In a sense there are three distinct issues here. The home cook, the grocery consumer and the restaurant customer. None of these subjects occur in a vacuum. The home cook needs to be a food consumer by buying food and utensils before they can prepare meals at home. And while the restaurant customer can be defined as a somewhat distinct relationship, individuals often choose restaurants based on how convenient, or difficult, it is for them to prepare meals at home Health considerations, access to healthy food options, and how individuals network with others in their communities are also intimately connected to how individuals relate to food choices While we include some unconventional ideas such as community cooking in this section, it is worth noting that even broader concepts such as time banks, cooperatives, alternative food trading systems, community based cooking classes, and a wide range of other ideas which are available under the Local Networking section may serve as a backdrop for the issues we discuss in this section. Our intention in this section is to present and organize information and ideas on the traditional institutions and processes involved with the preparation and consumption of food, and, for the most part, leave what might be called some of the more far-out ideas in the local networking section.. So while for the most part we will explore these issues in separate contexts, we at the same time suggest that you keep in the back of your mind this backdrop of a kind of potential feedback loop for the two systems of conventional systems and those potential alternative. While we are not offering an in depth discussion here of alternative models here, we nonetheless want to offer a brief overview of how individuals and communities approach their food systems The best illustration of the possibilities might be in the form of a continuum. At one end is a system exemplified by completely passive consumers who are not proactive in terms of educating or organizing themselves. Nor do they seriously contemplate their roles as citizens in structuring legal guidelines for their food system In the middle of the spectrum you may have varying amount of consumer education on a variety of issues including the health impacts, environmental impacts and the economic or social impacts of the food choices they make. At the same time you may have a varying or changing willingness of the food consumer to transcend the role of passive consumer into a more active role in relation to local restaurants and grocers. This may simply mean asking more questions of those at these businesses, or perhaps applying pressure with things like petitions, or even utilizing on-line review options. It may even rise to the level of being involved in legal processes to regulate food businesses. Then at the far end of the spectrum would be a community almost ultimately involved with all of these issues of education and social political ramifications we have previously mentioned. A highly motivated and informed public in this context would not simply result in some type of super consumer. Instead such knowledge and motivation would need to transcend into the ability to actually open and operate local eateries and markets which were in accord with the conclusions they had reached from their educational process. It would not be a necessity that such a highly involved citizenry actually open restaurants, but one way or another local food businesses would need to reflect the desires of such a highly motivated consumer base. It should also be understood that the highly educated and motivated food types should not necessarily been seen as the preferable option on this continuum. The time it takes to become educated comes at a tradeoff for something else you might have done with your life instead. Also becoming educated might serve as a curse if it towards a greater frustration in trying to get food systems to align your with your values
So with this general backdrop in mind we can move on to a description of the layout of this section. As we mentioned at the beginning we have three broad categories; the home cook, and the food consumer at grocers and restaurants.
The category of the home cook tends can tend to convey a sense of isolation with an individual or family kind of minding their own business preparing their own food at home And in one sense, we do want to highlight how those at home can make their life easier and to better organize their own kitchens without creating too much complexity. On the other hand there may be those who want to see the connections between their home cooking situations and larger issues, or how they can collaborate with others to improve their home cooking environments and abilities. . In trying to examine the area of the isolated home cook, there are few ways we suggest to break up the subject.
The category has three basic contexts. First would be the utensils and equipment necessary for your home food system.. This would include things as large as refrigerators and as menial as sponges. The second is the development of systems and processes to 'run' your kitchen. Things like making shopping lists, strategies to reduce food waste, to recycle your compost, wash dishes and perhaps utilize that waste water, etc. And the third is the overall physical design of your kitchen
In regard to kitchen utensils and appliances, we hope to offer a variety of resources to provide information in this area and hopefully to develop some discussion and feedback on these products. This section could also include some products you could make for yourself such as solar cookers, etc Companies such as Pampered Chef, or similar companies, which interact directly with individuals in demonstrations at peoples homes. Such demonstrations provide a good opportunity for neighbors to meet and discuss their kitchen needs and the products which may suit those needs.
