Simple Good and Tasty

So you shop at farmer’s markets and your local co-op. You buy local, organic, sustainably grown and harvested food. Your coffee is grown in the shade, your chocolate is fair-trade, and your bread is homemade.  How else can you can declare your support for the cause of "local, sustainable, organic foods and the people who produce them?”

Lucia's Restaurant at NightWho is your farmer?

Most people know their hairdresser, insurance agent, doctor and many others, but few today know their farmer, perhaps the most important person in their lives. Knowing your farmer can change your health, your approach to cooking, your respect for food, your stewardship of the earth and even your social and political circle. This dinner will introduce you to 12 different farmers and producers.

When I talk about eating local food at Minnesota's great get together, the MN State Fair (which starts today!), friends roll their eyes as though I've just suggested going to New York City and eating at Applebee's - why on earth would you eat local food at the State Fair, friends ask, when you can get fried alligator on a stick?

Last week, I blogged about the exquisite Simple, Good and Tasty local food dinner at The Strip Club in St. Paul. Today, I'll let the beautiful images, taken by Kate Sommers from Les Petites Images, speak for themselves.

Chef JD Fratzke, Todd Lein (from Thousand Hills Cattle Company) and I kicked things off by talking a bit about what we do and why. Here's a picture of JD holding court.

Tonight's the night for the August Simple, Good, and Tasty dinner at the Strip Club, sure to be another terrific local food experience with friends. For the 50 of us lucky enough to have signed up first, Here are the details:

For September's Simple, Good, and Tasty local food dinner, we're trying something a little bit different - the biggest, best, funnest local food potluck and pig roast that the Twin Cities has ever seen. SGT will provide the pig - you bring your family, friends, and a dish to share. This is a great, inexpensive opportunity to meet local food enthusiasts, cook up your CSA/farmshare bounty, and eat great food.

Here's a list of the great foods that came in our Harmony Valley CSA box this week, along with notes and a picture directly from Harmony Valley Farm to help us figure out what to do with everything. I posted my initial reaction to this great farmshare bounty last week. The food is really amazing (local, organic, sustainable, and delicious) - so much better than what you'd find in most grocery stores - even if it can be a bit overwhelming at times.

My kitchen counter, covered with this week's farmshare bountyWhat am I going to do with all of this stuff? It's taking over my kitchen! My fridge is still nearly full from last week's Harmony Valley vegetables! My fruit share includes an entire bag full of apricots! I've been eating salad greens and sautee mix non-stop for weeks! I don't know if I can eat another basil vinaigrette. And now that there are tomatoes - blessed, delicious tomatoes - it occurs to me that nobody else in my family will touch them.

What a fun night we had at the Red Stag Supper Club in Minneapolis! The room was gorgeous, the food was superb, and the company was best of all. The photos, taken by my friend, fellow foodie, and excellent blogger Kate Sommers of Les Petites Images, tell the story way better than I can.

Adam Anderson, former chef at Lucia's (currently at Whole Foods), creates Simple, Good, and Tasty recipes using the ingredients from our Harmony Valley Farm CSA boxes each week.