The Journey of a Peanut and Jelly Sandwich

Here is some of the info from our co-op today.

Peanut Butter

- 60% of all peanuts used to make peanut butter are grown in Georgia, Florida and Alabama, with 50% of the entire peanut crop being grown in Georgia.

- The largest peanut butter manufacturing plant in the world is Smucker's in Lexington, KY. (approx. 383 miles from Atlanta, GA)

- Once made and jarred in Lexington, KY, the peanut butter then travels to the super market in Lake Mary, FL (approx. 838 miles)

and Jelly

- The largest maker of grape Jelly in the US is Welches. They have manufacturing plants in New York, Pennsylvania, Michigan and Washington and their corporate head quarters is in Concord, MA. (We will use the Lawton, MI location.)

- Welches uses two types for grapes. Concord Grapes are grown in Concord, MA (approx. 879 miles from Lawton, MI) and Niagara Grapes are grown in and around Niagara Canada. (approx. 411 miles from Lawton, MI)

- Once jarred in Lawton, MI, the jelly then travels to the super market in Lake Mary, FL (approx. 1191 miles)

Sandwich

- Grain is grown in the US in the Great Plains States. (We will use Omaha, NE for measurement purposes) Grain is also imported from China, Greece and Turkey among other countries. (We will use China for measurement purposes)

- Grain grown in the Great Plains and grain grown in China are both shipped to the baker in Orlando. (1428 miles from Omaha, NE and 6257 ocean miles from China to a port in Los Angeles, CA and another 2513 miles from LA to Orlando)

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So in total, the ingredients for our Peanut Butter and Jelly Sandwich have traveled 13, 900 miles. Not including the gas used for the cargo ship (I couldn't find info on that) and based on the average semi truck getting 6.5 MPG, our PB&J has used 1176 gallons of fuel. That is equivalent to 78.5 tanks of gas in the average American car (average gas tank holds 15 gallons).