June 2011 Archives

This is a quick and easy pasta dish that incorporates several of the market’s summer specialties. This is one of those recipes that is easily adapted to your own sensibilities; you can add other vegetables, leave out the corn, add more garlic, change the proportion of oil and vinegar or just make more — whatever suits your fancy. Just start here and experiment.

Mash 1 or 2 cloves of garlic with 1 teaspoon of salt on a cutting board or with a mortar and pestle until it forms a paste. Transfer to bowl or measuring cup and whisk in 2 tablespoons each of red wine vinegar and extra virgin olive oil. (Or do all of this in a mini food processor.) Dice enough fresh farmers’ market tomatoes to equal 2–3 cups and macerate them in the dressing for at least 30 minutes while you cook 2 ears of fresh corn (5 minutes only), drain, cool and cut the kernels from the cobs and add them to the tomato mixture. Prepare 8 ounces of your favorite pasta and add the warm pasta to the tomato and corn mixture. It’s summer in a bowl! You may also add diced mozzarella cheese.

Dear Shopper,

Since Smart Markets was founded in 2008, I have been writing and talking about the issue of organic farming. We even hosted a forum with some big-name food writers and experts in November 2008 to address the issue. But I get so many questions at markets and in emails that I am going to give you some facts and opinions about the issue again.

Our shoppers usually want to know whether we have any organic farmers in our markets. The answer is no — not certified organic. Certification of a farm’s organic growing practices is now done by the federal government — the U.S. Department of Agriculture, to be exact. Before the feds took over this process, operating an “organic” farm was either a personal decision or a state-approved designation; the federal government had nothing to do with it.

Around 20 years ago, a movement began among corporate commercial farming interests to encourage the USDA to take over the certification process, which meant that only the feds would be granting “organic” status to farmers, large and small. This seemed to be a good idea at the time for these big growers, as they were the ones selling all over the country and having to deal with a huge number of different requirements labeling their produce for the various states. But as often happens, it has led to some unintended consequences that seem now to have undermined our need to know — if not the corporate farm’s need to make money on organics.

Federal guidelines were established and a lengthy, laborious and expensive process for acquiring that “organic” certification was created which has nearly wiped out the certified-organic small farm — especially those that use less than 100 acres. Given that the average farm in Virginia is only 40 acres and that most of those farms depend on retail farmers’ markets sales to survive, there are very few certified-organic farms represented in the markets across the state.

However, many farmers farm in an organic manner but are not permitted to use the term anymore. They are seriously committed to growing without any chemical fertilizers, herbicides, fungicides or insecticides. Others have seriously reduced the amount of these products they use because they are expensive to use on a small scale. Some farmers must use the occasional fungicide or insecticide because of growing conditions here in the Middle Atlantic and Upper South, where the humidity supports all kinds of fungi and insects. But almost all of our farmers use these aids sparingly and early in the growing season, unlike the big farms, where massive amounts of toxins are sprayed on our food sometimes as often as once a week.

Compared to anything you can buy in the grocery store these days — even California-grown organic produce has been the source of E. coli in the last year — produce from a local farm and brought to market by the farmer is as close to safe food as you are going to get under any label. Would you trust an organic label on Mexican- or Chinese-grown produce? Or would you trust your farmers to tell you exactly what they use, letting you decide based on faith and trust?

That is the issue — whom do you trust? I know who I trust — and it’s not the commercial grower, no matter what label the produce bears. And by the way, commercial growers are now encouraging the USDA to lower its requirements for that “certified organic” label. I don’t see anything good coming out of those discussions, either.

See you at the market!

Photo by ilovebutter

Dear Shopper,

I have felt a rant coming on all day; in fact I knew I would have to write about what I saw Sunday at the Gainesville market when I saw it. I felt as I would have if I had seen a mother hit her child in public, and even though the incident I saw was not nearly so traumatic, it may very likely have a lasting effect.

In brief, there was a mother at the market that morning with her two little boys, about four and six years old. The boys were eying cherries on Max Tyson’s table, and I felt at the time that Max was very close to letting them know that it was fine for them to have one right then and there. But before he could offer, their mother walked up and said, “You all don’t like cherries. We’ll come back when the peaches come in.” They looked so bewildered that I felt sorry for them.

The perturbment then set in. Since most of us who have raised children know that a child’s taste buds can change from week to week — as well as his or her sense of adventure and risk when it comes to food — I would like to think that we could also use that knowledge to let the children take advantage of the sampling opportunities at our markets.

Especially when we have produce vendors such as Max Tyson and Chester Hess, who set up tables with every kind of peach and plum and nectarine and tomato — not just for the adults to sample, but for the children to try things they may never have eaten before.

I know from almost ten years of working at markets that children left to their own senses of smell and their own delight in the colors and textures of the fruits and vegetables will try just about anything if given the freedom to do so. I will always remember my favorite twins from years ago who would eat a couple of boxes of berries while their mother was standing in line. I took it upon myself not only to look after them but to let her know what to add to her purchases.

There was also the day that Lukie picked up a jalapeno pepper and took a bite out of it! His eyes got really big and he grimaced a little as he carefully returned the uneaten portion to the basket — and then looked at me as if to ask, “What happened?” But he did not cry and he was not deterred. Today I have no doubt that he and his twin sister, Charlotte, will still try anything and like most of it.

