Good Grub

DJ Mr Scruff and make us a brew! launch new BIG CHILL TEA at The Big Chill Festival (6 – 9 August 2009)

Listen up tea lovers – avid tea enthusiast DJ Mr. Scruff is planning to launch his brand new make us a brew! BIG CHILL tea exclusively at this year’s The Big Chill Festival during his now legendary festival tea party. As The Big Chill regulars will know, the place to go for top notch DJ sets, home baked pies and cakes, and mug loads of quality make us a brew! teas. Mugnificent.

Made from a blend of organic rooibos, sweet pear, cinnamon and Mr. Scruff’s new favourite find, valerian (a natural relaxant), make us a brew! Big Chill tea (named after the festival obviously) helps you get into that laid back, “Heeeeey maaaan” atmosphere and makes reality television and the thought that Christmas is less than five months away distant memories…

So if you’re The Big Chill bound at the beginning of August, come and join the make us a brew! crew at Scruff’s tea party, every day and night next to the lake, and treat your lucky mug to some Big Chill tea. We find it best enjoyed after a night of cutting hardcore shapes on the dance floor and contemplating how we’re going to find the way back to our tent…

Big Chill make us a brew! organic herbal tea launches on 6 August at The Big Chill Festival and, for those not going to this year’s fest, the tea will be available from retail stores in September, RRP around £2.00 for a box of 25 teabags.

For more information on the new herbal range head over to www.makeusabrew.com or for festival info visit www.bigchill.net
The Big Chill: 6th – 9th August 2009
Eastnor Castle Deer Park, Eastnor, Ledbury, Herefordshire, HR8

Tags: big chill, festival, herbal, organic, tea

A dramatic shift in farm subsidies by French President Nicolas Sarkozy looks set to bring healthier foods to consumers in France. Now food campaigners are asking when Prime Minister Gordon Brown plans to do the same for UK citizens.

This week the French government announced that from next year it would snatch back 20 per cent of the billions of euros paid in subsidies to big grain producers and give it instead to livestock graziers, hill farmers and organic producers. The surprise move will bring real health benefits to French consumers, who are already among the healthiest and longest-living in Europe.

The small farms in line for the extra cash have one thing in common – they all raise livestock the natural way by grazing them on fresh pasture. Research evidence is now accumulating that meat and dairy foods produced this way are rich in the nutrients which protect against today’s most intractable
diseases.

These health-boosting nutrients include a range of antioxidants including vitamin E, which protects against diabetes, heart disease and cancer; omega-3 fatty acids, which protect against heart disease; and a substance called CLA, a powerful cancer fighter.

Over the past 20 years levels of these nutrients have fallen in western diets leading to a big increase in degenerative diseases, including type 2 diabetes now reaching epidemic proportions.

One of the reasons for this loss of nutrients is the growing trend for beef and dairy farmers to take their animals off their natural pastures and feed them on cheap grain in concrete yards. Thanks to EU grain subsidies Britain’s surplus of pesticide-ridden cereals is now so big that more than half of it has to be fed to livestock.

This is not only damaging to the animals and the consumers who will eventually eat the foods, it is also harmful to the environment and the health of the planet. The bold French move to strip away some of the cereal subsidies will give a boost to the nation’s health, say food campaigners.

Graham Harvey – author of The Carbon Fields which spells out the health benefits of pasturefed foods – has welcomed President Sarkozy’s action. He said: “Once more the French, who are the longest living people in Europe, have been prepared to put human health before the profits of big corporations. It’s the global pesticide companies who benefit most from subsidies to cereal growers.

“And once more the British government is failing to protect the nation’s health by standing up for consumers against powerful interest groups. As Britain faces an epidemic of obesity and diabetes that threatens to overwhelm the NHS, the politicians fail to make the connection with falling food standards.

“The answer’s obvious. If you want to live to a ripe old age, the best advice is to move to the other side of the Channel.”

Books by Graham Harvey:

The Carbon Fields: How Our Countryside Can Save Britain

The Killing of the Countryside Winner of the BP Natural World Book Prize

Tags: EU, farmer, farming, farms, food, France, French, health, organic, pasture

Soil Association Organic Food Festival 2008
6-7 September 2008
10-6pm on Saturday and 10-5pm Sunday
Harbourside, Bristol
Admission to the Festival is £4 (FREE to under 16s and Soil Association charity members – bring your card)
For more information on the Festival go to www.soilassociation.org/festival

The Soil Association Organic Food Festival, sponsored by Yeo Valley Organic, is Europe’s largest celebration of all things organic and kicks off this year’s Soil Association Organic Fortnight, a nationwide campaign bringing together individuals, communities, retailers, restaurants, schools and organic farms.

Now in its eighth year the festival will be host to over 300 organic companies showcasing the very best organic food, drink, fashion, skincare and homeware products. Visitors will be spoilt for choice with bustling food markets, a green planet pavilion, a demonstration kitchen, an exciting talks programme, food cruises around the harbour, and an arts and entertainment fringe that includes food demos, children’s activities, and music.

Patrick Holden, director of the Soil Association said,
“Attending the Soil Association Organic Food Festival is truly memorable and inspiring and has become one of the highlights of my year. Meeting the producers and learning the stories behind the food you eat is a life enhancing experience. Making a commitment to buy local and organic produce is one of the most important actions we can take to build a more secure and climate friendly food future for ourselves and our children against a background of fossil fuel depletion and climate change.”

