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Local or loca?

Recently I had lunch at the 100 Mile Cafe, which prides itself on sourcing all of its produce from within a 100 mile radius of Melbourne. I smugly enjoyed a Yarra Valley rainbow trout battered in local spelt flour, thinking that my food miles were taken care of for the rest of the week. Then in the bathroom a mural cautioning against over-flushing told me that it takes 500l of water to produce a single orange. Food guilt ensued.

But this is nothing in comparision to the angst that several locavores are enduring for an ABC blog. You'd think the Metrolocavores would have it easy getting to choose from grub from anywhere within a 160km radius of Australia's self-declared foodie capital. In fact there's been real trouble especially with coffee (Melbournians would have to be the most caffenated Australians), so they've adopted the 90% rule. This means that there's 10% wriggle room for the odd coffee and office cake or staff BBQ.

But even this is proving difficult. The toughest food seems to be the most basic. Making your own bread seems to be the only option as Hilary Harper has discovered as she makes her own sourdough. And somedays they feel like quitting which makes for even more drama. With the rest of Setember to go, there's plenty of grub trouble to be had.

Comments

  1. This article in the new matilda has an interesting slant:
    http://newmatilda.com/2008/09/04/think-global

    Perhaps 'embodied energy' is a better way of calculating food guilt. I just started a veggie patch in my western desert backyard - it's not impossible but I'm dreading the water usage.

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