With Eggs

Farmer Vicki told us (see below) that Spring is the time for things green (although Hat Hammond notes that there was a bit of purple this week as well.) A way my family enjoys these omnipresent spring greens is with eggs. A great natural partner, and many cuisines do the egg-greens combo thing. The eggs (good farm fresh like we get from Genesis Growers*) tap down some of the green's edge, and the greens boost the mildness of the eggs. Moreover, when you make the eggs strapazzatti, gently scrambled in large curds, you get wonderfully contrasting bites of egg and green.

This recipe started with Swiss chard, dropping the stems in boiling water a few minutes before the leaves. Some where in between, I added kale to the boiling water. You cannot have too much or too little greens for this dish. I lightly beat eight eggs with salt, pepper, and a good splash of heaven forbid non-local olive oil. Then, I sauteed the whites from three of this week's green onions in some olive oil--I used to bemoan all the spring onions Vicki gave, then I realized we needed to cook with the onion in season; green from spring through early summer, then the soft skin sweet onions (until they ran out) and finally, the rest of the year, the dry ones. The greens go into the pan to get introduced to the onions followed soon by the eggs. It's done over low heat. I don't use a classic French twenty-five minute scramble, but I do try to take my time. It's a recipe that will work with any green around, and like yesterday, especially good with something (my chard) that was on the tired side.

Of course, we were stayed as local as possible with a side of Michigan potatoes (boiled). Mesculun from last week (strong!) set us up for two local cheese from Marion Street Cheese Market in Oak Park: Prairie Fruit Farms moldorific ordorrific goat's blue called Huckleberry Blue and a slightly milder (anything would be milder) Amish edamish type of cheese whose name I cannot now locate. Had to stay local for the beverage, drinking hoppy (but too simple) beer from Two Brothers (nice post on them here.)

The box this week: the used kale, romaine lettuce, green leaf lettuce (a variety called Waldmans), Napa cabbage, radishes, beets, spring onions and a jar of Vicki's home canned apple jam (although I would have preferred the spiced apples I spied in her kitchen the other day!).

*The eggs are a hoot. Because the chickens are different breeds and ages, it's a dozen "mixed", ranging in size and color. Not eggs to bake with, per se, but as delcious as anything.

Eat Local - In Spirt

A long time ago, I touched on the notion that it was possible to Eat Local without actually eating local. That given the various constraints (see post below), it was not always possible to Eat Local (or as local as you wanted), yet one could always try to eat "as if". Was it made like local; artisanal; family (or small) farm, fair trade, organic, shade grown, free range, grass-fed, hormone free, without antibiotics, tuna safe--buzz words for sure, but pay attention, research. I have no hierarchy or scale (although I do tend to disdain corporganic like Horizon Milk). Just look for the products that seem best. Seek the products that would be like what you would get if you could find it local. Moreover, could it mimic the environmental impact of local; how many layers of packaging, could it be bought in bulk, how far did it travel.

A good read today, from the Chicago Tribune discusses the issue of plastic bags. In short: plastic bags bad (!). So, compare the amount of plastic bags needed to buy produce at the grocery store to my CSA box from Genesis Growers. Who gets more plastic? If you are not getting a CSA, however, you can still try, as if, by reducing your use of plastic bags. As they say in the article:

Avoiding the use of plastic bags is very difficult. My daily newspaper is usually delivered in a plastic bag. Most department stores, convenience stores and drugstores offer nothing but plastic bags. When I make a small purchase and say "I don't need a bag," I am usually greeted with disbelief. At a grocery store that customarily offers paper bags, I have to emphasize, "No plastic, please." At some establishments, for tiny purchases, many shopkeepers ask, "Would you like a little bag?" as if it were a courtesy.

Things do add up.

Honey We're In the New York Times!

Well not us per se (we were in the Sun Times), but today's New York Times notes [registration req.] the movement towards eating local. It's an OK article. It hits upon key elements on why; carbon footprint, tastes better, supports farmers, but especially as it focuses on purists, makes it seem quite hard to eat local.

