Perpetual Notion

I was starting a response in the comments but then it just kept going… So here it is. If you have not yet read the comments to the Eat Local Challenge post, do so now. Then you may better understand the following post.

To comment from the very beginning of Manipadme’s critique, I am currently operating to my own disadvantage. I am not exercising the perfect solution to our system. Instead I am pushing my diet to an extreme so that when October rolls in, the challenge is over, and I can snap back to my regular eating habits… well, maybe I will not snap all the way back. With hope I will be finding a new balance.

If by religious you mean meditative, then yes. Perhaps I am making things more complex than need be, but I do spend a fair amount of time planning and preparing (meditating on) my meals. Cooking is far more an event than it was a week ago. I have begun to feel like an ancestor of long ago, where I spend hours of the day foraging for food. I have in fact spent hours on meals, and am fortunate to have a schedule that abides.

But by religious you probably mean the group-think aspect. In everyone I talk to about the challenge, I try my best to emphasize the personal approach. Folks can take on the local diet to the extent that they deem reasonable. For me to drink coffee I would only be “disloyal” to myself and my own goals. I am not a week in and I miss coffee. I do not dwell on my loss but instead think beyond coffee. What else can I have? Where else can I go?

The crutches have been kicked out: pasta, rice, oils, spices. I leaned quite heavily upon certain base ingredients. Now that they are purged from my diet I am teetering. I am off kilter and actively searching for replacements. Meals take so much more effort because in a way, I am starting from scratch. I made a salsa last Sunday based on pumpkin. It was good. I also made a more typical tomato salsa, but at least my mind is moving.

To clarify on Just Local Foods, yes they are a business. JLF is a sponsor of the challenge. Though the challenge did not stem from our local co-op, it sprouted in San Francisco. The idea was introduced by A Second Opinion Magazine to Just Local Foods, and they jumped on board. Why would they not? The challenge completely fits the niche that JLF works within. And to consider their partnership to be purely one of profit is a bit dark. Owning and operating a cooperative grocery store in Eau Claire is not a business move for the profit minded. It is a good business and they are ready to expand, but there are other far more lucrative avenues than an employee owned local and organic food shop. They do what they do because it allows them to sleep well at night. Their’s is a business of social growth, as well as profit.

To close this response up, this is an exercise in compromise. I do not foresee living out the rest of my life upon the diet of one hundred miles. The severity of this challenge is opening my eyes to things I otherwise may have never encountered. You mentioned the concept of balance. I am working toward a farther reaching balance than what I knew in August. Life until this month has been the thesis. Right now (Eat Local Challenge) I am operating within the Antithesis. October comes and I will hope to arrive at new understanding, a synthesis if you will.

Thank you Manipadme, for the thoughtful critique.

P.S. Bjorn is correct. I did at one time weigh out my options on the McDonald’s menu.

I first heard of the Eat Local Challenge last spring while attending the ground breaking ceremony for the UWEC Foodlums’ garden in the courtyard of Phillips Science Hall. After the speakers had their say, a lingering group of Foodlums remained to enjoy the sun, the grass, and the remnants of the donated local cuisine. Arwen Rasmussen of A Second Opinion magazine approached our patch of lawn, introduced herself, and proceeded to tell us of some bold San Franciscans called the Localvores. As the story goes, back in 2005 these West-Coasters decided to receive all of their dietary sustenance from within 100 miles for the month of August.

The Localvores have since worked to extend the success of their challenge beyond the bay area, and into local communities around the world. This year the Chippewa Valley is part of the effort slated for the month of September.

Not a futile act, but an actual concerted effort toward change, the Eat Local Challenge stands to draw attention to what so often goes unnoticed. In this ever-increasingly developed world we have grown disconnected from something so simple as eating. There was an age that required our ancestors’ entire waking day just to find adequate nourishment. Today is a bit different. Now we pick up a phone, drive around to the window, or throw it in the microwave. We have become removed from this thing that is instrumental to our very existence.

We have become distanced from our food, both physically and mentally. Minds have moved on to other matters than the dinner plate. And our indifference has bred a far different place setting than that of our grandparents. If as individuals we are too busy to be concerned with our food, then whose job does it become? The task has been left to the hands of corporations – entities that are chiefly concerned with profit, and with quality only to the extent that it moves product. Yes product, today’s diet may as well be of plastic for how the business is run. The produce of the supermarket is engineered for quantity. High yields and a long shelf life to outlast the great distances of shipping. The meal of today travels on average well over 1,000 miles before we stick a fork in it.

The Eat Local Challenge operates at a personal level. Any interested individual is welcome to participate to whatever degree best befits their lifestyle. However, as it is a challenge, folks are asked to make some concessions to their daily routine. There are some who plan to attempt 100% local while others may try a couple meals a week. As little as one local meal a week can be an eye-opener to the array of goods available right here in our valley. The challenge is also intended to be doable. If you cannot go a month without your morning cup of coffee, then make an exception. Some of the common exceptions will be coffee, spices, and oils.

