When I decided to take this challenge, part of my driving interest was to see how feasible it would be for the average person, with an average income, to eat locally. I anticipated I would do more driving than in a typical month, but I figured my budget could probably absorb it. However, here we are at day 18, and when I reviewed my funds this morning I decided that even with the price of gas a dollar lower than it's been in recent memory, I really couldn't afford to drive to Ocean Springs to pick up the locally raised chickens from Live Oak Farm I had planned on using to add variety to our diet. I was disappointed, but hey, the average person isn't going to travel far and wide to put local food into their pantry. So it's realistic, right? We'll just have to make do as best we can on what we can get here.

Today, making do included a breakfast of scrambled eggs with arugula, lunch of homemade sandwich bread with blackberry jelly, and a dinner of pizza with tomatoes, arugula, basil, and Sweet Home cheese. There were even leftovers for tomorrow.
At today's Cathedral Square market: baked goods, candy, corn, cucumbers, eggplant, eggs, cut flowers, greens, honey, jelly, pasta, peas (shelled and unshelled), pecans (shelled and unshelled), persimmons, pickles, plants, pottery, pumpkins, satsumas, seafood, soap, summer squash (zucchini), sweet potatoes, textiles, tomatoes, vinegar, wine.


Hi there, I’m really excited to be able to finally leave a comment on your blog. I have been following along on your food challenge and think you have made the right decision. Wasting our time and resources in a gargantuan effort to eat only locally produced foods kind of defeats the purpose.
Ah well, off to dig in the dirt!