Green City Market’s Locavore Challenge
Chicago’s Green City Market kicks off their Locavore Challenge this week (9/10-9/24) in which they ask people to take a two-week pledge to eat only foods produced in Illinois and border states. A number of local restaurants will be participating by providing “locavore options” on their menus.
I’m pleased by any attention brought to the idea of eating locally-produced foods, but I tend to bristle a bit at these short-term “events” where people try to endure the pain of changing their habits for a short period of time. Changing your shopping and dietary habits is a difficult process and not something that can be taken on in a cold turkey mode.
I’d love to see the organizers of this event follow up with some participants a year later and see if they held on to any of the changes they made during the two-week event.
I’m skeptical about the effectiveness of these challenges and I don’t like how they frame eating locally as something that you need to “endure”, but I’m still hopeful that the Locavore Challenge can turn a few people towards locally-farmed foods.
If you’re taking the challenge, we’d love to hear from you in the forums.
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where can I purchase flour and yeast in the midwest?