Gordon Ramsay hates it when you cook with food that’s out of season. He hates it so much he wants a ban on it. He wants a ban on it and he wants restaurants to be fined for doing it. That’s right; if you’ve got asparagus on your menu in December, you’d better be prepared to pay the price.
His big rallying point is that produce should be locally grown and not shipped in from around the world. Ramsay says he’s already spoken to Gordon Brown about outlawing out-of-season foods as a means of raising cooking standards and cutting carbon emissions. Ramsay also expressed his displeasure with TV chef Delia Smith, who has encouraged people short on time or cash to combine canned and ready-made things with some home cooking efforts.
While Londonist agrees that food in season is really what tastes best, but imposing a fine on what isn’t seems to be a bit much. Any top restaurant will already be serving food that’s in season, and we can hope that others will follow suit. But chances are if a restaurant is serving things that aren’t in season, it’s probably related to the demand. Also, how did Gordon Ramsay get chat time with Gordon Brown?
If you can’t afford to be making regular trips to the farmers’ market, Londonist suggests the excellent website Eat The Seasons to help you keep up to date on what’s in season. They break things down by the week, offer buying advice, and some tasty recipes.
Ramsay also took the opportunity rail against plastic bags. Unrelated, true, but yeah, plastic bags are pretty bad.
Image courtesy of D I C K S D A I L Y's Flickrstream.
