Frankenburger or tortured animals, what do we want?

The news of stem cell grown meat is hitting the news and shocking to many people. I think it is brilliant news as it raises awareness to meat production and the whole, sorry, food industry.

If food trends continue, the question all meat eaters will eventually have to ask themselves is this; should I eat laboratory meat, or factory farmed meat where the animals have been genetically modified and tortured all their lives?

The food industry has already moved down the road to more factory farming with increasing genetic modification (click to see previous blog) to satisfy the increased demand for meat. This means keeping animals in appalling conditions and feeding them millions of tonnes of grain that could be fed to humans. (it take 8kg of grain to make 1kg of beef).

In the long term if we want to eat meat, care about animals and feed the world, laboratory meat sounds like a great solution.

This trend also means the growing control of the big corporates with an even smaller return to the farmer. (Currently, on average, for every £1 spent on food in the supermarket the farmer only get 9p!)

The only way to avoid this disaster is to change the food industry. We need to change to buying local food direct from the producer, to help build a more sustainable, local, food industry controlled by local people and cutting out big business and rip off retailers.

As always we welcome your comments…..

Survey to make BigBarn even better; And the chance to win Joanna Blythman’s new book & Pipers Crisps.

One of my Food heros Joanna Blythman followed us on twitter last week and after some messages, I found that she thought we were pretty good to.

She has added a link to us on her website and given us 5 copies of her new book as prizes for our latest survey to make BigBarn and our MarketPlace even better (if you haven’t tried it yet click here). Or browse the discount code page here and use code BB1. By completing the survey you also have the chance to win some Pipers crisps. If you can spare 5 minutes click here for the survey. Or to read more about Joanna’s new book read on.

Covering all the pressing food dilemmas of our times, award-winning food writer Joanna Blythman assesses the desirability of common foods from all angles, showing you how to make sensible, thoughtful and practical choices about what to eat each day, irrespective of your income.

Food should be one of life’s greatest pleasures yet, increasingly, choosing it is becoming a chore. Bombarded by questions such as ‘Is red meat bad for you?’ and ‘Is local always best?’ it’s difficult to know what to eat. At the same time, even the basics are becoming more and more expensive, making it essential that we choose the best foods for ourselves and the planet and make them go as far as possible.

So how can we eat well without waste, expense and ethical dilemmas? In this inspiring, practical guide award-winning journalist Joanna Blythman addresses all of these issues and more to help you buy food that’s good in the broadest sense of that word: food that is healthy and affordable and which doesn’t trash the environment; food that doesn’t exploit producers or cause unnecessary animal suffering, and last but not least, food that tastes great.

Packed with brilliant ideas for choosing lovely, wholesome meat, fish and veg and quick, easy suggestions for cooking them well, without compromising your principles or emptying your purse, this is the modern manual for eating well in the twenty-first century.

Joanna Blythman is Britain’s leading investigative food journalist and an influential commentator on the British food chain. She has won five Glenfiddich awards for her writing, a Caroline Walker Media Award for Improving the Nation’s Health by Means of Good Food, and a Guild of Food Writers Award. In 2004, she won the prestigious Derek Cooper Award, one of BBC Radio 4′s Food and Farming Awards. In 2007, Good Housekeeping Magazine gave her its award for Outstanding Contribution to Food Award 2007. She writes and broadcasts frequently on food issues.

Rapeseed Oil: a classic example of why the food industry is NOT good for us

Virgin cold pressed Rapeseed oil is really good for us. It is delicious for roast potatoes & dressings and we should eat more for health reasons.

We can now buy it all over the UK, not because the food industry has made it available, but because enterprising farmers have ignored ‘the industry’ and grow, press, bottle & market their own.

This is a classic example of how the food industry is failing consumers and why we should turn to our local farmers for the best produce and help build a new, LOCAL, food industry.

Virgin cold pressed Rapeseed oil is high in omega 3, and essential for our health. A recent study showed had we should consume 10 times the quantity of Omega 3 oil, to Omega 6, found in most oils and foods, like crisps.

UK farmers have been growing rape for 40 years and sold via the food industry. It has then been used it to make vegetable oil using solvents to extract as much oil as possible. The trouble is, the solvents are difficult to extract at the end of the process, and ruin the end product.

Luckily some enterprising farmers, angry by the low price they were being paid for their rape, realised they could make a better return by crushing their own and sell for the same price as a quality Olive oil.

