Fed Up of Food?

Oh, finally the rhubarb in my garden is almost ready for picking!! Spring seems no closer than it did last time I blogged, which, given that that was three weeks ago, shows just how appalling the weather up here has been. Rosie the Lamb is very grateful for the sunny days when she can go out to play without being rained on, and I am tearing my hair out every time it does pour and the ground gets soaked again. I can see crops being expensive this year....

In fact, it must be said that the present time is not an ideal one for sourcing local food. I guess that this will always be the counter-argument to the pro-local campaign: namely, that when the weather is this bad and there is less choice about, why shouldn't we buy (for example) Chilean asparagus to sate our desire?

It's probably going to be cheaper after all, at the rate things are going. Sitting in a particularly depressing accountant's meeting recently, our main man announced that heat and light were up by an astonishing margin - for a minute we thought he was accusing us of cooking books, not food. But then he proceeded to reassure us that this was by no means a one-off instance.

The problem we are having is that, by supporting local produce, and using the best quality that we can, our costs are going up, there's no two ways about it, but we don't seem able to pass those costs on to the consumer, who still doesn't want to pay too much for their food. I don't particularly think that there is a decisive answer to all these problems, except that we must continue to support local producers over cheaper, less socially acceptable alternatives. If this means buying less, or cheaper cuts, then so be it. It staggers me when I see so many people complaining about food prices, but able to spend almost six quid on cigarettes, or fifty to sixty pounds a night on going out socialising.

It seems clear too that the Government is in no way going to help us now or in the near future to work towards bringing costs back down. So I think we need to concentrate on frugal food and do our best to eat well whilst not necessarily indulging in fillet steak all the time!

On the subject of frugal food, just for a giggle, I am hoping to make Panhackelty Britain's Best Dish this year. And if one more person says they don't know what Panhackelty is.....mind you, apparently we no longer think of Singing Hinnies or Stotties as local food either. It appears that the kebab has become a North Eastern speciality.

Fed Up? Just a bit - but I'll persevere just a wee bit longer. Anyway, it's Eat NewcastleGateshead this fortnight so we must do our best to celebrate what we have on offer up here. It is worth it...

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