Eating local tidbits

I visited a new local food source, Birky Farms. I picked up some pork products (their specialty), some Yoder Popcorn, some Essenhaus noodles, and a few other local products.

Today’s preservation activities:  simmering sweet and tart cherries to freeze.

Today’s harvest: The first Juane Flame tomato. the first squash of the season, a golden zucchini, a couple dozen beans, four very tasty sweet 100 tomatoes, a handful of basil, and an armful of mint that was out of control. There was also one strawberry and one potato that I found while weeding the potato patch. Everything but the potato are from container grown plants. The first coosa squash and first pumpkins can be found on the vines.

These photos of the tomato and squash are from a few days ago.

Independence Days Update Week 11

I feel a bit scattered with my post but things are getting back to normal so next week should be better.

Gardening:  Pulled out the broccoli that flowered while I was gone.  Harvested and pulled the snap pea vines.  Tied tomato vines and then tied some more tomato vines. Potatoes are flowering.  I have a pepper almost big enough to pick and some squash that should be ready within the week.  Some of the larger tomatoes are starting to ripen. Nothing new planted as I need to get the current plants back under control. Working on plans for the fall container garden.

Harvested: small amounts of peas, green beans (and purple), green onions, kale, rhubarb; a few cherry tomatoes; lots of lemon verbena, mint (assorted types), basil (assorted types), oregano, and thyme; a small amount of sage and lavender that were looking rather unkempt.

Preserved: dried lemon verbena, mint, basil, sage, kale leaves, beet greens, lavender, rhubarb, oregano, and thyme.  Added some strawberries to the freezer just before I Ieft for flood relief so I’ll count them here.

Cook something new: They do not require cooking but I have been eating fresh blueberries which is not something I have done before this year. Sad that I lived more than four decades without eating blueberries but there it is.

Prepped/Stored: Thanks to the fact that I drove rather than flew to Rockford, I picked up some things to add to my stores while on the road.  I bought 2 lbs of honey from a local producer in Rockford. I took advantage of a store, Woodman,  with better prices and more selection than my local grocer — not to mention being employee  owned — to purchase some staples. I added more rice, beans, the honey, pastas, teas, a few pounds of coffee, assorted grains to try in 1 and 2 pound amounts, and more organic popcorn.

As I ran errands upon arriving back home, I took advantage of some sales combined with coupons and added a few things to my stash of non-food items: more toilet paper, bandages, tooth brushes, Advil, shampoo, allergy tablets, ammodium, and tums.

I finally gave in and invested in a garden fork; trying to turn the compost with a shovel and hoe was NOT working. I also added more pint and half gallon canning jars to my collection.

Managed: I have been entering my inventory into an a spreadsheet.  After only a few months of picking up extra when I find a good deal, I have a surprising amount on hand.  I am much further along that I would have thought.  I’ll keep picking up and putting up what I can this summer. Any big purchases will have to wait until after regular checks start again at the end of September. Used the aforementioned hoe to thoroughly turn the compost pile.

Local Food Systems:  While in Rockford, I visited two different Farmer’s Markets.  This isn’t local to me but it was supporting local food in general. I have market envy; there is a market almost everyday somewhere in Rockford.  From the markets there, I purchased things I could eat in my motel room and 2 lbs of honey to add to my storage.  After returning home, I made my weekly visit to the local market now that I am back home; my market report for that trip can be found here.  I cooked my OLS meal for the week and posted about it here.

Reduced/Reused/Recycled: I can’t think of anything out of the ordinary here.

Other observations: All local fuel is currently at $4.23 or higher with most over $4.25.

It is good to be home - OLS Week 6

After two weeks of motel rooms and eating out, it is good to be home and back in the eating local fold.

My one local meal for the week started with two chicken breasts from Farm Direct Meat, a yellow squash and knob onion from my morning trip to the Chesterton European Market, and some odds and ends from my garden.

I wanted comfort food so I used a bit of non-local Red Mill baking mix (maybe a 1/2 cup left in a container that I wanted to empty), an egg from Creighton Brothers and Crystal Lake eggs (Atwood, Indiana) and milk from Fair Oaks Dairy (Fair Oaks, Indiana) to bread the chicken after I cut it into chunks.  I fried those in a bit of olive oil (non-local). One of the things I most want to find is a source of local grain products (e.g., flour, pasta, whole grains, something).

