Persimmons from Van Dyke Ranch at the Santa Cruz farmers market. I've mentioned this before, but for those who don't know what to do with persimmons, my darling Bob likes to freeze them and grate them—like a granita. (I'm not a big fan of them...yet...that could change. I like them in bread and hidden in other things, not just plain. Something about the grainy texture.)
I was excited to commit to blogging every day this month about something useful, informative, and/or entertaining about farms and inspiring foods . But I did not get out to a farm today—I got as far as my mailbox, and that was all the energy I had. So getting out of the house to visit a farm was not possible, nor was it possible to pick up the phone and ask one of my farmer friends a few questions. My voice sounds like a cross between a foghorn, a chainsaw, and my cigarette-smoking great-aunt's. The bronchitis, she no fun.
My offerings today are gleaned from all over, so let's start with the farm/food stuff.
EATING LOCALLY
Winter is upon us, even here in California. Those of us who are interested in eating local foods as much as possible constantly ask the question, "What are we supposed to do in the winter?" As a citizen of the one of the most diverse food regions in the entire world, I have no right to complain about anything related to the deprivations of winter eating. But others always say, "Sure, you can eat like that—you live in California. What's a guy in Cleveland, Ohio, supposed to do in the winter time?"
And that is what Umbra Fisk addressed over at Grist, when someone from New Hampshire (state motto: "Eat Snow or Die!") asked her how she might eat as locally as possible over the winter.
Also in Grist, farmer Tom Philpott, whose voice I always enjoy, writes about a $30 meal he shared with a friend he was visiting in North Carolina, in which they tried to be as responsible as possible in buying local, clean food.
We wanted to celebrate over a meal, but were strapped for time and cash. Rather than go out, we decided to cook a simple, quick, and relatively frugal meal at home. Our experience conjuring up an impromptu dinner in Chapel Hill, a city known for its robust local-food infrastructure, taught me a lot about the limitations of trying to eat responsibly under time and financial pressure -- and how just a few tweaks could bring dramatic change.
After blowing half their budget on a biodynamic Italian wine, the rest of the meal came together beautifully. But still—comments left at Grist are mildly scolding about that. (Although anyone who suggests hard cider as a replacement for wine with that meal—and maybe any meal—is not coming to my house for a BYOB potluck.)
I like that he suggests Charlotte creating a USDA slaughterhouse—how many communities with small farms and ranches would benefit from that?
BLOGGING FARMERS
I found the most charming farm blog…a rarity given that farmers are so intensely busy themselves, and finding a farmer—actually, finding anyone, regardless of their general profession—who enjoys writing is doubly rare. Young Laura Fehrichs and her partner in all things, Adam Cullip, live and farm in Minnesota, where the state bird is the loon. That they named their farm Loon Organics is a double entendre. Laura writes:
Our farm name is Loon Organics, named initially after the wonderful state bird of Minnesota, the Common Loon, although I believe the loon is far from common, being prehistoric and having one of the most sublime bird calls I have ever heard. It seems that the more nuanced connotation of our farm name, (which inspired my blog name _loonatics_) is that one must be somewhat of a loon, i.e. crazy, to dedicate his/her life to small-scale organic farming. It is not all peaches and cream, and I thought that I had a good idea of the sheer back-breaking work of it all and the measley pay, but I am slowly realizing that we got ourselves into a something a lot bigger than we imagined. Overall though, I think it is worth it.
Something in her voice is as pure and plain as Laura Ingalls Wilder. You can sense the character and the spine in her.
Laura started her blog last June, and I am slowly working my way through, like a chapter book. Her very second post is about a devastating hail storm that pelted their very first crop—the fear and then the practical assessment of damage that could be sustained, versus loss that could not, gives insight into things that those of us who rely on others to grow our food would do well to consider.
Thank you, Laura, and please keep writing about your work. It's beautiful.
