A friend told me about this great network about eating local and sustainably. It is not based in the NT, but is a national organisation and has a great website. The local harvest challenge is between 1st and 7th April and is a wonderful idea that is promoted through Local Harvest and challenges you to eat locally and sustainably, or even more than usual during that week, if you already try. It may seem easy, but especially here in Darwin, some people may never eat a local ingredient, others may eat a few. We try and eat mostly local produce, but this time of year even that can be a challenge as there are so many other options that sometimes seem easier. I might try out the totally local challenge. Have a look below and think about joining up to a Darwin group, at whatever level challenge you fancy.
The different levels are
- Bite-sized challengeChoose one thing for each day (7 things)
- Meal-sized challengeChoose two or more things for each day (14+ things)
- Feast-sized challengeCommit to eat only locally and sustainably produced food during the week.
These challenges go along with other options or commitments you can make for the week. With 100% of our dry goods coming from 1000s of kms away, the feast size challenge is really thought provoking.
To take this challenge really will underline our issues of food security {and how we would survive with out long distance freight), but also hopefully provoke great innovation and be lots of fun. I have started a group “Food Care NT” that any folks up for the challenge can join. This is affiliated with the group Food Care, which holds local food get togethers and backyard workshops in Darwin to let people share ideas. this group will be holding workshops, before the week to get ready and share ideas to stock pile and make ingredients- like coconut oil and home grown mung beans and after the event to swap experiences and recipes. The challenge is at various levels, if you don’t fancy the extreme, go for bite sized, and if you want to find about the workshops contact foodcaredarwin@gmail.com and write about what you are thinking of doing in your week!!
As I said usually we try and eat mostly local fresh produce, but this is more challenging during the wet season, when I miss tomatoes and such things! I can’t really imagine a week without olive oil or black pepper, now we could give growing pepper a crack, maybe not in 4 weeks though, but olives!!! So what would we use for oil- and protein or pulses?? Some Road Kill maybe,,,,, ohhh the ideas are coming..we can do it!
Tasteofthetopend 