Farm to Philly in the news!

Friday, March 06, 2009

We’ve been keeping a little secret around here, but now that the latest issue of Grid magazine has hit the streets we feel safe letting the cat out of the bag: Farm to Philly is featured in this month’s issue (see page 5)!  If you haven’t heard of Grid, it’s a new monthly mag that focuses on what all of us can do to live more sustainably in the Philadelphia area.  This is their third issue.

A few other things in this month’s issue: a recipe for turnovers featuring the really fantastic canned peaches from Three Springs Farm (I tried them a month ago while volunteering at the Fair Food Farmstand - they are amazing!), a primer on home brewing, and an article about Southwark restaurant (they have a seasonal menu focused on locally grown foods!).  You can get the entire magazine online, or you can pick up a copy in your neighborhood.

We also have more good news: Farm to Philly will be a featured blog when Where the Locals Eat launches its online list of “The Best Food Blogs in Amerca”.  You’ve probably seen dining guides from Where the Locals Eat - they’ve been publishing yearly guides since 1996.  Recent editions include New York, Los Angeles, Nashville and Las Vegas. Last September they released an iPhone application called LocalEats (look in the Travel categories to find that app).

In the News…

Saturday, February 28, 2009

Having been a hectic few weeks preparing for vacation, I haven’t done too much cooking.  I did, however, find time for some reading, and few interesting pieces come through my Inbox, The New York Times’ Dining section, and from Plan Philly. 

First, Wednesday’s Dining Section had a long article on artisanal products handmade in Brooklyn (where else?).  These craftsmen are all coming at this from other careers; for some, these products are just a side business.  Far from being in competition, they promote each other’s work, and even barter amongst themselves.  There is definitely a defiant, you-could-never-do-this-in-Manhattan strain to it - not to mention the New York-centric attitude of the writers and New York Times in general.  Nonetheless, it’s worth reading.  I’ve had fun try to imagine which local producers would appear in a similar article on Philadelphia.  Are you listening Inquirer? 

Second, from Plan Philly, there is an exciting announcement about the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority (RDA) permitting urban greenhouses on RDA land for the short-term (three to five years).  The first project could be up in running as soon as this Spring.  Yet more evidence that we deserve far more credit than we get for local food.

Finally, I was excited to learn that Michael and Charis, of Red Earth Farm, are coming to Philadelphia to meet CSA members in late March.  The meeting will be at Mugshots Coffeehouse, on 21st and Fairmount, from 5 - 7pm..  For all Red Earth members, this should be an enjoyable experience.  Going on my third year as a site host and having had many e-mail and phone conversations with Charis, it will be nice to meet them face to face.  Incidentally, Red Earth Farm - if you can believe it - is expanding.  They’ve offered advanced purchases of 2010 shares to help finance the purchase of an adjacent tract.  Amazing to think that a local farm is actually growing in size. 

The People’s Garden…maybe

Tuesday, February 24, 2009

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack took a jackhammer to the concrete in front of USDA headquarters in Washington to begin construction on the inaugural People’s Garden earlier this month.

The new garden will add 612 square feet of planted space to an existing garden traditionally planted with ornamentals. The garden will showcase conservation practices that all Americans can implement in their own backyards and green spaces. As a component of the garden, pollinator-friendly plantings will not only provide important habitat for bees and butterflies, but can serve as an educational opportunity to help people understand the vital role pollinators play in our food, forage and all agriculture. The garden plot is adjacent to the site of the USDA Farmer’s Market.

According to Vilsack, the People’s Garden illustrates President Obama’s commitment to “responsible stewardship of our land, water and other natural resources, and one way of restoring the land to its natural condition is what we are doing here today”.  The garden will contain fruit trees and vegetables (although the larger project includes things like window boxes on adjacent buildings and conservation techniques), the output of which will be donated to soup kitchens in the D.C. area.  And we hear that more of these little gardens are scheduled to pop up at other USDA facilities across the country.

Michele Obama supported the initiative by dropping off a heritage breed Magnolia seedling to the ceremony, saying “I’m a big believer in community gardens, both because of their beauty and for their access to providing fresh fruits and vegetables to so many communities across this nation and the world.”

