Marcela Valladolid Quotes

There's a lot of American kids think their food comes from the grocery store and the concept of seasonality has no meaning to them whatsoever.

For me, summer hasn't really started until tomatoes reappear in local farmers' markets.

My grandmother taught me the seasonality of food. She lived with the rhythms of nature. That's the way we should live. Why do we need raspberries in January flown from Chile?

Whenever possible, I use local, fresh ingredients, just because it tastes and feels better to eat an egg or a tomato or a hamburger that wasn't flown halfway around the world, that didn't travel on a truck and get stuck in traffic jams, that hasn't been sitting in a supermarket's refrigerator case for days.

I would like to see people more aware of where their food comes from. I would like to see small farmers empowered. I feed my daughter almost exclusively organic food.

Previous generations used to eat locally out of necessity. Without options like flash-freezing and worldwide export services, communities had to rely on local farms for all of their meals. In many ways, this was beneficial. People ate fresh, seasonal foods that were naturally flavorful and nutritious, and farmers and communities prospered.

I want to know where my food comes from and the conditions in which it's grown. I also want to embrace traditional British produce, and seasonality.

Buy local fruits and veggies at the grocery store. You will support local businesses and cut down on all the fuel that is used to truck produce around from state to state.

We undervalue food in this country, yet Britain has beautiful food and beautiful growing conditions. It is astonishing the range we can grow.

California is lucky, the East Coast is lucky because we get great seafood and a lot of produce from Florida, locally in good weather, but in the winter we have to buy it.

Look at our farmers' markets today, bursting with heritage breeds and heirloom varieties, foods that were once abundant when we were an agricultural nation, but that we have lost touch with. Bringing all these back helps us connect to our roots, our communities and helps us feed America the proper way.

If people are prepared to eat locally and seasonally, then they probably do pretty well in terms of environmental impact.

Understanding where your food comes from, trying to bolster local farmers and local economies and having a better connection to the food around you and the people around you, only good can come of that. I love to be involved with things like that.

Locally produced foods - defined as those harvested within a 100-mile radius of one's home - have a lesser impact on the environment because of the decreased need for transportation from source to consumer.

We've gotten so good at growing food that we've gone, in a few generations, from nearly half of Americans living on farms to 2 percent. We no longer think about how the wonderful things in the grocery store got there, and we'd like to go back to what we think is a more natural way.

According to the supermarkets, there is no such thing as 'out of season.' Berries in the middle of February? Why not? Seafood flown in from Japan? Sure. While it all adds up to appetizing and varied meals throughout the year, regardless of the weather, it comes with a price tag - both ethical and financial.

Supermarkets don't really sustain a community, and they completely remove people from the food chain.

I do a lot of reading about food and the food industry, so I try to eat locally and go to the farmer's market.

When the farmer can sell directly to the consumer, it is a more active process. There's more contact. The consumer can know, who am I buying this from? What's their name? Do they have a face? Is the food they are selling coming out of Mexico with pesticides?

A safe, affordable and plentiful supply of food is a national security issue.

The focus of Congress is on keeping the nation secure - and it doesn't see that food security is an essential part of that responsibility. Instead of putting more food on the tables of America, they are busy finding ways to take it away.

The concept of being a locavore, or one who chooses whenever possible to incorporate locally grown or locally produced food into one's nutrition plan, is of great importance.

In Cleveland, I'm so fortunate that we're surrounded by farms with an endless variety of beautiful vegetables. For me, I always eat very tightly with the season, even if the season is only six weeks.

I probably spend more on food than a lot of people, and I feel good about the whole food chain I'm supporting when I'm doing it. But even I have to remind myself. I'm always complaining about the prices at the farmer's market.

I think it's really important to try to eat seasonally as much as possible. It helps put people in touch with what's happening locally and with nature.