The problem
1.In recent years epicurean excess has replaced religion for most Gautengers at Christmas.

2.In a good year gorging rather than worshipping is a personal matter between you and your conscience.

3.But this year has been so hard and there are so many people around us who aren’t able to eat and drink let alone be merry that suddenly the standard unthinking Christmas blowout feels wrong.

4.As the lucky ones of us fill our trolleys with yummy things we are all being left with a bad taste in our mouths.

5.Bad tastes in the mouth serve no purpose – do something or stop fretting.

6.The question is how to eat well and have a clear conscience?

The solution
7. Ethical doesn’t have to get in the way of enjoyable.

8.What follows is a series of sops for the guilty glutton. Things you can do that allow you to enjoy yourself and put a bit of goodness into the universe.

9.Whether you choose to be good to the environment, good to turkeys or good to street children be good to someone this Christmas…

Christmas is for everyone’s children
•Hillbrow Children’s Centre at the Christ Church Christian Care Centre cares for 47 orphans.
•This number is expected to rise to 60 in January.
•They get no government assistance so they are wholly dependent on donations.
•They desperately need donations of staples so that they can feed the children throughout 2009.
•They say they would like mealie meal, rice, samp, beans, long life milk, sunflower oil and children’s vitamins.

If you want to take things through yourself:
Christ Church Christian Care Center
15 Mitchell St
Berea Johannesburg

•Central Methodist Church Zimbabwean refugee centre
•They are housing 2000 people within the church and a further 400 sleep immediately outside the doors.
•Everyone is hungry, destitute and homeless. Yesterday parents came in with an 8 month old baby who looked 4 months old. The parents had come from Harare with nothing.
•There is a crèche which has a desperate need for nappies, baby formula (specifically NAN or NIDO) and baby food

If you want to take stuff through yourself:
Central Methodist Church
79 Pritchard St.
Downtown next to the High Court

If you are too frightened to go into Hillbrow or the Central Methodist Church to donate you can take your donations to the Bryanston Bible Church who have agreed to take them in for you. The church is at 9 St James Crescent, Bryanston. They can take donations from 9am – 2pm

At the church there is a call button to push to get in the gate. When people state they are there to drop off items, a facility worker will come out to meet them and direct them to the drop off area

Ethical eating at home
•Wherever you are you can hold a Starfish Dinner of Hope for your Xmas dinner. You register your dinner on sadoh@starfishcharity.org and then you can cook any type of meal in any venue, you show the starfish DVD and guests donate to Starfish foundation. Your contribution is the cost of the event. You put the money raised into the Starfish Greathearts Foundation bank account. Additional questions can be answered by going to www.starfishcharity.org or calling 011 259 4103

•And who is more unfortunate than turkeys at Christmas? Braeside Butchery in Parkhurst (011 7883613) will sell you a free range turkey from Vereniging. They also have organic Turkish apricots for fab stuffing.

•The environment is pretty much constantly unfortunate: Taryne Jacobi (011 706 7114) will do you an organic Christmas dinner without the schlep of having to cook it yourself. For R145 per person (minimum 6 people because of the size of the turkey) she will do you deboned organic roast turkey with polenta, sage and pear stuffing, organic pork chipolatas, organic carrots with caramelized thyme butter, organic new potatoes, organic asparagus salad and an organic berry and white chocolate trifle.

Ethical boozing
•Booze: Wine farms haven’t traditionally had a great reputation in terms of ethical behaviour but the situation is improving. In recent years several wines that promote themselves as Fair-trade, BEE, organic etc wines have come onto the market. The problem is lots of them taste like lentils and ponchos. The question is how to have a virtuous wine that tastes fabulous.

I called Carrie Adams who suggests the Pierneef range at La Motte which is organic (there is a shiraz and a sauvignon blanc) and the farm has an extensive programme to uplift the workers - worker village, 10 hectares, schools, hospital, day care, athletics track and Olympic size swimming pool for kids.

Ethical eating out
•There is a nationwide charity called Street Smart in which R5 is added to your restaurant bill and the money goes to education and family reunification programmes for street children. The web site has a list of which restaurants participate (www.streetsmartsa.org.za). To Johannesburg’s shame there are only 2 in Gauteng (the Attic in Parkhurst is a member) but there are lots in Cape Town. Most of the up market Cape Town restaurants (including Jardine, Bon Appétit, Showroom etc) are members. If you are staying in Joburg lobby local restaurants to join up.