My guest today is Shirley Harring, founder of Hand Sourced.

Shirley is the director of Hand Sourced - an niche market food hub that operates both wholesale and farmshare produce distribution.

She is inexplicably drawn to food, and the kind of person you won't want to dine with unless you mind sampling innards, gizzards, or food related obscurities.

In another life, Shirley qualified and worked as a school teacher. She stumbled into writing back in the early 1990s when her love of gastronomy and words led her to a regular gig for food and wine column in a local newspaper.

Shirley holds qualifications in gastronomy and food history; food writing; education; adult education and is working on the Masters of Food Studies.

Outside of work, she grows vegetables, wrangles chickens and devours books. Now based in Brisbane, QLD she lives with her family of boys, who she finds are very useful for washing up and carrying heavy things. The teacher still lurks within - she hopes that one day, tuck shops will turn into fresh food cafeterias and school ovals into edible, self-sustainable gardens.

She is always hungry.

You can connect with Shirley on twitter and Facebook.

You can find Shirley on her websites shirleyharring.com and handsourced.com.au.

You can listen to this episode via the link above, on iTunes or Stitcher or via the podcast app on your smartphone.

What Shirley Harring and I discussed

•being the middle man between the farmer and consumer

•ethical food

•growing to organic principles vs certified organic

•the exclusion of packaging when certifying organics

•what organic fed actually means

•focusing on stories

•real farmers' markets

•slaughtering chickens and then butchering and eating them

•going from being a teacher for over 20 years to running Hand Sourced

•the impact of food on our health

•cutting out preservatives and processed sugars

•sponsorship of major sporting activities by companies such as Coca-Cola, KFC and McDonalds

•school chocolate drives

•challenges faced by our food industry and our farmers

•Tammi Jonas podcast episode 

•transport costs

•tips for people wanting to eat more ethically

•making the most out of your roast

•Flavour Crusader - an excellent site for information on ethical eating

•price vs provenance

•McDonalds and their meat

•eating weird foods

•food heroes

•International Year of Pulses

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