An even more interest fact is that local rapeseed oil could have some of the same anti allergenic qualities as local honey, helping hay fever and perhaps many other ailments.

This is a classic example of the food industry failing consumers and why we should look local for the best food and drink. The more we communicate and buy, the more farmers are encouraged to grow more, and diversify. Likewise the more we buy the better economies of scale and the cheaper the produce will get.

To find your local rapeseed oil producer and buy online we have 10 enterprising farmers in our MarketPlace. To make the delivery charge less of a burden, you can buy a larger quantity and share it with your friends.

Our disappearing pubs and Post Offices – the glue that holds a community together

This a BigBarn Guest Blog from Alex Chambers at Squisito Deli

I received a letter from DVLA reminding me to get a new tax disk last month. With Christmas coming along I resolved to sort it out in the New Year. Everything was fine until it came to finding a local Post Office at which point I discovered yet another nearby village Post Office had closed and, with an expired tax disc, I faced a clamp and a fine by driving into town to get a replacement. It’s an experience that is being repeated nationwide and across Warwickshire.

From getting some change to a prescription, a gallon of fuel or a battery for your car key living in the country is becoming a hazardous business.

Our local volunteer run village fire station closed recently. Unfortunately there is no Warwickshire Air Fire Brigade to help the farmer with hand trapped in a combine or a metal shard in the eye as one young neighbour. Even if there were such a thing no doubt a full-time fireman from the town would not have the knowledge of farm machinery to release a trapped arm or limb quickly assuming they could find the right field. There is no substitute for local knowledge and a volunteer service run by the community.

As you may gather, I live in a village in rural Warwickshire. It could be yours because the story is the same and now the problem is spreading to towns.

Where once my village had 8 or 9 independent shops from butcher to baker and Post Office to undertaker now there are none. Older village residents and families are being forced out by mobile incomers who find it difficult to integrate or appreciate rural life since there is nowhere to meet and share experiences. Be you an Earl or unemployed we all need a pint of milk or a loaf of bread or someone to look in if you are ill or missing at the village end.

So why are our pubs and Post Offices disappearing when human needs have not? Some people say the internet is the cause of rural Post Office closures but that belies the big rise in parcel deliveries and shopping online. Other say that pubs are no longer needed but ignore the massive price differential between pub and supermarket and the change in drink and drive habits plus the no smoking ban.

The truth is much simpler. We all have to work harder and longer because of the rise in taxes on basic items like fuel, debts levels because of inflationary mortgage lending, increased rents and rates for pubs or shops relative to turnover and the fact that most villages are becoming dormitories because there are few village jobs and nowhere to meet.

In context of this financial gearing the death knell to village pubs and shops for the non-working half of the population comes from KVI’s and Borough Councils favouring out of town shopping whilst granting changing of use for rural shops to residential use without granting balancing permissions for replacement shops and small businesses.

What is a KVI you ask? A Known Value Item is a pint of milk, a loaf of sliced bread, a pint of beer or a gallon of fuel. Each are examples of products the ordinary person knows the price.

It is KVI’s which the big supermarkets take advantage of by running ‘loss leaders’ which independent shops and pubs cannot compete with. Even the UK’s biggest baker objects to supermarkets selling the product they make with the supermarkets brand on at less than the cost of their own label. In short, anticompetitive activity is helping to wipe out the nation’s independent shops (the UK lost 20% last year) and rural shops and pubs in short order.

The final nail in the coffin of the rural pub, shop and Post Office are planning regulations which make no distinction between shopping centre and village life. Most village shops face directly onto the pavement and do not have off-road parking as insisted upon by planners as a requirement for any new shop. Little wonder village our village scene no longer resemble postcards of the 1950’s or 1850’s.

The consequence is that once a village shop or pub is lost it is practically impossible for a community to replace it or for a sustainable and local businesses to startup as in the past. Village pubs invariably face residential redevelopment or the wrecking ball as breweries demolish rather than pay business rates on empty buildings.

What is needed is a requirement to provide planning permission for equal business space within the same street if Councils permit the loss of a shop or independent business. This should be backed up by rates holidays and rent assistance for new businesses and local jobs with grants and support to promote Community Shops, food production and services.

To prevent demolition of community significant buildings a right to buy for the community is a necessity to prevent demolition and unsustainable property development.

