One Local Summer, Week 4: New England

Tuesday, July 01, 2008

New England is now green!  Lettuce is plentiful, as are other greens like spinach and Asian greens, we’ve got some broccoli, peas and plenty of herbs.  There is definitely some color around, too, in the form of red strawberries and cherries (even some early raspberries), greenhouse tomatoes, and baby summer squash.  It seems like we go a long time with nothing, then POW, all of a sudden, it’s here!  And folks must be busy with all of the great stuff, since our numbers are a little down this week.  If you didn’t get around to e-mailing me this week, stick your link in the comments so we can catch up with you.

So, what are we doing with all the fresh, green stuff?  Well…

MA

Sarah H made homemade whole-grain spelt noodles (with home-ground spelt flour!) and served them with garlic scape pesto, tofu, and roasted summer squash. She enjoyed the noodles with a radish-salad turnip salad with a spicy-sour dressing.  Check out her entry for great tips on roasting the squash!

Capitalizing on labor from visitors (and that leftover?! lobster), Leslie and her guests enjoyed a lobster salad composed of ingredients from different farmer’s market vendors.  They even had a wild-blueberry pie for dessert.  Check out those little red potatoes - aren’t they the cutest?

There’s still some squash left at Laurie’s house, and she enjoyed it with a meal she also put together from the farmer’s market - delmonico steak (is there anything like a grilled steak in the summertime?), and a green salad with lettuce, radish and greenhouse tomatoes (yeah, tomatoes!). 

Erica showcased a couple of the stars of the season in her meal.  She made a green garlic and pea soup with the bounty of fresh peas.  And, since, as she points out, strawberry season always coincides with heat and humidity, she did the only logical thing she could with her berries, she made ice cream.  She stressed a little about some of the non-local ingredients included in both recipes, but I think she made those two ingredients shine!

Sara E. tried some new ingredients this week, something she probably wouldn’t have done if she wasn’t trying to eat more local foods.  Kale and red currants were in the rotation at her house.  Her entry meal is a beautiful salad of lettuce, broccoli, fresh peas, red currants and cranberry dressing - gorgeous!

NH

Sarah enjoyed a roasted chicken with gravy, potatoes and a delicious kale gratin.  Check her post out on Flickr this week. 

Chicken and potatoes were on the menu for my entry this week, too.  It was a cold, rainy Saturday here, so I also took the time to pit some cherries for a clafouti, and we enjoyed a caprese salad with cocktails.  I’m sorry we didn’t think ahead and invite someone over, for crying out loud!

If you haven’t had some pastured pork yet, find a way to try some. Lisa is lucky to have her own, and enjoyed some grilled porkchops, homemade egg noodles and fresh peas.  She made homemade pie for dessert, too.  She’s got great tips for whole-wheat pie crust in her entry.

VT

Pasta and chard with basil pesto were on the menu at Stacey’s.  She, too, made homemade pasta, and what looks like a really yummy maple pudding.  I hope she’ll share the recipe, it’s always nice to make something using local sweetener. 

Have a great week, everyone!

One Local Summer-week 4: Western Region

Oregon, Washington & Colorado:

Kimberly is predicting rain for the 4th, and she’s probably right. In the meantime, she’s getting her cooking out of the way early in the day. On the list was a loaf of no-knead bread, a roasted chicken and roasted asparagus and cauliflower. The chicken, asparagus and cauliflower were combined with a salad of farro, minced garlic scapes and chopped hazelnuts for a perfect hot weather dinner.

Here at our house dinner was a simple affair of roast chicken, boiled new potatoes, steamed broccoli, salad and homemade strawberry ice cream.

With a week filled with family parties and barbeques, light fare was the name of the game at Monica’s house. Burgers with eggs mixed into the ground beef for juiciness, lettuce, oven fries and red cherries. Sounds like the perfect menu for the weather around here.

JM had a busy, and hot week, but still found time for local salads and fried egg and cheese sandwiches. Instead of having a single special meal to point to, “it was “just” something like “oh hey look, local foods fully integrated into my life.” Hooray!”

Making up for lost time, Lisa had her first all local meal of the challenge this week. Her heat wave appropriate spread included strawberries, raspberries, red peppers, cucumbers, nectarines plus homegrown lettuce, spinach and radishes. Not to mention all the great insight into what she’s been eating the last 4 weeks.

Joan made use of her new Ivy Manning cookbook and made spicy minced pork in lettuce bundles, watercress, snow pea and shiitake stir-fry and asian slaw with peanuts. All shared with friends while traveling.

Even though she started the week with other plans, Donna’s meal this week sounds great to me. She made chili and cornbread with butter and honey. You know it’s good when the kiddo is begging for more!

Ellen got a quick recap up before leaving for vacation. Recent meals included steamed greens with tofu, homemade tortillas with eggs, radish and marinated artichoke salad, eggs and pancakes and more.

*****

California and Alaska:

I got some help this week from one of my favorite food bloggers, Anita, as I’m a bit swamped. She covered California and Alaska (below). Thanks Anita!

Tracy in San Diego starts her week musing about her favorite comfort food: Grilled cheese sandwiches with tomato. So you can imagine what happened when she “found this amazing raw Gouda, made at a creamery not even 60 miles from my house.” She whips up an elegant (and beautiful) tartine for this week’s challenge meal: open-face Gouda sandwiches on French bread, topped with arugula and tomato.

Up north in the Sacramento Valley, Taryn laments her inability to make this week’s One Local Summer meal look as good as it tastes: “I couldn’t make the swiss chard and basil pesto look like anything other than a green pile of yuck,” she tells us. No worries: Her supper of pesto-laced potatoes with sour cream, a simple salad, and a sliced plum for dessert sounds tempting.

At Anita & Cameron’s house, wacky weather and wildfire smoke whipped up a case of the kitchen doldrums. Their planned OLS meal was so “ugly and odd”, but they had another option in their back-pocket: spicy San Francisco-style Sloppy Joes, with bacon-laced cole slaw on the side. “We had a perfectly fabulous — and 100%-local — quick summer meal. Not glamorous, but definitely delicious.” (recipes included)

Green Bean in Silicon Valley has the brilliant idea of whipping up breakfast-for-dinner for her challenge meal. Borrowing Melinda‘s popular yogurt pancake recipe—using homemade yogurt, bonus points!—with a combination of local and fair-trade ingredients. “We topped it off with farmers’ market strawberries, blueberries and blackberries,” she tells us (causing her commenters to lick their screens.)

Dolores in Northern California’s East Bay turned her 100-mile radius finds into “a meal every bit as satisfying as anything I’d seen come out of the Hell’s Kitchen I had playing in the background...” A fillet of butterfish with a strawberry-peach-avocado salad, and roast potatoes with onions. You have to love this kind of simply elegant supper—and you have to admire that she got it to the table in less than an hour!

