Locally Grown - Availability for June 3rd , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

Before a quick snippet about continuing food adventures back in Taiwan this week I want to mention that the Georgia Mountains Farm Tour is fast approaching. It’s less than a month away on June 27-28th. If you are curious what the farms look like that you order food from every week here at Locally Grown, this is the best opportunity of the year to go out and meet these farmers in person. This year we are also adding a few Crop Mobs in advance of the event to help farmers prepare for the event and get caught up on farm chores during this busy time of year. Don’t forget to add these items to your cart this week (the Crop Mob actually earns you a discount to the TOUR).

Back here in Taiwan (our brief jaunt to Japan ended last week) we’ve been slowly making the rounds to eat all the best food that is well known in Taiwan. A few of my favorites are guo bao, which is a steamed rice bun wrapped around pork bellies that have been soaking in a delicious sauce for a day or more, then sprinkled with cilantro and a ground peanut sauce. It’s one of my favorites. I have to admit that my wife can make a better version of this back home using O’hana’s pork belly. Lucky me!

Shalom bao is another favorite, consisting of another type of steamed rice bun with ground juicy pork in the center. This is eaten with seaweed and an egg soaked in soy sauce on the side.

By far the most extravagant way to eat in Taiwan is a Taiwan banquet. Imagine an enormous lazy susan with a new dish brought out every 5 minutes or so. This is a family gathering way to eat. It started with Sashimi sushi, every bit as good as what I had in Japan, but more ornately delivered. Then fried soft shelled crab. An amazing fish soup with delicate rice noodles. The fish had been fried before being added to the soup. Stinky tofu I’ll skip. Not many Americans would go for that one. Another fish dish! Then some great little fried cakes with sweet potato and taro in each layer. Slices of orange to finish it off.

Well, I’ll have to get into more details in my final post next week.

Hope everyone has a great week!

Justin, Chuck, Teri and Andrew

Locally Grown - Availability for May 24th , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

This week’s message is being beamed across the world from Kyoto, Japan. I know you may be confused why the Local Food blogpost is gonna be about Asian food on the far side of the Earth for the next several weeks….but I hope you don’t mind to roll with it….as it’s fun for me to share how people eat in far away places. And its fun to share a little bit of the joyous experience of eating while traveling in Asia. After all, I can’t eat North Georgia’s Locally Grown while I’m away!

Let’s see, where to begin. In the last several days we’ve walked all over the city indulging in every kind of treat you can imagine. Day one we went to a very well known ramen noodle house. Everything about this experience was interesting. For starters, you pick out what you want at a little machine at the entrance to the place and order a ticket, and put your money in the machine (It’s like a vending machine with photos of the items you want). You pick out what noodles, how mucj, which types of broth, how spicy, how many onions, etc. Then you go into a little private booth with a curtain and wood benches. A huge pipe crosses the room and from that is a spigot to pour yourselves clear cold water to drink. A small wooden window at the end of the bench opens and a ramen noodle cook appears to take your tickets. Behind the little wooden door you can hear half a dozen noodle cooks shouting at each other in these kind of ritualized call and response tones. About a minute passes and 4 bowls of fresh ramen come out. For those who are super knowledgable about ramen this was the miso broth version, with a couple of thinly cut slices of pork on top. Miso comes from fermented bean paste, and is a very popular form of noodle soup, but there are other variations. Tonight for instant we had burnt miso which was a totally different flavor, and I had Shoyu which is a soy sauce base to the soup…(this shoyu was burnt as well so it had a rich smoky flavor that lingered for a half hour after the meal which was very interesting).

Another highlight was my introduction to little fried octopus balls or takoyaki (which is the name of the ball shaped pans that they are cooked in). This is a very popular snack. Asians have this great characteristic that I have learned to follow. When you see a long line of people waiting for something, that’s how you know that it is very good. Everywhere I have seen a takoyaki store there has been a long line so I’ve learned to get in line. The balls are made from a mixture of wheat batter, diced octopus, tempura and ginger. A sweet sauce is often poured on top. Like many street foods in Asia, part of the joy is watching the food be made right in front of you. The cook uses two little needle like pokers to turn the balls to cook them evenly on all sides. Their hand motions are fast and focused and elegant. And the result is quite delicious.

