On Tuesday night I left the farm and flew to milder climes. It kind of feels like I’ve run away with the circus - I’m now in an unassuming and laid back coastal city that’s about to be uncorked.

For the past two years I’ve been nursing an elite athlete-driven program called David Suzuki’s Play It Cool.  The program and I moved last spring from the David Suzuki Foundation to it’s partner organization The Climate Project Canada, and together our organizations have been hashing out big plans which culminated in a splashy news conference last Wednesday. We presented the organizers of the Vancouver 2010 Olympics with a bronze medal for their efforts to reduce the event’s climate impact. These are the greenest Games yet, and it’s been a thrilling ride to play a role in pushing the organizers to follow through on their bid promise to make them so.

Canadian Alpine Ski Team member Kelly VanderBeek, who’s tragically been sidelined from the Games due to a knee injury, and retired Canadian Speed Skater Ingrid Liepa (above with David Suzuki) filled out our Play It Cool athlete contingent. I can’t even describe how proud I felt to hear Kelly and Ingrid speak so eloquently and passionately about the visible impact of climate change on winter sports, and what they’re both doing to reduce their carbon footprint. They blew me away with their compelling stories and positive message, and we had excellent national and international media coverage which just fills my heart! It’s wonderful to see this five year campaign build up to such a positive peak.

As I’m sure you’ve guessed (no surprise here) I’m in Vancouver and I’ll be here for a month covering the Games. I have a packed calendar but it includes tickets to six Play It Cool athletes’ events so it’s not all work and no play! I’ll be blogging soon quite regularly here alongside our ‘Green Olympians’ so I’m not sure how focused I’ll be on all things locavore. I’ll post when I catch my breath, how’s that?

Let the Games begin!

What is it about goats? I know it’s not just me - just take a look at how popular they are at petting zoos! People lap them up, and I’m right there with the little four and five year old’s, chasing them around and picking them up when staff aren’t looking.

Today Roddy, Ewan and I found ourselves in the neighborhood of River’s Edge Goat Dairy, just outside of Arthur in Wellington County. We missed our turn initially, but I made sure we got there. I wanted to see goats, pet goats, and come home with goat cheese.

Their herd is incredibly cute, and their chevre is divine. The Wilman’s secret is selling only the freshest milk and cheese, and the result is a rich, smooth and tangy treat that drives my taste buds wild!

Ever since watching The Girl from Paris during my French film binge last year, I’ve held onto a fantasy of someday keeping goats of my own. It would not be in Canada, though. It would be somewhere bucolic with rougher pastures where I’d heard my goats through the hills and soak up the scents while the wind whipped through my hair. I’d craft the creamiest, most heavenly goat cheese concoctions, and play my guitar under a canopy of apple trees dripping with fruit (or blossoms, depending on the season).

Today, however, I saw goats as they are without the romance. I noticed their eerie, alien-like pupils. I saw how much they poo, and how it stuck to my favourite Onitsuka Tiger sneakers (why did I change out of my wellies when the sun came out?). And I thought of how much time they would take from everything else I love to do in my free time.

In short, today I learned to love the fact that a family in my county has decided to raise goats and sell delicious milk and cheeses, so I don’t have to. At least not yet.

Julia Child, why am I so late in discovering you?! When your name first came into my lexicon while I was interning for Food Network’s Opening Soon, I let the reference go un-researched. You sounded old fasioned and fluffy. I was drawn instead to the raw, behind the scenes expose of the restaurant biz, as told through the wry humour of Anthony Bourdain. I’ve matured in five years, however, and I’m now ready to dive into your tantalizing French recipes and learn more about your culinary journey.

Julia & Julia was an excellent primer to the life of the woman who brought French cuisine into the homes of Americans from the 1960s, and one of her loyal followers who blogs her way through a personal challenge to cook every recipe in Child’s famous cookbook in one year. Meryl Streep, phenom that she is, has set me on a mission to scour local bookshops for a used copy of Child’s seminal cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume 1 and get tucked right in. Rich sauces, homemade mayonnaise, heavenly pastries, and sinful tarts and cakes await.

My challenge: to locavore-ize some of Child’s buttery delights. I’m sure French cuisine will be a mission in itself, but I want to concoct recipes that highlight fresh, local ingredients, and also taste mouth wateringly delicious.

What about you? Are you inspired by the towering, bubbly, culinary genius? Tried any of her recipes? Want to join me in the kitchen with Julia? Leave a comment below before midnight on August 31st, and I’ll send the winner a free copy of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Volume 1. Yum! 

Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstal is a modern pioneer. Not because what he did is novel, but because he exposed his journey to the masses via the telly and inspired me to redefine ‘the good life.’

A five star London chef, he made the bold move of trading in the smog and fog for the greener pastures of Dorset County, where he embarked on living off the land. What unfolds from Hugh’s trials and triumphs on his idyllic small farm can be seen in a slew of BBC series themed around his culinary adventures at River Cottage.

While he’s been scorned by some Brits as selling out as he expands his venture, Hugh’s enthusiasm for local food and culture is unparalleled in the TV world. Not only does he dive right in, often literally, to entertaining food endeavors (curing ham, making alcoholic cider, para gliding for mushrooms, assisting the birth of lambs, bee keeping and clam digging), but he completely assimilates himself in local, seasonal food culture and traditions.