Hi Everyone,

I hope 2022 has started well for you all.

Last week our first appearance at the Eco-Park camper van site was a great success and we will be continuing to go every Thursday morning for a couple of hours. Luckily my friend Mauro who has organic chickens can supply me with extra eggs, so I will be able to keep our eggs for orders and Loule market.

I also went to Aljezur yesterday and picked up a batch of fresh Acayu non dairy cheeses. They only have the cream cheeses for now - but I will have the firmer varieties in a couple of weeks' time. I now have stock of the Dill & Garlic, Olive and Oregano, Smoked and Zaatar flavors of cream cheese. The guys at Acayu also introduced me to a Lebanese producer of Tahini and another farmer from the Rogil area producing natural peanut butter. Apparently Rogil is famous for it's peanuts and I can testify the peanut butter sample they gave me is muito bom! I will pick up a few pots of each the next time I go to Aljezur in a couple of weeks' time.

In the field, I have been planting beetroot and catching up with weeding and weed whacking, which needed urgent attention after the holidays. Now the garden is looking good again I am going to plant garlic over the next few days. I am rapidly running out of space to plant in the field and i am considering using a bit of my neighbor's land to increase my harvest.

Unbelievably the price of carobs continues to rise. I was quoted 48 euros for 15 kilo this week. I still have mine in the garage and I am happy to hold onto them for now:)

There are a few new items on the list - I have chucha tomatoes, grapefruit, and the vegan cheeses as mentioned, and some nice big white potatoes for baking.

IN THE NEWS
Finally I read an interesting article about a huge rise in autoimmune diseases and the link to modern 'western' diets.

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2022/jan/08/global-spread-of-autoimmune-disease-blamed-on-western-diet

Apparently wherever fast food goes - a rise in autoimmune diseases follows.

It seems they've worked out that the diet only causes autoimmune disease in people with a certain genetic make up. The scientists interviewed were concentrating their research on the specific genes that combine with the diet to cause disease. For people with an debilitating auto-immune disease this is encouraging. But doesn't it also make sense to identify what it is in modern diets that makes us so sick, and reduce the amount of these foods we consume? Just saying ... :)

Lots of love,
Peter