Apparently, none of us should get too excited, though - the pavement that was torn up by Vilsack won’t really be a garden: it’ll just be grass.  Yes, grass is better than concrete, but how about some edible landscaping?  And there are some who say this entire initiative was little more than a photo op gone horribly, horribly awry.  There’s not much of a plan for the garden: there’s no budget and the growing of any vegetables or fruit will be a volunteer gig and there’s no real plan to determine how food banks would get these theoretical vegetables.  So what’s the bottom line?  Well…a garden may or may not be planted.  That’s kind of a bummer.  To quote Fox Mulder, I want to believe.

Philly in the NY Times - Again!

Saturday, January 17, 2009

I’m not sure I can believe it, but Philadelphia has made The New York Times again, and there isn’t a hint of condescension.  Don’t get me wrong; our house is devoted to the “paper of record.” However, the Times can occasionally take a “the-natives-are-surprisingly-sophisticated” attitude when they venture outside of the five boroughs (or is it just Manhattan?) and act like when something is new to the New York Region, it must be new everywhere (i.e., nothing happens anywhere else first). 

Nonetheless, there is a feature on some of our finest local beer.  Between the article and the accompanying slideshow, they touch on many of the best local breweries.  Couple this with a fawning review of Vetri by Frank Bruni, and it’s starting to look like Philadelphia is earning some respect. 

P.S. Local food is the subject of this week’s Splendid Table

Local Green Heroes: The ChallaMan

Friday, January 16, 2009

As a compliment to Jackie’s post about making bread and Four Worlds Bakery, I bring you a video clip. I am a loyal patron to Four Worlds Bakery. I generally buy a half loaf of bread a week (my favorites are the multi grain levain, cranberry-walnut levain and spelt levain), along with the occasional bulk order of local flour, sucanat or bran litter. Customers receive a couple of emails a week concerning news, updates and order information. This week’s email included a five minute video showing interviews of the ChallaMan himself and documenting the move from baking in his own basement to a professional baking space behind Kaffa Crossing at 45th and Chestnut. This move was orchestrated not by U-Haul, not by Philly Car Share, but by the Pedal Co-op—bicycles! Michael Dollich has the noble goal of going carbon neutral, and moving via bicycles is an excellent way to support that goal.

Indeed, Michael Dollich offers the community with his bakery a true sustainable business model. He bakes to order. Bread that is not sold is frozen and sold at half price. He mills his own grains to ensure freshness and sells the remaining bran as kitty litter (my cats are living proof that this litter is just as good as S-Wheat Scoop, only much much cheaper at $0.25/lb, and perhaps a bit more powdery). To save waste in terms of packaging and payment envelopes, there is a reusable bag system into which regular customers can buy (a one time $10 investment), and for drop off payments, envelopes are offered, which are constantly reused and recycled for future order payments. All of this waste reduction is not for naught. After one month of baking out of the professional kitchen, Four Worlds Bakery produced one single bag of trash. If that is not commendable, I don’t know what is!

In the ChallaMan and his Four Worlds Bakery Philadelphia finds a true, green, community-oriented hero! Keep up the inspiring work, Michael.

A localvore’s wishlist for Obama

Wednesday, December 24, 2008

Yesterday the New York Times ran a column about how federal food policy may change in an Obama White House.  Many point out that since Obama is taking office during a time of economic recession and crises for the financial and auto industries, recent attacks on women’s health care and human rights, as well as those two wars we’ve got going on and the energy/environmental cluster&%#@...well, maybe the food policy might not be right up there on his list of things to overhaul.  And Obama’s choice of Tom Vilsack doesn’t exactly speak to his interest in small scale farms.

Still, it doesn’t stop many of us from fantasizing what this could mean.  The column writer speculates that Obama is more of a ‘foodie’ than the current occupant of the White House (something tells me that wouldn’t take much - I envision private moments in the White House as such: the President in his boxers sitting around in a lounge chair, one hand in his waistband, the other clutching a Bud Light, a plate of Triscuits with Easy Cheese at his side), and Michele Obama has put it out there that she buys organic produce whenever possible.  The new Chief of Staff belongs to a synagogue that runs a CSA program.  The local foods movement is not entirely foreign to these folks.

My gut tells me that of all the things people would like to see happen, the one that may have a chance of getting tackled is the issue of school lunch programs.  If you have a kid who regularly buys lunch at school, you know that the lunches are generally not the highest quality (who can forget the “catsup is a vegetable!’ fiasco during the Reagan years?).  As an alumni of the reduced cost and free school lunch welfare program (we were fairly po’ growing up), I vividly remember school lunches of dismal, grey mystery meat “salisbury steak” and fake mashed potatoes. 

