If, like me, you are used to a grocery delivery, the recent weather has probably changed things a bit. My Riverford delivery could not get through so I foud myself having to do a ‘big shop’ – not something I’ve needed to do for a long while. I rely on Riverford from my dairy and groceries, Hazeldene for my local organic meat, Darvell’s for delicious bread, and Lucia’s for ham, oil, pasta and anything else that looks tempting. Eco cleaning materials come from Healthright mostly or mail order. Which leaves Waitrose for biscuits and… oh yes, fish…
…well, as you can see, I’m not a ‘big’ shopper’.
But, running low on everything saw me with a piled up trolly in Waitrose. I was turning the clock back about three years and looking at the system with new eyes.
The choice we have! We could be hungry and walk into a supermarket and get confused about what to eat. We are, literally, spoilt for choice. We say: what do I fancy? We hum and ha. What kind of meat? What kind of fish? It’s all there, so much to choose from. You are almost surprised if they don’t have something. Surely they can fly it in from Israel, of the USA, or South Africa. Someone has to have it, we need it for a recipe!
If I’m honest, the site of all that food makes me sick.
Yes, it’s great that people who ‘can’t cook won’t cook’ can pop in and get a ready meal at the end of a busy day. And in our hectic life cooking can take up so much time. I can see how it all happened. It’s all about demand and supply.
But, and it’s a big but for me, if we lose our relationship with our food we have lost our relationship with something vitally important. We eat to sustain ourselves, we eat to keep alive. Food is how we take in minerals and vitamins that sustain our bodies. This is a pretty important stuff.
Yet, here we are relying on some complete unknown commercial manufacturer to make it for us and add ’stuff’ to it so that it will last a week or so longer before going off. Yes, there are rules and regs about additives, of course it’s ’safe’ to eat. But how much goodness is there in it? And I mean real goodness, not chemically manufactured additives and the nutritionalists recommed for daily intake.
And why does everything contain ‘flavouring’ as if the food doesn’t have any?
We need to have a relationship with our food. We need to know what we are eating. We need to understand what it is to eat the right food at the right time of year. Seasonal food provides the goodness we need for that season. There is a lot of stored energy in root veg.
I nearly didn’t publish this as it sounded like a “bah humbug”, but then I read this article in the Economist.
This supermarket monopsonist system is not sustainable. But who is going to say so? Not the farmers. Not the supermarkets. Not the shoppers who are laregley unaware of the problem. Not the government unless the people ask them to…
It’s down to us, guys. Anyone who reads this and agrees.
It’s down to us…
By the way, it’s home made cottage pie tonight – full of all it’s own flavours;>)