A note from the editor - January 2022

Keep doing what you're doing

New Year, New You…. Veganuary…. Dry January…. Thank Goodness it’s nearly February and the reformists can leave us alone to carry on living the way we want to live!

​I gave up nothing new in January but continued to stuff as much cardboard and plastic into my recycling bin as I could, eat as many of my five a day as I could manage and not have too many gin-soaked evenings after a hard day of graft. I know I could do more to eat healthily and to reduce my impact on the planet, but I am doing the best that I can. The choices surrounding us are multi-faceted and nothing is a quick, simple fix.​

​Marks & Spencer’s recent advert for a vegan ready- meal made the claim that skipping meat for one day has the same impact on your carbon footprint as not using your car for a week. Really? Where’s the proof… based on what sized car? diesel or electric? doing how many journeys a week? Compared to imported beef from where? Or a chicken from the local farm shop? Marketing propaganda can be a dangerous rabbit hole down which to fall!

​​You don’t need to read Einstein to know that relativity is important. One article I encountered even had me questioning whether a tomato is an ethical choice… if that tomato is grown in Spain in an unheated greenhouse and then flown over here, is it more sustainable than a UK grown tomato that has blossomed and swelled in a heated greenhouse? STOP already and let me eat my salad!

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​Farm shops can be proud to shout about their ethics and maintain their customers’ trust by highlighting where their food has come from whether that is organic meat from animals that are happy and healthy and grazing in the field next door to their shop, or a good old British leek pulled from the mud a few miles down the road.

​​I still live by the old adage “a little of what you fancy does you good” so meat, veg, chocolate and gin will continue to be a part of my diet. The jargonists can call me a flexitarian or a vegi-vore or whatever new-fangled word it is next month but knowing where my meat comes from and eating seasonal fruit and veg is good enough for me… maybe with the odd imported avocado - on my birthday!

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