Further east in the Bay Area, Allison treats us to an al fresco feast: Mount Diablo chicken thighs with grilled veggies. Hope you cleaned your plate, because she’s got a 100%-local dessert, too: Grilled Apricots! “The apricots were freshly picked by me about 2 hours before grilling for about 12 minutes and drizzled with honey.”

Our northernmost participant, Kim finds it hard to get the challenge started: Summer starts a lot later up in Anchorage. “The fish are late and running in low numbers, the days have been overcast and the nights cool which have the farms producing much more slowly than normal.” Kim reports. But she managed to pull together a delicious meal of spaghetti Alfredo, topped with some wild-harvested fiddlehead ferns!

One Local Summer, Week 4:  Midwest

With veggies from her CSA, Lesli of Going Green made a pretty veggie wrap with strawberries on the side. 

The farmer’s market is keeping Jenny of The Nourished Kitchen busy and well supplied with local ingredients for all of her meals. 

Columbus Foodie Becke is also making lots of local meals, this week, one of which included a lovely chicken paprikash. 

Pancakes were on several local menus this week; Sirena at Swimming in this Sea of Life served hers with bacon and Mexican chocolate coffee.  Ellen of The Daily Grind also had pancakes with strawberry syrup and eggs for one of her many local meals this week, and so did Mandi at Eco Burbun—she had strawberries and cinnamon mocha coffee with hers. 

Joy of The Spiral of Seasons made a potato salad with tzatziki sauce and chicken and a salad with grated beets. 

A BLT and an unusual minted whey beverage made up a meal for Holly of blender, and another meal consisted of roasted chicken and “toss-your-random-herbs-in-here-potatoes.”

Anne at Green Leanings tried her hand at cooking a steak for the first time and had a delicious-sounding artisan mango lassi frozen yogurt for dessert.

Few meals sound better than Robyn’s paneer and raita followed by gorgeous strawberry ice cream for dessert.  (JediMomma’s Journal)

Katherine of Kitten’s Lost Her Mittens is lucky that one of her employer’s share’s their CSA veggies.  Because of this she got to try raw turnips for the first time!

Molly at field | work paid extra attention to enjoying good food and good conversation at her meals this week. 

Fresh-from-the-garden peas, broccoli and kale were on the menu for Anna of twelve22.org, along with potato hash. 

Debbie of Rites of Passage made a brown rice risotto-like dish, some more tofu, and broccoli and sugar snap peas. 

Karen at toteleeding is cleaning out her freezer and put together a beautiful cauliflower cheese pie and roasted eggplant and peppers salad, with angel food cake and strawberries for dessert.

Last minute addition from Lori of Life in Webster Groves. 

One Local Summer, week3: International

Thursday, June 26, 2008

It’s taken a while to round up all the international section this week ... but it was worth the wait.

In Brussels, Labelga has taken up the challenge, but I didn’t get her urls, so she’s checking in here for the first time. In week one, she visited her very local market and found that she should have heeded Alice Waters’ advice to scout all the stalls before buying anything. Even so, she cooked a three-course meal.

Week two in the market and Labelga found a Belgian-grown cauliflower and some greeny-blue Araucana eggs, so cauliflower gribiche with poached egg and spring onions was on her menu.

Week three and she couldn’t get to the market. Luckily, her local organic shop had a few local items in amongst the produce from Egypt Spain and France. Tartare of tomato followed by braised pointy cabbage using a Surinam / Dutch traditional recipe. Very useful to me, as my vegetable box is full of pointy cabbage at this time of year.

And I’ve found, too, that it’s harder to find what you want when you have to go beyond your one trusted easy supplier. Actually, it can be hard to find what you want period when you’re only buying local.

Karen bought a ready-made meat pie with beef raised at the Well Fed Food farm shop - Black Angus cattle, since you ask. Now before you go asking why she didn’t make it herself if she wanted it local - the enterprising farmer has these pies made locally for the convenience of his customers.

Amber says her week three looks a lot like week one - fish. But, as she says, she’s near the ocean. And she’s found a local food market - transformed from a tourist market, sounds like progress to me! She’s raised a problem familiar to every locavore - although sugar beet is grown in Alberta, she hasn’t been able to find a local source, it all seems to go to agribusiness. So, halibut, roasties and salad were on Amber’s menu.

Mariah at Rural Aspirations feels she’s made good progress this week. So much so that she found she’d made an all-local meal without having to plan it out. Her week three menu was: portobello mushrooms, red peppers with Raclette cheese and homemade bread using locally milled organic whole wheat and unbleached white flour.

Riana‘s in the south of France, so she’s ahead of us here in the UK - great, because she’s got lots and lots of ideas for the courgette / zucchini mountain that’s coming. I’m still at the stage where I’m just loving the courgettes, but it won’t be long before we’re wondering what on earth to do with them next. Her post is seriously useful to locavore gardeners everywhere.

Sally in Bristol had one of those weeks, and her local meal used up some leftover week two ingredients. But, driving around in the course of her work, she spotted a number of local farm shops which she’s planning to visit this week. Her post at Diario makes the point forcefully: if you want to eat locally produced food, you have to make a special effort, and it’s not always easy or compatible with the other things going on. It shouldn’t be like this.

Donna‘s email says: My local meal was a simple omlet, local eggs, asparagus, and cheddar cheese.  Salt not local. What could be better?

This week at Joanna’s Food I wanted to crack the meat problem. I was passing a much-recommended farm shop where I know they sell meat. It was virtually all labelled as produce of England, not really good enough. I bought steaks for the children which were labelled produce of Berkshire, our next county, but felt that even that labelling wasn’t enough. What farm? Where exactly? The children ate the steak while we were out, so my local meal was breakfast .... my favourite breakfast, actually, tomatoes on toast. I made the bread with locally milled locally grown wheat (I pass that farm every time I go to Oxford, it’s about 10 miles from here). And the tomatoes - some came from my vegetable box, grown in Hampshire, some were last year’s slow-roasted frozen, and two tiny ones came from the garden, the first of the year. I’m just off to the farmer’s market. Right now. Watch this space!

Related posts

Roasting tomatoes
Slow roasted tomatoes
Homemade tomato ketchup

One Local Summer - Week 3 - South

Tuesday, June 24, 2008

There were some fantastic things happening in the South this week!

Capturing Today’ fixed an amazing looking Sunday lunch: their own sirloin steak tips, potatoes, and peas.

Mel at Thirtyo made a great end of the garden casserole.  If you’ve got odds and ends of produce lying around from farmer’s market trips that you can’t quite figure out what to do with, casseroles are a great and delicious choice.

Over at Breakfast for Dinner, Jenn put together several great looking meals featuring local ingredients, including potato gratin, zucchini and onions; Carne Guisada; and frittata.

The folks at Tennessee Locavore had an tomato toast (including homegrown garlic!), grilled zucchini and squash, and cheese. Reading about it is making me hungry. 

