How to eat fresh, local foods — even in the snow

Another cold Cleveland winter will soon be upon us, and the brilliant yellows, reds and greens of bustling outdoor farmers markets are fading away. But that doesn’t mean you have to give up sustainable, savory and nutritious foods during the winter months. And why would you, considering the soul-warming possibilities of homemade comfort foods, perfect for frigid temperatures? From stews to soups and chili to pot pies, warming up is more delightful when you have fresh, tasty ingredients to work with.

Beth Knorr, the farmers market manager for the Cuyahoga Valley Countryside Conservancy, shares some tips so you never have to forfeit your healthy summertime eating habits, even when the weather outside is frightful.

1. Freeze it. It “does take a little bit of planning if you know that you want to continue eating locally throughout the winter,” Knorr admits. “Freezing things when they’re in season certainly will make that easier.” So buy a surplus and prepare for the long haul.

2. Make new friends. If you’ve established a positive relationship with the farmers at your summer market, keep it up over the winter, suggests Knorr. Ask your favorite vendors if you can contact them directly to purchase produce during the off-season to tide you over until the weather warms up again. Thanks to new technology, there’s a decent chance that vendors will have a steady supply of leafy, juicy, vine-ripened, organic and otherwise wholesome foods available, even when it’s below freezing and icy out.

3. Seek shelter. Though not nearly as plentiful as markets in July and August, indoor farmers markets do exist during the winter. At Happy Days Lodge on State Route 303 in Peninsula, for instance, farmers markets will be held on the third Saturday of every month from now until April.

All of these tips will take a little bit of time and planning to put to good use, and it might be easier to just open a can or heat up a TV dinner after trudging home through the snow and slush. So why should you stick with fresh, local food? Well, if not because it’s good for the environment, the local economy and your health, do it for the taste. The amazing flavor of fresh, local food keeps people craving it all year long. “It’s really not even comparable to what you find in the grocery stores,” Knorr says. “It’s unmatched.”

Missed the markets this summer? Check out the farmers market guide from our June issue and see what you can look forward to next year.

This is a Keeper

This is the most bountiful time of year for fresh local produce. I was at the North Union Farmers Market on Shaker Square Saturday morning and was just knocked out by all the gorgeous stuff — onions, corn, green beans, eggplant, chard, zucchini, patty pan squash, peaches, nectarines, and of course tomatoes of every size and in shades of red orange, yellow and green. In a situation like this, my impulse is to buy everything in sight. The problem is using it up before fruit flies, mold, rot and limpness take hold. To me it’s a crime to allow food this good to go to waste. Further complicating the challenge is that not all produce is the same: leafy greens must be handled differently than leeks to make them last. A friend just turned me on to an absolutely great guide for how to best store most common fruits and vegetables published by Berkley Farmers’ Market. It’s a really clear, comprehensive and easy to use collection of instructions for handling fresh produce and keeping it at its peak. I’ve printed the three pages and put them on the shelf in my kitchen with the cookbooks.

The best part of this guide is that plastic bags are not used. There’s something fundamentally wrong with employing a petrochemical product that is clogging up landfills to tote and store sustainably raised local food. The result, it seems to me, is that one good for the earth act is canceled out by a bad one. We Americans are addicted to these handy little items — I read that it takes approximately 12 million barrels of oil to make the 100 billion plastic bags we use annually (according to the Worldwatch Institute). Now I have less reason to use them.

I just learned that there’s a new weekly farmers market setting up shop downtown this week. North Union is launching a satellite location on the Cleveland State University campus starting Thursday, Sept. 3, from 10:30 a.m.-1:30 p.m. Look for it on Euclid Avenue between E. 18th and E. 21st streets. Perfect destination for a lunch hour stroll, snack, and shop — and thanks to the folks from Berkley, over-buying need not be such a big problem. For more tips about what to do with your farm fresh swag and a list of other area farmers markets, read my article Farm Fresh in the June issue of Cleveland Magazine. (Photo Courtesy of Barney Taxel, Taxel Image Group)