Recently in Food Category

The Saratoga County Fair is wrapping up this weekend, so if you haven't had a chance to go yet, now's the time.  The rain has passed and the sun is out, so head on down to Ballston Spa and check it out!  The Fair may conjure up images of cheese fries, dizzying Midway rides and tractor pulls, but the Fair is also a showcase of the locally made and locally grown.  I went into the Townley building and found displays featuring an amazing array of food and other products made right here in our region.

By Amy Stock, Contributing Writer
Photos by David DeLozier


As an individual, one of the simplest and perhaps most gratifying steps you can take to 'go green' is to buy local grown produce and locally made products.  Fortunately in the Capital Region we have plenty of options to access local produce and products, including shopping at local farmer's markets, joining a CSA (Community supported agriculture), buying fresh produce from a local farm stand, or shopping at one of the many locally owned grocers.

Chef Dave Pedinotti of The Mouzon House recommends this great early summer Salad.  It brings together the two best flavors of the season - Strawberries and Arugula.  The Mouzon House on High Rock Ave., is just up the street from the Saratoga Farmers Market, so Chef Pedinotti can simply walk down to the market and get the freshest ingredients for his entrees.  Talk about eco-Local!

 

 

By Wendy Hobday Haugh

Imagine a restaurant that recycles its glass, cans, and paper products, uses biodegradable take-out containers, purchases all its green produce locally, composts every kitchen scrap imaginable, serves only fair-trade coffee and made-from-scratch, cooked-to-order food, uses no trans fats or chemical additives, delivers its customers' plate-waste to families with pet pigs, gives its leftover bread to folks raising chickens, changes its cooking oil frequently, and donates its discarded oil to a local man who processes it and uses it as fuel - to power to his car!

Mary Beth McCue   RD, LDN, CDN
Integrative Nutritionist

There are many methods and opportunities to eat healthy while being penny-wise and "green" during this time of positive reflection on how we impact our environment, our pocketbooks, and our health.  

Convenient and instant foods are normally more expensive, always less nutritious and leave you feeling tired and lifeless.  Many have no whole foods and therefore natural nutrients; many contain non-food items. You will begin to be healthier, happier, more energetic, and more capable of living your life to your fullest potential by practicing the suggestions below.

By Drew Monthie of Ecologic Consulting

I have never been a fan of turf grass.  For starters I hate mowing and on top of that all 3 species of grasses used in lawns (Bluegrass, Rye and Fescue) are native to Europe.  They are cool-season grasses which means that they look their best when temperatures are cool and conditions moist. This is why your lawn looks nice in spring and fall, but not so hot in summer.  In their native habitat these grasses go dormant during the hot months of summer.  Here in North America to keep turf grass looking good when it's supposed to be resting we waste phenomenal amounts of water: 30 to 60% percent of residential water used outside is used on grass which amounts to more 7 billion gallons of water used per day for lawn irrigation.  To fertilize all of this grass and kill the pests common to the unhealthy practice of growing monocultures we use 3 million tons of fertilizers annually. Over 30 thousand tons of synthetic pesticides are used on lawns annually.  $2.2 billion (2002) or more is spent annually on pesticides for home and garden use.
The average homeowner per acre uses 10 times the amount of pesticides that farmers do (Nicholas School of the Environment at Duke University, 2008).  Many (if not all) non-organic fertilizers and pesticides are organo-phosphates or carbamates meaning they are made from petroleum further increasing our dependence on foreign oil.

Looks like the long Winter has finally broken and Spring is here.  One sure sign that Spring has Sprung is the return of the Maple Weekends.  We are fortunate to have the producers of the finest sweetener on the planet right here in our backyard.  Of course, I'm talking about the annual ritual of Maple sap collection to create Maple syrup.  Checkout the article "March Maple Madness" in my previous blog post here at Saratoga.com and read about some of the characters involved in this right of Spring.

By Shannon Hayes

On Wednesday, March 11th, the U.S. House Subcommittee on Livestock, Dairy and Poultry will hold a hearing on the proposed National Animal Identification System (NAIS). On the surface, NAIS is a marvel of technological wizardry whereby we farmers tag every head of livestock in the country and the USDA electronically tracks their whereabouts. In the event of a disease outbreak, they plan to identify within 48 hours which animals are involved, where they are located, and what other animals might have been exposed. After an outpouring of farm and ranch protests, NAIS was made "voluntary at the federal level," but the status is precarious, because funding to states can be contingent upon mandating compliance. For us as consumers, NAIS may sound like a legislative dream, assuring the American food supply is safe. But for us as citizens, NAIS is a nightmare. Policy opponents argue the program cannot deliver on its promises to thwart di sease contagion; it does nothing to contain food-born illness; it threatens the civil liberties of farmers; it infringes on the religious freedoms of many, like the Amish, who object to the system on grounds that it represents "the mark of the beast."

By MaryBeth McCue

The need to practice personal responsibility to acquire and maintain health may be at an all time high, even while the new Obama administration in Washington is working to "improve" our Health Care model. Chronic illness and disease are on the rise and have been for some time.  People are living longer, but at the expense of living more years not feeling well and lacking vital function -needlessly.   Many have come to believe that "forty or fifty something" means the start of chronic disease, when it does not have to be.  And even more alarming, but now "common", are seeing young people in our culture burdened with chronic conditions such as obesity, diabetes, heart disease, auto-immune diseases, depression, ADD and more, which a very short time ago where seen as diseases of the  "aging " population.  Complementary and Alternative Medicine (CAM), Integrative Medicine (IM), Mind- Body-Medicine (MBM), Functional Medicine (FM) - most are out of pocket services to help restore health- continue to be utilized more and more each year.  This upward trend is yet another significant "indicator" of the continued deficiency in our western-conventional health care model.   A broken system where many with chronic conditions are told by their physicians:  There is nothing wrong with you"... "There is nothing more you can do",...." You just have to live with it", etc etc etc .

The experts, and the non-experts, like our government - are in agreement that the inclusion of Integrative Medicine as a covered health care service will help our nation heal their health, their economy and unite back into the world more whole and complete and able to serve. This end result will itself continue to feed the healing process. 

March Maple Madness in the Town of Thurman

By Persis Granger

It all begins on one of those special days in late winter, when snowmelt hammers on the porch roof, the sun seems higher in the sky, the air has an unmistakable smell of spring, and crows caw over the meadow. In Thurman, folks wait all winter for days like that. On days like that, the maple sap is running.

The tiny Warren County town of Thurman boasts a proliferation of maple producers - probably more per square mile than anywhere else around. Most are second- or third-generation sugar makers, carrying on a proud family tradition of maple production, using a combination of learned-at-the knee know-how and an ongoing quest for technology to streamline their operations and make them energy- and labor-efficient. Many recall a grandparent carrying buckets with a yoke to a kettle over an open fire. Some will share memories of two or three generations of their family working together to gather, boil and bottle.