I’m eating one last plum. One small, soft, juicy, purple-black plum, its pulp sweet and cold, its skin tart and fibrous. One last plum before the summer fruit season ends.
Many of my friends talk about the mixed feelings of changing over their wardrobes from summer to fall: the end of cotton skirts and sleeveless blouses; the ushering-in of wool sweaters and blazers and suede boots. This year, with warm humid temperatures extending into the beginning of October, some of them have sounded more eager than wistful about saying goodbye to bathing suits and sandals and reaching for their autumnal wardrobe.
For me, the wardrobe turnover isn’t all that meaningful. It’s in the fruit crisper that I mark – and lament – the change of seasons.
Goodbye to sweet white peaches, tangy yellow peaches, intensely flavored apricots, red and purple and black plums. Goodbye to complicated cherries, delicious despite their tangle of stems and messy pits, and nectarines, the fruit that seems to have an agreeable disposition, neither as sloppy as peaches nor as mealy as apricots.
Goodbye to summer vegetables as well: plump sweet corn kernels lined up along the cob; dark flavorful tomatoes in blobby irregular spheres.
I’m not adamant about locavorism, mostly because I can’t imagine forever giving up bananas, avocadoes and coffee. But the very best of the summer fruits and vegetables simply aren’t available in the supermarket off-season. And even without being proactively locavore, I appreciate the annual rhythms of the harvest: asparagus in the spring, an abundance of juicy tomatoes and fruits, and flavorful lettuces, in the summer, pears and apples in the fall, oranges and grapefruit in the winter.
So today I say goodbye to summer’s delicious stone fruits. One more perfect plum, and then eight or nine months without. Time to turn to the autumnal harvest for cooking and snacking inspiration. The wheel of the year turns, and we’re at the start of a new season, once again.
Showing posts with label locavore. Show all posts
Showing posts with label locavore. Show all posts
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Quasi-locavore
Preparing Sunday evening’s quasi-locavore menu reminded me that although if it’s awfully difficult to go one hundred percent locavore in our part of the country, it’s always fun to try.
Even Barbara Kingsolver, who brought the concept of a locavore diet to the attention of millions of American readers (including me) in her 2006 memoir Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, allowed each family member one exception, one non-local ingredient that they could sneak in to the yearlong scheme of eating local. Kingsolver herself chose coffee; her daughter chose chocolate. Those would probably be my top two choices as well; I’m not sure which way I’d go if I had to pick just one or the other.
For Sunday’s dinner, to which we’d invited my parents, I started with vegetables I’d bought at Carlisle’s Farmers Market the day before: new potatoes and tomatoes. On Sunday morning, I dropped Holly off to play with her friend Bella, and Bella’s mother handed me a zucchini just picked from their garden.
And the other local cache I had, in addition to these vegetables, was herbs grown in my garden. Some were from cuttings grown in a town close by and others were from my friend Jane’s Carlisle garden, so all the herbs passed the test.
For an appetizer, I made a goat cheese tart topped with herbs and olives. Another year, I would have been able to buy goat cheese right here in town, but unfortunately, our prize-winning goat cheese makers moved out of town earlier this summer. So the cheese wasn’t local, and neither were the olives (which a truly locavore plan would require me to eliminate from our diet altogether, unless we happened to be traveling in Greece), but the herbs scattered over the cheese were. Then I sliced the tomatoes and zucchini, layered them in a baking pan, and made pesto to spread over them. The basil for the pesto came from my garden; the other ingredients – the Parmesan, garlic, pine nuts, olive oil -- were not local, however.
With the potatoes I made potato salad. The local ingredients were the potatoes, of course, and garlic chives from my garden. I theoretically could have made mayonnaise using eggs from local chickens – local eggs are ubiquitously available in our community – but I didn’t, so that was a supermarket item, as was the vinegar, the salt and the pepper.
Since I’m the only vegetarian in my family, I bought sausages to put on the grill: not local at all. I could have increased our locavore score if I’d instead grilled steaks from my parents’ farm. But somehow it never seems right to serve guests food they themselves produced.
