Day 7: the promise of a full week of eating "exclusively local" - or at least by our modified rules - was somewhat exciting 7 days ago. And over the week its proven to be pretty satisfying. But today could only be described as two-thirds failure, one-third dramatic success. after sleeping in past 8, Lori wanted an egg burrito for breakfast, and who am I to deny? So off we go to Ralph's in Chatham to pick one up, en route to a family hike to see the largest waterfall in Columbia County. After a successful hike, and an hour and half nap by yours truly, lunch was in high demand. What do we have? Um, nothing. Diner, here we come! Meatloaf sandwich for me, Cheesburger and Fries for Lori. OK, so there's little chance much of the food we consumed for the first two meals originated in the north east.... and even though they were both served from local businesses who rely on local support, I'm definitely feeling like we're failing on our last day of the challenge. So, onto dinner plans. 

We still have the legs, thighs, and wings from that Kinderhook Chicken in the fridge... and the tarragon in the garden is thriving. So.... lets make Tarragon Chicken! Lori has made this Sara Foster recipe for about a year now, and I absolutely love it. Though tonight was the first time I tried making it. Its incredibly easy, and even more incredibly flavorful. I ended up making a simple risotto alongside it, and topped with some broccoli from my parent's fridge in Maine. I don't know if the broccoli was from my dad's farm, my parents garden, or the local grocery store... but it was local in spirit! And certainly the chicken and tarragon were local... so i felt somewhat redeemed, or at least marginally back in the locavore game.

Conclusion: Weakness and failure gave way to one hell of a dinner. In total the week was definitely a challenge, and legitimately opened our eyes to a few new foods in the local area. I've always liked eating local, and i think this week has solidified my yearning to keep it local when possible. There's little chance I'll continue it this hardcore, but at least in the summer its pretty easy to do so. Meat will be the hardest thing to keep getting local as its so expensive... but its also significantly better than mass-produced stuff so maybe we simply need to eat less of it! That said, I have 2 lbs of ground beef and a 3lb chuck roast in the fridge getting ready to be smoked tomorrow and I'm 100% positive it ain't from around here. More weakness.... but I'll be back! 

Day 6 started with a resounding thud as my firstborn son woke up with a chip on his shoulder and would not listen to a damn thing I said in my groggy 6AM state. So once the whole family was up, I declared it a "go out to breakfast" morning, and we piled in the truck (with a full load of trash to take to the dump), and headed over to the Old Chatham Country Store for breakfast. I had scrambled eggs with whole wheat toast and a side of sausage which i quickly turned into an egg sandwich dipped in Cholula and ketchup. I wasn't in the mood for pictures, so you'll have to trust me that it was fine looking and tasty. I have no idea where OCCS sources their food, but we figured supporting a local small business is in the same spirit as eating local, so it fit into our newly-modified rule book. 

For lunch we had grilled cheese sandwiches alongside the rest of that tomato soup from the night before. That soup just gets better the longer it sits. Mmm! And we also had a little tomato taste-off from our garden. Turns out we like all four varieties, though the fourth-of-july and yellow are a bit too bright/tart/tangy solo. But those brandywine and rainbow heirlooms are amazing! 

For dinner we had one of my favorites - grilled chicken breasts with a parsley vinaigrette. I've made this before, but trying to keep real with the local vibe I omitted the lemon. I substituted rice-wine vinegar which was absolutely perfect! Its possible its actually better with the vinegar than it ever was with the lemon. A taste-test would be smart. But this is where our rules start to get weird as that vinegar isn't from anywhere near us.... but it is a condiment of sorts, and we already had it on-hand so it did fall with guidelines.  All that aside, the chicken was truly outstanding. It was another Freedom Ranger from Kinderhook Farm... though this time Georgia aged the chickens longer. I think they were about 20 days older than the previous KF bird I had, and I'd say the flavor was indeed a bit more robust. And the breasts were definitely larger.... almost too large for a normal sized dinner, though I'm not normal and I ate all of mine and one third of Lori's. Mmm... truly delicious. The vinagrette also featured garlic from my father's Finson Farm in ME, and fresh parsley from our garden. We served up the chicken with some simply grilled local zucchini mega spears, and some homemade onion rings with onions from Hawthorne Valley. Man, those onion rings were outstanding! 

