The "Keep it Local" Challenge

The Grande Finale…of sorts

This years challenge had a hard time getting started and getting going…but a few of us were able to eat locally and eat well all month long.  It was delicious.  As always I love seeing all the good food, getting inspiration for my own cooking and meeting my (and your) farmers.  for me eating locally is, of course, about making choices that might benefit our environment, but mostly it’s about fresh food, supporting local business and getting to know my farmer.

As always there were many folks who signed up to participate, but never quite got going.  I hope that you too were inspired by some of the good eats and while you may have never sent in a photo of your food – I hope you ate well, supported your farmers and enjoyed our posts.

on to the food

WEST COAST

Beth – California

Dinner was fava beans, corn, and salad.  Dessert was a melon popsicle.

 

• From my garden:  cucumber and purple bell pepper.
• From my CSA:  lettuce, radishes, tomatoes, musk melon
• From the farmers market:  fava beans, avocado, corn, garlic, olive oil (!)

I'm very happy that I got in a dessert, got local beans, and finally bought some local olive oil.

Kathy, Liz, Matt and Nathan – Washington

Tonight we had Zucchini ricotta cheesecake and corn chowder

In the zucchini cheesecake was:

• Zucchini (obviously!), garlic, shallots from jubilee farm, Carnation, WA
• Ricotta made from milk and buttermilk from Smith brothers Farm, Kent, WA
• Basil from our yard
• Eggs from our chickens

This was a really good recipe http://www.101cookbooks.com/archives/zucchini-ricotta-cheesecake-recipe.html.  Surprisingly light—not eggy like quiche and not heavy like cheesecake and it was easy to make. We made it with shredded zucchini, but you could use most any vegetable.

The corn chowder was one of the best I’ve eaten. The recipe was in a recent issue of Cooks illustrated http://www.cooksillustrated.com/recipes/detail.asp?docid=29692

In it was:

• Corn from Magana Farms, Sunnyside, WA
• Bacon from Blue Valley meats, Walla Walla, WA
• Onion from Jubilee Farm
• Potatoes from somewhere in Yakima, WA
• Basil from my yard

MIDWEST

Wyatt and Maura – Michigan

This weeks meal was butternut squash soup (squash, onion, garlic were local)  had to search elsewhere fore curry and cinnamon (Sorry!)

• Green beans - Veg from farmers market,  beans were frozen from earlier this season
• NY strip steak - Bearfoot Farms  Paw Paw , MI about 20 min

Kids wouldn't even try the soup but the 10 month old loved it.

Thanks, Erin
Keep it Local
Wyatt and Maura

 

Erin (your hostess) Illinois

So I had this grand plan to pick up some local vodka (there are a couple choices actually!), but it didn’t happen.  Luckily, Lara (who has participated a few weeks of this challenge) picked up a local cherry wine for me while she was in Door County Wisconsin late last month.  I made a local sangria!

I added apple and raspberries (that I froze early this summer).  Cheers!

**********************************

Thanks to all who participated this year – it’s always fun for me to get a little peek into your lives this way.  Keep it local!

xoxo

erin

Week 4!

Another week of good looking food, from good-hearted people.  And some interesting thoughts from our friend Georgene in California.  What reactions has eating local brought up for you? Negative, positive – leave a comment and tell us all of it!

There is one more week of the challenge – don’t forget!  eat well, be well…now on to the good eats…

MIDWEST

Sara, Ari, Charlie and Lucy - Illinois

This week's local dessert was an exercise in chemistry: I tried to make meringues, but it was just too humid and I couldn't get the egg whites to form stiff peaks. Do the challenge again in the winter and I'll try again in an arid kitchen.