Other traditional Japanese foods we’ve enjoyed, Unagi, which is a seasonal river eel. The place located across from our hotel had the smell and smoke of the grilled eel (called Kabayaki) pumping into the street for many days before I finally went to try it. A very unique but delicious flavor. These eels spawn in the ocean and then spend most of their lives as freshwater eels living in rivers. In the wild these species are considered endangered but because of their importance as a major food source throughout Asia they are now raised in aquaculture.

Tonkatsu is a breaded and fried pork chop, usually a loin cutlet (and often of Berkshire pork….which I think ours was….I can’t read everything on the menu). This is traditionally served with a mountain of shredded cabbage and a handmade dressing and a side of miso soup. Another nice feature of this dish is making your own dipping sauce for the pork. It starts with a bowl of freshly roasted sesame seeds which you grind with a mortar and pestle then add a brown sauce and spicy sauce to taste. Really tasty.

Another unexpected treat was Japanese style French Toast. I don’t know the backstory on this but around Kyoto we’ve seen several places that have a delicious delicate bread that is deep fried then coated with sugar. It’s eaten without syrup which is unnecessary with the sugar. I’m a huge French Toast fan, and this just adds to my love. Not sure how easy it is to reproduce (I don’t deep fry for starters) but would be interested in trying a version of this. It also seems to me that the Japanese really like some elements of French Culture. There’s a super croissant shop also nearby, but with their own flare added of course. Such as baking, lotus root into the top of a sliced croissant with a little cream beneath. Yum!

There’s so much more such as sashimi sushi, green tea ice cream, all kinds of mochi (sticky rice treats in different flavors), yatsuhashi, warabimochi (similar to mochi but a jelly like starch rather than rice), tempura fried veggies, kobi beef, all types of interesting egg dishes, tofus, various seaweeds, etc.

Well, that’s about all I have time for this week. More to come.

Hope everyone is enjoying the bounty of locally grown food back home.

EAT WELL,

Justin, Chuck, Teri and Andrew

Locally Grown - Availability for May 20th , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

Greetings from half way around the world. This message is being sent from Tapei, Taiwan which is about 8,000 miles away from North Georgia. I think this is what you call truly “getting away from it all!”

It’s been two years since my last trip here, so let’s refresh on some of my favorite things….and some of the more unusual aspects….of traveling in Taiwan and Asia more generally.

I’ll start with the basics. The U.S. and western countries in general tend to think horizontally. Buildings, vehicles, even our own bodies tend to spread outward on the sides (You know what I’m talking about). Since Taiwan is a very small country (at least 3 Taiwan’s would fit inside of the state of Georgia), yet the population is 4 times larger at 24 million, and it’s also an island, space is a precious commodity. So everything is about maximizing space, especially vertical space.

For example, my in-laws house is modest, yet has 4 stories plus a rooftop with a great view of the sunrise…pretty much like every house in the area. The width of the front entrance is probably only 16 feet across, which includes a garage door for parking their van. The van itself is tall and skinny, just like all the trucks here. Two cars can easily pass each other on a narrow alleyway.

Businesses on the main streets are very dense, one right after the other so all the signs are oriented upright vertically, long and skinny, and span several floors of the buildings they are affixed to. People here are skinnier too, but not due to lack of food. Food is everywhere! And the Taiwanese love to eat. There are markets with fresh fruit. In season right now is mango (my favorite, more on that later), water melon (shee qwa) and pineapple. Fresh cut meat is displayed each morning on the carts of butchers lining the roadway with little spinning fans with long strings hanging down to keep insects away.

The primary modes of transport are scooters and trains. Many, many people jetting around on scooters is a sight to behold. It’s even more fun to be on the scooter jetting yourself. You kind of know what it feels like to be a single blood cell being pumped through a circulatory system. Having a baby in a stroller this time around, we’ve found you literally can’t walk down the sidewalk for all the scooters parked there. I’d guess there are more than 50 but less than a 100 scooters for every single block you walk.