For dessert, I made chocolate custard. It would be very difficult to grow cocoa beans in New England or most other parts of the U.S.; chocolate is something many American locavores have to compromise on or give up altogether. The milk and eggs in the custard could have been locally produced if I’d gone to a little more trouble to find those items. Not the sugar, though.
I topped the chocolate custard with raspberry sauce. One of the vendors at Farmers Market had fresh raspberries, and that’s what I should have used, but we’d eaten the entire pint of raspberries we bought before we even left Farmers Market. So that ingredient was grown elsewhere.
All in all, I think my locavore score for this meal was only about a 3 on a scale of 1 to 10, but at other times of year it would be a 0 or a 1, so it’s a start. Locavore eating isn’t easy, as Kingsolver admits in her book about it, especially in New England, where there are abundant choices two or three months a year but very little in the way of fruits and vegetables at other times (although I realize a lot can be done with canning, preserving and freezing).
Moreover, shopping at Farmers Market carries its own inherent conflict. Carlisle’s market includes a few local farms but mostly backyard gardening hobbyists; buying from those gardeners who cultivate plots at our town’s community gardens doesn’t do anything for the goal of supporting local agricultural businesses.
But it’s fun to experiment with locavore cooking and see how far you can get with it. I’m really enjoying my herb garden so far this year, and I’m grateful so many of my neighbors grow vegetables. Later in the summer we’ll go blueberry picking and peach picking and count those into our options as well. In the winter, I’ll probably cave altogether and buy all kinds of distantly grown items. The intent is strong, but during those long winters, it’s hard to resist the occasional fresh strawberry on the supermarket shelf.
Even Barbara Kingsolver, who brought the concept of a locavore diet to the attention of millions of American readers (including me) in her 2006 memoir Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, allowed each family member one exception, one non-local ingredient that they could sneak in to the yearlong scheme of eating local. Kingsolver herself chose coffee; her daughter chose chocolate. Those would probably be my top two choices as well; I’m not sure which way I’d go if I had to pick just one or the other.
For Sunday’s dinner, to which we’d invited my parents, I started with vegetables I’d bought at Carlisle’s Farmers Market the day before: new potatoes and tomatoes. On Sunday morning, I dropped Holly off to play with her friend Bella, and Bella’s mother handed me a zucchini just picked from their garden.
And the other local cache I had, in addition to these vegetables, was herbs grown in my garden. Some were from cuttings grown in a town close by and others were from my friend Jane’s Carlisle garden, so all the herbs passed the test.
For an appetizer, I made a goat cheese tart topped with herbs and olives. Another year, I would have been able to buy goat cheese right here in town, but unfortunately, our prize-winning goat cheese makers moved out of town earlier this summer. So the cheese wasn’t local, and neither were the olives (which a truly locavore plan would require me to eliminate from our diet altogether, unless we happened to be traveling in Greece), but the herbs scattered over the cheese were. Then I sliced the tomatoes and zucchini, layered them in a baking pan, and made pesto to spread over them. The basil for the pesto came from my garden; the other ingredients – the Parmesan, garlic, pine nuts, olive oil -- were not local, however.
With the potatoes I made potato salad. The local ingredients were the potatoes, of course, and garlic chives from my garden. I theoretically could have made mayonnaise using eggs from local chickens – local eggs are ubiquitously available in our community – but I didn’t, so that was a supermarket item, as was the vinegar, the salt and the pepper.
Since I’m the only vegetarian in my family, I bought sausages to put on the grill: not local at all. I could have increased our locavore score if I’d instead grilled steaks from my parents’ farm. But somehow it never seems right to serve guests food they themselves produced.
For dessert, I made chocolate custard. It would be very difficult to grow cocoa beans in New England or most other parts of the U.S.; chocolate is something many American locavores have to compromise on or give up altogether. The milk and eggs in the custard could have been locally produced if I’d gone to a little more trouble to find those items. Not the sugar, though.
I topped the chocolate custard with raspberry sauce. One of the vendors at Farmers Market had fresh raspberries, and that’s what I should have used, but we’d eaten the entire pint of raspberries we bought before we even left Farmers Market. So that ingredient was grown elsewhere.