Systems can include things like simply making grocery lists, food journals, or keeping track of how much food you are wasting. The type of systems you want to prioritize will of course rely on factors that we have discussed here previously such as, the health quality of the food, how important is the cost of food and minimizing food waste for this reason, the relationship to the food in your kitchen and your garden, what is in season and available at the store, whether you are cooking for the week or just for today, and to what degree environmentally related factors such as recycling matter to you. So this area is highly variable, but it can be seen as a kind of intersection between how you design your kitchen and the results you want to see in terms of the food that ends up on your plate
The last category we come to is cooking itself. For some this may be the final stage of all of all the background information we have given up to this point. However if you are a raw food person, this of course would not apply. The cooking aspect itself is really too broad a category to capture simply. We hope to be able to break the category down somewhat based upon general diets such a vegan, vegetarian, paleo, and ethnic diets. Also we hope to provide information in regard to cooking techniques, such as frying, steaming, etc, and how these techniques realty to health and the equipment necessary for them. When possible we hope to provide a list of authors on cooking and too offer some recipes, but again the breadth of the information out there on this subject will make the task of outlining such resources more daunting than other subjects. Recipes do not always lend themselves to clear understandings on how to prepare and cook the meals , so video resources such as YouTube and DVD's will be another area of resources that we will try to break down.
Local or regional cooking classes is the final area of resources that we will address. We should also mention that the local networking section will address any informal or community based efforts to teach one another any special cooking skills or knowledge which we may have to share with others
At other locations on the site we have mentioned the idea of a food index. The food index is simply a layout of relevant information in several different contexts. Such an index would have several different layers to it. an initial index would likely have a spread sheet format where an individual could take a quick glance on various food stuffs in different contexts including cooking, and how long food stays good in storage. Ideally this would be laid out in a spread sheet fashion with all the individual food stuffs including produce, meats, algae, whatever on the left side of the ledger and then have columns that would describe these food stuffs in various contexts. Such an index would go beyond the category of cooking alone. For instance for broccoli, there would be columns for categories such as how to start broccoli in the garden, when and how to harvest it, etc. But categories such as how long it stays good in the frig, or how to cook it to retain its most healthful nutrient qualities would apply to our general category here of the home cook while others would relate to the growing food category. The cooking aspects would explain cooking the foods such as vegetables by themselves, though such an index could also include a small degree of what a particular food item is often cooked with. Further the cooking aspect would also have to be considered in whether we are simply aiming at good taste or a healthy cooking style. Also such an index could easily include how to shop for the specific food and therefore also have overlap into our next category of the food consumer. So the food index idea spans a variety of the categories we are offering here, but should be seen as an important resource for the home cook in terms of storing, preparing, and cooking food
In theory the food index, or similar approaches, could supply much of the information the home cook would need to understand the intrinsic qualities of food stuffs, and provide the home cook a good background towards preparing foods for meals. But it would also be helpful to look at a few categories that serve as general strategies or techniques which are used to prepare or store foods. These categories include: canning and preserving, juicing and blending, freezing and dehydrating, and sprouting and fermenting. These methods can have important consequences for individual home cooks and a community food movement since it can offer a way to store locally harvested food and extend the time span local food is available. Additionally these techniques can offer healthier methods and choices for local food consumers, and in some cases, offer a wider field of individual experimentation in developing unique flavors. This last point is especially true in the case of fermentation which has had a rather marked increase in popularity in the last few years amongst the homesteader types and even some chefs. These categories often have their own set of necessary special equipment which are listed under the market/products section, and they have specific health aspects which are listed in the health section
Community cooking in its simplest expression is simply the practices we can engage in that complement and enhance each others efforts. So while that sounds a little nebulous lets use some of the more concrete examples. Community oriented commercial kitchens are becoming an increasingly popular phenomena around the country. Such kitchens pass the legal hurdles for preparing and serving food within the laws of the given locality, but they also allow, for a variety of local food entrepreneurs, the ability to prepare and sell their foods which they may have not otherwise been able to do if they had to have paid for the expense of kitchen space by themselves. Another fairly concrete example is that of a group, or community, having a canning get together While this can occur at a commercial kitchen which follows local guidelines for food sales, we are also going to suggest that it could occur in an informal system at some individuals home as long as no actual sales occur. In other words a group of interested individuals, some of whom are well versed on proper and safe canning techniques, could get together for a canning project. Such an effort could serve the dual purpose of making easier the fairly logistically difficult process of canning alone, but could also allow individuals to have some certainty that the process was done correctly and that the canned goods could be traded at a later date with more certainty of safety than if one person had canned alone. There are more possibilities in this realm than we can mention here. In general however it covers two main categories; how we can physically prepare and cook food together, and how we can educate one another to do so without cooking together. The latter can be as simple as sharing recipes or good books, but it nonetheless belongs to this idea of enhancing each others efforts in cooking
Special Populations and Cooking
