Back soon..... (girls on tour)

After nearly two months of daily blogging and supermarket avoidance, I'm taking a little break and stepping away from my computer this week. Don't worry - I promise I won't stray into Tesco - but you will have to do without my random ramblings for a few days.

I've been warned that this is tantamount to blogging suicide. According to my boss, Derby Telegraph editor and blogging guru the majestic Neil White (who incidentally has his own excellent blog in case you really do need something else to read), if I step away from my site for even a couple of days you will all desert me in your droves.

Well I'm sorry, but I'm not sure I believe that. Surely a bunch of hardcore foodies, local shopping campaigners and friends of my mum can't be put off if I go on a little holiday? We're made of tougher stuff than that - aren't we?

Anyway, there's not much I can do about it. I'm going to spend some quality time with my two gorgeous best girlfriends Christine and Christina in a log cabin in the middle of a forest in North Yorkshire, and the holiday firm's website says not to expect any mobile phone reception - never mind internet access. So I'm going to be cut off for a few days. It all sounds a bit Blair Witch doesn't it....

Never fear though, I promise I'll have lots of fun supermarket-free stories to report when I get back. Chris'n'Chris are viewing the trip with a little trepidation because usually when we go away together we stop off at a supermarket en-route to stock up on essentials (chocolate and wine mainly). They've asked if they can nip into Tesco while I wait in the car park but I've told them that's not allowed. Instead I've found a couple of really brilliant-looking farm shops near to the site and we're going to call off on the way so I can introduce them to the joys of shopping local.

And if you enjoy the fact that I tend to be a pretty graceless and clumsy as I go about my business then you'll get an even bigger laugh when I throw The Chrises into the mix. Christina in particular has a talent for creating the odd slapstick moment, is currently pregnant with twins and has just texted me to say she has a flat tyre, which can no doubt only add to the fun. I'm sure between us we can create a few entertaining local shopping anecdotes, while our mother hen Christine picks up the pieces.

Me and The Chrises

So that's all for now then folks, I'll be back in the loop and blogging again on Friday, so please don't give up on me.

PS - Yes it is quite handy to have two best friends with the same name. We actually all lived together back in our graduate days and it was brilliant, if I needed anything all I had to do was bellow "CHRIS" and they'd both come running. These days they reckon they can tell from the tone of my voice which Chris I want.

They're taking over the service stations!

Right, I'm going to lay my cards on the table straight away. I'm feeling a little delicate this morning. Neil and I were at a wedding in Bromley, London, last night so I'm currently sat in the passenger seat as we start the four hour drive back to Chesterfield, typing this blog on my iPhone in an effort to distract myself from the niggling feeling that I might be sick.

So what does my hangover have to do with the supermarkets?

Well, nothing really, I'm just making conversation and mitigating for any spelling errors in this post! But our trip down the M1 has given me the chance to avoid the supermarkets in a slightly more unusual way - and forced me to eat at Burger King for the first time in years.

This is because several of the supermarkets now have branches in many of the service stations - most predominantly M&S Food and Waitrose.

We stopped about four times on the way down yesterday, largely because I have the world's smallest bladder, and saw supermarket branches at three of those four service stations.

And when it became time to grab a quick lunch I was faced with a choice between a BK veggie burger (yuk - not my cup of tea at all) or an M&S sandwich. Clearly the best option from a taste point of view would have been the sarnie, but sadly it wasn't to be. I know they're both huge corporate organisations but I felt I had to stick with the rules of this challenge, which of course allows BK but forbids M&S.

And now we're faced with another little inconvenience. We're about four hours from home so the chances of us making it back in time (or with the energy) to go to the farm shop are unlikely. But I'm not sure what food we've got in the house. Before starting this challenge we'd have probably grabbed a pizza or ready meal from M&S Food during one of our service station stops, purely for convenience, and had a night vegging out on the sofa. But now we're facing the prospect of getting home and figuring out something to cook.

Or beans on toast.

So we're back to the convenience issue again. I was chatting to a lady while digging into the wedding buffet last night and we got talking about my challenge.

In broad cockney she exclaimed: "Now why the 'ewl would youw wanna dow that?"

I reeled off my usual list of reasons: better food, knowing where it's coming from, supporting local shops and saving money.
She considered and agreed it was a good idea, even confiding that she had once worked at a fishmonger so understood the value of supporting local businesses and producers.

"But the supermarkets are just sow convenient," she said.

Well yes, unfortunately she's right, they are. I do actually know of one service station near Carlisle that is bucking the trend with a fantastic farm shop on sight, rather than a supermarket. But we're certainly not driving all the way up there today, so we'll have to make do with Burger King and beans on toast.

Fabulous fruit and flowers

I've dropped yogurt all over the floor and held up the queue of shoppers a number of times with my purse fumblings and inept bag-packing, but my local greengrocers Hasland Fruit and Flowers have yet to bar me from the premises, and for that I think they deserve a special mention on this blog.

This is the fab little shop I've written about before, where I've found Longley Farm yogurt, made not too far away in Yorkshire, fantastically-priced greens for Beans bunny, and lovely flower arrangements that make brilliant gifts for friends.


Hasland Fruit and Flowers

Hasland Fruit and Flowers is about a three minute walk from my house and one of the two greengrocers/florists that we're blessed with in the neighbourhood where I live.

I particularly like the aforementioned shop though because it actually offers more than just fruit and flowers, making it a really handy local shopping resource right on my doorstep. There are also eggs, yogurts and other dairy products, a huge shelf with pickles, preserves and other little posh deli items, and they even sell bottles of the hallowed Henderson's Relish (USE THE SAUCE).

