The Rules

So, what exactly will I allow myself to eat in the year ahead?

To answer that I guess the first question has to be: Why am I doing this? Of course, there are huge environmental consequences of importing so much of our food, so if I am reducing the impact my diet has on the planet then that’s good. But it’s not the overriding reason for doing this. The main reason is that there seems to be a fantastic amount of high quality food being produced around me and I’d like to spend a year focusing on eating as much of it as I can! My interest in the food I eat always seems that much higher when I know where the ingredients come from and, ideally, who produced them.

Of course, eating locally also means eating seasonally. I think most of us have largely lost touch with what’s in season around us. I know I certainly haven’t paid too much attention to eating seasonally in the past, so eating with the seasons is something I’m really looking forward to.

But, ultimately I’m doing this for fun, not to be puritanical or over zealous. I also wanted to eat solely British produce, but not solely British cuisine. So with that in mind, some things are obvious: all meat, vegetables, fruit, cheese, and other fresh produce absolutely have to be British, and wherever possible, even more local. And because part of the aim is to ensure I don’t just eat the same things I normally would, imported staples such as rice will be off the menu. (I’m assuming shop-bought pasta will fall into this category too, but have no idea whether the ingredients used to make it are British – will have to check, and if not, make my own!).

Then we come to the thorny issue of spices. I love cooking with spices, and have a not inconsiderable number in the store cupboard. I think I need to balance my desire to only eat British food with my responsibility to not let food and ingredients go to waste. So my current thinking, as I start out, is that for just one meal a week, I’ll be allowed access to what’s already in the spice cupboard. But only what’s already in there, and once it’s gone, it’s gone. Deciding on this though has definitely been the toughest part of setting the rules, and I’ll keep it under review. If it doesn’t feel right I’ll just cut the spices out altogether.

I’m also planning to apply the same rules when eating out, and will seek to eat dishes made with British ingredients. Though clearly I’ll be much more reliant on the advice of staff, that doesn’t give me an excuse to head straight to the nearest curry house and bury my head in the sand. Or rice bowl.

That said, there will be certain basics which I certainly will continue to use, such as salt, pepper and sugar. Also, I’m not including drinks in this. There’s no way I’m going without coffee or wine for a year!

I think that covers the main parameters before I start, any other decisions will be made as I go along. Sunday is April 1st, and that’s when I’m planning to make the change.

This suddenly seems more daunting than it did a week ago!

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The plan

Hello.

I should probably use my first post to explain what this blog is going to be about. It’s quite simple: for the next year, I’m planning on only eating British food.

Now, I know that’s not a particularly radical idea. There are probably thousands of people who have already made a conscious decision to eat  food that’s produced as local to them as possible – and it really shouldn’t be that difficult. I’m lucky enough to live in Yorkshire, about 45 minutes drive from the beautiful Yorkshire Dales, one of the best food-producing areas of the UK (not to mention the best countryside!). And in the other direction, it’s about 20 minutes by train into the city of Leeds, so good quality, locally produced food should be pretty easy to come by.

I think I have a pretty good starting point too. Until a couple of years ago, I didn’t really do too much cooking or think too deeply about what I ate, but that has been gradually changing. I’ve reached a stage now where I try to buy British and local produce whenever possible, and I’ve come to realise that food produced locally and eaten as freshly as possible is pretty much as good as it gets.

But still, so much of the food that I eat – that the majority of us eat – has travelled huge distances. A quick look around the veg section of the supermarket is like a whistlestop tour of the United Nations – Kenya, Morocco, Guatemala, the list goes on. I don’t particularly have a problem with importing food, particularly spices, pulses and the like, but flying fresh meat and vegetables from half way around the world so we can eat whatever we fancy all year round just seems unnecessary.

So I thought I would try and move away from all that for a year to see if I can just eat, and eat well, on food produced only in the UK for the next twelve months. There will definitely be things I’ll miss. Peppers, ginger and chillies spring immediately to mind, but I’ll hopefully be surprised at what can be produced in the UK. As for those things that I can’t find but absolutely must have, well, I’ll just have to try growing them!

I’m sure there will be times when I’m sorely tempted to give in and just cook a curry, but I’m determined that if I’m going to try and do this, I might as well do it properly. But if I’m going to avoid cheating I’m going to need some ground rules….

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