Chef Paul Canales hit up the Derby Street Farmers’ Market yesterday with daughter Eva in tow. The duo got a look at some of the recently available tomatoes at Riverdog Farm, Catalan Farms, Lucero Organic Farm, and Full Belly Farm. Tomato season should hit its peak in the next few weeks, giving the chefs time to evaluate what’s up to snuff for this year’s tomato dinners.
Cherry tomatoes and Sun Golds are tasting delicious right now, but we’re still waiting on Early Girls, San Marzanos, Red Zebras, Pineapples, and the rest of the larger varieties to hit their peak flavor. If everything goes according to plan, that should happen some time over the next three to four weeks just in time for our annual Tomato dinners.
We visited with Trini Campbell and Tim Mueller of Riverdog Farm back in April, soon after their tomato plants went in the ground. Tim tells us what the next few months will require to insure healthy, flavorful tomatoes by August: lots of attention, diligence, and a variety of essential oils that help to combat against an even wider variety of pests.
Italy’s finest co-operative, establishing admirable quality levels in both its blended Barbaresco and its designated-vineyard selections made in the traditional style.
Founded in 1958, this landmark co-operative has a sterling reputation for long-aging wines and exceptional value. The co-operative sources exclusively Nebbiolo grapes from an association of about 80 growers within the Barbaresco zone. Many of these grower families have worked the same land with the same fruit for generations. Aldo Vacca, the Director of the co-operative, has been a great friend to Oliveto for many years and played an essential role in the creation and development of the Wine In Time project.
This Saturday at dinner we’ll be offering an Italian Riviera-style fisherman’s stew in addition to our other menu choices. It will be served in honor of our small-boat fisher-men and -women, available to forum participants and audience as well as to our regular customers. The stew will be comprised of all local fish-rockfish, squid, and clams-with wild fennel pollen, saffron, and olives, and so on.
Twenty dollars for the lovely stew, $5 for a glass of appropriate, chilled white wine. A fitting meal to cap off what we hope will be a worthwhile afternoon. You don’t have to attend the forum to join us for dinner, but we’re excited by the way the forum has evolved, and hope that you do so. Continue reading ‘Come for the Fisheries Forum & Stay for the Stew’
We received the following e-mail yesterday from Welling Tom of Brookside Farm in Brentwood:
Yesterday (Sunday, July 12) we sold our first tomatoes of the year at the Montclair farmers’ market. It was only a couple weeks ago when we were still watering them, so these tomatoes (Early Girls) were still larger and more water-plumped than ideal, but they were not bad, and people at the farmers’ market have been asking for tomatoes for some time now. The Early Girls were completely sold out. They should be better next week. Maybe good enough for Oliveto. We’ll see.
The idea for a forum on local fisheries was sparked by one of our regulars at the upstairs bar who came in one night excited that Obama’s new head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) would be Prof. Jane Lubchenco, a prominent and well-respected marine biologist from Oregon State University. Our friend thought the appointment portended significant changes in the supervision of our local fisheries, which so urgently need enlightened management. We became curious: what’s possible in these times of entrenched interests, with a legacy of bureaucratic inertia?
As a start, here’s a very good film about a Southern Oregon fishing community in jeopardy, but with a plan in place for a positive outcome. Comparable fisherman from our community are also threatened by similar circumstance and policy.
When we visited Joe Schirmer of Dirty Girl Produce back in April, he had many things to tell us in regards to climate, planting times, soil quality, and procuring information on patented seeds. But what really piqued our interest, was Joe’s knowledge of the practice of dry-farming, as well as its history. Finding little current information available, Joe tracked down texts dating back to the 1920s in an effort to understand how to grow vegetables using limited water. Here, he imparts some of his wisdom.
Chef Marco Forneris of Osteria Lalibera in Alba visited us last week, and in conjunction with Chef Paul Canales, devised a unique menu for our Dinners for Produttori del Barbaresco, June 25th – June 26th, 2009. Ben Schwartz and his video camera spent some time with the two of them in the kitchen that first night.
