Results tagged “slowfood”

Two years ago, we bought our first local turkey to serve for Thanksgiving. At the time, it was mostly an ethical decision - after reading far too much about turkeys that are too breast-heavy to walk and too stupid to mate on their own, we didn’t want any part of the turkey empire that is Butterball. We visited a farm near our parents' home in Iowa, picked out a turkey that seemed lively and drove home with it that very day. After brining and roasting, the turkey was presented to family and friends, and we realized the other reason to buy local - it tastes better. Much better.

         

"Have you ever been to one of our family dinners?" Rob Levitt of mado asked us Monday night at the LTHForum GNR awards dinner. Allowing that we hadn't, Levitt's eyes lit up. "They're fun and, with this one, you're gonna be in for a real treat."

      

We dined last night at Carnivale for its Slow Food and Goose Island Brewery dinner. The meal featured produce from local farmers prepared by Chef Mendez and paired with a Goose Island brew. Once seated at communal tables, the evening began with a warm welcome from Chef Mendez and a beer graciously poured by his wife, making us feel like they'd welcomed us into their home for a dinner party with friends.

Remember that rooftop garden we told you about a few weeks ago? It’s not open to regular patrons of Uncommon Ground, but if you go to an upcoming Slow Food Chicago Dinner, you can get a group tour of the nation's first certified organic rooftop garden. We’ve been up there, and it’s not to be missed.

     

Surrounded by dirt, trellises, plants and happy gardeners; you would think we had wandered into a fairy tale about sustainable agriculture. Which, in a way, we had … except this storybook was set in a magical land 20 feet above the ground. On Saturday, Uncommon Ground opened America’s first organically certified rooftop garden at their Devon Avenue location, and they invited Mayor Daley to join in the revelry.

Mike Gebert took a road trip to Iowa recently to film some behind-the-scenes footage at La Quercia in Norwalk, IA. La Quercia owners Herb and Kathy Eckhouse make some of the best dry-cured artisan salumi available, particularly prosciutto and guanciale. Jeffrey Steingarten called La Quercia's prosciutto "the best American or imported prosciutto [he's] ever tasted," while Bon Appetit once named La Quercia "Food Artisans of the Year."

George Rasmussen of Swan Creek Farms provides quality artisan meats to restaurants throughout the city. More recently, Rasmussen has been a beneficiary of spent brewers grain from Goose Island's Clybourn brewpub. One of the early hits of John Manion's still-evolving menu overhaul there is the sliders made from Swan Creek's "beer-fed" pork. While making local deliveries a week ago Rasmussen lost his truck, trailer, generator and a lot of food intended to customers to a fire.

Joining a Community Supported Agriculture program is a great way to cut out the middleman and get just a little bit closer to your food supply.

Growing up in a family with Southern roots, we were always exposed to freshly butchered meat. Mom bought poultry on a regular basis from Ciales on Armitage or Western Meat Market, by Clemente High School. Our stepfather's family ran a livestock abbatoir/market in Mississippi. One of our first summer jobs was at a catfish farm in Tennessee. We were paid by the dressed pound, which might have seemed like an urchin's wage. But that job paid for our first trip to Mexico. Our brother-in-law traps raccoons in Wisconsin every winter to sell the fur and cook the meat, and we've hunted for deer, boar and the wily squirrel. It forces one to come to terms in his approach towards eating meat. It's not taken lightly in our family, believe that.

So I'm a week into the Green City Market Localvore Challenge and doing well. I've been able to find really good, in-season fruits and vegetables without spending a small fortune and the meats I stockpiled over the summer in the freezer are coming into good use. I've also been surprisingly creative with my daily menus. For example, yesterday I was hard-pressed for a breakfast idea and didn't want to resort to the standard bacon-and-eggs.

Tomorrow is the start of the annual Green City Market Localvore Challenge, where market regulars who partake in the challenge must commit to eating only locally produced food.

Some of you foodies may have heard that Alice Waters, the godmother of the American localvore and slow food movements, is in town this week. If you don't have reservations to Saturday's sold-out farm-to-table brunch at North Pond Restaurant, you can still catch Chef Waters at Green City Market at 9 a.m. Saturday, where she'll be signing copies of her book The Art of Simple Food: Notes, Lessons and Recipes from a Delicious Revolution. She'll...

It's tax week, everyone. It's also a busy weekend for food and drink events in the city, between WhiskyFest and the IACP Cookbook Expo. Some of you are probably shedding tears in your beer after writing yet another check to the Man. In the spirit of empathy, we have a wine-and-spirits intensive edition of "YFFB" to take your mind off things. It's Still Alright to "Head For the Mountains of Busch": Sometimes it pays...