Good Good Food
I love this time of year in Lake County...
It is SO easy to choose foods that are locally grown. In fact, recently, I was able to eat each meal from foods grown almost entirely from our own farm and garden.
For example, for breakfast: I ate a scramble--sliced zuchinni from the garden sauteed in locally-produced olive oil with two farm fresh eggs (produced by our farm's chickens), seasoned with chives and basil.
For lunch: some fresh grapes of the vines in our garden, and a fresh tomato salad with walnuts and an herb vinagrette. And for dessert: some of Sky Hoyt's local strawberry sorbet.
For dinner:"farm-grown fast food": 2 giant freestone peaches off the peach tree, a handful of cherry tomatoes off the tomato vines in the garden, a bunch of grapes off the grape vines and a sparkling glass of mint-ice water using the mint from our herb garden.
In the United States of America, food travels, on average, 1500 miles from producer to table, requiring huge amounts of fossil fuels both to grow it and deliver it. Most of THIS food traveled less than 100 feet. And I guarantee it tastes a lot better.
Everything is flavorful and colorful and nutritious. Late summer is so bountiful here... it can't get much better than this. I can't think of a better way to heal my own spirit, and heal earth at the same time.
posted by Denise @ 10:50 PM
1 Comments
1 Comments:
Thank you, Denise, for inviting me to share my experience with our backyard garden and the concept of "eating our water bill."
Our recent household water usage was higher than usual, so my husband queried experts at the water district. “Are you eating your water bill?” they asked. Now that’s something we hadn’t heard before. It means water usage usually increases when summer gardens are growing. We felt reassured.
Later, relaxing in the shade of a fruitless mulberry tree, we surveyed our Hidden Valley Lake backyard. The fruit trees generously feed us cherries, apples, and figs. We eat grapes from grapevines growing along the back fence. Our persimmons will ripen soon.
From two raised-bed gardens, we eat zucchini, cucumbers, tomatoes, kale, artichokes, eggplant, strawberries, basil, parsley, garlic chives, oregano, and lemon thyme. And, we’re harvesting giant sunflower and pumpkin seeds to roast.
Around a tiny lawn in our unfenced front yard, sage, rosemary and lavender plants flourish underneath three flowering fruit trees.
This is the first summer we’ve swapped vegetables over the fence with our neighbor, another gardener. Also new this year is the enjoyment my husband gets from lovingly preparing cardboard “gift baskets” for friends filled with vegetables and fruit from our yard.
Especially satisfying is consuming our own delicious food. We augment our fresh food supply by shopping at Kelseyville’s farmers’ market, an occasional trip to Hardester’s grocery store, and with home-grown beef from my dad in Natomas, near Sacramento.
Author Barbara Kingsolver’s book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, was my birthday gift from my son and daughter-in-law. Living in San Francisco, they live vicariously hearing our “crop reports” during weekly phone conversations.
Kingsolver’s book makes a passionate case for putting the kitchen back at the center of family life and diversified farms at the center of the American diet. My husband and I bless our rural life in which we can raise our own food and consume what is grown by us or people we know.
We realize the growing season is finite. Our water use will soon lessen. Meanwhile, we give thanks for water and the harvest it provides.
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