monday, november 19th, 2007

It's a lexical victory for greenmarket supporters everywhere. Not only has the New Oxford American Dictionary recognized locavore as a word, they have named it their word of the year. I suspect that most of us are locavores and didn't even know it.

The word ‘locavore’ shows how food-lovers can enjoy what they eat while still appreciating the impact they have on the environment,” said Ben Zimmer, editor for American dictionaries at Oxford University Press. “It’s significant in that it brings together eating and ecology in a new way".

Locavores make an effort to purchase food grown within a 100 mile radius of their home, promote the consumption of seasonal products, shun large supermarket chains and do most of their shopping at local farmer's markets or grow their food themselves.

It's further proof that the farm to table movement is going mainstream and hopefully in the not too distant future, locavore will not just be the word of the year, it will be a way of life for us all.