This is a kind of in between category. It does not fit into the home cook category , nor does it fit into the classic idea of the consumer relationship with a restaurant. The three main contexts we want to look at are school lunch programs, food for senior's in any assisted living situations, and prison populations. In general these populations do not cook per se, and are likely to be considered to be closer to the consumer relationship of restaurants. Yet these populations do not seem to have the input or choice offered in the consumer relationship to varying degrees. Any discussion of these populations having greater access for cooking for themselves will be included in the local networking section since these areas would be outside of existing systems that presently exist. Otherwise the discussion of these populations would be more in regard to the health impacts on the existing systems, and the advocacy systems who have input on what these populations are fed and what choices they are offered. Home economics classes in schools are an even more specialized context that again might be highlighted both here in terms of the existing course available for students , and in the local networking section in terms of broader possibilities
Food Consumer
Restaurants
In the layout here, we spent more time in the food consumer in relation to restaurants. But much of that information is of course applicable to grocers as well as restaurants since both modalities acquire their food stuffs from on the ground food producers. Therefore finding information about how and where the food was originally produced is generally the true focus for the information we need, and how those original sources are offered at grocers and restaurants are simply an extension of understanding the food from these original sources
Restaurants and grocers represent different types of choices for the food consumer. The most obvious difference is that restaurants process and cook food furnished to them by a supplier, whereas grocers do not alter food products that they receive from suppliers . The food suppliers to both restaurant and grocer are really the primary source that we need to look at to the degree that is practical. Therefore those individuals who want to be more informed on what kind of foods they are getting from restaurants may want to do some background research on the main companies that supply to restaurant chains and independents. Then if you decide to ask your local restaurant staff about their suppliers you will be better informed about the issues in those discussions. We will offer a separate area for food companies who supply restaurants and those who supply grocers, though there is sure to be companies who supply both or who use different brand names with the same parent companies.
In general we are here to provide information, or to help others find it for themselves. However, there can be some downsides in terms of information overload, and the complications of copyright and private property are also concerns . But for the moment, we would like to put those controversies aside, and at least explore what the avenues in a fully transparent system might look like. Increasingly individuals want more information on the nature of the food they ingest This includes both the environment in which the food was grown and transported, and in the case of restaurants, how it was prepared. The nature of the food includes the general type of plant or animal, perhaps where it is from, and some approximation of the conditions it was grown or raised in. The two main categories that most of us use in this regard is that of organic and conventional. For many of us, or most of us, that might be enough information if we feel confident that those two distinctions give us enough assurance to feel confident about the nature of our food choices.
Some of us we might want to go a little farther in exploring the grey areas around these terms. One example of how food consumers might deepen their understanding, is to ask your restauranteur some questions about their food. Where it comes from, and maybe even who some of their suppliers are could be a first step in advancing towards a broader understanding If you are lucky, and the suppliers are local, then in a perfect world they might be willing to let you tour their facilities Individuals who went through this process could then work together to post what they had learned in some public forum, and perhaps both the restaurant and the public would benefit. The restaurant would not have to explain the operations of his producer to their customers as much, and the producer could seemingly gain more public attention in general. It would further allow those farms and ranches who are using near organic standards, yet not with official organic certification, the opportunity for the restaurant consumer to discover the near organic quality of their producer. Hopefully some of these suggestions can be seen in the light of a cooperative and transparent spirit which can help our local restaurant owners and the growers who supply them, and not simply as an invasion of privacy.
Consumers may also choose to use services such as Angie List and YELP which provide a online forum in which to post reviews of various businesses . In other words if you were to visit a restaurant or grocer you could post a review of your experience on their on-line forum for others to see. There are controversies with these services. For instance, a competitor of any given business may choose to post an unflattering review of their competitor without revealing their potential conflict of interest. Developing local systems which serve this same purpose may have some advantages, such as, more transparency regarding those who are posting and perhaps bypassing some of the conflict of interest issues. Regardless of the particular forum, the concept of having more public feedback on local food related business is an important aspect to consider
A less direct avenue for an informational enhanced food consumer would be in accessing the existing public information on these issues. As we stated above, if you do your own research into who some of the major food suppliers are, and what some of their practices may be, then you are better prepared to talk to your local restaurateur about the issues in general. What sources you trust, and the type of information you look for, are additional factors to consider For instance you can become more familiar with what exactly organic standards mean, and what types of sprays and substances are involved within the organically certified products are. You may also want to consider the reliability of organically certified products when they come from overseas. In other words while international production facilities may in principle have the same standards for organic certification, their inspection processes may differ, and there may be potential that you are not receiving food stuffs that comply with the organic standards. Now it may be the case that these issues are beyond the understanding of your local restaurateur, but perhaps your efforts will help them become more interested. In general know something about where you get your information, why you trust it, and have some sense of the most salient points to consider.
