Come along with me as I take baby steps toward eating more local produce.
Strawberry season is upon us in Connecticut. The crop is a couple of weeks early, due to beautiful spring sunshine. By the end of June, they’ll be gone. So I made sure to stop by a local farmstand this afternoon. They weren’t cheap – a quart cost $4.99. But just one bite will turn you against the 2 for $4 California-born clamshell boxes at the grocery store. These berries are bursting with juicy sweetness – good enough for dessert on their own.
I also bit the bullet and finally bought a basil plant. I don’t have a yard with planting space, so any ‘crops’ of mine have to be of the potted-plant variety. And since I unintentionally murder any plant in my possession, I’ve been reluctant to do this. But I decided I’d be damned if I bought another $3 container of basil from the grocery store. (I know. I should be slapped.)
Pesto, pizza, tomato mozzarella sandwiches, salads….here I come.
Leeanne Griffin is a freelance writer and food enthusiast.
Since the weather is supposed to be awesome this week, I think I’m going to bug out of work early on Wednesday and take my daughter strawberry picking. We always have a great time.
$4.99 a quart, eh? When I was a kid, right after I got my driver’s license, I used to take my younger sibs (there were 4 of us) out strawberry picking early Saturday mornings during the season. We’d bring our harvest home, wash, sort, and pack the berries in wooden pint and quart baskets, and sell them door-to-door on Saturday afternoons. 59 cents a pint, 89 cents a quart.
You know, the higher prices for local fruit and produce kind of caught me off guard too. I figured since I’m buying direct, eliminating the middle man that is the grocery store, it’s gotta be cheaper. That documentary ‘Food Inc’ really changed the way I feel about buying locally though, and at the very end Michael Pollen says that you vote every time you go to the store and buy something that has most likely come from huge agrofarms. It might be a bit more expensive to support your local farms, but that’s OK with me. I’d rather give my business to a local guy who busts his butt for pretty humble returns than pad the pockets of the elite. /rant
I’m also excited about the basil plant I picked up Sunday. It’s a cinnamon basil plant, and I don’t have any idea what to do with it. A few people have made a homemade sorbet out of it which means I might have an excuse to pick up an ice cream maker. Like you, I’m hoping I can keep the poor thing alive long enough to make it.
These strawberries are so gorgeous and tasty that I’m happy to spend the money during the short time they’re around. We sliced them on top of vanilla frozen yogurt for dessert last night. Amazing.
I’ve heard people say for years that ‘local tastes better’ and it’s true – stuff that gets shipped in from the West Coast or South America loses some of its nutrients and flavor in transit.
Good luck with your cinnamon basil. I bet that smells incredible.