To accompany the chicken, I sliced the onion and chopped one of my final three heads of garlic from last summer’s market into a bit of olive oil.  I sliced the squash and added it.  To this I added a couple handfuls of green beans, the quarter cup or so of peas that my vines produced, and the two side shoots of broccoli that I salvaged when I returned home earlier this week.  I heated until just warm but still very crunchy.  Just before I turned off the heat, I added some rosemary leaves I had picked while the vegetables cooked.  Once on the plate I drizzled some non-local balsamic vinegar on top. The veggies would have been even better with some halved grape tomatoes but sadly no tomatoes were ready to be picked today.

The meal did not seem complete when it was on the plate so I quickly washed a handful of blueberries and cherries from Lehman’s Orchards) (Niles, MI) and added those.  To add some more color to the photo, I garnished the plate with some basil and a nasturtium blossom from the containers on my deck.

This is the end result  with plenty of leftovers for tomorrow.

Market Report: July 12 at the Chesterton European Market

I made my trip to the Chesterton European Market . It was a soggy morning but I found some goodies. I did postpone my first ever trip to the Michigan City market until a nicer day.  I purchased from someone new (to me)  as this woman usually sells homemade pet treats. Today she had a few things from her garden which according to her sign is pesticide free. She had some lovely leaf lettuce so I purchased two heads of that at $1 each. She had yellow squash and knob onions for .60 each; three of each are now waiting in my kitchen. Finally she had beets at 4 for $1 so I bought eight of those for the greens and roasting. I picked up a strawberry rhubarb mini pie from Marilyn’s Bakery and my usually rosemary flat bread from Froelich’s. Then I stopped at the Lehman’s Orchard tables to talk to two of my favorite people at the market. From them I purchased two pints of sweet cherries (they will soon disappear until next year), two pints of blueberries (the first of the year for me) and a quart of tart cherries. Peaches were available too but I decided to give them another week or two.

I also spotted cabbage that was labeled as local but didn’t pick up any of that as I had more than enough fresh goodness for now.  The Cheese People were there but I have cheese on hand so I resisted the temptation.  There were of course more baked goods and prepared foods but I passed on those as well. One booth had a few baskets of Michigan strawberries but they didn’t look very fresh.  Sadly I missed much of strawberry season while I was deployed but there is always next year.

Local food not only tastes wonderful but it pleasing to the eye as well.

Why I Make the Choices I Am Making

Mary Jane’s letter in the summer 2008 issue of Mary Jane’s Farm fits nicely with some things I have been pondering. My thoughts have to do with why I take part in things like the Independence Days Challenge or One Local Summer.  They have to do with why I grow my own garden, use canvas shopping bags, engage in community service, sometimes pay more for local and organic products, and host of other daily actions and choices.

As much as these thoughts are about what I do they are also about what I don’t do.  For example, I don’t join in the debates about Peak Oil and/or Climate Warming though I use those debates to make wiser choices. You see it doesn’t matter to me who is right and who is wrong about if/when peak oil has/will be reached.  The fact is that consuming less is the responsible thing to do for the plant, for future generations, and for those is less technologically developed countries that have paid more than their fair share for the lifestyle we in the United States and other most industrialized countries have enjoyed.

I don’t debate the cause of climate changes and whether it is caused by man or if they are part of some natural cycle. Whatever the cause the effects are real.  I write this from motel room where I am deployed on a flood relief operation and as those of us deployed here talk among ourselves it is clear that we all expect the calls to serve to come more and more frequently as the weather becomes more extreme and the population builds more and more often on marginal lands.  Whatever the cause, species are disappearing and the ranges of others are shifting.

Do I think that canvas shopping bags, growing my own food, and supporting local economies will save the world?  Not necessarily but if enough of us start doing little things, I think we can make a difference. Our combined little acts have a better chance of making a difference than doing nothing does.  Will standing against hate and intolerance make it disappear? A world without hate is a pretty big order but challenging intolerance can some times help those around think more openly.

Of course  it would be easier to ignore those things that seem too big and too hard to change.  So why do I keep doing the little things I can? In the words of Mary Jane quoting an activist on a panel sponsored by Physicians for Social Responsibility, “I work on these issues because if the bombs go off, I want to be able to . . . say, I did everything I could.”

Using f “bombs going off” in a general way to encompass climate change, economic collapse and a host of other catastrophes, I do what I can in an attempt to be a part of the solution and not simply a part of the problem.  Still the problem seems daunting and my actions are not nearly all they should be; there are things I relish that I don’t NEED — coffee and hot showers to name a couple.

