Posted by Anita on 04.20.07 10:47 PM
After much hemming and hawing, I decided there aren’t enough good reasons not join in next week’s Penny-Wise Eat Local Challenge. So, we’ve committed to spend a week — or, in our case, six days — eating as much as we can from within our foodshed.
As if consuming foods grown or produced exclusively within a short radius of our home wasn’t hard enough, we’re also doing it on less than $144 a week, plus a mere $8 (!) for alcohol, in an effort to prove that it’s possible to be a locavore without spending any more than the average American two-person, two-earner family.
Coming from our house, where we have been known to spend $144 on a single dinner and $8 on one cocktail, this is going to be …interesting. But luckily, we have a gorgeous new kitchen where we love to cook these days. As for dining out, that’s one reason for our loose interpretation of the challenge week (the official start of the event isn’t until Monday the 23rd): We’re attending a benefit for a very worthy cause on Thursday night, and it doesn’t feel right to pinch pennies under the circumstances.
I’ve also done my best to plan meals for this week that are within the grasp of the average American home cook, both in terms of technique and ingredients. I’ve got a serious edge, living in the Bay Area, where we have so many great local artisans and farmers within close reach, so I didn’t want to stack the deck any further by choosing esoteric items or high-falutin’ preparations.
As far as exemptions go, I am allowing myself the so-called “Marco Polo rule”: I’m not tying myself to local spices, nor small quantities of condiments. Cameron’s going to continue to drink his coffee (it’s from Peet’s, a local establishment) and I feel no need to abandon my nasty Fresca habit. We’ll add the cost of these items to our budget, as well as any other non-local items we consume. We’re also buying bread that I have to assume is baked with non-local flour, but at least we’ll be supporting local artisans.
And because some of our favorite items come from slightly further afield, we’re going to extend our challenge radius to 200 miles, from the standard 100. But mostly, when we have a choice, we’ll opt for a product grown or made as close to us as possible. We’ll also be using fruits and herbs from our own garden, so perhaps that will keep our average distance down.
Tonight’s dinner was an old favorite, a taco-salad-like dish known in my family as “Walking Tostadas.” I sauteed some ground beef in a skillet, added some taco seasonings and a pureed tomato, and simmered. On the plate, the dish is simply a handful of broken tortilla chips, topped with the taco meat, then some shredded cheese, lettuce, salsa, tomatoes, avocado, and sour cream.
Here’s how it breaks down…
chips: 1/6 of a bag from Rancho Gordo (Napa / 50 mi) — $1
ground beef: 1 pound Prather Ranch (Shasta / 200 mi)– $6
tomato for puree: Whole Foods “locally grown” (Dinuba / 200 mi) — $0.66
lettuce: 1/2 of a romaine heart: Earthbound Farms (SJ Bautista / 88 mi) — $0.50
cheese: 1/2 wedge raw-milk chipotle cheddar Bravo Farms (Traver / 225 mi) — $1.50
crema: 2oz creme fraiche Bellwether Farms (Tomales / 50 mi) — $1.33
salsa: 2oz prepared Primavera (Sonoma / 50 mi) — $1
avocado: 1/2 a small one, part of a $3 grab bag from Will’s (Soledad / 130 mi) — $0.50
grape tomatoes: 1/6 of a large bunch from Balakian Farms (Reedly / 200 mi) — $0.50
(edit: The grape tomatoes were from Bruin Farms in Winters, 65 miles away)
Total this meal: $12.49 with plenty of leftover meat
I’m not going to go into this level of detail all week, I promise. But so far, I’ve estimated we’ll spend a good bit under our budget. Tomorrow’s trip to the farmers market will be the real test, but the most expensive items — meat and cheeses — are very predictable.
cooking, farmers markets, garden, locavore, other blogs, shopping
4 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 03.11.07 6:12 PM
Yes, cardoons. Also nettles, green garlic, and pea vines. Ah, it’s even beginning to smell a bit like springtime at the Ferry Plaza farmers market.