At Walnut Spinney, they had a meal that many folks think you can only get from takout:  hamburgers, fries, and ice cream.

C. at Foodie Tots at locally off and on all week, including an amazing looking Father’s Day brunch.

E. at Outpost 505 cooked up two great meals:  pork and broccoli stir-fry, and grilled zucchini salad.  That salad is going on my to-make list.  I love zucchini, but always end up stir-frying it.

Heather at Simple - Green - Frugal documents had another entire day of eating locally, including pancakes, chipping away at a peach surplus, some lovely soup, and spaghetti squash.

At Our Greener Pastures, a mostly zero-mile frittata and salad were had.

Tiffany at The Garden Apartment did up a huge (and tasty looking) stuffed zucchini.  I know what I’m doing with the 8-ball zucchini lurking in my fridge.

Melissa at Bridgman Pottery had an all vegetable dinner with a great story behind it.

And finally, over at Low Mileage Food, we had a simple (but so, so good) dinner of squash and cube steak.

One Local Summer- Week 3: Mid-Atlantic Report

The Metaphorical Magpie has joined the OLS challenge this week with this scrumptious looking salad. Beets, radishes, ham, cheddar– this Jersey girl is off to a great start. The fixings came from the farmer’s market, her own veggie patch and even Shop Rite.

Danielle and family at Touch the Earth Farm enjoyed another zero-mile meal this week: pork tenderloin from a heritage breed of pigs they raise on their Maryland farm called Tamworth. Accompanying the pork was a just-picked salad of lettuce, spinach, green onions, turnips and homemade chevre. Couscous, flour, garlic and the vinaigrette for the salad were the only non-local ingredients.

Once again Philadelphian Chad has made the most of his local resources. Tapping the farmer’s market at Head House Square, his local meat source, Meadow Run Farm and his father’s herb garden he pulled together what must have been a delicious dinner: teriyaki-marinated ranch steaks served with sugar snap peas, fried artichoke slices, a colorful mix of fingerling potatoes and a dish of cipollini onion, golden and red beets with rosemary-skewered bacon.

Also hailing from Philadelphia, Pamela of Asterisms in the Stars’ Set Order, enjoyed a hearty, healthy meal of wilted beet greens and swiss chard with a side of Johnny cakes. The Johnny cakes were made from local cornmeal and spelt which she scored at her co-op. The veggies came from nearby farms.

Greens are a common theme this week. Mia over at Food on the Fire Escape enjoyed kale with green garlic courtesy of her CSA. She also had a mixed green salad with herbs and radishes from the farmer’s market and some Mergueza Lamb Sausage from the Catskills.

I too found myself with a wealth of greens from the CSA. For me it was arugula which I sautéed along with some Cape May scallops. I seasoned it with some of my own homegrown sage and then tossed it all with some pasta from Brooklyn. I served it with a simple salad on the side. It made for one tasty meal.

There’s no better way to enjoy a local meal than to toast it with a local wine which Meghan of Liberty on Tenth Street discovered this week. And New York has a lot to offer in that regard. Along with the wine, she enjoyed a local lasagna chock full of farmer’s market veggies and local Italian shop delicacies. For dessert she served grilled peaches with goat cheese (something I’ve got to try). And if that wasn’t enough, she also served up a local lunch this week: mozzarella, tomato and basil salad.

Tamar over at Studio Tamar had her sautéed greens (kale and chard) with a side of serious thinking. The locavore movement is not without its detractors, and it’s worth reading their side of the argument if nothing more than to further understand your own motivations for eating local.

The Purloined Letter welcomed Shabbat with a meal of Maryland’s best with farm-fresh hotdogs and spicy sauerkraut (also from the same farm), bread from a local bakery, a big arugula salad courtesy of their CSA and local strawberry ice cream. And as if that wasn’t enough, they also enjoyed breakfast the next morning: bakery challah French toast, farm eggs and milk, home-rolled oats (with nonlocal almonds) all topped with farmers market strawberries and local maple syrup. Sounds delicious!

Emily of The Shining Egg joined us this week with this beautiful meal.

Local beef, sautéed spinach, grilled summer squash and a tossed salad made for one lovely meal enjoyed, appropriately, al fresco.

Lauren of Philadelphia gave the classic stir fry her own local spin. She started with locally made tofu then tossed into the wok snap peas, bok choy, Napa cabbage and green onions from her CSA. Lancaster honey gave the dish added local flavor.

I’m utterly impressed by Robin of simple.green.organic.happy. who made mayonnaise this week. The homemade mayo went into a potato salad brimming with local goodness: potatoes (of course), homegrown parsley and spring onions. An appetizer of fresh mozzarella, homegrown basil and tomatoes got everything off to the right start. While boiled sweet corn has me green with envy, I’m weeks away from that!

-this section of Mid-Atlantic updated posted by Elizabeth of Seedling.
_____________________________________________________

Pennsylvania

Beany made her own yogurt and topped it with homemade strawberry syrup for a great breakfast treat.  She served it with local chicken and apple sausages, toast, and butter.  I’m coming to Beany’s house for breakfast - wow!

Naomi made a partly local meal of local chicken and broccoli with semi-local parsley and basil.  She also cooked up a tofu/kale/zucchini/snow pea/lemon basil/spring onion/garlic scape stirfry with non-local buckwheat noodles and seasonings.  Yum!

Buzz and Pat came up with three local meals this week! Meal one was onion and pepper turkey sausage with braised broccoli - which, sadly, didn’t live up to Pat’s expectations.  They got their hands on some buffalo and made two meals: buffalo stew using the first potatoes and onion from their garden, and buffalo burgers with a side of beets and sweet and sour stuffed peppers.

The lovely ladies from Philly Farmers made a big salad of spring mix, swiss cheese, and hardboiled eggs from their CSA and carrots from the farmers market.  And the apricots they served with it were gorgeous...and reportedly very, very tasty!

Mikaela continued her quest for simplicity with a seven ingredient meal: head lettuce, sugar snap peas, tofu, hakurei turnip, strawberry, spring onion, and escarole.  She made a veggie and tofu salad with strawberry dressing.  And she shared the recipe for the dressing - another good use for that immersion blender!

My own local meals were, well, meaty. Meal one was roasted duck with cherry sauce served with roasted cipollini onions and sauted garlic scapes.  Meal two was honey glazed pork with a swiss chard and onion saute and little round zucchinis stuffed with leftover risotto with kale and butternut squash (the squash was the last of last year’s frozen booty). The arborio rice, of course, was far from local.