I had intended to layer meringues with berries and whipped cream in an "Eton Mess" kind of recipe. Instead, we had to get by with fresh strawberries and raspberries from J.W. Morlock in Watervliet, MI and Kilgus Farmstead cream in Fairbury, IL. Poor, poor us. ;)

 

Wyatt & Maura, Michigan

Today's meal consisted of baked chicken breast, roasted carrots, onion, red and sweet potato.  Michigan peaches, always delicious.  A sliced tomato to brighten up the plate.  Wasn't sure what to do with all of the hot peppers from my garden, so I stuffed them with cheese and wrapped them with bacon.  Wonderful.

Chicken from Otto's Chicken
Bacon from the farmers market
Cheese from Battle Creek Michigan, 20 min
onion, carrots, and potato from CSA
peaches from farmers market
tomato and peppers from backyard

Erin Loughlin (your hostess!) – Illinois

It was dessert week – wahoo!  I’d been thinking about making this dessert all summer, just waiting for the peaches to be ready.  The main ingredients are all local (flour, peaches, blueberries and butter)  the sugar, tapioca and lemon juice are from far off lands I’m sure.  But this cake. THIS CAKE. it’s good.  Even though my nephew doesn’t think so. 

• flour – Ted’s organic grains
• Peaches – Fat Blossom Farm
• Blueberries – from all over Illinois/Michigan I’ve been storing away blueberries every week all summer. 
• butter – Alcam Creamery

 

WEST COAST

Beth – California

Super Summer Stacker. 

Grilled bread and veggies with a white bean herb puree.  I cheated a little this week with the beans because I really needed protein for dinner. 

Bread from Palo Alto.  Onions, eggplant, and herbs from my garden. Pattypan squash and zucchini from my CSA.  The beans, olive oil, and red wine vinegar are not local.

I planned to do a side salad with cucumbers and tomatoes from my garden, but I was too hungry.  :)

 

Georgene  - California

Well, not quite a meal exactly.

I've been sick and food has been a challenge of the non-local sort, so I'm copying Erin's idea of "cocktail" as meal.  Here we go:

Z Cuvee wine from Zaca Mesa Winery in Santa Ynez 137 miles

Goat Cheese Souffle made with:

    Goat Cheese from Soledad Goats 93 miles

    Eggs from Lily's Farm 55 miles

After that, it gets a little dicey.  The souffle has a few drops of milk in it that the container says comes from a Southern California dairy.  No idea of the miles there.  And no idea how far the black pepper of cream of tartar traveled.

Each week of the challenge, I find myself questioning why am I doing this and what is local? I try to eat local outside of the challenge, mostly for environmental reasons.  But if environmental is really my goal, than this "meal" is a total fail because it's pretty well-established that going vegan is the best thing we can do for the environment.  (so my meal the second week of the challenge, which was vegan and straight from my garden) was the very best I could do.

I have a tendency to think of myself as doing pretty well on the local front, but when the challenge forces me to confront the reality of my diet, I see a lot of short falls.  I wanted my lunch to be my local meal for this week -- tomato, basil and buratta sandwiches with tomato and basil from my garden, buratta from about 25 miles away and bread the grocery store labeled "local."  But while the bread may be baked locally, where does the flour come from?  And where did the place that made the burrata get the milk?  These are things I don't normally think about when the challenge isn't going on.

These kind of thoughts really get me down, but that being said, this is the first year in our house, and the first year we could truly garden.  I'm really proud that this summer I grew every single herb I needed, every ear of corn, every bean, every leaf of lettuce, every tomato, every pepper, every squash and every slice of watermelon.  Sometimes I think that's not a lot, but when I look at our grocery bills, they're down about 30%.  Part of that is because we are growing our own food and part of that is because growing our own vegetables encourages us to have a more plant-based diet.  Next year, since we will have been in the house in time to actually plan a garden and not throw in whatever plant we can find at the farmer's market, I am hoping to get about 70% of our summer food from our own back yard.  We shall see.

And on that note, signing off from Los Angeles.

 

Kathy - Washington

This week we ate:

 

King Salmon—troll caught on the Washington Coast

Corn from Magana Farms, Sunnyside, WA

Grilled zucchini, onions and peppers from Jubilee Farm, Carnation, WA

Grilled eggplant from Magana Farms

Basil for pesto from Jubilee farm

Beer—made by Matt, Kathy’s husband in our backyard (grains were not necessarily local, but the hops are grown in Washington)

Week 3

The holiday weekend seemed to throw most of us for a loop.  We have 2 more weeks of the challenge to go…hope we get some return folks for these last two weeks.  Anyone want to join me in creating local desserts next week?

Six of us participated this week and the food looked just as tasty! 

(No links this time – I was rushing to get this up today!)

MIDWEST

Sara, Ari, Charlie and Lucy – Illinois

So you can look at this week's local dinner one of two ways: on one hand, it was the most ambitious because the ingredient lists were long. On the other hand, not all the ingredients were local. I wanted to cook vegetarian though because it is my favorite, especially this time of year and finding certain ingredients in many of my favorite dishes locally just was never going to happen. I realized that some is better than none though, so I present my Mostly But Not Entirely Local Spinach Mushroom Burgers and Tomato Cobbler.

Here are the local ingredients for the spinach mushroom burgers:

• olive oil from The Olive Mill in Geneva, IL
• onion, garlic and spinach from Nichols Farm in Marengo, IL
• Phil's Eggs from Forreston, IL, butter from Organic Valley in La Farge, WI
• and mushrooms from River Valley Ranch in Burlington, WI.
• The nonlocal ingredients were rolled oats, parmesan cheese, panko crumbs, salt, pepper and pine nuts.

• The tomato cobbler's local ingredients were:
• that same Olive Mill olive oil
• onions and garlic from Nichols Farm
• beautiful cherry tomatoes...I forgot to write down where they came from but it was somewhere in Illinois and I bought them at Green Grocer
• butter from Organic Valley
• Gruyere Cheese from Roth Kase in Monroe, WI
• cream from Kilgus Farmstead in Fairbury, IL
• and Clabber Girl baking powder that I was delighted to discover comes from Terre Haute, IN. The nonlocal ingredients were flour, red pepper flakes and salt and pepper.

 

Lara – Illinois

Okay, week 3! Almost forgot this week.  All the details involved with going back to work after maternity leave kinda put things like cooking on the back burner.  We pulled it together though tonight with a meat and potatoes meal. 

We had a delicious cut of sirloin steak from Heartland Meats (Evanston Farmer's Market) and lightly fried some potatoes from a farm stand in Door Co.  I also had a cucumber from a farm stand and sliced that on the side as well.  That was it......  Only non local ingredients were again salt, pepper and the grapeseed oil.

 

Erin (your hostess) – Illinois

For my dinner this week I also put together a vegetarian meal…which was not my original plan!  There is a guy at the Rogers park farmers market that sells the best looking sausages and my plan was to buy some meat from him and grill it up and call it a meal.  And then I saw a couple of ladies making locally sourced and produced tofu! And I became unnecessarily excited about this.  I don’t even really like tofu.  But you don’t see a lot of local tofu around here, which is ridiculous when you see the number of soybean crops surrounding this city.  Anywho…I roasted the tofu along with some tomatoes, green beans, mushrooms and loads of garlic (along with balsamic vinegar, olive oil and sugar).  it was delish.

Katie – Iowa

Well today we had brats that are made at the grocery store, tomatoes from the back yard, corn from Stratford, Iowa (15 miles south of big ole Webster City) buns from Boone, Iowa. Earlier in the week I had a slice of apple pie from an orchard near my office

 

WEST COAST

Beth – California

Eggplant Panzanella and Robdello Red Wine.  Wow. This was yummy.

The eggplant, lemon cucumber, onion, basil, and parsley are from my garden.  The tomato is from my CSA (110 mi).  The bread is from Palo Alto (2 mi).  The wine is from Sonoma (75 mi).  The lemon was labeled "local" at the store.

What's not local or unknown?  The red wine vinegar, salt and pepper.  And the olive oil, which is disappointing since I can get local olive oil.

 

Kathy and Liz – Washington

So Liz and I made BLTs yesterday.

• The bacon came from Blue Valley Meat in Walla Walla, WA
• The tomatoes and lettuce came from Jubilee Farm, Carnation, WA
• The bread came from Essential Baking company Seattle, WA
• We had pickles we made from cucumbers and garlic from Jubliee Farm, Carnation, WA

Week 2!

Five  Seven of us participated in this week’s challenge (I’ll update the blog if anymore entries roll in today).  Looks like maybe one other person is joining in my breakfast-lunch-dinner-dessert-cocktail challenge…sara? yesnomaybeso?  the food is looking good folks! read on…

MIDWEST

(Just Added!)

Rebecca - Illinois

Gazpacho! - So I didn't get to a full meal this week, and a couple of ingredients in this are not local,  (olive oil, wine, S&P) but here goes:

Tomatoes/Green Pepper/Onion ~ Angelic Organics/Caledonia, IL (Thanks Sarah P!)

Garlic ~ Henry's Farm/Congerville, IL (Central IL/Mackinaw River Valley)

Simple but sooo good. More next week.

Sara, Ari, Charlie and Lucy – Illinois

this a veggie and goat cheese sandwich and it was goooooood. Bread from Bennison's Bakery in Evanston; tomatoes from Growing Power; cucumbers from Green Acres Farm in North Judson, IN; goat cheese from Prairie Fruits Farm in Champaign, IL and basil from Nichols Farm in Marengo, IL. That yummy side of melon was from Genesis too.

Everything except the basil and the melon came from Green Grocer in Chicago. Cassie and the gang make this local thing almost too easy.

 

Lara  - Illinois

Here is what I came up with for week two.   I made scrambled eggs with some sautéed veggies on the side. I used some baby summer squash that I still had from Wienke's Market in Door Co.  The eggs were Phil's and I also grated some cheese with dill from Renard's in Door Co. as well.  The only non-local ingredients were the grapeseed oil I used for cooking and Celtic sea salt I added to the eggs.

Erin (your hostess) - Illinois

There is a magical place in Three Oaks, Michigan that has single-handedly changed my palate when it comes to certain foods.  If you ask me under normal circumstances if I’d like for you to make me a ham sandwich with mustard, pickles and a tomato I would give you a dirty look and maybe I’d even fake gag.  But if the goods from that sandwich came from a place called Driers Meat Market I would try it. and I would like it. and then I would eat it again and again and again.

• Bread – Three Tarts Bakery, Northfield, IL
• Mustard, ham and pickle – Driers meat Market, Three Oaks,MI
• Tomato and lettuce – Twin Garden Farms, Harvard, IL

Also, why are sandwiches so good?

WEST COAST

(Just Added!)

Kathy Pelham - Washington

Here’s our local dinner for this week. We got tied up last night with complications in cleaning out the chicken coop (we are such exciting people…) and I had to take pictures inside so the lighting looks yucky….and then I forgot to send this over.

We had Dungeness crab from North Puget Sound

 

• Butter from Rose Valley in McMinnville, OR
• Corn from Yakima—I forget the name of the farm
• Cucumbers, tomatoes from Jubilee Farm, Carnation, WA
• Basil and garlic from my garden
• Bread from Essential Baking company in Seattle. They use Fairhaven Flour from Bellingham.

Beth – Northern California

I had every intention of cooking a local meal for dinner! The eggplant in my garden is ready to go.  However, I helped a friend can 50 lbs of (local) tomatoes today and I'm exhausted.  So my entry is homemade salsa, crushed tomatoes, spicy tomato juice, and strawberry rhubarb jam.  I'm not actually eating any of it today, but I'm too tired to cook anything else.  I will have a nice meal in January with local tomatoes.

The tomatoes were picked by my friend and her family. (She has 70 lbs to do tomorrow.)  The strawberries and rhubarb are from 25 miles away.