First of all, if you peruse the Eat Local Challenge blog you find few (if any) absolutists. We wrestle with issues like spices yet accept many far away products. Some of it is craven addiction--see me without morning coffee, a lot of it (at least for me) is a sense of which items are meant to travel or have historically traveled. Spices have always been caravaned; apples have not. Second, as I keep on saying, it's not that hard (or maybe, it gets easier). Yes, it can require diligence and effort. Find farmer. Buy freezer. Enjoy turnip. Take what you can get. Help if the kidz love apples.

Granted, the article brought up some serious limitations. For one thing, the article talks about people forced to make odd sandwiches because there were no local grains. I mean coffee-shmoffee, if your area does have bread things, it can get tricky. For another thing, the article mentions the increased cost of local chicken. It does take some work and expense at being local. I mean if I wanted really local bread, I could bake it from Wisconsin wheat. If I wanted. To bake. On the other hand, I'm laying out some big coin for my 1/2 cow; it's not that expensive for beef, per se, but on the other hand as one purchase, it seems a lot.

Figure out what works because it can be done.

What's Local at My Local Whole Foods

Nothing!*

It's fun to repeat blog posts, no? On Sunday, the sign advertised Harmony Valley turnips; the box said Cal-Organic.

*Actually, without a sign or any sign or other advertisement, Whole Foods was selling red potatoes from IGI Farms in Wisconsin.

Links

I've culled some Eat Local links from LTHForum.com

Fresh Eggs Near Wauconda

Wettstein's Meat in Oak Park

Grass Fed Beef in Chicago (granted not all of it is local)

Best CSA

Excess Radishes in Box, Now What

2007 Wisconsin Artisan and Farmstead Directory

Unexpected Delight at Green City Market

Local Produce in the Off-Season

Winter Green City Market

Beer and Cheese Tour of Wisconsin

Will('s) Special

Well, I was Mr. Proud Papa last week (thank's again Janet), but, as it turns out, compared to Our friend and Pal, former Chowhounder, current LTHer, YourPalWill, well, as those neighbors in Aurora would say, "we're not worthy, we're not worthy".

Let me explain:

Or digress, you see most foodies of a certain age, before we had the Internets to inspire and amuse us had books and magazines and stuff like that. We had, namely, Calvin Trillin and the Stern's. Mr. T writes some food stuff still, but without his beloved, he seems a bit less interested in that. The Sterns, even as one took a career change, go on, cranking out new editions of RoadFood every few years. Occasionally, they mix it up, as in their latest version, which focuses on the sandwich.

So, I see new book yesterday at Book Table in Oak Park. My wife and I start thumbing through the book, noticing all the places and sandwiches we've tried over the years: Casamento's oyster loaf, Katz's, Hoover's in Austin, when we get to the third (or so) page of contents. I (first) see Rivieria. Cool. Been there done that. Then, I notice the sammy listed for da'Riv.

Not just an Italian sub, but the Will freakin' special. The Will special. Granted, for those who know Will, take his girl scout cookie orders or otherwise hang with him, they know he's pretty darn special, but now all the nation also knows about the Will Special at Riviera. And (and!) Lthforum gets a plug too!

Check it out in bookstores everywhere! And get thee to Riviera for a Will Special.

Riviera Italian Imported Foods
3220 N Harlem Ave Chicago, IL 60634
773-637-4252

Eat Local - Fish

Bill Daley in (the link free!) Chicago Tribune blog asks about local fish, namely local smelts. Sadly, as far as I know, there is no commercial fishing in Illinois, or much commercial fishing of any kind in Illinois. Perhaps there are people who know, but when I look at the regs, there seems nothing against fishing per se. Forces do conspire.

It's fishy. It's bony. It's toxic. (OK, there may be a point there.) Muddy, mushy, not so meaty, no tartare, no sashimi, hell no ceviche, who wants freshwater fish. And remember that cookbook culture that tells us we should be gorging away at artichokes and peas about now, well these books are filled with tuna and salmon and recipes just for the halibut (hahahaha). I can see why no one wants to dip their nets in our waters.