So what about the food? This isn’t a travel blog after all…. tell us about the food. Well I should start by saying that most meals so far have been at home, since my father in law is an incredible cook. I’d choose his cooking over most other Taiwanese food any day. Just as in most of the world, preparing meat for guests is a sign of generosity. However, the method of preparation is very different compared to the states.

Chicken and duck for instance is salted and streamed then chopped with a large butcher’s knife into diagonal cut pieces. These cuts go straight through the bone, so you are constantly picking little pieces of bone out, or chewing around them. But, since you aren’t just eating the thigh or breast meat, you often get more dark and white meat mixed together, for a greater diversity of flavor. An accompanying orange dipping sauce is very tasty too.

Our first night here, right off the plane we had stir fry noodles with seafood which included squid, octopus, and shrimp. Taiwanese love all chewy foods, and after several trips here I’ve acquired a taste for some of them too. Cuttle fish is another squid substitute that is quite good.

Pork is a backbone to much cooking here, though never in big pieces like a pork chop, usually it is cooked for a long time in different types of sauce then pulled apart and used as a flavoring in different dishes. Though we did have some whole ribs cooked in a soy based sauce that was so good! Tender salty meat falling off the bone. All meals are eaten with a small rice bowl in hand and chop sticks then you pick and choose from all the dishes in front of you. You can have a few bites of pork, then a few of chicken, then some stewed squash or napa cabbage (this one with mushrooms, pork and little tiny dried shrimp).

For breakfast we’ve had two options most mornings. Little cafes around town specialize in what’s called egg pie, which is just a rice flour tortilla type thing on a griddle with a scrambled egg poured on top to cook. Before flipping it closed and sliced into pieces you can add many different fillings. One of my favorites is dried pork (which is kind of fluffy and hair like) with corn, and a sweet mayo sauce. Our other breakfast has been these amazing traditional Tawianese pastries. I’ll describe those for you later.

Since I’m almost out of time for today, let me wrap up with my favorite sweet treat that I had yesterday (oh there are so many I hope to describe). It’s a mango shaved ice. Shaved Ice is a taiwanese speciality I’ll try and describe later, but for this version the ice is actually flavored like Mango, then fresh mango pieces are frozen and put on top, then two scoops of mango ice cream, and some condensed milk over it all, with little chocolate sprinkles. It’s very refreshing, and very Mango!!

There are many more tales to come. On Tuesday, we’re on our way to Japan, so that should be all new experiences to describe.

Not missing Georgia yet, but I’m sure that’ll happen before the end of the trip.

I hope everyone orders big this week! Keep your bellies full of good food while we’re away!

and EAT WELL,

Justin in Taiwan
Chuck in Rabun
Teri in Clarkesville
Andrew in Gainesville

Locally Grown - Availability for May 13th , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

Hope everyone had a Happy Mother’s Day! For our family we had lots and lots of fun things to eat for this….our first mother’s day. It all started on Friday with the thawing of two pork chops from Wauka Meadows while we went for a quick jog before the thunderstorm came through. Once thawed I did my favorite pork chop preparation which is simply chopped fresh thyme and rosemary (it’ll be mainly the rosemary that carries through) rubbed on the chops with a little olive oil and then some fresh ground pepper. I let them sit that way for a half hour to let the flavors soak in. Then onto the grill for just a minute or so on high to sear the meat on both sides, then down to low for a nice long slow cook.

