Out & About

From the Mississippi Market website: MISSISSIPPI MARKET TO OPEN NEW ST. PAUL LOCATION TODAY

Mill City Farmers Market is always overflowing with fresh food, families, and foodies. On a recent visit there, director Marjorie Hegstrom talked to Live Green Twin Cities about the market's mission, its growth, and its waiting list that’s a mile long. I met Marjorie at the Market at 6:30 am, ensuring there was plenty of time to watch local farmers and food producers (who had arrived as early as 5:30 am) set up their stands beside the mighty Mississippi River before the market opened at 8:00.

I'm very glad to let you know that we've locked in a date, time, and location for our August Simple, Good, and Tasty local food meal. Here are the details:

When: August 19, 8:00 pmWhere: The Strip Club, 378 Maria Ave, St. Paul, MN 55106Cost: $35 for 3 course meal, not including tax, tip, or boozeContact: 651-793-6247 (restaurant), lee@simplegoodandtasty.com (me)

The Strip Club is a cleverly named steakhouse, widely loved since it opened last year in St. Paul. It's in a beautiful space, and I've talked with Executive Chef JD Fratzke several times - he's not only a great chef, but also a superstar of a guy.

I read an excellent article in a recent New York Times Magazine about Tim and Liz Young of Nature's Harmony Farm in Elberton, GA. The whole thing is a good, quick read, describing the story of how Tim (a marketing service entrepreneur) and Liz (a special ed teacher) discovered beauty, balance, and justice on their 76 acre farm. Rather than raise animals to compete with those sold at Walmart, the Youngs are committed to the preservation of rare breeds, such as Ossabaw and Berkshire hogs and Murray Grey cattle. Here's an excerpt from the article:

This is an excerpt of an article I wrote for Live Green Twin Cities. To read the entire article, click here.

The next Simple, Good, and Tasty local food dinner, on July 29 at the Red Stag Supper Club (that's head chef Brian Hauke in the above picture, left) in northeast Minneapolis, is completely full. For the lucky 50 people who signed up first, here are the details:

The new site is up - welcome! Please take a look around and let us know what you think. Happy 4th of July!

I couldn't be more excited to let you know that Simple, Good and Tasty is relaunching this weekend. Why? I'm glad you asked. Here goes:

This is an excerpt from the full article “Local D’lish aims to be the cream of the crop” published by Live Green Twin Cities on June 30, 2009.

Local D’lish is a grocery and gourmet-food store near downtown Minneapolis that focuses almost exclusively on local foods. The care and planning that has gone into making the place both beautiful and inviting is immediately evident: Tomato plants greet visitors, and the warm, sunny walls make the little shop feel like a celebratory outdoor market; and the selection of foods and food products is vast and unique, made up almost exclusively of good, local, real foods made in Minnesota and surrounding states (Obsession Chocolates, made with fresh local ingredients in Wisconsin, are a particularly tempting find).

July is local food month at Live Green Twin Cities, a supercool blog that focuses on the “green lifestyle.” That’s good news for me, because I’m partnering with Molly Priesmeyer at Live Green to produce a bunch of new content throughout the month. Here’s what the site says:

We’ll introduce you to great local stores and shops that sell healthy and organic local food; local chefs focusing on sustainable practices; and local farmers producing healthy and organic produce, meats, and more.