Blessing the Hands that Feed Us
Page 20
So now I use my big dinner plates for heaping salads and steamed greens. For the rest I use the next size down.
When I backslide into late-night “barefoot in front of open fridge with spoon in hand,” I can break the spell by taking out one of my three-inch saucers, heaping it high with six almonds and twenty raisins, and paddling back to my office indulged.
Savor Your Food
Take pleasure in the flavors and see how long you can still taste your food before swallowing. Focus on how the mouthful tastes as you chew. The old fuddy-duddy rule of thumb is twenty chews for each bite. My trick: savor the flavor as long as possible. Interestingly, meat loses its flavor sooner than other whole foods—at least in my mouth.
Slow Down
Whether you want to savor your food or notice when you are full, slowing down helps. Two ways I do this are putting my fork down between bites (my generation was taught that as manners) and dining with friends with the intention of being leisurely.
Track Your Daily Bread
Write down everything you eat each day. Not to count calories but to be aware of your own hand-to-mouth habits. You could think of it as savoring your food a second time—when you review your eating day. Such tracking will naturally reveal unconscious eating.
Try a Whole-Foods Lent
Like my friend Suzanne, you could engage in a whole-foods Lent—forty days of nothing packaged, prepared, or processed. After a few days of calculating what she’d eaten and a few more negotiating with the butcher to sell her meat wrapped in paper rather than shrink-wrapped, she did fine. The Lenten practice was less about her preferences and more about how whole-foods eaters interface with a highly-processed-foods culture.
Change Your Relationship to Meat
Vegetarians argue for no-meat diets on the grounds of personal and environmental health, longevity, and cruelty-free eating. Many others argue for meat eating: Atkins, Paleo, Abascal, and Weston Price diets have meat as a key element. My 10-mile diet showed me a middle ground based on learning what it takes to pasture-raise animals and an understanding of how livestock is part of most well-managed small farms. Pastured animals fertilize pastures as they graze; provide manure for biodynamic preparations; and feed family, friends, and communities milk, butter, cheese, eggs, and flesh. Choosing to eat only locally grown pastured animals will naturally slow down your meat consumption. The supply isn’t endless and the price is appropriate to the work invested and the dignity of the animal.
Here are some explorations and practices around the issue of meat:
MEAT AS A TREAT
Track how much meat you eat in a normal week. Be honest. Don’t skimp because you’re watching. Get that hot grocery store chicken if you love it. Order ahi tuna. Grab a Whopper. Whatever is part of your weekly meat routine.
10 PERCENT RULE
Use the 10 percent rule to moderate that. If you eat 40 ounces of meat a week, for example, go for 36. If that seems plenty, drop it to 32 ounces. Keep it up, slowly, until you cut into your true appetite for meat. Then add an ounce and stabilize there. As I’ve said, I started at about 45 ounces and now eat about 20. I eat an occasional juicy steak for my inner carnivore, though I now find I’ll box half the restaurant portion and make it last a few days.
MEATLESS MONDAY
The Meatless Monday campaign was designed to help people eschew chewing meat one day a week. It’s like the old Catholic fish on Friday—a habit in service to a set of beliefs. It’s a choice that affects many things at once: weight, health, justice, sustainability, climate disruption, rainforest preservation, and your grandchildren’s future. If you were told you could take a pill that would have all these effects, you’d do it. Less meat is no bitter pill.
SUNDAY DINNER
Roll back the clock to an era when we ate a Sunday roast that became Monday sandwiches and Tuesday spaghetti sauce and Wednesday tacos and Thursday soup, followed by a couple of days of macaroni and cheese, leading to another extraordinary Sunday dinner.
EAT HALF
Set aside half your meat at the beginning of a restaurant meal. Bring your own container or ask for ones made of compostable material. Voilà! Another meal.
DO IT YOURSELF
Participate in slaughtering and butchering an animal at least once in your life. If you’ve never done it, you’ll have a searing experience, making meat either unpalatable or holy or primal.
The No-Meat Mantra
Say again and again: “Nuts and seeds [beans, sesame, pumpkin, sunflower] are protein; nuts and seeds are protein” until the grip of the cultural indoctrination about animal products being the only source of protein is gone. In fact, most vegetables are high in amino acids.
All of these both objectively run less meat through your body and interrupt your behavior patterns so that you can rechoose how much you need or want to eat.
Hint!
Relocalizing your food is easier if you try to eat whole foods—that is, foods with only one ingredient, like any fruit or vegetable, plain meat or fish, whole grains, beans, nuts, and plain dairy.
Try These Recipes
After all the talk of chicken, it’s time for a delicious recipe from Patrick Boin of The Braeburn, for chicken served up with his essential ingredient: integrity. But first here’s one of Georgie Smith’s traditional central Whidbey farming community recipes.
Farmer Georgie Smith is carrying on the heritage of her four-generation family farm, Willowood Farm of Ebey’s Prairie. Her great-grandfather settled here in the late 1800s and farmed the rich prairie soil of Central Whidbey. Over the years the farm grew grains, peas, iris bulbs, sheep, winter squash, cattle, and a great love of the land and the farm. Farmer Georgie today grows twelve acres of mixed fresh market vegetables, selling to local Whidbey Island farmers’ markets and to restaurants in Island, Skagit, and King counties that are committed to using local foods. Farmer Georgie works hand in hand with her father (he is in charge of all the equipment!) and has high hopes that her two young daughters will one day carry on in her farming footsteps.
Nutty Renee’s Red Kuri Soup
Named in honor of my mother, Renee, who came up with this recipe featuring the rich, hazelnut-reminiscent flavor of red kuri winter squash. Peanut butter brings out the creamy sweetness of the squash, but be careful to not overdo it as the peanut can also easily overpower the delicate flavors.
2 cups red kuri squash from a 2-pound squash, roasted
2 cups chicken stock
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 cup pine nuts
1/4 cup finely chopped onion
1/2 cup milk
1 tablespoon freshly ground pepper
1/4 cup (no more) quality peanut butter (like Adams)
Baby spinach leaves or arugula, for garnish
Cut the red kuri squash in half, scoop out the seeds, and roast it until it’s soft. Roasting the squash is important as it partially caramelizes the vegetable, which is great for the flavors. Let it cool and then scoop out the flesh. In a food processor, add the chicken stock and squash and puree until smooth.
In a large saucepan, heat the olive oil, then sauté the pine nuts and onion until soft. Let cool and then chop coarsely (in the food processor if possible). Transfer back to the pot, add the squash, and simmer the entire mixture.
Fifteen minutes before serving, add the milk, pepper, and peanut butter and stir well. Do not boil after this step.
Garnish with the baby spinach leaves or arugula and serve. Other squash or pumpkins can be substituted, but be sure to roast them!
Patrick Boin at The Braeburn says:
As for a personal philosophy toward cooking and why I do what I do, I am a steward for the earth and all she provides. I have a responsibility to the planet, my community, the local farms and farmers who work them, and my coworkers to prepare this bounty with humility, respect, honor,
and grace. I am a simple man making my way through the universe, and kitchen groovin’ is my ride of choice.
Chanterelle and Cauliflower Mushroom–Stuffed Roasted Chicken Breast
Two 6-ounce boneless, skinless chicken breasts
2 tablespoons cold-pressed extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup Romanesco cauliflower
1 teaspoon capers
1 tablespoon minced fresh garlic (2 cloves)
2 tablespoons diced red onion, small dice
1 ounce cooking sherry
1 ounce white wine
1 cup chanterelle mushrooms, cleaned and torn
1 cup cauliflower mushrooms, cleaned and torn
1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh rosemary
2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley
1 teaspoon chopped fresh sage, fine chiffonade
1 teaspoon stemmed fresh thyme
1/4 cup Craisins
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper
1/4 cup panko bread crumbs
1/4 cup water
1 ounce butter
Preheat the oven to 400°F and adjust a rack to the middle position.
Wash the chicken breasts, remove excess fat and tendons, pat them dry, and lay them flat. At the meaty part make an incision and split the chicken nearly in two, leaving a 1/4-inch “spine” on the back side. Cover and set them aside in the refrigerator.
Heat the oil in a medium sauté pan just to the smoking point, then add the Romanesco cauliflower, capers, garlic, and onion. Turn the heat to medium.
Sauté over medium heat for 2 minutes, then add 1/2 ounce each of the sherry and the wine; continue to sauté for 2 minutes.
Bring the heat up to high, then add the mushrooms, rosemary, parsley, sage, thyme, and Craisins; continue to sauté for another 3 minutes, adding the remaining sherry and wine in the last minute.
Remove the mixture from the heat and place it in a small mixing bowl, add the salt, pepper, and panko, and incorporate with a light hand.
Remove the chicken breasts from the refrigerator, lay them flat, and open them so you have a “butterfly”; fill one side of each breast with half the stuffing, then cover with the opposite flap; gently pat any remaining filling on the top of the breasts.
Place the breasts in a small baking dish, add the water and butter, cover with a piece of foil, and bake in the preheated oven for 30 minutes.
Remove from the oven and check the temperature (the internal center reading should be 165°F).
Plate with a quinoa salad and life is sublime.
Notes
no sweatshop chicken
size matters—bigger takes longer
use mushrooms that inspire you; their earthiness will always shine through
be seasonal with your vegetables
adjustments may be necessary
most important . . . make this recipe yours; after all, it’s for you—peace
CHAPTER SEVEN
Revelations of the Final Week
Home stretch! I could almost smell October 1 like a horse smells the stable. In Spanish they call it querencia—a wonderful word for that longing we feel, when stressed, for home or turf, stable or lair—for that place where we rest and gather strength. After a long ride, querencia fuels a last burst as the worn-out horse gallops to the barn.
In week four, my querencia was toast. With cheese. And certainly nuts.