New York

Rabi wins the award this week for most gorgeous OLS meal in New York.  Seriously - I never thought garlic scapes and radishes could look so beautiful!  I just made some of that garlic scape pesto and now I wish I had some radishes of my own to go with it.  This is what Rabi has to eat when her fridge is empty…

Julia from The Wounded Chef made me drool with all her talk of a restaurant that focuses on seasonal ingredients.  Queen of a container garden, Julia decided it was time to harvest the last of the Winter greens so she could plant up some herbs - so she mimicked a more expensive salad from the restaurant at home with her bitter greens and parmesan.  For those who say eating local and seasonally is more expensive, see Julia.  Later in the week, Julia busted out a big salad topped with radishes, baby carrots, and (be still my heart!) squid, as well as steamed clams topped with garlic scape pesto.

Linda made a great looking grilled pizza, and was delighted that the dough didn’t fall through the grates of the grill.  A girl after my own heart, Linda made her own mozzarella for the pizza, and used toppings from her garden (basil, garlic, and last year’s canned tomatoes) and pesto from a local supplier.

The other New York Linda delved into the wonderful world of broccoli rabe for the very first time this week and loved it!  She cooked up a roasted/veggie broiled/cheese combo, with potatoes, radishes, beets, and garlic with New York sharp cheddar. The side was braised broccoli rabe with garlic.

Peg discovered a wayward bag of beets in the back of her fridge and decided to use them up finally...in a very interesting way: via solar power.  She roasted beets in a solar oven with onion and sweet potato, and sauteed pea shoots as a side.  She calls her meal “motley”, but I call it ingenious!

New Jersey

There has been discussion at the One Local Summer yahoogroup about what ‘local’ means to each of us.  Bezzie is defining ‘local’ as “food that’s made in a place that’s a comfortable day’s drive away” and scoured her local ShopRite to see what was inexpensive and produced within her driving radius.  She found a few commercially produced goods that fit the bill - Freihofer’s bread (distributed out of PA) and Heluva Good Pepper Jack cheese (headquartered in upstate NY).  She put it together to make a grilled cheese sandwich.

-this section of Mid-Atlantic updated posted by Nicole.

One Local Summer: Week 3 - New England

Heat, humidity, rain and wind have all passed through New England this past week.  My county was under a tornado watch on Sunday afternoon.  Between the rough weather, though, there has been some nice warm sunshine to get things a-growing.  Most everybody has strawberries now, and the farm stands and markets are starting to bustle.  Hooray for summer getting started! 

This week, we’ll start from the end of the alphabet, with

VT

Stacey feels behind a week, but she’s hanging in there with a great entry of rosemary bread quiche, sauteed kohlrabi and (yeah!) strawberry shortcake!  She managed to cook this delicious meal even though she wasn’t in her own kitchen.  Bravo!

NH

Roasted beets, pan-fried zucchini and summer squash, sauteed beet greens and pickled radishes, oh, my!  It was a veritable veggie feast at Peaceable Imperatrix, especially considering she didn’t think she’d get a meal in, at all.  The quick-pickled radishes are my next radish experiment, I think.

Mack Hill Farm is a great place to get an almost zero-mile meal.  Lisa made a great Sunday brunch with eggs, spinach and bacon all from the farm.  Sounds like the freezer reorganizing paid off with the discovery of more bacon.  The strawberry shortcake looks fabulous, and there’s no better way to top it than with whipped raw milk sweetened with honey from the farm.  Mmm, mmm!

I had some strawberry shortcake too, as we enjoyed our first berries of the season, from just a few miles down the road.  I had a local meal of grilled (farmed - ugh!) salmon, grilled greenhouse zucchini and greenhouse cucumber salad.  Thank goodness for those greenhouses.

Sarah highlighted some sausage and eggs for her local meal, but also highlights a not-quite-as-local recipe for fusilli with pak choi and sausage from Alice Waters.  If you’re in NE, you know it’s greens season, so we’re ready for recipes that use the variety that our farmers are growing for us.  Thanks, Sarah!

ME

Lisa C.’s must have some of the most adventurous kids when it comes to food that I’ve heard of.  They request chard in their eggs.  When your kids request chard in their eggs, well, you give them chard, don’t you?  Chard and eggs with local butter, milk and cheese, that is.  Eat up, kids!

MA

This entry of Laurie’s is impressive not just because it’s a delicious-looking roast chicken dinner, but also because the acorn squash on her plate survived the whole winter intact in her root cellar.  Are you willing to give root-cellar lessons, Laurie?  Clearly you’re doing something right!

For a taste of local eating down south, check out Sara E.’s entry about her trip to Georgia.  Before reuniting with REM, Sara ate at The Watershed Restaurant in Decateur, GA.  She has a great write-up and pictures of her meal (and refreshing cocktails), including pimiento cheese and a pecan tart.  Sounds like you had a fabulous trip, Sara!

Leslie relied on the garden and her spice cabinet for her vegetarian meal.  She had grilled asparagus and garlic scapes and fresh kale with young garlic.  Check out her entry for a great sesame kale recipe.

Sarah H. gives us not just one meal for this week’s entry, but a whole day’s worth of local food.  She enjoyed Maine oatmeal for breakfast, a big, fresh salad for lunch and a hearty braise of sausage and greens for dinner.  Do tell, Sarah, how the experimental cookie/bar turned out.

Erica enjoyed veal loin chops, white polenta, and steamed asparagus with a dill and cream sauce.  Check out her entry to see how simple ingredients can be elegant.  The polenta looks like something I’d love to try, and she reminds me that cream sauces are easier than we often imagine they are, and can make a big impact on a meal.

Thanks for keeping up the cooking, everybody - have a great week!

One Local Summer-week 3: West Region

The summer solstice seems to have brought summer to the rest of us. This week saw the first of the summer fruits at Seattle area farmer’s markets and the arrival of stone fruits and more of late summer treats in California.

I could hardly contain my joy at discovering full flats of strawberries at the market yesterday and had to immediately make jam last night. Saturday saw us enjoying dinner after experiencing the wonder of a rainbow while we grilled. Herb rubbed pork chops, roasted asparagus and spring saute were on our plates - it was so good that neither of even made it to the salad course.

Now Sterling the cat and I are sitting here by the window enjoying a glass of Washington Syrah, toast with fresh strawberry jam and the stories of everyone else first official meals of summer.

*****

California:

Fish tacos to make us all drool were the order of the week at Anita’s house. After a so-so lunch at a local joint, she set out to make her own Baja style crispy fish tacos washed down with local beer. It had me drooling at 7:00 am this morning - I dare you to check out the photos and not have an instant fish taco craving.

Fresh peaches, apricots and figs are calling Momaste’s name this week. Their local dinner this week was chickpeas and barley in eggplant sauce with fresh basil and feta cheese in pita bread. On the side was the sauteed zucchini. I missed her last week when she made a meal of gigantes bean soup with potatoes. Sorry Momaste!

The official start of summer brought Tracey a balmy 108 degrees and a week long heat wave. She found refreshment in homemade pasta, fragrant basil and mounds of beautiful tomatoes all combined into lemon basil fettuccini. Yum.