New to the festival for 2008:

• With rising oil prices fuelling our passion for local production, this year we are showcasing a wealth of organic producers and retailers within a 30-mile radius of the city with our first Local Market in Anchor Square.
• If you really want to focus on eating locally what better than your own back yard! There will be a Grow your own organic garden area featuring a Garden Café, demonstration vegetable plots, talks, and opportunities to pick up useful tips.
• Organic Live! areas across the site will include cookery demos and wine tasting and visitors can engage with exhibitors and environmental experts on a range of fascinating subjects – from their personal stories to big panel discussions on climate change and sustainable fishing. Come along and learn everything from how Transition communities are moving from oil dependency to local resilience to how to be “Self-Sufficient-ish” from Bristol twins and authors Andy & Dave Hamilton.
• For budding Jamie Olivers the Food for Life Partnership cooking buswill be in the Kid’s Zone. There will be free, 90-minute cookery sessions taking place three times a day where 7 to 11 year-olds will be taught how to make delicious organic treats.
• The festival will open on Saturday morning with the Matthew sailing towards the Amphitheatre to the sound of ‘Food Glorious Food’ sung by the amazing People of Note Choir. They will also be performing again later on Saturday on the Millenium Square stage. This will be part of a whole feast of musical entertainment throughout the site over the weekend.

Helen Taylor, Soil Association development director said:
“Every year the Soil Association Organic Food Festival just gets bigger and better. There’s something here for everyone whether you’re looking for help growing your own veg, a chance to try out a new organic beauty product, or just looking for something tasty for dinner.”

This year’s festival is greener than ever

With the introduction of sustainably sourced biofuel (from used cooking oil) to power the festival generators, and an emphasis on travelling to the festival by train, bus and ferry. To keep it green and encourage people to come by train, the Soil Association, in partnership with First Travel, are offering a 2 for 1 offer on festival tickets on presentation of proof of using First Travel transport.
There will be comprehensive recycling facilities provided by Network Recycling, sponsored by Barts Spices, and the Soil Association is supporting WRAP’s ‘Love Food Hate Waste’ campaign with sessions in the Demo Kitchen and interactive talks – highlighting that the food we throw away is a huge waste of energy, water and packaging. Come and learn about easy ways to reduce food waste, help the environment and save money.

Tags: Bristol, festival, food, organic, Soil Association, Yeo Valley

“Delia Smith today hit out at the vogue for organic and free-range food, declaring that it was more important that poorer families had access to nutrition.”

Full story: here

Dear Delia,

I read the newspaper reports of your attitude to animal cruelty and air miles with shock! I can’t believe that you think it’s OK to rear animals in a cruel way so that “poorer people” (there must be an awful lot of people poorer than you) can eat properly. What’s proper about eating an animal whose flesh is loaded with antibiotics and hormones? What good does that do anyone?

I’ve been poor – in fact, I’ve been so poor that I couldn’t afford chicken – I used to describe my self as an ‘economic vegetarian’. But even then, I was able to feed myself and my family properly by buying foods in season (not Kenyan peas, for instance) and budgeting well.

But let’s look at this theory of ‘poor people can’t afford free-range chickens’. Yesterday, I bought a free range chicken from Lidl. It’s quite large, weighing in at 1.89kg, and cost £5.67, less than the price of 3 Big Macs (by way of a comparison). Half of that chicken will feed 4-6 as part of a roast dinner, another quarter will make a risotto for 4, the final quarter could be used to make a chicken and vegetable pie, or a curry, in a spaghetti sauce and so on….. to feed another 4 people. That leaves us with the carcase. If you strip off all the bits of meat still left, then boil the carcase and vegetable trimmings and then make soup with the resulting stock, adding back the scraps and some vegetables and perhaps vermicelli or macaroni or better still, lentils and pearl barley, that then gives you a hearty soup which will feed 4-6.

All wholesome food. Let’s add up how much each meal for each person cost. The added costs of potatoes, carrots, cabbage (sticking to seasonal veg, as they’re cheaper), rice, pasta, some frozen peas (cheaper, and definitely more nutritious than peas flown in from Kenya, which have been stored longer), and the herbs and spices, adds another £3-4

Potatoes, King Edwards £1.38 for 2.5kg
Carrots, 62p for 1kg
Cabbage, white, 58p
Frozen Peas, 100g, 18p
Rice, 400g, 19p
Pasta, 200g, 22p
(all prices correct at 15/02/2008

other items from storecupboard or bought. If the additional costs are £4, that’s a total cost of £9.75, for 18-20 meals – less than 55p per meal!

Delia, as a chef, surely your main concern is that people eat good, wholesome, nutritious food – not any old rubbish that fills a belly and could cause health problems. As a chef, you SHOULD be concerned at how your food is treated before you eat it, and as a human you SHOULD be concerned about the effects on the planet that our way of living is generating. Your attitude is both arrogant and patronising, and I’m surprised. How we eat and what we eat is not just politics, it’s about our future.

Finally, farmers in Africa DO need to make a living – and the answer to that IS political. Farmers in Africa need to be able to sell to their local markets, and not have to compete with cheap, mass-produced and over-produced food dumped from the EU. The answer does not lie in flying produce to this country so the privileged classes can shell peas in the middle of winter.

Yours sincerely,
Jean Smith (not a relation).

Tags: delia smith, food, free range, organic