July 20. 2019

Irish Stew Reflection & Importance of Localized Farming


For the most part, I think that my meal was rather sustainable.  The ingredients I used in my Irish Stew were mostly from a garden, both my families, and a nearby residence that I gathered during my camping trip. Without a doubt, however, there are things that could be deemed as rather harmful to the environment, one being the harvesting of a rabbit.  Now, with that said, I do think I could have definitely gone without that source of protein for just one night.  It is evident that my primitive nature took over after being in the woods and I felt that I should test my skills. It was unnecessary and I could have stuck with the food that was provided by the two gardens.  The gardens in themselves were both very sustainable and ecologically sound.  Both being fertilized by manure from goats and horses while being watered from a private well, made them safe as one could probably imagine.  This information, in a way, promotes my meal as a solution to our nation’s commercial agriculture and pesticide problem, with more people putting in work for their meals, more gratitude follows while eating the food.  In my household we hold true to the whole “farm-to-table” concept, however, if we think about that phrase it doesn’t make much sense.  We have narrowed that phrase down to correlate with only localized farming.  As a society, it seems that we fail to realize that these commercial farms are even farms, we see them as factories in a sense. This meal does indeed have limitations, most of the US lives in large industrialized urban areas, making it almost impossible to plant gardens, especially if you reside in an apartment building or dormitory.  My sister used to live in Williamsburg, Brooklyn where she had noticed that groups within her community started rooftop farming, ultimately exercising our societies “farm-to-table” concept. I found this so cool and I have noticed more and more community gardens in urban areas.  In fact, my parents who live on a 30-acre hobby farm decided to till plots for our own community in Wausau, WI.  In whole, I think my meal definitely shows that we can make food without making a trip to a big box store and buying our goods. By supporting localized farming, you are not only boosting your own communities farming and economy, but you are making a small step toward cutting out the food that comes from these places such as commercial farms and meat processing plants.  I think that it is important to realize that most of our meals do not follow this way of life.  By recognizing the issue and exercising ways to limit our impact on the environment by just watching what we put in our bodies, can make a huge difference in the long run.
  Here I have attached a screenshot of all the local community gardens in Milwaukee.  This shows that even though growing our own herbs and food seems incredibly difficult in an industrial city, steps have been made in order to diminish this problem.  Today especially, I think we fail to realize where our food comes from.  Growing your own food shows that you have an immense appreciation for the world we have been given.

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