Mexican restaurant chain Wahaca has dropped avocado from its menus, replacing guacamole with a new Wahacamole made with organic British fava beans due to the environmental and social damage that avocado production can cause around the world.
On their website Wahaca states: From day one, we challenged ourselves to minimise our environmental impact. We were the first UK restaurant group certified Carbon Neutral and are proud members of Food Made Good, we have been crowned most sustainable restaurant group three times! So it's no surprise to see them making progressive changes to their menu to further reduce the impact that their ingredients have around the world.
Why are avocados deemed unsustainable?
It takes a huge amount of water to grow avocados, up to 2000 litres to grow 1kg of the fruit, before being flown from all corners of the world before reaching your plate here in the UK. The main producers of avocados are in fact Mexico, Peru, and Indonesia, with these three countries alone accounting for 68.4% of all production. With continued rise in popularity of the avocado over the past decade it's no wonder that it's started to become the target for change.
With the increased popularity, agricultural practices in the developing nations growing the fruit have also come under strain, pushing prices up as well as the reports of illegal deforestation to meet export demands.
Wahaca have said that they are now sourcing its fava beans used in the new Wahacamole from Suffolk-based farm Hodmedod's, before blending them with green chilli, coriander leaves and lime - combining to give the dip the green complexion we're used to with guacamole. It's not the end of avocados on Wahaca's menus though with it still being featured in other dishes. Wahaca's co-founder Thomasina Miers saying: "While we won't be seeing avocados leaving our menu any time soon, we felt the time was right for a new twist on our guacamole."
Image - www.wahaca.co.uk