Posted by Anita on 11.22.08 9:53 PM
We finally got ourselves over to Alameda this afternoon to visit the Hangar One / St. George Spirits distillery. We’ve always managed to be out of town during their annual open house parties, but this year was different. For a $30 ticket, we got the chance to sip pretty much everything they make (though we limited ourselves to things we hadn’t already tried), including the seasonal Spiced Pear vodka. The best part, though, was getting up close with their gorgeous copper stills, one of my favorite photo subjects.
For an additional $10, we also got to sample the new Agua Azul, a 100% agave spirit that can’t technically be called tequila because it’s not made in Mexico. We loved all three expressions — rich cristal, smoky reposado, and mellow-but-not-boring añejo — but balked when we saw the $60, $80, and $120 price tags. (We’ll probably change our minds right as they sell out, just as we did with the Absinthe Verte last year… oh well.)
In addition to all the sippable samples, admission included copious top-notch munchies: June Taylor preserves, Boccalone salumi, El Huarache Loco antojitos, La Cocina sweets, and Recchiuti chocolates. We were impressed at the short lines for both the samples and the loos (thanks to a set of porta-potties ’round back of the distilling equipment), and plentiful water stations all throughout the warehouse. A DJ spun tunes, employees answered questions, and a shuttle swung by every hour to drop guests off at BART.
Sound like fun? Sign up for the newsletter to find out about next year’s open house and other special events throughout the year.
Hangar One / St. George Spirits
2601 Monarch Street
Alameda, CA 94501
510.769.1601
drinks, East Bay, locavore
3 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 11.18.08 9:30 PM
There’s some sort of culinary magic that happens in autumn, when even the homeliest of foods can be made beautiful and delicious. I’m convinced that there’s something in the air at this time of year — every foodie I know looks forward to fall, and it can’t just be because we’re all sick of tomatoes and mozzarella.
A case in point: We had a half-knob of rather unattractive celeriac left over from an earlier recipe, so we cobbled together a creamy soup by adding a potato, some celery, butter, stock, and thyme. A few shallots, admittedly gorgeous by anyone’s definition, gave the mixture a hint of sweetness.
You might think something this monochrome would taste as bland as it looks, but you’d be mistaken. It’s earthy and herbal, silken and almost meaty. Served in demitasse or small bowls, I think you could even call it pretty enough for company, should the occasion arise. But trust me, you won’t want to share.
Celeriac Bisque
– Serves 4 as a first course
2T unsalted butter
1/3 cup chopped celery (1 medium stalk)
1 medium shallot, minced
12 oz celeriac (also known as celery root), peeled and cut into 1/2-inch dice
1 medium starchy potato, peeled and cut into 1-inch cubes
3 cups unsalted chicken broth or stock (plus more as needed)
2 sprigs fresh thyme
–
2T whipping cream
herbs for garnish
In a heavy, medium-sized saucepan, melt the butter over low heat. Add the celery and cook, covered, until the celery just starts to soften (2 to 3 minutes). Add the shallots and saute, uncovered, 3 minutes more. Stir in celeriac, potato, stock, and thyme sprigs; lightly salt to taste. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat to a bare simmer. Cover and cook until vegetables are very tender, about 40 minutes.
Remove the thyme sprigs and, using a stick blender, puree the soup until smooth. (You can also use a standard blender: cool the soup a bit, work in batches, and then return the puree to the pan). Add additional stock as needed to achieve desired consistency. Stir cream into the soup and adjust seasonings with salt and pepper. Ladle into flat bowls, and garnish with chopped herbs or small tender sprigs, as desired.
cooking, locavore, recipes
4 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 11.16.08 10:44 PM
The irony of yesterday’s 80-degree excursion to the Ferry Plaza was that none of us wanted summery stuff. We waltzed right past stalls filled with tomatoes, artichokes, and strawberries(!) and gravitated toward the pork, beans, and greens we all craved despite the heat.
With the unseasonably warm weather and our un-air-conditoned house, we knew it would stay too hot to braise, so we headed over to the Marin Sun Farms stand and checked out their grillable options. Laura picked out a lovely slab of pork ribs, and I walked across the aisle for a bag full of Brussels sprouts from the Iacopi’s stand.
