Happy Star Wars Day!

It's May the Fourth, so may the fourth be with you!

Yes, it's a bad one, and it's not getting better from year to year. But since I'm a sucker for bad puns, and good ones, and especially ones that are so bad they are coming around again to emerge on the good side... I still enjoy it.

In that vibe, here's the good old Grocery Store Wars video, because it's Star Wars-related, and it's punny, and I really enjoy it. Also, sadly, even though this video is quite old by now... it's still current.


We're still having trouble with pesticide use (killing off our insects); there's a lot of unsustainable farming practise, including fish farming. Mind you, I don't think that just buying organic food is the golden solution - I'd guess it is more sustainable to buy a locally grown cucumber that has been commercially produced by a farmer using fertiliser and other agricultural chemicals responsibly, than to buy an organic avocado from Peru. Lots of organically grown things also come in plastic packaging, including fruit and vegetables - also not the best thing for our environment.

So personally, I try to buy food that is locally grown and unpackaged, bringing my own containers to the shop or market. Bonus if it's organic, but local and unpackaged actually has higher priority on my list; we basically only buy things from outside the region if it's something that cannot be grown here, such as bananas and oranges.

Next best is re-useable packaging - deposit glass jars, for instance. Next best: paper or paper-based, plastic-free packaging material. Following this are one-way glass jars, which we re-use in our own household for storage of stuff we buy unpackaged, or for canning our own things. Home-made convenience food does have its own charm.

We're thus down to buying or consuming very little plastic packaging these days. A lot of things only come in plastic packaging, and there is an easy solution for most of these, for us: We just don't buy them. On closer inspection, most of these, for us, can be replaced by something equally delicious that has no plastic wrapper, or we can make it ourselves. (Mascarpone is one of these. Tortilla chips have been successfully produced here. It has the side effect of actually appreciating treats a lot more.)

Meat and fish are the really difficult bits here, especially with the additional hygiene rules implemented by a lot of shops due to the Corona thing. To our great delight, we've recently discovered a small farm shop that makes it possible to bring our own containers, so the meat problem is more or less solved. It means we'll eat what kind of meat they had - but since most of my meal planning goes "Let's see what we get at the market, and then we'll make it work somehow", that has not brought much of a change.   Fish, though... there's one local fish farmer on the Saturday market, and he has lovely fish, but it's all plastic packaged.  So we've reduced the amount of fish consumed, and are keeping our eyes open to find some alternative where we can get unpackaged fresh fish.

It's a journey. It makes some things harder, and it means not eating a lot of things because they are out of season, or only available in plastic - but on the other hand, the same thing makes life easier in a way, as well. If it's clear that something will not be bought due to reason X, Y, or Z, that makes shopping decisions quite a bit faster... and seasonal things a lot more awaited, and appreciated.

So. Use the fork, Luke. Use it wisely. And if you suddenly find yourself in a quite different movie: Choose wisely.