Who makes our food and the circumstances of their employment are logical areas of interest for a local food movement. Not everyone is going to agree on where to draw the line between the privacy of both business owner and employee, and the public's and consumer's desire for information. This issue of course goes beyond simply the question of what we need to know about food, and begins to enter the realm of whether communities want to have greater input on issues like a living wage and working conditions. And while these issue are in some ways divorced from the condition of our food, there is nonetheless a pretty clear connection between whether well paid well trained workers with good working conditions will result in higher quality of food. Yes there may be every reason to believe that the present system is accomplishing the task just fine, but the suggestion here is that greater transparency and an increased public demand for such information could assure us that this happening. Also the question is not simply about fine tuning transparency and other such issues, but also about how a communities greater involvement and prioritizing issues of food would result in a transformed attitude towards the local food system in general. One possibility which might arise from such an arrangement would be some business getting together in a cooperative manner and agreeing to meet certain public concerns such as wages and working conditions. For example the allied business group may agree to pay some so called living wage based on the input from the public A somewhat tangential but related discussion is the importance of locally owned businesses. There seems to be good evidence that locally owned business offer economic advantages and perhaps a more direct conduit for communication between the public and the owner. If you are interested in these topics please go to the larger issues menu under localism.
Another area where the public may want to have more transparency and input from local food business would be in the area, of recycling and food waste. And while again we may have issues regarding the limits of the public's right to know may end and the private business owner's begin, we can nonetheless at least consider the importance for the community of how these issues impact us. General recycling issues, as they relate mostly to pollution and resource depletion, are a little beyond the focus of he most direct issues for a local food movement. However food waste potentially could serve many uses if it were properly utilized which would include both perhaps providing some of the waste as edible food, or to be simply re purposed as compost
As we stated in the opening paragraph of this section, there is a spectrum of involvement here. An individual can be seen as a food producer, consumer, and a citizen who helps define the rules and regulations of the markets themselves. Therefore , at some point, the pay and worker conditions at local restaurants have a connection to even the food we grow even in our own backyards This does not mean it would make much sense to start a local food movement by demanding local restaurants pay higher wages, or insisting that they join some kind of locally certified business alliance. But rather as a food movement grows, and the interconnected nature of the local community perhaps grows with it, and it is at that point where a natural evolution may occur that will have impact on the local restaurants as well
Grocers
The issues with grocery markets are of course very similar to the issues that we discussed in regard to restaurants with a few significant differences. Both almost always acquire their food stuffs from a food producer. Therefore, tracing back to their suppliers is a fundamental issue which applies in both instances.. In the case of grocers, processed foods are labeled quite extensively, and in some ways this provides us more information on what is in our food than we can easily learn from restaurants. Another fairly significant difference is , grocers, at least large ones, are members of large corporate chains, and may not be as interested in transparent, or cooperative relationships with local food activists in the same way smaller locally owned restaurants might be. This is of course raises the question of whether we might want to work towards increasing the amount of locally owned responsive grocery markets. Again, like restaurants, we are suggesting that the situation be looked at in a broad context of possibilities which includes ways of trying to create change in our existing markets through either consumer pressure or local government processes , and for the potential to open new markets which may be more aligned with local concerns and perhaps locally owned. Before trying to create change in local markets, we of course need to have a good understanding of what the conditions and policies of those markets are, and what the priorities of the community are in trying to effect change At this point we should again to note that in regard to the layout of the website, some aspects of local food sales and trade are in a separate category than this one. The local networking category takes up so called alternative forms of food trades and sales such as; farmers markets, crop swaps, CSA's, etc. In this section we try to focus on existing formal commercial grocers, and the ways we can interact with them through consumer relationships, and to some degree, how local regulations may effect such issues
Even with the additional hurdles regarding grocers, there is still a lot of room for an active community to empower themselves in relation to their grocery markets. We have already mentioned the idea of educating ourselves in regard to the list of ingredients on processed foods. Additionally it is likely a good idea to have some understanding of the companies and corporations who produce our processed foods. If we can establish a reasonable amount of trust with certain producers this may, to some degree, allow us to skip the work involved in becoming ingredient experts. However when we are not able to establish such trusting, or cooperative relationships, with producers, then we may need to return to a closer look at our relationship with the neighborhood grocer . First we hope that our produce managers, and other store management, would be willing to provide information on who their produce suppliers are. and then perhaps we could gain a greater focus on the producers we need to look at.
