Ent

Following the lead of two sons, I've going to 'give up' something for Ent (having missed the first part of Lent through prevarication).

Lent's a time for experimentation in the family this year. S, normally vegetarian, is going vegan; M is giving up "added sugars" and home internet; I've been mulling...

I'm having a go at temporarily giving up food and drink that has especially high 'food miles'. I'm doing this a bit selectively to make it achievable and to not be a right pain as it's a policy that is largely mutually exclusive with veganism. A cow from 30 miles away vs. a cow-meat-weight of cashew nuts from 3000 miles away. I had thought to keeping it to 'British isles' foodstuffs. Maybe another time.

So the main list is: southern-hemisphere / transatlantic wines, coffee (ought to be tea too), non-European fruit (bananas, pineapple,...), and chocolate.

Chocolate!? But those truffles from E are really very nice - quick, we'll have those out of the pile! Hope no-one's noticed.

One problem is that, as you can see from above, we're keen on fair trade and practically everything on my list I'd only buy fairtrade products. That's quite a conflict for me, but the argument here is energy. The truffles will help mitigate the conflict...

It costs a phenomenal amount of energy to move these products around the Earth. I've been doing a bit of research and the amount of energy (and deforestation) 'embodied' in a tea bag is huge, and, given the mess this planet is facing, logically unnecessary. I've kept tea as coffee is the bigger offender (more energy, more distant).

As the veggie's are out of town, we've a nice juicy joint of British free-range pig for tonight.