All in all, I think my locavore score for this meal was only about a 3 on a scale of 1 to 10, but at other times of year it would be a 0 or a 1, so it’s a start. Locavore eating isn’t easy, as Kingsolver admits in her book about it, especially in New England, where there are abundant choices two or three months a year but very little in the way of fruits and vegetables at other times (although I realize a lot can be done with canning, preserving and freezing).
Moreover, shopping at Farmers Market carries its own inherent conflict. Carlisle’s market includes a few local farms but mostly backyard gardening hobbyists; buying from those gardeners who cultivate plots at our town’s community gardens doesn’t do anything for the goal of supporting local agricultural businesses.
But it’s fun to experiment with locavore cooking and see how far you can get with it. I’m really enjoying my herb garden so far this year, and I’m grateful so many of my neighbors grow vegetables. Later in the summer we’ll go blueberry picking and peach picking and count those into our options as well. In the winter, I’ll probably cave altogether and buy all kinds of distantly grown items. The intent is strong, but during those long winters, it’s hard to resist the occasional fresh strawberry on the supermarket shelf.
Friday, January 21, 2011
Winter kitchen
I’ll confess that I’m not a committed locavore. I thoroughly respect the importance of not supporting the long-distance transport of food (and I often wonder what happened to the unfortunate copywriter who came up with Trader Joe’s ‘bringing you tastes from around the world’ campaign at exactly the same time that the ‘eat local’ movement kicked into high gear). But I also can’t imagine making the choice to give up bananas, grapefruits, English cheeses, chocolate, coffee and avocadoes simply because I live in New England. (Though if, like trailblazing locavore and author Barbara Kingsolver, I had to choose just one of the above to keep, I too would choose coffee.)
Even during high harvest season in New England, I like to be able to add a squirt of tropical lime to a batch of salsa I’ve prepared with tomatoes and garlic from the neighbors, or some Asian-imported tofu to a stir-fry of broccoli and corn from our Farmers Market. And I’ve noticed that even my friends who do espouse strong locavore principles in the summer talk about it a lot less once January arrives.
Still, my need for Florida citrus throughout the winter not withstanding, I find I’ve been preparing a lot of winter-inspired foods recently: foods that reflect the chill and darkness of January even if they aren’t truly based on root vegetables picked in September and hauled up from the cellar.
I’ve been making vegetarian soups a lot this month. Minestrone, with big white kidney beans, frozen kale, and canned diced tomatoes. Corn chowder, thickened with diced white and sweet potatoes. Black bean soup flavored with cumin or curry powder (definitely not from a local spice crop). And I’ve made gallons of vegetarian chili, using pinto beans, fire-roasted canned tomatoes, frozen corn, Yves brand meatless “ground beef” substitute for texture, adobo sauce for flavoring.
The current batch of vegetarian chili in my fridge reminds me of something from a children’s story or folk tale: it’s the bottomless pot of soup. I made it nearly two weeks ago. When it was down to its last quarter of a pot, we were invited to a last-minute dinner get-together during a snowstorm, so I cooked some barley and added it to stretch the chili farther, but then we never made it to the party, so I kept it. I didn’t think it would last more than a few days, but every night in the fridge it thickens, so every day when I heat it up for lunch I add water. Then the next day, it’s thick as soup concentrate once again, so I add more water. The chili goes on and on.
Luckily, there’s nothing I’d rather have for lunch. A few years ago, when I had an office job and was brown-bagging every day, I noticed that it takes me approximately the same amount of time and labor – some washing, some chopping, some stirring – to make one sandwich as it does to make a whole pot of soup. But one lasts a day and the other lasts a week. Or longer and longer, in the case of the vegetarian chili.
In another month or two, I’ll be tired of hot, savory soups and be craving the crisp fresh flavors of late summer: raspberries, strawberries, apples, arugula, peppers, tomatoes: foods best eaten as soon as they are picked. Unlike the chili, they barely last a few days, let alone a few weeks. But now it’s the darkest longest part of the winter, with the days only just beginning to lengthen almost imperceptibly, and I’m still in a soup mood. Stirring, heating, sampling, seasoning. Hot winter fare for a long cold winter.
Even during high harvest season in New England, I like to be able to add a squirt of tropical lime to a batch of salsa I’ve prepared with tomatoes and garlic from the neighbors, or some Asian-imported tofu to a stir-fry of broccoli and corn from our Farmers Market. And I’ve noticed that even my friends who do espouse strong locavore principles in the summer talk about it a lot less once January arrives.
