Buying local. What are your views?

Apart for ingredients used in Indian and Asian cooking, everything we buy is at least Croatian and at best local. Markets here have always been the major source of food here. Local grapes, pears, plums and apples will be available till the end of this month. People here know how to store apples and pears for winter. Next month the local Mandarins and Oranges come into play.
 
Lullabelle said:
One guy wanted to know where he could but a British made teapot so that he could have a proper British cup of tea...do we grow tea in England :scratchhead:
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I think there is some tea grown in Cornwall somewhere. Here we go:

English Tea from Tregothnan | The Tea Grown in England. Its very expensive.

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Burt Blank said:
Apart for ingredients used in Indian and Asian cooking, everything we buy is at least Croatian and at best local. Markets here have always been the major source of food here. Local grapes, pears, plums and apples will be available till the end of this month. People here know how to store apples and pears for winter. Next month the local Mandarins and Oranges come into play.
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I thought I'd spied some UK supermarket ingredients in your photos...
 
Tea, that's another good example. The quality of the tea depends a lot on the characteristics of the area where the tea leaves grow, I can only imagine how challenging it must be to recreate that artificially.
 
MypinchofItaly said:
I wonder if there will also be a 'travel only within your country'.
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We are seeing that now in Portugal. Most of the major travel bloggers switched to that kind of speech. Which was great for local tourism, with the end result that some places in Portugal got really crowded :ohmy: Me, I thought about going somewhere in Portugal on my holidays but in the end I spent 2 weeks at home. The places where I really wanted to go I'd need a car (I don't drive), the places where I could go didn't seem super exciting and the money I'd spend there would pay me a flight to Jordan, or Cyprus, or Lebanon...I decided to save the money and spend it on a great travel adventure once the pandemic has passed.
 
Morning Glory said:
You are right - I remember a UK food programme where the Chef decided to try to grow rice in the UK. It was hopeless - not enough could ever be produced to make it viable.
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Yes, rice is very picky. We produce a lot of rice in Texas, but it all comes from one small region along the Gulf coast. You need very flat land, and need to flood the fields once every season.

CD
 
Morning Glory said:
I thought I'd spied some UK supermarket ingredients in your photos...
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Morning Clouseau, we only moved here 2 years ago. The pics would be from my library. The last 4 years in the UK we bought 90% of our food from Waitrose for two reasons. 1 the quality 2 Mrs Blank was the Meat and Fish specialist for Chester. Staff discounts and manipulation ensured that. She managed both Depts. One of the best steals we got was 5kg of Halibut. Chester was not approved to sell halibut so the till had no code. When a delivery mistake like that is made it cant be sold to the public or returned. It is supposed to be binned. She would offer it to her troops. Most only liked cod and haddock so we got 4 kg for £4. As the specialist Mrs B set the price for staff purchases.
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LissaC said:
Tea, that's another good example. The quality of the tea depends a lot on the characteristics of the area where the tea leaves grow, I can only imagine how challenging it must be to recreate that artificially.
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Lissa mate, I grew a few good bushes in the UK " Tea plants need protecting from frost when young and it is advisable to bring them into a greenhouse or cool porch during the first two winters. Camellia sinensis takes 3 years to reach maturity but once the shrubs reach around 1m in height, they should be hardy enough to survive an English winter. " The problem is finding skilled slave labor to pick it commercially.
 
Morning Glory said:
You are right - I remember a UK food programme where the Chef decided to try to grow rice in the UK. It was hopeless - not enough could ever be produced to make it viable.
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Glory mate, rice is very easy to grow. Commercially it is one of the most labor intensive crops even with machines. Once again it is not viable in the UK because we do not allow slave labor like in third world countries.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XS9kp88zC1U&ab_channel=essenceworld
 
caseydog said:
Yes, rice is very picky. We produce a lot of rice in Texas, but it all comes from one small region along the Gulf coast. You need very flat land, and need to flood the fields once every season.

CD
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One of my families firms Dein Bros Sea Isle products was back in the day the biggest importer of American rice in the UK. The company was sold to fund the brothers long term plans to buy a controlling stake in Arsenal FC
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