In the case of fish, a great deal of understanding can come from knowing the general reputation of certain species. For instance tuna is known to have issues with mercury while salmon is known to be high in healthy omega 3's.. Besides our local grocers there is also the question of on line direct shipment marketers. There are of course regional CSA's which might fit this description but for the most part we are referring to larger companies which may be quite a distance away. Therefore part of the consideration in ordering from these companies could be viewed in terms of carbon footprint questions. And it that regard we might want to consider the question of bulk purchasing. In other words if we are ordering some relatively small amount of a food item from a distant direct shipper on a frequent basis then that wold be a different calculation than ordering a large shipment of a relatively non perishable product on an infrequent basis. This idea eventually leads to the idea of community or group bulk purchasing. This could allow a community both a discount in pricing and more leverage in discussions of transparency in the quality of the food being produced. However this topic will be discussed more at length in the local networking section. Again,at this point we want to remind folks the distinction we are trying to make between the food consumer category and the health category. While they are clearly inter-related, the suggestion is that one first become educated on what they are looking for in terms of healthy food, and then refer and contribute to the food consumer section here in regard to how to acquire them, or at least how to consider them, in your purchases from producers
So with this general backdrop in mind we can move on to a description of the layout of this section. As we mentioned at the beginning we have three broad categories; the home cook, and the food consumer at grocers and restaurants.
The category of the home cook tends can tend to convey a sense of isolation with an individual or family kind of minding their own business preparing their own food at home And in one sense, we do want to highlight how those at home can make their life easier and to better organize their own kitchens without creating too much complexity. On the other hand there may be those who want to see the connections between their home cooking situations and larger issues, or how they can collaborate with others to improve their home cooking environments and abilities. . In trying to examine the area of the isolated home cook, there are few ways we suggest to break up the subject.
The category has three basic contexts. First would be the utensils and equipment necessary for your home food system.. This would include things as large as refrigerators and as menial as sponges. The second is the development of systems and processes to 'run' your kitchen. Things like making shopping lists, strategies to reduce food waste, to recycle your compost, wash dishes and perhaps utilize that waste water, etc. And the third is the overall physical design of your kitchen
In regard to kitchen utensils and appliances, we hope to offer a variety of resources to provide information in this area and hopefully to develop some discussion and feedback on these products. This section could also include some products you could make for yourself such as solar cookers, etc Companies such as Pampered Chef, or similar companies, which interact directly with individuals in demonstrations at peoples homes. Such demonstrations provide a good opportunity for neighbors to meet and discuss their kitchen needs and the products which may suit those needs.
Systems can include things like simply making grocery lists, food journals, or keeping track of how much food you are wasting. The type of systems you want to prioritize will of course rely on factors that we have discussed here previously such as, the health quality of the food, how important is the cost of food and minimizing food waste for this reason, the relationship to the food in your kitchen and your garden, what is in season and available at the store, whether you are cooking for the week or just for today, and to what degree environmentally related factors such as recycling matter to you. So this area is highly variable, but it can be seen as a kind of intersection between how you design your kitchen and the results you want to see in terms of the food that ends up on your plate
The last category we come to is cooking itself. For some this may be the final stage of all of all the background information we have given up to this point. However if you are a raw food person, this of course would not apply. The cooking aspect itself is really too broad a category to capture simply. We hope to be able to break the category down somewhat based upon general diets such a vegan, vegetarian, paleo, and ethnic diets. Also we hope to provide information in regard to cooking techniques, such as frying, steaming, etc, and how these techniques realty to health and the equipment necessary for them. When possible we hope to provide a list of authors on cooking and too offer some recipes, but again the breadth of the information out there on this subject will make the task of outlining such resources more daunting than other subjects. Recipes do not always lend themselves to clear understandings on how to prepare and cook the meals , so video resources such as YouTube and DVD's will be another area of resources that we will try to break down.