And they're not afraid to stock new things. Earlier this week I bought a bag of apple and strawberry crisps that I've never seen anywhere before. The shop assistant said they were keen to try something a bit different. Sadly the crisps turned out to be not quite to my taste - but 10 out of 10 for effort from a small local grocer!

A look on the shop's website tells me that they also make up hampers as special gifts, with a selection of fruits, flowers, curds, chuntneys, champagne and chocolates.

Earlier this week, after going through my usual routine of fumbling with my change and ham-fistedly packing my bag-for-life (although this time I did manage not to drop a pot of yogurt all over the floor!) I got round to telling one of the owners about my mission to go supermarket-free for the year.

She seemed really taken with the idea (although I've yet to meet an independent shop owner who hasn't been!) and asked me how it's going so far. We chatted about the fact that shops like hers were working out cheaper than going to the supermarkets and she said she'd seen a real boom in business since the horsemeat scandal broke. Although to be fair, I've never found this store empty, so I'm clearly not the only one to have discovered this little local treasure.

I count myself really lucky to have shops like this on my doorstep and thankfully my pledge to spend the year avoiding supermarkets has opened my eyes to the need to support them.



Derby Telegraph boosts local shops

As regular readers will know, I work at the Derby Telegraph, Derbyshire's daily newspaper and one of the best local papers in the land. Yes I know I'm biased, but really we are very very good and we pride ourselves in supporting our local community.

Shopping local makes the front page

Recently we've noticed that as a result of the horsemeat scandal, there's been a shift in the shopping habits of our readers. Local butchers are reporting a big rise in sales as shoppers seek out meat producers who they can trust. And we've also seen a rise in the number of independent food shops who want to advertise with us.

As a result of all this we've launched a new weekly feature, which we hope to run every Friday, giving a platform to small local food businesses, butchers, markets, farm shops, delis and grocery stores. And it centres around a feature written by me, based on my drive to shop local this year, looking at why it's so important to support our local shops and what consumers can get out of it - not least in terms of having more faith in your food and finding out where things come from.

So if you live in the Derbyshire area look out for today's Telegraph - in which you'll find the first instalment of the feature as well as loads of adverts for brilliant local food retailers.

And if you're a Derbyshire food producer or retailer, and you're interested in featuring in the Derby Telegraph, give me a shout and we'll try to make it happen for you. 

Finally, I must add that this blog is separate and independent to the Derby Telegraph, and the views expressed on this site are entirely my own!

Today's feature in the Derby Telegraph on food you can trust

Mum-to-be shames supermarket

We all know that as we go about our daily business, pregnant women are supposed to be afforded a little extra courtesy. We give up our seat for them on the bus or tube, or give them a hand with a heavy bag of shopping. And thanks to a little-known English law made centuries ago, a pregnant lady can even legally have a wee in a policeman's helmet.

Admittedly this can make life for the rest of us a big tricky (not least if you're a copper), because spotting a mum-to-be can be increasingly difficult in today's podgy society. Does she have a bun in the oven or has she just eaten too many pies? It's a question that I'm sure most of us have wrestled with at some stage when trying to decide whether the offer of one's seat (or helmet) will be gratefully accepted by the pregnant lady or angrily rebuffed by the woman who is just a bit fat.

One of my colleagues, however, is now well past the stage of "is she or isn't she?". At nearly eight months pregnant she is visibly blooming. Yet she came into work the other day with a tale of a shopping trip where she was left struggling because no one was willing to help her. And yes, you've guessed it, she was in a supermarket.

My friend had visited her local branch of a supermarket which is probably best not named, seeing as there's no heavyweight legal team behind this blog. I do actually have a couple of lawyers amongst my regular readers but I don't think either of them would be impressed if I got myself into hot water. Suffice to say that this colleague of mine is a regular at this particular branch and would call it one of her local places to shop.

The trollies were those silly ones where you need to put a pound coin in to use them and our mum-to-be realised she'd got no change in her purse. There was no one at the customer service desk so she decided she'd have to do her best with a basket. But halfway round the store she began to struggle with its weight and in the end was forced to put it down. She was then faced with an even bigger challenge, because having not seen her own toes for several months, she was in no position to pick it back up again.

Our rotund heroine ended up physically kicking the basket down the remaining aisles to the check-out. And do you know, not one person stopped to help her.

She went home feeling very tired and woke up the next day more than a little sore. She wrote to the supermarket in question to complain and was sent a £10 shopping voucher.

But I really think this shows just what is wrong with these huge megastores - they are just so impersonal. You would never expect that sort of service in your local grocery store, farm shop or butcher, where the staff usually go out of their way to be helpful. Even after just seven weeks of local shopping I have already built up the sort of friendships with some store owners where I can say with absolute certainty that if I was to go into them heavily pregnant I would get the five star treatment and as much help as I needed. I reckon some of them would even deliver goods to my home or office if they could.

And it's not just the supermarket staff who behaved poorly by ignoring my pregnant colleague's obvious need for help. What about her fellow shoppers?

It goes back to what I said on the very first post on this blog, about supermarkets seemingly bringing out the worst in people. We get behind a shopping trolley and we become angry, ignorant human beings (a bit like when BMW drivers get behind the wheel of their cars). We ram our trollies into other people's ankles and tut when little old ladies get in our way. Supermarkets seem to give us an excuse to behave badly.