Since Laura’s only able to find pintos and cranberry beans at her local markets, she planned to load up her bag with lots of fun varieties from the Rancho Gordo stand. Little did we know that Steve Sando himself would be tending the stall on Saturday, training two new employees and charming the shoppers who were surprised to see the bean guru himself behind the baskets and bags. In addition to the four varieties Laura chose — old favorites Yellow Eye and Calypso, plus two others that escape me Pebble and Anasazi — we also bought a pound of Red Nightfall, for our Dark Days dinner that night. I had no idea how we’d serve them, but I knew we could find inspiration flipping through our just-bought copy of Steve’s new book, Heirloom Beans.
Cameron gave the ribs a simple rub (salt, pepper, dried sage, and pasilla), and we planned to serve them with a mustard-and-vinegar sauce, so we looked for a simple recipe that would showcase the beans’ natural flavors. It didn’t take us long to find a dish that we all agreed sounded delicious: What’s not to love about porky goodness topped with a drizzle of bright olive oil and a snowy dusting of cheese? We found a hunk of Fatted Calf pancetta in the freezer and snipped some fresh sage from the garden, swapped a red onion for yellow, and left out the original recipe’s carrot. The end result was delicious, if I do say so myself, and a perfect counterpoint to the smokiness of the ribs and the tart-bitterness of the shredded sprouts.
ps: For more great photos of our meal prep, don’t miss Laura’s set and post.
Beans with Pancetta and Sage
– adapted from Heirloom Beans
1/2 pound heirloom beans, soaked
– the original recipe calls for Jacob’s Cattle, but we used Red Nightfall
1/2 medium red onion, chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
1/4 pound pancetta or slab bacon, diced
2T chopped fresh sage
dry Jack or other hard cheese, grated, for garnishing
Place the beans and their soaking liquid in a tall pot, adding enough cold water to cover by at least an inch. Bring to a boil for 5 minutes, then reduce heat to low. Simmer, partially covered, until beans begin to soften (about 30 minutes).
Meanwhile, heat a heavy skillet over medium heat. Add the olive oil and warm through, then add the onion, celery, garlic, pancetta, half of the sage, and a little salt and pepper. (Keep in mind your pork may be heavily salted.) Reduce heat to medium-low and sauté very slowly; do not allow the ingredients to brown. When very soft and aromatic, about 20 minutes, remove from heat and set aside.
Add the sauteed mixture to the beans and bring to a simmer, adding more water as needed. Taste the simmering liquid, and adjust for salt as needed. Simmer, partially covered, until the beans are tender, about another hour, keeping an eye on the water level. When beans are cooked through and no longer chalky, add the remaining sage and adjust seasonings; simmer for 5 minutes.
Serve the beans with a little of their pot liquor in shallow bowls, drizzled with olive oil and sprinkled with the grated cheese.
—-
Disclaimer: Cameron and I are big fans of pretty much everything Steve Sando does; the three of us are friends from the olden days on various food boards, and we’ve been known to babysit his market stall on occasion. There’s no way to say that I’m not biased, but I still think that the book is fabulous: The recipes go well beyond the usual things you think of making with dried beans; the photography is stunning; and the graphic design is trademark Rancho Gordo, with bold typography, clean lines, lots of white space, and judicious use of bright accent colors.
Although I’ve only cooked once from it, at the price ($15 on Amazon) it seems like a bargain. It’s got a fun foreword by Thomas Keller (yes, Food Jesus is one of Steve’s fans, too), great front matter that covers everything from Rancho Gordo history to equipment notes, and recipes from some of our favorite restaurants — like Range‘s Cellini Bean Soup with Chard and Poached Eggs. I’m looking forward to exploring it in more depth, and I’d say that even if Steve wasn’t a pal.
cookbooks, Dark Days challenge, farmers markets, locavore, other blogs, recipes
6 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 11.15.08 11:46 PM
Oh, what fun we’re having with Laura, eating our way around the Ferry Plaza and The Mission from sunrise to sunset, then cooking up a storm for the first night of the Dark Days challenge. The three of us (with the dogs, naturally) sat up gabbing until almost midnight, telling stories and talking about… food, duh!
I promise a thorough recap later, but for now you can check out my Flickr set — plus Laura’s Flickr set and post on (not so) Urban Hennery — for a quick peek at our day.
Dark Days challenge, farmers markets, other blogs, shopping, The Mission
3 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 11.13.08 11:41 PM
…to Married with Dinner?