Maybe teeming is not the word, but the Great Lakes contain many delicious fish: whitefish, perch, the un-sellable coho, trout, Bill Daley's smelts, even (I'm sure) some remaining herrings. This is how I suggest demand gets re-built. Go to Washington Island, Wisconsin. Granted, it's like a $45 ferry ride but still less than half a tasting menu at Alinea. Commercial fishing thrives on Washington Island, meaning a boat can go out, catch 25 whitefish, 25 lawyer (burbot) and a mess of perch and have them all eaten by the next day. The fish can be done up fancy at the Washington Island Hotel , boiled at KK Fiskes or say a Friday fish fry at Findlay's Holiday Inn. No flash frozen, packed on ice, color added, farm raised fish tastes like it. Try!

After that, you'll not just pine for some smelts, you'll god damn demand we get fishin' in Illinois.

Welcome Sun Times Readers

(Thanks also for the plugs from Paul at Kiplog and Gapers Block.)

In Janet Fuller's other article today, she mentions hoop houses, the PVC(ish) tents that magically transform and extend the growing seasons for Northern farmers. Besides keeping things warm generally, the hoop houses keep the ground from freezing. Farmers like Vicki, can (and do) harvest year-round. (Listening, Whole Foods?). The hoop houses make Vicki's spring CSA more meaningful and robust.

My box this week:

• Head lettuce
• Mescalin mix
• Radish bunch
• Chard
• Kale
• Bok choy
• Carrots
• Mint

Vicki e-mails, don't be so put off by all that green:

Spring is the time for greens. The cooler temperatures are perfect for growing greens. I don't know about you, but my body is craving greens right now. They are super nutritious - about as good as a multi-vitamin. I really believe we should eat according to the cycles of earth. Things are set up in nature according to what we need, when we need them. After a long winter of storage veggies, low light, cold weather and a lower activity level we need super foods to clean out the toxins and rev our systems back up. Nature helps us with this by providing greens. I will continue to provide green things every week - along with ideas on how to use them.

Welcom Sun Times Readers

Like Monica Eng before here, Janet Fuller managed to make me look saner than I thought.

So you wanna eat local.

Good.

It's hard. Not what you think. You do not need to live in California or work for Google [ed. which means you are already living in California, right?]. Winter is not your problem. Listen, don't let anyone from California tell you they have better strawberries. Don't worry that there is no year round public market. You live in the middle of the best farmland, probably, in the world. Shop at a farmer's market when it's there. Subscribe to a CSA. Freeze, can, dry, cold-store; You can live (fer sure) year round on the fruits, vegetables, milk, nuts, butter, eggs, beef, lamb, pork, turkey, duck, pheasant, ham(s), cheeses (many) available within 100 (or so) miles of your house. Getting the stuff is easy.

Using the stuff, that's hard. I was reminded again the other day while dripping purple juice everywhere. Beets are a pain. Like mashing rutabagas and peeling squash (oy, what a pain) and triple washing the aphids off your spinach. Eating local, of course, requires you to eat what's in season, or if you don't eat in then in season, it must be processed for when you will eat it. This means your stuck eating what's around.

Often (typically?) what's around is beets or turnips or celery root. It aint all perfect, ideal, heirloom tomatoes. It takes work. Roast about a dozen beets. See how long it takes. Make a root vegetable mash. See why Rachel Ray is not a localvore. But then, see what she misses in flavor. Not the least enjoy the benefits of eating local...even if can be hard (at times).

You want to eat local. Here's some help:

Read often, the Eatlocalchallenge.com blog. Get inspiration and help from the several posters there. There, you can also find Jamie S.'s, tips for eating local.

Read often (also) the best Internet food forum, (luckily based in Chicago) where you'll find notices of local meat sales and threads about where to find local eggs (one of many).

Make friends with a local farmer. Our family was extremely lucky. A local farmer made friends with us, actually made friends with a daughter. "Farmer Vicki" Vicki Westerhoff took time from vigorous farm life to introduce and inspire the kidz at Hatch Elementary School in Oak Park. Three or so years later we are buying one of her cows. Through our relationship we gain access to products beyond what's at the market. More importantly, we learn about farming and even get to help. Unless (or until) you are a farmer, you cannot full understand and appreciate eating local without the guidance of a local farmer.

