VEGAN, SEASONAL, REGIONAL

This is the most sustainable diet. But is it really possible to cook and eat like that? I tried it out for four days.

I am a vegetarian and try to chose vegan options as often as I can. But a lot of food like avocados, chocolate, coffee or rice comes from far away. Especially fresh fruits often are transported by plane, which is the fastest way, but also the one with the biggest negative impact on the environment.

Normally when I do my groceries I only check where the exotic fruits and berries come from but rarely all the other products. When I started the research for my project, I realized that a lot of food origins from places I had never thought they would. Like cucumbers, broccoli or tomatoes from Italy or Spain. In winter sometimes even the apples aren't from Switzerland (where I come from).

That's why I decided to conduct this experiment.

Day one

Usually, I don't have breakfast, so I didn't have to worry about that. But I got hungry around lunchtime and had't done the grocery shopping then. I searched our house for food that would fulfil my criteria and the only things I found, where I was sure, were carrots and apple juice.

So after this snack I went down to our local store to buy food. I decided to go there instead of going to one of the big supermarket chains, because I thought they might have more regional products. I was right and found a lot of Swiss products and one German Tofu, which was produced in Freiburg (a town very close to the Swiss border).

Just the choice of fruit was quite limited, as the only regional option were apples and pears.

Back home I made myself a very refreshing sandwich with onions, lettuce, cabbage and self-made vegan wild garlic pesto.

For dinner I made a muesli with apples, Swiss soy-yoghurt and hazelnuts and was happy with my first day.

The next days

When I was at home it was surprisingly easy to cook whole meals with only the products given. I got really creative and tried out some recipes, which would have never come to my mind without this experiment. The food was really tasty and it felt very good to know that my meals were eco-friendly.

The only raw material Switzerland has, is salt. So lucky me could easily spice the meals. I even found Swiss curry in a zero waste shop.

But I started to ask myself, if all ingredients of the products I bought are Swiss. A friend of mine who works for Bio Suisse told me that only a certain amount of the content has to be from our country, so you can't be sure that everything is regional. So if you wanted to be truly consistent, you'd be much more limited than I was.

On Friday I went hiking with my boyfriend and packed some Zweifel crisps, carrots, radishes and an apple. It was a good pick-nick and we even found a farm that sold self-made apple juice which was delicious!

When we returned we got invited by his mum for dinner. I was totally conflicted if I should accept, because I was sure the dinner wouldn't meet my criteria. In the end I agreed, because I was so tired and the idea of having a nice evening with the family instead of cooking a whole meal by myself was too tempting. I had some rice from Belgium, lettuce from Spain and carrot salad and radishes from Switzerland.

I felt really bad the next day and persistently sticked to my restrictions for the rest of my experiment.

Conclusion

In some way it was easier to eat vegan, seasonal and regional than I thought. Especially stir-fry vegetable was very easy and really tasty. I also had a lot of options for snacking, when I was hungry in between meals (apples, crisps, carrots, apple juice).

But if you want to make sure that all ingredients of your bread or pasta are local, you would have to make them yourself, which takes a lot of time and effort.

It was very hard to integrate this diet into my social life and I think it would get a bit boring over time always using the same ingredients more or less. On the other hand, it must be very exciting, to be looking forward for your favorite food to come in season.

I think it was great value to become more conscious on where my food comes from and what's in season right no. I will definitely be more aware on my shopping behavior and try to avoid food from overseas and buy more local products instead.