Local or regional cooking classes is the final area of resources that we will address. We should also mention that the local networking section will address any informal or community based efforts to teach one another any special cooking skills or knowledge which we may have to share with others
At other locations on the site we have mentioned the idea of a food index. The food index is simply a layout of relevant information in several different contexts. Such an index would have several different layers to it. an initial index would likely have a spread sheet format where an individual could take a quick glance on various food stuffs in different contexts including cooking, and how long food stays good in storage. Ideally this would be laid out in a spread sheet fashion with all the individual food stuffs including produce, meats, algae, whatever on the left side of the ledger and then have columns that would describe these food stuffs in various contexts. Such an index would go beyond the category of cooking alone. For instance for broccoli, there would be columns for categories such as how to start broccoli in the garden, when and how to harvest it, etc. But categories such as how long it stays good in the frig, or how to cook it to retain its most healthful nutrient qualities would apply to our general category here of the home cook while others would relate to the growing food category. The cooking aspects would explain cooking the foods such as vegetables by themselves, though such an index could also include a small degree of what a particular food item is often cooked with. Further the cooking aspect would also have to be considered in whether we are simply aiming at good taste or a healthy cooking style. Also such an index could easily include how to shop for the specific food and therefore also have overlap into our next category of the food consumer. So the food index idea spans a variety of the categories we are offering here, but should be seen as an important resource for the home cook in terms of storing, preparing, and cooking food
In theory the food index, or similar approaches, could supply much of the information the home cook would need to understand the intrinsic qualities of food stuffs, and provide the home cook a good background towards preparing foods for meals. But it would also be helpful to look at a few categories that serve as general strategies or techniques which are used to prepare or store foods. These categories include: canning and preserving, juicing and blending, freezing and dehydrating, and sprouting and fermenting. These methods can have important consequences for individual home cooks and a community food movement since it can offer a way to store locally harvested food and extend the time span local food is available. Additionally these techniques can offer healthier methods and choices for local food consumers, and in some cases, offer a wider field of individual experimentation in developing unique flavors. This last point is especially true in the case of fermentation which has had a rather marked increase in popularity in the last few years amongst the homesteader types and even some chefs. These categories often have their own set of necessary special equipment which are listed under the market/products section, and they have specific health aspects which are listed in the health section
Community cooking in its simplest expression is simply the practices we can engage in that complement and enhance each others efforts. So while that sounds a little nebulous lets use some of the more concrete examples. Community oriented commercial kitchens are becoming an increasingly popular phenomena around the country. Such kitchens pass the legal hurdles for preparing and serving food within the laws of the given locality, but they also allow, for a variety of local food entrepreneurs, the ability to prepare and sell their foods which they may have not otherwise been able to do if they had to have paid for the expense of kitchen space by themselves. Another fairly concrete example is that of a group, or community, having a canning get together While this can occur at a commercial kitchen which follows local guidelines for food sales, we are also going to suggest that it could occur in an informal system at some individuals home as long as no actual sales occur. In other words a group of interested individuals, some of whom are well versed on proper and safe canning techniques, could get together for a canning project. Such an effort could serve the dual purpose of making easier the fairly logistically difficult process of canning alone, but could also allow individuals to have some certainty that the process was done correctly and that the canned goods could be traded at a later date with more certainty of safety than if one person had canned alone. There are more possibilities in this realm than we can mention here. In general however it covers two main categories; how we can physically prepare and cook food together, and how we can educate one another to do so without cooking together. The latter can be as simple as sharing recipes or good books, but it nonetheless belongs to this idea of enhancing each others efforts in cooking
Special Populations and Cooking
This is a kind of in between category. It does not fit into the home cook category , nor does it fit into the classic idea of the consumer relationship with a restaurant. The three main contexts we want to look at are school lunch programs, food for senior's in any assisted living situations, and prison populations. In general these populations do not cook per se, and are likely to be considered to be closer to the consumer relationship of restaurants. Yet these populations do not seem to have the input or choice offered in the consumer relationship to varying degrees. Any discussion of these populations having greater access for cooking for themselves will be included in the local networking section since these areas would be outside of existing systems that presently exist. Otherwise the discussion of these populations would be more in regard to the health impacts on the existing systems, and the advocacy systems who have input on what these populations are fed and what choices they are offered. Home economics classes in schools are an even more specialized context that again might be highlighted both here in terms of the existing course available for students , and in the local networking section in terms of broader possibilities
Food Consumer
Restaurants
In the layout here, we spent more time in the food consumer in relation to restaurants. But much of that information is of course applicable to grocers as well as restaurants since both modalities acquire their food stuffs from on the ground food producers. Therefore finding information about how and where the food was originally produced is generally the true focus for the information we need, and how those original sources are offered at grocers and restaurants are simply an extension of understanding the food from these original sources
Restaurants and grocers represent different types of choices for the food consumer. The most obvious difference is that restaurants process and cook food furnished to them by a supplier, whereas grocers do not alter food products that they receive from suppliers . The food suppliers to both restaurant and grocer are really the primary source that we need to look at to the degree that is practical. Therefore those individuals who want to be more informed on what kind of foods they are getting from restaurants may want to do some background research on the main companies that supply to restaurant chains and independents. Then if you decide to ask your local restaurant staff about their suppliers you will be better informed about the issues in those discussions. We will offer a separate area for food companies who supply restaurants and those who supply grocers, though there is sure to be companies who supply both or who use different brand names with the same parent companies.
