Finding local food: Day 1-3

Day one

Saw my dear friend Maria Ponti today.  She asked us to come over for dinner on Saturday and of course I said yes.  We haven't seen them in ages and it will be great to get together.  Told Shannon and her first response was – "What are you going to eat?"  Oh, no.  How will I go for dinner at Maria's  and not eat any of her food?  I called Maria and explained the local food challenge and offered to bring my own food.  She asked for more details and decided she liked the idea.  She was going to try to make it happen for our meal on Saturday.  What a good sport!  I'm sure it will be an awesome meal as Maria is super resourceful and a great cook!  I am looking forward to what food resources she finds.

Breakfast – coffee with local milk and honey, fresh made bread with butter and honey, see no-knead bread recipe.  Made it last night and cooked one loaf this morning and will cook the other tonight.  Used Westwind Milling unbleached bread flour.

Lunch – apple, 2 hard boiled eggs – from my chickens, slice of bread and butter

Dinner – lamb tender stir-fry

Lamb-Turtlee's

Veggies – from Stone Coop Farm – purple cabbage, carrots, rutabaga, kale, brassica salad mix, onions, frozen hot peppers. Stir fried all in some olive oil and salt & pepper.  Yummy!

Served with fresh made warm bread and butter. 

Day Two

Breakfast – oatmeal with butter and honey.  Oatmeal from Westwind, butter from Calder's (bought at Simply Fresh) and honey from Turtlebee's and coffee – Bigbee coffee.

Lunch – leftover lamb stir-fry

Dinner – Stopped by VG's hoping to find some meat that was from Michigan in the butcher case. No luck, none of the meat was from Michigan.  Very hungry and disheartened and didn't feel like cooking. Everyone in my family had already eaten when I got home.  Decided to have raspberry smoothie, hard-boiled egg, and slice of bread.  Raspberry smoothie made with plain yogurt from Thomas Organic Creamery (bought at Simply Fresh), frozen raspberries from my back yard, and a teaspoon of honey.

Day 3

Decided to try variation on bread recipe.  Added ½ cup of organic corn meal from Westwind, mixed ¼ cup of honey with water to make 1 5/8 cups of liquid.  Made it this morning and will bake tonight.

Can't wait to go to Ann Arbor Farmers' Market tomorrow morning have high expectations that I will find more options for local food.  No idea what is for lunch or dinner tonight.  Need a plan.

Breakfast- a hard boiled egg and a mission to find some food.  Decided to get a few jobs on the farm completed and then search for food.  Sounds so dramatic, just a tougher challenge than I thought.

Went to Meijer's – asked at meat department for Michigan meat – none.  Asked in produce – apples and some potatoes (none organic).  Bought some apples, but just can't buy non-organic potatoes, they put too many chemicals on conventionally grown potatoes.  Looked for cheese, dried beans and frozen fruit and found a couple items:  Montmorency Cherries-frozen from Friske Orchards in Charlevoix and three kinds of dried beans (red, black & navy) from The Cooperative Elevator Co..  Then went to Marv's Meats – no Michigan meat, but had sun dried Michigan cherries.  Ended up at Simply Fresh and purchased butter from Calder Dairy, organic whole milk from Thomas Organic Creamery, Cannellini beans from Carlson-Arbogast Farm and some cheese (Monterey Jack and Veggie) from Farm Country Cheese House.

To celebrate my hunt I fixed lunch.  I still had some cottage bacon from Turtlebee's.  It is lean, salty and wonderful.  I fried it – almost no fat on it so more of a dry fry. After it was done I put a large handful of spinach from Stone Coop Farm and a few Montmorency cherries in the same hot pan and cooked them for about 1 minute.  Had it with a couple slices of the Monterey Jack cheese and was supremely happy! It was also beautiful to look at. 

Harvested spinach and brassica salad mix for Maria for dinner tomorrow.  Also took her some eggs - she said her amazing flan is for dessert - YEAH!  She is also not sure what she will be cooking as it has been harder than she thought to find local food.

Dinner - Fresh bread (the cornmeal and honey added are amazing!), applesauce I made with Erwin's apples, cinnamon and a tiny bit of water, and a vegetable curry soup.  I had a quart of vegetable soup I had canned when I was at the MSU's Student Organic Farm and I added some local parsnips from Colasanti's Market, and some turnips from Stone Coop Farm.  I sauteed them, added the soup, about one teaspoon of curry powder and 2 cups of whole milk from Thomas Creamery.  It actually tasted great.  Troy made brownies from scratch using dark cocoa powder, Calder Butter, eggs, and Pioneer Sugar.  It was wonderful to have dessert tonight and the brownies were some of the best I have had.