More anon.

What's Local This Week at (My) Whole Foods

Nothing!

It's a truism of local eating, eat what's available not necessarily what you want. For instance, my local CSA provided me this week with a Napa cabbage. I use that for slaw even if I'm more in the mood for a red cabbage slaw. Obviously, things are a bit more complicated. A bit of attention to eating local, and you realize that whole categories of foods are seasonal. Take soup, I mean stock or related, braises. Good braises or stocks require aromatics like carrots, leeks, onions, and celery.

From the Eastern Market in Detroit, we had a sackful of Michigan winter carrots. Lying around our basement fridge from a late Winter Farmer Vicki delivery was "cutting celery" or German celery or leaf celery (i.e., stemless celery), which is good for nothing but seasoning. My thrifty wife preserved some leek tops in the freezer. There are enough onions in storage. We were ready for a red wine braised beef. We bought six pounds of chuck. Then, Bugs Bunny of a daughter number 1 ate all the carrots.

Even a dedicated localvore finds himself in the Whole Foods produce aisle once in a while. We needed carrots or the beef would be spoiled (heaven forbid we do the braise sans carrots). Now, localvores have been sneering at Whole Foods, and mostly for good reason. It is the epitome of global-cororganic food, with as much food from New Zealand, Mexico and Chile (it seems) than even evil California. Whole Foods has tried, realizing the Time Magazine spotted trend that is Eat Local. For instance, here I reported on some local food exposure at Whole Foods last September. Here in River Forest, through the fall they sold produce from Driftless Organic in Wisconsin.

And yesterday when I saw a sign, one sign amidst all the grown in California, for kale grown in Wisconsin, I went to buy it. I did not even need kale, having other greens from last week's CSA, but I wanted to help show Whole Foods that people would buy local. There were two different kales in front of me. Both had "cal-organic" labels. I asked. It seems that there was no local kale, only a sign for local kale..."it's our only sign for dinosaur kale." Perhaps, Whole Foods was capitalizing on the eat local trend without supplying local food. Maybe (!)

Typically, the produce guy sneered when I asked where was the local kale. The presumption remains that it is not possible to have anything local yet in this part of the world. Yet, my farmer filled (kinda) a box this week. There is no reason Whole Foods cannot develop better relationships with farmer's like Vicki that use hoop houses to jump start the growing season. There should be more than nothing local each week at Whole Foods

Double Duty

As if from Harry Potter, Fergus Henderson's books have magical properties [ed. cannot resist those Potter analogies, huh?]. You find yourself wondering if you should salt some liver to see what Dried Salted Pig's Liver, Radishes and Boiled Eggs tastes like. Salted. Pigs. Liver. The spell wears off and you are at least enchanted with his fascination with radishes. He devotes two pages on how to eat them, and you eat not just the bulbs. Last night I doused the radish greens with balsamic vinegar to cut the bite, and we had a fine salad to finish a meal.

One of the great things about getting produce from farmers is that you get the whole thing. This week's box may have included only about five radishes, but the radish greens provided another dish (so to speak). All the time, us CSAers get double duty: turnips and turnip greens, beets and beet greens, parsley and parsley root; hell I've even made use of carrot leaves (tastes a lot like parsley). Double duty helps a lot at this time of year because a spring box is not vast.

The idea of spring vegetables springs from two related sources (I think). First, in California (evil California), things are growing away. The supermarkets have artichokes, asparagus, strawberries. Second, there's (I believe) a kinda idealized, what I would call, cookbook culture of spring because so many cookbooks base their words on French and Italian climates and cuisines where peas do come in April. In Chicagoland, peas come in late June. Those eating local know otherwise. We can, however, make due.

