one Seacoast resident challenges us all to eat only local food for the month of August 
Picking blueberries is hardly a revolutionary act, even if it is the hottest day of the year.

But while I’m scouring bushes on an August morning, collecting some to eat now and some to pull from my freezer for pancakes in January, I’m participating in a radical challenge.

“Last year I participated in the online ‘Eat Local’ challenge for the month of August,” says local food activist Sara Zoë Patterson. “But my frustration was that I would do it, write it up on my blog, and just feel it wasn’t making an impact. Preaching to the choir. So I decided come hell, high water, grad school or work, I would somehow take it offline and put it out there publicly for this year. Thus was born Seacoast Eat Local and the Eat Local Challenge.”

To participate in the Eat Local Challenge, you eat only or mostly foods from our local area for one month. A variety of sources are listed at www.seacoasteatlocal.com, from farmers to vintners. You define how local you want to get, how often you will eat local meals, and what exemptions you’ll claim—say, for food that can’t be found in New England. The idea is to experiment, learn and enjoy intensely, in order to apply the lessons learned on a more relaxed scale year-round.

“Other people have done it before and written books, namely Gary Paul Nabhan and his book, ‘Coming Home to Eat: The Pleasures and Politics of Local Foods,’ and Bill McKibben, who did it for a winter in Vermont and wrote a brilliant essay for Gourmet (July 2005, ‘A Grand Experiment’),” Patterson says.

McKibben notes in his essay that the average bite of food today travels 1,500 miles before it reaches your lips. He also notes that change is afoot.

“The number of farms around Burlington, Vermont’s chief city, has grown 19 percent in the last decade. Most of them are small, growing real food for local consumers instead of commodities for export; the same trend is starting to show up nationwide. Something’s happening, and I wanted to see exactly what,” he says of his winter living off the land and meeting the network of farmers who made it possible.

In a region rich with vegetables, berries, beef, fowl and fish, it’s hardly a hardship. The berries I’m picking are beautiful on the bush, some full, soft, frosty blue and wholly ripe, others still green with bits of purple blush. Some will end up at one of our local farmers’ markets, because I pick for free at this farm if I return half of what I pick back to the landowner, who sells at markets and to restaurants and donates to local food pantries.

I try to pick the best, the fullest and ripest, because that’s what shoppers want. But nature offers a whole variety. The harvest is uneven this year, thanks to a wet and cold spring followed by a dousing hailstorm mid-July. The ones that turn out to still have too much purple hiding on the underside, or a scratch dented into their plump curve, I’m tossing onto the ground between the rows. Mulch for next year’s crop. Some I pop into my mouth, which puckers at the tartness.One day last summer, after I had spent the morning picking, I returned to downtown Portsmouth, where I ran into a chef who’d just had berries delivered from the same farm to his restaurant. I liked to imagine I had been picking for him; he, in turn, loves to coax the freshest, sweetest, fullest local fruits and vegetables into unexpected, moan-inducing sensations for his diners, who may never appreciate the farm, the open hillside, my fingers and his.

Sweat is beading on my back, but I hold still as a flock of nine young turkeys and a single parent purr and chirp their way through the grass, passing just a dozen feet from me. It’s too bad we are so picky. The fruits we find at the market and especially in the grocery store bear no resemblance to nature, to this field, where life is in motion. I scare up a pair of birds farther down the row. A breeze sweeps up from the forest at the foot of the hill, rustling through the 60-year-old maples that run along the stone wall. Crouched over a low bush, I lean on my closed fist for support, and my knuckles come up draped with a gauzy white cobweb.

Eat local isn’t just a challenge to support local farmers—though it does help, and thus help preserve the open space we all value.

It’s also an investment in more nutritious food (less vitamins and nutrients are lost during transportation), a vote against homogenization, a vote for our community and a stand for the environment by minimizing the impact of trucking food into the area. According to Michael Pollan, the author of the popular book “The Omnivore’s Dilemma,” one-fifth of America’s petroleum consumption goes to producing and transporting our food.

