I've started trying to do my weekly shopping in different places, to try to get an idea of which might be the best. Up until now, I've done nearly all my shopping in Sainsbury's and it's been fairly easy going. They are quite good at labelling their produce with country of origin information, so finding the British items hasn't been difficult.
I thought I'd give Tesco a try for a change, so I headed over to the Tesco's in Causewayside. However, on the way, I noticed a new food outlet called Earthy Foods & Goods (33-41 Ratcliffe Terrace).
I popped in to see what they were about. It turns out that they are a shop specifically aimed at selling organic, local produce. I've never really focused on the organic side of things, I must admit, but I was intrigued to see how much local food I'd be able to pick up there. I chatted with one of the guys working in the shop and he told me that it's a low point in the season for British food at the moment, since we're coming to the end of the root vegetable season and the other stuff hasn't started coming in yet. So, there wasn't too much to choose from which was British. There was plenty of food in the shop though and if I hadn't been sticking to the Eating British project, I'd have had an easy time picking up my weekly shop.
As it was, I think I've managed to get a weeks supply of food. I purchased two pork chops, 500g of minced beef, 4 leeks, some potatoes, a box of 6 eggs and some Serano ham (made in Britain, from Tamworth pigs, apparently!). I already had some bits and bobs left over from last week, but the total came to just over £20, which isn't too bad.
I had one of the pork chops for my dinner last night and it was really good. I'm usually fairly sceptical about organic food tasting better, but for some reason this really did - it was one of the tastiest pork chops I've had for some time!
More information on Earth Foods can be found here: http://www.earthy.co.uk/