Just another of the growing list of reasons why I'm happy to be out of them. And my friend has vowed not to go back either.

Clocking up the miles

I'm not one of these natural beauty types. I need make-up, hair straighteners and sympathetic lighting to look good, and exercise certainly doesn't help. While some women take on a healthy, radiant glow after a bit of exertion, I just go blotchy and wild-looking. As a dear friend who comes from Liverpool is fond of saying, I look like five kinds of s****.

So when I went to inspect myself in the mirror in the office loos yesterday after my lunchtime walk, I was disappointed but not particularly surprised to discover that I looked like a frazzled tramp who had just run away from a vicious dog after spending a night in a skip. My hair was a fuzzy, unkempt mess, my skin had taken on the mottled colour of a partially-cooked pork and leek sausage, and my nose was bright red. My mascara had smudged down my left cheek and the bottoms of my black tailored trousers were splattered with mud.

Now this state of affairs would have been acceptable if I'd just attempted the London marathon. But in fact I'd simply power-walked into town to grab some bread from Baked and had an afternoon of meetings and conferences to look forward to, for which I'm expected to look relatively presentable - or at least not like a complete hobo.

The selection of fresh bread at Baked yesterday

Baked is the amazing bakery and cafe in Derby where the owners Tony and Victoria get up at crazy-o-clock every morning to make their own fresh bread and cakes on site. But I really wish I could move their little shop, on The Strand, just a bit closer to the Derby Telegraph offices.

I feel the same about Jack Rabbits, the brilliant deli on Queen Street which is also just a little bit too far away from work for comfort.

It means my lunchtime shopping trips have become mad power-walks rather than relaxing strolls, but on the bright side I reckon I must be clocking up the miles and burning those calories. I've plotted the usual route I take into town and worked out that it's a round trip of just under two miles if I want to go to Baked and Jack Rabbits on my lunchbreak. So if I do this several times a week, and add in a couple of other little walks to some of my other favourite places, then this challenge to avoid supermarkets is starting to look a bit like regular exercise.

I've always been rather dubious about exercise. I'm the polar opposite of sporty and at school I was always the one picked last for team sports like rounders. In fact, I believe on one occasion a team actually elected to play with one man down rather than take me off the bench. And gyms leave me cold - why spend your free time pounding an indoor treadmill like a hamster on a wheel? It's lucky I ride horses or I'd probably be the size of a house.

But I reckon My Year Without Supermarkets might actually be boosting my weekly exercise intake. Rather than shuffling out to the car and driving to Morrisons or Tesco, then gathering my shopping in a trolley, I'm walking to local shops on an almost daily basis and then retracing my steps carrying heavy bags of shopping.

Thankfully places like Baked are worth making the extra effort for, because their bread is better than any supermarket bread. I will cheerfully walk for 15 minutes and spend the afternoon looking like I've been dragged through a hedge backwards to keep myself stocked up with their ciabattas and brown rolls. And seeing as their food is so moreish it's probably a good job I've got to do a bit of exercise to get to it! In addition to the bread I bought a chocolate brownie yesterday (purely in the interests of journalistic research, obviously) and it turned out to be the best chocolate brownie I've ever tasted in my entire life. If I ever find myself on death row, Baked brownies are what I want for my last supper (perhaps with a little side order of mashed potato - just for good measure).

I made the mistake of promising to share my brownie with my colleague Whaddy, one of the Derby Telegraph's sub editors, but as soon as I took a bite I regretted giving half of it away. I tried to persuade Whaddy to give it back to me but he wouldn't, and then I tried threatening to put a photo of him eating it on this blog as a deterrent, but it still didn't put him off - he just kept right on eating.

"Mmmmmmmm brownie"

So here's Whaddy, stuffing his face with Baked chocolate brownie, which he also agreed was the best in the world (and this man has one hell of a sweet tooth so he knows a good brownie when he tastes one).

Unfortunately we'd scoffed the lot when we both realised that it might have been nice to put a picture of the brownie on this blog too. So you'll have to take our word for it on how amazing it was.

And I think I need to be careful - what with all the messy lunchtime walks and stuffing my face with goodies, 'My Year Without Supermarkets' could soon turn into 'My Year of Looking Rough and a Bit Podgy'!

'My Year on a Diet' could be coming to you soon....





Doesn't get any more local than this...

When it comes to shopping local, what better example that the corner shop? I can't believe it's taken me seven supermarket-free weeks to write a blog post on corner shops, but perhaps this just goes to show how overlooked and taken for granted they are.

Although I understand they are a dwindling resource, I think a large number of people still have access to a corner shop, but how many of us actually stop to think about supporting that store - rather than just using it as a place to dash to in an emergency, perhaps on a Sunday afternoon when the Bisto has run out or one evening when we fancy a trashy magazine to read in the bath?

Our lovely local corner shop

In fact, the only time you tend to hear people speaking fondly of their corner shop is when it's under threat. Some neighbourhoods are prudent enough to mount campaigns when their local store is threatened with closure, but in other areas it is only AFTER the village store or corner shop has shut that residents grow wistful.

"We used to have a local shop," they say sadly. "But then it closed. Now if we want a pint of milk we have to drive to the supermarket."

Hmmmmm, I wouldn't mind betting that most of them drove to the supermarket in the first place - hence the shop's closure.

And until we started this challenge, I'm afraid Neil and I fell into this category. We'd happily get in the car and drive to Tesco on a Saturday morning to buy a few simply things for breakfast, rather than shopping local.