Laura from (not so) Urban Hennery is visiting San Francisco this weekend, and we’re the lucky ones who get to show her around! We’ve got a full schedule of foodie fun planned: Dinner at Range, a trip to the Ferry Plaza farmers market (of course!), even a stop at Mission Pie. And naturally we’ll hit some of the tourist highlights: The view from the top of Twin Peaks, a stroll through some of our favorite neighborhoods, and a drive across the Golden Gate Bridge.
We’ve even managed to stir up some mighty fine weather. Probably not quite as gorgeous as the autumn day in the photo above — that was October of last year — but it is supposed to reach the high 70s over the weekend, which is sure to send poor Laura home to the cold, dark, and rainy Pacific Northwest shaking her head.
As fun as our adventures will be, the part I’m most looking forward to is Saturday night, when we’re planning to cook dinner together with all the fun things we find at the market. We didn’t plan it this way (or maybe Laura did, ’cause she’s a organizer extraordinaire) but Saturday also happens to be the first day of this year’s Dark Days Eat Local Challenge.
Just like last year, we’ll make a point of searching out new local farmers and vendors — we’ll try to do a better job of profiling them, rather than just a quick mention — and cook at least one meal each week from 100% from our 100-mile radius. We’re going to pass on taking any exemptions other than salt and spices this time, since it’s just one meal a week, and we’ve got a pretty good assortment of just about every other class of food.
Our personal ground rules for the 2008/2009 Dark Days Eat Local Challenge:
- We will continue to cook 90-95% local as often as we can, with a challenge baseline of one dinner per week made from 100% local ingredients.
- We will write about new pantry items, new farmers we’ve discovered, and recipes for in-season items within our foodshed.
- Local for us will be a 100-mile radius. Strong preference will be given to items purchased directly from farmers at market rather than retail.Â
- For our weekly challenge meal, we’ll try to eliminate processed and prepared foods; We’re making ‘Marco Polo’ exemptions only for salt and seasonings.
- We’ll continue with the challenge through March 15, 2009.
Dark Days challenge, other blogs
4 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 11.12.08 9:42 PM
The image above is last weekend’s shopping haul, one of a series of similar photos I’ve been taking each Saturday since early summer. Inspired by my friend Jen’s beautiful shot of her farmers market purchases prettily laid out on a kitchen table in the cool spring light, I’ve started documenting what we’re buying each week. I flatter myself that it’s a fun Flickr set to flip through — overview shots of each week’s purchases all piled together, and a few solo portraits of our favorite finds — and an interesting way to keep track of the seasons. I can imagine referring to it next year (“Did we get corn in June or July?”) as a sort of visual seasonality calendar.
But, more than its mere utility, I’m struck by how beautiful the food we eat can be, especially in its natural state. Conventional wisdom holds that organic food is imperfect by nature, and uglier than the supermarket stuff. But after eating this way for the better part of two years, all I can see is the personality of our purchases. It’s perhaps a little too romantic to say that this aesthetic appeal is the direct result of the care that our farmers give their crops, and yet I do realize a lot of the variation I find so appealing — the huge with the tiny, the bright with the dull, the symmetrical with the misshapen — is part and parcel of the heirloom varieties and less-industrial methods that small-scale farming allows.
The set is a celebration of everyday beauty, the product of my brief meditation each Saturday on the wonders of the market. It makes me inordinately happy to lay out my week’s purchases on the counter, fuss with the arrangement, and set up the shot. Sometimes the light cooperates, and I end up with a subtly shaded image that’s like a Renaissance painting. Other times the spirit eludes me, and I end up with something less artsy and more documentary. Either way, I’m forcing myself to pay closer attention to mundane beauty, to wean myself from the fake perfection of the retail world.
farmers markets, other stuff
11 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 11.08.08 8:44 PM
Not a lot to report — we’ll get back to real posts tomorrow — but I couldn’t help but share a few snaps from the Ferry Plaza market today. It was grey and chilly but sometimes the bright colors of our fall produce seem even prettier when set against a monochrome sky.
We arrived on the (very) late side, so we had to battle against the crowds. But I was like a kid in a candy store playing with my new toy: A Canon G9 camera. It’s a pocket-sized point-and-shoot model, but it comes equipped with lots of photo-geek features. I’m surprised how much fun I’m having using a zoom again, after the fixed lenses on my dSLR camera. One pleasant side effect is that I can take my weekly food still-life shots from overhead, instead of straight on. I’m not sure I’ll stick with that format forever, but it’s nice to have the flexibility.