As a side we tried something new. We had beet greens from Trillium Farms (those came from the Clarkesville Farmers Market not Locally Grown, we like to get around to all the local food we can find if you know what I mean), beets from Mountain Earth, and oranges from …..o.k. from the grocery store….but what did you expect…..we can’t grow oranges around here. I had a vague idea of beet orange salad but had never had one. It’s so simple and beautiful it’s perfect. First, everyone should know how to properly roast a beet, and I don’t mean bake it to death where it’s all dried out. I learned this from Alice Waters. You simply take a baking dish or pan and put just a little bit of water in the bottom, enough to cover the bottom of the pan (.25 inch let’s say or a little more) then add the beet roots, then put foil over the top, bake on 400 for about 45 minutes. Beets will come out tender to the fork. You can peel if you like. I just ran cool water on them to cool them down fast chopped them up in a bowl, then parboiled the beet greens (that just means flash boil them for about a minute), chopped them up and added them. Then I zested an orange, peeled it, broke it into sections and actually I just pulled it apart into pieces (you could chop it just as easy). It all went in a bowl and got chilled for 20 minutes. Boom, beet/orange salad. You can add a fancy vinegar like a champagne vinegar, but we went without and it was great just simple.

Then for desert we had strawberries, wonderful strawberries. We ate them raw, then we also cut them into pieces and sprinkled with vanilla extract and sugar and let them sit. Then after 20 minutes some of those went into a blender with a few scoops of ice-cream and some milk to make a really good milk shake. The rest went into homemade popsicles. Half the popsicle was the strawberry/vanilla/sugar mixture with yogurt mixed in. The other half of the popsicle was mango mixed with mint and green juice (which is a vegetable and fruit juice blend).

As you can see it was a tasty start to the weekend. Also this weekend we had Leah Lake collard greens, some BG farms bacon, and lasagna made with BG farms beef, and a combination of beet greens and spinach. Sounds strange …..tastes amazing! And of course more strawberries.

Spring is my favorite time of year for eating local.

I hope it becomes your favorite time as well.

Two big announcements before I go.

We’re looking for some very important volunteers to help us with a few projects this year. And even if you don’t have the time I hope you’ll help us spread the word on these two great activities we have coming up.

The first is a brand new project for us. While we have FORUM communications helping us for two more months developing a wide range of marketing tools, we came up with the idea to begin compiling our own RECIPE BOOK with Locally Grown items, and dishes made by YOU GUYS our customers, also dishes by our FARMERS and even some CHEFS. If you would like to be involved in helping us compile recipes, collecting them from some of our friends, and possibly even taking photographs and other interesting tasks, we’d like to find one or two volunteers to help with this project. We will have a template for making the recipes look attractive so we can start to circulate them as we collect them. The long range goal though is to come up with enough (at least 40 or more) to compile into a Book, which should help to entice even more people to EAT LOCAL.

If you’re interested in such a task just send Andrew an e-mail Andrew.NGLG@gmail.com and let us know why you’re interested, and what skills, talents or interests you think you might be able to lend.

The second VOLUNTEER effort is helping out on some of our Locally Grown farms, and playing Farmer for a day. When polled farmers agree, the single biggest way that we could help them and make their lives easier (other than eating their food every week) would be to come out and put in a few hours of work during the crunch time of the season. We’ve never organized an event like this before and we’re pretty excited about being able to lend a hand. Details are still getting nailed down but the week of June 22-26 we’ll be helping at least one farm in a very significant way. In exchange you can get a pretty big discount (over 30% off) on your purchase of a FARM TOUR pass. More important than that, you’ll likely learn a lot about what organic farming looks like, skills that you can use in your own gardens. If you’re interested, please add “CropMob2015!” volunteer day to your cart this week. It doesn’t obligate you to anything….and it doesn’t cost anything. But it’ll give us an idea of how many folks are interested in lending a hand. And we can also coordinate the best dates and times based on who is most interested.

Thanks to you all for supporting Locally Grown foods in all the ways that you do. There are more opportunities every year!

Eat well,

Justin, Chuck, Teri and Andrew

Locally Grown - Availability for April 29th , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

Just a quick reminder to get you some good Local Food this week. The asparagus has folks attention, but you gotta order fast to get it. It’s fun to see some of these specialty seasonal items get gobbled up.

I picked my first asparagus a little over a week ago, and i scooped out some of the soft innards of a stalk to let my 9 month old little girl have her first taste, just a few minutes after it had been cut from the ground. She loved it. So I let her hold the spear and chew on the end like a teething toy. Now that’s what life should be like. Not plastic teething rings, but fresh organic asparagus spears, dangling from babies mouths, getting them used to the taste and nutrition of locally grown food. I think letting her dig into a hard boiled pastured raised egg is coming up soon as well.

