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Archive for the ‘food’ Category

Veggies in the city

Posted in events, farmer/grower, food, market, photo, tagged , , , , , , , on March 25, 2010| 2 Comments »

Roots in the City Farmers Market in Overtown

Just west of new luxury high rises on Biscayne, a row of white tents sprang up on the corner of NW 2nd Ave. and 10 St., smack dab against a patch of young collard greens. Underneath the tents, farm fresh fruits and vegetables were arranged on tables. The newest farmers market was launched on Wednesday in Historic Overtown, one of the oldest and underserved neighborhoods in Miami. If people couldn’t come to market to get much needed produce, well, the market was going to come to them. There hasn’t been an actual farmers market in downtown for decades.

Locals checking out and buying from Redland Organics.

Two local growers were at the Roots in the City Farmers Market. Farmer Margie from Redland Organics put out a colorful display of radishes and white Asian salad turnips, carrots and celery, Asian greens, loquats, canistel and black sapote. Under the next tent, farmers Teena Borek and her son Michael from Teena’s Pride Farm brought tomatoes, red bell peppers, white eggplant that looked like bowling pins, and bunches of greens.

John Lealand Laundry likes celery.

The market was open from 1 to 4, and there was a fairly steady trickle of curious neighbors wandering over. A lot of looking, a bit of curious sniffing and tasting, but mostly people were excited that a farmers market suddenly appeared on their street. People bought a few things, choosing carefully. One resident told me that there are several groceries in the neighborhood, including a Winn Dixie on the other side of I-95, but produce is very expensive.

Market tokens

Some neighbors paid with cash and some were happy to find out they could use food stamps. That was the best part, the most amazing thing. The Roots market is set up to accept food stamps (also known as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program or SNAP). Even better, the Roots market has implemented a Double Value Coupon Program that would double the value of a person’s food stamp purchases. For example, if somebody bought five dollars worth of veggies, they would get that equal amount in tokens they can then use to buy more food at the market.

This bit of shopping ingenuity and the Roots market came about from the collaboration of many entities. The Wholesome Wave Foundation has set up similar “Nourishing Neighborhoods” programs at over 80 farmers markets around the country, and provided leadership, training and seed money. Health Services Coalition handled the actual SNAP transactions, acting as a go-between the farmers and the buyers, and is putting the word out in the community. Michael’s Genuine Food and Drink enlisted Margie and Teena, the first two local family farmers to participate, and helped with fundraising and promotions. And the Roots in the City community garden (which is raising nearby collards, and has two acres of garden in the immediate area) offered space for the market, and added its produce to sell.

People from HSC on hand to handle SNAP sales and manage tokens.

The Roots market will have a dedication ceremony in two weeks, on Wednesday April 7. Miami Mayor Tomas Regalado has been invited, and there will most likely be other dignitaries attending. The market will run for four weeks, with maybe an extension for four more, and is scheduled to resume in fall.

Listen to Low-cost produce comes to Miami’s Overtown, the WLRN report by Joshua Johnson, here. The Genuine Kitchen has posted the press release (with lots of good information) here. And Mango & Lime posted her report on the market opening here.

Miss Sarah tells it like it is to the media.

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Locavores on bikes

Posted in agritourism, chef, events, farm, food, locavore, photo, tagged , , , , , on March 20, 2010| 3 Comments »

Bikes resting after a tour of farm country.

On a sunny, breezy Saturday morning last week, over 80 cyclists converged on Bee Heaven Farm for the Slow Locavore Farm Lunch, organized by Slow Food Miami (SFM). The Farm Lunch combined a 7.5 mile bike ride along Redland back roads, with stops along the way at several farms, and ended with a gourmet lunch prepared by Chef Kris Wessel and Chef Kira Volz served at Bee Heaven.

Donna Reno

Donna Reno, the leader of the Miami convivium (as the SF chapters are called) said she came up with the idea after going on a similar farm tour bike ride in Italy about 20 years ago. Farmer Margie (who has served on the SFM Advisory Board for the past year or two) was an active collaborator and gave that memory legs. She picked the farms, plotted the route, made suggestions for sourcing local food, and provided her ample front yard for the event.

The cyclists visited four farms, beginning and ending at Bee Heaven, with stops and tours at Fancy Koi 2 fish farm, Going Bananas! nursery/grove, and Teena’s Pride farm, which is known for its large and lovely heirloom tomatoes. “It’s important to know your grower and visit the farm,” grower Teena Borek told me. These weren’t just pointless, picturesque visits but an opportunity for locavore cyclists to put their eats into a bigger context. The connection would have been stronger and easier to make had more local local foods from those farms been on the menu. But maybe I’m asking for too much? More on that later…

Chef Kira Volz, Creek 28

This bike ride/farm lunch was daring and unusual for SFM because it was held outdoors and was reasonably priced. Most of their activities are meals in upscale restaurants for hefty prices. It was good to see Slow Foodies get out from behind white linen tablecloths and ride around in fresh air and sunshine for a change. But wait! Most of the attendees were participants of spinning classes at Equinox gym, not just the usual Foodies. (Donna Reno explained that they got permission to hold an olive oil tasting at Equinox, using it “to reach out to the biking and fitness biking communities.”)

