The six-generation family-owned farm is, as Anna’s father explains in the film, representative of what happened to a lot of farms in the area. It began as a diverse produce farm, growing fruits and vegetables that would be sold to its surrounding area for food. Nowadays, it only grows corn and soybeans for industrial uses, although one uncle of Anna’s has recently reinstated a livestock operation. What’s the future for Mumford Farms? Anna wonders, as her parents’ generation reaches retirement, and she ponders the possibility of growing real food on it again. The future of Mumford Farms is representative of what’s in store for our larger food system, too.

I had the pleasure of having my garden watered by Anna this morning, and got caught up on this project. Stay tuned as Anna completes the film, and become a supporter of the project if you’re a fan on its Kickstarter campaign. We were lucky to catch a sneak preview of an excerpt from Mumford Farms at the last Hungry Filmmakers screening, in April. You can see more excerpts from the film in progress here and here, too.

Back to urban gardening for now!

Since starting this blog, I’ve been on a mission to explore all sorts of ways (and reasons) to enjoy a home-cooked meal in the city. And I’m impressed by the variety of them that seems to grow every day. Furthermore, many of them share the same values about food — fresh, seasonal, and conscientiously produced. Here’s one great revelation that’s come to home cooking in Brooklyn, a new start-up by Quinn Fitzgerald called Feast Upon.

I was lucky enough to get the inside scoop from Quinn as he was devising the concept for this service earlier this year. It’s simple: pick out a menu that you’d like to prepare from a selection of those created by local chefs. Order it, and Quinn comes to your door with a bag of fresh ingredients and a simple instructions card. It’s the kind of formula that might only work as well as the food turns out, and after tasting the recipes twice, I have to say, the meals came out marvelously.

Since it’s just began, the project is still hyper-local in scope, featuring chefs’ recipes from Park Slope restaurants (such as Palo Santo, whose duck and chimichurri sauce I made), and delivering only to nearby areas so far. But let’s see what Quinn has to say about where it’s going, and how it was founded, in his own words below.

How did you come up with the idea for Feast Upon — were you its perfect target audience?

QF: I saw that cooking at home was too time consuming for many who would otherwise love to do it. So I set out to make it easier for New Yorkers to connect with great food at home. As a frequent entertainer, I developed a formula for hosting dinner parties and dates in New York. I would pick my last great restaurant meal and attempt to replicate it at home. Then I would get obsessive about finding farmers who were growing the best seasonal produce and visit multiple farmers’ markets. And for appetizers and desserts I turned to the new crop of local artisans making incredible breads, cheeses, chocolates and baked goods.

Sometimes the meal was great. But one time, early in my hosting career, I rashly invited more than ten people on short notice to impress a girl. I drastically over-reached with a braised lamb inspired by a recent meal at Dressler. While the lamb didn’t come out until midnight, and by all culinary measures I failed as a host, there was a fun story behind the affair and the night was a success. More importantly it brought the people I cared about together in an intimate setting and I ended up dating the girl for two years.

I found that many share my enthusiasm for eating great food at home, but don’t have the time or the patience to pull it all together. I launched Feast Upon to provide a solution. So yes, I am my target audience, but I think there are a lot of us.

As a kitchen shortcut, Feast Upon almost reminds me of the days when housewives opted for boxes of just-add-water stuff, only with exceptional ingredients and a better outcome. Ha! Do you think people will become better eaters and perhaps cooks overtime with feasting on your concept instead, though?

QF: I’m sure you’re not old enough to have suffered through the dark days of American home-cooking. But yes, our mission is to spread the joy of cooking and part of that is having a bag of tricks. So each of our meals has at least one fun cooking trick not typically used in home kitchens. For example, our Summer Salad recipe calls for quick-pickling an onion. It’s so simple and delicious but the average home-cook wouldn’t think to do it. But since we provide all the ingredients in the right proportions, it’s very hard to screw up. So you can learn with Feast Upon and take it with you the rest of your life.

As for one of the great challenges in home-cooking, timing, we didn’t want everyone to learn the hard way like I did with my midnight lamb. So we worked with food testers and writers to create a single step-by-step instruction page that integrates the recipes for the entrée and the sides. This way you know everything will come out at the same time. Now novice cooks can get a feel for pulling together a full meal without fear of failure.

a great bunch of red Russian kale that came with my duck breast dinner package

How was it working with the chefs who shared their recipes for each of the feasts?