And Laura farms at Gardens of Eagan, where she and Adam rent some land from the certified organic farm. They partner at a farmstand with the owners of Gardens of Eagan—a young woman named Atina Diffley. Atina also blogs: you have to look at the calendar via the Archive link, and then click "2005" to go to the beginning. I loved her first entry, in its entirety:
Meagan, Sarah and I spent the day transplanting tomatoes in the greenhouse. What a great team. It’s great being three woman. We spent the day getting to know each other and telling our most important life stories. Sarah starts the custom of saying, “pause” when one of us has to leave the space to do something and, “play” when we return so as to not miss any of the conversation.
I don't know the whole story about the legal battle, but I know it's hugely inspiring—on the front page of Gardens of Eagan's website this is what greets you:
We have signed an agreement with the Minnesota Pipeline Company.
They understand the importance of protecting organic farms.
1. They will not cross the Gardens of Eagan farm.
2. They agree to the first organic mitigation plan in the country.
A saying comes to mind: "If you think something small can't make a difference, try going to sleep with a mosquito in the room."
Thanks, ladies, for the inspiration.
• • • • • • • • • • •
And now a little bitter with the sweet—I will conclude on the sweet, I promise.
I visited Regina Schrambling's Gastropoda site last night, and found six items that she's given me permission to quote here. She calls these tidbits "Bites," and you can almost hear her teeth snap when she writes some of them. (Frankly, I'd be in there sharing the kill if I could, because I am so glad when someone says these things out loud. So to speak.)
Note: these bites aren't "nice." But they're funny and tart in a kind of "finally!" way—I am not interested in "nice" so much since it comes from an Old French word, nicere, meaning "to pretend not to know." None of us can afford to pretend like we don't know, as the results of the most recent national election show. (Still exultant over that one, and do we ever have our work cut out for us.)
In undated entries, Ms. Schrambling writes [emphasis mine]:
1.
Interesting creature, the Chimp. He likes his turkeys free range but his soldiers cooped up, in a quagmire costing $11 million an hour. If there was ever a year to skip the ridiculous poultry “pardon,” it should have been this one. And to think they call turkeys stupid.
2.
Here’s a trend that should be nipped in the petroleum stage: upscale plastic flatware. I’m starting to see it touted in magazines -- $120 for a 16-piece set in Lucky, most recently -- and there could be nothing more insane. I just went to a world-class birthday party where the most decadent touch was metal cutlery for all 24 of us to tackle the pulled pork and individual apple pies. And now we are being told plastic is preferable, by the same people who assume we would invest in fake lace doilies? It reminds me of a party I went to back in the Eighties where the hostess served a full turkey dinner; when I told a magazine editor later what a great idea it was, she asked, “Was she doing it to be cool, or didn’t she know any better?” I would need supreme self-confidence to set out $10-a-fork plastic sh-t at a party. And then I would lose it all realizing I had tricked myself into dishwashing duty, defeating the whole purpose of plastic. I’m sticking to those wacky wooden forks from Fairway. Or just giving up magazines for the holidays.
3.
Anyone halfway sentient understands the WSJournal’s editorial page has absolutely no sense of humor, but it was still astonishing to read an apparent attempt at Swift that advocated sending poisoned turkey sandwiches to dictators around the world on the day after Thanksgiving. Under the regime these jokers worship, you could get arrested just for suggesting doing the same to a literal son of a bitch closer to home who deserves even worse. Given that the spy who succumbed to sushi was dead by then, the bad taste really reeked. Maybe for the next big holiday they could hire the Rush Limbaugh of restaurant critics to do a piece on sending radioactive fruitcake to New Orleans. Hilarious, isn’t it?
(Is this Alan Richman?)
4.
Call me insensitive, but I just cannot wake up every morning thinking, “Save the ducks!” Maybe it’s my consort’s clock radio blaring bloody news from halfway around the world, but the urgency of passing laws to ban foie gras absolutely eludes me. The New York City “legislator” who is now proposing that lunacy certainly did choose his moment, though, only days after “Our Daily Bread” opened in theaters here, exposing the strong of stomach to the horrors that chickens and cows and pigs go through on their passage to the table. Believe me, ducks and geese are at the Golden Door by comparison. Given that Christmas really is a sad season for the poor, it’s also odd that he would take up the cause of overfeeding right when so much of his own city is afflicted with what those bleeding hearts in Washington call food insecurity. I could live, maybe not happily, without foie gras. But I would be very distressed to live in a country without freedom to eat. Meantime, will no one speak up for the steer? Ducks, after all, die with their balls on.
