Minneapolis

About a month ago, I went to the Minneapolis Whole Foods Market looking for local meat. I’ve been a Minnesotan long enough to know that our produce choices are severely limited in the winter months, but I figured there’d be plenty of local pork and beef to bring home. Turns out I was wrong - there was almost none. I left Whole Foods confused and surprised, and I left them a note. The next day, Renee Howard sent me an email.

We'll, not really. But we do have a garden started in our yard, thanks to A Backyard Farm, which I wrote about in an earlier Simple, Good, and Tasty post. A Backyard Farm, in its first season, is the brainchild of Joan and Coleen, two terrific women whose quest to grow local, sustainable foods in Minneapolis and St. Paul now now extends to other people's home gardens. We had Joan and Coleen out to our house a couple of weeks ago, and we discussed an approach that would work for us.

There was a short article in the Star Tribune last week about Common Roots Cafe (whose terrific local, sustainable food I featured last week) and the support they give Whittier schools in Minneapolis. Here's a quote:

It would be hard to overstate what Lucia's - and it's owner/founder Lucia Watson - have meant to the Twin Cities food and dining landscape for the past 20-plus years. Since it's inception, Lucia's has been not only one of the city's finest restaurants, but also one of it's most active members of the local, sustainable food community.

Just after the ground was broken on the White House's new, organic garden, the Washington Post quoted Michelle Obama as follows:

Peace Coffee is a terrific Minneapolis company committed to organic, fair trade beans. Here's what it says on their site:

Minneapolis' Cloud Cult, whose most recent album Feel Good Ghosts (Tea-Partying Through Tornadoes) tore up the CMJ charts, is a band on a mission. The band, formed in 1995, features a cellist, violinists, and two painters, all of whom perform live.

Brasa, a self-described "premium rotisserie" in Northeast Minneapolis (just down the block from the Red Stag Supper Club), serves only three meats:

I think if I skpped the whole Minneapolis thing and just wrote about Michael Pollan, I'd still be a busy man. This is from the NYTimes.com Well page. In Pollan's words:

The move towards sustainable food has not been lost on the city of Minneapolis. The City of Minneapolis Sustainable Food Initiative website lists these benefits associated with eating local, sustainable food: