Where does my food come from?

Last week I started reading Barbara Kingsolver's memoir-ish Animal, Vegetable, Miracle which is an account of her family's move to Appalaicha and the year they spent trying to eat only local food that had been grown and produced in their own county. Even after finishing only the first quarter of the book, I have been struck with the urge to find out where my food comes from, in every sense. As grocery-store oriented as we are, we tend to think that food comes from the grocery store, forgetting that it actually grows. Yeah, really! Like, in the dirt. And we tend to forget that foods come in seasons. Grapes for example. Yesterday I came home and there was a bowl of grapes in the fridge. It's February and I live in Tennessee. There are also avocadoes, raisins, apples, peppers, and spinach in my fridge. I'm pretty sure avocados don't grow here, and I know for sure that it's not apple or pepper season. I have suddenly become almost self-conscious of the fact that I - me- a person who likes to think of herself as environmentally, socially, politically, economically aware, a person who likes to think of herself as intelligent and thoughtful doesn't know where her food comes from. I don't know where it comes from, how it's grown, how it's harvested, when it's in season, who picked it, how far it traveled to get here. . . granted I know basic things like apples grow in the fall and strawberries come in the summer but the number of things I don't know outweigh the things I do.

So, so, so.

I've decided something.

I've decided that just for the next week I am going to keep track of everything I eat. Not for dieting or calorie-counting purposes, but to find out where my food comes from. I am going to keep track of:

-where it was grown

-where it was processed/packaged/produced/shipped from

-how many miles away from me that is

-ingredients and where those all were grown and came from

-HOW certain food is grown, and where it is most abundant

-is it in season?

-price

-deliciousness (taste factor)

-packaging (cardboard box, plastic wrapping, etc.)

My goal is twofold: to educate myself, and to see if eating only locally and in season would be less expensive than my household's current food costs.

Bon Apetit. Aren't fossil fuels yummmmmmy? :)