There are a million studies that have looked at alternative school lunch programs where the cafeterias focus on healthy meals, fresh produce, and even sourcing locally grown foods - all say the same thing: kids who eat better have better focus and do better in school (not to mention it helps combat the growing obesity epidemic).  Considering how badly U.S. school students lag behind other countries in math, science, etc., and given President-Elect Obama’s commitment to education, overhauling the federal school lunch program might be a possibility.

An overhaul could not come at a better time for Philadelphia.  In October of 2008, the USDA decided to terminate Philadelphia’s Universal Feeding Program.  The UFP is a model that many other cities around the country were looking to adopt - it basically eliminated the paperwork needed to opt into the school lunch program.  In a school system in which at least 75% of families qualify, it seems like a good idea.  It saved the school district a lot of money in paperwork processing fees and the stigma of getting a free lunch was reduced.  The new schools superintendent also began a program to offer breakfast that depended on the continuation of the UFP.

Now granted, the Philadelphia program was by no means a healthy program.  Like all school programs, it relies on giant quantities of frozen and prefab foods that aren’t exactly super quality (and the Philadelphia school district never has the kind of money they need to provide quality education to its students, let alone quality nutrition).  With our wealth of local farmers and the many organizations in the area devoted to sustainable agriculture, my guess is that it wouldn’t be all that hard to put together a more healthful program focused on fresh and locally sourced foods - if the federal government were backing such an initiative.  And taking Philadelphia’s dismal high school graduation rates into consideration, this kind of an overhaul could help at least a little bit.

[graphic is from the NYT column]

Locally grown: a coming trend in the NFL?

Tuesday, December 23, 2008

It’s practically sacrilegious to admit this in the Philadelphia region, but I am not much of a sports fan.  While many are bemoaning the latest Eagles loss, I can barely bring myself to even notice that the Eagles are actually in the midst of football season.  Even though I don’t really care about sports so much, I was tickled to see an article in the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette about the executive chef for the Pittsburgh Steelers football team and the team management’s commitment to locally grown foods and environmental sustainability:

Most pro football players don’t sing the slow-food mantra of local sustainable food. If you ask them, they might say it is nice to eat an apple from a local farmer. But most football players aren’t talking about it the way the students did at Carnegie Mellon University, where Chef Hayes worked as a sous chef for Parkhurst Dining.

Buying local is important for Dan Rooney, owner of the team.

About 20 percent of the food used at the Steelers training facility is locally sourced, but most is not organic, said Jamie Moore, Parkhurst’s director of sourcing and sustainability.

[...] Chef Hayes also grows his own herbs just outside his kitchen. What’s the herb of choice of Steelers? “Football players don’t have a favorite herb,” he said. Then he added: “Pepper.”

I couldn’t find any information about whether any of the chefs for our local sports teams (or the team management) embrace those same ideals.  For all I know, the Eagles, Phillies, etc. are awash in locally and sustainably grown foods.  It’s nice to imagine that the local sports team who rely on community support are giving back by supporting area farmers.

Obama: A Model For Farmers?

Thursday, December 18, 2008

This past election, Obama led what many are calling the best campaign of all time. It was tight, well-run and well-organized as well as being the techie-est campaign ever. And, according to a seminar I attended a couple of weeks ago, farmers (or any community group) would do well to pay attention to the tools that the campaign used, namely, the use of online organizing.

A couple of months ago I wrote a piece about how farmer’s need websites. It got some responses, most of which, understandably, had to do with being able to afford it as well as cold feet about the technical aspect. So first, let me talk about the seminar that I attended because I believe that this alone could be a huge help in both respects. BarCamp Philly was a free seminar that creates a real-life equivalent of the online experience to push and reciprocate knowledge. It’s free-form, open discussion groups that lasted all day and (see picture below) came with some nice booty. Anyone can lead a “class”: you can either be an expert OR someone who simply has a question and would like to pick the brains of others. This would be the perfect opportunity for local farmers (or an emissary) to post a class to discuss whatever tech questions concern them. In addition, it would give anyone a great chance to network. You could, possibly, find out information about, say eCommerce and find a programmer or consultant. There is such a community aspect to this that the people you find here want to help, as opposed to seeing you as just a great big dollar sign.