Many a closed rural pub is a sustainable proposition for community use if the brewery were compelled to release the property without abusive ties. Existing tenancies should be subject to fair rent reviews whilst ties should be abolished for tenant landlords.

With fuel prices and the tax take rising at 20% per year now is the time for sustainability grants and regulation of supermarket fuel prices and KVI’s to prevent the loss of rural garages and shops. The trouble is that Government is part of the problem and uses environmental arguments as a justification for tax increases whilst doing nothing about reducing the need to travel from rural areas by protecting rural shops and businesses.

With an aging population that is living longer the loss of rural shops, pubs and Post Offices is a time bomb for social care as children are forced to live elsewhere. We may be able to live longer but can we keep a car until the day we die assuming we can afford to run a car?

Cheap and accessible places to meet like the village shop or Post Office is the glue that holds the community together in most villages. If Granny Smith does not collect her pension or pint of milk then the postmaster knows to put the word out for a visit on ‘village broadband.’

For all the benefits that digital communications bring most villages, Facebook is no substitute for a cup of tea and a chat or a beer and a game of skittles.

© Alex Chambers, 2012

How do we get more people cooking real food, and enjoying it?

nassaulibrary.org

Why are there so many cookery programmes on the TV, yet so many people eating out, buying takeaways or ready meals? Surely we would all be healthier and wealthier cooking at home with cheap, fresh, ingredients?

Here are 10 ways to get more people cooking, with a ‘spin’ on how to make each enjoyable! We also include a competition to win one of 4 massive boxes of Pipers crisps, containing 48 assorted flavour 40g bags.

1. Video recipes & cookery programmes
Technology means we now don’t have to study a book and follow a long recipe, making sure we have the right quantities of each ingredient. We can set up the laptop or tablet and follow a video recipe. Comparing our work in progress to what is on the screen and clicking ‘pause’ whenever suits.

2. Grow your own & fresh seasonal foods
At BigBarn we are great believers in Growing Your Own. Not only to get really great fresh food, but also to make some extra money if sold through a local shop, or swapped of local goods and services. Having really fresh vegetables also encourages, tasting, like raw carrots, cooking, and making a meal of your delicious crop.

3. Celebration
Some people dread their turn to have the family for Christmas lunch, what a shame! Is it the family or the perceived hours of cooking, mountain of washing up, and endless, dry, turkey sandwiches? Perhaps the Christmas event puts many people off cooking? We really need to change our attitude, get some friends round and think of something to celebrate, hopefully the food.

4. A nice drink
Which brings us to a good reason to have a nice drink. Have you noticed how restaurants mark up expensive wine? Staying home and cooking a nice meal means you can justify buying a good bottle of wine to enjoy with your meal.

5. Attitude
Cooking is not difficult, and to me, and millions others, very satisfying. Especially if those you are cooking for have the grace to leave the ketchup in the fridge and give positive feedback. A glass of wine might help.

6. Bribery
There is no reason why this positive feedback can’t also include a cash payment to the cook. A great way to get the kids cooking.

7. Save money or earn money
In these austere times we all need to cut back on buying expensive ready meals, takeaways and visiting restaurants. How many times have you eaten out and paid £15 for a meal you could have cooked better yourself? If the family want a take way meal, home made burgers are really easy to make, likewise pizza, fried chicken and curry.

Or if really ambitious perhaps start a secret pop up restaurant and charge for your delicious meals.

8. KIS
KIS stands for Keep It Simple. So many cookery programmes on TV make cooking look like an art form, producing meals that only a handful of people on the planet could possibly copy.

Why not make cooking easy, simple and quick? To help we will be launching KIS cookery on BigBarn next week, a video channel full of short video recipes. Hundreds of recipes will be shown and prizes (Pipers Crisps) given every month to the best. We hope that very soon you will even be able to type in the list of the ingredients you have in your fridge and a quick video recipe will match.

9. Fame
Try cooking and making a few videos for out KIS Cookery channel and you might be ‘found’ as the next famous chef!

10. Love
And last of all, as we approach Valentines day, what better way to show your love than cook that special person a delicious, aphrodisiac laced, meal. As always we welcome any comments you might have.

BigBarn wins Award

On Thursday night, amongst some the great and the good, BigBarn won the CIC category of the People and Environment Achievement Award (PEA).