So please feel free to let your children lead you through the market and ask them to pick out what looks good to them. And while we encourage you to let them try whatever they would like, we also ask that once those tasting tables are out there for your pleasure and edification, please supervise them, too. Max Jr. and Sr. already spend half their time cutting samples, but to have to toss an entire plate because a child has grabbed at it with his hands or replace a full plate of samples because one child has wolfed down all of them does cause them to wonder sometimes why they devote so much time and effort to helping you learn what you like best.

After the incident that got me going Sunday I was talking about it with one of our vendors who is also the mother of two boys, and she had another tale worth repeating. Since her boys were young, when they shop they have always selected at least three fruit varieties to get them through the week, with each child selecting a favorite. The family then has fruit for breakfast every morning and again later in the day for snacks or even dessert. But the children always have the honor of picking what they want that week. So no one is telling them what they like or do not like — they choose. I often wonder where kids would lead us if we let them.

See you at the market!

Photo by Bruce Tuten

Our newest vendor at our Centreville, Oakton and Gainesville markets is Virginia Crabs. They sell large male steamed crabs, crab cakes and steamed shrimp. Igor and Irada buy only local seafood and, in spite of their Old World heritage, they know how to do New World crabs.

You can order ahead from Virginia Crabs and pick up your order at the market. Their menu:

• One dozen large male crabs — $55
• 2 5-ounce crab cakes — $15
• Crab cake sandwich with slaw — $10
• One-pound steamed 16–20 count shrimp — $18

Email your order to us at jean@smartmarkets.org.

Photo by Bobbi Bowers.

Dear Shopper,

I was at the beach last week, and while it was not a busman’s holiday like last year when I was actually able to visit two farmers’ markets in North Carolina, it was interesting that I was reminded in a number of ways that the issues we are dealing with here in our own neighborhoods and in this country are also affecting others around the world.

As part of my beach reading, I read the latest in a series of mysteries by Donna Leon about an inspector with the police department in Venice. Set in modern times, it includes fascinating detail about the city itself as it struggles to stay afloat and also includes an ongoing backstory about the home life of Commissario Brunetti. Not surprisingly, his family life seems to center on family meals, as he is always hard-pressed to make it home for both lunch and dinner in the evening.

At one meal, the vegetarian teenage daughter makes clear her disgust at how chickens are raised commercially in Italy, and her mother calms her by assuring her that they are not eating one of those chickens. Later, Brunetti’s wife explains that “the others are filled with hormones and chemicals and antibiotics and God knows what, and if I get cancer, I want it to be because I drank too much red wine or ate too much butter, not because I ate too much factory meat.” A much better way to go, I agree!

I also picked up in a lovely craft shop — in addition to a mixed-media sculpture of a dancing lady and a small quilted wall hanging — a bumper sticker with the following announcement:

“GET FRESH WITH YOUR FARMER”
Feast Downeast — Bringing Local Farmers to Market”
A Southeast North Carolina Food Systems Program

I have yet to research the organization or the program on the Web, but I am sure it will resonate with what we are trying to do with Smart Markets and provide some good ideas. There are so many inspiring and exciting things happening all over the country and around the world that reflect that worldwide concern for how we grow what we eat today. We can all benefit from knowing more about them. In Italy or in a small town in North Carolina, people are beginning to question the validity of our food system that we have handed over to major corporations all over the world and that’s how revolution, even a peaceful one, always begins. Feast Downeast

I receive updates from Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution each week and right now he is committed to removing flavored milk from our schools — he now has nearly a million names on a petition that he plans to deliver to the White House once he reaches that magic number. This effort has spawned grassroots cells led mostly by moms all over the country to work at the local level to incorporate the initiative into other efforts to improve school meals.

It must be the old community organizer in me that delights in this and knows that this is how it starts. We can get back to basics even if only through small community-based efforts that we think have only a limited impact. But each new initiative — especially in the age of Twitter and Facebook — can inspire 100 others. What I wouldn’t have given for that kind of outreach and influence when I was working on the first free-breakfast and free-lunch programs in the country. It may not have taken nearly so long to see them in every school in the land.

So stick with it, whatever you are doing at home or in the larger community, and know that someone will hear about it, learn something from your efforts and maybe be inspired by them too. We find our inspiration in some strange places these days.

And I didn’t even tell you about the set of small cookbooks published in 1846 that I saw in my favorite bookstore in Wilmington, N.C. More on those later.

See you at the market!

• 3 small red potatoes (diced)
• 2 small green onions or 1 large leek (sliced)
• 2 T oil
• 2 T butter
• 2 lbs of fresh asparagus (sliced)
• 1 T fresh dill
• 1 T fresh basil
• 6 cloves of garlic (chopped)
• 4–6 cups of vegetable broth
• 2 cups half and half, cream or any percentage of milk
• Salt and pepper to taste

Heat oil in large Dutch oven and add onions and potatoes, then the rest of the ingredients except for the butter, milk, salt and pepper.

Cook until potatoes are soft and remove from heat. Purée in blender or food processor. Optional: You can run it through a strainer if you want it completely smooth.

Once pureed put back in pot and heat adding remaining ingredients. Don’t boil, just cook until warm.