The adventure part comes with trying to source everything locally from organic sources. Friends have gifted me with 5 deer this year, allowing me to process my own meat.
Many times, I substitute venison for red meats in recipes.
My friend, Helene, in Birmingham, chooses and clips recipes for me. She's more than my travel agent, she's my partner in crime.
Other meats are mail ordered from White Oak Pastures, a completely vertically integrated organic farm in Georgia.
They have it all!
My geriatric hens have even begun producing eggs again.
What can't be gotten locally is carefully sourced to ensure my consumer dollar is going to help a family farm or to promote the sustainable farming movement. My teenage years spent in Greenpeace haven't left me-- I've developed more of an epicurean flair to my environmentalism. Or one could say I'm Miss Piggy with a conscience.
Earl Grey and Chocolate Tart (Earl Grey from family plantation in India).
My coffee comes to me green directly from Nicaraguan and Columbian farms. Takes me about 20 minutes, cranking continuously on my Jiffy popper, to roast my own coffee.
No matter what I do, it sets the smoke detector off every time!
But, worth it.
When it comes to beans,
I still have some dried beans that I grow myself. Christmas limas are my favorite.
My other beans come from Rancho Gordo in California. What isn't grown on his farm is sourced from family farms in Mexico.
I cook for a family of 6 and freeze the rest.
My freezer chest is my ticket to a travel destination.
Some times the trip isn't memorable...
How hard I worked, putting in fresh herbs from my garden, into making spaetzle.
Something should've told me we were in for turbulence when the dough was sticking to me like glue.
Sally forth and discover...
...that we're not going back to this place again!
A sincere thank you goes out to Helene for taking so much time to choose recipes and adventures for me! You're the best!