I haven’t even cracked the manual yet, but I’m hoping the G9 will be swoopy enough that I can (mostly) leave the big camera at home for ‘studio’ work. We’re travelling to London next month, and it would be a pleasure not to have to haul the ‘big gun’ around with me on our daily adventures. People whose opinions I trust seem to love their G-series cameras, so I have high hopes.
farmers markets, geekery
5 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 11.01.08 2:36 PM
Last year, when I discovered — after reading Bonnie Powell’s excellent post — that the Judy’s Family Farm eggs I’d been buying at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market were the product of an intensive factory operation called Petaluma Farm, I was pretty pissed.
I first blamed CUESA, the market’s organizers, for allowing me to be duped. But soon I realized the real culprit was my own ignorance, and I directed my anger where it properly belonged. It was foolish, after all, to expect that all food sold at the Ferry Plaza market would meet some rudimentary ethical standard and that the products would be sold by, you know, actual small farmers. I really should have wondered how Judy’s managed to sell their eggs for a third of the price of Marin Sun or Eatwell, but I was blinded by the almighty bargain.
My frustration at having been deceived spurred me to pay closer attention to how the food — especially the eggs, dairy, and meat — we buy at the market is really grown. I spent the better part of 6 months asking a lot of questions, and I am sure some farmers got pretty sick of me. But when all was said and done, I was pleased to realize — with the exception of this one major blip in the egg department — that the Ferry Plaza was full of real farmers whose animal-care practices I can support in good conscience.
But now, with the attention CUESA has given Petaluma Farm as part of their coverage of Proposition 2 — the California initiative that would require all caged and crated animals the exceedingly modest consideration of being able to stand up, lie down, turn around, and extend their limbs — I feel I really must speak up and question their motives as an organization.
To put it in perspective: I realize that, as recently as last year, there weren’t enough pastured eggs to meet demand. Egg aficionados lined up before the market opened, and latecomers (or even on-timers) were often heard sighing over how they’d been beaten to the punch yet again. I’d like to think that the decision to permit this…. shall we say “less-than-ideal” vendor was a matter of filling in the gaps; local and quasi-free-range eggs are better than nothing. But now that Marin Sun, Eatwell, Marin Roots, and Soul Food offer a steady supply of pastured, humane egg options, I’m shocked that CUESA continues to allow large-scale, factory producers to sell at the Ferry Plaza market. There’s no excuse left that I can find.
But the thing that really sticks in my craw is that CUESA offered the bully pulpit of a prime feature spot in their weekly newsletter to the specious anti-Prop 2 arguments of Petaluma Farm’s Steve Mahr.
Mahr’s got a right to his opinions, and (for now at least) the legal freedom to cram as many laying hens into confinement as he sees fit. I’m glad to learn that he raises at least some fraction of his hens in a cage-free environment. But the hypocrisy of passing off his blatantly industrial product as the sustainable and humane gleanings of some idyllic family farm needs to be called out. And I’m absolutely furious that CUESA is letting it pass.
Mahr claims in the CUESA story that, “I will not be in business if Prop 2 passes.” To which I say: “It’s no worse than you deserve, you greenwashing jive-turkey.” At least the eggs sold at Safeway aren’t pretending to be anything other than the inhumane, factory-produced crap you’d expect.
Of course, pastured eggs are still a luxury that many shoppers can’t afford. But not everyone has room in their weekly food budget for pastured beef, either, and yet you don’t see CAFO meat at the Ferry Plaza. If CUESA is going to claim that one of the 10 reason to shop to shop at their farmers market is “to promote the humane treatment of animals … who have been spared the cramped and unnatural living conditions of so many of their brethren,” then that’s what should be offered, period. And they need to get on the bus and support Prop 2 without any ifs, ands, or buts.
