Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: snippet of the day

When Poisonwood Bible came out, Barbara Kingsolver came to our small town on her book tour. If you bought a copy in advance of release, you were eligible to buy tickets to hear Barbara speak. I gave the book and one of the tickets to my sister for her birthday. It was a treat for both of us.

In her most recent book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, Kingsolver shares the reasons for and the adventures in a year of trying to eat local. We've been dabbling in this for awhile, somewhat intentionally, somewhat serendipitously (our nearest neighbors are CSA organic farmers).

I'm never going to have time to write one whole review all in one go, so I'll give you snippets as I read and gather them all up when I am finished.

Today's snippet:

Knowing the secret natural history of potatoes, melons, or asparagus gives you a leg up on detecting whether those in your market are wholesome kids from a nearby farm, or vagrants who idled away their precious youth in a boxcar.~ page 10

Part of her argument is that wholesome kids from nearby farms are yummier; her other point is that the ones in the boxcar spent more energy calories in fuel consumption (boats, planes, trains, trucks, etc.) getting to your market than they can deliver to your body. Buying auslander produce is running an energy deficit.