Braving the farmers market again, Green Bean and family ate their way through strawberries, blackberries, blueberries and more last week. After her five year old sampled his way into a bag of not-so-ripe cherries she put them to good use in a cherry clafouti. Combined with local corn, peas, baugeete, goat’s milk brie and green beans it was quite the simple meal.

Sarah made the proverbial chicken with forty cloves of garlic this week. It’s a recipe I’ve always wanted to try but never managed to make. Combined with a salad from the garden it looks delish.

Shawna continues to discover her local foodshed, but also finds that some local foods are prohibitively expensive. In the midst of the heat wave she and her son found the perfect local snack - plums from the neighbor’s tree.

*****

Washington, Oregon and Colorado:

Recovering from her “very bad week”, Ellen is back at it with meals that included turnip salad, homemade corn tortillas and eggs, bok choi and honey baked beans an Asian tofu and greens stir fry. Not to mention the homemade granola and waffles. The race is on to start refilling the freezer before it’s completely empty…

Over at Joan’s house a father’s day dinner of grilled stuffed salmon, salad, sauteed spinach, roasted carrots and fingerling potatoes and rhubarb crisp started off the week. It was followed up by homemade whole wheat fettuccini with mushroom sauce. She topped it off with a local breakfast of Melinda’s yoghurt pancakes topped with strawberries.

Sharon’s meal featured center cut pork chops rosemary in a mushroom, baby onion and garlic scape reduction. On the side was a salad with the snappy addition of radish and peas. For dessert were cherries on vanilla ice cream.

Donna and her family enjoyed their OLS meal last week at my new favorite burger joint, Burgerville. After a long weekend, they stopped on their way back from Portland for cheese burgers and strawberry milkshakes - so jealous as that’s my new guilty pleasure. Good thing the closest one is almost 200 miles away…

Eggs in a basket with salsa and cheese, salad with toppings, cheeseburgers, spinach and eggs and steak and potatoes all made appearance (some more than one) at JM’s house. And she poses the very astute question “If you can eat local as a matter of course, why not do it?”.

I missed the Shibaguyz last week by a matter of moments it seems. While Shannon was sick, Jason picked up the slack by making roasted chicken with homemade stuffing, homemade stock and leftover chicken with the emmer that Shannon cooked before falling ill.

Melinda and Matt hit the farmer’s market with the Shibaguyz again and picked up some amazing heirloom cauliflower. With it they made a vegan hearty cauliflower soup by adding onion, garlic vegetable stock pizza sauce and ziti pasta. Hit her blog for photos and a recipe.

Last week marked the first time that Denise was able to build an entire meal around the produce from her garden. Sauteed zucchini, broccoli raab and green onion plus a scrumptious sounding salad were joined by braised pork chops. If you want to know why I want a green house - Denise’s garden is it.

Finding herself without access to a weekend farmer’s market, Monica raided the remainders of last week’s purchases to make a dinner of apple slices, red potatoes, quiche and honey bran muffins.

Kimberly thinks that summer might really be coming our way but I’m reserving judgement for now. Nevertheless, she celebrated the solstice by eating locally all day long. For breakfast she enjoyed the last of her egg custard. For lunch she had a big salad with the tiny sweet carrots and sugar snap peas of spring. Afternoon snack was sweet Chelan cherries duncked in quark. For dinner wild salmon with smashed yukon gold potatoes and sauteed sugar snap peas. And finally, dessert was strawberry rhubarb cobbler. Now that’s how you celebrate the solstice!

One Local Summer, Week 3:  Midwest

Destabee made an asparagus-tomato-spinach quiche that sounds absolutely delicious.

Karen’s CSA haul allowed her to put together a satisfying meal of burgers, salad, and a bunch of veggies.

Becke had the ingredients to make CaBoom! Chili, and she shares the recipe with us!

Holly had an abundance of local leftovers and was able to put together her leftover speciality dish—it was so good she had to work quick to get a photo of it. Earlier in the week she had an almost all-local day!

Ellen was able to put together several local meals this week, and offers some suggestions for preparing greens for storage.

Jenny reports on a local on-the-road meal from last week, and two local meals she had eating out this week.

Sirena was adventurous and tried some new-to-her items, garlic curlies (scapes) and exotic mushrooms.

Robyn had a gorgeous meal of Roast Chicken with Candy Beets, Sauteed Beet Greens, and Sauteed Sugar Snap Peas.

Joy also had chicken with an interesting potato salad with kohlrabi and a green salad.

Anne had a great stir fry with a strawberry granita for dessert.

Molly experimented with arugula pesto and then made roasted thyme chicken.

Anna savored the joy of just-picked lettuce in a lovely salad.

Lori made “Bagel draped with melted methuzela cheese and topped with a halved 2-egg chive omelette, served with a side of tomato slices and washed down with fresh-brewed iced coffee liberally dosed with hormone- and antibiotic- free 2% milk.” And locally roasted coffee.

Debbie made collard wraps with a curried tofu and quinoa filling.

Katherine had a pretty meal of pork steak, new potatoes, and sugar snaps.  (I’m not sure if this was for week 2 or 3, but here it is anyway.)

One Local Summer, week 2: International

Thursday, June 19, 2008

After last week’s success in finding good local cold-pressed oil, this week hasn’t been great. I didn’t manage one single meal that was entirely local, although most were mostly local (75%+). What stopped me succeeding was a queasy feeling that too much driving round looking for suppliers wasn’t the best way forward.

This was the week I intended to find local meat. Horatio arrived home unexpectedly for vegetarian supper, and announced: A meal without meat is a wasted opportunity. Next year he’s living in a student flat with four other young men, and I wonder how long he’ll continue with that attitude will last once he sees how far his money will go.

There’s a farm shop at the other end of the village, the sort that’s in a barn: several people have recommended it to me. Huge disappointment - the vegetables are all bought in from all over the world, there are loose frozen veggies to help yourself to from a freezer, the meat counter didn’t look appetising, and definitely wasn’t local, and although the eggs were marked “from our farm” there wasn’t a single chicken to be seen. So I left empty-handed.

My usual butcher supplies good meat, and mostly from the UK, but he’s not a locavore. The monthly farmers’ market in Henley is next week, so I should have better luck then - I didn’t feel it was helpful to drive over to Reading specially.

Fish is similarly tricky, as we’re a little way from the coast. But there are rivers near here. And fish farms. And the school holidays are about to start, so there’ll be time to catch fish ourselves.

Instead, this week, all our vegetables, without exception, came from our box, so were grown less than an hour’s drive way, or from the garden (especially herbs). The bread was all made with local flour, oil and honey. The milk - delivered with my veg box - comes from a farm near Marlborough, just over an hour’s drive away. Not quite local, but better than the supermarket’s offering, lower in food miles too. And I know where it came from, will try to take a photograph when I’m over that way next week. I’ll also try to source some closer milk - sadly, the milk that’s produced in this village at Lucy’s Farm is all taken away by a huge tanker which holds up the through traffic which clogs up our tiny lanes ... but isn’t there something mad about a farmer producing good milk which he can’t sell to his neighbours, as practised by the whole of humankind for millennia???