I actually made a list of my sweet (and salty and oily) weak spots, the “eating-home” I yearned for:
• chocolate-covered almonds
• a handful of nuts a day
• nonwheat bread
• cheese—but really good cheese as a flavor, not a food
• dried fruit—prunes, apricots, raisins, figs, peaches
• Mr. Mobley’s sauce (a Whidbey delicacy) and/or goddess salad dressing
• almond butter
• stevia! (my natural alternative to artificial sweeteners)
Once written, that list seemed too short. Surely I’d need avocados. And crackers, three types. And rice and oatmeal. And . . .
At the same time, the constraints of September had wrung some precious insights out of me, and I wasn’t about to toss those out once I opened the door again to the Industrial Cornucopia. I occupied myself in this last week with long journal entries and blog posts on the big picture of my very little picture of local eating. For me, seeing patterns and systems is almost as yummy as toast with melted cheese, so I relished—so to speak—this chance to mull it all over.
As I reflected on what had changed, I saw three levels: the objective report, the practical changes, and the spiritual tempering.
We’ll start with the facts. The tallies and measurements. I totaled it all up and posted the following:
Ladies and Gentlemen, the Tallies Are In
I know you are waiting with bated breath to get the results of this month of 10-mile eating. Here are some highlights:
Weight: I lost six pounds. My average calories a day were 1,600 so that accounts for some of it. I’ll bet that without grains I lost water weight—no swelling in hands and feet.
Cholesterol: Tricia’s part of the bargain was to feed me. My part of the bargain, beyond not cheating, was to get my blood work done before and after the 10-mile diet experiment. So here’s the numbers:
Total cholesterol down 3
HDL (good) up 7
LDL (bad) down 9
Risk ratio from 4.2 (about average) to 3.7 (low range)
These are the kind of numbers in a month that the doc says, “Whatever you are doing, keep doing it.”
Calories: Fifty percent of the calories came from Tricia (supplemented by my garden and some extras from friends). That’s good news, bad news.
Good news is: Wow! That’s a lot of food grown by the one little industrious Tricia.
The bad news is that without the extra milk, meat, honey, oil, and a little cheese, I’d have been definitely underfed.
Ahh, but the good news is, ALL the food except for the oil, salt, caffeine, and 30 little limes came from my 10 miles. That is very, very hopeful in terms of our ability to feed ourselves.
Ahh, but the bad news is that everyone who wants to eat this way would need to grow a big kitchen garden with plenty of squash and potatoes, and (except vegans) would need to at least be part of a chicken and goat/cow coop OR form a relationship with a grower who can provide this. Our current CSA and agricultural production couldn’t feed us all—all year. Yet.
The good news is that just beyond my 10 miles up on Ebey’s Prairie, people are growing grains and beans, and if there were more demand for such, I’m sure more land would be put into those crops. We do not need to do without bread! Or beans in our winter soups.
The bad news is that demographically we are an aging population, and if we don’t find a way to attract and retain young farmers we will not be able to feed ourselves into our dotage.
The overall news is that we are actually on our way to at least partial food self sufficiency on the island if we would eat what we can grow here—and not insist on what cannot grow here. And if we commit to support our producers by buying from them, especially during the transition as an integrated food system develops here. And if we are wise about what we need from 100 miles and 300 miles and 1000 miles—we actually can map our food system against our food needs—and begin to actually address the challenge Pam set before us and all eat more than one month a year.
Taking Stock
For the sake of the grand experiment, Tricia and I kept track of the food she gave me and the food I acquired within (and beyond) my ten miles. I ate nearly 50,000 calories that month. Sounds like a lot when you think in terms of days, but divided by 30 that’s about 1,650 a day. A tenth of that total was
milk! Half was meat and eggs. I drank three cups of oil for 3,500 calories, and two and a half cups of honey for 2,500.
All this is sobering on two accounts. One is that I eat a lot. I can start to see how I’ll die having passed six tons of food through my alimentary canal. The other is that without my exotics and 10-mile extras, I would have consumed only 750 calories a day. You can see why it takes a complete food system to feed a village—not industrial monocrops, not just backyard vegetables. Later, in February, I would add grains and beans. With those I could have had adequate calories without any animal products, but even so, I saw the level of focus and intention it would take to feed the villages of Whidbey from the farms and ranches of Whidbey—and that much would need to change to make food a shared priority.
Then I assessed the changes I’d made and thought would last.
They say you create a new habit by faithfully doing it for twenty-one days. Indeed. The 10-mile diet had settled into a routine, and I was satisfied with it. In twenty-one days I’d turned my cooking and eating around. I had
• restocked my kitchen with local foods.
• learned to cook formerly overlooked foods, like turnips and kohlrabi.
• pulled out my old pressure cooker and Foley food mill and put them to work.
• learned what it takes to make flour and would forevermore bless the hands that grow, harvest, thresh, grind, and package what before seemed a lowly food, best consumed as sourdough toast.
• learned to make zackers and zookies, though I was sure I’d revert to toast on October 1.
• learned to make butter, which went from miracle in week one to standard practice by now.
• developed not just a tolerance of but a real taste for raw milk and ultrafresh greens, and truly free-range chicken—worth every penny.
• come to savor my food more because I knew what it took to grow it.
• come to love my farmers, not just “know them,” as food activists suggest.