Since Cameron will be in NYC all week, and I follow him back on Tuesday, we weren’t really doing our usual food-shopping rounds, although we couldn’t leave without a gorgeous Prather Ranch rib-eye for the grill and some jumbo brussels sprouts to roast.
And we did manage to stock Cameron’s bag with carry-on nibbles for his flight — petit sec from Fatted Calf and some sweet treats from the ladies at La Cocina. But mostly, we ate our breakfast, poked around, took a couple dozen photos (more than half of them floral, not food), visit with our favorite vendors, bump into a trio of old friends, and soak up just enough sunshine to make us forget all about the winter coats in our suitcases.
In between work and family time in New York, we’ll do our best to post about our wanderings. We’ve got reservations at a few restaurants we’ve been longing to try, and a list of cocktailian haunts as long as your arm (thanks, Murray!). When we get back, expect a thorough kitchen-remodel update.
farmers markets, shopping
10 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 02.26.07 7:34 AM
We didn’t by any plum buns or fat hogs — although we did buy both pâté maison and calabrese sausage from the Fatted Calf, so I’ll take that last one on points. But we did spend a very chilly late morning at the market Saturday. By some miracle, the dogs let us sleep until 9:30, so we were on the late shift, but still mostly alone in the artic air.
Chilaquiles? SÃ, por supuesto! (And also delicious tacos de pollo hiding under some rather insipid guacamole.) We made quick rounds of the veggie stands, admired some of the first signs of spring — plenty of blossom-studded boughs, stacks of baby onions, and buckets of tulips and calla lilies to make you glad you left your nice, warm bed.
I’m getting a chill just thinking about it, though. Damn, it was cold! Quick, inside the building, chat up the guys at Prather, flirt a bit, get a lovely flat-iron steak for the grill and one of those heritage chickens we’re hearing so much about. (That’d be $15-ish each, not per pound, thank god.) After warming up — and a stop at Miette, of course — it’s back out front to pick up chips, tortillas and Yellow Eye beans from Rancho Gordo… where Steve tells us we just missed Alan Richman from GQ and that the NY Times will be singing his praises two weeks hence. Let’s hope he remembers us when he’s well and truly famous.
All in all, a successful re-entry into San Francisco. The kitchen’s coming along nicely, too — but it’s all under tarps at the moment, so the promised update will have to wait.
In the meantime, there are more market photos here…
farmers markets, meat, shopping
8 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 01.31.07 12:04 AM
One of the farmers at the market this weekend was selling a big-ass bag-o-roots combo — turnips, parsnips, mostly, and also some gnarly carrots — so of course I couldn’t pass that up. As I strolled the empty aisles, wondering how I would prepare my mess of veg, I remembered seeing a recipe for a creamy root vegetable soup in the market newsletter. Nobody seemed to be selling celery root, so I popped into Farm Fresh to You (after a stop at Miette, mais oui!) and picked up a knob. Mission accomplished!
With a minimum of chopping and sauteeing, and a little help from — don’t hate me — chicken broth from a box, we had an incredible soup that left each of us scheming for ways to get all the leftovers for ourselves. I made a double batch, and froze half of the puree (omitting the creme fraiche, which I’ll add when I thaw and reheat it), so the next batch will be even speedier.
Golden Vegetable Bisque
– adapted from Full Moon Feast by Jessica Prentice, via the CUESA newsletter
2 T fruity olive oil
1 small onion, sliced
1 small celery root (celeriac), peeled and cut into chunks
1 parsnip, cut into chunks
1 golden turnip, cut into chunks
1 carrot, cut into chunks
1 bay leaf
3 sprigs of fresh thyme
1 clove garlic, peeled and smashed
1 quart chicken stock, low-sodium chicken broth, or water
4 oz. creme fraiche (or other dairy, as you prefer)
1/8 tsp. freshly grated nutmeg
Salt and pepper to taste
Heat the oil in a medium-sized saucepan. Add the onions and sauté until tender. Add the vegetables one by one, sauteing each for a moment.
Add the stock to cover the vegetables by about half an inch. Add the herbs and garlic, cover, and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat and simmer, covered, until all is tender, about 25 minutes.
