h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I think I'll enter into one of those weekly vegetable box arrangements. To be honest, I don't know why I haven't done before.

I was having a look at it tonight, and out of curiosity I priced a similar selection of veggies from Tesco to what I'd get in a box from a local farm. The Tesco option came out at around 60% more expensive.

Not just the price. There's the freshness too. I'd be getting vegetables straight out of the ground from a local farm, an hour or two's walk from the front door. And with that, of course, a minuscule fraction of the carbon footprint.

And then on top of that, if I buy from Farmer Sammy down the road, there's a lot less chance that any profits there are will end up in a tax free account in the Cayman Islands, and a lot more chance they'll go back into the local economy and help pay for roads, schools, and hospitals, too.

Then there's the fun little challenge element, of coming up with meals to use up each week's selection. And I'm sure I'd end up eating healthier, as well.

There really isn't any reason not to, as far as I can see.

Here's a brilliant idea that actually made it through the must useless congress in history; doubling the value of food stamps to buy local produce.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2014/11/10/361803607/how-double-bucks-for-food-stamps-conquered-capitol-hill

I'll be interested to hear how you get on, KB. I've considered it before but I wonder if we'd endup composting some of it. (plus, in winter a steady diet of turnips...)

I'm lucky, here, where I live for vegetables/fruit.... The little corner shop nextdoor, actually buys his fruit/veg each day in a London market, and he's now gotten a good reputation for good fruit/veg, so the turnover is quick, and his stuff is always very good.... Plus there is a fruit/veg stall near my bank, just up the road, which is fiarly decent too, and then there are a couple of stalls on the market, one of which I regularly use to get my duck and hen eggs, and veg too, and that is from her farm, somewhere just outside the town Plus, I've the Indian supermarket, and near that the hippy organic shop, which I regularly go near (I get my flour from the hippy organic shop anyhow, so go there ever couple weeks) I actually have a numbered list, in my head, of my favorite places locally to buy garlic... seriously, its so variable, and gosh, nothing like the rubbish little things one buys from supermarkets 1. veg stall (Llynn), on market), 2. Indian supermarket, 3. shop nextdoor, 4 Hippy organic shop As I tend to buy just want I need/want, it must save a fortune as I don't ever throw anything away, to the point, like today, where I@m heading away for a week, I'm actually a little annoyed I've a handful of mushrooms in the fridge, I didn't manage to use up, which I'll have to give to my lodger With all the nearby decent veg, I never really thought about a veg box scheme, I think if I did that I'd end up with wastage

They are prepared to bend the rules and include some imports in winter so you don't have to live on cabbage...and there's a gap of about a month when they don't deliver.

I wish I ran a massive greenhouse again. It's fun making your own seasons by tweaking heat, water and light!

It's not fun when an alarm goes in the middle of the night because a pane of glass falls in and all the heat is getting out and everything is dying, and you're clambering about like a half-asleep monkey trying to plug up holes....

I'm glad I don't run a massive greenhouse again.

I'm getting Very Very Cross.

I want baked potatoes. For that you need big, "floury" potatoes.

Can you get them here in Germany? Can heck as like. Grrrr.

There oughta be a law

What do you (and Germans) use when you want to make mash?

Feels aghast that Sho cannot make proper baked potatoes!


Also, I'd love to hear more about KB's big heated greenhouse. Giving up my allotment was, and still is, my only regret in life. Sadly you can't pack up a plot of land and take it with you.

Nine times out of ten, I'd prefer a nice firm, waxy potato a la Germany, but they just don't cut it for a baked potato!

That was when I worked in the States in a big growing facility, Lanza. But I think we worked too productively, because after a while we made the company enough profit to invest in an unbelievably hi-tech greenhouse that automated us all out of our jobs. That new glasshouse was some machine, though. It was like something out of science fiction - like a massive artificially intelligent organism!

I still dream about having my own growing facility from time to time. But I think I'm just conveniently forgetting all the unappealing bits!

Those acres of glass houses are something else aren't they? When I was in horticulture for a living, I used to go and buy young plants from this type of industry. Everything is controlled or robotically sown/transplanted and fed, watered, lit, etc etc. I didn't mind it so much for ornamental plants, eg fuchsias that you'd want flowering before the summer ended for instance - but food plants- I don't think they have the same flavour.

ps Your journal has inspired me to write about a tiny foray into growing something on my balcony.

Fuchsias I wish they were easier to grow (and easier to get) around here. My dad was a dab hand at growing them.

Fuchsias are a bit funny. I have two out the back. One is about halfway between my knee and my waist. It flowers well enough, but it always looks a bit unwell in the foliage. The other is, I'd say about 9' tall, and it also flowers well, but the foliage is a lot more bushy and lush.

Guess which is the one which was just sown accidentally by the birds?

in winter you can buy floury potatoes, but they are too small for good baked potatoes.

as for growing stuff: I. Killed. Mint. Twice.

It is Basil and Rosemary I feel sorry for, once you start giving them names..

I think this talk about potatoes is very appeeling.

I don't think that even my mom could've killed mint (This would be the woman that killed a cactus worth $75 in the early '70s...)

Not even for her own enjoymint?

I've managed to see off an aspidistra, and they're not called the cast iron plant for nothing

Cacti, on the other hand, are pretty easy to kill. Just give them too much water or leave them out in the cold during the winter. That must have been some cactus to be worth $75 though

Most cacti are very specialisticly adapted, aren't they, in different ways?

Forgive that fifth word. You know what I meant.