It’s universal… people wander into a kitchen and conversations start. Welcome to ours.
Want to eat more local foods? Here’s how you start.
Every solution starts with someone taking the first step.
I have been having a lot of conversations these days about food. I know that may not seem like such a big deal for a guy who owns a restaurant but these are bigger food conversations. Things like:
”What is wrong with the food system, if anything?”
“Does ‘local’ food really matter? Maybe it is just a trend.”
”What is local food?”
“All food is local, somewhere, right?”
”Isn’t eating locally really expensive? I can’t afford it.” And so on and so on. Some of these questions come from customers, some come from peers, some come from friends, some are conversations in kitchens, and others are conversations in my head that have happened over the last five years. They are all valid questions, and I have a bit of knowledge on some of them but I DO NOT HAVE THE ANSWERS. (If I did, more people would be reading this blog, or I would have multiple books and you would see me on many talk shows, and we don’t want that, now do us.)
The thing that intrigues me so much about local food is that it does affect so many people and so many other parts of our lives. It is energy. It is economics. It is the opportunity to share food with someone and ultimately develop community. It is sometimes the opportunity to be alone and just be in the moment all by ourselves. Food is pleasure. Food is a challenge. Food is art (if you work at it or get lucky.) Food is very important to me. This is why I spend so much time thinking about it. This is how you can take that first step. Just think about it. Think about food. Think about where it came from. Who grew it? Where did the seed come from? What is the story behind that food? Who handled it along the way? How many miles did it travel? How many hands – how many people touched your food before it touched you? That food is yours, right in front of you. Every time you choose to eat something you have bought all of where it’s come from. Think about it.
Here are some ideas of what you can do to get the ball rolling.
1. Eat something you have never eaten. Learn about it. Read about it. Food Timeline and History
2. Take a friend to lunch, even something small and simple, don’t talk about food, and just enjoy the time with that person.
3. Find a recipe for something you had eaten a long time ago and make it again. Learn everything you can about that food. If it is important enough that it is still in your memory, get to know it better.
4. Enjoy a guilty pleasure. Find something, one bite of something that makes you just crazy. Just one bite.
5. Find a server in a restaurant and talk to them all night long about food. Servers know a lot and they are willing to share. If that server does not know, they will find out and you will have helped them out with their knowledge as well.
6. Email a chef. Send them a note about a meal you had, were it great, and were it bad, something, starts a relationship with a restaurant. It will make you both appreciate the experience of eating in a restaurant that much more.
7. Email a farm, really. Find out where you can get there food, buy a CSA. If you don’t know what a CSA is, look it up. Ask that farmer more about why they farm. GO, and help them, volunteer to work a day or make a visit. (At the same time, respect the farms time, be creative, and maybe bring some friends and help for a day, of if not, just get to know them the best you can.) Land Stewardship CSA List
8. Foster creativity and curiosity in a child by introducing them to a new vegetable. Let them eat it raw, the cook it, and let them see the difference. Lyndale Youth Farm and Market Project
I am going to end there, some of you may want to go to a top ten list or maybe 15, or 20, who knows, and I will let you fill in the rest. Answer back and give me some of the things that you think about with food. Try some of these things and see what happens. In the end. We all have to eat, so why not truly enjoy the process?
You wanted to know what goes on in the kitchen. Right?
Not much more to say than ” Corner Table is now on Twitter.
click here… go ahead.. try it.. you will like it.
What’s a Corner Table Cooking Class Like?
This is the coveted pork belly class. We had so much interest, so, keep an eye out, this class may show up again in February. Or it might not…
The first thing we should mention is that this isn’t your normal cooking class. For one thing it’s in the kitchen of a rather busy restaurant during dinner service. Another thing is that you’re greeted with the first course of your dinner for that night, a “nosh plate” with beer or wine.
Behold our featured ingredient for the night, the pork belly.
Mise en plase, if you cook, you should know this phrase. If you don’t, look it up.
Salt is very important.
Oops – the wifi went out so Chef de Cusine, Jorge Guzman, filled in talking about pickling while it was being fixed. Just a little bonus since pork belly goes so well all things pickled.