Remove the pot from the heat, and discard the bay leaf and the thyme stems. Puree the soup with an immersion blender (or in batches — carefully — in a standard blender). Add the creme fraiche, nutmeg, and a big pinch of pepper and salt. Taste the soup and adjust the seasoning. Feeling fancy? Try it with some Eatwell Farms rosemary salt.
cooking, farmers markets, recipes
5 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 01.16.07 11:39 PM
Not much of a story: We bought two baby fennel bulbs at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market this weekend, with no definite plan for what to do with them. I decided a nice shaved-fennel salad would be a good, crisp foil for the cheesy softness of tonight’s main course: the Baked Manicotti [* link removed] recipe from Cook’s Illustrated. (I give it a B-minus, not that you asked.)
Cruising the aisles of Bristol Farms, I picked up a beautiful pear and a container of mild bleu cheese crumbles. When I got home, I sliced the pear and fennel as thin as I could — which was pretty thin, since we’d just gotten our big knife back from Critical Edge — tossed them with some Alejandro & Martin “fruity and fragrant” olive oil, half as much champagne vinegar as oil, salt, cracked pepper, and those bleu cheese crumbles.
If I do say so mahself, it was one of the best salads of the year. (OK, so the year’s only 16 days old… it was still good enough that I wanted seconds.) We’re eating pretty well down here in the basement!
Fennel-Pear-Bleu Salad
2 baby fennel bulbs, or 1 smallish regular fennel bulb
1 ripe, fragrant pear
2 tsp. fruity olive oil
1 tsp. Champagne vinegar or other mild-flavored vinegar
1/4 to 1/2 cup mild bleu cheese crumbles
salt and fresh-ground pepper to taste
Remove the fennel tops, and slice the bulb thin, on the bias. Halve the pear, remove the core, then halve again and slice thin. Toss the fennel, pear slices, and half of the cheese with the olive oil and vinegar, seasoning to taste with salt and pepper. Plate up, and garnish with the remaining cheese.
Serves 2
—
* Edited to add: We removed the link to the Cook’s Illustrated manicotti recipe in July 2008 in protest of their bullying tactics.
farmers markets, recipes
1 Comment »
Posted by Anita on 01.05.07 3:37 PM
Ruth, Joe and Jeremy Hoffman
Hoffman Game Birds
Manteca, CA
January 5, 2007
Dear Hoffman clan,
I’m having a hard time putting into words how sad I am to read in the CUESA Newsletter that I will no longer be able to buy your birds on Saturdays at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market. Your beautiful chickens have become one of our weekly staples, and we’d even started coming to the market earlier so as to avoid being disappointed by your “sold out” signs.
I hope you’ll consider teaming up with a retail outlet in San Francisco; I don’t know how often we’ll be able get to Berkeley to visit Magnani’s Poultry, but the thought of going without your birds is too much to contemplate.
I’m sure I’m not alone in my love of your poultry, but I also couldn’t let the opportunity pass to let you know how much we appreciated what you’re doing. I hope the attached post, about your chickens, sums it up adequately.
Sincerely, and sadly,
~ Anita
farmers markets, other stuff, shopping
1 Comment »
Posted by Anita on 11.21.06 12:49 PM
No, this isn’t a post about some Thomas Keller masterpiece. Rather, it’s an ode to a single bird that’s fed us amply for the last three days.
We’ve gotten into the habit of buying a chicken from the folks at Hoffman each Saturday, and then roasting it up for Sunday dinner. Sometimes we put it on the rotisserie, sometimes it ends up as Zuni Roast Chicken, still others we spatchcock it and stick it under the broiler.
The thing about these Hoffman birds is that they’re normal size, even perhaps a little smallish (which is how I like them, anyway). But the skin is so tasty, and the meat so satisfying, that we quite happily feast on them for days, without complaint. Not a scrap goes to waste.
This weekend, we simply stuffed some rosemary-salt butter under the skin, trussed the legs, and set the bird in the oven on 375º for about an hour and 20 minutes. The bird cooked faster than I expected, catching me off-guard for side dishes. I set the roasted bird aside, and Cameron made a simple salad using baby greens we’d picked up at the market.
