Where you live/lived: Best natural foods you'll miss

[OakLeaf]

Whenever I'm in Florida I miss fresh foods of all kinds. It's awful.

"Farmers'" markets might have a few dozen local eggs if you get there as soon as they open, but all the fruits and vegetables come from somewhere else. Produce in the grocery store comes wrapped in three layers of EPS trays and plastic wrap. Organic produce in the natural food store comes from Holland or China or, if you're really lucky, California. Plant City strawberries in season excepted, of course. (Organic strawberries still come from California. Which strawberries are one of the foods that supposedly have the most toxic pesticide residues on them. )

It's possible to get local food if you go direct to the farmers, but it's 15-25 miles one way for produce, 40 miles (in a different direction) for meats, and AFAIK (probably because of the water shortage) there is no local dairy.


(PS to Emily - most of the commercial orange groves in central Florida shut down after the big freeze in the '80s, whenever it was. Almost all of it comes from south of Palm Bay, which is south Florida, in my book. )