So, what does this have to do with Obama being a model for farmers? Well, as I mentioned, one of the seminars discussed online organizing and how the Obama campaign really blew the lid off of this. Their techniques, their databases, their technology was A++. The seminar leader compared this model to traditional, offline organizing (this model, although made for a campaign, is just as applicable to any community-building needs). He predicted that those community-based organizations who don’t adapt to this model will quickly either be locked out and made irrelevant, taken over by a competing group or, and this is most dire, replaced by corporate structures that co-opt the goals of these community groups but do so to sell a product or agenda. This is, unfortunately, what’s at stake: as the local foods movement becomes larger, corporate interests will move in. And when they move in, guess who moves out? In order to keep the basic spirit of local foods (the ability to actually see and talk to the farmer that produced your food), this group needs to organize and use the very best tools at it’s disposal. I envision an umbrella organization of all area local farmers who, through the strength of pooling their resources, can set up the necessary online devices to keep this movement relevant to it’s customers. Then, that organizes it’s customers. Farmers will now have a database of those interested potential customers and can set up efficient and relevant ways to reach them. Marketing can now be microtargeted, rather than a shot in the dark.

So, let’s take my previous post a step further: not only do farmers need websites, but they need a collective, umbrella site whose main function is to be the “go-to” place for anyone seeking information about local PA. There are already sites that attempt to be a go-to place (Local Harvest, Farm To City). But we should consider these Web 1.0. We need an upgrade. First off, create something that is PA based. Then, give it enough useful and pertinent information so that potential customers will willingly give their email and other contact (and demographic!) info. Then you can take that info and tailor events, growings, everything to how to best reach those that want to be reached. It would be the best money ever spent. I mean imagine: reaching people who want to be reached! See, this is the big advantage to community-based marketing as opposed to corporate marketing. No one gives a crap about what Tide can do for them. But there are groups of people willing to spend (and spend!) on sustainable agriculture and well-made food. Microtargeted marketing is perfect for small groups such as local-foods producers.

The fact is, these are rough economic times. People want value for their dollar. Stay in their minds through marketing. And market by using the best tools available. Times like these can be a downer or they can be the best opportunity ever. Market, state value, partner up with anyone with a plot of land and a stand at a farmer’s market. And don’t be afraid of tech seminars. Most of these people are the nicest people that you will ever meet. Get the most bang for your buck. I know that it’s hard to find dollars to spare. Go talk to your neighbor. Tell him or her to group together. Get an umbrella organization and use that as a portal for personal websites. In these times, that’s the wisest use of marketing dollars. I won’t lie to you: these types of websites are expensive. But in addition to tapping the resources of your neighbors, also tap into the resources that the web provides. Go to seminars such as Bar Camp Philly. Heck, feel free to write me for advice on where to turn to next. There are great resources out there. There are people that truly believe in what you are doing. And we want to help. Just tap us on the shoulder and say “I got great farm products!”. After we’re done salivating, we’ll give you advice. Just keep making that delicious raw milk cheese. Deal?

Introductions!

Thursday, December 04, 2008

My name is Melanie and I am the newest contributor here at “Farm to Philly.” I have been avidly following this site for the last few months and am incredibly excited to join the team! For my first post I would like to offer an introduction to myself and, more specifically, to my food beliefs.

To precisely describe what I am in terms of what I eat is tricky. Vegetarian is not 100% accurate. I do eat fish (eco-best). Had I a real hankering, I might consider eating meat that comes from a local farm which observes sustainable practices. Locavore might fit. I strongly believe in eating local and thereby supporting local small farms and the local economy. I do not eat 100% local, however. And I do not believe that eating only local is necessary. Supporting free trade and buying organic products that travel to my table in environmentally responsible ways contradicts in no way my food beliefs. The most appropriate nomenclature for me would be, perhaps, ecovore. The environment and my impact on it informs what I eat, how I eat and how I live. That being said, I probably eat 75%-95% local. Thanks to my local food co-op, frequent visits to the farmer’s market and a CSA share, this takes little effort and costs much less than you would imagine.

