Small Actions

I'm not naïve and yet I also can't give up the possibility that taking action in small ways makes a difference. Although some days I do give up. I mope or buy a piece of plastic. I tell myself I don't care and I throw the plastic in the trash without a backwards glance. And then possibility, I don't know how, but possibility returns when I'm asleep and there it is waiting for me on the edge of the bed. It still surprises me.

So I've been signing petitions. The first was initiated by the Wildlife Action Center to request a ban of the fishing of bluefin tuna in and near their spawning grounds after the recent BP oil spill centered in their breeding grounds. If there are any still there, they deserve to be left alone.

Then I sent a letter to Hilary. It seems she wants to give corporate awards of excellence to Coca Cola and other bottled water companies. I agree with Food and Water Watch; What is she thinking?

The same day Food Democracy Now! sent an action alert titled, FDA cover up on genetically engineered salmon. Again I put my name to a letter asking, demanding, urging, begging, pleading for the FDA to not approve GE salmon; at least until there is transparent and independent studies done on their impact for an educated and unbiased decision.

Food and Water Watch took a different approach to their opposition of GE salmon. They drafted a letter to Barbara Boxer requesting she ask President Obama to deny approval of the 'experimental fish'. I joined them and sent a letter to her too.

And two days ago I took a stand and declared my commitment at Four Years. Go. A commitment to communicate, adopt, educate and create; a stand for a thriving, just and sustainable way of life for all. The wording reminded me of John Lennon and I wanted to hold hands with someone. Anyone. Everyone.

Maybe I am naïve and signing petitions and declaring a commitment to thin air is useless. Completely useless. But naïve or not I can't ignore the possibility, the smallest penny sized possibility that even such small actions can make a difference.

This Place Where Food Grows

I have tolerant friends. Really, I do. They've been patient as I've gone from rabid locavore, to igniting my hair on fire at the plight of farm workers; from talking about industrial food to simply serving them a pastured fried egg and letting them taste the difference. I've seen them exchange the look, eyes rolled up to their foreheads when I've cornered the conversation; gmo's, corn, the loosing game of plastic packaging. But I'm getting better. They would say, I've relaxed. I hope they would say I've relaxed. A little?

Now I've added a new obsession - listing the food I see growing. There's a lot of it. On a walk with a friend we saw still green figs, an orange tree as crowded as a World Series parade. She pointed at honeybees in the back of an industrial park, chickens behind a suburban home. We saw artichokes and rosemary growing through a front fence, an apple tree with a few remaining fruits. There were blackberries, grapes and sage. It was exciting, it was abundance, it was an awakening.

I've long pinched rosemary from the hedge on the corner and walked further for a few fresh leaves of bay. I've generally noticed a fruit tree here, another there and exclaimed over anything with a blossom attached; but food, I haven't been focused on food in the landscape. I'm not talking about gardens, I love those too; I'm talking about the wild edges, forgotten fruit trees, edible landscapes. I'm talking about front yards, back yards, the school yards, the parking lot at the library; I'm talking about the food growing along the paths that connect them. There's an entire menu out there I've overlooked.

And now I'm determined to name this free growing and previously discounted food, acknowledge it and yes, make a point of pointing it out to my friends too. I'm sure they'll want to know so they too can walk down the street and pinch a sprig of spice or gather wild fruit. Or simply appreciate this place where food grows.

The Vanishing of the Bees

Preserving fruit into jars for the season has come to an end and I left the kitchen to see the documentary, Vanishing of the Bees. To be honest I didn't expect much. I read the news, I know the story line; the bees are dieing, it's called Colony Collapse Disorder and there are different theories on the why. The movie told a bigger story though and damn if it didn't get to me; laughter, tears. I left knowing more than when I arrived.

I learned California almond growers upon facing a deficit of bee colonies in recent years imported colonies from Australia. There was footage of the bees on crates loaded by forklift into the belly of a jet. All those little bee suitcases. Kidding. Only about the suitcases. They really imported bees.

Then I learned honey from China is honey plus. It's some part honey with additional ingredients and sold as honey. There were oil barrels of the stuff; honey with lactose, honey with high fructose corn syrup. Which naturally makes it tough for US beekeepers to get a straight price for straight honey. It was another dilemma.

The Vanishing of the Bees is filled with dilemma, filled with drama. There were french beekeepers taking up their arms in the streets of Paris, an organic beekeeper fleeing a gmo corn monoculture to a friendlier farm in Vermont. There was a bonfire of bee boxes after a massive colony collapse, there was a hearing in Washington, DC; corporations not taking responsibility. There were genetically modified seeds impregnated with pesticides.

And there was heart. The big beekeepers in the documentary, competitors, were also friends. When their colonies began collapsing they began talking every day, became each others support. One admitted to talking to his bees. They went to France. They talked to beekeepers there. Their caring beyond business, beyond profits was apparent. As was their fear. Without bees we're all without more than another industry that can't survive.

