Green Christmas

Save time – and the environment (a little) by getting your Christmas groceries delivered rather than visiting the supermarket. We’ve got a slot booked on the 18th. No doubt there’ll be last-minute items requiring some local shopping but an internet order saves time (I think) and carbon footprint. I’m not sure if we should share our order with the family who are with us over Christmas. When we all went away together in the summer, daughter-in-law Gayle placed an order for things like disposable nappies but she made the mistake of offering the order to the rest of us. So we had great fun adding – and changing – Gayle’s order. I think my credit card was used in the end, of course!

While we’re on green Christmas (it doesn’t scan like white Christmas) have you looked at whether the food you’re getting is locally sourced – or at least has reasonable transport history? I have a copy of the book Shades of Green by Paul Waddington. Paul discusses the ‘greenness’ of various things. He doesn’t cover Brussels sprouts which I’m sure are fairly OK – they are not grown under polytunnels or air-freighted from miles away. He does discuss courgettes which are apparently Britain’s tenth-favourite veg. While eating locally-grown ones in season is OK, buying imported ones is very poor – particularly as they are 80% water and have virtually no nutritional value! Has anyone worked out the carbon footprint of a Christmas pud?