QF: Now we have a routine and it’s pretty simple, but the first few meals took a lot of work.The upside was I got to spend time with Jacques at Palo Santo, Justin at Beer Table and Mike at Flatbush Farm. They are wonderful people and so clearly passionate about their food. On one of my visits to Flatbush Farm, Mike got tired of explaining how to cook his famous chicken. So he took me down to the kitchen and cooked the whole meal in front ofme. He then served it to me in the backyard with a cold beer and said, “That’s how you cook chicken.” Chefs are amazing people and we want to celebrate the inspiration they provide.

Do you hope to expand the offerings outside of your ‘hood in Park Slope?

Absolutely! I want every New Yorker to be able to access on-demand delivery for cooking chef-inspired meals with farm fresh ingredients. Right now we only deliver in Park Slop eand Prospect Heights, but we are getting loads of requests for delivery all over Brooklyn and Manhattan. So last week, we started crowd-sourcing our expansion plan and added a button on our site where you can vote for your neighborhood to be next in line.

What’s your hands-down favorite meal to serve for a:
a) date night for two?

Personally I love risotto for dates. The care involved with stirring in the liquid bit-by-bit while the grains slowly plump with flavor lends itself to a romantic meal. But if you want to impress, Flatbush Farm’s Old World Chicken is the way to go. Each person gets their own small pouissin chicken from this incredible organic farm in North Carolina served on a bed of sautéed chard next to herb infused fingerling potatoes.

b) family dinner for four?

I grew up in a household where cooking was the central focus of our evenings and the whole family got involved. We designed Palo Santo’s Seared Duck Breast with Chimichurri as an alternative to a typical family dinner and as way to get the entire family cooking. Mom can tend to the surprisingly lean Hudson Valley Duck breast, while Dad chops the herbs for the chimichurri and the kids season and toss the potatoes for roasting.

c) Mmm… and large party for ten?

I’m a big fan of buffet style dinners for large groups. And with more people avoiding meat, Beer Table’s Summer Salad & Chickpea Stew is perfect. You can start guests with a light, tangy summer salad with capers roasted cauliflower and pickled onions. Then pass out bowls for a buffet style entrée of tomato, chickpea, barley and couscous stew served over arugula and let guests mix in their own Vermont yogurt and spicy sriracha to taste.

my seared duck breast with chimichurri dinner

What’s your take on why it’s great to “feast upon” meals that you made yourself?

Everyone needs to eat. But what we eat, how we it, and who we eat it with says more about who we are then almost anything. Bringing friends and loved ones together around a home-cooked meal with quality ingredients is one of the great pleasures in life. We want to help make it easier and more fun. But we also want to better connect people with the food on their table. That’s why with each meal we profile the chef who inspired the meal, the farmers who produced the ingredients and the local artisans who made it even better. When you cook with an eye to where your food comes from you are not only supporting the most conscientious food producers, but playing an active role in this incredible food community. And, of course, eating very well.

If you have attended a tasting event held by the Greenmarket, Edible Manhattan/Brooklyn or Just Food, chances are you’ve seen Jacques Gautier. He’s the guy flipping fresh masa tacos before the longest line of people waiting for a bite. Jacques also does this (as well as preparing a hearty menu of fresh, seasonally-inspired Latin cuisine) at his Park Slope restaurant, Palo Santo. As the chef/owner/rooftop gardener of the restaurant, he has a lot on his hands everyday. Yet he still finds time to engage in community events and cooking classes, such as a recent class at Ger-Nis Culinary & Herb Center in Gowanus.

When I heard the name of this particular class, “Pre-Colombian Cuisine: Indigenous Foods of Americas,” and its instructor, I knew I had to finally check this place out. Nissa Pierson has extended her range of services in fresh, sustainable food to include a variety of fun, interactive classes for people of any level of cooking expertise, in a cozy classroom kitchen. Still a distributor of food products, Ger-Nis now has a full calendar of events and classes, often featuring local chefs and artisans like Jacques.

Ger-Nis founder Nissa Pierson introduces the class

When I walked into class, the place already smelled like roasted tomatillos and poblano peppers. I found my friend Noah in the kitchen, peeling the skins of said peppers and placing the slippery flesh into a blender. This would be for Chef Jacques’ green mole sauce. Mole, he explained, can be any number of sauces, even though we tend to think of it as a thick red, earthy-flavored one. For instance, “guacamole,” made from fresh avocadoes, is one. This green mole would accompany a delicious braise of turkey legs that Jacques was just getting started on.

fresh, prickly cactus

As the class went on, Jacques filled us in on how many foods native to the Americas have been embraced around the world — chile peppers, potatoes, tomatoes, etc. With the dozen or so students in the class, we kept up a fluid conversation about these “New World” foods, including those ones that haven’t become so popular afar, like cactus, which we were slicing up for one dish. We split up into groups to prepare the four recipes Jacques was teaching us for the night, and reconvened once it was time to make the tortillas.

grinding corn for masa

Using whole blue corn kernels that had been nixtamalized, soaked and cooked in water for about an hour, we ground up rustic masa dough using a traditional metate y mano, basically, a stone rolling pin and surface. It was pretty arduous work, but after everyone had given it their try a few times, we had enough workable masa for everyone to press a tortilla out of. Jacques doesn’t actually use a metate y mano to grind up his corn every day, but he does make all his tortillas from fresh masa at his restaurant. And over the past year or so, I’ve had the chance to try these as finished tacos with fish, pulled pork, and numerous other things at the many festivals that Palo Santo has participated in. It was humbling to discover how much effort is put into just this step.

Jacques giving a cooking demo at Grand Army Plaza Greenmarket

By the end of the class, we all had the chance to sit down and dine together. Altogether, we had a rich and spicy slow braise of venison, a bright and bubbling dish of turkey legs with green mole sauce, a corn, squash and lima bean succotash with clams, fresh tortillas and guacamole. It was a vibrant feast, and I’ll have to finally check out Palo Santo sometime to have more.

a colorful succotash with squash and clams

In the meantime, though, I was able to wrangle a recipe out of Jacques, as well as a little Q&A below. Dig in! (And for more info on cooking classes in the city, check out Reason #37.)

You’re like, everywhere in the city it seems. Any time there’s an event focused on local food, you’re serving up the best small bite. Why do you think it’s important to participate in these community food events?

Here’s a great recipe for that!

Chimichurri
(from Jacques Gautier, chef of Palo Santo)

Chef’s note: A good summertime recipe for all types of grilled meat and game. This recipe makes enough for 12 large steaks. It is something that keeps well in a jar in the fridge for at least a few weeks.

1 bunch parsley
1/2 bunch cilantro
1/4 bunch oregano
1/4 bunch thyme
1/4 bunch rosemary
1/4 bunch chives
4 cloves garlic
1 shallot
1 red jalapeno
100ml extra virgin olive oil
100ml red wine vinegar
10g kosher salt
2g ground black pepper

Wash, de-stem and chop all herbs. Chop chives. Peel and chop garlic and shallot. Remove seeds and chop chile. Combine everything.

Grill meat. Rest meat. Slice meat. Spoon chimichurri over meat

Cost Calculator, Health Factor and Green Factor ratings respectfully omitted for guest recipes.

I was at a backyard party in Brooklyn a few weeks ago hosted by my friend June. I’d been to her paella party at about this time of year last summer, and so I knew what kind of yumminess to expect from this event. I got there a little late, again. June was just adding the shellfish to a paella pan, plunking clams and mussels hinge side down into the rice. The wide, cast-iron pan was placed on top of a blazing hibachi grill on a small space of concrete. On top of another grill, there were sliced zucchini just going down, the smell of blackened shisito peppers was in the air, and trays full of grilled sausages, browned chicken, rabbit meat and beans flocking the station all told me that June had been laboring over open fire for some time now. My cocktail, served up by a guest/friend behind a makeshift bar, must have gone straight to my sun-weary head. I stood before the barbecue, transfixed, and watched the mussels and clams slowly open in the pan and continue to gape wide, as if they were all preparing to sing the Hallelujah chorus.

Since then, I can’t get paella off the brain, so I had to bug June for her tips and pry her tried-and-true recipe (below!). The detailed procedure she provides in it was eye-opening to me in many ways, and I can’t wait to give it a try. Good ingredients are key: June sagely froze peas from this spring to sprinkle on at the end, while her lima beans were just in-season and fresh. (Beans are a traditional addition often forgotten today, from the dish’s peasant roots.) June is actually a very talented cook of all kinds of food, not just paella. And when not cooking, entertaining or putting up foods for the winter, she is advocating for and visiting regional farms as the farm inspector at GrowNYC. GrowNYC is the non-profit that makes the Greenmarkets happen, and they recently changed its name to that from CENYC, the acronym for Council for the Environment of New York City. And are they ever growing — there are more Greenmarkets, more farms selling at them and more variety amongst them than ever. Have you noticed it this summer, too?