This might be the appropriate moment to slip in that I am a graduate student living off of a modest stipend under the shadow of an immodest student loan debt. Eating good quality ingredients and connecting with your local businesses and farmers is not a privilege of the wealthy. My co-op, Mariposa, (which accepts food stamps, as do the majority of area farmer’s markets) allows me to set up a monthly food budget by paying a self-determined amount to my account each month and shopping off of it. The decision to join a CSA (Keystone Farm) was largely a financial one. I do love to eat and I love to cook. Beautiful, local, fresh produce thrills me. The colors, smells, new flavors—I can not get enough. But I, admittedly, would sometimes go overboard at the farmer’s market and spend far too much. Thus a CSA share structured my purchases. At the moment I pay approximately $20 a week to receive one dozen eggs, a local cheese, farm-made granola, and a large assortment of fruits and vegetables from Keystone Farm. This is an organic farm, mind you. I actually share half of this with a friend, as it is really intended for a family (I live alone). So for $10 a week I have more local, organic food than I can sometimes eat. For the winter share (starting December 13th) I will do a half share for, again, approximately $10 a week. Half-dozen eggs, one cheese, one bag granola, fruits and vegetables. I don’t know that there is a better bargain.

I have resided in Philadelphia for the last one and a half years. Philadelphia: The city of brotherly love. The city that loves you back. A city with one of the highest murder and crime rates in the country. A mecca of slow food and its locavore followers? As a matter of fact, yes (to all of the above). A grand, gritty, city, Philadelphia indeed has shown itself to be an ideal place for those who care about food and who want to make a difference through food. Since May I have resided in the eco-haven of Philadelphia, West Philly. Here can be found my farmer’s market, my co-op, as well as many a liberal, green, progressive type. Clark Park, acting as the cornerstone green space of my neighborhood, serves as an interesting intersection of academics, artists, hippies, punks, African-Americans, Eritreans, and more. And it kind of works.

It’s probably about time that I say something that might cast some light onto why I think any of this matters. I vividly recall a conversation with a dear friend in which said friend acknowledged my food beliefs—he does respect, humor and even partake to some extent in them—but made the point that there are greater issues: poverty, abuse, violence, war, whatever. Of course. These are real issues and they are of great importance to me and should be to all. I would be deeply insulted to think that anyone who knows me would ever imagine that I do not care about these things (and this person was not going that far). But my food beliefs (which I do not intend to push onto anyone, though perhaps some might take note of my example) reflect a certain mindset. Approaching food thoughtfully, being aware of where it comes from, informing oneself about production and environmental impact, limiting waste all have greater implications. Everyone has to eat. Changing the way you address your diet affects the way you address the rest of your life and the world. This may sound idealistic, but encouraging people to be thoughtful, aware and informed could really bring about radical change. My thoughtfulness does not end with food, nor does my concern end with the environment.

I doubt I will make such “radical” statements in future posts, but I do believe very strongly in how I choose to live and eat. In the coming months, I intend to share recipes, gush over exciting, local food, and possibly rant about food politics.

p.s. I abhor high-fructose corn syrup.

p.p.s. My West Philly apartment has a great roof space, on which I had my first urban garden this summer! Here’s the current fall view from it:

All points bulletin: a good cook!

Thursday, October 16, 2008

While admittedly I harbor fantasies about having my own cooking show where I try to out-local Jamie Oliver, I lack the charm and skill to pull something off like that.  But now is my chance - and yours - to at least make an effort to get that show!  The Next Food Network Star is coming to Philadelphia for auditions.  No doubt they saw all of our local flavor on display last night when the Phillies made it to the World Series and decided they had to give us a shot!

WHAT WE ARE LOOKING FOR:
Cooking Know-How: You can be self-taught or professionally trained or somewhere in between, BUT YOU MUST HAVE FOOD KNOWLEDGE!!
Personality that Pops: Do people often tell you that you have the charisma and personality to have your own cooking show?
Teaching Skills: Do you teach at culinary school or maybe a cooking class and want to bring those teaching skills to the next level? Do you have a clear point of view on food and want to teach America about it?

****One winner will receive his or her own six-episode show!!!
IF THE ABOVE DESCRIBES YOU, ATTEND THE OPEN CALL!!

Philadelphia, PA- Wednesday, October 29th, 2008- 10am-3pm
Embassy Suites Hotel- Philadelphia- Center City
1776 Benjamin Franklin Parkway, Philadelphia, PA 19107

Important Directions:
The Casting open call will be on the 28th floor of the hotel

Things to Remember:
Please download application (http://www.foodnetwork.com/star) and bring to the open call.
Call backs will be held the next day so please plan accordingly.

For more information or questions, please e-mail .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address)

I always thought the Food Network needed more shows about seasonal eating!  Now is our chance!