Conclusion: a rocky start to the day ended on a very solid food note. All three meals were great. 

Day 5 started out super-fast: Kids slept in, and therefor so did mom and dad... resulting in a relative mad-dash to get Charlie ready for his last day at Hawthorne's kinder camp. So there was no time for breakfast at home, but with it being the last morning going to Hawthorne Valley, I jumped at the opportunity to get one of their raison scones and a cup of coffee to go in the truck... no time to take a picture, but that's one damn fine scone! one of my favorites for sure.

Lunch was a repeat of Oscar's chicken sausages, though this time i pan-fried them in the sauerkraut which was better both for the sausages and the kraut. We ate them on top-split hotdog buns which were likely not local, but were from the freezer on-hand so fit in our rules again (and were far superior to the baguette from the night before). We served with some fridge pickles from earlier in the week, and a bag of North Fork potato chips which are perhaps the best bagged chip I've ever eaten. Crisp, fresh, not too much salt, not too heavy... a really fine chip!

But the crowning meal of the day was Lori's tomato soup made from a selection of heirloom tomatoes from our garden. We cheated a bit and used boxed chicken stock, but regardless this was one hell of a tomato soup.  And those croutons! Man, my wife seriously knows how to serve up a tomato soup meal. Yum. Corn was local according to the little sign at Hawthorne Valley, but it was total crap. Bummer... bad corn is a total waste.

Conclusion: sad to have Charlie's last day at camp, but that scone was delicious and Lori's soup was outstanding! 

 

Day 4 started out with more Ronnybrook yogurt. We're kind of obsessing about Ronnybrook right now. The peach yogurt was very good, though really sweet. Why does everyone add so much sugar to yogurt? it's good by itself, and then add super sweet fruit and it'd be perfect! There's gotta be a market for no sugar added fruit yogurt. I digress.

For lunch I finished up the egg salad from day 3 on the rye bread again, though this time I opted for open faced so I could fit more egg salad into each bite. And we finished off the day with homemade fries from a Hawthorne Valley potato, and some chicken sausages from Oscars smokehouse. The baguette and sauerkraut were from Hawthorne Valley as well. Oscar's sausages were pretty tasty... very juicy. And we also cooked up the last Italian sweet sausage from pizza night which put us both over the edge with food consumption.

Conclusion: I need to take a day away from eggs, but homemade fries are soooooo good!

Day three started with peasant rye toast from a Hawthorne Valley loaf, with butter and sliced hard-boiled egg this time. Perhaps overdosing on eggs I then also had a another egg-salad sandwich for lunch, but it was much better on that rye bread. During the day I made pizza dough from a Mark Bittman recipe for family dinner night. Lori cooked up some sweet sausage from a place in Tivoli Hawthorne Valley, with some shitake mushrooms from the Berry Farm (clearly we love the Berry Farm) Hawthorne Valley [though we do love the Berry Farm!], some jarred sauce from a place just outside Hudson, and fresh mozzarella from our butcher back in Brooklyn which i picked up on my trip there the day prior. Turns out they make the cheese right there... and its got to be some of the best mozz i've ever had. And that pizza was killer! 

 

 

Conclusion: An egg-heavy day, but I loved it. 

Day two started off with the same toast, butter and jam from Day one. I also had some Ronnybrook coconut yogurt which was totally strange and absolutely delicious at the same time. Today was a "travel day" for me as I had a doctor's appointment for my son in the city, so I packed up the car and headed down south at about 830 that morning, returning by about 5 that evening. Lori made me the most delicious egg-salad sandwich I've ever had. Eggs were local, and she made those terrific fridge pickles I've talked about before... and she put the chopped up pickles in the egg salad. Holy crap! That sandwich rocked my world.  And then for dinner, Lori just kept on going and made a zucchini/tomato/beef/mozz casserole. She's been making this for years and I love it... but tonight's was truly outstanding. Zuc's were from the Berry Farm, beef was from Hawthorne Valley, tomatoes from our garden, and mozz from a place in NY which i can't remember... but we got it at the Berry Farm as well. Super fresh, and just really amazing. 

Conclusion: even with the hiccup of traveling, today was a great food day entirely thanks to my wife!