Thoughts From Becca

I've always had an interest in cooking in the way that is now called Slow Food. The movement to local is again gaining popularity. It never lost momentum with me. Flavour marriages are at a premium when you take the local produce from the same region and season; you can't go wrong! Classical food combinations are historically based on these regional and seasonal marriages. Although my reasons for cooking seasonal regional and fresh were always based on taste, there are lots of other reasons to use this base in understanding food, produce, cooking. For a start in our industrialised, and then technology based societies, (global) transport is easier and quicker so we've come to enjoy produce from other regions at any time of year. Long distance hauls have an impact, on not only flavour, but also have a huge cost to the environment. What is the impact to our world on transporting water in a bottle up to 15,000 kilometres (or sending pears to China from Australia?) Long stor...

During the week I've been following a regional food challenge limiting myself to food within a 100 mile (160km) radius of my home. I started the tough way by cleaning out the fridge and starting with an empty larder. Well, it would not have been a challenge otherwise. Always mindful of using fresh seasonal produce, limitations on distance from farm to table have proved interesting. What an education I've received. Was I crazy to think I would walk into the Sydney CBD and find local produce, or even find food for which the origin was known. On the first day, I spent (more than) my lunchtime walking the city. Just one helpful fruit stall (Pitt Street near Martin Place) had produce (known to be) from this state. His display of apples was from Batlow and I purchased three. To be sure of my distance obligation, a friend did his technical thing and checked, and Batlow did not fall within range from Sydney. Regional for sure! But I'm a Taurus and determined. I did not want to ...