Here is a photo of our local shop - which as you can see really is a corner shop in the purest sense of the word. It's on a street corner about a three minute walk from our house, and up until we started this challenge I don't think we'd ever set foot inside it. Which, looking back, really is shameful.

Now we're becoming regulars and we've come to realise what a fantastic little shop it is. It's run by a family who live just a couple of streets away and is a veritable Aladdin's cave of handy and useful treasures. It stocks newspapers and magazines, alcohol, tinned goods, confectionery, cleaning products, a few vegetable staples such as spuds, sauces, ready meals, and even baby food. It has a little fridge with butter and cheese, and a freezer. It really does sell a little bit of everything and it would be very easy to come away with the ingredients you need to make a quick evening supper. And of course its opening hours are comparable to the supermarkets so it's very convenient too.

I popped in a couple of days ago for a tin of baked beans and got chatting to the owner's son, who was on duty behind the till. I'd been out for the morning and wanted beans on toast for lunch, and up until this challenge started I would have stopped at Tesco on my way home to buy the beans, simply because it wouldn't have occurred to me to go into my corner shop. But stopping at Tesco would have taken me three times as long, because I would have had to negotiate the car park and walk through the huge store to find the beans, before queuing for a till. And that's if I'd managed not to pick up half a dozen other items on my way round!

I told the owner's son about my pledge to avoid the supermarkets this year and he seemed delighted. He said that more people should be doing it and promised to visit the blog. He also seemed genuinely pleased when I praised the variety of stock in the shop.

So there's another friendly face to add to the increasing number of people I'm getting to know in my local community, all simply by avoiding the supermarkets. Local shops are also a brilliant place to say hello to other people living nearby, who eventually you will get to know, and there's usually a noticeboard with community events, lost cats and items for sale. Corner shops really do tend to have their ears to the grapevine, and they need our support.
I know it's not practical to get an entire week's groceries from the corner shop, but we could all try to at least pop in more regularly for odds and ends, rather than dashing to the supermarket.

A little round-up

Hello hello everyone, right I'm going to mix things up a bit today and do this post a bit differently. I've had a lot of people asking me for updates on the various things I've written about over the last seven weeks, so this is going to be a bit of a news update for those who are interested....

AM I SAVING ANY MONEY ON FUEL?
You may remember that I used to religiously fill up my car at either Tesco or Morrisons before starting this challenge, at which point I switched to my local Texaco filling station in the neighbourhood where I live. I wrote a blog post on this after Carol, the manager, explained that she believed Texaco fuel was better of quality than that offered by the supermarkets, with different additives, and that despite being more expensive I should get more miles to the gallon with it.

So was she right?

Well my calculations are very very rough because I hadn't clocked my car's supermarket mileage before starting the challenge. But I know roughly how far my tank used to get me in terms of regular journeys, and I do believe that the Texaco petrol is giving me an extra day's commute. That really is a very vague estimate though. But it certainly feels like it's getting me further.

However, to further fuel this debate (god I just love a good pun don't I?!), I had an email from my friend Annette last week, who has very kindly run the test that I currently cannot - she clocked her car on supermarket fuel, and again with diesel from her local BP garage. The findings were stark - she got 14p per mile with her BP fuel and 18p per mile with her supermarket fuel, having put £30 into her car at each filling station.


HOW ARE MY ONION SEEDLINGS?
Mostly dead, sadly. Shortly after starting this challenge I blogged about my green-fingered ambitions to try growing my own this year, despite being an utterly hopeless gardener, and enthusiastically planted a tray of white onion seeds and a couple of pots of parsley.

Unfortunately the onions haven't done well. Just four little seedlings crept up our of the compost, before keeling over and dying. My random little unknown seedling, mentioned in a subsequent post is still going strong though and the parsley seeds have also sprouted, although they are looking a bit stringy.

My gardening ambitions remain undeminished, although I am less hopefully of success!

IS NEIL PLAYING BALL?
Yes! He's been very cheerful about all the nice meat and cheese we've been getting, and he's been happily handing over our housekeeping money for me to take care of and trailing me around various farm shops at the weekends. He also even voluntarily went into Sheffield's Castle Market by himself, on his lunchbreak, the other day rather than going to the supermarket convenience store near his office.

He's routinely bringing home Molly milk instead of supermarket milk. He's also acting as my technical support guru when I lose patience with Twitter and other forms of social networking.

Unfortunately he has done a couple of little clandestine supermarket trips when he's fancied a particular something that either hasn't been in the house, or I haven't been able to buy - such as the cured meat he wanted for the top of a pizza. So he's a work in progress...!


DOES MY MUM LIKE TOFU?
Yes she does! Particularly the basil-flavoured one I bought for her.

AND FINALLY, WHAT HAVE I DONE WITH THE COMPOSTABLE LOO ROLL WRAPPING?
Why, I've composted it of course! Two weeks ago I blogged about finding environmentally-friendly Eco Leaf toilet tissue, which even came in compostable packaging. So below is a piccie of it on my compost heap.

Go #Local4Lent

Well I've written about a lot of unexpected things over the past few weeks, from horsemeat to loo roll, tartan trollies and romance at farmers' markets, but never did I think my blog would stretch to religion.

I'm not the religious type you see, but it's Sunday - supposedly a day of religious contemplation - so it seems like a fitting time to talk about two ladies who have started a brilliant movement called Local4Lent.

Charlotte and Zana started the initiative through Twitter, and it was through that same medium that the concept grew and grew. It's a simple but brilliant idea - rather than giving up chocolate or crisps for lent, it encourages people to make a more meaningful commitment and pledge to support their local businesses and economies by shopping local for a month instead.