So, our Spring CSA from Farmer Vicki's Genesis Growers is a rump offering. Stuff that happens to be thriving now in her hoop houses, mostly odd(ish) greens like boc choy and napa cabbage. Lettuce makes it. We also got this week a few big turnips and beets that I think came from storage. The message is, while we can stretch some of the box, radish and salad, we cannot expect a box this week to be sufficient. It still takes storage, freezer, and as we do (often) a bit of eating out to stay local.

Eat Local...Ham!

A while back I wrote a post for the Eat Local Challenge blog on how my effort to eat local had skewed my palate. Like an observant Jew who would actually not like the taste of bacon, I found that all things local tasted that much better to me. One of the things I cited was locally made Iowa prosciutto from La Querica. So, it turns out it's not just me. Mike Sula's piece in the Reader mentions he got some of the ham at Whole Foods in Chicago; I've always purchased mine at Fox & Obel. Unfortunately, the demand (until now) appears a bit low, and sometimes the Querica ham at F&O is a bit dried up.

Vie

Seems like I'm not the only one waiting to write about a February meal at Vie. Eat Chicago covers all the main points about Vie: the tinker-tinker-tinker they do in the kitchen ("hey let's make some sausage guys"); the effort to source local instead of talking about sourcing local, and the kind of cooking you cannot do at home (even if you tinkered and sourced). There is no more restaurant (or restaurateur) that I like around here than Vie (and Chef Virant).

But do I love it? I kinda do. I will go endlessly back to see what's around, what they are doing. I want pickled grapes and house made tasso. Vie appeals to all my sensibilities. It does not always appeal to my senses. On our February visit we had the same scallop and black rice dish mentioned by Eat Chicago. Like EC, my wife and I found the dish cooked well but tasting eh. For ages (I love reading the Vie menu) I was salivating over a brisket and bean dish. When I finally tried it, last winter, it was another eh, especially compared with brisket I had recently had in Central Texas (score one for cheap eats). I still remember one of the first things I had at Vie, a salsa made with fresh oregano and other herbs. How do we say...oh yea, eh. Maybe it's refinement when I'm looking for a bit more oomph. Why I prefer the Rolling Stones to the Beatles.

I will say this. There are things that are always (seem) delicious at Vie. Seek anything fried. They are mastering of the fry. Although I did not favor the brisket, I tend to like things coming off the wood-burning grill. And fish, I hate the fact that the restaurant I love most for its local-ness does best, things that are not local. So, make sense, I love them for being local but love best what's not local. Right?

Buy Local - April 14 Buzz Cafe - Oak Park

Ann Fisher, of LTHForum posts to let people know they can buy local beef, pork, chicken, lamb and eggs from the Wettstein's this Saturday at the Buzz Cafe in Oak Park. See here for details.

I cannot resist an opportunity to support this farm. Taste the way food used to taste--last summer Slow Food Chicago organized a BBQ taste-off, having Honey 1 do batches with conventional pork and the Wettstein's pork; Robert Adams of Honey 1 commented that day how the Wettstein's pork reminded him of his grandfather's piggies. More importantly, support a true local farm, that is doing it all right.

Links

Blog 3.0 needs some links. I've added two (with more to come). Jen Maiser monitored and marshaled various localvores into one place, Eatlocalchallenge.com, which has become an outstanding resource. Read how people many people attempt to eat local, including many who are showing it's possible to be penny-wise and still eat local. More importantly, behind the scenes, Jen has served as a real hub for the whole Eat Local movement, answering e-mails, schmoozing the press, spreading new challenges. Her blog barely scratches the surface of all she does, but it is a great read anyways, with outstanding pictures to boot.

What Me Blog

Well, yeah, there's so much I shoulda coulda woulda blogged about; not the least, from November 2006 until April 2007, we bought not a single "baby" carrot. And cow, soon there will be a whole half cow in the freezer. We are buying 1/4 of Farmer Vicki's current heard.

So because I was eating local all this time, because it's time to encourage others to eat local, because the first box from Farmer Vicki came last week, because I need a place to post a couple of pics I like of the Sonoran desert, because I cannot continue to spend so much time playing computer poker; it's time to blog again.