Meanwhile, I boiled a half-box of linguine, defatted the drippings, added some stock and wine, and reduced it to a saucy consistency. When the pasta was still al dente, I tong’ed it into the roasting pan, tossed it in the sauce for a quick simmer, and popped it on the plate with a piece of the chicken on top. It was good enough for company, if I do say so myself.
The next morning, I turned some leftover breast meat into my favorite chicken salad, and smeared it between two slices of Acme pain de mie — heaven. And then, for dinner, we tucked some more shredded meat and cheese into Rancho Gordo tortillas and made tacos dorados from the Doña Tomás cookbook.
Am I sick of this chicken yet? Not on a bet. This morning, I finished off a stale bag of tortilla chips with some of the leftover salsa from last night’s dinner, sprinkled on a little cheese and the last of the breast meat… voilá: Chilaquiles for breakfast. And I’m having the leftover tacos for lunch. If I wasn’t heading out of town, you can bet that the carcass and back meat would be destined for soup later in the week, too.
cookbooks, cooking, farmers markets, Mexican
6 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 11.19.06 7:38 AM
I was talking on the phone with Mom on Friday, and she asked me what my plans were for the weekend. “Are you going to the Farmers Market?”
“Yes!” I yelped, my voice faltering, surprised to find I was tearing up a little.
Call me nuts for getting all emotional about a freakin’ farmers market, but I’m a creature of habit. Being out of town so much, combined with having too many house-related projects brewing all at once, has kept me away from my favorite Saturday haunt for an entire month. But I got it in my head that I was going this week, come hell or high water. Not that we have any less work to do this weekend — in fact, we have more — but first and foremost, I needed to be back in a place that makes me so illogically happy.
Yes, you’re right: It’s just an overpriced yuppie food scene. But it’s also my little village, at least for a few hours every Saturday, and I take comfort in the same vendors being in the same place every week, selling a subtly shifting set of wares until it’s time for their turn to rest for the season.
I get excited about the new crop of pea vines (already!?) and the deepening flavors of the apples and pears, puzzle at the miracle of tomatoes (still?!) in November, then look around to realize my favorite stall’s yellow beets seem to have run their course for the season. Working in my hermetically sealed glass cube all week, the market’s my weekly check-in with what’s happening in the natural world.
Yesterday, the market was everything I needed it to be: Primavera was making their guajillo chilaquiles — my favorite among their rotating selection — and the sun was shining brightly off the bay, even at 8:30. We bought lots of great seasonal treats — I even found sunchokes for a fall salad I’m planning for this week — and saw all of our favorite farmers. The only hitch was that my camera ran out of batteries (and, for once, I had no spares!) after the second shot. D’oh! But it was fine, really. I needed to be in that place much more than I needed to take another dozen photos of brussels sprouts.
I know I should be sad that I’m going away again, but somehow, I’m not… at least right now. I know I’ll be glad to return, and that’s enough. As Steve said, consoling me as I sighed about missing the next two markets, “We’ll all be here when you get back”.
farmers markets, shopping
4 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 10.22.06 11:47 AM
I’ve always loved going to farmers markets, even before they became the trendy (aqnd pricey) scenes they are now. When I lived in Menlo Park, ages ago, there was a farmer there who sold the most wonderful corn I’ve eaten on the West Coast. She admonished anyone within earshot in a nasaly whine: “Don’t cook my corn! Just HEAT IT and EAT IT!” Of course, we have to replay this little scene anytime we’re cooking heating corn, or any other fragile food.
Even after all these years of wandering the asphalt aisles and sniffing out seasonal veggies, I think this is the first year where I really am getting a full understanding of the interleaved seasons of all the produce that’s grown in Northern California. It doesn’t take much of a genius to recognize that tomatoes are summer food, but it’s another thing entirely to see the incremental changes that happen week by week, variety to variety.