June Russell before her handiwork

As mentioned, the expert’s recipe is below, and I hope you’ll try making it outdoors before the summer’s done. Here are a few more questions I put to Inspector June, in case you had burning questions about the dish, too.

So, you must be Spanish, a true Valencian, correct?

JR: Laughter! A lot of people think that. Must be my mid-western accent, it’s often mistaken for Valencian.

What made you decide to bring paella to Brooklyn?

JR: About six years ago, this woman hired me to cook for her husband’s 50^th birthday. He was a volunteer fire fighter, and had just built a fire pit he was really proud of and wanted to use for his party. So I did paella for him and bought a large paella pan to do the job. I had also just moved to Brooklyn with my girlfriend, into a garden apartment with space to grill and entertain. I did my first party with friends that same summer. Everybody brought an ingredient, it was a blast.

How did you learn how to make this dish?

JR: I worked in the kitchen at Zingerman’s in the 90’s, and made vegetarian paella almost every day during Spanish Food month. They would, and still do, an authentic paella out on the patio, so I watched and learned. I have learned a few other tricks over the years though, like making the sofrito ahead of time to really build some flavor from the base, and saving broth and drippings from the sausages and meats I prepare ahead of time.

Does it really need to be cooked outdoors over an open flame?

JR: No, you can cook a paella stovetop as long as your pan fits the burner, but it is traditionally an outdoor production. I have two different sized pans now, and the large one fits perfectly on my grill. I can get a more even heat on the grill then I could from a burner, and the rice cooks better that way. La Tienda has paella burners that use propane but I haven’t bought one yet. Paella is a great high summer dish to make, when everything is bountiful at the market and you just want to be cooking outside.

hot coals heat a bubbling paella pan

What makes paella a great dish to serve up at a party?

JR: People don’t get to see paella being made very often, so it is fun to see people’s reactions to watching it all come together, especially when the shellfish start to open. There’s lots of oohs and ahhs. It’s also a great way to feed a lot of people. I was in France a few years ago during the Tour de France, and these guys were making a ginormous paella to feed the crowd that was there to cheer on the riders. It seemed like their version of street fair food.

Rachel Wharton watches the shells open, too

What’s the best part about paella, in your opinion?

JR: As a cook, you can’t help but get obsessed with the crust or the socarrat. When you get the heat and the timing right, the rice forms a crust on the bottom that adds a great texture to the dish that is coveted by paella lovers. When I worked with Dominican and Puerto Rican kids on the Lower East Side we made arroz con gandules and they would always let the rice burn a little and make a crust. The kids said that the elders always love the “con-con.” I love that image, and think a lot about what that means. And I’m just smitten with how beautiful it is when it’s all done.

What is your official title at GrowNYC?

JR: My coworker warned against titles which contain an “and” but I manage Farm Inspections AND strategic development and regulations. My role has expanded in the last year, and has not settled into a tidy moniker yet.

How long have you been with the organization?

JR: I have been with Greenmarket for over six years. I started by managing neighborhood markets and doing cooking demos at Union Square. I LOVE neighborhood markets, People don’t realize how great they are, or what an incredible network we have. People fixate on Union Square, which is great, but there is a lot more.

So does being an inspector mean you’re like a cop?

JR: I am really (don’t tell anyone) primarily an advocate. I spend a lot of time at markets and on farms, mostly learning the issues, ebbs, flows, and products that our farmers and region produces. Sometimes you come across someone who is pushing the line and we address that when it happens. But because I spend so much time out in the region, I have become a pretty good scout, looking for ways to tie Greenmarket into a larger, viable food system. That work has become really exciting for us, and has lead to projects such as facilitating the renewal of grain production in the Northeast, and we are now working to connect farmers with processors and processing initiatives in the city.

So maybe some short-grain rice for paella can be found at the Greenmarket soon? Check back in a few weeks to see, and in the meantime, here’s that recipe!