Kosher Wars

Monday, October 13, 2008

As a non-practicing Jew, before I knew about locally grown, pastured meats I often bought kosher meats in the supermarket assuming they were somehow superior to the rest of the factory farmed cuts on the shelves. I really didn’t know much about kashering, the act of making something kosher, other than the interesting fact that rabbis can kasher an oven with a blow torch. I knew that there’s a certain way that an animal must be slaughtered in order to be kosher, a way that’s supposed to be more humane, but I didn’t realize that most rabbis no longer perform the act until I heard rumors of PETA footage of slaughterhouse atrocities. 

Kosher Wars, an article in this weekend’s New York Times Magazine, explores the meaning of kosher and the movement to link kosher food to ethical issues, discussing a kosher food economy based on a model of farmer’s markets and coops.

Ten years ago, learning how to slit animals’ throats by hand was simply not a compelling choice for young rabbis of the clean-shaven, earnest sort like Kastner. But the politicization of food issues and the popularization of epicurean and artisanal eating has made learning Jewish food traditions relevant for a new generation. Kastner grew up in the Reform movement, which 120 years ago formally disavowed kashrut, the kosher dietary laws, as an anachronistic impediment to “modern spiritual elevation” — though Reform leaders later softened their position, decreeing that kashrut was a matter of personal choice. But for Kastner, Jewish ritual slaughter actually seems a bit revolutionary. He says he thinks that contemporary disconnection from our food sources is the cause of numerous environmental and social ills, like the national obesity epidemic. He wanted to be a shochet to help people make more healthful food choices and reconnect to the source of their food, and to encourage investment in local agriculture. He says the rules around kosher food — like the requirement that meat be slaughtered by a pious person with a certain intention and the requirement to say a blessing over every food acknowledging its source (land, tree, grain, other) — encourage mindful eating and discourage overconsumption of resources.

Kastner is part of a nascent Jewish food movement that draws upon the vast body of Jewish traditions related to agriculture and farming; Judaism, for all its scholarly abstraction, is a land-based religion. The movement emphasizes the natural intersections between the sustainable-food movement and kashrut: a shared concern for purity and an awareness of the process food goes through before it reaches the table. “The core of kashrut is the idea of limiting oneself, that not everything that we can consume should be consumed,” Kastner said. “I wouldn’t buy a ham sandwich, and I would also refrain from buying an exotic mangosteen imported from China, which wastes fossil fuels and is grown with pesticides.” He told me he studied shechita because he wants to “create food systems outside the industrial model.” He has been trying to set up a grass-fed-kosher-meat co-op in his neighborhood; he says he hopes to travel to a local farm and shecht the animals himself.

The full article is here.

Hendricks Farms cleared in raw milk scare

Wednesday, October 01, 2008

For the last month or so, Hendricks Farms and Dairy has been in the middle of a health scare - on September 11, the farm’s license to sell raw milk was suspended after at least 10 people in Bucks and Montgomery counties and two from New York were infected with campylobacter.  The bacteria allegedly came from raw milk purchased at Hendricks Farms.  Happily, Pennsylvania reinstated their license on September 19 after state ag lab tests came back negative for the bacteria.

Trent Hendricks, owner of the farm, tests their products and equipment every week, and treats his cows very, very well.  The farm sells 600 gallons of raw milk each week, not to mention all their fantastic cheese made from the milk. 

The state jumped the gun in placing the blame on Hendricks Farm, and this could very well be part of the larger war against raw milk sales.  Several states around the country prohibit the sales of raw milk for human consumption, and Pennsylvania clearly has concerns about its safety.  This only illustrates how important it is to know and trust the person from which you’re purchasing raw milk - raw milk purchased from a reputable source is as safe as purchasing milk from the supermarket (more so, considering the lack of chemicals and added nutrients).

What Is Local Again?

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

As we wait to board our plane here at Heathrow,  I’ve been thinking about food (since it’ll hours before I get some decent food, I suppose).  I spent some time getting acquainted with local food by visiting Borough Market, eating at “local” restaurants, and even shopping at a Farmer’s Market in Oxford.  So, in my last few minutes in the UK, I am asking myself, “What can Philadelphia learn about local food from London?”  Here, in no particular order, is what I’ve found. 

Local Seafood - Naturally, I was impressed by what was available at Borough Market, but that extended to several dinners I had in London and even Oxford.  Granted, London is a short distance from the coast, but so is Philadelphia, and we don’t have anything remotely commensurate.  The fish and oysters I’ve had here surpass anything I’ve tasted in the States – particularly the oysters.  Aside from wine (see below), I feel continually frustrated in my efforts to eat local seafood - and I know I’m not alone.