Promotions for the 2015 Georgia Mountains Farm Tour is now in full swing. The event is in exactly two months and you can order a weekend pass now from our website www.eatwellbuylocal.org

The proceeds from our Farm Tour is what our local farmers use to fund all our collaborations throughout the year including visits to each others farms, an annual farmer dinner, and this year we’re planning a few technical workshops that we’ll open to the public. Farmers collaborating is what made it possible for Locally Grown to exist, and its what allows farmers to exchange information and grow the local food movement stronger. If you or your business would like to SUPPORT the local food movement and our farmers network in particular we are currently looking for a small handful of SPONSORS for the farm tour. If you think you or your business would like to become actively involved in helping farmers, this small contribution would be a huge and direct help, and help to promote your business. Donations are tax-deductible. Click here for details

And if you have other suggestions of potential sponsors, please let us know when you attend market this week.

One of the most exciting things we’re adding to this year’s farm tour, and was one of the most requested areas that farmers wanted the Network to help support them, is the organization of some CROP MOBS, which are basically days that volunteers can come out and play farmer for a day, and really help farms catch up on some projects as well. Andrew is organizing some dates and locations for those currently. If you’d really like to help a farmer out with some simple bending over work for a few hours sometime in early June send Andrew an e-mail. It should be a great way to really BECOME a part of the Local Food movement in North Georgia!

Another great way to get involved is to eat local food. So we hope you order from Locally Grown this week and EAT WELL!

Justin and Teri in Habersham
Chuck in Rabun
Andrew in Hall

Northeast Georgia Locallygrown Availability list for April 17

The market is now open for orders.

Locally Grown - Availability for April 15th , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

Me oh my! Things are cranking up! Locally Grown just bought our first piece of property. It’s a 5×8 enclosed trailer with a side door! That’s right, your food will now be traveling down the road in style. There’s even a big fat sticker in red white and blue that says PATRIOT! And shouldn’t it be patriotic to be eating local food from local farms!

Ok, I know the 4th of July is too far away for the flag waving but we are proud at how far we’ve come. Locally Grown started in 2010 as an experiment between two communities and about 10 or 12 farmers. Farmers in Clarkesville and in Clayton had very small markets at the time and everyone was looking for a way to reach new customers. That’s when Chuck Mashburn had the idea to bring the Locally Grown model (invented in Athens) to the mountains.

It was amazing, is amazing how quickly it began. And how quickly farmers we didn’t know found us. In fact it still works that way today. Both Waukau Meadows and Homegrown Products LLC (who just joined us this week by the way) found us and gave us a call just in the last several months.

Growth was slow. The first 3 years sales were under $40,000 and were only growing by a bit of a %.

Then last year. POW! Growth! The move to Gainesville helped. But sales were up, way up at our original locations too. In fact, today, Clarkesville is by far our biggest location. We expect Gainesville to catch up and pass them soon, but way to go Clarkesville! For such a small town we have a lot of dedicated local food eaters. Most of them come every week, and many have been there since almost the beginning.

As things change we hope to retain everything that Locally Grown has always been, a laid back, fun-loving way to help farmers distribute food to more people, while ALSO becoming some new things as well. For example, we hope we’re getting better at communicating who are farmers are and why they are special. This year we have a featured farmer calendar and as each farm comes up we hope to share with you some of the things that we LOVE about the farms, the farmers, their products, and what inspires them to produce this wonderful food!

The whole point of the FEATURED FARMERS is for you to get a chance to meet some of these folks. Just imagine having a mental image of the face of the farmer behind almost every meal you eat. That’s possible now!

Well, that’s all the time I have tonight. Really want to encourage folks to check our newest growers Tara and Russ Grindle at Homegrown Products. They are egg producers and soon to be lots of veggies in the weeks ahead. Their website link is on our FACEBOOK and under our GROWERS section. Pay their site a visit and order some eggs this week and in the weeks ahead!

