Book Review :: The 100-Mile Diet
Review by Meghan Mast
Today’s consumers should have no difficulty finding organic products in ordinary grocery stores and other surprising sources. Now organic coffee is even available at 7-Eleven. Although the increase in organic food availability is a huge improvement, a new issue has emerged. Even food grown organically has environmental repercussions when it has been transported across the continent and across the world. The most eco-friendly products are not only organic, but also local. However, is it even possible to buy only local food?
This is the question that Vancouver natives Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon tackled when they began the “100-Mile Diet.” In order to accurately achieve the goal of eating only local food, the couple made a rule to only eat only what was grown within a 100-mile radius of their home in Vancouver. Soon, what began as a simple statement at the dinner table, “I think we should try eating local food for a year,” became an inspirational example for the rest of North America.
Although their plan proved possible, it certainly wasn’t easy. At the beginning of the experiment, Smith moaned about how hungry she was, desperate for caloric carbohydrates and a fresh salad. By the end of the year however, the couple established a good sense of where to find local and also nutritionally balanced groceries.
While Smith and MacKinnon dove immediately into a purist definition of local eating, their advice for people interested in the 100-Mile Diet is to start small. Begin with a 100-mile meal, or one day committed to 100-mile food. Gradually increase this to a week, and over time work up to a year commitment. This tactic makes eating locally look much less impossible and much more like a piece of cake. Of course, not just any piece of cake, but one made with local honey, free-range local eggs and organic local flour…