The power of the Local4Lent movement was so strong that it ended up culminating last year with a big event at The Corn Exchange in Leeds, and this year the idea is again getting a lot of interest already on Twitter.

But what if you're not religious? After all, Lent is primarily a Christian period of prayer and penance for a period of around six weeks until Easter. 

Christians aren't the only ones who undergo periods of self-denial; Muslims observe Ramadan and Buddhists regularly take part if periods of fasting, meditation and reflection. So I would argue there's nothing to stop us non-religious types from also taking part in periods of abstinence and personal development for the greater good - especially it it's to the benefit of our local communities.

I have no idea whether Charlotte or Zana are religious, but Zana sums up their motivations behind Local4Lent perfectly on her blog. She writes: "The most important thing for me is the relationships you are able to build up with your local business owners... it's so lovely to know where your money is going and that it is supporting our local community and keeping small businesses strong, not just some big money-making supermarket."

Clearly these ladies and I are very much singing from the same hymn sheet, so if the idea of going a whole year without supermarkets makes you balk, why not try quitting them for lent instead? Who cares if you're not religious - or that lent actually technically began several days ago? When there's so many benefits to be had, does it really matter?

Go on, see if you can go supermarket-free until Easter. You'll be supporting your local businesses and farmers, meeting loads of lovely people in your local shops which will soon make you feel much more connected to your local community, and having such a good time in the process. I know it takes a little more planning, but take it from me, going supermarket-free is really good fun. And your palate with thank you for it too as you'll end up trying to fantastic new foods and recipes - you can forget about dodging those horsemeat burgers for a few weeks.

As well as advocating the local shopping movement, Local4Lenter Charlotte is a mean cook and there's loads of fab recipes and thoughts on shopping local on her blog Preston Blumenthal (lovely name - she lives in Preston). I think knowing how to cook goes hand-in-hand with avoiding supermarkets, because you need a bit of confidence to know that the raw foods you're buying, such as meat from the butchers and raw vegetables, can be made into a passable meal. But really it's a lot easier than you think, and with so many blogs and website's like Charlotte's out there there's really no excuse not to give it a try.

In the words of Mrs Doyle (who certainly was of the religious bent), ah go on, go on, go on... go #Local4Lent.

(And if you're on Twitter you can follow the hashtag for loads more inspiration).

How to shop at a butchers

So the horse meat scandal is still ranging on, and I reckon it's set to rumble for some time. There are now mutterings that donkey meat has also have found its way into our food. The Food Standards Agency is investigating and the headlines are full of speculation over which countries are involved and where the meat has come from.

It's pretty frightening if you're a consumer - and no doubt even more so if you've got a stock of lasagne or cottage pie ready meals sat in your freezer. How is it possible that these food companies do not know what is going into their products?

My view on this is that it's time to take control, stop buying these products and start visiting local butchers instead. These guys DO know where their meat is from and they can also tell you how to use it. They tend to have good relationships with the farmers who rear the animals, who more often than not are local, so you should also be helping to support your local rural economy.

But I think a lot of people are nervous of butchers' shops. We're simply not used to them any more. We have grown accustomed to having our food neatly packaged and presented to us. We seldom see it lying there in all it's gory meaty glory.

Imagine my trepidation upon first entering a butchers' shop. I'm a vegetarian for goodness sake! Like a devil-worshipper trying to take refuge in a catholic church I expected to be struck down by a lightening bolt at any second. Or at the very least politely shown the door.

The butcher can be a rather overwhelming experience for a veggie. There's bits of dead animal everywhere. Minced bits, random legs, lumps of flesh, raw sausages and chunks of bone. It's all very disconcerting. And the smell is something else - it's a creeping, incipid odor that seems to get into your nose and then stay there for hours afterwards.

But the thing is, all this becomes worthwhile when you take into account that the butcher can actually account for the animals (or bits of them!) that you are seeing and smelling. He can tell you that the pigs lived a happy life, frolicking in large outdoor pens at a local farm, before making their contribution to the sausages, or that the cows had daily grazing on a local hillside before becoming rib-eye steaks.

And you can pretty much count on your butcher to know that they are cows or pigs - not bits of horse! My favourite butcher, Bill, who owns and runs Dunston Farm Shop near Chesterfield, has even been known to take hold of a piece of beef and pass it through his mincer right in front of me - leaving no question that the mince I'm taking away has come from a single cow.

AND butchers really do tend to be very friendly people. They're happy to help out and don't expect you to know any special lingo or criptic passwords to shop with them.

So here's my guide to shopping at the butchers - for those new to the game:

1 - Don't be put off by the bits of blood, slabs of meat or the funny smell. Meat comes from animals and this is what they look like when they're dead. You can console yourself with the fact that at least you'll be able to find out exaclty where they came from.

2 - Don't be afraid of asking for small amounts. There's only one meat eater in my household so I regularly buy a single chicken breast, steak or small portion of mince. Butchers should be happy to sell you whatever you want.

3 - If you're not sure what something is (and lets face it - all those slabs of meat do look pretty similar to the uninitiated) don't be afraid to ask. Most butchers are really happy to help educate their customers and they should even be able to help you out with the best cuts for different recipes or the best way of preparing something.

4 - Ask about where the meat comes from. At the end of the day, that's one of the big reasons why you're at the butcher rather than in the supermarket, so have a conversation about the produce. A good butcher should be happy to talk to you about it, and if they aren't then perhaps you need to shop elsewhere. Ask which farms supply the shop, where the animal was born and reared, under what conditions, and where it was slaughtered.

