Regarding the article Tom mentioned yesterday, Joel Stein's Time article, "Extreme Eating": while Mr. Stein is of course free to eat whatever type of food he chooses, I must take exception to his contention that "Dodd was basically telling the Iowans that every night they should decide whether to accompany their pork with creamed corn, corn on the cob, corn fritters or corn bread. For dessert, they could have any flavor they wanted of fake ice cream made from soy, provided that flavor was corn."
I am forced to question whether Mr. Stein has actually been to Iowa (outside of a presidential candidate's rally). While there is indeed a large amount of corn, soy, and pork grown here (more than anywhere in the world in fact), to say that this is all we can eat when we choose to eat locally is blindly absurd and typical of a bicoastal mentality that considers America's great heartland to be little more than "flyover states."
In fact, Iowa farmers can and do grow anything that can be grown outside the tropics. Our support for local, sustainable agriculture is evident in the hundreds of farmers' markets we have, many of them year-round affairs, and the dozens of organizations that support the so-called "locavore movement." The Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture is at Iowa State University. Practical Farmers of Iowa and the Iowa Farmers Union enjoy tremendous growth and prestige here and around the country. The Iowa Network for Community Agriculture supports local food resources statewide. There are five Slow Food Convivia here, and eight "Buy fresh, Buy Local" campaigns organized statewide. Edible Iowa River Valley, a member of the Edible Communities family of magazines, boasts a quarterly readership over 36,000.
My restaurant alone provides our guests with all its meat and roughly 60 percent of everything else (year-round) from more than 30 "Devotay Local Farm Partners" -- and not to belabor the point, but there is no corn on our menu.
Mr. Stein concludes by saying, "I'm going to keep buying food from my foreign neighbors. Because it's the only way we Americans learn about other countries, other than by bombing them." While this may or may not be true, I suggest he spend a little more time learning about his own country first. He can start here, I'll have a table waiting for him.
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Comments
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JohnMashey Posted 7:41 am
16 Jan 2008
Actually, I think Joel Garreau's "The Nine Nations of North America" is more appropriate. Certainly, anyone in most of California, of all places, should be able to get great meals that haven't traveled too far.
Stein clearly doesn't understand Peak Oil, and I suspect, like most Americans, doesn't understand much about farming...
Can you say some more about:
the distance distribution of food served in your restaurant?
How you get the food? Do farmers deliver? Do you get together at markets? Do you have an Amish suppliers>
Of food that comes from further away, how much comes by trucks versus rail? If rail, is it electrified?
Here's what I'm interested in: some people think that we can do away with fossil fuels, go entirely electric, and essentially forbid biofuels.
As an old farmboy, I'm at a loss to understand quite how this would work in the mid-West, but maybe the world has changed. [I'm less clear how one feeds New York via local-only food, but that's a separate issue :-)]
It sounds like you're in the middle of good example of what can be done in you're located in the middle of excellent farm country, so you might be able to provide informed opinion in place of blather that sometimes appears.
Thanks!
-John Mashey
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Kurt Michael Friese Posted 8:20 am
16 Jan 2008
What I referred to is a "bicoastal mentality," one that is common on both coasts, that dismisses the heartland as bland, boring, unable to do anything well or present anything worthwhile. It is especially prevalent in publications like Time Magazine.
So it would seem. Nor does he care much about the conditions under which his food is harvested, packaged and sold, the way the farmers are compensated, or the destination of his money.
I'll say right up front that I do buy some things from the commercial wholesalers. This is because Iowa produces no (for example) olive oil, salt, chocolate, or oranges. Of the foods we do buy locally, a vast majority come from less than 100 miles away. The furthest items that I still refer to as local come from an organic fish farm in Wisconsin, about 150 miles or so from here.
It is obtained many ways, mostly from the farmer who makes weekly trips to town for my restaurant and others. Others come less frequently. Some I pick up. During the season, much of it is grown in our own 1-acre garden.
Of the commercial stuff we buy, I'm sure some of it comes to the distributor by rail in some cases (diesel locomotive, not electric), but it all comes to me on a truck.
None of this is to say that what we do at Devotay is the perfect model. That's why I say that we buy everything FEASIBLE from local sources. Some things are not feasible here. If I were in LA, all or nearly all of the food on my current menu could be supplied from within 100 miles, or at least certainly from within the state.
My issues with Mr. Stein stem from his self-righteous shortsightedness, and from the snobby way he dismisses those of us who are trying to do what we can as "Luddites."
Not to mention that no one has yet pointed out the economic folly of his distantly-sourced victuals. The dollars he spent on that food are gone, never to return. Whereas the money I pay a local farmer helps him get his haircut and sends the barber to my restaurant. Looked at another way, if every one of the 45,000 household in my county redirected just $10 of the existing weekly food budget toward buying locally, it would keep more than $23 million in the local economy, improving everyone's lot - not just that of Mr. Stein's "European King."