For all these reasons, the idea of eating locally is capturing the imagination of the same nation that gave rise to industrial agriculture and the “super” market. This spirit has been encapsulated in a movement-turned-organization called Slow Food. Founded in Italy in 1986 and propelled by the Internet, Slow Food promotes purchasing from local farms wherever possible to help family farms thrive, promote culinary diversity, preserve farmland and sustain better health from fresher food. The organization has grown to 83,000 members and has chapters in over 50 countries, including a new convivium on the Seacoast that partially fills in the gap between Slow Food Portland and Slow Food Monadnock.

The group has set up informational tables at local food events, hosted a public informational meet-and-greet and gathered new members together for their first meeting, held in July. Their mailing list includes about 150 interested supporters.

“We’re creating a network of food growers, artisanal producers, chefs, food fans, herbalists, historians and activists to carry on a conversation about the value of sustainable, honestly produced and good-quality food in our lives and on our tables. We plan to run a series of monthly meetings including talks, tastings and discussions, and are exploring ideas for festivals, a movie series and intiatives to bring more of the local harvest to Seacoast tables,” says Michelle Moon, director of education at Strawbery Banke Museum and founder of the Seacoast convivium.

To eat food produced within 100 miles of Portsmouth in August hardly means suffering for Seacoast residents. “I’ll eat lobster,” votes a friend of mine when I tell him about the challenge.

Moon mentions our regional bounty in a recent article she wrote for the national Slow Food magazine, “The Snail.” “A commercial fishing fleet supplies the area with lobster, finfish and shellfish from the Gulf of Maine. The city of Portsmouth offers dining for every taste, from Gilly’s diner-car burger (served the same way since 1912) to award-winning fine restaurants which increasingly bring local, seasonal, and heirloom produce to their diners’ tables. We enjoy a food-lover’s bounty of businesses built on careful cooking and good taste: chocolatiers, breweries, bakeries, wine shops, and specialty foods line the downtown streets. Our region also extends inland to take in tightly interconnected rural communities, where farmers work to bring seasonal produce to an array of weekly farmers’ markets, and craft producers make ciders, cheeses, ice creams, and wines.”

Discovering these resources for yourself is half the fun.

“I’ve always been a farm groupie,” Patterson says. “It’s always been apparent to me that there’s a strong connection between food and politics, culture, environmentalism, and other assorted social issues. I was a teenager of the early 1990s, the last time environmentalism was cool and popular, and I really never let it go.” Networking with local farmers, she’s participated in a garlic cleaning party and a jam-making party this summer, and she volunteers on a couple of organic farms in exchange for food.

Few of the resources on her Web site are for local seafood, but Patterson is working to extend the network.
“I’m talking to people to try to understand their sources. Of course, there’s lobster and steamers and sometimes oysters. I hear Al’s Seafood in North Hampton might carry local fish,” she says of her research. “This whole endevour, even last year when I was just doing it for myself, involves a lot of conversation and connections, which is a really fun aspect. I’ll say, “I can’t get any local ____!” and someone in my presence might say, “Oh, there’s a farm down that road, bring your own container, the refrigerator’s inside the barn and its self-service.” Sharing those information connections, making it easier on everyone, is my goal.”

One of the most beautiful scenes on the Seacoast is the curving sweep of Pickering Road as it heads north from Dover toward Rochester. Approaching the Parsell farm,  rolling hayfields are bounded by dense forests left and right. The farm has been in the family for 35 years, and judging from customers driving in and out on a recent Saturday morning, business is brisk. Open June through October, a sign on the roadside advertises what’s currently in season: carrots, squash, beans, beets, beet greens, cukes, corn, mulch hay, lettuce, rhubarb, peppers. A small tractor towing a trailer with crates of zucchini and tomatoes idles outside the enormous white barn that makes an L with the farmhouse, sheltering the yard. The barn doors are open just wide enough to admit a pair of visitors, and when two pass through, a half-grown black-and-white cat rockets out the door. Inside, neat, hand lettered signs clothes-pinned to strands of twine give prices for an array of vegetables that includes what’s listed on the sign out front, plus Swiss chard, four types of potatoes, onions, cabbage and popcorn. In the back of the barn, hay is piled to the rafters, and birds dart in and out. Outside, a rooster crows. Two grandchildren of Eileen and William Parsell are helping to run the stand today, sorting vegetables, answering questions and tallying purchases.