5 - If you're struggling to find a butcher then look out for adverts in your local paper or foodie publication, or visit a farmers' market and get some advice. You could also try Googling farm shops or butchers in your area, or asking about in your workplace or at the school gates for a recommendation.

So there you go - if the horse meat scandal is alarming you then you know what to do. Take matters into your own hands and make friends with a butcher. Or go veggie!

Local shopping heaven

Well I've been in my element this week, what with trips to Jack Rabbits and Baked, but yesterday I really did find myself in local food heaven when I went for a lunchtime romp around the brilliant Brown and Green.

Local food at the garden centre

In a fantastic show of how communities of independent producers and retailers support and vouch for each other, I was actually pointed in the direction of this store by the couple who run Baked bakery in Derby. And it really was a spectacular recommendation.

Brown and Green is a business started by couple Euan and Susie Keenan and they run three shops in Derby, Stoke and Gloucestershire. They specialise in produce that is local, ethical and artisan, and the Derby store was opened nearly two years ago in Derby Garden Centre, in Little Eaton.

The first thing I notice as I enter the shop is how well labelled everything is. One of the big things that we, as consumers, are learning in the wake of the horse meat scandal is the importance of finding out where our food comes from, and B&G makes this really easy.



Pickles to taste



Labels and notices around the shop explain exactly where the produce was grown or made. I can see, for example, that much of the veg on sale was grown in Melbourne, in South Derbyshire. And there are also labels on the local produce telling shoppers exactly how far the food has travelled to reach the shop, so for example there are beers from Nutbrook brewery that were made four miles away. It's all very informative and really gives you confidence in what you're buying.

The selection really is great, with a huge cheese counter, meats, pies and pastries, drinks, confectionary, bread, dairy, fruit and veg, pickles and preserves, frozen goods, and much much more. It's the sort of shop were you could probably find something different to try every time you visit - like a veritable Santa's grotto of lovely food!



Veg grown in Derbyshire



It's open and airy - an advantage of setting up in a huge garden centre I expect - and various things are laid out for people to sample before they buy.

And the staff are hugely helpful. I got chatting to a chap working behind the cheese counter and I think I terrified him slighty with my gushing over-enthusiam for the shop. But he is very polite and friendly, and when I told him about my challenge to avoid the supermarkets he was really keen on the idea, asking me about where and how I've been shopping.

 The opening hours are more convenient too, with the shop staying open until 6pm daily.

Huge variety of cheese



Finally, the lazy girl in me loves Brown and Green because it's roughly the same distance as Morrisons from my office. The attentive will recall perhaps one or two (ha ha ha) occasions on this blog where I've had a little moan about having to dash out in the cold or rain at lunchtime to walk into Derby city centre and grab some shopping. And while having a break and a walk is really good for you and can be invigorating, there are time when I really just can't be arsed!

Brown and Green is a handy seven minute drive from the office (a little too far to walk), so the next time it's raining I'll be able to just flop into my car and drive somewhere local and non-supermarkety to get some butter or milk, rather than schlepping out into the rain. Wonderful!

In keeping with the loving local ethos, I've put a couple of the things I bought below with a few more details about where they were made.... (as well as a few cameos fromn my right hand!)



BANTER BEER from Nutbrook Brewery in West Hallam, Derbyshire. This brewery is family-run and makes a range of craft ales, recognised by Camra and the Great Taste awards.

SKIMMED MILK from Duffield Dairy in Duffield, Derbyshire. The website for this diary is brilliant, with photos and loads of information, and animal welfare is clearly at the heart of what they do. The site invites customers to "get you milk from Beryl, Dave, Listy or Wilderbeast" and goes on to say that the cows are "part of the family - not faceless numbers". I'm very entertained by the idea of Dave the cow giving milk - either Dave is a girl or we need to be doing a story on him in the Telegraph! The farm has been run by the Foster Family since 1965 and they use several breeds of cattle, including Jersey and Fresians.

PORK AND APPLE SAUSAGES made with free range pork from Buttercross Farm in Market Drayton, Shropshire. Okay okay, so not quite as local, but still plenty of information available on this farm, including how passionate they are about animal welfare. To my mind free range piggies are happier piggies, which makes me happier about Neil eating these sausages!

My supermarket Valentines

Pssssst. I think someone must have tipped the supermarkets off that I'm avoiding them. And they seem to have launched a campaign to win me back. As some lucky people get surprises in the mail to mark Valentine's Day today, I've been receiving some seductive mail of my own.

I've had three letters in the post from the supermarkets this week - two from my old friend Tesco wooing me with some deals and one from a market research company asking me to take part in a survery in return for a chance to win some Asda vouchers.

The Tesco correspondence in particular is very alluring - they really are pulling out all the stops. There's the offer of what appears to be an excellent credit card deal with no interest on purchases for 18 months. I've cross-checked this at comparethemeercat and it does seem to be one of the better deals out there.

And regular readers will recall that I was (and I guess still am) an honourary Clubcard holder, so the second letter tells me that I have £4 of vouchers to spend and some other offers.

The thing is though, the £4 vouchers actually don't seem to be that great a deal when I consider how much I spent to accumulate them. I religiously used my clubcard last year so it amounts to weekly fuel stops and regular shops. Apparently you get one point for every £1 you spend, so you need to spend £150 to get £1.50 back. Doesn't really seem like that much in the grand scheme of things.

