Benefits of a local diet

IT is 10.30am on a Wednesday at Home Farm at Beningbrough. The farm shop has not long since opened for the day, but already there are several vehicles in the car park and a clutch of bikes in the cycle rack.

Inside, customers are browsing through the day’s produce: glorious plump cauliflowers, carrots and potatoes from Easingwold and Ripon; asparagus from Malton; wonderful Yorkshire cheeses; preserves from Elvington; award-winning pies from Voaxes of Whixley, supplied uncooked then cooked here on the premises so they’re oven fresh.

Mike Daniels is carrying a basket filled with cuts of fresh grass-fed Aberdeen Angus beef. “It’s the best steak I have ever tasted,” he says enthusiastically. “When you cut into it, it just falls apart.”

No need to ask where the award-winning beef is sourced from: the cattle are grazing in the fields all around. They are sleek and well fed, luxuriating in the rich pasture.

The River Ouse is a flood plain, says farmer’s wife Lucy Jackson, who runs the shop, and the mineral-rich soil makes for wonderful grazing.

In a hard-hitting report earlier this week, the Campaign to Protect Rural England (CPRE) warned that independent shops, markets and farm shops that sold local food were under threat from the relentless rise of supermarkets, which were continuing to increase their share of the food market.

There is no sign of that at Home Farm, however.

The Jacksons have farmed here for 50 years. Lucy’s husband, Alistair, still runs the farm itself, as a tenant of the National Trust, rearing Aberdeen Angus suckling cows.

But in 2008, the pair decided to diversify, opening the shop in old sheds on the farm, next to Beningbrough Hall.

Lucy started by selling beef from the farm. No doubt benefiting from the 130,000 visitors to the hall who pass by every year, the shop quickly grew.

It has been able to take advantage of the ‘amazing’ Yorkshire produce available virtually on the doorstep to expand its range, Lucy says.

“We’ve got about 50 suppliers now,” she says. “We get fruit and veg from Ripon. There’s a man in Easingwold called Mr Smith who provides us with wonderful cauliflower, broad beans, fruit, raspberries and strawberries – he just comes and brings what he has. There’s a lady from Alne who supplies us with autumn raspberries and gooseberries. We get Yorkshire Brack from Whitby, lamb from Helperby, chicken from Pateley Bridge…”

Home Farm isn’t alone in carrying the flag for local produce in this part of Yorkshire.

Deliciously Yorkshire, the Askham Bryan-based not-for-profit organisation supporting local food producers, retailers and caterers, has 500 members.

They include B&Bs that pride themselves in providing good Yorkshire breakfasts; farm shops; gastropubs boasting menus full of locally sourced dishes; preserve-makers; farms supplying shops and restaurants with prime Yorkshire beef, lamb, pork and chicken; village stores selling local produce; and city and town centre restaurants.

Deliciously Yorkshire brings all these organisations together, matching suppliers with retailers and restaurants; offering advice on marketing; even helping producers with packaging if they want to get their produce into supermarkets.

There are many reasons why it makes sense to eat more local food when it is available in such abundance. It is fresher; it hasn’t been flown half-way around the world, so it is better for the environment; and it has a regional flavour. It says something about who we are.

Diners at his inns love to know the asparagus on the menu comes from Helperby, says Michael Ibbotson, who runs the Provenance Inns chain of local pub restaurants that includes the Durham Ox.

Yet the CPRE report, ‘From Field to Fork’, claims all this is under threat. “The large weekly supermarket shop has increasingly displaced food from marketplaces and town centres or closed vital outlets for local food,” it says. As a nation, it argues, we should be doing much more to support what it calls ‘local food webs’ – networks of producers, suppliers, retailers and restaurants that can bring local food to our plates.

York restaurateur Michael Hjort, of Melton’s and Melton’s Too, agrees that we should be making more of local food.

Quality local produce is a perfect fit with a city centre such as York, which prides itself on being distinctive, he says. The York Food Festival in September capitalises on that, and is a great chance to showcase the range of fantastic local and regional Yorkshire produce, he says.

But he would like to see more of such produce in local shops and markets. “It reflects something of the locality. We have a lot of tourists coming here: what we should be looking for is for them to say ‘we come to York looking for local produce’.”

More and more city restaurants now have local food on their menus, he says, but they don’t always make that clear. “We should shout about it.”