Local Food Gardens - For whatever reason, the Tate Britain was lined with a luscious herb garden.  If I had a kitchen at the time,  may very well have plucked a few leaves when no one was looking.  However, last week, when I visited Anne Hathaway’s cottage in Stratford-Upon-Avon, the garden (dubbed a “Victorian” garden) was full of enough food to feed me and my wife for the remainder of the summer – including the most amazing artichokes I’ve seen since Culton Organics’.  There’s a nascent movement of converting vacant lots into urban farms, and what I’ve seen here indicates to me that this holds only more promise.  If a restaurant like Konstam can fashion its menu from what can be found within the London Underground network, what can Philadelphia do?

Gastropubs - As well as any American city, Philadelphia gets gastropubs (we’ve had the Standard Tap much longer than New York has had the Spotted Pig), but we do not have anything to compare to London.  I was fortunate enough to eat at the Duke of Cambridge (an organic pub to boot), but I also enjoyed the Anchor and Hope (potted cockles, yum) as well – and those are just what I managed to get to on my budget.  There was the Eagle and the Coach and Horses that were on my list, too.  Should places like the Royal Tavern and Standard Tap continue to open, it seems only natural that they - seeking to be neighborhood destinations - showcase local food. 

Local Organic Beer and Wine - Philadelphia is such a great beer town, so why don’t we have organic beers? Of course, the Duke of Cambridge was serving them, but I also had an organic ale at a chain restaurant (Gourmet Burger Kitchen), that was brewed from hops grown on the farm.  Local wine for me, mostly, is still nascent.  As much as I would love to drink local wines, I’ve tasted very few that equal my favorites from Southern Italy. 

Celebrity Chefs Gone for Local Food - If you haven’t already seen Jamie Oliver (and, given the crappy timeslot from the Food Network, you may not have), he’s already gung ho for local food.  At our lunch at Fifteen (a worthy enterprise in its own right), my braised pork shoulder actually named the local farmer from whom it was purchased.  Yet, that’s not all.  Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall, of River Cottage fame, has a weekly series.  More interesting, Marco Pierre White is fashioning the ultimate British feast .  Marco is, to be frank, insane (just read Bill Buford’s account of him in Heat, if you don’t believe me), but he is talented, and it’s been very interesting to see what he finds as he traverses Great Britain.  The show could be a complete sham for all I know, but that anyone thought it was worth making is interesting to me. 

Above all else, though, I admire the genuine pride in local, artisanal products that I’ve seen here.  I know that “British” cuisine was not considered serious for some time, but that seems to be disappearing (I hope), as this country has a long and distinguished culinary tradition.  It’s nice to see traditions thriving alongside and complimenting London’s international cuisines. 

And so, Goodbye, London Town…

As I walked on with a heavy heart
Then a stone danced on the tide
And the song went on
Though the lights were gone

- “Lullaby of London,” The Pogues

Drop the tomato and no one gets hurt

Saturday, June 14, 2008

No doubt you’ve heard about the great Tomato Salmonella Outbreak of 2008, right?  The total number of people who contracted salmonella poisoning from commercially produced and handled tomatoes now numbers 228 people from 23 states.  Federal authorities are baffled - they have no idea where the contaminated tomatoes came from - could be Mexico, could be Florida.  The feds are saying that you can eat cherry and grape tomatoes or regular tomatoes with vine still attached to them.

Oh, and homegrown tomatoes.  You know, since most people who grow tomatoes don’t wipe their hands on raw chicken or beef infected with salmonella and then go out and pick tomatoes, or water the garden with groundwater contaminated with diseased animal poo..

The feds do know that the salmonella strain in this case is Salmonella serotype Saintpaul, a rare variety.

During times of salmonella and other food illness outbreaks, I am generally comforted by the fact that I don’t buy much of my food from commercially produced sources.  I trust the farm from which I purchased my CSA share - I tend to think of them as not much different than me growing my own food (except they do so on a larger scale).  My food is safer.

Yesterday Newsweek published an article about the tomato/salmonella issue, and discussed whether or not locally grown tomatoes are safer.

“As a scientist, I cannot say smaller is better. It’s just not that simple,” says Martha Robert, a microbiologist at the University of Florida Institute of Food and Agricultural Sciences and a safety adviser to the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange and the Center for Produce Safety at the University of California. “The large packers we have are extremely stringent with sanitizing techniques and measures to prevent cross-contamination, but if someone makes a mistake when they’re mixing or dicing large quantities, the problem is going to be larger too,” she explains. “But sometimes a small grower has been doing something for years, and [they] don’t know they’re putting themselves at risk.”

