www.eatlocalchallenge.com

Finding Justus

by Expat Chef

I can’t go home again, or at least not without a million memories good and bad flooding my mind and heart. After high school, I spent quite a bit of time seeking to be anywhere else but there. Even 22 years later, it still takes a lot for me to return to that small town community less than an hour away. Usually it’s a call from one of my best friends. Last trip, however, it was a call to the dinner table at Justus Drugstore.

When you are lucky enough to live in a small city with more than a couple James Beard award-winning chefs in it, it seems pretty odd that you’d go 40 miles north to a former drugstore in the main square of a small town to dine. Frankly, small town fare up there is usually a diner or two, or fast food on the fringes near the highway. Not exactly cutting edge cuisine territory even if it is the perfect terrior to source the food from.

Another Harvest Season Passes

by Expat Chef

It seems like each year I do the Eat Local Challenge that it becomes a greater part of my life. Not only does the amount and types of foods that I buy locally increase each year, but I feel myself becoming more deeply connected to this way of life.

I tried my hand at putting up foods for winter, mainly freezing and seed saving, although my current tactic is stockpiling vast amounts of sweet potatoes, pumpkins and squash. (I actually have even more now). I just finished preparing many of the season's last vegetables as nine quarts of soup and stashing that in the freezer for a cold winter's feast. However, the one thing I did not try my hand at during September's challenge was canning. I wanted to, I just could not find the time amidst all the weekly cooking and little one running around.

This does not stop me from stockpiling information along with my pumpkins. I took some time to ask an expert, Julie Smith of Treehouse Berry Farm, for some good advice for a beginner like myself. Julie and her family have an orchard and can and sell a huge variety of jams, salsas, preserves and jellies at my local farmers market. They also make homemade lollipops to which my child became addicted. Julie was kind enough to answer a few questions for me despite a tremendously busy season of canning, wholesale business and fall festivals. We finally caught up and she shared some great tips for all of us inspired by this year's September Challenge.

Question: Canning is kind of a lost art. What is the most important advice you could offer someone who is just learning to can and preserve? How did you get started?

Local food in Kansas

By Marc

Via the Ethicurean digest, an article in the Parsons Sun about how farm subsidies are affecting rural life in Kansas ends with snapshot of the local food situation:

Paul Johnson, Lawrence, an organic farmer and lobbyist with the Kansas Catholic Conference, said subsidies do little for either rural populations or small farms.

He notes that Kansas consumers spend about $525 million a year on fruits and vegetables, yet only about $15 million worth of those crops is grown here.

It would take only 150,000 acres to grow enough fruits and vegetables to satisfy consumer demand in Kansas, according to studies done by Kansas State University in the Kansas River valley.

Johnson, a market gardener in the summer, recognizes that not all of the state would be suitable for fruits or vegetables. But he said Kansas is so focused on big agriculture that it misses the larger picture.

"I guess it's sexier or more handy to get into a $250,000 combine and ride the prairie," he said.

How does 150,000 acres compare with the amount of farmland in Kansas?  It's basically nothing:  Kansas has 10.3 million acres planted in wheat (according to the USDA National Agricultural Statistics Service).

Marc lives in Berkeley, California.  He writes Mental Masala (an enticing blend of food, history, travel, and nature) and contributes to Ethicurean.

Image credit: Photo of the wheat harvest in the Palouse (Washington, Oregon, Idaho) from the USDA ARS Image Gallery.

Federal rules stymie local food efforts in Iowa

By Marc

"About 32,000 acres could supply Iowans with five servings a day of fruits and vegetables for three months out of the year, according to Iowa State University economists. Iowa farmers will harvest nearly 14 million acres of corn in 2007."  That's the sidebar message in a Des Moines Register article brought to my attention by the invaluable FarmPolicy.com newsletter.

Iowa farmer Gary Boysen grows sweet corn, peppers, tomatoes, cantaloupes and other produce on 65 acres near Harlan.  He sells his produce at nearby supermarkets and Wal-Mart.  And he would like to be growing more fruit and vegetables for Iowans.  However, a big obstacle is standing in his way:  federal agricultural rules.

If farmers want to plant fruit and vegetable crops on land enrolled in USDA subsidy programs, they must permanently give up the possibility of receiving benefits. Not just for the period when they are growing non-program crops.  Permanently. 

Summer Freeze

by Expat Chef

This September, the Eat Local Challenge is offering a whole range of ways to participate in the ELC September Challenge. With so many ways to participate, we can all join in the experience.

One of the ways to participate this year is to leahrn how to preserve your locally grown food for winter. It’s easy enough to do for many foods. You don’t even have to buy special equipment or learn to can. You just need a bit of time and freezer space.

I decided to try this approach this year after watching a friend of mine struggle with the vegetable side dishes for a 100-mile diet Thanksgiving. There's not much around for fresh veggies in late November other than sweet potatoes. What I do not use on the Thanksgiving table can easily be added to the turkey leftovers for a Turkey and Vegetable Soup, perfect for those chilly late fall days.