Mary Jane goes on to offer words of comfort and encourage to those of us making changes, challenging beliefs, finding ourselves on the receiving end of skeptical comments and looks, and chastising ourselves for not doing more. She says:

“For those of us who want the world to be a better place, we mustn’t be too hard on ourselves about whether or not we can accomplish what we set out to do.  We shouldn’t let that deter us.  On a grand scale, that seems mostly out of our hands.  But showing up isn’t, and daring to care isn’t.” (emphasis mine)

So I’ll keep dreaming of my big chosen family living on a homestead that is nearly self sufficient in a world where skin color, sex, relgious or sexual preferences, body shape, and social class matter far less.  I’ll also keep enriching my solo, duplex-living, container gardening life in a imperfect world in all the little ways I can by doing the things in which I believe so that if nothing else I can look in the mirror and say that I showed up, I tried, and I cared.

Another week of motel living

Still working a flood relief operation in Illinois so no One Local Summer or Independence Days post again this week.  I hope to explore a couple of local farmer’s markets here this weekend and hopefully Monday I’ll head back to my own home. After being in preparation (proactive) mode for the last few weeks it is strange to be in response to disaster (reactive) mode. I look forward to getting back to eating food I have grown myself and living a more low impact life.

Visiting a local food network

I am currently away from home but managed to dip my toe into the local food network where I am assigned.  My first discovery was accidental.  Yesterday I stopped for lunch The Olympic Tavern.  I was pleasantly surprised to find a placard on the table letting me know that they “offer the best locally produced food available.”  This bit cut from their website was also included on the table sign.

Our Steaks:  Our steaks are all procured from corn-fed Angus and Herford breed cattle from Northern Illinois farms, the heart of corn country. Our meat is inspected for wholesomeness and graded for quality. We only use the very top Choice and Prime grade meats - the top 10% of the cattle grade. Our steak cuts are hand-selected, aged to perfection, and processed according to our house specifications. We hope you’ll find that eating a high quality piece of beef is a highly satisfying dining experience.

Our Pork: Our pork is hand selected for high marbling from Duroc and Berkshire bred pork. Hand selected for juiciness and tenderness and procured from local farms.

While not entirely local, my lunch of a spinach and scallop salad was delicious. It felt good to eat honest food again after several days of exisiting on typical mass produced food.

My second Winnebago County food adventure was a stop at the Farmer’s Market at Klehm Arboretum. This evening market was well past half way by the time I was released from work and stopped by.  I shared a cucumber that with one of the vendors; she had picked it only a few hours before.  I bought some cucumbers since I can eat them without access to cooking implements.   I bought a jar of local honey to take home.  My breakfast this morning was a scrumptious cinnamon roll from the market.

From eating things I grow to eating out

No Independence Days or One Local Summer posts this week.  For the past 5 days, I have been in Illinois working a disaster relief operation.  Instead of picking what I eat from my own container garden or purchasing it at area farms and farmer’s markets, I am eating food that I don’t even cook myself.  Instead of reducing my consumption as much as possible I am trying to keep the housekeeper from changing the sheets each day. There is an evening market tomorrow at Khlem Arboretum and the hotel room has a small refrigerator so hopefully I can pick up some fresh fruit and veggies that I can eat raw.  That would help.

I miss my garden a great deal.

This blog may be quiet for a couple of weeks

I have received a disaster services assignment and head to one of the many flood/storm areas first thing in the morning.  I might be gone 5 days or might be gone 3 weeks or more.  Until I return there won’t be One Local Summer or Independence Days Updates.

One Local Summer (Week 3)

My one local summer meal for this week is dinner tonight.  I wanted simple so I made a crustless quiche sort of dish accompanied by some cherries Remus Farms from  and some sugar snap peas and strawberries from Johnson’s Farm Stand and the first tomato (husky cherry) of the season from my own garden.

I didn’t use a recipe but the quiche included:

4 Creighton Brothers and Crystal Lake eggs of Atwood, Indiana.

2 cups of milk from from Fair Oaks Dairy of Fair Oaks, Indiana.

Sweet Swiss cheese also from Fair Oaks Dairy

fresh asparagus from Remus Farms in Hobart, Indiana

dried tomatoes from Lehman’s Orchard of Niles, Michigan purchased at Chesterton’s European Market

the last of the baby spinach and some chives from my  container garden

a bit of nutmeg and ground mustard (non local)

The final product wasn’t very photogenic but some of the ingredients were: