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Stalking the Perfect Parsnip

Locavores say we should only eat food that’s locally grown, which is easy enough in the summer. But what about the wintry depths of February? One woman rises to the culinary challenge.

Illustration by Polly Becker

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The New Oxford American Dictionary named “locavore” the word of the year for 2007. Not so long ago, we just had to be green. But locavores are far more demanding. Coined in 2005 by four women in San Francisco, locavores propose that people should eat food grown within a 100-mile radius of where they live. They urge consumers to buy from farmers’ markets or even to grow their own food. As Ben Zimmer, editor of the Oxford American, said when he announced the winning word, “Now food lovers can enjoy what they eat while still appreciating the impact they have on the environment.”

Great idea.

But have any of these people ever lived in Providence? My yard is the size of a card table. And it’s brick. Oh, and it’s in Rhode Island, where it snows, rains, freezes and does every other thing not conducive to growing anything but pansies in spring and tomatoes at the end of summer. Who am I, though, to argue with the New Oxford American Dictionary, or Al Gore, or four women in San Francisco who invented not only a movement but a word? So I take a deep breath, put on layers and step up to the locavore challenge. For one month, in February, in Rhode Island, I will buy and eat locally. Did someone say turnip?

Week One:   
Okay. I cheat immediately. But how can I perform a test without a base line? For this week, I entertain myself by writing down everything I eat and then putting it to the locavore test. In other words, if I weren’t cheating, could I eat these things? I start my day, every day, with coffee. My coffee has half and half. No one grows coffee in Rhode Island, though they do roast it in Pawtucket. Happily, there are dairies here. As a locavore, I would drink half and half every morning.

Every morning at around eleven, I eat a toasted English muffin with chunky peanut butter and a sliced banana drizzled with honey. (Note to self: Vary diet!) As a locavore, I could only eat my local honey. So far, my locavore diet is half and half followed by honey. Once a week I meet my friend Sharon at Julian’s on Broadway and get a Swiss cheese, mushroom and spinach omelet with Italian toast. (Note to self: You have boring eating habits.) Rhode Island has local eggs! There!

I do not eat lunch usually. But sometimes I meet my mother at Gregg’s, where I always get the turkey club with extra mayonnaise. (Note to self: Why am I so afraid of ordering something different? What is wrong with me? I think of myself as a risk taker! Ha!!) I examine my turkey club and conclude that as a locavore I could not meet my mother for lunch. Unless I ate another omelet. Plain.

Before dinner, I like to enjoy a delicious glass of wine.

California. (Nope!) Chardonnay. (Forget about it!) For me, it’s all or nothing. If I can’t have California chardonnay maybe I’ll make do with vodka. They make it in Maine. I know because Josh Miller at Local 121, told me so. They serve it there. But guess what? Maine is more than 100 miles away from Rhode Island. No California chardonnay. No martinis. The water here is very good, but as a cocktail?

I don’t know about you, but I don’t eat at home every night. This poses a challenge for locavores. On the three nights that I do eat at home, I have pasta with marinara sauce and meatballs; chili; and burritos made with the leftover chili, Monterey jack cheese and salsa. (This happens to be one of my favorite meals, my own version of Shepherd’s pie.)

Pasta night. I suppose I could have gone to Venda on the Hill and bought homemade pasta. But the flour would not be local. My mother made the sauce and the meatballs. My mother is an incredible cook, but she does not can her own tomatoes or raise her own cattle. So this meal doesn’t cut it.

Chili. Organic beef, but it’s not locally raised. Canned beans. The spices? Forget it. Cumin. Chili powder. Oregano. Garlic. But wait! There are onions. Surely in February somebody in Rhode Island grows onions. If I were a locavore, I would eat onions tonight for dinner. Onions sauteed in local butter.

When I make the burritos, I use tortillas from Tortilleria Pixatla on Atwells Avenue. But once again I run into the flour dilemma. I realize that the challenge I have set for myself is going to be impossible. Woman cannot live on half and half, honey, eggs and onions—even onions sauteed in butter—alone. Especially this carnivorous woman. And what about my social life? Virtually nothing that I ate out this week would be allowed. For one thing, it’s the Chinese New Year, and since our daughter is from China, we celebrate one night over beef with broccoli, strange-flavored chicken, fried dumplings and rice from the Four Seasons in Cranston. (My husband and I got all of the food for our wedding from the Four Seasons, so it is our go-to Chinese restaurant.) The food is delicious, spicy and crunchy and fresh. But from a glance, locavores would not eat it.  I do, however. Happily.

I also spent two days in New York City this week. My friend Glenn and I went to my favorite wine bar, Gottino, and drank Italian wine and ate all kinds of salumi. The wine was a super Tuscan. The salumi did not come from Manhattan. (Note to self: Why do you always go to Gottino? Are you the most boring person ever?)

Another night, my husband, Lorne, worked late so the kids and I got an extra cheese and pepperoni pizza from Fellini’s on Wickenden Street. Enough said.

At week’s end, I realize I would be a very hungry, dairy-heavy locavore.

Week Two:
There are three kinds of locavores: wild card, which means you buy everything you can that has been grown locally, then buy from small local producers to supplement, and also give yourself some luxury items, like salt and coffee (purists, even Barbara Kingsolver who spent a year, God help her, as a locavore raising her own food in Virginia, allowed her family to choose luxury items. FYI, they chose chocolate, dried fruit, spices and coffee); Marco Polo, which allows you to use any spice or food item on the Spice Route; and then the hard line (must live in places like California or Hawaii) locavores. I’m going to spend a week trying each. This week, I get to do wild card! Phew!

The thing is, I love grocery stores. I love food shopping. I love to cook. Looking for locally grown or produced items with the fall-back that I can also get parmesan cheese from Parma and olive oil from a small farm in California actually delights me. I roam the aisles of Whole Foods humming “Food, glorious food” from Oliver! and reading packaging labels. Being a Wild Card locavore is terrific. I feel smug—hey! I’m helping the environment!—and I feel challenged. Those strawberries from Peru? No way! But that bag of local apples is a winner. And I can buy goat cheese from Massachusetts and stuff it in an organic chicken.

Disclaimer: I am not someone who eats bad food (see above diet notes). But like the rest of us, I can get lazy. Hey! If Prince macaroni is on sale ten for $10 at Stop and Shop, I don’t buy Barilla just because it comes from Italy. And I have a three-year-old who loves canned anything: corn, peas, carrots. I have no idea where those vegetables came from. But when you have a three-year-old who will only eat these three things, you give them to her. (Sorry, Al Gore!)

Also, my husband is not a vegetable lover, but he likes salad. I make him beautiful salads with that mesclun mix from those big bins with the tongs sticking out of them at the grocery store. I don’t know where that mesclun mix is grown. I even asked someone who worked at the supermarket but he just shrugged and scurried off. Does being a Wild Card locavore mean depriving my husband of the mystery mesclun mix? Does the man have to eat kale? I hesitate. My conscience gets the best of me, and I pass right past that mesclun. However, I also pass the two local vegetables highlighted: kale and turnips. I make an executive decision:

Except for Annabelle (come on, she’s only three), we will not have any vegetables.

This week passes happily, and I feel both superior to the shoppers around me, throwing asparagus into their carts with reckless abandon, and smarter. It takes work to do this. But with the forgiveness of the wild card, I am able to buy bread from Seven Stars, risotto from Italy, lots of brie.