And, again, the importance of salt and the two best tools in the kitchen. Your hands.
Did we mentinon that you get dinner along with your class? Yeah we did. We’re going to mention it again. You get dinner along with your class. This course was warm celery root and parsnip soup with bacon, pancetta, guancalle and fresh pork belly garnished with sweet red pepper and lemon simple syrup.
It appears that it was good to the last drop.
Not your traditional piece of fat to make lardo, but in the interest of using all parts of the belly, this is a quick verson of the traditional Italian ingrediant.
Ah, this is the joy that is pancetta.
This course is bacon and eggs: fresh pancetta, poached egg, spicy dark cherry + honey gastrique.
pork belly: braised
Hidden Steam Braised pork belly, butternut squash puree, Ames farm caramelized apples, creamy heirloom beans from Riverbend Farms. Dessert had very little to do with pork belly, but it does speak to the balance betweena rich full dessert and citrus. Rogue chocolate ganache with lemon curd, candied walnuts and chili sweet sauce.
Vino + Vinyl is Moving
Wondering what we are doing with Sunday nights at the restauarnt. Well, here you go. Vino + Vinyl is moving to Thursady nights. We already do $1.00 corkage fee on Thursday nights, so we are going to break out the turntable and spin some records as well.
Sadly, we are going to close on Sunday nights. We thank all those that walked in fromt he neighborhood, and spent Sunday nights with us. We are going to have some new and exciting things happening at Corner Table.
Stay Tuned.
Minneapolis, New Years Eve, Thank you
Blue Moon, Corner Table, Tour de Farm Tent
I just wanted to take a moment this morning to thank everyone who grew, cooked, decorated, served, ate, drank and in any other way were involved in the wonderful evening we had last night. It truly does take a leap of faith to come out on one of the coldest nights of the year to a tent set up in the middle of a Minneapolis street, and that’s just what you did. You’re amazing. Thank you all.
Here was the menu from the night
Amuse
Family style
Hidden Steam Pork Belly and Lutsen maple gastrique
1st course
Larry Gates in Kellogg Warm Sweet Meat squash soup, allspice Castle Rock cream, Ames Farm Apple and northern Lites Blue cheese
Wine Course
Morin “Olympe” Chitry 06
2nd course
Cured Star Prairie Tout, crème friache, poached potato in PastureLand butter
Cono Sur Riesling 2009 from Argentina
3rd course
William Yoder Roasted beets, Riverbend farm polenta, Star Thrower farm Sheep’s milk ricotta
2005 Vina Alarba Old Vines Grenache
4th course
Thousand Hill braised grass-fed brisket, Rutabaga puree from Elizabeth Emerson in Castle Rock Cream + pickled mustard seed
Bordeaux- Cotes de Bourg, Domaine Peychaud, old vines Merlot 2006
5th course
Rogue chocolate ganache cakes, warm Pepin Heights Apple cider crème anglaise + Honey caramel sauce, Sweet braised beets
Lustau Pedro Ximenez San Emilio Sherry
Minnneapolis, New Year’s Eve, Blue Moon
Yes, the ground is frozen
“Once in a Blue Moon…” Right? That is the saying. Well, that is kind of what I am thinking right now about putting this tent up. While everyone is cozy and warm there are about six hard working guys putting up a tent and getting ready for dinner tonight.
You have to have a velvet rope for New Year's Eve
We also are going to have a number of Farmers with us tonight. Thousand Hills Cattle Company, Dragsmith Farms, Pastureland Butter and our friends at Tangletown Gardens will be joining us for dinner as well. We can all sit around and talk about local food and what we are going to plant in the spring.
Why don’t you come and join us tonight to see how it all turns out. New Years Eve Dinner
Minneapolis – this New Year’s Eve… Celebrate Local!
If you would like to have an evening like no other in Minneapolis on New Year’s Eve, you need to get your seat at our Tour de Farm Table! It is very easy to do and you will never forget it. You will be greeted at our reception area at 6:00pm with beer from our newest local brewery: Fulton and their IPA, Sweet Child of Vine. (It’s good.) You will nosh on appetizers made from the finest artisanal meat and cheeses Minnesota has to offer. There will be some guests of honor at the event: Yes, our farmers! Come and find out the answer to, “What do I do with rutabaga?”