A few CSA members were also in the mix. Janet  and Larry Peterson said the ride was an great opportunity to visit farms that were “pretty impressive” that they otherwise wouldn’t be able to see. Janet explained she was inspired to seek out local food and joined the CSA after a group at her church, Riviera Presbyterian, read Barbara Kingsolver’s book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. As she looked around Bee Heaven, she said, “If this kind of farming could take hold, it would be a good local food source and would stop urban sprawl.”

Lining up for seconds (and thirds) at Chef Kira Volz’s tent.

The printed menu had a clear, comprehensive definition of locavore.

It is part of the concept of local purchasing and local economies, a preference to buy locally produced goods and services. Those who prefer to eat locally grown/produced food sometimes call themselves locavores or localvores.

So, let’s look at the food:

Key West Shrimp Fattoush (Kira Volz), Hand Rubbed BBQ Ribs & Herb Tossed Home Fries (Kris Wessel), Who Do You Do Voodoo Chicken (Kris Wessel), Andean Restorative Salad (Kira Volz), Aunt Rita’s Key Lime Pie (Kris Wessel’s aunt), Strawberry Shortcake Bar (The French Pastry Chef), Going Bananas Bread Pudding (Kira Volz) washed down with limeade (Robert is Here), water, beer and wine.

Yet not all the food on the menu was local. (Expected to see tilapia, since Fancy Koi 2 raises those fish.) When I asked Donna Reno about it, she did admit that “the freeze affected availability and we didn’t meet our goals 100 per cent in terms of local.” She pointed out that the tomatoes were from Teena’s, the shrimp was from Key West, and bananas in the bread pudding and strawberries were local. She even pointed out that the organic beer, Monk in the Trunk, was from Jupiter FL. (A closer reading of the fine print on its label revealed that it was actually brewed in South Carolina.)

Three of the four growers featured in the tour. L to R: Margie – Bee Heaven, Don – Going Bananas!, Sharon – Fancy Koi 2. Photo by Nick Pikarsky.

Wait a minute! Call it Locavore Lunch but only a smattering of ingredients is actually locally sourced? My head is spinning! A completely local meal is not that hard to do. It’s been done before. Last year’s End of Summer Brunch over at Robert Barnum’s Possum Trot was all local food and drink. And Farmer Margie held a Mothers Day Brunch last year that was completely locally sourced except for maybe salt and pepper.

Donna was pleased with the event. “We’ll do it again, maybe next spring,” she told me. Good idea! That’s plenty of time for SFM leadership to scope out farms and groves and farmers markets to see what’s growing — locally and in season — and create a menu from local food, rather than build a menu and then look for some local food to fit. I’m certain that Chef Kris Wessel and Chef Kira Volz could have come up with delicious, creative dishes based on an all-local, post-freeze list of ingredients, had they been given that challenge. It would be fantastic if the group held more events that celebrated local, regional and artisanal food, as per their own principles and mission statements.

Chef Tim Rowan of Deering Bay stopped by to help out Chef Kris Wessel of Red Light. Filling in as his prep chef is his second cousin Mark Parkerson.

Locavore shouldn’t be just a foodie fad — it’s not about worshipping trendy ingredients or rock star chefs. The point is to connect the food on your plate with this place and these growers. They work very hard to feed us city folk, and have a tough time paying their bills. “The only way a small grower can survive is to sell directly to the public,” Teena Borek told me. Hopefully that connection or epiphany happened with participants on the bike ride. Our grandparents knew what food was about. It was so obvious to them but we’ve forgotten how. No farms, no food, no chefs, no locavores. It’s just that simple.

(For another take on the bike ride and lunch, check out this recent post on Mango & Lime.)

Strawberry shortcakes for dessert!

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CSA share: week 16

Posted in csa, food, tagged on March 19, 2010|

CSA share: week 16

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CSA share: week 14

Posted in csa, food, tagged on March 5, 2010|

CSA share: week 14

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One last bite of potato

Posted in agritourism, chef, events, food, locavore, photo, tagged , on February 28, 2010| 2 Comments »

Even the Welcome sign is a bit quirky!

The big day finally arrived. Farmer Margie and her intern Andrew went over early to Possum Trot to help Robert Barnum with the last minute preps for the Potato Pandemonium dinner. His sous chefs Bob and Lindsay were slicing, dicing, frying and stirring.

Robert calls his dinners the Possum Trot Experience, and they are rightfully so, as there is a bit of adventure involved just to find the place. Six thirty rolled around and the guests trickled in, flustered that their GPS or Google map gave them cryptic directions. It would appear that Possum Trot is not on the map. It’s Terra Incognita. If you missed the front gate and sign and solely relied on your GPS, it stubbornly led you down a deeply potholed back road to a different entrance, and then a muddy driveway leading you through a jungle of trees and vines back to the farmhouse. Ah, the mysteries of navigation!