Here are links to the international section of One Local Summer:

Amberism, week one - salmon patties
Amberism, week two - cheese omelette on home-made rye
Garlic Breath, week two - pork ribs, artichokes, grilled pointed cabbage
Rural Aspirations - lentil burgers, home-made buns, salad
Diario, week two - toad in the hole, sorbet

Links to related posts

One local summer, week one round-up
OLS, Saturday lunch in the garden
OLS, first thoughts
Introducing OLS

Useful links for locavores in the South of England

Rapeseed oil from Gloucestershire
Wessex Mill

One Local Summer - Week 2 - South

Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Amy put together a local stew and localish pop sicles.

Jenn at Breakfast for Dinner served up local NY strip steaks, deer sausage, veggie and butter, and wine. Wowsa!

Jasmine at Knitting 40 Shades of Green fielded a busy week and power outages, and had pasta, tomato sauce, and salad.

Madeline at Barn-Raising had the help of her son this week, in making some lovely looking stuffed pork burgers and smoothies.

Capturing Today’s had some great local components in their meals, in a very busy week.

Over at The Garden Apartment, local sausage, salad, and potatoes were had.

Mel at Thiryo made up some luscious looking patty pan squash.

Carolyn and Jim at Walnut Spinney had lunch all from their garden. Pam at Our Greener Pastures also raised her own food this week, and did CLD at Soap Box Blog. I am seriously jealous of everyone’s gardens and animals.

C at Foodie Tots found some great local foods while on the road.

Heather at Simple - Green - Frugal ate local all day again, in between riding her bike to errands and mowing the lawn.

Over at Bridgman Pottery, they had a great looking baked omelet and some other goodies.

And over at Low Mileage Food, we had a week of near misses.

If I missed anyone, give us a shout out in the comments!

One Local Summer- week 2: Mid-Atlantic Report

Another delicious, zero-mile meal was had by Danielle of Touch the Earth Farm. At the center was a rotisserie chicken which was served with couscous, a mixed green salad and home-made ciabatta. The couscous (really the only nonlocal ingredient) was flavored with sundried tomatoes and basil from last year’s garden and ricotta cheese. The salad was tossed with radishes, green onions and chevre.  Both cheeses were made fresh from their own raw Jersey milk. They enjoyed their meal with a local Maryland wine. Sounds amazing!

Hannah of The Purloined Letter took inspiration from one of her fellow OLS participants when she decided to make Purslane Paneer, her own spin on a vegetarian Indian dish. A seasoned cheesemaker, she found making her own paneer to be quite straightforward. Part of the challenge of eating locally is making the best use of what you’ve got on hand. Proving this point, she tossed in radish tops and purslane. My CSA last year introduced me to purslane, and I can see where it would work well in this dish. Technically purslane is a weed, gastronomically it’s quite versatile, flavorful and nutritious.

I can relate with city girl Mia’s dilemma this week having once been an apartment dweller myself. Though there’s plenty of Food on the Fire Escape to be enjoyed, grilling is just not an option. So instead she broiled her upstate NY chicken, despite the steamy weather. Seasoned with herbs she had frozen from last year’s CSA share, she was able to satisfy her yen for grilled flavor. The asparagus and greens hailed from Jersey.

A bumper crop of basil became inspiration for Meghan of Liberty on 10th Street. Harvested from her own Brooklyn window boxes, she transformed her basil into what must have been a delicious pesto served with ricotta gnocchi. The Italian specialty shop across the street provided many of the ingredients including the ricotta which was made fresh. She concluded her meal with some local red wine sorbet complete with farmer’s market strawberries and apples. Mmmm.

I think many of us can relate with some of the sentiments expressed by Smtwngrl over at Writing: My Life. This is truly a “challenge.” We’re all devising or adapting recipes to suit what’s available and in many cases, affordable, too.  Smtwngrl rose to the challenge this week with her asparagus omelet with new potato homefries. The farmer’s market yielded all sorts of tasty enhancements including spring onions, garlic scapes, dill and parsley.

Omelets are a popular approach to the OLS challenge as Robin at simple.green.organic.happy can attest. They are the perfect way to highlight the bounty of the season. Shopping the local farms turned up all sorts of fresh options. This Pennsylvania family enjoyed asparagus, tomatoes and “super-sweet” peas. Sounds great.

Chad was happy to report that he had the best pork chops ever this week. Simply seasoned then dusted with cornmeal, I think he’ll be remembering this meal for seasons to come. An apple and red onion compote was served up on the side along with zucchini with tomatoes and spring garlic and new potatoes with parsley. Chad has found all sorts of sources for local foods in his home city of Philadelphia including the Fair Food Farmstand at the Reading Terminal Market.

And as for my own contribution this week, over at Seedling, I wanted to put to good use the piles of CSA strawberries I’d come into. We’re drowning in lettuce as well, so a salad seemed a wise choice. Snap peas and radishes were also provided by our CSA. Asparagus by our local grocery store.  We topped it all off with some grilled sirloin from our local source for organic, grass-fed beef.  I’m trying to eat less meat, so when I do I want it to be worth it. This time it truly was.

-this section of Mid-Atlantic updates posted by Elizabeth of Seedling.
_________________________________________________________________

Pennsylvania

Mikaela’s desire to keep it simple produced a very pretty seasonal dinner using only eight ingredients last week. radish and pickled kohlrabi salad; a stir fry of locally made seitan, bok choy, spring onions, and snow peas; and dessert of strawberries.  Oh, and the recipe for the stir fry, as well as the kohlrabi pickles, is included!  Loving all things pickle, I might have to give the pickles a try.

For Father’s Day weekend, Caroline’s husband wanted roast pork.  He’s a smart guy, because roast pork today means pulled pork sandwiches tomorrow, and who wouldn’t love that?  Caroline cooked up a pork loin in her pressure cooker with her homegrown garlic and veggie stock and some locally grown onions.  The side dishes were things she got in her CSA share this week - locally made perogi (coincidentally, if the fact that you get perogi isn’t enough reason to join her CSA, I don’t know what is) and fresh peas, as well as strawberries for dessert.  They also drank Victory Lager from Victory Brewing Company, a local brewery, with the meal.

Liz, who is having trouble finding locally grown grains (I feel your pain), cooked up a meal of summer smoked sausage and horseradish cheese, with fried eggs from her own flock of chickens.  I’m green with envy over here.  I want hens, too!  Her meal ended with strawberries.  I see a running theme for Pennsylvania!

Our resident scientist, Naomi had trouble finding time to cook this week because of research deadlines.  Despite that, she managed to make a tofu scramble of local tofu, baby spinach, snap peas, garlic scapes, and spring onions, plus dried basil from her parents’ CSA.

