Locavore: A chef's salad? Check up on the roof

By Erica Noonan, Globe Staff

Chef-owner Jeffrey Fournier of 51 Lincoln in Newton Highlands needed to be in the kitchen, but still wanted to hand-pick his produce.

The solution? A rooftop garden.

With some advice from his friends at Allandale Farmin Brookline, Fournier created a container garden using the 1,800 sq. ft available on his eatery's roof, and even MacGyvered a little pulley system to lower produce to his kitchen door......

Locavore San Francisco Restaurant Announces New Brunch Hours and Menu

Locavore, the restaurant that serves local, organic and sustainable food in San Francisco's Bernal Heights neighborhood, is excited to announce some great news for local foodies: Their Saturday brunch, which started in April, was so popular that they recently decided to open on Sundays, too. They are now serving fresh, locally sourced brunch food on Saturdays and Sundays from 10 am to 2 pm. They also introduced a brand-new brunch menu, featuring their celebrated whole-animal cooking.

As the seasons change, so do the offerings at Locavore, where everything is made from scratch using fresh ingredients from local farms and producers. The new brunch menu at the San Francisco organic restaurant features New American cuisine with a twist:

• Gem lettuce with lamb bacon, one poached egg, creamy dressing and shaved radish
• Buttermilk biscuit with sausage and cream gravy, two fried eggs
• English muffin sandwich, maple sausage, scrambled eggs, hollandaise, side rosti
• Duck confit, butter beans, sunny side up eggs, herbed bread crumbs and sage
• Seasonal vegetable omelet, white cheddar, basil, side rosti
• Chorizo scrambled with eggs, mashed avocado, cilantro, hot sauce, side rosti
• Butter milk pancakes, maple syrup, whip cream, strawberries, ham
• Grilled asparagus, two poached eggs, hollandaise and lardo
• Burger with caramelized onion, bacon, cheddar and fries
• Garlic stout sausage on a brioche bun with sauerkraut and fries

Enjoy any of the above with a mimosa; $8 each or $12 for bottomless. Locavore is proud to feature locally roasted De La Paz coffee, brewed in a Chemex coffeemaker.

For more information about Locavore's new menu or any of Locavore's products or services, call (415) 675-8142, visit view them on the web at www.locavoreca.com, or visit their restaurant, located at 3215 Mission Street in San Francisco's Bernal Heights neighborhood.

About Locavore Restaurant
Locavore is a unique restaurant in San Francisco that specializes in preparing foods made only from ingredients purchased from farms within 100 miles of the City. They work with a network of about 25 farms and ranches that report fresh food availability to Executive Chef Jonathan Merritt daily. Merritt bases the menu each day on the availability of ingredients and what he can find at the farmer's market, where the abundance of fresh food provides additional inspiration.

Great Escape: Explore Farmer's Markets - Enumclaw, WA Patch

Great Escape: Explore Farmer's Markets - Enumclaw, WA Patch: "It’s that time of year and local produce is popping up on farms all over the state, feeding into more than 125 farmers' markets in Washington! Each city seems to have embraced the locavore mentality and is encouraging the fresh farm-to-table concept.

In many cases, the farmers' market idea can be stereotyped by Seattle's famed Pike Place Market, but each city has a unique spin and features our most local farmers."

Dondero: Red Mule grits a local, tasty alternative to polenta || OnlineAthens.com

Dondero: Red Mule grits a local, tasty alternative to polenta || OnlineAthens.com: "Question: What is more locavore than polenta, easier to make, and (in my opinion) has better flavor? Answer: Stone-ground Red Mule grits prepared like polenta."

I experimented several summers ago with dinner grits for a cooking demonstration at the Athens Farmers Market. They wanted local produce to be used in the recipes.

Using organic, locally ground grits (I mean Clarke County local) rather than pasta or rice, I made a foundation dish for the butternut squash I had sautéed with herbs and summer vegetables. Subsequently, I used the same grits dish for a "local food" banquet our restaurant catered for the University of Georgia School of Ecology.