 

Georgene Smith – Southern California

Greetings from Los Angeles! This week's meal is as local as I can get.  Spaghetti squash with heirloom tomatoes, fresh basil and garlic, all of which is from my garden.  The garlic was sautéed with olive oil from Clovis, 222 miles away.

 
Can't vouch for the salt and pepper.  Their could be some serious miles there.

Keep it local challenge – week 1 eats!

A delicious start to the challenge.  There were seven nine ten of us who kicked off the challenge this year.  Meals ranged from freshly caught fish to a couple of egg breakfasts.  Meals had on vacation, meals had on the fly and meal we’ll just have to imagine what they might of looked like :).  A good start I’d say.  Please join us for week 2, beginning……NOW!

Oh wait…but first on to the good eats!  Get hungry.

{{Scroll down to read Maura and Wyatt's new entry along with Sara and her family! And Meagen and fam! All midwest...}}

MIDWEST

Kathy Pelham (on vacation), Michigan

I'm on my annual trip to Leelanau County, Michigan. My family has spent summers here for over 100 years. I've been impressed over the last few years at how the farmer's market has grown and how many new small farms have popped up. On Tuesday I walked out of the farmer's market loaded down with numerous bags of good stuff.

We started out with hors d'oeuvres on the dock-- eating venison sausage made from a deer shot by a hunter friend in the southern half of the state and drinking Bell's Oberon from Kalamazoo, MI.

Dinner consisted of fantastic super fresh Lake Trout caught the day before in Lake Michigan by Red Cloud Fisheries in Suttons Bay. When he's not selling fish, the owner, Francis Weese makes beautiful traditional Native American baskets.

We grilled zucchini and onions from Second Spring Farm in Cedar, MI and wild ramps from Bakkers Acres, Suttons Bay, MI.

The best corn of the season came from Harris Farms in Honor, MI.

We drank a Chardonnay from Willow Vineyard--my favorite local winery--in Suttons Bay, MI.

Grilled peaches from Cherry Beach Orchard in Suttons Bay, MI and Butter Pecan ice cream from Moomers in Traverse City, MI topped with local maple syrup was the grand finale of our local dinner.

Oh, man, Michigan in the summer.  Nothing beats it.  - Erin

Lara Fickes (on vacation) Door County, WI

one cranky baby = emailing you late.  Not bringing camera cord on vacation = no photo to go with my write up.  But here is what I pulled together this week.......
I had a hamburger with an ear of fresh corn on the side and a glass of wine.  The hamburger meat was from Heartland meats - purchased at the Evanston Farmer's Market.  I am currently in Door Co, WI on vacation.  I was hoping to find a local bread source, but was unsuccessful, so I ate the burger with no bun. I did however top it with cheese from Renards, a local cheese maker, as well as salsa and sliced pickles.  The salsa and pickles were from a local roadside type stand that does their own growing and canning.  The corn, also from a little road side stand.  And, last but not least, the wine was from a local Door Co winery.

Sounds like a great meal!  I love roadside stands.  You guys should stock up! - Erin

Erin Loughlin, (your hostess) Illinois

So I’m going with my theme of featuring one main meal per week as local.  This week was breakfast!  My refrigerator broke down midweek so I was worried all would be lost, but that’s the beauty of local foods – they are so fresh and best eaten as such.

• The potatoes and tomato were from Nichols Farm, in Marengo, IL
• Basil, egg and garlic – Tempel Farms, Oak Creek, IL
• Goat Cheese – Belmont, WI
• Red Onion – Lake Breeze Organics, SW Michigan
• Salted hand rolled butter – Alcam Creamery, Richland Center, WI

My big score this week was the BUTTER.  It’s rich and creamy and delicious. yum.  I bought a huge log of it and will freeze it in thirds so that I can use it all year long.

(Just Added!)