The PEA Business Awards recognise the exceptional leadership and vision that make a lasting impression and whose best practice and key strategies might inspire others in the future. They highlight the people who are creating Britain’s greenest businesses, who understand and respect the planet’s precious resources and are prepared to make changes today to improve future well-being.

The glamorous awards ceremony was help at the Orangery at Kensington Palace and sponsored by Green Magazine.

We were nominated by the Green Directory and one of two organisations shortlisted to attend the ceremony. It was a fantastic shock to first be even nominated, and then to actually win. A big pat on the back for the BigBarn team and much needed awareness raising to all our hard work over the last 10 years.

If this momentum can continue we will help divert more of the £100 billion spent with supermarkets to local shops and communities with massive social benefits for all. You can help by shopping locally by using our local food map and telling your friends. You should save money by cutting out the middlemen and retailers and avoiding special offers you don’t need!

If local food is cheaper, and better, how do we get more people to switch from the supermarket to buying local.

Many of our previous blogs have talked about saving money by switching from the supermarket to local food producers and small retailers.

Buying seasonal food, direct, means saving money by cutting out the supply chain cost, and not wasting money on ‘temptations’ like DVDs and special offers.

In these austere times you would expect this to be the major factor in getting people to change. Especially when 80% of people say they want to buy local food. So why do only 25% of people actually buy local food, and what will get more to switch?

Knowledge
Perhaps people don’t know they can save money. Or don’t believe supermarkets are more expensive. “How can they be, with all that buying power”, I hear people say.

Another problem is that most people know where their nearest supermarkets are, but not their local producers, farm shops, or friendly butcher.

Answer: There should be more media coverage, social networking, and price comparison in shops.

And a definitive database of local producers and retailers on many websites, so that people can find their local food suppliers. Like the BigBarn Local Food map. This map has now been packaged so that any other website can have it to look as though it is theirs and earn a commission on trade.

Frightened
Many people also feel safe in the supermarket and are worried that the local butcher or retailer will laugh at them if they ask a silly question.

Answer: Local food suppliers should make a quick You Tube video to show how friendly and enthusiastic they are about their produce. These videos can then be seen on their BigBarn page.

Loyalty schemes
Millions of people are obsessed with their loyalty cards and points.

Answer: People must realise that any loyalty points are given are paid for by higher priced products.

Convenience
It is great to go to a shop where everything is in one place and you can wheel your trolley back to the car. You can pick up things you did not have on your list.

Answer; Supermarket meat is not good, and veg not fresh, a local producer/small retailer might be closer and cheaper. Do you need, everything every week, switch to buying local every week for fresh food and leave the supermarket to once a month.

Special Offers
When supermarkets buy so much they have to clear their shelves and often have great bargains.

Answer; Yes, sometimes. More often however they use ‘offers’ to get you to spend more than you wanted and many ‘offers’ are actually more expensive; One 185g pack foe 2.75 or two for £5. Just below a 250g pack is not on offer at £2.50 cheaper!

Trust
With their big business status, their constant marketing & UK food standards you can trust supermarkets to look after you.

Answer; when offers are not ‘special’ and very little of your money returns to farmers & your community, do supermarkets really deserve your trust? A local business who’s reputation is at stake will reward your trust and will grow more and employ more local people as his/her business grows.

And now for some reasons to shop locally where the supermarkets can’t compete:

The Story
Wouldn’t you like to know the story of the food you buy? What’s in season, how fresh, animal welfare, where and how the animals have been produced, the best cuts of meat for your recipe, how long has that beef been hung,recipes for seasonal fruit & veg, why is that bread so tasty, what’s so special about that product

Leisure
Many farm shops have animals for the kids to look at, play areas, picnic sites, tractor rides and some even pig or sheep racing. A great day out while doing the boring old shop!

Selling Grow your own
Many local retailers will be happy to sell food that you have grown. This is a great way for small shops to get fresh fruit and veg and for you to join the food industry. Look for rossettes on icon on the BigBarn local food map for BigBarn ‘Crop for the Shop‘ participants.

Events and celebrations
Many farm shops have seasonal food celebrations and events like ‘Apple day’, ‘Asparagus week’ or regular Farmers Markets to meet the local farmers.

So, some great reasons to try your local producers and make the switch. If I have missed any other reasons please comment below.

