Edinburgh Farmers' Market
As a self-employed, self-funded student, money is a persuasive factor in what I buy. However, although I’ve been vegetarian for a couple of years, recently I’ve been wondering if that’s any better (or possibly worse!) for the environment than a meat-based diet. While Googling ‘sustainable food and budgets’, I came across Cambridge Carbon Footprint website, and decided to join the ‘eating well on a budget’ challenge remotely from Edinburgh.
Already I feel like I’ve discovered lots of changes I could make to my shopping without bursting a budget:
1. Buy loose, ungraded vegetables
My first stop was the Edinburgh Farmer’s Market, which runs near my flat in the town centre every Saturday morning.
It was cheaper to buy loose, ungraded asparagus, rather than the neater, pre-grouped bundles. I found the sellers at Phantassie Farm really helpful in pointing out the best value products when I told them about my budget challenge.
It was also interesting to see that the same 100g-packet of Phantassie Farm salad leaves I bought at the stall for £1.00 was selling for £1.70 at Real Foods (who are apparently Scotland’s largest organic food retailers) … definitely worth buying from the farm directly!
Fresh Rhubarb
2. Buy peak-season produce
According to the seller, the rhubarb had plummeted in price per kilo since the previous week, down to £3.50 per kg. I bought three generous stalks for £2.20.
3. Soup and Sauce tomatoes
One of my favourite discoveries was the Clyde Valley Tomato ‘soup and sauce’ box: lots of unsorted, misfit tomatoes selling at £2.00 per kg (the same price as standard Tesco tomatoes … but much, much tastier!)
Fresh Tomatoes
4. Dried pulses
As well as local fruit and veg, I’ve been buying dried pulses. Although these are imported, they are apparently less carbon intensive than the canned versions I usually buy, and actually work better value for money, even if they do take more time and forward-thinking to prepare.
Other changes I’ve made include buying loose-scoop organic oats from Real Foods, rather than Everyday Value oats from Tesco. Like many of the supermarket products I’ve been looking at, the Tesco value packet doesn’t actually tell me much about where the oats are grown. However, neither myself nor the shop assistant in Real Foods were completely sure what was meant by ‘organic’. I bought the ‘organic’ oats in faith that organic means better for the environment (plus it was only 10p per kilo more than the non-organic oats in Real Foods). Still, it has surprised me this week how little food labels tell me about where food comes from. In truth, I’m not sure how different my slightly-more-expensive Real Foods organic oats are from the Tesco Everyday Value ones! I’m assuming that Real Foods place more value on sustainability than Tesco, but I’d like to be more sure.
Elizabeth
May 16, 2013