Peace,
kmf
_________________
"In the long view, no nation is healthier than its children, or more successful than its farmers"
-Harry S. Truman
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JohnMashey Posted 3:05 pm
16 Jan 2008
A few miles away is Jesse Cool, for example:
http://www/cooleatz.com/about/index.html
One of the most famous chefs in the Bay Area would be Alice Waters of Chez Panisse fame, who would probably die of apoplexy if she read Stein's article.
Time: ugh.
It would do urban/suburban dwellers a lot of good to actually spend some time on a working farm in a large farming area. A lot of well-intentioned, but silly, comments might disappear.
One last question if I may: how far is the nearest railhead?
-John Mashey
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Kurt Michael Friese Posted 11:13 pm
16 Jan 2008
Peace,
kmf
_________________
"In the long view, no nation is healthier than its children, or more successful than its farmers"
-Harry S. Truman
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caniscandida Posted 11:56 pm
16 Jan 2008
I hate the term "fly-over country"; I have flown from one coast to the other just twice in my life, hating both times; by contrast I have traveled by bus, train and automobile through every state between the Ohio Valley and the Great Basin (save Nebraska, totally by accident), and have always enjoyed it; and so far as Iowa goes, I very much enjoyed a visit with friends in Dubuque, one of whom was studying at the Wartburg Seminary.
I strongly suspect that whatever anti-"fly-over country" prejudice really exists is mostly on the California end.
Looks-wise and society-wise, SF (with the whole Bay area) is plainly preferable to LA.
Museums-wise, LA has it all over SF, which is quite surprisingly impoverished in terms of important collections.
LA's Barbara Boxer is a hero of mine. SF's Diane Feinstein and Nancy Pelosi are fine, but of lesser quality.
A friend of mine from school, a rabbi, and a New Yorker, commented interestingly and memorably that the LA Jewish community was the greatest Jewish community in the country. Another Jewish friend of mine from school, an historian, was outraged when he heard that. But who, after all, could the rabbi have been thinking about in LA, save transplanted New Yorkers? -- e.g. Streisand, Spielberg, Barbara Boxer.
Is it true that Monica Lewinsky's mother made that remarkably enlightened comment, to the effect of: I am so embarrassed about my daughter, now the whole world knows she doesn't swallow? Hurray for LA!
Chickens are our cousins! So are fish! So are other sentient animals! Let us learn to be kind.
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mihan Posted 2:33 am
17 Jan 2008
I grew up on the East coast and have the misfortune to return occasionally, and I can assure you that the bicoastal mentality is just as alive on the East Coast as in CA.
In NYC, visiting the GF, I told a friend of hers that I lived "in Madison." She said, "Where is that?" Um, excuse me? It's a state capital, and where a lot of "coasties" come to school to party far away from their parents?
In fact, I seem to recall that after the late-2004-event-of-which-we-try-not-to-speak a number of Gristmillistas suggested taking away all the (mid)western senators and redistribute them to the coasts.
Myself, I like to visit CA as much as the next girl, but hope to never have to live there.
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caniscandida Posted 3:25 am
17 Jan 2008
http://www.linesandcolors.com/2006/01/17/saul-steinberg/
Sure, we heard of Madison, back in grade school when we memorized the state capitals. But for those of us who never heard of the University of Wisconsin, what would we associate it with?
And in general, state capitals are not often the most interesting or noteworthy cities in their states. Most of us in NYC hardly know what to associate Albany with, after all.
By contrast, because of their sports teams, we certainly have heard of Milwaukee and Green Bay. But show us an unmarked map of Wisconsin, and would we be able to locate them? Noooo ...
Or for that matter, show us an unmarked map of the US, and would we be able to locate Wisconsin? Noooo ...
But that is probably true of Americans anywhere outside of your region.
Anyway, my point about bicoastalism being more a Californian phenomenon than a New York phenomenon -- a very facetious suggestion, of course -- is just that those guys out there seem relatively more interested in traveling back East, to DC, NYC or Boston, than we seem to be to travel there.
But what do I know? : )
As for redistributing Senators, yes, I recall that suggestion, and an excellent one it is, too. But I think we had in mind places like Wyoming and Kansas, certainly not Wisconsin, with its noble progressive tradition.
Chickens are our cousins! So are fish! So are other sentient animals! Let us learn to be kind.
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Jon Rynn Posted 3:32 am
17 Jan 2008
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danielbell Posted 4:00 am
17 Jan 2008
Thanks for the post, it was a surprise and delight to see. I'm from Iowa City and have eaten at Devotay and other gourmet local food restaurants in Iowa City. I now live in Berkeley which has an alright local food scene of its own. (I'm out here doing green building and wind energy consulting.)
