The fourth-annual gathering of some dedicated UVA foodies.

By Andrew Jenner [Edible Blue Ridge Magazine]

To Dana Smith, the meal had all the appearances of a traditional Thanksgiving dinner, and in most ways, it was just that—turkey, pies, sweet potatoes, and eggnog, spread across several tables. But this Thanksgiving meal satisfied on a deeper level: Nearly everything had been grown, made, brewed, or otherwise concocted within 100 miles of Charlottesville.

Filling a church fellowship hall were dozens of happily chatting students, faculty, friends, and family of the UVA department of urban and environmental planning. As the crowd worked its way down the buffet line, guests read and discussed the recipe cards that sat beside each dish, explaining where the ingredients had come from. Then, while seated to eat in smaller groups, they continued to parse the most adventuresome and tastiest of the 100-mile dishes, each of which was prepared by someone in attendance.

Tim Beatley, a renowned professor of sustainable communities, introduced the 100-mile Thanksgiving idea to his department in 2006, after meeting Alisa Smith and J.B. MacKinnon, writers from Vancouver who popularized the concept in their book The 100-mile Diet: A Year of Local Eating.

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