In came the small organic beekeepers though. They weren't a complete solution but part of one. As were the people planting gardens to attract bees, people buying organic, people choosing products without gmo ingredients. There were as many pieces to the solution of the vanishing of the bees as there were to the problem.

It's a good film. Watch it if you can.

Local On Our Table - September

Farmers' Market
Ancho Cress
Apples
Arugula
Basil
Bell Peppers
Blue Potatoes
Broccoli
Butternut Squash
Cabbage
Cucumbers
Emerald Beaut Plums
Figs
Garlic
Heirloom Tomatoes
Hot Italian Peppers
Jalapenos
Leeks
Lemons
Melon
New Potatoes
Onions
Padron Peppers
Pears
Pluots
Spinach
Strawberries
Sungold Tomatoes
Tazee Peaches
Tomatillas
Zucchini

Back Deck Harvest
Epazote
Basil
Lime
Mint
Oregano
Parsley
Peppers
Thyme
Tomato!

To the Pantry
Betty Anne Plum Conserve w/Rosemary
Emerald Beaut Conserve w/Mint
Flavor Grenade Plum Preserve
Flavor King Pluot Preserve w/Rosemary
Peach and Rose Geranium Conserve
Plain Peach Preserve
TaZee Peach Preserve w/Thyme
San Marzano Tomato Sauce
Strawberry Preserves

Gleaned and Gifted
(From Someone Else's Yard)
Figs
Lemons
Pink Pearl Apples

San Marzano Tomatoes

I've spent the summer canning. Obsessively. Pick a fruit. Any fruit. Okay, a local fruit. It's on my shelf. In a jar, in a syrup, a jam, maybe a jelly or a pickle. I've lost my fear of canning and for the first time I'm putting up everything. This week I'm on tomatoes. San Marzano tomatoes.

I would have passed the San Marzanos up at the farmers' market if I hadn't been told they were good. They look hot house, too shiny, too conformed, all the same size. They look like a chorus line, each one in the same costume. I shop for disheveled heirloom varieties. The lumpy, jowly varieties that are art when sliced in any direction.

The first time I sliced into a polished San Marzano I grimaced. Grocery store, I thought. Not a lot of meat or seeds, or, well, anything. It was nearly hollow. I tossed a few in a pan; with a little heat the skins came easily off. I worked them; but not too much, stirring, pulling out the peels. They became almost delicate.

Not expecting much I put a dimes worth on the end of the wooden spoon. The first taste I didn't believe. I put a nickles worth on the spoon, then a quarter. I was sure. The taste was sunshine. New sunshine. It tasted like the first part of the day when everything is still possible. It tasted pure, pure tomato, and it was love.

I've since slow roasted them, a few hours at 170, peeled back their skin, one half at a time and slid them directly into my mouth, the taste as brilliant as the inner mandala of an heirloom.

And I've turned the San Marzanos into sauce. It didn't take much; a warm pan, a food mill, they melted into sauce as fast as I could get them into jars and seal them.

Winter is going to be sweet.

Local on our Table - August

Farmers' Market
Arugula
Butter Lettuce
Cabbage
Carrots
Cauliflower
Cucumbers
Figs
Garlic
Grapes
Heirloom Tomatoes
Jalapenos
Kentucky Wonder Green Beans
Lemon Cucumbers
Lemons
McIntosh Apples
Melon
Nectarines
New Potatoes
Onions
Peaches
Pluots
Radishes
San Marzano Tomatoes
Spinach
Zucchini

Back Deck Harvest
Lime
Mint
Parsley
Serrano Peppers
Thai Basil
Thai Peppers

To the Pantry
Apple Cider Butter
Blackberry Jam
Figs in a Balsamic Syrup
Fig Jam
Nectarine Jam w/Balsamic
Nectarine Conserve w/Mint Infusion
Nectarine-Plum Preserve w/Rose Geranium
Peach Jam
Plum Jam w/Star Anise
Plumcot Preserve
Roma Tomatoes Squared
San Marzano Tomato Sauce
Slow Roasted Tomatoes

Gleaned and Gifted
(From Someone Else's Yard)
Beets
Garden Roses
Plums

A Fig Carton

I wish I'd come up with this idea. But I didn't. It's someone else's. Someone more creative than me. Someone who has perhaps eaten more figs, more smashed figs than me; and I've eaten my fair share.

This someone, I'd never seen her before, wouldn't recognize her if I saw her again, had an egg carton in hand. She was choosing her figs one by one, perfectly ripe, soft, pliable figs, placing them in the egg carton until there were a dozen. A full purple dozen. Brilliant, I thought. And I did it too, put my figs in a carton.

Another day I cradled a dozen apricots in another egg carton, because they too are tender, so easily bruised. The fruit a precise fit. And for a moment, only a moment, I thought myself creative too.

But really, it was someone else's idea.

I wish I'd stopped to thank her.