June Russell’s Summer Party-Perfect Paella
(for a 22-inch paella pan)
serves 15-18 people

3-4 medium onions
4-6 cloves garlic
3 (total) red & yellow bell peppers
1 quart canned tomatoes, preferably put up from last year
1 lb Merguez sausages (Dancing Ewe Farm)
1 lb pork sausages (Arcadian Pastures)
1 whole rabbit (2.5-3lbs)
12-18 clams
12-18 mussels
4 cups short-grain rice
1 tsp saffron, toasted and minced
2 tsps paprika
2-3 bay leaves
2 cups lima beans
2 cups fresh peas
9 cups liquid*

*Barnyard stock (stock made from all the bones saved in the freezer until there is enough to make stock with) and water. I use a 1:1 ratio of stock to water, plus all the drippings (see below) so there is lots of flavor, but it’s not too rich.

Day before:

I do the sofrito the day before so that it cooks down slow and gentle.

Dice the onions and peppers to a quarter inch and sweat on a low heat until soft and sweet. (Add the garlic after the onions and peppers have been cooking down for about 10 minutes.) This can take a while, like 45 minutes or more.

Add tomatoes and simmer on low until the mixture gets thick. Let cool and refrigerate.

Day of prep:

Cook the sausages.

And the rabbit; break the rabbit down into pieces, salt, brown in a skillet and finish in a hot oven.

Save all the juice and drippings from everything to add to the liquid*.

Clean shellfish: wash the clams well, and de-beard the mussels.

Prep the mis en place; get everything you need ready to go at your grill station.

To cook the paella:

Light a charcoal fire, with enough briquettes to make a double layer of coals around the grill bed. I use charcoal briquettes because they generate a lot of strong, even heat and last a long time.

Tip: While the grill is hot, I use a comale to cook off shisitso peppers, and some haloumi cheese for starters.

When the coals burn down to an even medium-high heat, place the paella pan on the grill, and let it heat up. Add the sofrito and let it get hot, stirring constantly. Add the paella rice and saffron and stir the rice into the sofrito, like a pilaf, letting all of the rice kernels get coated with the sofrito and turn slightly translucent.

Add the combined liquid, paprika and bay leaves. Stir well, getting the rice evenly distributed around the pan. Add the meats, placing evenly around the pan. Leave it alone.

When half of the liquid has cooked into the rice, place the shellfish, hinge side down, into the paella, evenly distributed around the pan. Add the lima beans. When there is just a little liquid left, and the shellfish have opened, add the peas. Let it cook until it appears all the liquid has cooked into the rice. Remove from the heat and let it finish cooking for another 5-7 minutes.

(Cost Calculator, Health Factor and Green Factor respectfully omitted for guest recipes.)

It’s summer. There’s produce, plenty of it local. It’s coming to supermarkets, restaurants and Greenmarkets throughout New York City. But one place you won’t hardly ever find it at is a bodega, those convenient, often round-the-clock shops where you can get toothpaste and telephone cards or tonight’s dinner of ramen and chips. Unfortunately, this is the only type of grocery store that exists in increasingly more communities here.

That’s why the Healthy Bodegas Initiative was formed in 2005, aimed at increasing access to fresh food and improving the health of all New Yorkers through its bodegas. Targeting the most underserved areas, or healthy “food deserts,” the mission has partnered with many bodegas and local organizations, such as the Greenmarket of Grow NYC (previously called CENYC). Check out Kerry Trueman’s great interview with the initiative’s founder, Donya Williams, on Food Systems NYC. And read below for an interview with Justone Bossert, Director of NYC Operations for Red Jacket Orchards, an upstate, family-operated fruit farm that’s joined the cause.

But first, check out their Kickstarter campaign, and pledge what you can to help them innovate and implement solutions to bringing good food to bodega shelves in the places that need it most. If you’ve already been deluged with Kickstarter campaigns coming from everyone and your cousin’s uncle, I can relate. But one play of that video might make you want to pitch in. Read on for Justone’s explanation of what your donation will go toward. And hot tip: they’ve “just harvested some early season white cherries,” which should be available at the Greenmarket soon.

According to your website, Red Jacket grows apples, strawberries, raspberries, cherries, peaches and plums — and then of course, all different varieties of which. That’s a lot of orchards! Am I missing anything else?

JB: It is a lot of orchards, and that’s good. It means we are increasing the amount of locally grown fruit available and saving farmland from being developed. A big part of our success is always having the next new thing and being very focused on what the customer wants. It is our goal to make fresh, healthy fruit available  to all of New York.

We grow every type of fruit this climate can support. In addition to the one you mentioned we also grow blueberries, wild black raspberries, currants (black, red and champagne), red and green gooseberries, nectarines, apricots, prunes, rhubarb, and grapes.

