A Passage to India

Unfortunately, despite living in Vancouver and loving Indian food, I have not yet been to Vij's, one of the most celebrated Indian restaurants in the world. I have tried a few of his sauces and recipes to great effect, but that's neither here nor there.

But this insanely awesome press release sure caught my fancy - the part of me that would love to travel back in time and visit India or Egypt as they once were. Imagine getting to explore the Rajasthan area with one of the great chefs of our time, staying in out of the way historical areas and learning about the local food and culture and traditions of food collecting and preparation. 

"An over night picnic on thoroughbred Marwari horses to a remote village culminating in outdoor cooking with villagers, retiring in luxury tents, and perchance, participating in an elephant polo match are just some of the extraordinary highlights of this tour. "

My rebuttal: *drooooooooool*

Fruits of the day

So we went to the market again yesterday morning, for the fresh local stuff. Meeting all the area farmers is inspiring, and one of the most outstanding parts is being able to bypass certain purchases because I already have that item I need in my own garden. 

Picked up (as you can see) couple of peaches, pears, three tomatillos and a dark, pointy tomato. Hmmm? What's that other thing? Oh, uhhh, that's just my giant hammer. I heard there might be some zombies around, so I thought I should probably be packing some heat. 

Multimedia Bacon

I'm a supporter of the idea of enjoying food vicariously... I mean, some of my favourite writing is food writing. Not only does this give you the pleasure of the surrogate experience, it can also encourage you to do something new and unusual with your regular meals. 

All this by way of saying - HOLY SAINT ANTHONY!! Look what my sous-chef Savage Henry Lee cooked up today down at Starry Industries! A video-film of some delicious bacon!! From frying pan to plate.

**Special thanks for editing out that part in the video where I started singing South Park's "Do What You Wanna Do". aheheh. 

Mmmmm quality BACON!

When I first bought some of this bacon from the farmer's market a month ago, I fell head over heels in love. Gelderman Farms is in Abbotsford, BC and is a family-run farm. The pigs live in these nice uncrowded naturally ventilated & lit pens. Also, the Gelderman family actually blend their own feedstock for the pigs right on their farm with all vegetable components. Which, y'know... is pretty reassuring, knowing what I know about what most corporations will do to save a buck. 

(Also, the Geldermans totally recycle all the sawdust the pigs sleep in into compost for all kinds of gardening... which is pretty creative and awesome.)

My secret recipe for cooking bacon... just stir it up in a cast iron frying pan. Don't worry about laying it in strips. It'll all cook eventually. It does help to have a fabulous enameled cast iron frying pan, mind you. 

Works every time. And let me tell you, this bacon is absolutely incredible. Sweet, crispy, chewy, perfectionary. I heartily endorse this product, and/or service. 

• Aug 15 - Location Not Decided Yet
• Aug 19 - Main St. Station at Thronton Park
• Aug 22 - Trout Lake Farmers Market
• Aug 22 - Abbotsford Farmers' Market
• Aug 29 - Haney Farmers Market, Maple Ridge

Yeah, how about THESE tomatoes?

Heritage. Organic. Local. Cherry tomatoes. O farmers market, I love you. Check these babies out, you NEVER see any of these varieties in the supermarket. The round yellow ones are almost translucent, and supersweet and soft. And do you see those dark ones? You'd think they were cherries or something. All the varieties except the little orange ones are heritage. They've still even got some field dirt on 'em.

Heritage, or heirloom plants are an interesting topic for me because of my background with plant biology. I mean, I'm all for maintaining and increasing genetic diversity, and that's what heritage cultivars are all about. Also, heirloom plants can often be more disease resistant and easy to grow in local conditions, because they have adapted over the years to the particular stresses and challenges of their environment. The novelty of getting to sample unusual varieties of fruits and vegetables is another big factor in my purchase of heritage produce.

I read an article recently which had some interesting points which are not often discussed when it comes to local food. Rather than think only about how far your food has travelled, the author suggests that we should also consider how efficiently it was grown, the amount of time and resources that went into its production, the amount of CO2 produced in the plant's full lifespan. While I find this interesting to consider, I think that even though some varieties are less efficient to grow, they are worth saving anyhow.

Personally, I would much rather subsidize someone on a family farm struggling to grow the same varieties that his great-grandfather did, than someone planting a monoculture of Monsanto Roundup Ready 2 Yield(TM) soybeans. But I can understand how the Federal Government might consider the latter a much better bet than the former. Western society has already gone so far down the road of growing only the most efficient, high-yield, transportable, truck-ripening of plants, there is no coming back. In the meantime, I don't think there is any harm in trying to support local, heritage farmers the only way we can - with our grocery-buying dollars.

One thing you cannot deny - heritage tomatoes have some damned awesome names. Hillbilly, Green Zebra (not a true heritage tomato btw., est. 1983), Abraham Lincoln, Dwarf Champion, Banana Legs. Maybe I'll become a heritage-tomato-spotter or something.

*Note: the 7 little fruits in the upper right hand corner of the top photo are actually tiny plums, not cherry tomatoes.