How can it possibly be August already? That leaves us less than 30 days to go to prepare for our year of eating locally. Granted, September is still harvest season here in Colorado, so it’s not like I have to have everything put by before the end of August, but still, the pressure is on!
This week, Matt tackled the issue of how to organize & track all of the veggies we’ve been blanching, vacuum-sealing and storing in our extra freezer in the garage. A combination of some storage bins (the downside to the vacuum-sealed containers is that they’re not square and therefore hard to stack) and a tally sheet did the trick!
But the tally also made us realize that, with 22 full weeks between the end of the Boulder Farmer’s Market in November 2008 and the beginning of the 2009 season in April, we’ve got a lot of long, cold, weeks where local food is going to be in short supply. And did I mention that I do not intend to live on bread and potatoes during those weeks?!
Some things we’ve got covered. I think even with adding jam to our yogurt, I’m getting close to having enough jam for the winter (two batches of strawberry, one cherry/serviceberry/strawberry, two batches of pineapple/apricot–yes, I realize pineapple’s not local, but it sure is good!, and peaches just starting to ripen for another couple of batches of peach jam). And we’ve got enough pesto for us to have a pretty good sized serving every week from now until the basil harvest begins next June.
But I’m still worried about having enough green & red veggies (I figure the crazy amount of butternut squash and pumpkin I’ve planted will cover the orange). We’ve frozen green beans, peas, snow peas, carrots, and sweet corn, and will roast & freeze peppers soon. I still have a ton of dried tomatoes left over from the 50 pounds I dehydrated last fall, so I’m not sure if we’ll need more or not (I probably won’t be able to help myself once the canning-sized boxes show up at the market).
And fruit is of course a concern. We’ve already conceded that we’ll buy some organic Texas citrus over the winter (we’re earth-conscious, but we’re not saints, and I do have two small children who, as smart as they are, do not yet understand the concept of eating local). Our current plan is to dehydrate some apricots, maybe some grapes if we can find them, can some peaches and pears, dry some apples, make a ton of applesauce, make some apple cider, and make some of the other fruits available here locally (melon, strawberries, and cherries, for example) into sorbet syrup that we can freeze now and enjoy in our ice-cream maker this winter.
Both coffee and sugar are going to have to come from elsewhere. And while I’m not planning to stock-pile non-local goods between now and September 1, I am also not going to throw away anything that we already have in the pantry, meaning that things like yeast and spices will not be 100% local (although I am planning to dry or freeze as many herbs as I can and will be making a year’s worth of pickles. Oh, and taking a shot at making ketchup!).
Although we love our local raw cheese & goat cheese, we still haven’t found a true cheddar, which makes Artz staples like burritos and grilled cheese sandwiches a bit difficult. We’re going to try melting Windsor Dairy’s cheddar-like cheese to see how that works, but it’s still an area of concern.
And finally, one thing that I thought was going to be a slam-dunk, local eggs, is starting to become problematic. Because I don’t just want local eggs, I want grass-fed, free range, organic eggs from heirloom chickens. You know, happy chickens. Health chickens. Good bright-orange yolk eggs. Windsor Dairy doesn’t have enough and I don’t know if I can get them from Wisdom Poultry in the winter. I’ll keep you posted.
OK, time to go freeze some more corn, and I’ve got 10 pounds of cucumbers just waiting to be pickled. Good thing it’s 100 degrees outside because I’m going to be inside this afternoon!
3 comments
Melinda says:
August 6, 2008 at 9:09 pm (UTC 2 )
Julie, Matt and I ate about 90% locally last winter. I’m not sure how cold you are there, but we were able to eat about 50% of our food from the garden. We had fresh greens every day – which is possible anywhere but in the coldest parts of the world. We were able to grow a bed of greens, which we kept warm and a bit dry with a hoop row cover (we had a shade cloth over it, but you could do a frost cover or a plastic tarp). Or you could make or buy a cold frame. If you haven’t already, check out Eliot Coleman’s “Four Season Harvest.”
We also had carrots, winter squash that lasted many months stored in a cold room, parsley, beets (also good for greens), kale, fennel, and a few other things. Oh, and meyer lemons!
Julie says:
August 4, 2008 at 8:38 am (UTC 2 )
Let me clarify…I’m having trouble finding folks who are even pasture-feeding their chickens in the summer when grass (and grasshoppers and garden scraps) are readily available. Without naming names, Windsor Dairy had been getting eggs from another farm to supplement their own growing flock of layers, only to discover that the chickens were getting supplemented with conventional chicken feed.
So I have no problem with feeding chickens organic, local feed in the winter, I just don’t want to support folks who are using GMO feed (almost all corn feed is these days) or who are not letting their chickens outside to hunt & graze the way they were intended to.
We only eat about one chicken per week, so we’re just going to stockpile chickens in the freezer. Jay does deliver to restaurants in Boulder once a week in the winter, but I don’t know if I’m up for meeting him early in the morning just to pick up the eggs–I’d like to find someone closer to home and have a lead on that. I’ll keep you posted
Hatchet says:
August 3, 2008 at 3:53 pm (UTC 2 )
Actually, around here the chances of pasture-fed chickens in winter is very small. A lot of the pasture is either brown/dead/dormant or covered in snow. In winter, it’s grain feedin’ time.
Jay lives quite awhile away and I don’t believe he comes into Boulder during off season, but you should ask directly. He probably still delivers or ships over chickens for the restaurants he does business with on this side of the mountains. Ann Cure has eggs, but her chickens aren’t pasture fed, since pasture land is at a premium. Also, all of that water is used to grow veggies instead of grass for chickens to make eggs. Her chickens do get to eat all of the veggie scraps, though. You may want to talk to her at the market next time.
Your canning activities sound awesome! Would you consider writing about making jam? Pretty please!