How long has Red Jacket Orchard been selling at the NYC Greenmarket?

JB: We started attending Greenmarkets in 1992 and it didn’t take long for gourmet stores to start seeking us out and we have continued to broaden the types of places that carry our product ever since.

How did you get involved with the Healthy Bodegas Initiative?

JB: We were contacted by Michael Hurwitz of Greenmarket and Donya Williams of the NYC Dept. of Health about the city’s Healthy Bodegas Initiative. This program had made some great progress reaching out to Bodegas and getting people interested in selling healthy food, but did not have anyway to get it to them. That is where we come in. We are one of the few farms that not only grow food, but also distribute it. It is part of our mission to increase the availability of great tasting local fruit and having our own trucks allows us to take on the gaps in the existing food system.

How many bodegas have you partnered with so far, and how did the owners overall respond to your idea?

JB: We have only just started, but we are already working with a dozen or so bodegas and the owner’s have been enthusiastic about a distribution system designed to get them better product to sell to their customers. Bodega owners often want to sell fresh produce, the problem is that there isn’t a system to support them. That is the problem we are trying to solve.

samples of Red Jacket Orchards apples at Union Square Greenmarket

Many bodegas in my neighborhood carry some fresh fruit, but not enough people buy them. How do you hope to engage and entice the community to purchase them?

JB: The main problem with the fruit that you usually find in bodegas, if they have any, is that it doesn’t taste good. The reason it doesn’t taste good is because its probably old, not properly handled, and certainly not local. Our program aims to help the bodegas properly handle and display the product so that in can compete with the unhealthy stuff. When people try something fresh picked and tree-ripened their reaction is “Wow.” All you have to do is let people know that this fruit is different and let them try it. The pleasure they get from tasting it does the rest.

What do you think the biggest challenges are going to be with selling your product in these bodegas?

JB: The biggest challenge is that the entire food system is stacked in favor of the least healthy foods. Turning that around is going to take a long time, but the first steps are simple: get fresh local food to the places where people shop, handle it in such a way to ensure its quality, and let people know it is there and why it is different. The good food movement has succeeded because fresh picked local food tastes great. Once people get access to it and try it they don’t want to eat anything else.

What do you hope the best takeaway from this project will be?

JB: The goal of this project is to create a self sustaining model for distributing healthy local produce to food desserts.  The best takeaway would be for this model to be adopted and adapted in other places it is needed.

There has been much talk about the dearth of fresh food in underserved communities throughout NYC. Have you been inspired by or took lessons from any other initiatives for the same cause?

JB: We are lucky enough to be living in a time and place where many people are attempting to correct these sorts of inequities. There are so many groups and individuals that we learn from, but I think the most inspiring thing is the feeling in the air that comes from a lot of little steps happening at the same time. There is a lot of energy around solving these problems and I hope we all see a lasting solution come to fruition.

Aside from donating through the Kickstarter campaign, what else can we do to lend a hand?

JB: The Kickstarter campaign is important, it will allow us to expand the program to the point where it will become self sustaining.  Other than contributions to the campaign, going to these bodegas and buying the produce is a great way to support the initiative. We will be listing the bodegas we are working with on our Kickstarter page.

If you’d like to receive a free download of How to Cook Everything, just come up with a creative answer to this question in a comment on this post: What would you like to see a new food-related app for? I’ll select five winners at random.

And now, a few questions for Mr. Bittman himself. Thanks to Culinate for helping set up our phone interview. Also, you can hear us chat more when Mark Bittman joins me live in the studio on Let’s Eat In on Monday, May 3th. So don’t forget to tune in for that! For now, let’s hear what Mark had to say about this app, the future of the cookbook, and his next projects in store.

Me: So this iPhone app is really a milestone in food literature, or technology, as it were.

MB: Do you think so? I haven’t been following the app world, I knew it was a huge deal to get HTCE in an electronic searchable form, and Culinate was really great at developing the shopping lists, timers, etc., but I didn’t really know until this week that it was sort of groundbreaking. So it’s really exciting, it’s really useful.

Me: Do you think it’s more practical than the cookbook?

MB: I think the app’s strengths… while it’s not harmful in the kitchen, its strengths are going to be in the supermarket, or in the subway, in the bathroom –

Me: Well that’s where I do most of my cooking anyway!