Pastured Eggs at the Ferry Plaza
Eatwell Farm
Nigel & Frances Walker
5835 Sievers Road
Dixon, CA 95620
organic@eatwell.com
866.627.2465
Marin Sun Farms
David & Julie Evans
10905 Highway 1
Point Reyes Station, CA 94956
david@marinsunfarms.com
415.663.8997
Soul Food Farm (at the Prather Ranch store)
Alexis & Eric Koefoed
6046 Pleasants Valley Road
Vacaville, CA 95688
soulfoodfarm@aol.com
707.469.0499
Marin Roots Farm
Jesse Kuhn
PO Box 74, Petaluma, CA 94952
info@marinrootsfarm.com
415.309.2474
More information about Proposition 2
Yes on Prop 2 official site
Michael Bauer (SF Chronicle)
Los Angeles Times (op-ed)
New York Times (endorsement)
Grist Environmental News
Oprah Winfrey Show
The Ethicurean
farmers markets, farms & farmers, locavore, other stuff
14 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 10.19.08 1:05 PM
It’s more than a little embarrassing to admit that we’re on Day 19 of this year’s month-long Eat Local Challenge, and I haven’t even gotten our initial post up yet. Here’s the short version: We’re following the same guidelines we used for last winter’s Dark Days Eat Local Challenge, attempting to stick to them for every meal for the entire month of October. Of course, we do this pretty much all the time nowadays, with a few notable exceptions: Specialty ingredients for Thai and Chinese food, and the occasional non-locavore restaurant meal. But this month, we’re going for 100%, or as close to it as possible.
Suffice to say that life has gotten interesting over here — mostly in good ways — and that blogging was lower down on the totem pole than many other end-of-summer activities. We’ve enjoyed three weeks full of fun, including visits from good friends and trip to one of our favorite food cities in the world. We also spent a magical afternoon under the dappled sun at a picnic in the Santa Cruz Mountains, where the guest of honor was a whole roast pig accompanied by a beautiful buffet of side dishes, wines, and desserts (which were all way too good to call ‘potluck’).
During the week, we’ve been working like a pair of crazy people, but that doesn’t mean we haven’t been eating an amazing assortment of locally sourced meals. I won’t bore you with all the details, but I’m feeling incredibly blessed that we have locavore-friendly Range, Nopa, SPQR, and Beretta within easy shouting distance of home. And, of course, a freezer full of pasta sauce, sloppy joes, and other planned leftovers keep us fed when we’re too busy to cook.
You might be surprised to hear that, amid all this culinary chaos, there’s one dish I’ve loved so much that I’ve made it not just once but three times. When I first spotted this gazpacho salad in a magazine that I’d brought along in my carry-on luggage, I couldn’t wait to get home and try it. Luckily, even though the season for larger heirloom varieties is winding down here, it’s still pretty easy to find cherry tomatoes at the market. I soon discovered that although blanching and peeling a whole pint of cherry tomatoes may sound too fussy for everyday meals, it’s actually a surprisingly quick process that’s well worth the effort.
I’ve made a few changes to the original recipe — I’ve gone more savory than sweet in the tomato brine. Unable to source local sea beans (which I’ve since discovered at Far West Funghi in the Ferry Building), I substituted the tiniest haricots verts I could find. The next time, I left the beans out entirely, and it was equally delicious.
For my first attempt, I used a combination of baby tomatoes, including Sweet 100s, tiny Yellow Pears, and Sungolds. But plain-old cherry tomatoes — as the original recipe specifies — are a better choice. They’re far easier to peel, they all blanch at the same rate, and you don’t end up with yellow varieties muddied by the pulp from their red and orange pals. And, the larger size of the cherry tomatoes gives you a better chance to enjoy the salty, spicy burst of flavor you get with each one.
Gazpacho Salad
— adapted from Andy Nusser’s recipe, Food & Wine
– Brined tomatoes
1 pint cherry tomatoes
1 cup water
1 T sugar
1 T kosher salt
1 T red pepper flakes
1 (2 1/2-inch) cinnamon stick [Note: We use the softer, mellower Mexican canela]
– Salad
3 1/2-inch piece of baguette, cut into 1/2-inch dice (about 1 1/2 cups)
2 T plus 2 tsp extra-virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper
1/4 pound sea beans, or tiny haricots verts (optional)
1 cucumber, seeded (if necessary) and sliced 1/8-inch thick
2 scallions, thinly sliced
1 T sherry vinegar
To brine the tomatoes, bring a saucepan full of salted water to a boil. Prepare an ice-water bath and set near the stove.
Trim and blanch the beans or sea beans until just tender, and remove them with tongs or a strainer to the ice water bath. Remove and set aside on a towel to dry.
Blanch the tomatoes until the skins just begin to burst (15 to 30 seconds), and quickly remove them to the water bath to chill. Discard the blanching water.
In the same saucepan, simmer 1 cup of water, sugar, salt, red pepper, and cinnamon until the salt and sugar dissolves.