Farmers' Market Largess

by Jen Maiser

The lovely blogger who posts at "The Public, the Private and Everything in Between" has a post describing her attempts to eat locally this summer.  I enjoyed her cogent insights about several aspects of eating locally. 

An excerpt:

It felt good, finally, to do something I’d been meaning to do for such a long time, and know for at least one day out of my wasteful grownup life I helped the environment (buying local obviously means signicantly less gas was wasted delivering your food, plus the produce isn’t packaged or dumped into plastic bags) while at the same time buying healthy, beautiful food for S. and me.

Read her post here.

A Local Confession

by Expat Chef

I have to confess, I bought non-local peaches. I even bought them at the farmers market from a grower who usually sells peaches he grows. We lost 95 percent of the peach crop this year. He’s struggling. He and a few others carpool to Texas to buy fruit to sell here in order to stay in business.

So, a quandary exists. We have to have fruit in a balanced diet for our child. Do I buy fruit from the store where larger shipments probably use less fuel per fruit? Or, do I buy the same non-local fruit from my local farmers to keep them in business until next year’s harvest? Where’s the “local rulebook?” Has a flag been thrown?

I don’t know. But the farmer sure looked grateful when I bought the peaches and told him I would keep checking for his blueberries that are late this year.

Eating the Lawn

by Heather C.

Here in Ohio it seemed impossible to participate in the Penny-Wise Eat Local Challenge.  The farmer's markets in my area don't open until July.  We are still about a month away from the frost-free date for planting.  About the only thing growing here is grass.  Then I remembered a scene from my childhood.  My neighbor, who was a botany professor, always used to go outside and pick greens from his lawn for a salad.  It used to freak me out as a kid to eat plants that I "knew" were weeds.  But now I pay good money for gourmet salad greens so maybe it is time to reinvestigate eating the lawn.

Green Eggs and Lamb

by Expat Chef


Above: Beautiful green and brown eggs are dwarfed by the huge goose eggs. both available through Pinwheel Farms in Lawrence.

Want some of the most beautifully colored eggs this Easter, but don’t have time to dye them? No problem, just stop by the Pinwheel Farm in Lawrence, Kansas where you can get a mixed dozen of colors from soft, warm brown to light sage, blue-green and olive. The best part? The chickens do all the work.

I loved the fresh brown eggs we used to get from our neighbor when I was a kid in rural Missouri. The beautiful brown shells and bright orange, firm yolks were almost worth reaching under the chicken for. Almost. The rest of the memory is of pecking beaks and chicken poop, I am likely scarred for life. Not enough to call the 24-hour Alektorophobia hotline, but we chicken-phobes can all rest better knowing operators are standing by to take our call. These days, I like my farm fresh, brown eggs washed and in a carton.

But, green eggs? These I had to see. I called Natalya Lowther to get directions to her farm. I could barely hear with my kiddo screaming in the background. Ms. Lowther was polite. Instead of saying, “My, woman, can you not control that child?!” She said, kindly, “Oh, do you have a little one? She will love the baby lambs.”

I loved the fresh brown eggs we used to get from our neighbor when I was a kid in rural Missouri. The beautiful brown shells and bright orange, firm yolks were almost worth reaching under the chicken for. Almost. The rest of the memory is of pecking beaks and chicken poop, I am likely scarred for life. Not enough to call the 24-hour Alektorophobia hotline, but we chicken-phobes can all rest better knowing operators are standing by to take our call. These days, I like my farm fresh, brown eggs washed and in a carton.

But, green eggs? These I had to see. I called Natalya Lowther to get directions to her farm. I could barely hear with my kiddo screaming in the background. Ms. Lowther was polite. Instead of saying, “My, woman, can you not control that child?!” She said, kindly, “Oh, do you have a little one? She will love the baby lambs.”

What you need to know about buying eggs

by Expat Chef

Eggs can be found in several colors besides white or brown. The shells can be pink, speckled, blue or even green. The color of the eggshell has nothing to do with the flavor or the nutritional value of the egg. Both of these depend on the diet of the chicken, how it is raised and the freshness of the egg. There is a lot of confusion, however, with all the terms regarding eggs. Caged, Cage-free, Free Range, Pastured, Vegetarian-Fed, High-Omega-3 … what does it all mean?

The information out there does not make the learning curve any easier. For example, the American Egg Board, sponsored by industrial chicken and egg farming, states that “The nutrient content of eggs is not affected by whether hens are raised free-range or in floor or cage operations.”

by Expat Chef

Eggs can be found in several colors besides white or brown. The shells can be pink, speckled, blue or even green. The color of the eggshell has nothing to do with the flavor or the nutritional value of the egg. Both of these depend on the diet of the chicken, how it is raised and the freshness of the egg. There is a lot of confusion, however, with all the terms regarding eggs. Caged, Cage-free, Free Range, Pastured, Vegetarian-Fed, High-Omega-3 … what does it all mean?

The information out there does not make the learning curve any easier. For example, the American Egg Board, sponsored by industrial chicken and egg farming, states that “The nutrient content of eggs is not affected by whether hens are raised free-range or in floor or cage operations.”