice and promote good working conditions and fair pay.

The local pollens in honey have been shown to have beneficial side-effects for allergy sufferers. Why wouldn't it be the same for the rest of our food? It makes sense to me that our bodies would take easiest to foods grown near them.

If for no other reason, to cut petroleum consumption. This reason needs no explanation. The news says it all. We need to do what we can to decrease the demand.

What about things that don't grow here?
We love bananas, coconuts, chocolate, etc. as much as the next guy, gal and turtle. I don't believe we have to stop consuming these things all together. We just need to start doing it responsibly. The farmers who grow these things need to practice natural, sustainable practices. This may mean that we don't have year-round everything. Sad stuff. I think we will learn to love novelty again. It is a bit scary, but we can do it. Say it with me now..."We can do it!" Good job.

As of right now there are activists and huge organization trying to pass labels and guidelines to dictate more certifications. "Fair-Trade Certified" is a great starting point. As of right now it is all we have. What I am looking for is a way of international co-opping. Picture a tropical climate sister city. We do fair and reciprocated trade. We get a crate of produce from them and send a crate back. Why not? It ensures that we know where our food is coming from, how it is being grown, and it cuts out some of the middle men.

Basically, what I am saying about buying things non-locally is care about what goes into getting that to you. Caring is the first step. Education is the second, action the third, and activism the fourth. Before you know it we will all be pirched on our soap boxes preaching to the choir, and then we can stop and enjoy the peace. :)

Genetic Modifications
As many of you know there is a lot of tampering going on with nature. One of the most prominent ways to tamper is to get into the DNA of a seed and change its characteristics to make it do what you want it to do. I totally understand why this seemed like such a good idea at first, when things looked bad for farmers and they were experiencing drought, pests, etc. As this practice has become so mainstream we are seeing why this may not be the best idea.

The corn and soybeans that have been modified rely on massive amounts of fertilizers and pesticides to produce their current yields. These chemicals then wash into our rivers and oceans making them unlivable for wildlife.

Having the same genetic code for an entire species of plants takes away the immunity that biodiversity provides. In the '60s people were eating a different kind of banana than they are eating now. That species of banana became extinct because of a virus that ate away at the trees. So, people fell in love with a new species of banana that was supposedly immune to the virus. Now the virus has adapted and headed after our modern banana and is taking all of those trees out. You see...the way that we get such uniform produce is by cloning the trees that provide us with the desired traits of our food. When you clone for things like beauty, size, and storage things like disease resistance goes under the radar until we have a problem. The wonderful ignorance of humans allows us to believe that when we see a problem arise it is our duty to further the tinkering and fix it. Perhaps there is a better way to do this. Our tomato's genes have been infused with genes of a fish to extend their shelf life. Our grains have been stripped of all their nutrients simply to have the nutrients added back in through a process of enriching. There is a lot of exposure to high temperatures going on in both of these processes that mutate our food. Our food enters our bodies, and mutates our cells. All the while we have "no explanation" for why things like cancer, e. coli, and salmonela plague us.