This summer between July and October, the Moscow Food Co-op dares you to take the Eat Local Challenge. You decide what level of dedication is right for you: a week, a month, one meal a day, one day a week, whatever works.

Sign up on the sheet on the bulletin board in the front of the store, email or call me, or sign up at the Tuesday Growers’ Market at the Affinity Farm stand. You don’t have to sign up to participate, but it’s more fun, and maybe more motivational, to take the step of declaring your intent.

Supporting the local food economy is a goal that many Co-op members and staff support, and for good reasons. Food grown locally is fresher and tastier and often more nutritious than food grown thousands of miles away and shipped here; it also requires less fossil fuel to get it from the farm to our plates. Locally grown food is less likely to get caught up in a nationwide panic over the most recent incidence of a food-borne pathogen.

When you buy locally grown food you’re supporting your friends and neighbors in a meaningful, direct economic way – nothing sub-prime or derivative about it. And buying locally grown food instead of food shipped from far away is an investment in our region’s food security. Right now there is still a way to get food shipped here from California or Mexico, and many of us habitually rely on it through the winter. But as fossil fuels have gotten scarcer, that food is becoming more and more expensive. Making the extra effort now to support our local farmers insures that they’ll be here to feed us no matter what economic crisis comes next.

Those are all the academic reasons to buy locally grown food, but what really matters to me is the deep down satisfaction of knowing the people and the land from where my food comes. If you’re weary of a shrink-wrapped and bar-coded world, locally grown food is the refreshing antidote.

At the Co-op, we are working to provide local and Northwest grown food in as many departments as possible. The produce and meat departments lead the way, naturally, but check out the deli, bulk foods, cheese, and grocery departments too – you might be surprised.

This summer, look for the new signs and shelf tags throughout the store that indicate these foods; ask Co-op staff for help; read the newsletter for tips and articles and profiles of people who eat locally; check out the Eat Local section of our website that’s under construction; pick up a copy of Rural Roots local food guide; take some of our Essential Cookery classes. We’ll do everything we can to make the Eat Local Challenge a pleasure you’ll want to continue year-round.

But what about…??

 Coffee, sugar, chocolate, tea, Alaska salmon, olive oil, almonds, cinnamon, salt, you name it, there are a lot of wonderful foods, spices, and tropical stimulants that we just can’t seem to do without. And no wonder, these are the things that once upon a time spurred global trade and at times have been more valuable than gold.