5.
Talk about a disorienting week. Not only was the true loser in Vietnam at last, but I actually found something for less at Dean & Deluca, the intergalactic capital of gougery. Heritage turkeys from Good Shepherd there are going for $7.50 a pound, about double the free-rangers. When I had a butcher weigh one the same size as I had ordered online, it was only $145. But I’m not complaining. I’m just awed at the speed of change for the better in this country, at least when it comes to food. Imagine the gains if the real turkey were to be impeached. Brining and trussing would just be gravy.
6.
The sad reality is that we have two more years of decisions like the latest one by Chimp cronies, to do away with the word hunger in USDA reports and replace it with “very low food security.” The Washington Post had the sorry story, including the fact that 11 percent of American households suffer from what government functionaries actually insist is “not a scientifically accurate term.” Of course these are the same compassionates who couldn’t define torture and say “internal nutrition” when they mean “force-feeding.” Even Orwell would be slack-jawed. A good punishment might be to lock them all in a room stacked high with the latest People magazine sponsored by Kraft, which has come up with scratch-and-sniff ads (and some editorial). But then given how foul perfume inserts are, a few hours of inhaling white chocolate and cherry Jell-O might make them even less understanding of what it’s like not to have food to put on your family. Let them read “The Pet Goat” in hell with the inventors of processed cheese.
SWEET.
After clicking through hundreds of sites on the NBPM Randomizer, and discovering that most of the participants are sleep-deprived, stir-crazy mothers wielding knitting needles and cats (okay, so I don't knit!), and that most of the entries I read were written by Eleanor Rigby and Father McKenzie (seriously lonely people), today I stumbled onto a website that shone like Midori Ito did when she sailed onto the ice during the catfight of the 1988 Winter Olympics. You might be too young to remember the catfight between über-bitches Debi Thomas and Katerina (mreowwww!) Witt, but they were ruining it for me.
Similarly, lame-ass blogs made me think, "Why am I watching this channel?"
Until Midori Ito and until today.
I give you Fresh Arrival:
FreshArrival is all about slowing down the breakneck posting pace of the web and trying to bring something truly special to you everyday. We’ve never featured anything like this, but I think it is amazingly cool, so I’m sharing it.
And they give us Young at Heart. (Patricia Digh, I hope you're seeing this.)
This concludes the NaBloPoMo challenge, and I am drawing a deep breath of gratitude, because that is what November is all about.
THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: “A woman past forty should make up her mind to be young; not her face.” —
Billie Burke
Thanks for visiting.
Congrats on getting through the whole month, and with style to boot! I will miss your daily posts. Now get some rest!
Posted by: Cynthia | 30 November 2006 at 11:29 PM
Not once during this month of posts did I think, "Geez Louise, why did she bother to write today?" A beautiful month, many things to think about, and an effort much appreciated by those of us who lacked the courage to try to post every day for thirty days! Thank you.
Posted by: lydia | 01 December 2006 at 03:58 AM
I was JUST thinking about persimmons, and wanting to make my friend Dan's <http://dandutton.com/> pudding. You might too:
Persimmon Pudding
1 cup persimmon pulp
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 cup milk
1 cup flour
1 tsp baking powder
3 beaten eggs
1/4 pound butter, melted
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
Combine pulp with sugar, beat in eggs. Combine flour with baking powder,spices, and add alternately to the persimmon mixture, with the milk. Pour batter into a buttered 9" baking pan and bake at 350 for 35 minutes. Pour the melted butter over and bake 25 minutes longer. Cut in squares to serve and pour on some heavy cream.
Posted by: Cathy | 01 December 2006 at 05:59 AM
Great blog! Methinks I've been here before.
As for eating locally in Cleveland, our farmers market is so fabulous that I can almost make it through the winter without any supplementing. Of course, I'm one of those people who's happy to eat a steady diet of kale and acorn squash.
Posted by: kristin ohlson | 05 December 2006 at 08:11 AM