In general we are here to provide information, or to help others find it for themselves. However, there can be some downsides in terms of information overload, and the complications of copyright and private property are also concerns . But for the moment, we would like to put those controversies aside, and at least explore what the avenues in a fully transparent system might look like. Increasingly individuals want more information on the nature of the food they ingest This includes both the environment in which the food was grown and transported, and in the case of restaurants, how it was prepared. The nature of the food includes the general type of plant or animal, perhaps where it is from, and some approximation of the conditions it was grown or raised in. The two main categories that most of us use in this regard is that of organic and conventional. For many of us, or most of us, that might be enough information if we feel confident that those two distinctions give us enough assurance to feel confident about the nature of our food choices.
Some of us we might want to go a little farther in exploring the grey areas around these terms. One example of how food consumers might deepen their understanding, is to ask your restauranteur some questions about their food. Where it comes from, and maybe even who some of their suppliers are could be a first step in advancing towards a broader understanding If you are lucky, and the suppliers are local, then in a perfect world they might be willing to let you tour their facilities Individuals who went through this process could then work together to post what they had learned in some public forum, and perhaps both the restaurant and the public would benefit. The restaurant would not have to explain the operations of his producer to their customers as much, and the producer could seemingly gain more public attention in general. It would further allow those farms and ranches who are using near organic standards, yet not with official organic certification, the opportunity for the restaurant consumer to discover the near organic quality of their producer. Hopefully some of these suggestions can be seen in the light of a cooperative and transparent spirit which can help our local restaurant owners and the growers who supply them, and not simply as an invasion of privacy.
Consumers may also choose to use services such as Angie List and YELP which provide a online forum in which to post reviews of various businesses . In other words if you were to visit a restaurant or grocer you could post a review of your experience on their on-line forum for others to see. There are controversies with these services. For instance, a competitor of any given business may choose to post an unflattering review of their competitor without revealing their potential conflict of interest. Developing local systems which serve this same purpose may have some advantages, such as, more transparency regarding those who are posting and perhaps bypassing some of the conflict of interest issues. Regardless of the particular forum, the concept of having more public feedback on local food related business is an important aspect to consider
A less direct avenue for an informational enhanced food consumer would be in accessing the existing public information on these issues. As we stated above, if you do your own research into who some of the major food suppliers are, and what some of their practices may be, then you are better prepared to talk to your local restaurateur about the issues in general. What sources you trust, and the type of information you look for, are additional factors to consider For instance you can become more familiar with what exactly organic standards mean, and what types of sprays and substances are involved within the organically certified products are. You may also want to consider the reliability of organically certified products when they come from overseas. In other words while international production facilities may in principle have the same standards for organic certification, their inspection processes may differ, and there may be potential that you are not receiving food stuffs that comply with the organic standards. Now it may be the case that these issues are beyond the understanding of your local restaurateur, but perhaps your efforts will help them become more interested. In general know something about where you get your information, why you trust it, and have some sense of the most salient points to consider.
Who makes our food and the circumstances of their employment are logical areas of interest for a local food movement. Not everyone is going to agree on where to draw the line between the privacy of both business owner and employee, and the public's and consumer's desire for information. This issue of course goes beyond simply the question of what we need to know about food, and begins to enter the realm of whether communities want to have greater input on issues like a living wage and working conditions. And while these issue are in some ways divorced from the condition of our food, there is nonetheless a pretty clear connection between whether well paid well trained workers with good working conditions will result in higher quality of food. Yes there may be every reason to believe that the present system is accomplishing the task just fine, but the suggestion here is that greater transparency and an increased public demand for such information could assure us that this happening. Also the question is not simply about fine tuning transparency and other such issues, but also about how a communities greater involvement and prioritizing issues of food would result in a transformed attitude towards the local food system in general. One possibility which might arise from such an arrangement would be some business getting together in a cooperative manner and agreeing to meet certain public concerns such as wages and working conditions. For example the allied business group may agree to pay some so called living wage based on the input from the public A somewhat tangential but related discussion is the importance of locally owned businesses. There seems to be good evidence that locally owned business offer economic advantages and perhaps a more direct conduit for communication between the public and the owner. If you are interested in these topics please go to the larger issues menu under localism.