Two more meals from Buzz and Pat!  First, a very pretty beefaloaf with a side of roasted veggies.  And next, pork tenderloin with rosemary and thyme.  The herbs came from their garden.  They served that up with a side of buttered beets.  Yum!

Kristen from Philly Farmers had an unintentionally white OLS meal last week - roasted kohlrabi, peas, pierogies w/ sauerkraut and grilled (with olive oil) rosemary bread.  Hilarious photo with the entry, too!

As for me, there were a few OLS meals last week.  I’m lucky in that my husband likes to fish and will clean the fish for me!  With a trout he caught, we made grilled trout with onions, peas with homemade butter and mint from my garden, and spinach.  I harvested garlic scapes from the garden this week, so I sauteed some up with red onions, and used up the last of the Hakurei turnips and greens to serve with local honey roasted chicken legs.  Delicious!  There was a weekend breakfast of scrambled eggs, spinach, and red onions using pullet eggs.  Lastly, I went a little crazy and made goat ricotta and swiss chard cannelloni with bechamel sauce, and made the pasta from scratch.

New York
Comfort food was on the menu for Peg.  After waiting a little too long to get to her local farmer’s market, she got creative with what she had on hand and made what she calls Hudson Valley Colcannon: that’s mashed potatoes, carrot greens and kale, with sour cream and bleu cheese.  It sounds delicious!

Linda put together a meal of roasted chicken, and roasted savoy cabbage and radishes, with steamed asparagus on the side and yogurt for dessert.  She investigated her local grocery store options this week and was dismayed to see very little in the way of locally grown produce.  She definitely plans to hit farmer’s markets from here on out.  Voting with your food dollars is what it’s all about!!

Rabi managed two local meals this week, both of them very, very pretty!  Herbed new potatoes using her own herbs, pan-fried spring vegetables (vitamin greens, tomato, and purple onion), and seared summer squash with basil from the garden.  I’ve never heard of vitamin greens before, so I had to google them.  Apparently, it’s a green that has a stem similar to celery and one uses them as you would kale or collards.  It sort of looks a little like bok choy to me.  And then there were these gorgeous strawberry muffins she made for breakfast!  It’s probably not a good thing that I haven’t eaten breakfast yet as I’m writing this.

Linda opted for an Italian-theme OLS meal last week.  Better yet, the meal was shared with the in-laws during which Linda did a little seasonal eating evangelizing.  Do we all do this?  I usually save my evangelizing for Thanksgiving with the in-laws. Heh!  I really wish I could have been at Linda’s dinner - wow!  She made cheese lasagna with a side salad and served it with locally made bread and butter.  And she finished with homemade ice cream!  If the in-laws aren’t converts after that, I don’t know what it will take!!!

Julia did one of the coolest things ever: threw a locavore potluck!  For Julia’s own dish, she went with a pork roast (I really have to get to Union Square market to shop - I know it would be sort of a big waste since NYC is over an hour away by train, but everyone in NYC who shops there finds such amazingly beautiful things!!!!) cooked in a crockpot with sliced onion, barbeque sauce, salt, pepper, and a little water to create pulled pork.  She made her own buns for the sandwiches, too - awesome!  She also made fries to go with the sandwiches, as well as a garlic scape aioli dipping sauce.  Mercifully, Julia includes the recipe for aioli in her post.  Be sure to head over and read her post to find out what her guests brought to the potluck!

-this section of Mid-Atlantic updates posted by Nicole of Farm to Philly.

One Local Summer, Week 2: New England

My goodness!  Here we are again already, with lots of great food here in New England.  I like the way other coordinators split the post up with some photos and state/regional delineation.  So, if imitation is the greatest form of flattery, you other coordinators should consider yourselves the coolest!

Maine

Meat and potatoes were on the menu at Lisa C’s.  She made a meatloaf and smashed some potatoes, then tossed up a local green salad.  That pie she had for dessert is calling my name.  Check out the comments on her post for a great discussion about keeping those greens fresh when they start pouring in from the CSA share. 

Massachusetts

Sara E. discovered one of the principles of making local eating less stressful: use what you’ve got and don’t count too much on the availability of something.  After being thrown a little off course on a search for turkey sausage, she discovered she could afford some local, organic strawberries!  That’s right, our first strawberry post of the season, ladies and gentlemen.  Strawberries took center stage in her salad and her dessert.  Her post has some great thoughts about what she’s going to keep local, and what she may not be able to live without.

Laurie not only made homemade ricotta gnocchi, but she made the ricotta itself!  She also used a local hard cheese, garlic and spinach.  Check out her great photo and entry on Flickr.  She used a recipe for the gnocchi from Moosewood/Mollie Katzen.  I’m going to HAVE to try making ricotta this summer, if only just to try these out!

How much do you love a meat CSA?  Erica loves hers because they keep sending along breakfast meat.  Given an abundance of pork breakfast sausage and a shortage of morning time, she made everybody’s secret favorite: breakfast for dinner!  After deciphering a johnnycake recipe made with local cornmeal (note to self: try johnnycakes), Erica even included a salad with local honey dressing.  Mmmmm...brinner!

Sarah H. got to pick strawberries this week and enjoyed a “wild kingdom-style” kildeer display!  She also celebrated her first CSA share by making summer rolls with rice paper skins, cellophane noodles, and shredded CSA vegetables. 

Stephanie is on her way to a great PB&J.  She found some fresh strawberries and got jammin’!  She, like several of us, is looking forward to her CSA starting back up again for the season.

New Hampshire

Sarah sings the praises of Alice Waters in her second OLS post.  She made turnip and turnip greens soup with local turnips and greens and homemade chicken broth.  She’s thankful to her husband for that gift of The Art of Simple Food.

Despite some initial anxiety, Debbie managed to get started with the challenge and discover new food resources in her area.  With the help of her kids, she discovered a food co-op that identifies local ingredients.  Armed with local eggs, greens, cheese and turkey cutlets, she managed to relax and create a great meal of frittata and broiled cutlets.  Looks like she’s hooked!

Three meals in one day for Lisa R. this week.  I told her it was time for me to move in.  She enjoyed local eggs and cheese for breakfast, a homemade pizza with some more of that cheese and some homemade, canned pizza sauce.  For dinner, she broke out some of the grassfed beef in the freezer and enjoyed it with potatoes and spinach.  She even whipped up a spicy dessert you need to check out.  Yum!

Imperatrix wanted to make sure she had mastered eggs, so she enjoyed an asparagus tart and some gingered beets.  I think I might even like beets made with ginger!  I know how she feels with the second installment of eggs, but they’re a reliable, fresh source of food right now, so we’re all embracing eggs in the spring!

I had some local beef, too, along with a potato/spinach skillet.  I’m considering the potatoes local, as they were from Maine, although I know that means they could be from more than 100 miles away.  This time of year, I figure regional is a good compromise.

