ABSTRACT
This chapter examines food practices with a particular emphasis on local products, quality symbols, and short-chain distribution systems, all of which are closely associated with enhancing food sustainability. Rather than conceptualising consumption as an isolated practice, it is framed as an integral part of routines such as shopping, cooking, and eating. Food provisioning is approached as a mundane yet socially and materially significant activity.
The chapter explores everyday consumption practices, focusing on the role of quality food products, including Food Quality Schemes (FQS) and local foods, in shaping consumer behaviour. Adopting a perspective that views consumption as a socially constructed phenomenon, the study conceptualises the consumer as a ‘carrier of practices,’ whose behaviours are shaped by intersecting roles and contexts rather than a fixed identity.
Utilising a five-dimensional approach to practices associated with food consumption, as preservation practices or modern devices like coffee machines, the chapter highlights the interconnection of materiality, competence, meaning, infrastructure, and time. It seeks to deepen understanding of food culture as a dynamic system, shaped by both material and immaterial dimensions, and examines how these everyday routines and practices contribute to more sustainable consumption patterns.