MB: (laughs) Well, when you’re thinking, what should I make? And suddenly, you have a database with 1,500 or more recipes, then you can take that to the supermarket and go shopping. You can cook from the iPhone app, but I’d still rather cook from the book.

Me: So maybe it’s a good device for beginners? Who are just starting to cook more. A lot of people ask me, how do I know what to cook with X?

MB: Yeah, that’s true. I think for me, I might say, I want to make a pasta with… I don’t know, artichokes, and, what am I forgetting? Oh yeah, I have to have some butter. Or, here’s some nice artichokes at the market, and on the spot look up recipes to make with them.

mmm… artichokes

Me: So since this app is really groundbreaking, would you consider yourself a pioneer in the food world?

MB: Certainly not in the electronic food world. The short answer is no, I don’t. But when it came out ten years ago, How to Cook Everything was the first sort of modern, ground-up, basic, comprehensive cookbook that really took international flavors into it — maybe ever. There were international cookbooks before, but they didn’t incorporate standard American aesthetics and ingredients, and what you can find in average supermarkets. Supermarkets have a lot of international foods now, and that was not the case before.

Among the biggest changes in American eating in the last twenty years is that maybe we’ll no longer think of European food as superior to Asian food. We were a largely European country for 200 years, and now, really, we’re not. I think the beauty of Asian cuisine in a non-specific Asian cookbook is a large part of its contribution, and I’m proud of that.

Me: I know you must have learned how to cook many things after publishing How to Cook Everything. What are some of the foods or techniques you’ve discovered since?

MB: I think if you look at HTCE and Food Matters, you can sort of see a general shift in style between less-meatarian cooking, I think it describes a lot of what I’m doing now, which is very vegetarian and vegan-friendly — there’s a lot of vegetarian recipes, that’s an overall trend in my cooking and I expect it will continue. I feel like I learned something and I do something new every day — I often wake up, like today, and I know I’m not home for lunch or dinner, so what I did was I looked around in my kitchen and saw some tomatoes on the counter, and had some baby artichokes and made a kind of artichoke and tomato stew. It’s about 8-10 baby artichokes, garlic and tomatoes. I don’t recall having made that before. And I’m really happy about that. It’s not revolutionary cooking, but I’ll probably blog about it, that’s the nice thing about blogging is that you can just do this, as I’m sure you know.

let’s grow, tomatoes!

Me: So do you prefer blogging, or electronic to print media? Are books dead?

MB: I don’t think print is dead, there’s still a role for cookbooks in the kitchen, and if more people end up using iPads, it’s not that far from print. It can’t be free and there’s a whole discussion about that. I don’t think that good work by good people is going to be free, and we all should be able to discern between people who are just throwing stuff up there and those who are talented and hardworking and experienced, and is really worth something. This is not strictly a cooking question but a journalism question, it’s the same in the arts or anything — anyone can claim to be a painter, but presumably the cream rises to the top.

Me: On that topic, what’s the story with this new markbittman.com site relaunch?

MB: I haven’t thought about any sort of official launch publicity, hopefully it’ll be launched next Monday, on the day of your radio show, or the next, next Monday. But it will be much more dynamic and not a static site, with myself a bunch of other people blogging hopefully two to three posts per day, and not only food writers, but activists, farmers, producers, economists, anyone with something interesting to say in the world of food. It’ll sort of follow the salon type of blog, or a slog, where people can say what they want and meet and hopefully it’ll be a little more interactive. But we’ll see, I’m approaching it with great optimism and also great caution. We have a lot of exciting people who have decided to contribute. When I started markbittman.com, I didn’t know how popular it would be. It’s a tough world like with so many other sites, but I saw that there was a great need out there in the food world and I wasn’t doing what I should or could be doing for it, and I wanted to give this a chance, and to try it out.

Me: Well I’m very excited about it. Thanks for sharing!

The Farmers’ Market Sweep is April 11th — come down to cheer on these contestants in a food-politics trivia! Louisa Shafia, Just Food staff, and more will go head-to-head on their food-movement know-how at this live music-filled party. (Goodness knows I would have loved to be there with everyone if that date didn’t find me in Boston for a sustainable expo, D2E. D’oh!) In any case, you can learn more about the upcoming bike tour from Aaron and Robert yourself then, and you can also VOTE now to help get it off the ground at their Pepsi Refresh fundraising page. Voting ends March 31, and their proposal will need to stay among the top ten most-voted to get funding.