Personally I have resolved to approach the 100% mark as best I can. I do expect to miss my routine coffee and staple oil, so it goes. To lessen the individual burden, one friend proposed the forming of a Third Ward Neighborhood support group. We have spent a while going back and forth over the organizational format. Initial thoughts were to have a group of seven, each person having their specific cooking night. Further deliberation preferred more flexibility to the nightly menu. Not wanting to make a crutch of the support group, we are more apt to convene for dining a few nights a week as opposed to all. It just works that it is easier to manage family portions, and I will no doubt be trying some items that I otherwise would not. Besides, why not one more reason to socialize?

I may be out of luck for my daily coffee, but other sacrifices will have some more latitude. For my love of the fry pan, I can substitute butter for olive oil. Perhaps in a radical mood I may even try my vegetables raw. By default I will be eating out less, though I have been lobbying my favorite businesses to join the effort and tweak their menu.

If not by choice, then by force. Some of my friends are participating without their initially knowing. It happens on frequent occasion that I prepare meals with friends and roommates. For September these mealmates, when I am involved, will also be eating local. What better time than this harvest season to feed friends and allow them a new taste of their own region?

For the masses… a few of us intend to spread sign-up sheets around the town. Multipurpose of course, these documents will serve to measure the level of community participation, as well as create a contact list. Should another restaurant opt to add a 100 mile feature to their menu, then the word can be spread as simple as email. Feel free, as well as strongly encouraged, to sign-up and try one local meal a week. If you can commit to more, kudos, do it.

From my end, I can accept changing my lifestyle. That is, for a month anyway. I may find that a 100 mile diet is not to my taste. Though I figure I can wage these 30 days to make this personal discovery.

A blog for Chippewa Valley’s Eat Local Challenge can be found at www.asecondopinionmag.com, and includes local resource information from A Second Opinion Magazine, Just Local Food Co¬-op, and Native Bay Restaurant. Local farmers, producers, and challenge participants also contribute regularly.

…This article will be published in September issue of Progressive Outpost…

We have split up. Coffee is seeing other people while I am seeing other warm beverages. Within two days of separation I was already hitting the shops. I have been out with a few different teas. Five to be exact. Nothing too serious at this point.

Today I am seeing Ginger Peach for the second time. Until now, there have only been first meetings. This is the first follow up. Something about her called me back. Some of the other tea leaves had a decent flavor, but our interactions would grow stale as the night moved on. They began to seem more and more watered down. This is not the case with Ginger. Through our whole time together, she always has interesting and strong tastes.

Right away it was evident that Ginger Peach was a fast steeper. I do not usually get hung up on such qualities, though the immediate gratification is rather nice. I just hope that people do not think I am concerned with how soon she is ready. I am willing to wait for it. Also, Ginger is a green tea. I do not care where we come from, but Asian seems pretty cool. Perhaps she will open my eyes to new cultural experiences. It is difficult to say what happens next. I am curious as to what else is out there.

I still think about coffee. Sometimes when I enter a room, I feel as though coffee had just been there. It is almost as if I can smell his presence. I dig through my wardrobe and find the stains he left upon my clothing. Ginger, or any other tea could never stain me like that. There are times when I lay awake at night remembering how coffee would keep me awake at night. Then, in the morning before everyone else was awake. We would go to the kitchen and grind.

I had no idea how serious it was. Every time I picked him up, coffee left a ring on the counter. I was a fool to just leave it there. Ginger Peach is a great tea and all, but… I, I am confused. I am thirsty. I do not know what I want.

I do not want it from a box
Poked and pulled, electric shocks
Raised in a cage, served in a can
Taste the plastic and not the land

I have feelings towards meat. Opinions. With friends vegetarian and vegan, I have tasted new things, rethought what it is that makes a meal. I was anxious for the Farmer’s Market in coming back to Eau Claire. And I am active with the Foodlums (UWEC’s local and organic food club). My diet has been shifting, evolving. At the forefront, is meat. I like meat, I eat it, and I am not opposed to its presence on the dinner table. We started out carnivores. It is natural. When humans took to eating plants, that was unnatural, we got sick. Time happens, we got healthy, balanced out. It works.

Where my concern enters, is the process which brings the meal to my plate. We have turned our animals into products. They may lack our abilities of cognition, yet that does not defend their treatment as little more than plastic. Animals live in forests and fields, not in factories. What it boils down to, is that I do not want an animal to have existed for me alone. What creature should live for no other purpose than to feed another? The idea disturbs me. Everything deserves sunshine. If I have no other conviction in life, so be it. But everything, all of it, deserves sunshine. Our current practice falls greatly short of this. The issue goes to far more brutality than light deprivation, but you do not have to take my word for it. PETA.org will tell you all you care to know, and plenty more. …In fact, they may be a poor source. Rather scary and polarizing.

My resolution is to know what I am eating. I want to respect the life that preceded my meal. I can do this by knowing where it came from, what it ate, and how it lived. I want to know that it had the capacity to roll in a field of grass and was not squatted down in a cramped cage of filth. I will continue to consume meat, though consciously. And only when I know and agree with the origin. The term is free range. This is more work, often more financial expense, and overall less meat eaten. I can live with this, and what is more… I can sleep with this.