To help spread the vital information, I've re-introduced a bit of classic blog (design). Enjoy the ease of reading. Also, as you may note, the links and resources are gone. A lot of that stuff was dated or useless anyways. I'll update with the rest of the renewed blogging.

Eat Local Quandry Solved

I checked in on the Eat Local Challenge--the quest to eat as much as possible in our house from food grown with the states that roughly comprise the Big Ten Conference (and I mean in our house, we fail miserably to stick to the Challenge when eating out)--last week. As it turns out, after ridding ourselves of the mess, as well as some key buys from insider Eat Local sources, we are pretty well stocked. We are not digging into the freezer. Instead, we have fresh carrots, turnips, kohlrabi, lettuce, and tons of potatoes. Yet there was one big problem.

Garlic, we were about out of our stash of locally grown garlic. Spices are an Eat Local problem, fer sure. Garlic is not an Eat Local problem. Many growers around here have garlic. We bought a lot through October, but it turns out not enough. In our house, we really need garlic to cook. So much so that we had to give in and buy a head at a supermarket, probably from China, geez. Luckily, we spent Saturday in Milwaukee, visiting our beloved Public Market. The Milwaukee Public Market is a real treasure for Eat Local fans. Lakeside Meats sells "Yuppie Hill" chickens; the cheese people have all manner of (local) artisinal cheeses. And produce; frankly in the past, I have thought the produce vendors did not sell enough local produce. There's still too much foreign produce for me, but I'm a 1/2 full kinda guy. I loved the fact that they were selling local garlic. I bought all they had out, enough for a good time.

Other local produce for sale on Saturday were apples, potatoes, spinach (very expensive!), and beets. The Challenge gets easier this year.

Food and Wine Hearts Local

From Jen (via the Eat Local grapevine), here's links to two bits in the current issue of Food and Wine about eating local.

Localvore Inspirations - A few links to help Eat Local

How to Eat Like a Localvore - Like it sounds

Winter Mess

Much apologies for the lack of Eat Local Posts. There was that Thanksgiving road trip, holiday shopping, kidz vacation, the passing of good ol' dog (I know, enough, let's not make the blog morbid), and then with the kidz off the week after New Years, a seemingly extra week off. It's time to get back to things.

Like Eat Local. From the end of the Oak Park Farmer's Market in October to mid-November, we got a Fall CSA box from Farmer Vicki's Genesis Growers. Vicki farmed a second Fall CSA. With a bit of experience and the milder weather, she succeeded brilliantly. Of course one has to like turnips...but also cabbage, brussel sprouts, fat carrots, beets, greens, fall fields supplied (and this on top of plenty of storage apples, potatoes, onions and squash). A typical box looked like:

So, what happens come January? The challenge to the Eat Local challenge remains, how. Or what. What stays. What lasts. What to eat in the leaner periods. During the summer, we froze produce, especially peas, red peppers, asparagus, corn. We have not dipped into that stash. We put about 20 squash into our cold "canning" room where they joined potatoes and onions. Last year we learned that this room was not cold enough for root vegetables like beets and turnips. This year all of that went into our downstairs extra fridge.

Our garbageman comes on Monday. Time to assess. Beets horrible, shriveled and quite moldy. Turnips with some shrivel but salvagable. Big giant rhutabaga from October (!) holding on. Carrots too, show little wear. Cabbage in the fridge looks passable, just shed the outer leaves. In the cold room, most of the squash failed--Vicki warned us that her squash were too soft--we did not take heed. The oldest, summer potatoes sprout, star shaped neo-potatoe. They need to go. Bigger ones are fine, as are the sweets. We keep plenty of onions. And apples, we only stored a bit because Michigan apples are easy to get. Some of the apples mooshed; most survived. Two went into the kidz lunch today.

The challenge continues.

A Poem

Written By Sophia

Shatzi

Oh Shatzi, oh Shatzi my sweet, sweet dog

How I miss you with your hot dog like body and your brown-black eyes.

Why did you go, I'll miss you so, when you would bring me a ball or bring me a stick.

I loved you so much, oh Shatzi, my sweet, sweet dog, why did you leave me?