Locavore

That's the word for people attempting to eat local, and was featured as a buzz word in the Home magazine supplement in Sunday's New York Times. It must be gaining in popularity, which is a very good thing. Anything that makes people think about where their food comes from is a good thing. So, the weekend wrap up: Satuday I didn't do to well. Never made it to Central Market....maybe next Saturday. Ate from existing stock for lunch (a string cheese stick) and made pizza for dinner, which did feature local spinach, but foreign everything else. Sunday was started with foreign coffee and foreign sugar but local milk. Lunch was local pretzels with a few beers from Western PA. Not within 100 miles, but not terrible. For dinner I made a frittata with local cheese, local eggs, local spring onions, my asparagus, a tablespoon of local salad dressing, far away red peppers, and mushrooms. Technically the mushrooms are local. They come, as most mushrooms do, from Kennett Square - "Mushroom Capital of the World", which is roughly an hour from where I live, in nearby Chester County. So I could claim these. But I know that the mushroom farms exploit illegal immigrants (mostly from Mexico), paying them below minimum wage and working them 10 to 12 hours a day. Many of the illegal immigrants live in housing (trailers) on the mushroom farm property, sometimes 8 to 10 men in a trailer. So I'll use up the mushrooms that I have and find some other source. I don't think I'm up to growing my own. Even if mushrooms come from farther away, it's better than patronizing businesses that exploit people. Anybody know of a good mushroom source?

In other news, several little markets in my area are advertising local strawberries, which is totally awesome. Some people say that the tomato is the best example of something you buy in the store that is awful and grown at home is delicious, there simply being no comparison. For me, the best example is strawberries. Nothing beats homegrown berries. I was pretty good this year, only succumbing to the smell of berries at the grocery store two or three times, only to get them home and be totally disappointed with their taste. I will definitely make strawberry jam this year. The last two years I've made blueberry and a blueberry/wineberry mix, but this year I have a serious craving for thick, lumpy, strawberry preserves. Yum.