Thanks to you all for your dedication and EAT WELL,

Justin and Teri in Habersham
Chuck in Rabun
and Andrew in Hall

Locally Grown - Availability for April 8th , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

The Northeast Georgian newspaper in Clarkesville just gave Locally Grown some great press over the last week or so. One was a short column that I wrote. It had been almost four years since I’d written about local foods for the paper and a lot has happened since that time. Here’s the column. Hope you all had a great EASTER WEEKEND and we hope to see some of you at market this week!

Local Food getting easier to find

When I moved back to Clarkesville in 2009 local food was hard to find. While the normal thing to do is to eat the food that the grocery store sells, I’d had a few experiences that convinced me that fresh local food was better. And that’s a hard lesson to ignore once learned. Local food just tastes better. Scientists have proven it’s better for us nutritionally. And I just like knowing who grows my food. Farmers are interesting, generous, and good people. Each week when it comes time for me to make decisions on how I fill my belly, there are a hundred reasons why I’d like to fork over at least a portion of my money to a local farmer rather than a supermarket.

But in 2009 that was still hard to do. There were a few farmers markets around, but some were a little too far away, or they were small. Slowly but surely small farmers all across the area started talking to each other. And in April 2010 a little experimental website farmers market got going called Northeast Georgia Locally Grown. A year after that, the Clarkesville Farmers Market got started, then a nearby dairy opened, and a fruit and berry farm, and a honey farm, and a fella started growing mushrooms. And before I knew it, I was eating real good, and year-round.

Here we are about five years later, and a lot has changed. For one, if I want to eat local food now, it’s easy. Right now in my fridge I have local eggs, meat, milk, chard, spinach, lettuce, onions, butternut squash, potatoes beets, fig jam, and carrots. Those items come from about five or six different farms located near Toccoa, in Clermont, in Dahlonega, in North Hall County, and of course here in Habersham County. I know the farmers names. They are Nick, Scott, Tony, Ronnie, Larry and Brooks. I’ve been to all their farms. I’ve shared a meal with all of them, and hope to share many more.

But that’s not all that has changed in the last few years. School children here in Habersham and also up in Rabun County have eaten some of these same foods, from some of these same farms that I have. I’ve watched kids eat turnips and kale for the first time and tell me they thought it tasted good.

Last June over 500 people attended a tour of many of the small local food farms in our area. That’s a lot of people coming to the area because of their interest in fresh local food in the mountains.

Some change is slow and some change is fast. Some change is good and some change is bad. But watching local food becoming part of the culture of our rural area again is a welcome and beautiful thing.

We choose the things we value in life and local food represents values we all relate to, the health and well-being of our children, our relationships to community and to the land, our desire to learn more about the earth and our own health, and the joy of a good meal.

Last summer, farmers collaborated in getting more local food to our nearest urban neighbors in Gainesville, making local food easier to find there as well. Each of these steps, these relationships, these new farms that arise, or the expansion in their production, they seem so small when examined individually. But change is happening. It’s happening fast, and it’s the good kind of change. The kind that results in people valuing the important things in life, like eating well.

Justin, Chuck, Teri and Andrew

Locally Grown - Availability for April 1st , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

It’s gonna be a quick one this week. We do want to remind everyone that our winter hours officially ended last week (and hopefully winter ended right along with it). That means you now have from 5-7pm for pickups. As warmer days and brighter nights prevail it should be more and more pleasant to be out and about in the evenings.

We want to put out one final plug for our 2015 customer survey to find out what kind of fruits and veggies and other products you’d like to see more of in 2015. This survey helps us adjust the market to meet your needs so please share your ideas. Just click the link below. It only takes a minute or two.

https://www.surveymonkey.com/s/5ZTGCKH

On April 18th from 10-2 Melon Head Farms will be having an on-farm plant sale. If you’re looking to get out on a farm in the near future, this is a great opportunity. Visit their website.
http://www.melonheadfarm.com

A few weeks ago Andrew posted a great video of Chuck Mashburn, the co-founder of the NGLG market talking about the amazing jerusalem artichoke. This is a crop we all should know more about for its taste, and nutrition. And it’s just a cool thing to grow. See why in this great short video.

https://vimeo.com/120953447

There are lots of plants listed this week for gardeners! We’re hopefully past the worst of the weather so if you’re feeling brave, start planting! Please don’t buy those junk Bonnie plants at Wal-Mart this year. You won’t regret supporting local farmers by buying their starts. Grow what the farmers grow!

