dietitian online

Here’s a link to an article that connects two of my favourite blogging topics that I usually write about separately: nutrition for stroke prevention and local eating. 

Eat locally, eat healthfully

This week, thanks to Alex Steffan’s Worldchanging post, I discovered a real gem to help broaden and deepen my nutrition knowledge and take it well beyond its usual geographic and professional interest boundaries. The Weblog is: 

Agricultural Biodiversity Weblog

A good place to begin exploring the blog is on the About page. Then, as dietitians, we probably will want to check out the posts in the Nutrition, Organic Agriculture, Cooking, Fruits & Nuts,  Vegetables, and Nibbles.

I’m working my way through the nutrition archive today. Here is a sample of well-written posts on various topics: 

Food is good
Kids eat more if fruit and veg are home-grown
School gardens
Heirlooms are better for you

One of the first books I want to read on my “summer” (that does not begin until September, sigh) vacation is Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. My book choice is partly because I’m a dietitian but mostly because I’m a persevering urban gardener who wants to become more of a locavore.

Until today, this book was further down the “to read” list but it moved to the top after I listened to an engaging interview with Ms. Kingsolver on American Public Media’s Speaking of Faith.

Here is the link to the web page with all your listening and reading options. I downloaded this podcast and listened to it on my ipod. It’s a keeper and one I will be replaying.

Kudos to Vancouver Coastal Health for creating this Web page that explains food security and provides links to resources such as farmers’ markets in Vancouver and the rest of BC, community gardens and community kitchens in Vancouver, and food action reports from Bella Bella to Richmond and places in-between.

:: Vancouver Coastal Health Food Security Web page

In case you’re interested in kitchen gardening and/or farmers markets, both of which foster eating closer to home, you may to check out these links I’ve recently added to the blogroll under Sustainability:

Kitchen Gardeners International 
The Centre for Sustainable Food Systems at UBC

I’d like to say just enough about these sites here so that you will visit and explore their pages.

Here is an excerpt from Kitchen Gardeners International:

First and foremost, Kitchen Gardeners love food, both product and process. They do not dream of eating a good tomato, but a true tomato, picked warm and juicy from the vine at the peak of its ripeness. Their enjoyment of the fruit is a complete one because it is inextricably entwined with the memory of the plant in its various stages of development. They taste not only the fruit, but the care and honest labor that went into making it…..

Their love of food is a complete one that extends beyond the plate to the soil and the natural processes and cycles from which good food comes. Kitchen Gardeners are in tune with the natural world, the weather, and the seasons. They look for ways of working peacefully and harmoniously with nature, rather than fighting against her. They are stewards of the land, whether it be a farm or a window-box.  (link)

I get very excited when I read about the developments at the UBC Farm. The weekly Market List e-newsletter is worth subscribing to because it gives you a taste of the good things available at the Saturday Market.

Here is the June 21st, 2007 newsletter:  UBC Farm Market Update: First Market

As I sow veggie seeds in containers on my balcony (yes, I am very late putting in the garden) and begin reading The 100 Mile-Diet, I find myself thinking a lot about sustainability. Today, when I did a Google search on “Vancouver Food Policy Organization”, I found this page of resources on the City of Vancouver web site. The information is well-organized in a quick-and-easy-to-read list. 

This post likely has a small audience–I’m not sure if I have any local readers–but if you  live or work in Vancouver and are interested in local sustainability and food security concerns, you may want to browse the entire list. Here is a sampling of what you’ll find: 

REPORT & RESOURCES

• Second Annual Food Policy Progress Report, February 15, 2007
• 2,010 Garden Plots by 2010, May 30, 2006
• Vancouver Food Charter, January 2007
• Backgrounder on the Food Charter, January 2007
• The Vancouver Food Assessment Report - Summary
• City of Vancouver Edible Landscaping Brochure  March 2006
• Evergreen Foundation. Growing Healthy Food on Canada’s School Grounds. March 2006.

FOOD SECURITY WEB SITES (external links)

• 100 Mile Diet - Local eating reduces food miles!
• Community Kitchens: Building Community Around Food
• Slow Food Vancouver

Free and Low-Cost Meals and Groceries in Vancouver

• Listing of FREE Meal Programs
• Listing of LOW-COST Meal Programs
• Listing of Low-Cost Sources of Food

On days like today, when I read informative, interesting writing on other web sites and struggle to come up with something original and articulate for this blog, I realize I would soon starve if I had to earn my living as a professional writer!

But fortunately for both of us, I’m not writing this blog so you will read my words about topics. Instead, I  hope you will go to some of the sites I link to and read posts by others, who, although they may not all be dietitians, do know a lot about complex food issues, such as sustainability.

And so I’ve added this category to the blogroll (see right side of this page, near the bottom). I admit to (1) not knowing very much about sustainability and (2) feeling overwhelmed by the desire to “do the right thing” for the environment when making food choices. I’ve selected these web sites and specific pages within sites as starting points to help me learn more about food system sustainability:

100 Mile Diet :: The latest
FarmFolk/City Folk
Treehugger :: Food + Health
UBC Farm

Yesterday evening I trekked to UBC Robson Square to listen to an engaging, inspiring and humourous Talk-of-the-Town with the authors of:

The 100-Mile Diet

I’m willing to bet it was one the best after-dinner conversations in downtown Vancouver last night. I’m really, really looking forward to reading the book. I didn’t take any notes during the Talk, which I regret, but I’m going to try to recall or at least paraphrase some of the best quotes and share them here later.

What I really want to find is the source of the pumpkin-flavoured honey that the authors, Alisa Smith and JB MacKinnon, raved about!

Sorry for the short notice but I just found out about this event recently. I’m sharing it here in case you are in the Vancouver area and free this evening.

Local authors Alisa Smith and JB MacKinnon, who wrote about their attempt to feed themselves on food grown and produced within 100 miles of Vancouver in their book The 100 Mile Diet, will be speaking at Talk-of-the-Town on Monday, May 14 , 7:30 - 9:00 PM, UBC Robson Square, 800 Robson Street, Vancouver.

More details about tonight’s talk are on this web page: http://www.communityaffairs.ubc.ca/talkofthetown/2007/smithmackinnon.html

Combine the following:

1. April sunshine
2. A small balcony garden needing early spring pruning and repotting
3. A new discovery: You Grow Girl

I can’t resist. No blogging this evening. My hands will be tending plants instead of tapping a keyboard.

Blame it on serendipity once again. Yesterday as I was searching web sites for information on sustainable food choices, I came across what has become my favourite gardening website: You Grow Girl.

I just had to share it as soon as possible so you can be inspired and delighted by this site, too.