Another area where the public may want to have more transparency and input from local food business would be in the area, of recycling and food waste. And while again we may have issues regarding the limits of the public's right to know may end and the private business owner's begin, we can nonetheless at least consider the importance for the community of how these issues impact us. General recycling issues, as they relate mostly to pollution and resource depletion, are a little beyond the focus of he most direct issues for a local food movement. However food waste potentially could serve many uses if it were properly utilized which would include both perhaps providing some of the waste as edible food, or to be simply re purposed as compost
As we stated in the opening paragraph of this section, there is a spectrum of involvement here. An individual can be seen as a food producer, consumer, and a citizen who helps define the rules and regulations of the markets themselves. Therefore , at some point, the pay and worker conditions at local restaurants have a connection to even the food we grow even in our own backyards This does not mean it would make much sense to start a local food movement by demanding local restaurants pay higher wages, or insisting that they join some kind of locally certified business alliance. But rather as a food movement grows, and the interconnected nature of the local community perhaps grows with it, and it is at that point where a natural evolution may occur that will have impact on the local restaurants as well
Grocers
The issues with grocery markets are of course very similar to the issues that we discussed in regard to restaurants with a few significant differences. Both almost always acquire their food stuffs from a food producer. Therefore, tracing back to their suppliers is a fundamental issue which applies in both instances.. In the case of grocers, processed foods are labeled quite extensively, and in some ways this provides us more information on what is in our food than we can easily learn from restaurants. Another fairly significant difference is , grocers, at least large ones, are members of large corporate chains, and may not be as interested in transparent, or cooperative relationships with local food activists in the same way smaller locally owned restaurants might be. This is of course raises the question of whether we might want to work towards increasing the amount of locally owned responsive grocery markets. Again, like restaurants, we are suggesting that the situation be looked at in a broad context of possibilities which includes ways of trying to create change in our existing markets through either consumer pressure or local government processes , and for the potential to open new markets which may be more aligned with local concerns and perhaps locally owned. Before trying to create change in local markets, we of course need to have a good understanding of what the conditions and policies of those markets are, and what the priorities of the community are in trying to effect change At this point we should again to note that in regard to the layout of the website, some aspects of local food sales and trade are in a separate category than this one. The local networking category takes up so called alternative forms of food trades and sales such as; farmers markets, crop swaps, CSA's, etc. In this section we try to focus on existing formal commercial grocers, and the ways we can interact with them through consumer relationships, and to some degree, how local regulations may effect such issues
Even with the additional hurdles regarding grocers, there is still a lot of room for an active community to empower themselves in relation to their grocery markets. We have already mentioned the idea of educating ourselves in regard to the list of ingredients on processed foods. Additionally it is likely a good idea to have some understanding of the companies and corporations who produce our processed foods. If we can establish a reasonable amount of trust with certain producers this may, to some degree, allow us to skip the work involved in becoming ingredient experts. However when we are not able to establish such trusting, or cooperative relationships, with producers, then we may need to return to a closer look at our relationship with the neighborhood grocer . First we hope that our produce managers, and other store management, would be willing to provide information on who their produce suppliers are. and then perhaps we could gain a greater focus on the producers we need to look at.
In the case of fish, a great deal of understanding can come from knowing the general reputation of certain species. For instance tuna is known to have issues with mercury while salmon is known to be high in healthy omega 3's.. Besides our local grocers there is also the question of on line direct shipment marketers. There are of course regional CSA's which might fit this description but for the most part we are referring to larger companies which may be quite a distance away. Therefore part of the consideration in ordering from these companies could be viewed in terms of carbon footprint questions. And it that regard we might want to consider the question of bulk purchasing. In other words if we are ordering some relatively small amount of a food item from a distant direct shipper on a frequent basis then that wold be a different calculation than ordering a large shipment of a relatively non perishable product on an infrequent basis. This idea eventually leads to the idea of community or group bulk purchasing. This could allow a community both a discount in pricing and more leverage in discussions of transparency in the quality of the food being produced. However this topic will be discussed more at length in the local networking section. Again,at this point we want to remind folks the distinction we are trying to make between the food consumer category and the health category. While they are clearly inter-related, the suggestion is that one first become educated on what they are looking for in terms of healthy food, and then refer and contribute to the food consumer section here in regard to how to acquire them, or at least how to consider them, in your purchases from producers