Local. Sort of .
Thursday, July 26, 2007
We vacation in the Outer Banks where the produce at the local supermarket is terrible. The small produce store has some better items, but since I’m a member of the Red Earth Farm CSA (I split a full share of ten items with my friend Jen) I decided to bring along the entire contents of last week’s box.
The box contained:
Beets
Bunch of kale
3 zucchini
4 green peppers
Bunch Walla Walla onions
Half pint of Sun Gold tomatoes
3 heads of garlic (extra because they were left out of the previous week’s share)
Quart of green beans
Quart of wax beans
Pint of new potatoes
Bunch of Rainbow Chard (extra because it was left out of the previous week’s share)
Bunch of carrots
Pint of apricots
quart of sweet cherries
Quart of blueberries (from the buying club)
Block of Jack cheese (from the buying club)
Block of Cheddar cheese (from the buying club)
I also picked up a separate buying club order from Meadow Run Farm and packed up more (locally grown, pastured) meat in one cooler than I’ve eaten in the past six months.
Because that didn’t seem like enough for two weeks I stopped at my local Farmer’s Market and picked up:
6 ears of corn
2 quarts of Peaches
Cantaloupe
And from my own garden I picked:
Rosemary
Basil
Tarragon
Thyme
So far, instead of eating eating out for every meal our dinners have been
Whole Wheat Rotini with Ratatouille (Roasted Golden Tomatoes, Zucchini, Walla Walla Onions and Garlic, olive oil, thyme and basil) and parmesan served with Swiss chard sautéed with garlic and olive oil.
Hamburgers with raw herbed jack and raw colby dill cheese (from the Fair Food Stand) on whole wheat buns. Sauteed zucchini and onions with tarragon
Whole brined butterflied chicken grilled, corn on the cob, Green and wax beans with butter and parsley.
I used the chicken carcass and some carrots, onion and garlic to make a chicken stock for the next night’s meal, which was Beet risotto gone wrong. I brought the wrong rice (long grain, not short) so I had to make long grain brown rice with onions, garlic and butter cooked in chicken stock, roasted beets, and sautéed beet greens with garlic instead of the risotto I’d planned
So far our meals have been delicious and I’m thrilled I packed four coolers worth of food. But traveling 375 miles leaves me with this question- if I’m eating the meals in coastal North Carolina does the food still count as locally grown?