Its pretty easy and tempting for the coastalites to forget that there is a whole continent in between them. However, as far as local food goes, the rest of the country, with its lower population density, is best suited to local food. Iowa in particular has beautiful soil that could grow almost all the vegetables that currently get petrol trucked across the continent from the central valley.
Keep up the good work.
blog
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max norton Posted 4:05 am
17 Jan 2008
I've lived in both SF and NYC and figure it's probably dishonest to think we can make accurate generalizations contrasting people's attitudes in the two cities. But here I go anyway. People in both places tend to be pretty provincial, pretty scared of less urban areas; but as far as I can tell, parochialism is far more rampant in NYC. There are certainly a lot more people who have never been west of NYC than have never been east of SF.
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caniscandida Posted 4:35 am
17 Jan 2008
Chickens are our cousins! So are fish! So are other sentient animals! Let us learn to be kind.
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bookerly Posted 4:59 am
17 Jan 2008
When I lived in the SF BayArea, I frequented farmers markets and small local markets a great deal (though I can't say for sure where the later sourced their fruits and veggies). In Beijing, these days, everything is available year round. That said, most people eat things in season and more local than not (due to price if nothing else).
I have never lived anyplace except the two coasts in America. I do know that there are many fine and many terrible people in all parts of America.
One of the big current issues in America is immigration, and the nasty rise of the most recent racist nativism.
My concern is how the "buy local" movement relates to that. (And no I am not talking about any of the above posters, or any person in particular). There is just a part of me that notices how "buy local" can easily segue into "hate foreign" if one is not careful.
I urge the folks advocating "buy local" to make clear their distance and disdain for any sort of xenophobia.
While Iowa has many endearing qualities, it also propelled Mike Huckabee to the top of the charts, with immigration listed as the number one issue among Republicans.
patrick in Beijing
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JohnMashey Posted 7:59 am
17 Jan 2008
-John Mashey
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Kurt Michael Friese Posted 9:44 am
17 Jan 2008
In answer to your question about immigration to your query about immigration, what we are doing here is encouraging immigrants to start the same kind of farms that are traditional in Mexico. Called "milpas" they are basically 10-15 acres with a wide variety of products and livestock. The INCA conference next month is centered on that idea. Then when chefs and savvy consumers support them, we get both good local food and sensible assimilation. Great way to build community.
I don't have any answers to the illegal immigration problem, other than removing the incentive to come to the US by making life better in Mexico. Meanwhile I'm going to keep working to make the new neighbors we are getting here feel welcome.
Peace,
kmf
_________________
"In the long view, no nation is healthier than its children, or more successful than its farmers"
-Harry S. Truman
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bookerly Posted 9:58 am
17 Jan 2008
Dear Kurt Michael Friese,
Thanks for the response!! I am not surprised, but it is lovely to hear of your attitude. Good point about Obama.
Now if only we could get the MSM to provide more coverage of both your welcoming and local activities (smile), then those of us far away would get the right impressions!!
Speaking as a migrant, it is very lovely when I am seen as someone who can contribute and am welcome. Thanks!!
patrick in Beijing
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caniscandida Posted 6:56 pm
17 Jan 2008
On Iowa: The caucusers of Iowa are not to be held responsible, altogether, for what their chosen candidates go off and do or say afterwards, dear Patrick. Note that Mike Huckabee did not feel it was OK to start channeling Rick Santorum, with all that homophobic, dog-o-phobic excrement, until he got to South Carolina.
On Joel Garreau's "Nine Nations": Thanks for reminding us of that, John Mashey. I remember being impressed by that book's excellent geographic sense.
Thanks also for the heads-up on Anna Eshoo, about whom I shall read up.
Jon Rynn,
congratulations on locating yourself in Chicago! What a great classic American city, sans pareille! The architecture is much finer than New York's. Michael's favorite painting is there, Seurat's Grande Jatte. And it was so ironic, last summer, in Santa Fe, whispering with a former New Yorker selling us our NYTimes at the La Fonda, about how second-rate the Georgia O'Keefes are at the museum there, because all the best ones are in NYC and Chicago.
The American Academy of Religion will be holding its annual meeting there, next Fall, and I intend to do what I can to be there.
Chickens are our cousins! So are fish! So are other sentient animals! Let us learn to be kind.
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dhinrichs Posted 5:21 am
18 Jan 2008
I'll add that if you ever should choose to stop by for a visit you're in for a delightful surprise. Happy local eating...
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bookerly Posted 10:31 pm
19 Jan 2008
While I appreciate Kurt's comments, it must be repeated that according to the media, one of the top issues in the Republican primary was immigration.
Huckabee was running around with the beavis like guy from the "Americans who want to hunt and kill Mexicans" or whatever his border patrol group was called.
While I am sure there are many fine Iowans such as Kurt, there also seem to be a number of insane gibbering xenophobes. (They exist everywhere, but the concentrations vary!).
Those are the ones I worry about. Think American Gothic with noose and hood.
patrick in Beijing
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