That’s it for tonight.

EAT WELL,

Justin, Chuck, Teri and Andrew

Locally Grown - Availability for March 25 , 2015

Hey Local Food Lovers,

Well it’s getting to be that time of year, where each week is a little more exciting than the week before due to new items coming back onto the market.

Before I get into some of the great products this week, I want to mention some of the new features to Locally Grown you’ll probably notice us rolling out over the coming months. Hopefully most or all of you received a new e-mail reminder on Friday letting you know that the market is open. You may have noticed that the e-mail design, as well as all the great photos of farmers, products, and links to calendar events like our Farm Tour all look REALLY GOOD! Big thanks to Andrew Linker, our Gainesville Market Manager for the incredible work he’s put in the last several months to improve some of our communication tools, our logo (we have a new logo!), and our FEATURED FARMER calendar. This last one we’re especially excited about as we really want to brag on the impressive farmers that we have here in our region. We’ve struggled with how to do that in the past, but each month this year NGLG will feature a farm or two to help you get to know the farms behind your food. We want you to know these good folks by name, recognize their faces, and have a story to tell about what makes them special.

The Lazy L Ranch up in Rabun County is run by Daphne & Bill Lisenby, one of the newer pastured egg producers in the area. I think you’ll all be struck by the beauty of the view these chickens rise to each morning. Just picture that each morning that you fry up these eggs and you’ll have a beautiful start to your day. Part of the goal of Featured Farmers is for you to get to meet and interact with them directly. This Wednesday, Daphne and Bill will be in Gainesville during the pickup to talk with folks about their farm, their practices, their favorite stories and recipes.

Andrew shot this great video of Lazy L Ranch this winter that really captures the unique feel of the season.
https://vimeo.com/120698431

Thanks to the Lisenby’s for their participation in NGLG and for being our first official Featured Farm in 2015!

In other egg news, Sylvan Falls Mills Chocolate Marshmellow Eggs are back! Many of you have heard me brag on these before. Probably my favorite holiday item on the entire market. It’s a reminder that Easter is almost here. And it’ll be gone before you know it. I highly encourage you to try these while you can.

We also have a few specials on eggs bought in bulk this week. So as you’re gearing up for EASTER eggs, think about getting several local dozen at once. And if anyone cooks up a really beautiful Frittatta anytime soon, send us a snapshot and your recipes.

Other items of note this week. Shade Creek Farms has brought back their gorgeous mixed baby carrots. Simply beautiful array of sweet, delicious carrots. They also have strawberry plants for those who would like to grow their own strawberries. And Hakurei Turnips! A favorite.

Veggie Patch has brought on one of my favorite odd vegetables. The kohlrabi. Looks like it’s from Mars, has all the nutrition of a cabbage, but can be substituted for potatoes in lots of dishes. Give it a try.

Leah Lake has Leeks! There’s also swiss Chard from Veggie Patch and Mountain Earth Farms.

Welcome back to Hollman who have a wide array of native plants for sale. Veggie Patch is also selling several dozen types of SEEDLING plants for your garden (don’t get confused these are plants to grow, not veggies to eat).

Then there’s spinach, spinach and more spinach! Don’t take it for granted. Once summer comes, spinach is gone. I always love a spinach salad with a sliced up hardboiled egg. Did anyone else’s mother always make spinach salad that way.

Well that should do it for this week. Put in your order (or an extra order if something we mentioned sounds good). Market is open until 9pm tonight. Help us achieve our highest March sales ever!

EAT WELL,

Justin, Chuck, Teri and Andrew