Truly Happy Meat
Dec 30, 2008 cooking, farming, groceries, sustainable agriculture
I’m only singling her out because she made a post about something I’d been meaning to comment on previously but, in the forum thread “Food Related Goals for 2009“, Merridith wrote:
…I want to restrict my meat eating, as best I can, to sustainably produced, naturally raised, animals. First choice will be to buy direct from the farmer, if I need it fast, I will buy it from the organic grocery.
The idea of this is absolutely great, but the reality is that even meat at an organic grocer isn’t really all that happy because terms like organic, free range, and pastured have all been picked up by agribusiness and distorted wildly. You can have “organic” pork that was confined just as you can have “pastured” beef that is really just pumped full of corn. And that’s not to say I don’t occasionally buy meat in a store like Whole Foods,
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Tags: American Grass Fed Beef, Local Harvest, Riverfront Times, sappington farmers market, Whole Foods, Winslow's Home
Event: Organic Gardening Club
Dec 28, 2008 MO, farming, slow food, sustainable agriculture
In the past I’ve put off home-gardening because I’d hoped to move soon and didn’t want the mess in my backyard. But, with the economy what it is, I’m not going anywhere soon. So perhaps you, like I, plan to make gardening a part of your new year. And if you’re really like me, you’re better at killing things then growing them so the inaugural meeting of the Missouri Organic Association’s Organic Garden Club might just be for you.
The cost is $5 and the event will be held Thursday, January 8 at the Town & Country location of Whole Foods from 6:30-8:00 PM. Friend of Slow Food St. Louis Molly Rockamann of EarthDance Farms will be there to speak and answer questions as well as show EarthDance’s short-film, Connoisseur of Fine Foods, about Mueller Organic Farms in Ferguson, MO. You can catch a teaser of the film on YouTube.
Further details and registration information can be found online at WholeFoodsMarket.com.
Tags: EarthDance Farms, Ferguson, Molly Rockamann, organic garden, slow food, Whole Foods
Some
Jul 25, 2008 St. Louis, Television, missouri
I’m assuming three women* run the blog Blogging Top Chef, and they’ve got some posts about the Top Chef tour that rolled into Whole Foods the other day. If that’s the kind of thing you’re interested in, you can read about it.
* I’m assuming it’s three women because their profile lists three people: Chef Biatch, Chef Back Burner and Sous Chef Humor. Plus they have the following About Me on their profile: In our kitchen breasts, buns, and brains aren’t just ingredients! So stop staring at our boobs and go read the blog.
Tags: Top Chef, Whole Foods
Buy Your Oats While You Can
Apr 2, 2008 St. Louis, groceries, missouri
Well the final day is near and today Wild Oats began clearing the store out at 35% off. Things are flying off the shelves fast and I don’t think they’ll make it more than a couple days with much remaining. There’s still quite a bit of good stuff though if you move quick.
Hits would include lots of chocolate, cheese, yogurts, and Raincoast Crisps (which are like the heroin of crackers). The bulk food section still has a ton of stuff as well, and there are also big pieces of deli meat and blocks of deli cheese for those of you looking to throw a big bash, or maybe industry people needing to make tea sandwiches for a party or something.
All of the workers I spoke to planned to go and train at Whole Foods Brentwood for the next two months before moving out to the new store at the corner of Clayton and Woods Mill. Several told me they literally lived within walking distance of the current store so I can only imagine how annoying that will become for them as they trek to the new store.
If there was ever a group of people who could take it in stride though, it’s the Wild Oats employees. Stand them next to the Whole Foods employees and I’d pick them every time because they were easily the kindest grocery store in the area, and I hope their vibe remains intact in West County.
Tags: Raincoast Crisps, Whole Foods, wild oats
Dear Whole Foods
Apr 1, 2008 general food, groceries
Dear Whole Foods,
Although you are practically the symbol of Big Organic, at the end of the day, as much as I don’t want to, I like your stores and the conveniences they provide me.
You see, I like chicken, and while I can appreciate that a chicken has wings, and thighs, and legs, it’s their supple breasts that I desire most in my midweek meals, and as that’s not a cut that’s easy to get from my local farmers without breaking the chickens down myself, I often pick up a breast or two on my visits to your store.