New Year’s, food, resolution

Findwine.co.uk

A fantastic new year to everyone from us all at BigBarn. We hope that in the hard times to come you will still be able to eat great food and save money.

The best way to do this is to give up the supermarket and shop locally for seasonal foods that are nearly always cheaper. (You will also avoid the bogofs and DVDs you don’t need).

Buying local food means getting a bit more organised with your shopping list and dusting off a few recipe books to make the best of what is available.

And please don’t treat cooking as a chore, it can be a creation experience to be proud of and worth celebrating with family and friends.

It is always really worth while to get the kids involved, they are the future and should be much more creative than us oldies. They can even watch video recipes to feel more 21st century!

We also hope you, and the kids, can join our Crop for the Shop scheme and grow some fruit and veg to supply the dinning room table, as well as earn by selling through the local shop. Growing veg is a great way to get kids interested in proper foods and trying natural foods raw.

2012 should be a great year for BigBarn now that local food is cheaper, and better, than the supermarket. We will be making big changes, and adding more features to help reconnect consumers with producers and encourage local trade. The more trade the more food local farmers will produce, and the cheaper it will become.

We really hope you will get involved, grow and cook, and email us with any news, errors, or omissions relevant to our local food map.

HAPPY 2012 TO YOU ALL!

Supermarket arrogance; picture of asparagus on the back of Tesco vans

planetgreen.discovery.com

By promoting Asparagus on the back of their delivery vans Tesco is telling customers not to worry about food miles, or British seasonal foods. To me, another sign of their arrogance and complacency.

The UK asparagus season is normally from mid April to the end of June, and should be eaten the same day as picked to get the full flavour and goodness. This is true of many other seasonal fruits and vegetables, and is part of the rich variety of tasty nutritious foods available to us all in this green and pleasant land. As many seasonal foods mature they are very often plentiful, and therefor cheap, especially if bought direct from the producer.

The supermarkets would rather we did not buy seasonal food, unless they have them in stock, and can make their usual high margin. Only giving the producer less than 20% of the retail price.

By persuading customers to eat products, like asparagus, all year round they can make their usual high margins and plan their shelf stacking and sales in advance, without having to worry about when seasonal produce is available from local farms.

This is always obvious when English apples are in season, you will see plenty on local trees, but none on the supermarket shelf. A few weeks later some English apples will appear but only about 10 of the 1,000+ varieties we have in the UK. Only those varieties that have a long shelf life meet the supermarket specification.

We consumers really must realise that supermarkets do not care about; 1. supplying us with quality food at the right price, or, 2. giving British farmers a fair price.

They simply want us to become addicted to their loyalty schemes and making as much profit as possible from every shopping basket.

The great news is that most of us have an alternative. There are thousands of other places to buy food on BigBarn’s Local food map. Many places are cheaper than the supermarket, with most promoting local produce that is fresher and more nutritious.

Edible Todmorden, Veg in the Church yard

The tide is turning and there are places where no one shops at the supermarket, and many foods are free, yes free! Like edible Todmorden

In a these austere times what a fantastic way to save money and pull communities together. One of BigBarn’s jobs is to help many more communities follow this initiative with so many positive outcomes, including, cheaper, better, food, improved diet and knowledge of food +++.

Exciting times, as always, your comments are welcome below.

BigBarn and Positive Luxury

With its emphasis on home grown produce, support for British farmers and fresher, cheaper food, Positive Luxury is proud of their collaboration with BigBarn. BigBarn aims to reverse the ‘anti-social’ trend of the UK food industry by connecting consumers with local producers and encouraging local trade.

Choosing locally sourced produce not only reduces your carbon footprint and helps to support smaller business, but often tastes better too as you can buy fresh goods rather than those than have spent hours being shipped. The idea of making informed choices about the products you buy is central to our ethos, as we believe everyone can contribute to reversing environmental damage by selecting more sustainable brands.

Our blue butterfly icon was inspired by the story of the Large Blue, a species of butterfly which was driven to extinction in Britain as it was once highly collectable. In what would come to be called one of the world’s most successful insect reintroduction programmes, scientists were able to import them from Sweden in 80’s.

There are now tens of thousands living across the south west of England, in what Sir David Attenborough called “…a remarkable success story illustrating the power of ecological research to reverse damaging environmental changes.” At Positive Luxury we believe everyone can create a blue butterfly story by making careful choices about what we buy.