In hindsight, I’m incredibly glad that my New Year’s resolutions included getting closer to the source of my food — being at the market each and every week makes a great weekend ritual, and a real eye-opener. I don’t think I ever realized, for example, that many spring crops — favas, artichokes and the like — enjoy a second season in the autumn. It makes sense, when you think about it, but it’s easier to grok when you’re seeing it happen.
I’m going to miss the next two weeks of the market while I’m visiting my family, so I very deliberately soaked up as much of the atmosphere as I could. The weather was spectacular, one of those bright-crisp days we get as the seasons change, and everything looked beautiful. Primavera even made chilaquiles, after two weeks of huevos rancheros and other substitutes… we joked that they must have known I was leaving town, but in all seriousness, it was a lovely way to start my long travel day.
breakfast, farmers markets, shopping
Comments Off on To market, to market
Posted by Anita on 10.19.06 7:36 AM
Ack, I hate it when I look up and realize that (a) it’s almost the weekend and (b) I haven’t written anything since the previous weekend. Chalk it up to a busy week, I suppose.
Which is not to say that we haven’t been cooking — and eating — quite a lot. Saturday we did our usual trek to the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market in the morning. Although the light wasn’t as gorgeous as it was the week before, there were still plenty of gorgeous specimens to photograph… many of which you’ll see in the week’s menus.
Saturday evening, we roasted a little chicken from Hoffman, which made us realize — duh! — that yes, Virgina, there is a huge difference between these coddled birds and even the Rosies and Rockys at Whole Paycheck. Just like the pork and beef from Prather, I’d much rather spend the same money to have a little of this kind of chicken than a lot of the commercial stuff. Anyway, sermon over…
I’d also bought a bagful of broccoli di ciccio and turned it into a tasty side dish with orecchiete and sauteed chickpeas. For such a simple recipe, it was incredibly satisfying — and even better the next day for lunch, with some of the leftover chicken meat shredded into it.
The next morning, I got up early and baked a Red Velvet cake from the Lee Bros. cookbook, in preparation for a dinner that evening with friends. Just like every other recipe I’ve tried from that book, it required a bit of interpolation to make it work, but the end result was pretty good… and definitely red! I realized in the process that I hadn’t done much baking at all, in a very long time. That’s going to change — I really miss it!
There’s nothing we like better than puttering around the house, tidying and cooking and getting things ready for a dinner party. In this case, an impromptu meal with our friends Sean and DPaul, who we hadn’t seen for dinner in far too long. They’d spent the afternoon putting up a truckload of preserves, so by the time they hit our living room, they were well ready for a drink… and to sit down!
We drank our Manhattans and ate a plate of radishes with Irish butter and fleur de sel, and listened enviously to their tales of pear butter and other seasonal spreads. Ah, another thing I haven’t done this year — not even a batch of pickles. Sigh.
Dinner was a salad of marinated roasted beets served with bleu cheese crumbles and rosemary-roasted walnuts; the Zuni Cafe cookbook’s mock porchetta — our old standby — with roasted teeeensy potatoes and chunks of fennel; and, of course, that Red Velvet cake.
Monday night brought a soup-and-sandwich supper: The triumphant return of the cauliflower and Stilton soup from a Soup of the Fortnight of yore, paired with BAT (bacon, avocado, and tomato) sandwiches. Yum! So much fun to take good bacon — this time from Prather Ranch — and pair it with pain de mie and one of the last superripe heirloom tomatoes of the season.
And then Tuesday, we ate a very simple dinner of chorizo tacos and soupy beans. Man, those Fatted Calf boys know how to make tasty sausage — I think theirs is even better than my own! Paired with Rancho Gordo ojo de cabro beans and fresh-masa tortillas, I can’t imagine a better quick-weeknight dinner. Or breakfast! We smashed up some of the beans, tossed in some leftover chorizo, doused it all with good salsa roja, and stirred in some of RG’s chips, and sprinkled with queso… chilaquiles on a weekday, be still my beating heart!
More food later… must go pay the bills.
baking, cookbooks, entertaining, farmers markets, meat, Mexican, shopping, Soup o' the Fortnight
2 Comments »