Kitchen prep Lindsay Tidwell brings out the potato salad.

As the guests arrived, they were treated to a sampling of various homemade wines that Robert had made from fruit growing on his property. Two that I sampled were a sweet, full bodied lychee wine (no comparison to Schnebly’s), and a dry red wine that tasted a bit like merlot, which was made from bignay (or antidesma) berries, which quickly became a favorite at my end of the table. The wine bottles were recycled and still with their original labels, so it was a bit of an adventure as to what you were going to get.

Wood smoker (foreground) and wood fired grill.

The next part of the Experience was a brief tour of the property in the waning twilight. (Usually the tour starts earlier, and Robert will take you on a 30 minute stroll through a section of his 40 acre grove. You get to see a variety of trees including macadamia and carambola, and a natural swimming hole surrounded by ferns, among other things.)

Farmer Margie Pikarsky wears two kinds of bay laurel.

Despite the light sprinkling rain, we ambled around the house, looking at and smelling various things that Robert handed us — bay laurel, lemon bay, and bay rum (lemon form). Nearby was a rippling lake of citronella grass studded with diamond-like raindrops. Robert picked and passed around a perfumey cas guava, the size of a yellow ping ping ball, for us to smell. The wood fired smoker was puffing merrily as we approached. Robert opened a door on its side and revealed cut up potatoes smoking in a pan, and handed out chunks to taste.

Bill Dickhaus, Randall Rakestraw and Cindy Dwyer seated at the guanacaste table.

The dining room had high open beam ceiling and was lit softly with pendant lamps and a Waterford crystal chandelier. Guests had the choice of sitting at three tables, one which had its tabletop made from a single solid plank of guanacaste wood from Brazil. (It takes several very strong people to lift and move that table.) Around the room, china cabinets sparkled with glassware and plates. As we dined, a light rain pattered on the roof, adding to the cosy feeling. The house is authentic Old Florida, built in the 40s and 50s, and features a fireplace, two kitchens, a book-lined study, and a small winery in the back.

Hector Ugalde and daughter Aileen Ugalde

(I’m going to mention just a few of the dishes that night, having discussed others in an earlier post about the preview dinner. For a clear-eyed critique and photos of most of the dishes, click over to Bill Jacobs’ Tinkering with Dinner blog.)

Leisha John and Greg Hamra crunch chips while Andrew Clinard snips scallions, and Frank DuMond looks on.

Once guests were seated, Robert’s hard-working crew had food flying out of the kitchen. First came the lavender vichyssoise, which was garnished with snipped scallions. It was as good as I remembered, smooth and creamy with a delicate potato flavor. The colorful, crispy potato chips added crunch and a much-needed bit of salt. The chips quickly disappeared and became everyone’s favorite.

The souffle has risen!

The drab-looking souffle that had fallen last week was transformed. It had a golden brown top, and a light and fluffy texture that tasted a bit more of egg and a bit less of potato. One guest remarked, as she scraped the last morsels out of her ramekin, that the souffle would be good for breakfast with a sweet fruit sauce.

Dessert pancakes topped with the insanely delicious cas guava-passion fruit sauce.

The dessert pancakes with cas guava and passion fruit sauce were more potato-y and heavier than at the testing dinner. Maybe if the edges had been a bit crispy, one guest murmured. The sauce, though, is exceptional, and I can see it on the souffle, or perhaps with breakfast crepes as another guest suggested. The pancakes were accompanied by araza wine, light in color, dry, with a bit of the tartness and flavor of the fruit coming through. (Araza is a tropical fruit that Robert brought back from Amazonian Ecuador. The fruit first appeared for sale this summer, although Robert has been growing it for 30 years. Hani Khouri had used it to whip up a fine batch of araza ice cream.)

Mike Rimland

The dinner was a locavore’s dream come true. Many of the ingredients were grown right at Possum Trot – cas guava, carambola, betel leaf, Rangpur lime, passion fruit, eggs from free range chickens, and wood burning in the smoker. All the fruits for the wines — lychee, bignay and araza — came from the grove. Farmer Margie contributed red kale, carrots, scallions, garlic chives, rosemary, parsley and thyme from her Bee Heaven Farm. Purple, blue, red, yellow, white, small, fingerling and round potatoes were gleaned from a field nearby. And the USDA certified grassfed beef came from 4 Arrows Ranch in Citra, Florida. (If you want to buy some, contact Farmer Margie. She has a few cuts left from the last order.)

Sandra Torres and Marlen Caudron

If you are what you eat, them I’m looking quite like a potato these days, having happily devoured what seems to be my weight in spuds between the two dinners. It was tasty and unusual, and worth the extra miles on the treadmill (or so I’m telling my creaky knees).

But if you missed out on the dinner, or potatoes aren’t quite your thing, Robert is planning different meals soon — the Possum Trot Experience, he calls them. He’s also available for private dinners. You can contact him at 305-235-1768 for more information.

Sous chef Bob Fisher and the Cantankerous Chef Robert Barnum in the klitchen.

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