Eat In Sync with the Seasons
(Page 3 of 5)
August/September 2007
By Joel Salatin
When we first began selling eggs to gourmet chefs, I would apologize for the quality of the eggs in the winter because we couldn’t keep the yolk color up when fresh grass wasn’t available. Then, during one of these conversations, the chef interrupted me and said: “Oh, it’s OK. In chef’s school in Switzerland we had special menus for April eggs, August eggs and December eggs as they changed through the seasons. Some have better yolks and some have better whites, so you concentrate on recipes that capitalize on the particular quality of that month’s eggs.”
RELATED CONTENT
Support local, sustainable meat producers (and get more meat for your money) with a little help fro...
Learn all about H1N1 (swine flu) and the seasonal flu viruses, including how H1N1 developed, how fl...
It’s strawberry season, and there are so many ways to enjoy spring’s first fruit! Try these recipes...
You can enjoy fresh, local meals all year long with help from these cookbooks. Learn what fruits an...
Buyer beware: 'Fresh' meat may be preserved with carbon monoxide and diluted with salt water....
I stood there flabbergasted. I’ve gained a new respect for cultures that honor their heritage cuisine.
EAT IN SEASON, AND PRESERVE THE REST
Of course, produce follows seasonal cycles, too. Every year, right before frost, tomatoes rev into high gear and pump out masses of sweet, gorgeous orbs. But instead of local folks jumping on this last gift of summer and canning all the excess for winter, the industry — including the organic industry — concentrates on how to make sure fresh tomatoes are on the supermarket shelves in January, even when that requires shipping them in from 2,000 miles away. The local tomato flood gets composted, fed to pigs or just thrown out in heaps. What a waste!
If all the effort expended to get fresh tomatoes on supermarket shelves in January in Portland, Maine, was invested into fully utilizing the late August tomato flood, it would revolutionize our food system. Not only would it improve our nutrition, it would recycle dollars into our communities, and free us individually and collectively from far-away food dependency. In many cases, it might be the difference between local farmers making enough to get by, and making enough to romance the next generation into farming. When I suggest such a simple solution to nationwide problems, the conventional culture laughs me off as old-fashioned. But, in fact, preserving more of our fruits and vegetables would be remarkably easy to do.
The whole culture of eating food when it’s in season and laying by the surplus for later use is such a part of my family life that it’s difficult to explain to people whose umbilical cords are tied to the supermarket. But let me describe what’s routine in my family — and also was for most people until a couple of decades ago.
First, we have a couple of chest freezers. These are primarily for meat and poultry, and because I can’t live without ice cream. We also freeze quarts of blackberries and strawberries, which keeps them from getting mushy. When corn is in season, we cut it off the cob and freeze it on cookie sheets, then crumple it into plastic bags. When we need some, we just open the bag in the freezer and scoop out what we want.
Page:
<< Previous 1 |
2 | 3 |
4 |
5 |
Next >>