Drain and peel the tomatoes, and place them in a heat-proof bowl or Pyrex measuring cup. Strain the brine over the tomatoes. Brine the tomatoes until cool, about 40 minutes.
Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 350°. Cut the baguette into 1/2-inch cubes, and toss with 2 tsp of olive oil. Season with salt and pepper, and bake for 5-10 minutes, until lightly toasted.
In a medium bowl, toss the tomatoes, croutons, beans or sea beans, cucumber, scallions, vinegar and the remaining 2 T of olive oil. Season to taste, and serve.
Eat Local Challenge, locavore, recipes
10 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 08.29.08 11:48 AM
Our weekly shopping haul; One Local Summer, Week 13
—–
Unless you’ve been in a self-imposed media blackout, you may have heard about the party that Alice, Carlo, and friends are throwing here in Our Fair City. And you’d probably guess that a pair of diehard food dorks like us would be camped out in line, waiting for the chance to storm the gates first thing in the morning, wandering through the Victory Garden as we sample a continent’s worth of canapes in the dappled summer sun.
But the fact is, we live a Slow Food Nation life all the time. We spend practically every weekend grazing around the City and around the Bay Area. We live in a community where our oddball food choices have become fairly mainstream. We hang out with a crowd of thoughtful food-worshippers who can carry on a spirited debate about how to balance being a locavore with being a (small-c) chowhound.
We’re truly blessed to make our home here in the epicenter of the local, organic, sustainable food movement. San Francisco’s a city where it’s hardly a challenge at all to eat well and eat ethically… so much so that I get fairly bent out of shape when circumstances or travel force me to do otherwise.
So, no — No “Foodstock” for us. Happily, we have a lot to do this weekend:
– Buying our weekly groceries from the people who grow/make them
We do this every week at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, but just to make it interesting — and to bypass the frenzy of out-of-town foodies descending there this weekend — we’re heading across the bay to the Berkeley Farmers Market. We’ll see some of our usual vendors there, but I’m looking forward to exploring new stalls and new ingredients.
– Putting up food to preserve the harvest
Later in the day, we’ll pick up 100 pounds of San Marzano tomatoes at Mariquita Farm’s “guerilla veggie” drop-off. Later in the weekend, we’ll be hauling out the pressure canners and turning them into puree, marinara sauce, and whole canned tomatoes to feed us through the winter
– Supporting restaurants that support local farms
Mariquita’s making their drop at Piccino, so we’ll have a chance to experience their brunch for the first time. The fact that Sher and Wayne — like so many other San Francisco restaurateurs — procure so much of their raw ingredients from the same farmers and artisans that we buy from makes me inexplicably giddy.
– Exploring the food traditions of our neighbors
Saturday night, we’re heading out to a family-run ethnic restaurant with a group of food-obsessed friends. Later in the weekend — if we get our canning done — we’ll visit a Thai food festival put on by the local Buddhist temple at Golden Gate Park. Neither of these experiences are Slow, in the sense of using exclusively sustainable/local/organic ingredients, but supporting ethnic foodways is an essential part of being a citizen of our city and the world.
– Celebrating the bounty of our region
On Monday, we’re having some friends over for a little nosh. We’ll eat some pâté and peaches, sharp cheese and homemade plum chutney. We’ll drink local bubbly, sip homemade pear brandy, maybe even shake up a cocktail using artisanal spirits. Later there’ll be farmers-market pasta tossed with some of the marinara sauce we made earlier, maybe baguette slices spread with pesto. A pie, perhaps… made with a local-flour-and-butter crust (learned from a friend who also happens to be a local treasure) and filled with yet more amazing farmers market finds.
—-
Am I conflicted about opting out of the Slow festivities? Absolutely. I’m already drooling over the Slow on the Go and Taste Pavilion tidbits showing up in friends’ Flickr streams. By all accounts, the Friday events have been beautiful, interesting, and delicious. I hope that they keep it up, because the people who’ve traveled here from all over the world deserve it. And so do the farmers, food-makers, and volunteers who are going all-out to make a fabulous impression.
But on the other hand, I know we’ll make the perfect slow celebration, in all the ways that matter most to us, just as the folks visiting our city and our local producers will have theirs. Either way, I can’t think of a better way to celebrate Labor Day than by honoring the backbreaking effort — both physical and political — that our farmers and artisans spend to put quality food on our tables.
Bay Area, farmers markets, locavore, One Local Summer
18 Comments »
