Do you reckon that right now you could guess the air miles
of the food that you’ve recently bought?
‘Cause I’m starting to get really worried about the impact of the food that I’m buying
Even recently in the supermarket, I’ve bought apples from South Africa and blueberries from Peru
And the thing is, the emissions produced by the ships and the planes that take that
food from where it's grown to where we buy it here in the UK will impact climate
I’ve got to ask the question, how do diets like mine go on to contribute to issues
like climate change?
We hear more and more how the solution to this is to buy more local and seasonal food
I don’t know where I’d go to buy that kind of food and
even when I do see it, it tends to be quite pricey
So, I’m going to set myself the challenge of buying only local and seasonal food for one
week for the same price as my normal weekly shop
And based on a 2016 report, the average UK individual spends £25.82 a week on food
Now I’m going to set this counter to zero and over the week, I’m going to add up what
I spend and see if I can keep my local and seasonal diet in budget
Day one of the challenge, and I’m just on my way to my normal supermarket to see
how much local food I can find to get me going at the start of the week
So I'm home and I'm back from my first local shop
That was actually really quite challenging
Now I thought it’d be easy enough to find lots of food that was locally grown
in Scotland but today in the supermarket, even finding food that was grown in the UK
proved to be a challenge
Now so first on the shopping list today was fruit and veg and, when I went to try and
find all the stuff that I normally buy, and most of it was from either
South Africa or South America
So in the end, I opted for mushrooms, carrots, onions, beetroot and apples, all grown in the UK
By far, the biggest dilemma of the day came when I tried to buy milk
Now just now, I tend to drink non-dairy milk
I went for the dairy milk. This is the only milk I could find
that was produced in Scotland, so this is what I had to do
And it’s clear that eating locally and avoiding dairy and meat products in our food do not
go hand in hand
So ultimately, I managed to finish my shop with everything I need to have some
good meals over the next few days
But to get here, I had to make a lot of changes to the original shopping list that I had
I’ve added up everything I’ve spent today and the grand total is £8.59
So far, I’ve focused mainly on buying local foods. But a big part of this challenge is also
buying foods that are seasonal
So, for today’s shop, I’m going to steer away from the high street supermarkets
and look for more independent stores where I hope to
find a better range of local food that is currently in season
I found two great independent shops today and the food in them is great
It’s the freshest food that you could get
But you also get some really cool new things that you would never have found
before that lead to some really interesting recipes
Seasonal meals like this are great. See, when I went shopping today
instead of going with a set list of all the different foods I needed to buy
I went with an open mind and only bought what was seasonal and what was readily available
And as a result, I got such a cool mix of different foods that I would never have put
together before, which have made meals like this so fun to eat
And for springtime just now, these foods are things like beetroot, carrots and cabbage
So after my shop today, the total I’ve spent this week has risen to £16.48
I’m doing so much better than I thought. I did think some of these foods
would be a bit more pricey
But as long as you’re careful with what you shop, and you only buy
exactly what you need, I don’t think you should find any difference
So recently there have been more and more sustainable supermarkets opening up in Scotland
So I’m going to head across town to go to one now to try and get the
final bits I need for the week and hopefully stay under budget
But what I’m most excited about is speaking to the expert staff there
and seeking their local seasonal food advice
It’s great to hear that you’re doing a sort of local challenge
There’s lots of benefits to eating a local seasonal diet, right from supporting
the local economy and local farmers, reducing the food miles that the distance
that your food has travelled to get to you and with that, the climate change
emissions as well
One of the great things about it is eating seasonally which means eating carrots
cabbages and kale through winter is a lot more cost effective than eating tomatoes
which will have travelled a long way
I’ve made it to the end of the week buying only local and seasonal foods
So, I’m just going to add up my most recent shop to my running
weekly total to see how I’ve done
And I’ve done it!
My total for this week is £23.32
So it is possible, you can have a local seasonal diet for the same price as
the average UK weekly shop
Now, I can’t help thinking, sure that’s easy for me to say but would everyone
else have the same experience?
A lot of the places I’ve gone to buy this food have been in fairly affluent areas
of the city and I’ve had a lot of time
to go and search for the best places to buy this kind of food
It’s been quite tricky as well. I don’t eat meat and I tend not to eat dairy just now
But, to complete this challenge, I had to compromise on that and buy normal milk
So, it certainly isn’t a perfect solution. But on the whole, even if you’re just adding
one local seasonal piece of food to your shopping basket each week
there’s loads of benefits that you could see. I’ve got new recipe ideas and new types
of food that I really want to bring into the food shopping that I do in future
So if you do take on this challenge, my top tip would be stick less strictly
to your shopping list. Go with what’s seasonal and what’s readily available in the supermarket
and if you do that, you’re sure to come away with some tasty, healthy foods
and you’ll know that you’re doing your bit for the environment as well