While both large corporate farms and small local farms can be at risk of contamination at any stage of the growing, packing and shipping process, experts say some differences between big corporate farms and smaller farms can be a factor. Industrial producers are more likely to move their packaging plants close to, if not onto, the farmland in order to get the produce on the road as quickly as possible, says Gonul Kaletunc, associate professor in the department of food, agriculture and biological engineering at Ohio State University. In that situation, water contaminated with salmonella from feces, insects or plants might be used to both irrigate and wash the produce, increasing the chances of contamination.

While I can understand the reticence to pronounce small family farms safer than industrial agriculture, I think we have to remember that every food-borne illness outbreak I can remember in the last couple of years has been traced to some large-scale corporate farming operation.  And large packers may have all these “extremely stringent” rules for handling food, but FDA inspections are down - how can anyone be sure the packers/handlers/growers are following the rules? No, I still feel safer buying my produce from a local farmer who stays in business because his or her reputation is everything - I trust that a small, local farmer (particularly one committed to sustainable farming and ecologically ethical use of land) is making the extra effort to produce high quality, uncontaminated food because an outbreak of salmonella means losing the family farm. And really, when was the last time you heard of an e.coli or salmonella outbreak originating from Joe’s farm down the road?

Eating seasonally: extremist?

Wednesday, June 11, 2008

There was an article yesterday on MSNBC about being a ‘locavore’ - it focused very much on the issue of eating locally grown foods as an act of environmentalism (from the standpoint of reducing your carbon footprint), and also referred to it as “extremist”.  I can’t really say that I care for that.  What is extremist about wanting to eat what’s in season?  What is extremist about wanting to support local farmers or the local economy?  Is it really that far out to be concerned about the safety of your food, especially at a time when commercial grown tomatoes going through the usual gigundo processing facilities are making people sick in over a dozen states?

Hilariously, the article is called “Extreme Consumerism”.

Recently, however, a small but devoted number of Americans have started to think a lot more about the origin of the food going into their grocery cart. Worried about the environmental impact of shipping food hundreds of miles, plus the dwindling fate of local farmers - and obsessed with the idea of eating really good food - these extreme eaters try to only buy food that is grown within a 100-mile radius of their own home.

Whoa.  Since when is being obsessed with “really good food” an extremist act?  When I think of extremes in food, I think of kids who will only eat white food…or people who only eat fruit…or dieters who adhere to things like the “Jelly Bean Diet” or the “Grapefruit Diet”...or anorexics.  But people who don’t want to eat shitty food?  Yeah, that doesn’t seem extremist.  An act of rebellion, perhaps, but not extremist.

Why an act of rebellion?  Well, being concerned about pesticides and genetic engineering and humanely raised meat to the point of doing something about it is sort of outside the mainstream, I guess.  And opting out of grocery store purchases as much as possible is certainly a way of voting with your dollars.  And hey, I like the idea of being a rebel just because I happen to like uber-fresh food grown by someone I have personally met.  Let’s all be rebels!  Rebels with a cause! I like it!

Not only are we “extremists”, we’re also unrealistic.

Among locavore proponents, one popular pastime is the “eat local challenge,” in which participants try, usually for one month, to eat only food that comes from within their community. The rest of the year, many locavores are more realistic about the limits of their devotion.

Oh dear.  Another extremist and unrealistic activity is preserving food.  Yes, that’s right, we are “forced to take on domestic efforts that most families haven’t tackled for generations”.  Those “domestic efforts” are canning food and freezing food.  And if you have a root cellar, you might as well stop using deodorant and run around with patchouli stank because you are even worse than the rest of us crazy food jihadists.

Oh, and don’t forget all that running around we do to find our local foodstuffs and the outrageous amounts of money we pay for the privilege of eating locally.  I guess now wouldn’t be the time to mention that I travel to exactly one place usually to get my food, and that my CSA box runs about $25 per week and I usually end up freezing about half of it for Winter….so it really ends up being about $10.60 per week for the whole year.  Sure, pastured meat is more expensive than commercially produced stuff, but when weighed against the produce savings, I very much doubt I’m paying more than the average, non-locavore consumer.  I may even be paying less and I’m eating better.  But hey, I’m just an extremist with an unrealistic lifestyle.  What would I know?