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Locavoring
There's a good article in today's News-Miner on the "locavore" movement in Fairbanks, i.e. eating locally produced food as much as possible.
I'm a big proponent of locally-grown food for a number of reasons -- because it's healthier; because it tastes better; because I like to support local businesses; because as tenuous as our connections to the outside world are, supporting the local food-production infrastructure and having the ability to produce our own food (as a state, I mean) just makes sense.
I'm still totally sucking at actually growing my own vegetables. (I have big gardening plans this summer, but I have for the last four summers too, and look how well that turned out.) Last summer, though, I bought almost all of my produce and baked goods from the farmer's market. We grow our own eggs now, and most of our protein is locally harvested wild meat and fish (largely supplied by Orion's dad; neither one of us are particularly enthusiastic or skillful at hunting and fishing). I gather fruit where I can; we have raspberry bushes around the yard, and I've got a bunch of blueberries in the freezer which I need to do something with. (I do not actually like blueberries all that much -- I suspect over-exposure in childhood might have something to do with this -- but they make nice pies. I'm also tossing around the idea of making wine out of them.)
There is really no way to get wheat or rice that's produced in-state -- it just doesn't grow. And, of course, there are a lot of tropical foodstuffs that would have to be imported no matter what; locavore or not, I still appreciate having access to oranges, pineapple and kiwis. I am also not so down with the locavore thing that I refuse to buy lettuce in January. I likes my lettuce.
But we do have a fairly decent supply of local food, especially if you expand the definition of "local" to include things like locally-made baked goods (which comes more under the heading of "patronizing local businesses" than "eating local foods", I suppose). Considering how restricted our growing season is, there's really a lot more variety at the farmer's market than I'd expected before I started going there regularly -- a lot more than cabbage and potatoes (not that I don't buy quite a bit of that). Homemade pickles and fudge (not together, obviously), hothouse peppers and tomatoes, green beans, awesome little radish-sized salad turnips, and of course the honeycake lady ... okay, now I've got myself wanting to go there, and it's not open yet! (Woe.)
I have every intention of sucking less at gardening this year. The last few years I've basically limped along on what poor-quality dirt I could scrape together, halfheartedly planted a few things and then failed to take proper care of them.
This year, by god, I'm going and getting me a truckload of topsoil, and then I'm going to grow stuff. Carrots, radishes, snap peas, lettuce. I have the seeds that I bought for the last couple of non-gardens. I have the urge! Now if I can just muster up the ambition once the snow melts, which so far it's showing no signs of doing.
I've also been thinking about adding to the perennials in the yard. Right now we have a lovely little rosebush and a lilac which has been having a bad, bad couple of years. I'd like to add a couple more ornamentals, and some fruit as well -- I really love being able to just walk out the door and pick handfuls of wild raspberries to put in my breakfast cereal, and I'm thinking about getting some domestic raspberry bushes so that I'll have enough to make jam.
Last fall, they were having a super sale on strawberry plants at Fred Meyer, and I got a bunch of them, so if I can keep the birds off the berries this year, I might actually have a halfway decent strawberry harvest for a change. (I put in a bed of strawberry plants when we first moved here, then lost most of them the first winter and have been getting a smattering of tiny berries from the handful of surviving plants in the years since. The birds tend to get them before I do.)
Yay, spring! *waits impatiently for snow to melt*
I'm a big proponent of locally-grown food for a number of reasons -- because it's healthier; because it tastes better; because I like to support local businesses; because as tenuous as our connections to the outside world are, supporting the local food-production infrastructure and having the ability to produce our own food (as a state, I mean) just makes sense.
I'm still totally sucking at actually growing my own vegetables. (I have big gardening plans this summer, but I have for the last four summers too, and look how well that turned out.) Last summer, though, I bought almost all of my produce and baked goods from the farmer's market. We grow our own eggs now, and most of our protein is locally harvested wild meat and fish (largely supplied by Orion's dad; neither one of us are particularly enthusiastic or skillful at hunting and fishing). I gather fruit where I can; we have raspberry bushes around the yard, and I've got a bunch of blueberries in the freezer which I need to do something with. (I do not actually like blueberries all that much -- I suspect over-exposure in childhood might have something to do with this -- but they make nice pies. I'm also tossing around the idea of making wine out of them.)
There is really no way to get wheat or rice that's produced in-state -- it just doesn't grow. And, of course, there are a lot of tropical foodstuffs that would have to be imported no matter what; locavore or not, I still appreciate having access to oranges, pineapple and kiwis. I am also not so down with the locavore thing that I refuse to buy lettuce in January. I likes my lettuce.
But we do have a fairly decent supply of local food, especially if you expand the definition of "local" to include things like locally-made baked goods (which comes more under the heading of "patronizing local businesses" than "eating local foods", I suppose). Considering how restricted our growing season is, there's really a lot more variety at the farmer's market than I'd expected before I started going there regularly -- a lot more than cabbage and potatoes (not that I don't buy quite a bit of that). Homemade pickles and fudge (not together, obviously), hothouse peppers and tomatoes, green beans, awesome little radish-sized salad turnips, and of course the honeycake lady ... okay, now I've got myself wanting to go there, and it's not open yet! (Woe.)
I have every intention of sucking less at gardening this year. The last few years I've basically limped along on what poor-quality dirt I could scrape together, halfheartedly planted a few things and then failed to take proper care of them.
This year, by god, I'm going and getting me a truckload of topsoil, and then I'm going to grow stuff. Carrots, radishes, snap peas, lettuce. I have the seeds that I bought for the last couple of non-gardens. I have the urge! Now if I can just muster up the ambition once the snow melts, which so far it's showing no signs of doing.
I've also been thinking about adding to the perennials in the yard. Right now we have a lovely little rosebush and a lilac which has been having a bad, bad couple of years. I'd like to add a couple more ornamentals, and some fruit as well -- I really love being able to just walk out the door and pick handfuls of wild raspberries to put in my breakfast cereal, and I'm thinking about getting some domestic raspberry bushes so that I'll have enough to make jam.
Last fall, they were having a super sale on strawberry plants at Fred Meyer, and I got a bunch of them, so if I can keep the birds off the berries this year, I might actually have a halfway decent strawberry harvest for a change. (I put in a bed of strawberry plants when we first moved here, then lost most of them the first winter and have been getting a smattering of tiny berries from the handful of surviving plants in the years since. The birds tend to get them before I do.)
Yay, spring! *waits impatiently for snow to melt*
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