Then you will move out to the (yes, big HEATED) tent to be dazzled by the amazing food stuffs Minnesota has to offer over the next 5 courses + the starting amuse featuring (YES!) house made bacon produced from Hidden Stream pork. Then we move on to dishes created with: Sweet Meat squash, Cedar summit cream, Ames Farm Apples, Northern Lites Blue cheese, Star Prairie Tout, PastureLand butter Riverbend farm polenta, Stickney Hill farm goat cheese, Thousand Hill braised grass-fed brisket, and produce from Elizabeth Emerson Farm.
And we finish on a dessert featuring: Rogue chocolate, Pepin Heights Apple cider and Garden Frame Honey.
So where are you going to be this New Year’s Eve? (You should be here!)
Big Heated Tent
“So, what are were you thinking?”
That is the most frequently asked question I have gotten since we announced that we are doing a dinner on New Year’s Eve: OUTSIDE (in a HEATED tent.)
I was thinking is that this is the time of year that we have really great locally made food. We have a fantastic supply of meats, cheese, milk, butter, amazing root vegetables, etc. The list goes on and on. Yes, we have a great supply of local food! There, I said it. The excuse of not cooking locally in the winter is just not true anymore. There is more local food out in the marketplace than ever. We have the ability to eat year round with the season. That is the idea.
Ok, I know most of you understand that already or you would not have any idea that this blog exists. So, next question: Why outside?
Well, why not?
It is New Years Eve, Right? It is a special night. How many times have we gone out for New Years Eve and gone to a restaurant just for that one night because of tradition. How many times have you gone to a friend’s house, just because, well, that is what we always do? How many times have you just said, “it is just like any other night, except prices go up, and everyplace is crowded,“ and not gone anywhere. Here is your chance to ignore all the same things that you always do. Here is your chance to step out of the norm and do something that most people normally would not do. It is a special night, right? End your year with a bang. Who else amongst your friends and family are going to be able to tell this great a story about what they did on New Year’s Eve?
I think you get my point. It is a special night. Do it up.
The bigger reason is that it is a break the habits that you’ve built over your lifetime. That is really what eating locally is about: breaking the bad industrialized eating habits we’ve had in the past couple of generations. Or should I say, we need to get back to a traditions and a habits of our grandmothers.
You go through the week, thinking about what to eat, what to cook, and we get in the habit of doing the same thing over and over. We all have our reasons: family favorites, convenience, budgets, and habits. This really comes down to habits. If we all start to change our habits, little by little, we will be able to change.
So, this year, I challenge you to break a habit right at the end of the year. Start a new tradition. Do something on New Year’s Eve that is really different. Why not start with having dinner in a HEATED TENT, in south Minneapolis.
Sounds like a good break in tradition.
Eat, Drink + Be Farmy
New Year’s Eve at Corner Table this year is going to be a bit different. We are bringing the farm to you! Over this past year we have had a great time with our Tour de Farm (tourdefarmmn.com) dinners so for New Year’s we are going to create a “Farm Dinner” in the city. We’re closing off 43rd street and setting up a farm style dinner table in a big tent. If you attended the dinners – this is a great way to end the year! If you missed out, this could be the best dinner yet!
New Years Eve
December 31st, 2009
Recpetion starts at 6pm
Dinner at 7:00pm
$150.00 per person
5 course with beer and wine
Tickets only available online at tourdefarmmn.com.
Thoughts
Feed me!- Tour de Farm – 2010 is coming
- Want to eat more local foods? Here’s how you start.
- You wanted to know what goes on in the kitchen. Right?
- What’s a Corner Table Cooking Class Like?
- Vino + Vinyl is Moving
- Minneapolis, New Years Eve, Thank you
- Minnneapolis, New Year’s Eve, Blue Moon
- Minneapolis – this New Year’s Eve… Celebrate Local!
- Big Heated Tent
- Eat, Drink + Be Farmy
