A Face on Our Food

Maria at the market had her first peas today; they were so sweet I kept eating them raw. And then Rodrigo brought round the lamb he'd butchered today, raised on our Land and his. Afraid I gave the head and the lungs to Milene, plus some of the meat. But fried up the liver and heart with Maria's fresh onions and oregano, in olive oil from the next village. And Alentejano rice with chopped wild asparagus from our Land. The salt is from salt pans on the coast. To drink, juice from our oranges. The only thing I wasn't sure where it came from was the black pepper.

This from The Table Comes First, p167-8:
The best argument for eating the local tomatoes instead of the African green beans is that they really do taste better... 
What if, after all, all our beliefs about sustainability and the planet and food turned out to be false... I think it would still be worth cooking slowly, shopping locally, using the whole beast, not because these are acts that will demonstrably do something good but because we believe these things are good in themselves. We like them now. They don't ward off our later ills; they provide our present pleasures... 
you should eat locally because it connects you to your landscape, city-bred or countrified. We can at least be definitive about that - that a life lived with a face on our food is a richer life than one lived without it.

Gratefuls:
- loads of unexpected rain, with thunder and lightning, so good for the Land and the trees and the Lake
- food that tastes GOOD
- exciting plans for tomorrow!

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