A true local food system must provide access to nutritious, local food year-round if it is to be sustainable. (Lee LaVanway, Market Master of the Benton Harbor Fruit Market)
Last month our Brooklyn hub, St. Johns Bread and Life, provided locally sourced ingredients for holiday meals for 2000 families in Bed-Stuy, proving that local can be both accessible and affordable – even in December.
Chris Bedford tells the story of another institution serving local food throughout the year. The Mendel Center at Lake Michigan College worked with Lee LaVanway to purchase and preserve local produce to serve during the winter months. The chefs are happy, the guests are happy – and the college actually saved money, while keeping dollars in the Benton Harbor community. Yes We Can!
In our house, the fall harvest means a lot of cooking and freezing. I’ve spent my spare time in the past few weeks turning great veggies into winter meals.
This week I’m going to share a few recipes I love that are healthy and easy to make. Most important – the ingredients will be in season for another month or more.
Next week we’ll make roasted squash and garlic soup, squash stuffed with wild rice, and spicy collards done two different ways.
I ordered 5 dozen ears of corn last week from Valley Family Farm in Milan, Michigan. I usually get 3 dozen ears to freeze for the winter. But farmers Patricia and Ken grow super sweet corn that barely needs cooking, and at $15 it was pretty hard to pass up the very heavy burlap bag of 60 ears they had waiting for me.
So I had to figure out what to do with it all – quickly. I froze some (blanched for a minute and then cut it off the cobs). Gave some away. Roasted some (in an open pan, slathered in olive oil and sea salt). Boiled some. And still had more corn. Big ears of corn.
Which lead to an experimental corn chowder pulled together from whatever I had in the house, mashing up recipes from a half dozen cook books and web sites. It was a successful experiment by all accounts – not least because the corn was so good.
We need radical thinking, but we don’t need a revolution. We don’t need an overthrow of capitalism. Nor do we need to become vegetarians. We need not become spartans. We’re just going to have to learn how to cook.Dan Barber – Why Cooking Matters
I’m working on an essay about mapping and local food systems and ran across this provocative image – and scary post – by John Mack on the Drug Safety Hub.
I was talking to a new gardener who’s dealing with a healthy crop of tomatoes right now and doesn’t have time to can or cook them. She’s been giving the extras to friends and family, but wants to save some for the winter.
The quickest solution: wash and dry the tomatoes, put them in a freezer bag and stash them in the freezer until you’re ready to cook them. When you take them out of the bag, run the tomatoes under warm water and the skins will fall right off.
Whether you’re growing your own food or shopping the farmers markets, August and September are months of abundance, and you can easily freeze local produce to enjoy through the winter. My five core freezer foods are blueberries, tomatoes, basil, corn and winter squash. They freeze well and easily last until the next year’s harvest. read on for how to’s and recipes…
Loving Mark Bittman’s simple, flexible ideas for using the bounty of the season in his Minimalist column. I’m a sucker for savory recipes that use fresh fruit and three recipes, in particular, jumped out.
1) Mix wedges of tomatoes and peaches, add slivers of red onion, a few red-pepper flakes and cilantro. Dress with olive oil and lime or lemon juice.
I was talking to a new gardener who’s dealing with a healthy crop of tomatoes right now and doesn’t have time to can or cook them. She’s been giving the extras to friends and family, but wants to save some for the winter.