And then we have Asda's attempt at seduction - or at least a come-on from a market research company. Apparently if I fill it in then I get a chance to win a year's free shopping at the supermarket.

Clearly all this post has ended up in the recycling bin, where it may be turned into my new favourite Ecoleaf recycled toilet tissue - now there's a happy thought!

I guess when you're a company as big as Tesco or Asda you can afford some pretty heavyweight marketing, and you can use your power to offer some pretty good credit deals.

But sorry boys, the seduction hasn't worked on me. I'm sticking with my local shopping regime.

Getting onto the better bread bandwagon

It's rumoured that pint-sized popstar Prince thrives on three hours sleep a night, and Margaret Thatcher allegedly ran the country on just four hours kip back in the 80s. But in Derby we have our very own sleep-deprived superstars who get up well before the crack of dawn to make arguably some of the city's best bread.

Yesterday I went for a potter into town on my lunch break and ended up in Baked, a bakery and cafe on The Strand in Derby city centre. Husband and wife Tony and Victoria opened their business just over nine months ago and as well as offering cakes and snacks, theirs is one of the few places where artisan bread is baked on site.

Baked in The Strand. The puzzled little old ladies made me giggle!

Now, bread really is one of my bugbears because it's just not something we do very well in this country at all. On the continent it's so easy to find really great freshly-baked bread - cafes, corner shops and market stalls all seem to offer quality crusty loaves and French sticks. But back home in Blighty the main offerings seem to be those horrible, aneamic, floppy sliced loaves in plastic packaging and giant, stodgy baps. I passed an HGV lorry the other day emblazoned with an advertisement for one of our well-known brands of bread and the slogan suggested that this particular company was at the cutting edge of making top quality loaves. I had to laugh - but unfortunately so many people in the UK really do believe that this is what constitutes good bread.

And when it comes to bread, you've got to hand it to the supermarkets, who are actually doing a fairly decent job. Before starting this challenge I was a regular at Morrisons' bakery section, where you could at least pick up a fresh ciabatta or sourdough loaf.

That's why I was so delighted to find Baked. Tony is a self-taught baker and makes a range of brown, white and wholemeal loaves and rolls, sourdough, ciabatta and speciality breads such as olive, and walnut and orange, on site. He gets up at a mind-boggling 2.15am EVERY MORNING and spends around seven hours baking to make sure that the shop can offer fresh bread daily.

Victoria laughed as she recounted to me how she now manages to sleep through Tony's alarm going off, but then gets up herself just two hours later to make all the fresh cakes and scones sold in the cafe. I asked her what time the couple go to bed, expecting her to tell me that they tuck themselves in at about 6pm.

"About 11.30pm!" she replied. "We really don't get much sleep!"

And what about a lie-in at the weekend to catch-up?

"Oh yes, I stay in bed on a Sunday," said Victoria. "I can sleep until 6.30am on a Sunday."

My god, 6.30am would constitute a very VERY early morning for me, but to Victoria it's a luxurious lie-in.

I was also delighted to find that the bread at Baked is very reasonably priced. Sometimes artisan bread can be expensive, which is I suppose when so many people end up buying cheap sliced loaves instead, but the prices at Baked compare to supermarket prices for better quality bread - with rolls at 35p each and a large ciabatta at £1.60.

When I told Victoria what I thought of her prices she simply shrugged and said: "It's just bread. It shouldn't be overpriced."

And this was seriously tasty bread. I say was because I went home last night and troughed pretty much the whole ciabatta to myself - it was so good. I didn't even have any tea - just the ciabatta with butter and then a pancake for dessert. I think it was probably one of the best ciabattas I've every tasted.

I'm going to make it my business as part of My Year Without Supermarkets to find as many places selling really good quality bread as I can - as well as trying some some bread recipes of my own. I've already found that Jack Rabbits, in Derby, selling artisan bread made in Crich, Derbyshire, and a cafe/deli called Meringue, in Chesterfield. I'll write about these places in a bit more detail over the coming weeks.

I've also found details online about The Real Bread Campaign, run by charity Sustain, which is fighting for better British bread made with fewer additives. It makes for really interesting reading, calling for bread that gives nourishment, flavour and supports local farmers and producers.

Come on everyone, lets get on the better bread bandwagon!

Flippin' brilliant - it's pancake day!

I love Shrove Tuesday - so much so that I think Neil and I will be foregoing any attempt to have anything savoury for tea tonight in favour of gorging ourselves to the point of painful gluttony on chocolate pancakes. In fact I believe it might actually be a fact that calories don't count on Pancake Day.

Okay okay, that's clearly a load of rubbish (same as calories not counting if they're from someone else's plate - which is also codswallop) but I just don't think they're worth worrying about today. Shrove Tuesday pretty much falls into the same category as Christmas Day - all attempts to eat healthily or moderately are suspended.

So here I'm going to post my thoughts on finding supermarket-free pancake ingredients and a couple of favourite recipes.

But first I must share this... possibly one of the most exciting press packs I've ever recieved in the Derby Telegraph newsroom.

I arrived at work this morning to find a huge and mysterious-looking brown package, which turned out to contain some wooden cooking implements, a little pancake recipe book, a citrus fruit juicer and a lemon. Now I've had various strange press packs in my time (I used to be the health reporter - 'nuff said!) but no one has ever successfully mailed me a fresh fruit before!

