I went to the Farmers Market at the Flight Deck. Clearly the last week was a bad choice for trying it for the first time. There were TWO food vendors there and maybe five or six total. The vegetables didn't look bad, but I didn't need anything right now, plus our CSA basket comes Thursdays. What I was looking for was the meat and fish vendors they sometimes have. No such luck. I'll have to try again when it reopens in March! And I do plan to try the All Local one in downtown Columbia. I just need to figure out a Saturday when I'm home to go. Plus you have to get there early when it opens at like 8, which is early, so... But I will make it!
I also started working more on Goal #4 (looking for more sources of local meats, eggs, and dairy products, especially meats right now). I found a source for grass-fed beef and pastured poultry in Georgia that ships. They actually have reasonable prices ($5.99/lb. for grass-fed 90/10 ground beef - that's not much more than regular priced grocery store 90/10 ground beef) and shipping isn't outrageous. I want to do a little bit more research on them, but I think we might go that route for some of our meat! It's called White Oak Pastures. Supposedly they stock them in Publix supermarkets, but I haven't seen it in ours. I'm going to look again and then ask about it. If I can get it here for a reasonable price, then I'd rather do that. I also need to check out Earth Fare, the new Whole Foods, and Rosewood Market to see what their meat selection/prices are like. I have seen some local meat at 14 Carrot, but haven't priced it. I'm assuming that the shipping might be negated if I take into account the supermarket mark up. So lots more work to do there!
Some might ask about the increased price of this type of meat v. our food budget. Here 's an interesting post from 100 Days about their Week 3 Mini-Pledge on Meat. What I've found is that I feel like I'm using a little less meat than I might have before. The Volumetrics cookbook adds in extra vegetables to a lot of their recipes, so you don't need as much meat for a filing meal. The chili I made this week, for example, only uses 1/2 lb. of ground beef because it uses a base of 3 cups of veggies (green peppers and onions) and then adds beans (I add even more - 1 can of black and 1 can of pinto) and corn. I've made this wonderful Chicken in a Crockpot twice now. We can eat off of the meat for about an entire week. From the last one, I've gotten 6 meals out of it on average. The first night we had chicken pitas with cucumbers, feta, and tomatoes with homemade tzatziki sauce. Then we had homemade chicken noodle soup for 2 nights (with stock from the bones - we did have ham & cheese sandwiches to go with it, but the soup was really filling). I had enough leftover soup for 2 lunches for me. Then I made chicken risotto that gave us 2 dinners and at least 1 lunch for me. Now I'm using the remainder of the chicken (plus another frozen chicken breast for tonight's recipe that will have leftovers for tomorrow! So overall, I think I've bought LESS meat than we were before.
Tonight I'm trying a new recipe from 100 Days of Real Food: Chicken Enchiladas. I'm cutting the recipe in half because I don't want to freeze one yet. If it's yummy, then I'll do the full recipe next time! Rice is cooking now, so it should be fast to throw together later. I'm also making my friend Kaisi's guacamole recipe to go with it (except I'm using store salsa because I want to save that step!):
Pulse 2 avocados in a food processor with 2 tbsps of salsa. Add garlic salt and additional salsa to taste. Super simple!
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