He would also like to see a change in the supermarket mentality that insists a supermarket in York has to be the same as one in London or Edinburgh. “We’ve got to get out of that,” he says.

There are signs that supermarkets are beginning to realise this themselves.

Asda at Monks Cross in York has a Yorkshire deli offering regional produce, and says it has increased the number of local Yorkshire ranges by more than 20 per cent. Morrisons also stocks local products in York, including Yorkshire Blue cheese, Masham sausages, dry cure bacon, kippers, black pudding and roast hams, along with local milk and fresh meat.

It’s not enough, the CPRE says. National supermarket chains continue to dominate the grocery market, says the organisation’s senior food campaigner Graeme Willis – accounting for 77 per cent of all grocery shopping trips. They are expanding their share of the market – weakening town centres and the richness and variety of food outlets found there.

Local food expert Annie Stirk doesn’t believe that the situation is anything like as bleak as the CPRE paints it, however.

Annie, who runs food PR firm Absolutely Food, says that in Yorkshire at least, the local food market is ‘pretty vibrant’.

One of the reasons for that, says Ed Cartwright of Deliciously Yorkshire, is that this county has a great range of quality of local produce.

Yorkshire food is special, he says. “There is a lot of heritage to do with it: things that are unique to this region. If there is produce like this on your doorstep, why get stuff that has travelled half way around the world?”

Deliciously Yorkshire is exactly the kind of network of local food producers and retailers that the CPRE says is not receiving enough support. Yet it appears to be in robust health.

“Membership is growing, and we’ve seen quite a few start-ups,” says Mr Cartwright.

Certainly Annie Stirk remains upbeat. “I think we’ve done a tremendous amount here in Yorkshire,” she says. “Things have changed in the last ten years. Just look at all the farm shops, cafés, restaurants and small independents.”

The regular customers at Home Farm in Beningbrough will no doubt share her optimism.

What the CPRE report says

Local food suppliers and retailers are being stifled by the relentless growth of supermarkets, the CPRE report ‘From Field to Fork’ says.

In 1980, there were just 300 superstores and hypermarkets in England. By 2007 this had increased to 1,500.

“The number is still growing: by late 2011, applications had been permitted or permission granted for a reported 44 million square feet of supermarket development… 80 per cent of it out of town.”

It is vital that local food producers, suppliers and retailers are given more support, the organisation says. They are “essential to the character and attractiveness of towns and countryside across England”. More than that, they contribute £2.7 billion to the national economy every year, and support more than 100,000 jobs.

The CPRE report makes a number of key recommendations. These include:

• Supermarket chains should set themselves demanding targets for stocking and selling local food

• National government should re-examine competition policy to support retail diversity and the ability of new local food entrepreneurs to enter the market, and develop national planning guidance to provide stronger support for sustainable food

• Local authorities and other public bodies should form partnerships to develop local food strategies and action plans, including support for local markers

Selling from within a 40-mile radius

York has a monthly farmers’ market in Parliament Street. Held on the last Friday of every month, the market sells only produce from within a 40-mile radius of the city centre. “We actually go out and check with stallholders to make sure,” says city centre manager Paul Barrett.

The same rule doesn’t apply to stallholders in Newgate Market. Some sell local produce, others travel to wholesalers in Leeds to get the best deals, and the produce could come from anywhere. “That’s supply and demand, and that’s what people want,” Mr Barrett says.

Nevertheless, there is nothing to stop a local businessman setting up a stall at Newgate market selling only local produce. There are vacancies, Mr Barrett said: and for someone looking to start out, who doesn’t want to risk the overheads on renting a shop, initially at least, it’s a great, low-risk way to get started.

The city council is also looking at other initiatives to attract local businesses, including those wanting to sell or supply local produce, says Katie Stewart, the council’s head of economic management.

It is looking at ‘pop-up shops’, where a business takes over an empty shop temporarily until a permanent tenant can be found.

The council is also investigating the possibility of holding evening markets in Parliament Street.

There is no doubt that local food is a good fit with York’s city centre, Katie Stewart says.

The centre prides itself on being distinct and different from other High Streets. “And locally made, locally produced, locally sourced products of all kinds are part of our USP.”

• There is also a regular York farmers’ market at the auction centre at Murton, selling local produce under cover. The next one takes place tomorrow from 9am.