Still, my need for Florida citrus throughout the winter not withstanding, I find I’ve been preparing a lot of winter-inspired foods recently: foods that reflect the chill and darkness of January even if they aren’t truly based on root vegetables picked in September and hauled up from the cellar.
I’ve been making vegetarian soups a lot this month. Minestrone, with big white kidney beans, frozen kale, and canned diced tomatoes. Corn chowder, thickened with diced white and sweet potatoes. Black bean soup flavored with cumin or curry powder (definitely not from a local spice crop). And I’ve made gallons of vegetarian chili, using pinto beans, fire-roasted canned tomatoes, frozen corn, Yves brand meatless “ground beef” substitute for texture, adobo sauce for flavoring.
The current batch of vegetarian chili in my fridge reminds me of something from a children’s story or folk tale: it’s the bottomless pot of soup. I made it nearly two weeks ago. When it was down to its last quarter of a pot, we were invited to a last-minute dinner get-together during a snowstorm, so I cooked some barley and added it to stretch the chili farther, but then we never made it to the party, so I kept it. I didn’t think it would last more than a few days, but every night in the fridge it thickens, so every day when I heat it up for lunch I add water. Then the next day, it’s thick as soup concentrate once again, so I add more water. The chili goes on and on.
Luckily, there’s nothing I’d rather have for lunch. A few years ago, when I had an office job and was brown-bagging every day, I noticed that it takes me approximately the same amount of time and labor – some washing, some chopping, some stirring – to make one sandwich as it does to make a whole pot of soup. But one lasts a day and the other lasts a week. Or longer and longer, in the case of the vegetarian chili.
In another month or two, I’ll be tired of hot, savory soups and be craving the crisp fresh flavors of late summer: raspberries, strawberries, apples, arugula, peppers, tomatoes: foods best eaten as soon as they are picked. Unlike the chili, they barely last a few days, let alone a few weeks. But now it’s the darkest longest part of the winter, with the days only just beginning to lengthen almost imperceptibly, and I’m still in a soup mood. Stirring, heating, sampling, seasoning. Hot winter fare for a long cold winter.
Friday, August 27, 2010
Some days are better than others (dietarily speaking)
From my stomach’s perspective, it’s like that popular children’s book about Alexander: yesterday was a terrible, horrible, no-good, very-bad day.
Well, it wasn’t all bad gastronomically. But too much of it was. It just happens sometimes: I get too busy and made too many poor gustatory choices. Our housecleaner was working in the kitchen all morning (which was wonderful) so I took the kids to Bruegger’s. The egg sandwiches sounded tempting until it occurred to me that I’ve never seen a frying pan at Bruegger’s, so where exactly are they getting fried eggs from? Pre-packaged and microwaved? Instead I went with cream cheese. And a bagel. That’s not awful, but it’s not great.
My mother and I both like to cook, and since we’re next-door neighbors we frequently share our creations. She gave me a serving of a delicious chick pea, tomato and feta salad, so I had that for lunch, and then started to feel like I was more on track from a nutritional standard. But then in the late afternoon I embarked on a long drive to my in-laws’ house – I expected it to take an hour but it took more than two because of traffic – and along the way ate a bag of caramel popcorn and a chocolate bar. That was way more sugar and stickiness than I needed in one afternoon.
And when I arrived at my in-laws’, I was already late for the dinner celebrating my father-in-law’s birthday, so of course I dug right in to my mother-in-law’s homemade macaroni and cheese. Followed, naturally, by birthday cake. And not just any birthday cake: ice cream cake, made with mint chocolate chip ice cream, crushed cookies, and fudge sauce.
Did I mention that all of this was only a couple of hours after the sticky sweetened popcorn and the chocolate bar?
Some days are like that. Other days I try to practice good nutritious locavore habits, especially on Farmers Market days when I buy piles of fresh tomatoes, basil, peppers, corn, lettuce. At times like that, it’s easy to eat right, although there are favorite foods that make me think I would need to develop a much firmer ideology if I wanted to go whole-heartedly locavore: bananas, avocados and coffee are just a few of the distantly grown crops it would be hardest for me to give up.
