A Week in the Local Food Life

Our Dept. of Agriculture here in Virginia is issuing a challenge to residents to try eating foods grown locally for a week. I hope many people take up the challenge and as encouragement, I wanted to post that we always eat local foods from late April to late November. It may seem hard at first, but it's really not. Here in Richmond, we are lucky to have four or five farmer's markets.

You probably know from previous posts that we belong to a CSA (community supported agriculture), so that makes it very easy and cost effective to just go and pick up what we need every week. But while I'm at the market, I also pick up my beef and pork from Faith Farm Foods. Wonderful meats that are pasture-raised, you can't beat the taste and how well it is digested by your system. While purchasing meats from local farmers is not nearly as cost effective as buying from your local supermarket, it is definitely a healthier option that your body gets used to quickly! We have cut down on how much meat we eat on a weekly basis since it is more expensive, but we have easily taken to meals with eggs, beans and veggies for those non-meat days.

If you have trouble finding meat farmers, you can check your local supermarket for Laura's Beef, Coleman Naturals, and Heartland Chicken. Don't be fooled by Tyson's hormone-free labels, the birds are still tough little cage-raised creatures.

So eat up! But eat locally raised!