If you’re like me, you have your “usual foods” – those go-to choices when you don’t have much time/energy/ability to focus on following a recipe with 15 ingredients and a long list of instructions. I’ve been thinking a lot about my mother recently (she passed away in 2010 but would have been 95 in February) and about the “usual foods” Mom made regularly when I was growing up. And, I’ve been thinking about my “usual foods,” the ones that are my mainstay, especially during my really busy work times like the past month or so.
Mom was a “meat main course and vegetable/salad” kind of cook. We regularly ate her marinated-in-white-wine-and-herbs-then-baked “courtship chicken” (so-called because it was supposedly part of how she wooed my father). The chicken leftovers often found their way into curried chicken.
Dad loved ground beef, so we ate that in many forms. Sometimes just plain hamburgers, often in meatloaf, tacos (using fresh corn tortillas, not those yellow molded cardboard “taco shells”), and Joe’s Special. Mom learned Joe’s Special from Original Joe’s restaurant in San Francisco. When I shared that recipe with Kate French for the Conway 250th Anniversary Cookbook she’s pulling together, Kate said she lived in San Francisco for a year and used to eat Joe’s Special at Joe’s near the Golden Gate Bridge. Gotta love those small world connections.
Thinking about usual foods, what I realized is that my everyday foods have evolved to be ones that feature locally grown food.
It’s really about intention. My intention is to eat as much locally grown food as I can, to enjoy tasty, seasonal food grown by our neighbors and to reduce the amount of food I eat from far away. I’m by no means a purist, but almost every meal I eat includes locally grown food.
In this past busy time, I’ve eaten: variations on chicken/potato/spinach/leek soup, roasted chicken and roasted sweet potatoes made into chicken salad with Barberic Farm bread and butter pickles for lunches, quesadillas with local corn tortillas, cheese, spinach, and dried rosemary, LOTS of apples every day (in my morning oatmeal, as applesauce, as a snack), frozen blueberries in oatmeal, meatloaf with local ground beef, lamb sausage, and onions, local popcorn for snacks, egg salad, and scromlets (eggs scrambled with leeks, spinach, and herbs).
Lots of locally grown ingredients.
Tasty.
Easy.
And, many of the ingredients will be available at the Greenfield Winter Farmers Market happening on Saturday, March 5, 10 a.m. to 1 p.m., at Greenfield Middle School.
Of course, there are many other ways to enjoy locally grown food, but this is some of what I’ve eaten recently.
Last Saturday at the peace vigil, I told Peter Kusinski I was thinking about my “usual” foods. Peter’s a great cook and he told me about some of his “usual” foods. He said “the magic is in the spices.” Here’s one of his recipes.
What are your “usual foods”?
Please send me your “usual foods” recipes that feature locally grown food.
Peter Kusinski, Silk Purse Farm, Leyden (as transcribed by Mary McClintock into her little notebook)
Cut a pork loin into ½-inch medallions. Saute onions and peppers. Saute pork separately. Combine meat and vegetables with a little tomato sauce. Choose a spice combo: Mexican (chili), India (curry/cumin/turmeric), Italian (oregano/thyme/basil). Serve with mashed potatoes or roasted potatoes, or with pasta for Italian, or in corn tortillas for Mexican.
Mary McClintock (learned from her mother, Betsy)
Saute chopped onion in oil in cast iron frying pan until translucent. Add ground beef (or ground turkey). Cook meat until browned, breaking up with a spoon. Drain off any excess fat. Add chopped fresh spinach and cook for a minute or so until limp. Add 3 large, lightly beaten eggs. Stir and cook until eggs are set. Sprinkle with grated Parmesan cheese and serve.
Local food advocate and community organizer Mary McClintock lives in Conway and works as a freelance writer for Greenfield Community College and brand promoter for Goshenbased local food company Appalachian Naturals. Send column suggestions and recipes to: mmcclinto@yahoo.com