So yesterday might have been dismal gastronomically, but rather than dwell on it, I remind myself that today I’ll do better. I’ll start the day with an aerobic workout and a quart of water, like I always do, and I’ll pursue better eating habits than I did yesterday. While it’s not exactly like we get a completely clean slate dietarily every day – what we eat obviously accumulates in and on our bodies in various ways – it’s also true that one bad day of too much popcorn and chocolate and carbs and white flour doesn’t mean I won’t adhere to better standards the next day.
And then once I’ve convinced myself of this from a nutritional perspective, I remind myself that it’s true in other areas as well. There are days when I scold the kids too much; I remind myself I can improve the next day. There are days when I do too little work, or neglect to read anything of substance, or grow exasperated with my husband. But just as with bad eating choices, none of those mistakes is irreversible.
So I take a lesson from popcorn and chocolate: it was the wrong choice, but I’ll make better choices another day. Forgive yourself. Try again. It’s much healthier in the long run than stewing in self-recrimination. There will be caramel popcorn days and locally grown tomato days, whether the food is actual or metaphorical. Not happy with the choices you made today? Do better tomorrow. That’s a good enough approach for now.
Well, it wasn’t all bad gastronomically. But too much of it was. It just happens sometimes: I get too busy and made too many poor gustatory choices. Our housecleaner was working in the kitchen all morning (which was wonderful) so I took the kids to Bruegger’s. The egg sandwiches sounded tempting until it occurred to me that I’ve never seen a frying pan at Bruegger’s, so where exactly are they getting fried eggs from? Pre-packaged and microwaved? Instead I went with cream cheese. And a bagel. That’s not awful, but it’s not great.
My mother and I both like to cook, and since we’re next-door neighbors we frequently share our creations. She gave me a serving of a delicious chick pea, tomato and feta salad, so I had that for lunch, and then started to feel like I was more on track from a nutritional standard. But then in the late afternoon I embarked on a long drive to my in-laws’ house – I expected it to take an hour but it took more than two because of traffic – and along the way ate a bag of caramel popcorn and a chocolate bar. That was way more sugar and stickiness than I needed in one afternoon.
And when I arrived at my in-laws’, I was already late for the dinner celebrating my father-in-law’s birthday, so of course I dug right in to my mother-in-law’s homemade macaroni and cheese. Followed, naturally, by birthday cake. And not just any birthday cake: ice cream cake, made with mint chocolate chip ice cream, crushed cookies, and fudge sauce.
Did I mention that all of this was only a couple of hours after the sticky sweetened popcorn and the chocolate bar?
Some days are like that. Other days I try to practice good nutritious locavore habits, especially on Farmers Market days when I buy piles of fresh tomatoes, basil, peppers, corn, lettuce. At times like that, it’s easy to eat right, although there are favorite foods that make me think I would need to develop a much firmer ideology if I wanted to go whole-heartedly locavore: bananas, avocados and coffee are just a few of the distantly grown crops it would be hardest for me to give up.
So yesterday might have been dismal gastronomically, but rather than dwell on it, I remind myself that today I’ll do better. I’ll start the day with an aerobic workout and a quart of water, like I always do, and I’ll pursue better eating habits than I did yesterday. While it’s not exactly like we get a completely clean slate dietarily every day – what we eat obviously accumulates in and on our bodies in various ways – it’s also true that one bad day of too much popcorn and chocolate and carbs and white flour doesn’t mean I won’t adhere to better standards the next day.
And then once I’ve convinced myself of this from a nutritional perspective, I remind myself that it’s true in other areas as well. There are days when I scold the kids too much; I remind myself I can improve the next day. There are days when I do too little work, or neglect to read anything of substance, or grow exasperated with my husband. But just as with bad eating choices, none of those mistakes is irreversible.
So I take a lesson from popcorn and chocolate: it was the wrong choice, but I’ll make better choices another day. Forgive yourself. Try again. It’s much healthier in the long run than stewing in self-recrimination. There will be caramel popcorn days and locally grown tomato days, whether the food is actual or metaphorical. Not happy with the choices you made today? Do better tomorrow. That’s a good enough approach for now.
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