Eating local, how hard can it be?

This article from the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, "Farm Fresh Family: Eating local is no piece of cake," is about a Seattle family that took on the challenge of eating locally grown and raised food, and discovered that one of their greatest joys was seeing their 3-year-old son embrace fresh food like whole fish (over frozen fish nuggets). This is my favorite excerpt from the mom's blog:

Overheard in the bath tonight

"I have three kinds of fish for you: king, coho and sockeye. Which one do you like best?"

"You can put them into the freezer and cut them into stripes."

"I like the sockeye best, the other ones aren't the best."

-- Colin, age 3 1/2, playing with his fish toys in the bath, apparently running a fish stand.

Before you think that only hippies can do this, the writer explains that they're an ordinary gas-guzzling, Costco-loving family. It was hard but there were awards, like chicken without added salt and lettuce so fresh and tasty they actually wanted to eat salad.

I could relate to the inconvenience of shopping at farmers markets, which are open just once a week for a few hours. I haven't been to my local Sunday farmers market in months. I was much better about shopping there last summer. There are definitely benefits -- cheaper produce, more variety and the knowledge that you're eating healthy, in-season, pesticide-free food. But nothing beats the convenience of the grocery store around the corner from my apartment that's so close I can walk to it (which slightly alleviates my guilt of not shopping at the farmers market, especially when I'm carrying my reusable grocery bags). The mother pointed out that when she lived in Paris, there were three neighborhood farmers markets a week so it was easy to run out midweek and refresh her fridge with fresh, local produce. I saw the same when I visited my sister in Geneva. She shopped every week at two farmers markets, one she could walk to while pushing a stroller and another she took the tram to (which points out other things Europe does well, like a great public transportation system).

As this article points out, eating local can be cheaper (farmers markets) or more expensive (a whole chicken from a local farm), depending on what you're buying. Unfortunately, it's almost always less convenient until we train ourselves to shop in a different way (because really, who likes spending hours at Costco, fighting traffic in the parking lot and running over small children inside the store, only to leave with way more stuff than you intended and a lot less cash).