I mention it because while I can appreciate the devotion your meat department shows to their gloves as the workers discard them so sparingly, when they handle the raw meats I will purchasing with their plastic covered hands, type the code into the scales with those same hands, and then proceed to wrap my purchase in butchers paper without having ever removed them, what I get in my palm as we finalize our transaction is a neatly wrapped, meat-juice slathered, package.
It’s not cool, so stop that would you?
Tags: gloves, meat department, Whole Foods
King Corn @ The History Museum
Feb 27, 2008 events
| If you missed your shot to see King Corn last year, fret not, the St. Louis History Museum will be showing it March 13.
You can read the full event details on the history museum’s meetup.com page, but here’s the abbridged version: |
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| What: | Showing of the Documentary King Corn followed by a “panel discussion with the Kelly Twins, Trailnet, Whole Foods & MO Rural”
Prior to showing the film there will also be “information tables and tasting,” but of what I do not know. Commodity corn maybe? [Edit: See the comments...Companion will be there with food.] |
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| When: | Thursday, March 13, 2008 at 7:00 PM | |
| Where: | St. Louis History Museum in Forest Park | |
Tags: kelly twins, king corn, Whole Foods
Wild Oats Closing Date Set
Feb 24, 2008 groceries
Gail Appleson has the scoop over on the STLtoday Business Ticker blog.
The Wild Oats store at 8823 Ladue Road is closing April 13 and the approximate 75 employees have been offered jobs either at the Whole Foods store 1601 S. Brentwood Boulevard or the Town and Country store under construction.
Does anyone know what’s happening to the Wild Oats employees in the interim between Wild Oats closing and the new Whole Foods opening?
I drove by it the other day, and it didn’t look particularly close to being done.
Tags: Whole Foods, wild oats
More on Whole Foods Plastic Bags
Jan 23, 2008 groceries
Returning to the news Whole Foods has earmarked a date for the phasing out of plastic bags: Earth Day 2008.
From tea to ant traps my father is a life-long supplier to the grocery industry and he wonders if I “…think they are eliminating plastic bags to save money…or to save the world?”
Personally I think they are eliminating them because John MacKey is no idealistic hippie. He knows that by eliminating plastic bags it further enhances the public image of Whole Foods in a way that furthers their customers attachment to the store while at the same time reducing overhead.
Certainly I have no hard data, but I would suspect a large number of Whole Foods regulars are so because of the image the store represents rather than just the quality of the products lying within.
To put it another way, Whole Foods is the Apple of the grocery industry doing as much (or more) to push their image as they do to sell a quality product.
And yes, I do shop there. Go buy some awesome reusable bags why don’t you.
Tags: plastic-bags, Whole Foods
Dinner Triumphant!
Oct 27, 2007 farmers' markets, general food
I suppose because of my years cooking, I have a tendency to aim high when cooking dinner at home. While that in and of itself isn’t a problem, what is a problem, is that I’m rusty. Rustiness, coupled with my being particularly critical, means that I’m more than a little unenthused with most of the food I make.
Take last Friday for instance. On call at work and having to respond within fifteen minutes, I was forced to stay around the house for most of the weekend. Having known this well in advance I decided to do it up big for dinner after spotting some celeriac earlier that week at the Berger Bluff Farms tent at the Maplewood Farmers’ Market. I also still had the beautiful carrots I’d picked up in Kansas City at the Farmers Community Market at Brookside and not wanting them to go to waste, I knew they would make perfect sides to what Ellie and I had been craving all week: pot roast.
So as previously mentioned, at lunch last Friday I headed off for Whole Foods to pick up an American Grass Fed roast. But alas, it was one of the cuts that were no longer available. I instead picked up a larger rib eye for us to share.
That proved to be my downfall as I overcooked the beef a little in my frenzy to finish passing the celeriac puree through a sieve and get everything onto the plate hot. I was clearly trying to do too much at once, and I was doubly irritated because it had been such a fine cut of meat.