Terra nova

Terra nova: "Farm-to-table has become so commonplace in any self-respecting food town that any restaurant not getting on board the locavore train is more the exception than the rule. Yet it’s easy to forget that there aren’t a ton of farm-to-table options outside of San Diego proper.

Surprisingly, La Mesa is one of those communities that, until recently, didn’t have one. But now that Hillcrest stalwart Terra Restaurant has changed neighborhoods after 13 years in the same spot, the revamped Terra American Bistro is bringing delicious and farm-fresh dishes to the land east of 70th Street."

Urban foraging: Practice is taking root in Baltimore-area parks - baltimoresun.com

Urban foraging: Practice is taking root in Baltimore-area parks - baltimoresun.com: "If it's dinner time and Martha Stauss wants a salad, she doesn't run to the store. She strolls through her Lauraville yard or nearby Herring Run Park and picks wild lettuces, dandelion greens and other free salad fixings.

Depending on what time of year it is, she also might gather garlic mustard (which she uses to make pesto), black walnuts and hazelnuts, wild grapes, persimmons, pawpaws and all sorts of berries, including blackberries, raspberries, blueberries and mulberries.

'I don't have to pay money for it, it doesn't have to travel long distances, and they're good,' she said. 'And I figure that as long as I didn't pull them out of the sidewalk right next to the rushing highway, they're probably good for me, too.'"......

Check, please: Sit down at the farmers market | StarTribune.com

Check, please: Sit down at the farmers market | StarTribune.com: "Start at Corner Table, where Sunday brunch is back and better than ever. Chef/co-owner/locavore Scott Pampuch changes his menu with the seasons, but past highlights have included pancakes with maple butter, cinnamon French toast with caramel-tossed apples and poached eggs over smoked trout cakes, potato pancakes and red cabbage. Butter and love appear to be the two principal ingredients in the caramel-swiped cinnamon rolls, and shoppers need to peruse Pampuch's deli case on their way out the door for hand-crafted pantry staples.".......

Organic issue

Organic issue: "I am a self-confessed locavore, a wannabe-vegan and a sucker for organic produce that is pesticide-free, grown without being chemically fertilised, as close to home as possible. I’ve grown spinach, salad and herbs in my yard (successfully), potatoes and tomatoes (unsuccessfully and with growing desperation), and relate very closely to William Alexander’s $64 tomato. And yes, I am ready to pay extra for this, even when it pinches (and it does!).

Living in health-conscious California, it was impossible not to learn all about the food we eat. Product labels in the US are loaded with so much information (and complicated enough that I once took a four-hour class to learn to decode supermarket labels to access nutritional information!) that learning was just an inescapable fact of life. It stared at me from every Michael Pollan book my local library displayed in its reading area and nudged me from every aisle at grocery stores, until I finally began buying my produce from the local farmers market, held each Sunday to the eclectic sounds of different instruments. But the harp, bagpipes or cellos played by local musicians didn’t entirely soothe me into a sense of safety as I navigated luscious, red strawberries and nectarines (artificial colour? High pesticide-residue?) or brown eggs (antibiotic or hormone reinforced?) or lettuce heads (chemically fertilised?)"

Buying Local for Baby

Buying Local for Baby: "You may have heard of organic baby food and even gourmet baby food. But locally grown? Once the domain of food co-ops and high-end restaurants, the locavore movement has now made its way, in the form of nutritious mush, into baby spoons and onto bibs across the land. Small companies—such as Bébo Organics in Hilliard, Ohio; Local Baby in Austin; and Goo Goo Gourmet in Pittsfield, Massachusetts—are mashing, boiling, and packaging the stuff for an adoring following.

Bébo is the idea of three sisters, all with small children, who were dissatisfied with the baby-food choices at the supermarket. 'We knew if we were having this problem, others were, too,' says Ariana Ulloa-Olavarrieta, who rents a commercial kitchen with her sisters. They prepare the food themselves and sell it on a website and at local farmers' markets. Each week, they sell about 100 5-ounce containers of frozen Black Bean Sweet Potato Blend and Harvest Turkey Stew at $2.50 each."

