The 100-Mile Diet Paperback by Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon

Product Details

• Publisher: Vintage Canada (2007-10-02)
• Language: English
• Paperback: 288 pages
• ISBN-13: 9780679314837
• Item Weight: 243.81 grams
• Dimensions: 7.98 x 5.32 x 0.78 cm

The remarkable, amusing and inspiring adventures of a Canadian couple who make a year-long attempt to eat foods grown and produced within a 100-mile radius of their apartment.

When Alisa Smith and James MacKinnon learned that the average ingredient in a North American meal travels 1,500 miles from farm to plate, they decided to launch a simple experiment to reconnect with the people and places that produced what they ate. For one year, they would only consume food that came from within a 100-mile radius of their Vancouver apartment. The 100-Mile Diet was born.

The couple’s discoveries sometimes shook their resolve. It would be a year without sugar, Cheerios, olive oil, rice, Pizza Pops, beer, and much, much more. Yet local eating has turned out to be a life lesson in pleasures that are always close at hand. They met the revolutionary farmers and modern-day hunter-gatherers who are changing the way we think about food. They got personal with issues ranging from global economics to biodiversity. They called on the wisdom of grandmothers, and immersed themselves in the seasons. They discovered a host of new flavours, from gooseberry wine to sunchokes to turnip sandwiches, foods that they never would have guessed were on their doorstep.

The 100-Mile Diet struck a deeper chord than anyone could have predicted, attracting media and grassroots interest that spanned the globe. The 100-Mile Diet: A Year of Local Eating tells the full story, from the insights to the kitchen disasters, as the authors transform from megamart shoppers to self-sufficient urban pioneers. The 100-Mile Diet is a pathway home for anybody, anywhere.

About the Author

ALISA SMITH, a Vancouver-based freelance writer who has been nominated for a National Magazine Award, has been published in Outside, Explore, Canadian Geographic, Reader’ s Digest, Utne, and many other periodicals. The books Way Out There and Liberalized feature her work.

J.B. MacKINNON's most recent work of non-fiction is The Once and Future World, a national bestseller that was nominated for every major non-fiction prize in Canada, and won the US Green Prize for Sustainable Literature. His previous bestseller, The 100-Mile Diet, cowritten with Alisa Smith, catalysed the local foods movement, and inspired a Food Network TV series, cohosted by MacKinnon, that aired in 30 countries. Currently an adjunct professor at UBC Graduate School of Journalism, MacKinnon is a regular contributor to such influential publications as The New Yorker and The Atlantic; his journalism has also appeared in National Geographic, among many other publications, including most of Canada's major outlets. He's won a dozen National Magazine Awards, as well as several U.S.-based awards (most recently an AAAS-Kavli Award for Science), and the Charles Taylor Prize for Non-Fiction for his first book, Dead Man in Paradise. He lives in Vancouver with his partner, Alisa Smith.