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| American Grass Fed Beef Rib-Eye, Berger Bluff Farms Celeriac and Bellews Creek Farm potato puree, Kansas City Center for Urban Agriculture carrots, Claverach Farms chioggia beet greens, Our Garden butter |
But thankfully, while my story does technically end there, it began with one of my greatest home-kitchen culinary triumphs — my appetizer.You see, my other reason for going to Whole Foods was because I’d thought they were going to have the Bell’s Best Brown Ale. They however did not, and knowing The Wine & Cheese Place did, I knew I’d be making the quick trip around the corner to yield that delicious brew. It was then that I also remembered that they now have salumi from Mario Batali’s father’s shop in Seattle, and that I could finally buy some of that as well.When I did work in kitchens, I was always what I referred to as a “flavor wheel cook.” While there are some chefs that truly can think outside the box and create flavors that are new and challenging, I didn’t possess that sort of raw talent. Just as I make up for my lack of natural athletic ability in my running now with sheer mileage, I made up for my lack of talent in the kitchen by literally reading the hundreds of cookbooks I have. When you do this, you start to see patterns. There are foods that clearly go together, and a spin of the flavor wheel of pork for instance, will yield things like rosemary, sage, thyme, cranberries, apples, honey, mustard, onions, juniper berries, and walnuts.
With that knowledge in hand, while you won’t be breaking new ground, it is possible to make phenomenally good food rooted in solid techniques and classic flavor combinations.
So before leaving Whole Foods I grabbed a 12 month aged manchego because the flavor wheel of most any cheese includes cured meats. Because of the strong flavors Salumi’s salumi has, I gave the next spin to the cheese. Manchego, a Spanish cheese, would go with things like sausage, garlic, mustard, sherry vinegar, onions, thyme and olives. It was at this point that the hand of brilliance reached out and touched me.
Manchego is a sheep’s milk cheese with a similar texture and fat content to Pecorino — I could make the budino substituting manchego for the pecorino. With an additional helping of good fortune, The Wine & Cheese place had Salumi’s mole salami. With a nice touch of heat, a dash of cinnamon, and the richness from the added chocolate, it would go perfect with my plan.
Not to pat myself on the back, but it really did turn out beautifully, and we devoured every bit. The richness of the budino cut beautifully through the heat of the salami and the slight addition of some fresh lemon juice in my vinaigrette gave the whole thing a zippy freshness that really worked, and for a change, I was completely pleased with something I’d made.
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| 12 month Aged manchego budino, Claverach Farms mesclun, Salumi mole salumi, Bellews Creek Red Onion, with a sherry vinaigrette |
Tags: American Grass Fed Beef, beet greens, Bellews Creek Farm, budino, celeriac, chioggia, Claverach Farms, salumi, urban agriculture, Whole Foods
Bacon Bar at Whole Foods
Oct 3, 2007 general food, groceries
I spotted the Mo’s Bacon Bar I previously mentioned at Whole Foods the other day. Obviously, I snatched one up immediately.
At $6.99 it comes in a little cardboard box. On the back is a story about the inspiration for it’s creation, along with lengthy instructions on just how it is you are supposed to enjoy it. I can’t help but think this is like a pair of shoes coming with an instruction manual, but hey, whatever floats this woman’s boat. She’s the one that made a candy bar with bacon in it!
As for taste, as I let the bar melt in my mouth according to the explicit instructions I previously found online, the first thing that hit me was the smokiness from the bacon. While that was actually a very pleasant contrast to the buttery sweetness, as the bar melted, at only 41% cacao, the creamy milk chocolate quickly lead way to bacon-bit grit. For me, it was a weird textural contrast. The salt on the other hand really brought out the flavor as salt goes beautifully with chocolate as something like chocolate covered pretzels proves.
For the most part though, while I was eating it, I couldn’t stop thinking that it was missing something. That something was maple syrup, and after eating the bar, and noticing the story on the back of the box, I was surprised she too made the same connection from her child hood. So where is it already?
As it is now, it’s not so great, though it’s interesting. Make it a bacon, salt, maple syrup chocolate bar, however, and you’ve got yourself a hit!
Michael Ruhlman’s response to an email I sent sums it up best, I think:
“i’ve tasted one like it, was only ok, sadly”
Tags: bacon, chocolate, Mos-Bacon-Bar, Whole Foods