Farm Fresh: Two Twentysomethings Dig In to Create a Sustainable Ag Project in Ponder - Dallas Restaurants and Dining - City of Ate

Farm Fresh: Two Twentysomethings Dig In to Create a Sustainable Ag Project in Ponder - Dallas Restaurants and Dining - City of Ate: "Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma might have changed my thinking about food, but it sure didn't produce any big changes in my actions. Oh sure, there was plenty of stomping around self-righteously for awhile, spouting big talk about joining a CSA and buying hens for the backyard and only eating at locavore restaurants, but let's face facts: A CSA would probably deliver nothing but yellow squash and zucchini; chickens probably produce more noise and stink than eggs; and there aren't many, if any, true locavore restaurants in DFW.
In other words, my behavior is just like that of a lot of people who've read Pollan's work: There's this need to feed my new self-image as a local-eating, nose-to-tail, sustainable preservationist -- unless it's too much work. So when I heard about Cardo's Sprout Farm Project, a vegetable and egg farm in Ponder that offers workshops on sustainable agriculture practices in exchange for volunteer work, I reached out, signed up for an afternoon of hauling mulch and talked with the farm's managers."....

It's the week to think local, buy local in Central New York | syracuse.com

It's the week to think local, buy local in Central New York | syracuse.com: "Locavore is a trendy term for a person who buys and eats locally grown and produced foods.
Local advertising executive Bill Le Mon, who was a locavore before it was trendy, is the inspiration for 'The Cart Starts Here,' campaign, now in its 21st year.
Public service ads this week -- 'The Cart Starts Here' week -- on WTVH-Channel 5 promote the idea that buying local is good for the Central New York economy."

App watch: Locavore | Democrat and Chronicle | democratandchronicle.com

App watch: Locavore | Democrat and Chronicle | democratandchronicle.com: "Description: As home of America's Favorite Farmers Market, Rochester makes it easy to eat local. Your smart phone can help with the free Locavore app for Android and iPhone devices.

Locavore, if you didn't know, is the term for one who tries to eat only local foods.

The app uses a smartphone's GPS to share what foods are in season, and where the closest public market or farm are located. Up for a drive? You can find the states where your favorite fruit or vegetable is in season.

Of course, the Locavore app also helps with the next step – what to do with those groceries once you get them home? Consult the app for seasonal recipes."

Locavore: Eat local (on your way home) - Framingham - Your Town - Boston.com

Locavore: Eat local (on your way home) - Framingham - Your Town - Boston.com: "No time to stop at a farmer's market? The state Department of Transportation will bring one to your commute.

Beginning, Friday, May 20 local vendors and farmers will be selling their wares along Massachusetts highways, including the Mass.Turnpike.

From 10 a.m to 4 p.m. a handful of local vendors will be at the Charlton and Framingham service plazas, and state officials hope many more will take advantage of free space at 11 rest stops along I-90, and 7 new locations along various Massachusetts highways.

The agency said it has contacted 300 Massachusetts farmers, inviting them to sell their home-grown produce and made-in-Massachusetts products at Pike locations in Lee, Blandford, Ludlow, Charlton, Westborough, Framingham and Natick"

Leaning Local

"Anyone who reads CityBeat’s dining section knows that we try not to cheerlead for restaurants unless they truly deserve it. We’re honest in our assessments, and that’s what gives our dining section credibility.

One thing that’s part of our dining coverage’s philosophy, though, especially under my watch, is that we lean towards local. There are so many great locally owned and operated restaurants here in our fair city that I don’t need to encourage you to spend your dining dollars at big chains. Their corporate office has an ad budget to tell you all about their products — they don’t need my help!....

So we’re focusing this issue of the Dining Guide on one of this area’s astonishing assets — our many, varied local, independent restaurants. What do they do best? Heritage, authenticity, hospitality — we’ve got it."