Wyatt and Maura, Michigan

The cucumbers, tomato, some peppers were from our garden.   The chicken is from Otto's Chicken, Middleville, MI?.  Lettuce,  potato and some peppers, and zucchini from Visser Farms in Holland MI
Onion and yellow squash from Scobey Farms, Somewhere nearby in Michigan

 (Just added!)

Sara, Ari, Charlie and Lucy, Illinois

This week's local breakfast required a trip to the Wicker Park Famers' Market--Baby Lucy's first! We picked up lots of goodies and ended up with plenty of stuff to make several local meals, but first came breakfast: toast with scrambled egg, sauteed mushrooms, goat cheddar cheese and fresh basil.

The bread for the toast came from the appropriately named Delightful Pastries from here in Chicago; the eggs were Phils from Forreston, IL; the butter and cheese were both from Nordic Creamery in Westby, WI; the basil was from my favorite farm, Nichols in Marengo, IL; and the mushrooms were from River Valley Ranch in Burlington, WI.

(The mushrooms were being sold in one pound bags and when I asked the farmer if I could have a half pound bag instead, he looked me square in the eye and said, "Well yes, but I'll have to warn you...then you'll have half as many mushrooms.") We enjoyed our breakfast with some Rishi Tea from Milwaukee, WI and some gorgeous yellow cherry tomatoes from Nichols Farm that were pretty enough to string and wear as a necklace.

 (Just added!)

Meagen, Michael, Ian and Marcus, Illinois

Honey marinated chicken (honey from Wisconsin, chicken from our local butcher)

Michigan potatoes

Cucumber salad with dill - cucumber and dill was from a friend's backyard, the rest of the ingredients came from the farmer's market.

 

I am not a photographer and not a chef, so it doesn't look pretty, but it was good!!

WEST

Beth Harrington, California

Eggs scrambled with herbs, tomatoes and onions.  And fruit salad.

Eggs - 70 mi

Herbs (parsley, thyme, oregano) - my garden

Tomato - 110 mi

Onion - 110 mi

Musk melon - 110 mi

Grapes - 110 mi

Pluot - 110 mi

(My CSA is 110 mi away!)

Yay, Breakfast! ooh, muskmelon…never tried it. Give us the name of your CSA’s farm so we can ogle their website! - Erin

 

Georgene Smith Goodin, California

This was a bad week for me to start the challenge -- I was out of town all but one night and had to go "local" with what I had on hand.

All the veggies are from my garden.  The beans are actually purple on the vine and turn green when you cook them -- you have to cook them a long time or they're tough.  The red mess is actually caramelized tomatoes, onions and peppers and, despite appearances, is actually really yummy.  The corn's been a bit of a challenge -- it has to be picked at just the right moment or else it gets really starchy.

I failed miserably on the fish.  It's from, ahem, Alaska.  But at least is was grilled with California olive oil...

I’m jealous of your local olive oil and your garden!  can’t wait to see what you cook up next week! - Erin

Elizabeth Kramps, Washington

The day started with some beet thinnings and eggs all from about 20-40 feet away from the house. 

There was a picture of these super local ingredients after cooking, however there were a little less photogenic yet delicious just the same.

The day ended with a pork 'banh mi' burger with cucumber, carrot, red cabbage slaw, homemade kim chee and some grilled potatoes.

ground pork - blue valley meats, Walla Walla WA 260 miles
slaw veggies and kim chee veg all came from Jubilee Farm, Carnation WA 6 miles
dressing for slaw was a homemade mayo with eggs from the chickens that live 20 feet outside my door. 
burger bun - essential baking company, it's a seattle bakery but I can't vouch for the localness of their ingredients.
potatoes - from the Issaquah, WA farmer's market yet I cannot for the life of me remember which stand I got these guys at.
ketchup for the mystery potatoes - homemade with Jubilee Farm tomatoes.

