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Why You Should Cook with Local Produce

Why You Should Cook with Local Produce

by Mireille Kilgour

shutterstock_141200185 Farmer's markets and community gardens are popping up all over the place, and the backyard veggie patch is returning to suburban homes. The trend away from supermarket bought fruit and vegetables is all about local produce. It's a move plenty of Australian chefs support.

Follow the example of Aussie chef James Viles

Australian chef and director of Bowral's Biota Dining James Viles is one such advocate of cooking with local produce. With the help of his horticulturist mother, Viles serves up food in his restaurant that has mostly been grown on site in a kitchen garden. Any other produce is sourced locally from the Southern Highlands region. It's a move that is working well for the restaurant. As well as taking out the title for Regional Restaurant of the Year, Biota Dining deservedly received two hats in The Sydney Morning Herald's Good Food Guide 2014. On top of this, Biota Dining has received the title of best regional wine list, paying homeage to the restaurant's constant support for local winemakers.

Viles' dream is to create a new food movement in Australia, one that ensures a connection between the food on the plate and where it has come from. He believes that cooking with local ingredients is the key to sustainability, as well as incredible food. For Viles, when he worked as an executive chef overseas, there was a sense of disconnect between ordering ingredients through an online food database and the dish they would go on to become. Creating Biota was part of his vision to create a food empire that was all about its roots. This meant making the most of regional produce and experimenting with how to present the flavours of such food in the best possible way.

If that's not enough to convert you, here are a few reasons why it's worth using produce like eggs, meat, fruit and vegetables that have come from your local area when cooking:

Local produce tastes better and is healthier for you

According to Amelia Saltsman, author of The Santa Monica Farmers Market Cookbook: Seasonal Foods, Simple Recipes and Stories from the Market and Farm, food tastes best grown in its own season. Each season has its own set of crops and the difference in flavour between a tomato grown in summer and a tomato grown in winter can be quite staggering.

When shopping at a farmer's market or picking fruit or veg from a community garden, you are forced to eat only seasonal produce. The food will be fresher and picked at its seasonal prime, because local farmers haven't had to transport it far to get it to your table.

When growing for supermarkets, farmers must allow time for the fruit and vegetables to be transported, meaning produce can be picked before it has fully matured and the flavours have properly developed.

On top of this, there is evidence that suggests locally grown produce is healthier for you, containing higher nutrient content than fruit and veg stored in a truck for several weeks. Again, this comes down to the fact that locally grown food can be picked at the right time and is allowed to ripen naturally rather than by chemical ripening.

Going local is better for the environment

Buying local has a number of environmental benefits, including reducing the amount of greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere and the preservation of fossil fuels. When food is sourced locally, the number of kilometres it has to travel is reduced (often dramatically), meaning less transport pollution. There is also less energy being used from long refrigeration times in the storage of non-local produce. As well, when farmers grow organic fruit and vegetables, soil and water contamination is minimised, as there is less need to use maturing chemicals on what is being grown. When opting to grow mixed crops rather than monocultures, the need for pest repellent chemicals is also reduced.

Choosing local produce also helps to preserve biodiversity among food varieties. Currently, many supermarkets only choose to stock specific strains of a fruit or vegetable, pressuring growers to cultivate a specific variety and minimise biodiversity. As a result, crops become more susceptible to being wiped out by a plague. By buying local, you encourage farmers to grow food from a diversity of seed stock. Seed saving is an important aspect to Australia's environment and crops, and diversity is good for the planet.

Buying local supports the regional economy

Grabbing your basket and heading for your local farmer's market keeps money in your region's economy. By buying straight from the grower, you help to improve their income, as well as knowing they are more likely to spend the money locally too. According to the Grow Local website, in the US 93% of the money spent on produce in supermarkets goes to paying processors, packagers, distributors, wholesalers and truckers. Very little money makes its way back to the farmer who grew it.

Cooking with seasonal, local produce can make a massive difference to what gets served at the table. Ditch the supermarket aisle and try the farmer's market, grow your own herbs or buy some chooks for fresh eggs. Discover how good fresh fruit and veg taste when they're plucked straight from the tree or the ground. You can also experience good food by visiting the tables of restaurants like Biota, a participating Good Food Gift Card restaurant, to savour a region's wares.

About the author

Mireille Kilgour has been an entrepreneur for 35 years in the hospitality sector. French born, she has been an accomplished business owner and operator for a number of Sydney venues. Leading the industry with high profile institutions such as Lamrock Café Bondi, she has endless passion for the industry, and now has the pleasure of supporting restaurants to fill their tables with the new Good Food Gift Card program.