Read 'n' Seed 5: Fourth Quater of 100 Mile Diet

CHAPTERS AND PAGES: 

I read chapters December, January and Feburary, which led me up to the last page 252.

MAIN TOPICS:

*In December a main point the narrators highlighted was that when Alisa went to visit her grandmother, she was fed microwaved pasta and accepted it.  It was the first food not included in the diet and she almost vomitted because she wasn't used to the processed ingredients and taste, but choked it down to make her grandmother happy.
*In January the couple finds a resturaunt near by their home and figures out that everything sold there is completely locally grown.  They love the food so much, that they even try the beef there and love it.  It was their first time eating beef in countless years, since they have been vegetarians up until then.
*In Feburary the couple is invited to a wedding in Mexico.  While there, the couple realizes how the locals of Mexico eat and realize there needs to be a huge change in the way America's food organizations and distributors are organized.
*The couple also brings about the fact that by going on this diet made them realize what foods are seasonal and when they are optimal
*At the end of the book, the couple emphasize that they hope this story influences people to try to go on the localized diet, or try to mainly buy localized products to stop the big corporations from taking over.

SIGNIFICANT THINGS LEARNED:

*I decided to google how this book influenced the way food stores and markets changed after this book came out.  I found a website that found out that serveral farmers, gardeners, and food producers began offering services to deliver produce or urban farming or gardening services in the Vancouver area.  It just goes to show that once an important issue is made aware to the people of the public, that even if it's only a few people who make changes, we are still making our way to a large societal change.
*This section of the book also made aware that the average person in the United States meals consists of at least 1500 miles (at each ingrediant.)
*The January chapter brought about the idea why it can be a challenge to provide local food to consumers, such as:
-Weather conditions
-Seasonal foods
-Expensive
-Do not have machinary, so have to hand pick most produce-can be time consuming
*On the positive side, they also list some advantages for eating locally:
-help local economy
-locally grown food is almost always better for you and also tastes better
-Reduce global warming
-Local produce is much fresher
-Better for air quality and pollution
-More variety when eating local food
-Local fruits and veggies have longer to ripen

WHY SHOULD WE CARE??

*Like I've said plenty times, we should care about this to realize that huge food corporations are steadily taking over America's food corportion and distribution center.
*By eating locally we are reducing our carbon footprint, by lessening the amount of foods that have to travel over sea to reach our plate.
*By eating locally we are avoiding processed foods, which in reality we are watching out for our health and reducing our chance of obesity and preventable health related diseases such as heart disease and hypertension.