“It smells good in here. I love that smell of hay,” says one woman.

“I grew up on a farm. We had cows. Fifty head,” responds a middle-aged man, looking around.

When I finish getting what I need for the week—six carrots, a pound of potatoes, a zucchini, a pint of popcorn, four beets and two cucumbers—my total is $4.77.

Eating local is not a food fad reserved for the well-to-do, though if you prefer to buy from your local market, overhead does increase prices a little bit. Patterson’s next step is to create a kit for local markets, such as Portsmouth Health Food, Philbrick’s Fresh Market and On the Vine, to help customers identify local foods.

Back in the blueberry bushes, leaning and stretching, listening to the breeze in the maples, tasting the fruit, feeling for ripeness as I roll the best berries off their stems and into my palm, I’m miles from my daily life, yet connected to my community more deeply than in my daily routine. Eating local is an adventure. It’s healthy, it supports local farms, it’s better for environment because it reduces fuel consumption for transportation, it’s better for the local economy because our money stays local and it helps keep our community intact. And, honestly, it’s fun.

why eat local?

• Eating locally means more money stays within our community and supports our local economy. Farmers receive a greater proportion of the price.
• Locally grown food is fresher and more nutritious. Since it doesn’t have to be bred for long-distance shipping and rough handling, local produce can fully ripen, making it much more flavorful.
• Eating locally reduces your second-hand consumption of fossil fuels. The average American meal travels an estimated 1,500 miles from farm to plate.
• Supporting local agriculture supports responsible land development. When you buy local, you give those with open space—farms and pastures—an economic reason to stay open and undeveloped.
—adapted from “10 Reasons To
Eat Local Food” by Jennifer Maiser,
Eat Local Challenge

getting started

online
• www.eatlocalchallenge.com: home of the national Eat Local Challenge
• www.eatgrub.org: Grub is a movement for healthy, local, sustainable food for all, food that supports community, justice and sustainability.
• www.locavores.com: these are the people credited with starting the challenge
• http://100milediet.org: people who went extreme and wrote publicly about it
• www.folkfood.blogspot.com: Sara Zoë Patterson’s blog

in your backyard
• Seacoast Eat Local challenge, with numerous local resources for fruits, vegetables, meat, wine, vodka and more, at www.seacoasteatlocal.org. Add your own resources to the list.
• Locate local farms through www.seacoastgrowers.org.
• Connect with others trying to eat locally through the Seacoast Slow Food Convivium by calling Michelle Moon at 603-422-7507, Alison Magill at 603 664-2589, writing to This email address is being protected from spam bots, you need Javascript enabled to view it , or visiting www.slowfoodusa.org.
 
farmers’ markets
• Seacoast Growers’ Association, www.seacoastgrowers.org, 603-658-0280. In Durham on Monday, Pettee Brook Lot, 2:15-5:30pm. In Kingston on Tuesday, The Plains on Main St., 2:15-5:30pm. In Hampton on Tuesday, Lafayette Road, 3-6pm. In Dover on Wednesday, Henry Law Park, 2:15-5:30pm. In Exeter on Thursday, Swasey Parkway, 2:15-5:30pm. In Portsmouth on Saturday, City Hall Lot, 8am-1pm.
• Barrington, Routes 9 and 125. Produce, flowers and eggs, Saturday,  8:30-noon, through October, 603-749-6944.
• Kennebunk, Maine, Grove Street parking lot, off U.S. Route 1. Saturday, 8am-noon, through October. For more information, call Janet Weaver, 207-646-5926 or visit www.kennebunkfarmersmarket.org.
• Rochester, Wakefield Street at Church of the Redeemer parking lot. Produce, jams, baked goods, soap, pottery and flowers, Thursday, 5-7pm, and Friday, 3-6pm, through October. For more information, contact Thomas Huse, 603-859-7861.
• Wells, Maine, Town Hall parking lot (Route 109). Wednesday 2-6pm, through October. For more information, contact Janet Weaver, 207-646-5926 or www.wellsfarmersmarket.org.
• York, Maine, Stonewall Kitchen parking lot, Route 1. Saturday, 9am–1pm, through October. For more information contact Carrie Eisner, 207-363-4422 or www.gatewaytomaine.org.