Mother's Eve

Leo and Mini gave us a delicious dinner this evening, beef, six vegetables, and then this splendid pudding dish. And Mini presented me with a shell made of recycled bits, which I've pinned on to my rucksack ahead of Monday...

Presentation

Today is the feast of the presentation of Jesus at the Temple of Jerusalem. It used to be called Candlemas. At dinner last night, we were talking about the pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela: our host has completed it twice. He was quizzed by another guest. "What does a Jew do when he reaches Santiago?" The response, of course, was "Present himself at the tomb of the Apostle James, himself a Jew in boyhood."

It was an evening full of insights: the use of Seville oranges in a soufflé for one; but particularly into the mind of "South Africa's foremost documentary photographer" (the description is  Lesley Lawson's), photographed here with his elder son. He presents his work conceptually, ostensibly eschewing lyricism.

But does he really? I asked (knowing his work via the monograph in Phaidon's 55 series). Perhaps with the lapse of time, David Goldblatt admits, we can now view some of those stark images of South Africa in the Apartheid era as indeed lyrical.

"My food is my theology"

Ruth Valerio of A Rocha - photographed last night - came up with this striking credo at the outset of her One World Week talk in Bishop's Cleeve Parish Church.

Two thoughts inspired her. First, "Food is fantastic!" - her paraphrase of Genesis 1, 31, "God saw all he had made, and indeed it was very good." Matter, infused by the Spirit, matters to God: how we eat is of importance. Ruth commended Christian Ecology Link's LOAF mnemonic - to remind us to buy food that's - so far as possible - locally-grown, organic, animal-friendly and fairly-traded.

Secondly, food is gift. "I shall rain down bread for you from the heavens," God promised Moses. Even though we no longer require manna, we are still aware, or should be, of the contributions to our life support made by soil, water and the heat of the kitchen: hence the need to remember to say Grace.

Food and faith - they belong together.

Another weekend, another festival

Montpellier Gardens is full of tents once more, this weekend for the Food & Drink Festival. We biked down  in the sunshine this evening, calling first at the Gardens Gallery. It's fun looking round, even though we didn't plan - as others clearly had done - to have supper there. You could spend a fortune if you wanted. Food porn?

"The Great Food Debate"

We were kindly invited to this Cheltenham Literature Festival event by its sponsors, the SKGR Project; so it ill behoves me to speak ill of it. However, I'm bound to say I found the short hour all rather disappointing. Too many hares were set up and left unchased.

Jonathon Porritt was in the chair, the others on the stage being journalist/food writer Felicity Lawrence and Colin Tudge, promoter of the Campaign for Real Farming, originally a biologist. My frustration stemmed from the lack of any proper debate upon the platform; and from Jonathon's failure to pin the others down in answer to some quite sensible questions, including a couple from pupils of Cheltenham Ladies' College: it didn't help that in his usual way he took three questions at a time. So, we heard no argument as to how prices would remain stable following a transition to a more extensive (and organic) agriculture; and little response to a question about the effect of climate change on food supplies.

Afterwards, I overheard Jonathon saying that he had to put a zip on his mouth; but - I wanted to ask - for heaven's sake, why?

Freedom in The Suffolks

For once Cheltenham has had a dry late May Bank Holiday Monday this year. And The Suffolks were thronged with happy-looking people, strolling along, people-watching, enjoying the music - and browsing the stalls: one which caught my eye was selling fruit swirls, a sort of sorbet in an edible cup: mine was strawberry and yogourt flavoured - rather delicious.

"A taste of Freedom" was their slogan, and the name of a new social and environmental venture, intercepting fresh yet unwanted fruit before it rots - 20 million tonnes of it are said to be wasted annually in the UK. Tristram Stuart, on the right of my photograph, is behind it: his book, Waste: Uncovering the Global Food Scandal, was published by Penguin last year.

Shop local

Another posting on the Christian Ecology Link bulletin board, worth repeating, I thought - this time from Pete Redwood on the subject of supermarkets passing on unsold meat to be burnt:

Sainsbury's have also recently signed a contract with DPM at Doncaster to supply them with all their waste food to fuel their energy generation plant. This includes all fresh food waste. DPM specialises in producing material for pet food and already takes waste from retail butchers, cafes and restaurants within a 100-mile
radius of Doncaster. The new plant is an extension of that business, covers a number of supermarkets and feeds its electricity into the National Grid.

The question was posed, "Why so much waste?". The supermarket model creates waste by definition. In order to maintain an "attractive" display it is necessary to have more stock than can be realistically sold. As soon as the display starts to look empty sales drop.

The sell-by date system also creates a huge amount of waste. It is not a legal requirement in itself, but once shown on a package the retailer must comply with it. It has become standard practice by default rather than by legislation. Most food is still edible well beyond its sell-by date.

It is also worth remembering that most national supermarket chains do not sell truly fresh food. Due to the distribution process it is at least three days old, and usually more, before it even gets on the shelf! Which is why they insist on so many synthetic preservatives in their products.

Until about ten years ago most fresh products were supplied to each store direct by the producers/manufacturers. Each supermarket company insisted that it was supplied on a sale or return basis, and then deliberately over-ordered by one-third. Except for bread, and possibly milk in some cases, this system has now changed and all products are now supplied to a central distribution depot. Manufacturers and producers still cover the cost of waste by the grossly unfair discount structure operated by the main supermarkets.

WALL-E: spoiler alert!

Caroline and I went to the cinema together last night, a relatively rare occurence. Based on a favourable review and recommendations from Edmund and Thomas, our choice was the latest Pixar offering, WALL-E.

Its hero/heroine -arguably - is not the lovable, sentient robot of the title, but the last, or rather the first, plant on a planet Earth that has been overwhelmed by consumer waste, and whose inhabitants have mass-migrated to Space Station Axiom. The film is the story of their fight to recolonise Earth, which of course they do.

Caroline and I had a good laugh at the choice of the space station's name: her time with the Axiom Centre of the Arts here in Cheltenham was spent making a place full of opportunities to help people be as creative as possible: the computer running WALL-E's Axiom was intent on making its inhabitants as docile as possible.

Coincidentally, yesterday morning's email from Christian Ecology Link read as follows:

Conventional food production incurs the following hidden costs:
· 1,000 tonnes of water are consumed to produce every tonne of grain;
· 10-15 energy units are spent for every energy unit of food on our plates;
· With processed foods, more than 1,000 energy units are used for every energy unit of food;
· 12-15 energy units are wasted for every energy unit of food transported per thousand air-miles;
· 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions come from agriculture, which produces 60% of all methane emissions and 70% of nitrous oxide;
· Nearly 90% of all agricultural subsidies benefit corporations and big farmers, while in the USA alone 500 family farms close down every week; and
· Subsidised surplus food dumped on developing countries creates poverty, hunger and homelessness on a massive scale.

Axiom, here we come?

WALL-E, the verdict? A dazzlingly clever film, crammed with an immense amount of imaginative detail, some of it genuinely funny and touching; but a film made with a budget of $180m, trailing movie-related merchandise, advertising, not to mention popcorn in its wake - all those things that give rise to the opening hypothesis, that we are heading towards environmental disaster. The end of this film is to entertain and make money. It is therefore, in my view, ultimately making light of our greatest challenge, its "bold" theme ironically causing filmgoers to become numbed to the possibility of overcoming that challenge.