Post featured by Editorial Assistant Colleen

Everyone’s heard of the 100-mile diet. Local foods are all the rave and now you can enjoy and celebrate those dishes at various restaurants in Canada if you haven’t already tried the local food meal plan in your own home.

This is all part of the first ever Localicious event by the Living Planet Community. By choosing to eat foods that are locally produced or sustainable food, according to the Localicious Web site, you will be leaving a smaller carbon footprint.

Another motivation of this program is to promote and educate citizens on what is local and sustainable foods. According to their Web site, the main difference between local and sustainable foods is that sustainable foods aren’t always found locally but are produced in “a socially responsible manner, with lower impact on the environment”.

“Climate change is one of our biggest issues and food is a contributor that greenhouse gas emissions…If you’re going to work with Canadians to raise awareness of what kinds of choices we have that have an impact on the planet well eating is applicable to everybody. Everyone does it so therefore everyone can participate,” said Joshua Laughren, director of communications at WWF-Canada.

Any restaurant that you go that is a participating member of the Localicious program will donate some of the money you paid for the meal towards WWF-Canada’s conservation work.

The chefs are very enthusiastic to share their food for this cause too.

“The chefs are excited to participate because chefs are foodies. They love food and the chefs that are participating have been interested in promoting sustainable and local foods for a long time so really we’re just tapping into these great, passionate ambassadors and giving a chance to highlight what they do.” – Joshua Laughren.

Another aspect to this movement is the opportunity to find out some recipes that you can try out in your own home. Mix in local produce and see if it makes a difference with your regular dishes. If you go to their Web site to check out a list of Homegrown Recipes to help you take advantage of local and sustainable foods (you’ll event find recipes by Chef Jamie Kennedy!).

In addition to trying out these local meals at a variety of local restaurants, there’s also a contest that you can enter to win their grand prize of getting a private chef to cook a meal for you and five guests!

You’ll find details for the contest here: Localicious contest

Localicious is only on for a short period of time so if you want to try out a Localicious meal you’ll have to do so by October 18. There are participating restaurants in Vancouver, Calgary, Montreal, Ottawa, Toronto and Halifax.

For those of you outside of Canada, check your local city council for sustainable or local food events.

Photo by Southern Foodways Alliance

Starbucks has been feeling the sting of the new recessionary economy because all of these layoffs are preventing a lot of people from enjoying their daily $4/per cup of Starbucks coffee!

There was a lot of talk about Starbucks offering instant coffee to compete with the likes of McDonald and I’ll be honest, I still scratch my head at that one.

I found out not long ago that Starbucks is now serving breakfast and from the offering, I’d say that it looks pretty healthy!

The Starbucks breakfast will cost you $3.95 and you’ll be able to choose one of these three options: 1) coffee and an egg sandwich, 2) cup of oatmeal or 3) coffee and coffee cake. The value meals, which Starbucks calls “breakfast pairings,” save customers $1.20.

The food development team at Starbucks spent one year creating two breakfast sandwiches for the pairings … so this breakfast concept took a lot of time on Starbucks part to come up with something that was tasty and affordable.

Starbucks, which for a long time has been perceived as an expensive cup of coffee, is trying now to adopt a more affordable brand image because times are tough and people are being much more mindful of how they spend their coffee money.

The new affordable Starbucks breakfast is not yet available in Canada as I write these lines, but if any American reader has had the opportunity to taste it … we’d love to hear about it!

Photo by visualpanic