The Weblog
From vendor features & product spotlights,
to other important information,
including reminders of market closings,
upcoming classes, and events!
Night Market this Tuesday May 3rd!
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Ordering closes tonight for pickup this Tuesday. Plan to shop at the Night Market from 4 – 7 after you pick up your order – we’ll have the pickup in the same room as the Night Market, straight down the hall from where you enter First Place.
I know we’re out of eggs – sorry about that – but we’ll have eggs for sale at the Night Market, as well as a new item from King’s – frozen marinated drums!
There will be lots of wonderful items to peruse, as well as some free samples – can’t wait to see everyone there!
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The Foodscape We Live In
Shop here …and remember to join us for our Night Market on May 3rd from 4:00-7:00!
Food is such a multi-faceted thing. It involves family, tradition, childhood experience, emotions (think comfort food), willpower (meal planning, choices), health, agriculture, and economics. The food choices we make every day are to some extent determined by all these various factors and in turn affect so many other things, such as our health and the kind of agriculture our food dollars support.
For those who grew up in a household where regular meals made from fresh ingredients were the norm, they are fortunate because this good habit was taught by example. The added benefit is that they probably got a nutrition-based healthy start in life. But society’s food options and customs changed drastically in the last 30-40 years. Things like microwaves, highly processed items, moms with careers beyond the home, along with other factors, all impacted our ‘foodscape’.
The so-called convenience of pre-cooked ingredients and meals is, for the majority of people, probably too tempting or sometimes necessary just to get through a typical day. The downside of this is that these items are not only devoid of quality nutrition, but also are full of sugar, sweeteners, excessive salt, unhealthy oils, and all manner of synthetic additives—which, when consumed regularly, place added stress on digestion mechanisms, the liver, and kidneys, to name a few. Shelf life is inversely proportional to the quality of nutrition. Healthier foods are fresh and biologically active, thus feeding the good bacteria in our guts.
What is tragic about the prevailing food norms is that there are many preventable chronic diseases, if only proper nutrition is/had been practiced. Not that environment and genetic heritage are unimportant, but the problem is that we have too many improper choices. For those who want to do better, it is no easy thing to change a lifetime of habits, traditions, and lasting effects of experiences. However, small but steady steps are the path forward, and educating oneself on the basics of nutrition and health are a great place to start. I recommend the highly readable Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual by Michael Pollan. Concepts are presented in an easy to understand yet somewhat detailed way, just enough for you to get the picture, so to speak. There is a very amusing illustrated version of the book that makes it a really fun read. Heck, it might even make a good book club candidate among the shoppers at Miami County Locally Grown!
Caroline McColloch
Chez Nous Farm
cheznousfarm@gmail.com
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Oops - Night Market is May 3rd!
Oops! I wrote the wrong date for the Night Market – it’s not May 7th, it’s May 3rd from 4-7 here at First Place!!
So sorry for the confusion…
Spice mixes, lettuce starts, and veggie plants!
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We’re now open for the week. And make sure the Night Market on May 7th is on your calendar!
McGuffey Herb & Spice Co. has her items available again – yay! We’ve missed her delicious mixes, my personal favorite being the Normandy cheese dip. She is offering just one size of each mix, and there are recipes on the backs of the labels.
Simple Living Farm and Rosy Toes both have vegetable and herb plants for sale – a lot of interesting varieties – as well as Decker Indoor Farms with lettuce starts, so get your garden ready!
Erin
Order tonight to pick up this Tuesday!
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The Market will be open until 9:00 tonight, and we still have some kale and microgreens, as well as all your meats, baked goods, eggs, and syrups. I appreciate the support of MCLG’s loyal customers, and so do the farmers/producers! You could buy elsewhere, but you choose us :-) and that keeps your dollars in your local economy, not a massively wealthy food (often faux) company.
Don’t forget about our next Night Market on May 3rd here at First Place. We’ll have the Virtual Market pickup in the same room as the Night Market, just like last time. See you all in a couple days!
Erin
The Joy of Spring
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Walker Cabin Farm is almost out of garlic for the season, so grab the last of it while you can!
McGuffey Herb & Spice Co. has been sorely missed, but I’m excited to say that she’s getting ready to list her items again. I’ll keep everyone posted.
The Joy of Spring
It may be that a truly self-possessed person carries good weather on the inside, but there is nothing more joyful than a warm and sunny early spring day! It’s as if the Creator beckons us to participate in all the meanings of rebirth, by showering us with blossoms, birdsong, and the bluest sky meeting the greenest landscape…
Whatever problems or stresses beset us, a short and simple notice of such surrounding beauty cannot help but lift the spirit, no matter how brief.
Little things mean a lot—gratitude for the beauty of spring is almost an open defiance of all that besets our troubled world. Let your soul bask in the moment!
Caroline McColloch
Chez Nous Farm
cheznousfarm@gmail.com
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We're open!
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We’re open for the week!
I hear it’s supposed to be 80 degrees by Saturday, so I put a lot of foods for grilling on the featured items. I really and truly hope this is it with the cold and snow. I mean seriously – an inch of snow accumulation the day after a late Easter? Not cool.
I’ll be camping with my daughter’s Girl Scout troop this weekend, so I’m very thankful there won’t be snow!
We’ll have a few items added later in the week for this ordering cycle – watch for our email!
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Happy Easter!
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We still have some Swiss chard, kale, and a few microgreens left for the week, as well as gelato and a lot of scrumptious baked goods.
I hope everyone has a peaceful and reverent Easter. As a friend of mine said recently, the first Good Friday was not a time of celebration, but rather of unimaginable grief. But the first Easter…can you imagine the wonder and amazement? Selah (think on that). I love that word – so beautiful.
Erin
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The Activist's Dilemma
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The common image of an activist tends toward radical or extreme. But I prefer to think of it as anyone who participates in society with the goal to improve our life together or solve some problem, regardless of how small of a contribution it may appear.
As I’ve gotten older, I started paying more attention to what’s actually going on in the larger world, and caring a great deal about it indeed. So what can I do? Herein lies the dilemma. For the average person, so many of the world’s problems seem insurmountable; therefore the temptation is to insulate ourselves and justify that by saying, in effect, “nothing I can do will make a difference.”
At the other extreme, are those who commit to a cause to an extent that burnout or a misguided radicalization are the risks. So the dilemma is, we can become apathetic and cynical on the one hand or an insufferable zealot on the other. But I do believe there is middle ground.
And the key to this middle ground is humility. This is a virtue that doesn’t come easily, especially given that we’re surrounded by cultural images to the contrary. By and large, the people in this local food community are activists par excellence, for their consistency of support for something that definitely improves the community. It may seem like a small contribution as individuals, but collectively it is of great value. And there are many examples in other areas of life.
From the Jewish Talmud (book of wise sayings) comes this memorable idea: Do not be daunted by the insurmountable grief of the world. Do justly now. Love mercy now. Walk humbly now. You are not obligated to complete the work, but neither are you free to abandon it.
Caroline McColloch
Chez Nous Farm
cheznousfarm@gmail.com
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