Local eating
Saturday, 7.30am. For the past 30 years, every day has started with a mug of tea. But not today. This is the start of a week to be spent eating only local produce – food from within a 30-mile radius of my home in Kingston. The world from Horsham in the south to Welwyn Garden City in the north, and Reading in the west to Dartford in the east, is my oyster. Though oyster may not be the appropriate term; perhaps we should say the world is my carrot. Tea misses the boat by several thousand miles. I drink a cup of milk from a dairy in West Horsley, near Woking, instead.
This week should have been planned with all the meticulousness of the D-Day landings. But it hasn’t been. If I’d been planning D-Day, Europe would still be under Nazi control. My one attempt at preparation was a visit yesterday to Garson’s farm shop in Epsom. I’d hoped to pick up lots of local produce there, but most of what it sells comes from farms outside my catchment area. I came away with the milk from West Horsley, a Norbury blue cheese from the Surrey village of Mickleham, and some Loseley ice cream. A troublingly limited start, and my heart sinks further when I look at the label on the ice cream. Loseley originates from a farm in Guildford, but the company address is in Cardiff. Research is needed before I can legitimately eat it.
8.45am: Blue cheese doesn’t appeal first thing, so breakfast is just milk. But on the way to get the papers from the newsagents around the corner, a eureka moment: the butcher is advertising local pork. I snap up a small joint at a mildly outrageous £11 (it seems to be the rule that the less food has travelled, the more expensive it will be).
The pork comes from Plantation Pigs at Shackleford, near Godalming, and the butcher gives me a leaflet, which proves to be a paean to the pig. “Pigs are naturally inquisitive and social animals,” it says. “Given the freedom to live their entire lives outside, they will grub around the fields, play and make themselves nests. [Nests? They must have remarkable trees in Godalming.] They have a natural social hierarchy which we are especially careful to maintain, thus ensuring a stress-free life.” Stop off at a cashpoint on the way back: this is going to be an expensive week. And, I suspect, far from stress-free.
9.30am: Set off for the farmers’ market in Wimbledon. Surely here all my problems will be solved. The first stall I see is selling Norbury blue – the one thing I don’t need. I do, though, get some veg (potatoes, tomatoes, broccoli, lettuce) from the Heath Mill House stall, which is selling organic produce from Worplesdon, near Guildford, well inside the zone. Also buy duck sausages and mixed game pie from the Manor Farm Game stall. The company is based in Chesham, Bucks and markets game from local shoots (its logo shows an oddly contented-looking pheasant carrying a gun).
I’d hoped to buy eggs, but those at the market come from the Chiltern Hills, which are too far out. Strawberries from Ashford in Kent are also out of bounds. Console myself by eating two tomatoes on the way back to the car.
10.30am: Go to the Lighthouse Bakery in Wandsworth. Huge queues snaking down trendy Northcote Road (like high prices, long queues seem to be synonymous with good food). The excellent bread is baked on the premises, but I still can’t eat it. Inside the shop is a large sign singing the praises of the organically produced flour … which comes from Shipton Mill in the Cotswolds.
On the way home my receipts blow out of the car window. Hope the accounts department will accept this when I present my large bill.
11.45: Much-needed snack: game pie, more tomatoes and another glass of milk. Game on.
1.45: Lunch: duck sausages, mashed potato and a glass of tap water. Not quite sure about the source of the water, but there are several reservoirs about six miles away in Walton and I convince myself it comes from there.
2.45: Grim news. The Loseley ice cream has been ruled out. The cows may be on the farm in Guildford, but it is manufactured in South Wales. Visions of seasonal strawberries and ice cream disappearing fast.
4pm: Back to Garson’s farm shop. Buy more milk and some Barradale Farm eggs. This is a gamble as I’ve no idea where Barradale farm is. When I get home I google the name: it’s in Ashford (again!). Bang goes the breakfast omelette.
7pm: Hungry, so have an early dinner. I haven’t cooked the pork yet, so eat everything else instead: game pie, duck sausages, lettuce, tomatoes and Norbury blue cheese. A horrible combination. Wash it down with a glass of water AND a cup of milk. Today is the longest day – and, boy, do I know it.
Sunday: Wake up with a headache. Could be the thundery conditions, or more likely the excess of game pie. Still haven’t really worked breakfast out, so have a glass of milk. Look wistfully at the bread and eggs. Start to wonder about the point of this exercise: what are we trying to prove here? We’ve moved on from being hunter-gatherers. Whose idea was this anyway?
Noon: There has, I’m afraid, been a rather dramatic and unforeseen collapse. My headache was getting worse (caffeine withdrawal); the hunger pangs more acute; the organic broccoli had turned yellow; and I couldn’t face the remaining two duck sausages for lunch. I went over to Syon Park farm shop for emergency supplies. It had closed. I turned to the bread (with Cotswold flour) for solace, with lots of butter; then a banana; and a coffee; and a Penguin. Now for the strawberries and ice cream. I’m a miserable failure. And I’m sorry.
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