I do my best to support local businesses, eat locally, grow my own, recycle, reuse, or refuse. It sure ain't easy. I do admit there are times when, after having spent a long day working at my job, working out in the garden and taking care of my charges, I am tempted to just toss that bottle in the trash, instead of removing the cap, rinsing it out, walking it into my laundry room where it's sorted with the other recyclables. But I just can't do it. I am fairly rife with guilt and am old enough to still have the early passion of saving this fragile planet for our children, grandchildren, et al., above all else.
Given my guilt/passion, I am almost giddy with pleasure when I can create a meal that is made with 99% local ingredients. Last night I made a tomato-corn pie with: my tomatoes (20 yards or less out my front door); corn from a farm about 6 miles away; eggs from my girls in the back quarter-acre; milk from my dairy farmer neighbor 1/2 mile down the road; dried thyme from my herb garden off the back deck; farm cheddar cheese made by dairy farmers 2 miles to the north; and whole wheat pastry flour from a farm in southwestern VT, about 40 minutes to the northeast. The only ingredients that weren't local were the salt, pepper and olive oil. Even the extra virgin olive oil is bottled by a family in the same area of VT, although the oil itself comes from their olive grove in Greece. It was both satisfying and delicious. That is why there is no picture. I et it.
2 comments:
Three cheers and a big you betcha! It feels especially good to concoct a meal like that in the dead of winter. The foods might not be technically "fresh" but I feel pretty good knowing it was through my efforts (read blood, sweat and tears) that I managed to get the homegrown or local food preserved and put by with my own widdle two hands.
:-D
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