When you sit down to dinner, do you know where your meal has come from? Well, yes, it may have just come from the kitchen but do you know where the ingredients were grown and how far they travelled to be on your plate? It might amaze you to calculate how far each and every food product may have travelled around Australia or the globe.
With food for an average family BBQ travelling approximately 190,000km from source to table, Brisbane’s Lord Mayor is encouraging residents to think locally to reduce the environmental impact of transporting produce.
Lord Mayor Campbell Newman said the simple act of growing or buying local produce meant that residents were helping reduce carbon emissions from food miles – the distance that food has travelled from source to table.
“If one in four homes has a barbecue this Saturday, the food miles would be the equivalent of 3000 cars driving to Cairns and back – a typical barbecue with all the salads, meat and bread rolls produces around 13kg of carbon dioxide to reach a dinner table,” Cr Newman said.
“I expect most Brisbane residents will be surprised to find out their everyday food contributes so much to greenhouse gases – up to 30% of a household’s carbon emissions.”
A group of Brisbane friends who hold regular dinner parties decided to try and reduce the carbon emissions of their gatherings and recently they held a ‘locavore’ party. The term ‘locavore’ describes someone who sources all their food from within an approximate 150 kilometre radius. For Amanda, one of the dinner party cooks, it was an enjoyable challenge to create an elegant meal from ingredients local and seasonal to the region.
“Finding local gourmet cheeses and dairy products was easy,” Amanda said.
“We bought cheese, cream and milk from Kingaroy, Maleny and Barambah Organic dairies which meant there was lots of choice. Olives and dips were plentiful too. Similarly, finding local chicken wasn’t hard once I asked a couple of good butchers. I even found coffee that was grown in the Byron Bay hinterland.
“I used the local food markets to track down local fruit and vegetables. But it was important to ask where food came from as I was surprised to find one market stall holder stocking onions from China but the figs were homegrown in Logan!
“Sourcing alcohol didn’t turn out to be an issue either. There are good wines bottled in the Granite Belt and Burnett regions and the Paddington Cellars bottle shop had a whole wall of Queensland wines on display. And what’s more local than XXXX? Although we did wonder where the hops and other ingredients were from...
“Easiest of all were the things we grew ourselves, such as herbs. Most of us grow at least a few fresh herbs in pots or in the garden. Plus, we had home-grown cherry tomatoes, chillies and zucchini to throw into the pot.
“The dinner party was a great success and it got us all talking and thinking about where our food comes from. I’m trying now to buy more and more of my food locally.”
Visit the Brisbane City Council website for good links and information about growing your own food.
What do you do to grow or buy local food?