Vermont

Our lone Green Mountain State representative, Stacie, had a great meal last week of homemade bread and fresh salad.  She’s enjoying local lettuce, radishes and goat cheese.

----------------------------------------------
That’s it for this week - here’s hoping those CSAs kick in for everyone soon, or, at the very least your favorite farm stand opens soon (or is that just me wishing that?).

One Local Summer-week 2: Western Region

The second week of the challenge has come and gone and I’m running a bit behind on the recap. My apologies to my region. It was a busy week for me as I was in the middle of the Cedar Rapids flooding, witnessing first hand the destruction of the Cedar River. Each of us that is focused on eating whole, fresh, seasonal foods will be thankful in the coming months that most of our diet is not reliant on corn or soybeans.

The featured dinner at our house was a simple steak and potatoes affair. The only exciting parts of it were the salad that came completely from our new garden and the Naked wine. But the other participants in the West? Well, they certainly rocked it this week!

*****

Oregon, Washington, Colorado

Melinda made me so hungry last night when her post popped up in my RSS feed. These gorgeous low fat yoghurt pancakes are not only local, they’re good for you. She even posted the recipe for us, but be warned, the pictures are going to make you hungry!

Discovering that perhaps beans really are the “magical fruit”, Donna made a rich dinner of rice and beans. Sounds so good I may just have to try it if I can get my hands on some beans. Even her picky son thought it was delicious.

Joan is ready for summer, even if summer has been slow to arrive in the PNW. Her new freezer is awaiting spring berries and she thinks she might have seen the sun. Dinner this week was troll caught Black Cod with salad from the garden, potatoes with wilted greens and “Peace Bomb” bread. Yum.

Joining the group of bloggers that make me feel guilty for not learning to make pasta, JM made her own gnocchi and Bechamel sauce this week. It might not be photogenic, but it sure sounds good…

Denise channeled Michael Ruhlman this week, making the Paté de Campagne from Charcuterie. It not only made for an easy, no-cook weeknight dinner, it was rich and satisfying when combined with baguettes, onion marmalade and a big salad. Much better than the steaks that also made an appearance…

With the farmer’s markets still limited to greens of various sorts, Monica decided to make Spinach Manicotti last week. She followed it up with Father’s Day breakfast at a new local restaurant specializing in local and homemade foods.

Kimberly found inspiration this week in English peas and gnocchi (I sense a theme). Sauteed in brown butter with a bit of sage, it looks as good as it sounds. And she sourced the butter and peas from a couple of my favorite farms.

In the midst of a difficult week, Ellen still found time to make a dinner featuring local black beans and corn wrapped in homemade corn tortillas. And she continued to leverage her stash of frozen local soups. Feel better soon Ellen!

*****

California

Green Bean went supremely simple for her meal this week. With a child graduating from preschool she was in charge of providing the tea sandwiches for the celebration. Peanut butter and jam, cucumber and cheddar and egg salad on local bread were the name of the game.

Proving that even in a BUSY week you can make time for healthy local eating, Tracey focused this week on a salad made from last week’s remnants. And on the heels of this beautiful dish, she found a source of chicken and beef.

Taryn found locally made pasta this week and promptly put it to use in a meal of lemon-chive fettucini with chicken, olive oil, vinegar, garlic and chives. They washed it all down with homemade ginger ale.

Declaring summer a week early, Anita is looking forward to feasting on all of the bounty that it will bring. This week’s meal included roast chicken with herb butter, Tuscan-style artichokes and a simple orzo-and-garbanzo side with chevre. While the chicken roasted, they indulged in bruschetta with ricotta and salami. Check out her post for beautiful photos and recipes.

Amongst a lot of other happenings, Shawna still found time to make a local breakfast. It featured a simple omelette with eggs from their chickens and greens from the garden and homegrown strawberries on the side.

Lauren did justice to elk steaks hiding in the freezer this week. She pan seared them and served them with braised collard greens, saute of carrots, summer squash and sage, smashed Peruvian blue potatoes and red wine. I love elk steaks - sounds so delicious!

Avoiding eggs by the skin of her teeth, Allison instead made a dinner of pork sausage, steamed corn on the cob (!), broccoli and zucchini. Hard to believe that there’s corn on the cob in California and I’m sitting here with my wool slippers on in June.

*****

As always, if I missed you, please leave your update in the comments. Thanks again for a great week!

One Local Summer - week 2:  Midwest

Monday, June 16, 2008

Ellen had a rough week after minor surgery, but was able to have a dinner of homemade corn tortillas with local black beans, corn, onion and garlic.

Lesli had a simple but lovely salad of spicy greens, cheddar cheese and strawberries.

Sirena made a delicious-looking breakfast of andouille sausage, eggs, and feta cheese.

Kris actually made several local meals this week, using meat her family raised themselves, produce from their garden and their neighbor’s, and other locally produced items.

Mandi made some gorgeous egg salad pita sandwiches and washed it down with some local beer.

Joy created a beautiful meal with a black bean spread sandwiches, strawberries, and mixed salad with feta cheese.

Laura’s meal was a spicy, tandoori-flavored dish of onions, zucchini, cauliflower, green beans (and the rest of the family ate theirs with local sausage as well).

Anne made use of some very pretty calpyso beans in her dinner with green garlic and chorizo, braised greens with green garlic, plus a salad of mixed lettuce, snow peas, cucumber, grape tomatoes, and French breakfast radishes.  Oh, and some homemade creamy peppercorn dressing for the salad.  (I am in love with those beans!)

Becke’s husband showed off his considerable cooking talent with Mushroom Stuffed Pork Tenderloin with Port Reduction Sauce (and Becke shares the recipe!)

Alisa was on vacation last week, so this week is her inaugural meal (and blog post!) with a pretty salad (and some gorgeous peonies as well).

Destabee made a wonderful-looking mixed green salad with asparagus and other garden veggies along with goat cheese, dried pears, and walnuts.

Anna had lovely dinner of potatoes, asparagus and salad (and an almost all-local lunch of bean soup and a goat cheese quesadilla).

Debbie made some tofu this week using local soybeans.  She then used the tofu in a stir fry with some mixed veggies from her CSA and served it on quinoa from Laurel, Iowa. 

Lori also made a tasty meal of a “bagel draped with melted methuzela cheese and topped with a halved 2-egg chive omelette, served with a side of tomato slices and washed down with fresh-brewed iced coffee liberally dosed with hormone- and antibiotic- free 2% milk.”

Robyn made a soup and salad meal with a twist, hot spinach bacon salad with a cold corn chowder.  Like a lot of us here in the Midwest she’s missing the starchy foods that will come later, but this meal looks great!

(I hope I didn’t miss anybody this week, I’ve been a little disorganized.  Let me know if I missed you and I’ll add you to the post. Debbie.)