I can’t say I’m surprised by how good this looks – you guys always bring the good eats.  Can’t wait to see more – hope you’re enjoying your new home! - Erin

SOUTH

Barb Moran, Austin, TX

My "keep it local" dinner last night. Everything from Farmers Market or local Texas business

Yay, Aunt Barb!  This looks delicious.  Can’t wait to see what Texas brings to the table next week! – Erin

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For those of you intending to join the challenge but missed last nights deadline I’ll be adding entries throughout the day today only.  If you miss it altogether start planning for this week’s meal!

Check back to the blog on Wednesday for a tour around my local farmers market.

The Challenge begins today!

What you need to know…

1. Sometime between Monday and next Sunday, prepare and eat one meal made up of all local ingredients
2. Take a photo of that meal and send it to me along with a little write up of what you ate and where it came from: erinmloughlin@gmail.com
3. Don't forget to include your name, where you live and a website if you want me to link it
4. Eat that meal
5. enjoy it.
6. On the following Monday check back on the blog to see what everybody else ate all week!

 

Happy eating!

5 more days til the Challenge begins.  Getting excited?

Looking for recipe ideas?

Not all of us are intuitive cooks.  I watch these shows like Top Chef and Masterchef and CANNOT figure out how the hell a person can get the idea to make a surf-and-turf-carrot risotto-cake-with-truffles when all they’ve been give is the carrot.  How??

No, I need recipes.  I need someone to tell me that a certain combo of flavors will go well together.  But when you’re heading into a challenge such as this one, you have to start with what’s given to you.  What’s in season and available at your local market will dictate what you end up making. 

So I’m here to recommend my 2 favorite go-to cookbooks for cooking locally and in-season

1) Local Flavors: Cooking and Eating from America's Farmers' Markets, By Deborah Madison

Deborah Madison visits farmers markets from across the country and comes up with really great seasonal and locally produced items for all her recipes.  They aren’t going to all fit where you or I live, but the recipes are good and inventive.

2) MY FAVORITE!!!  Food to Live by, By Myra Goodman

I have yet to make a recipe from this cookbook that I haven’t wanted to make again and again; that others haven’t salivated over; that hasn’t been delicious.  It is GOOD. yum. 

*****************

Any other suggestions, folks?

i *heart* cookbooks.

xo

Erin

And now for a little extra challenge to go with your challenge

A week and a half before the challenge begins and I’ve started thinking about meals I might want to make.  How about you?

I realized that I planned this for five weeks instead of four weeks and that gave me an idea for a little extra twist I plan taking on during this challenge.  It goes like this:

• Breakfast
• Lunch
• Dinner
• cocktail (!)
• Dessert

The challenge is only one meal per week so each week I’ll focus making a meal reflecting a specific meal of the day (including everyone’s favorite: the liquid meal)

Whose with me?

The Challenge is BACK!

Ah, a year and a half later and it feels so good! 

Why do a challenge now, you may ask, after all this time?  Well a few reasons:

1. We are heading into the best time of year for eating locally here in the midwest and I’m feeling inspired again by all the farmers and farm fresh food around
2. I was listening to a show on the radio about running out of oil and alternative fuel sources and I started thinking about how hard it will be to get fresh food (some time in the future) when shipping food becomes prohibitive.  What a great time to learn about all your local sources!  Or grow your own!!
3. In the last year and a half i’ve been asked more than a handful of times ‘when are you going to do that challenge again?’
4. Most importantly:  I miss all of you and your good food and your awesome photos of good food and of your cute selves.

So let’s get it going again.

Official start date: August 15th 

It will run for 4 weeks and the basics are the same:

1. Prepare one meal per week made up COMPLETELY from local ingredients
2. At the end of that week send in a photo and little write up of your meal including where the food came from and any other little tidbits you’d like to share

There is no prize for this challenge – just the enjoyment of good food shared with others. 

Here are the rest of the rules

What do you say?  Want in?

To official sign up send me an email (erinmloughlin@gmail.com) with your name and location (and if you have a blog, send the link).

 

yay! 

happy eating!!

Erin