It turned out that the clever PR bods at Westfield Derby - the city's big shopping centre - had sent the package along with a press release about today's Shrove Tuesday activities. Towards the end of last year the centre appointed its "Panel of Fun" - a group of local kids who get to do cool stuff like test out toys. And today the panel will be launching a pancake making master class and dishing our free pancakes to shoppers.

The press release also contains some interesting statistics. Apparenty 38% of people surveyed in Derby are traditionalists who like a squeeze of lemon on their pancakes, while 21% like to funk it up with orange juice - a tactic I may try myself tonight. But sadly a whopping one in three shoppers said they bought packets of pancake mix rather than making a batter.

I find this quite staggering when you consider that a basic pancake mix consists of eggs (free range please), flour and milk. In keeping with the spirit of this blog, all of the above can be bought from your local corner shop or farm shop, so no need to go to the supermarket. In fact, seeing as Shrove Tuesday is also the last day before lent - why not consider giving up the supermarkets this year? A much more positive move than quitting chocolate or wine!

When my brother and I were kids we used to make pancakes for the family every Saturday evening and we certainly didn't use a measuring jug or scales. We literally cracked a couple of eggs into a bowl, added a good splash of milk and a spoonful of plain flour, and whisked it until it was fairly thick, but not quite as thick as Yorkshire pudding batter. And most of the time those pancakes turned out to be pretty good. It really is very hard to mess up pancake mixture.

But just in case you're still not convinced, here are a couple of my current favourite pancake recipes.

CHOCOLATE PANCAKES

Neil got me the GU Chocolate Cookbook for Christmas and ever since I've been pretty much dumping dark chocolate into everything I cook. But the recipe it contains for chocolate pancakes is quite simply spectacular.

INGREDIENTS:

100G plain flour

1tsp baking powder

2 tbsp cocoa powder

150ml milk

3 eggs, seperated

pinch of salt

caster sugar

100g chocolate chips

METHOD:
Sift the flour, baking powder and cocoa powder into a bowl. Beat the milk and egg yolks in a seperate jug and then mix them into the dry ingredients. Whisk the egg whites with an electric hand mixer in a bowl until they turn to soft peaks, then gradually whisk in the salt and sugar until it resembles shaving foam. With a metal spoon stir the first third of the egg whites into the batter, then gently fold in the rest. Heat a non stick pan with a little butter and pour in a bit of the batter, then sprinkle a few choc chips over it, and spread a little more batter over the top to prevent them from burning. Cook for 30 seconds on one side then flip and cook for the same amount of time on the other.

Ta-dah! Amazing chocolate pancakes. This cook book really is ace! We like to serve them with cream or creme freiche, strawberries, raspberries and nutella for a spectacularly chocolately experience. They make a great posh brunch if you've got pals coming round too.

BASIC RECIPE
Okay, if you don't trust my childhood pancake making instructions above, here is a basic recipe that should make pretty decent pancakes, to which you can then add whatever you wish...

INGREDIENTS:
150g plain flour
1tbsp sugar
pinch of salt
2 beaten eggs
250ml milk
2 tbsp butter

METHOD:
Put flour in a bowl and mix in sugar, salt, eggs and milk, then beat until smooth. Heat the butter in a frying pan, add a dash of the mixture, fry for 30-60 seconds, flip and fry for the same amount of time on the other side.

See, it really is spectacularly easy. If you've bought a mixture then you should hang your head in shame.

Happy pancake day everyone!

Appeal for anchovies and Weetabix

"That's the lady who's doing the year without supermarkets!"

I power-walked over to Jack Rabbits in Derby yesterday on my lunch break to grab some bread and suddenly found myself an object of curiosity with the staff.

If you like food and you're anywhere near Derby then Jack Rabbits really is worth a visit. Although it only opened a couple of years ago it's already really well-known and popular, and for good reason. It's got a lovely cafe area, a deli counter with some 60 different cheeses and other delicacies, a small store offering vegetables, local jams and pickles, oils and eggs, and a sandwich shop where busy workers can grab something to take away.

Jack Rabbits prides itself in stocking local produce, so it's meat, bread, milks and cream, chocolates and honey are all sourced from small local farmers and producers. And last time I went in I spotted that it even seems to have launched it's own cook book with some of the most popular recipes from the cafe.

The staff are all really friendly and keen for visitors to try before they buy. I've had several chats with co-owner Julie and told her about my challenge, so I guess I shouldn't have been too surprised as she nudged her co-workers as I poked about with the breads yesterday and told them who I was.

Several of the girls behind the deli counter were really interested in what I'm doing and started asking loads of questions, which was fantastic. In fact I had to very politely explain that I was on a bit of a rushed lunch break and had a meeting at 1pm - otherwise I could have been there all afternoon!

But one of the girls has thrown down the gauntlet for me in terms of a little challenge, and it goes without saying that I like a challenge, otherwise I wouldn't be doing this blog!

She told me that she'd been trying to avoid the supermarkets herself but was struggling to find anchovies. Apparently this lady has a real taste for anchovies and likes to pop them on pretty much everything. Now being a vegetarian I've never really considered where to find something like this and Neil doesn't eat fish so there isn't much call for anchovies in our house. But never-the-less, a challenge is a challenge so I have promised to try to find some.

Then when I got back to the office my colleague Helen decided to add to this list. She informed me that although she was impressed with my supermarket-free living she couldn't possibly do it herself because her son eats a huge amount of Weetabix and she wouldn't know where to find it outside of her local superstore.

So I need to track down Weetabix for Helen's son and anchovies for the friendly brunette in Jack Rabbits.

Does anybody have any ideas on where I could find them?