I’m sure you’re full of questions for these intrepid biker-foodies. So let’s hear it from Aaron and Robert themselves. Both of them chimed in for this interview via email below, which I’ve peppered with photos from some of my favorite potlucks over the years.

What inspired you to start spreading awareness about local food? Was there any one kicker or was it just a growing concern?

Ever since reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma in 2007, we’ve been thinking a lot about the food system – a grand irony, considering at that time we were studying at a school funded by Big Ag and CAFOs in Northern Colorado.

Over the last couple of years we took in a lot of information from friends, articles, films, and books, and became increasingly concerned, yet optimistic, about the current state of our food system.

We wanted to do something that would encompass communities across the country, and our original plan was to create a simple book at the end of the trip. But we felt we’d have a greater impact sharing our journey online as it unfolds, using social media as a vehicle to tell the stories to thousands.

How do you hope to engage people over the course of your tour?

Over food! As they say, great discussion happens at the dinner table, or in our case,
with food in hand. We felt that spurring discussion about local food, while sharing edibles grown and cooked in the community, would make everyone feel comfortable about sharing stories and ideas – and what better way to broach the subject of food!

Our aim is not to preach, or even teach — we’re not experts — but to ask questions, listen, and document the stories we find. We’ve already put some feelers out at our respective homes, with positive results. But we can’t wait to start meeting folks.

What’s the most important practice or lesson you hope people will take away from it?

Think before you buy! We want to get people thinking more about the positive
implications of buying locally, of supporting sustainable agriculture, no matter how much they currently know about our food system.

It’s very important to us that we talk with a wide range of individuals in terms of their food knowledge and eating habits – foodies and farmers, of course, but all sorts of other Americans, too. We want someone who hadn’t thought about the implications of eating locally to start thinking about it; someone who occasionally buys locally to visit the farmers’ market more often or start a monthly dinner discussion group; someone who knows a lot about the food system but hasn’t been very active or vocal to make something happen in their community.

We’ve heard of marches and walks for a cause — for disease research, social justice, etc. Do you think that your cause (the good food movement) will go down as a major concern of our generation?

Without a doubt. When we began to plan this trip last year, it seemed awareness of the Local Food Movement was nowhere near what it is now – it’s phenomenal to see how much momentum this movement has gained over the past couple of years, propelled by celebrity journalists and farmers and smaller projects like ours too. We’ve seen restaurants switch to locally-sourced foods, Michelle Obama plant a garden, and just recently, Jamie Oliver talk about healthy eating at a school in West Virginia.

This generation is more environmentally conscious than many before it. And it’s showing through in what we’re choosing to eat. Community gardens are popping up all over and farmer’s markets are busier than ever. We don’t think it’s a fad.

Your ride reminds me of another bike ride, by three women who visited small farms around the country and documented their journey in a film, Faces From the New Farm (shown at Hungry Filmmakers I). Were you aware of that project before deciding on yours?

We had no idea their film was made prior to deciding to potluck across America – but it was a nice surprise. Shortly after we learned of Women’s Garden Cycles, we found out that Robert lives near one of the filmmakers. Robert and Lara from WGC had the opportunity to exchange thoughts, ideas, and advice about the trip.

That’s one of the great things about the Local Food Movement right now – there is an overwhelming sense of mutual support. We hope to meet up with the rest of their group in Nebraska this summer.

Are you and Robert looking for other bikers to possibly join you along the ride?

Sure! Our schedule might be tight from place to place, but we’d love to have folks join us for a stretch of the ride and share in some good local food.

Aside from the twelve potlucks you’ll be throwing throughout the country, what do you think you’ll be eating on the bike tour?

Wild garlic, cattails, and dandelions. We’ve picked up a couple of books on foraging and have been talking with Ava Chin, the NY Times wild food blogger. We are excited to explore many of the foragable foods typically perceived as simple grass, weeds, or berries not typically found at the store. We wouldn’t mind happening upon a raspberry bush or fig tree, either. Yum.

Aside from our wild food adventures, we’ll eat locally whenever possible, shopping at local farmers markets and roadside stands. It’s going to be tough at times, and completely unreasonable at others, but we’ll do our best.

Have you always enjoyed cooking, or having potlucks?

Both! We started cooking together in college, getting into the finer side of knife skills, food prep, and delicious dishes. After school, we found that a great way to meet folks and engage in good discussion was through big dinners and potlucks. The last couple of years have been filled with many potlucks of varying themes: Foods-that-start-with-the-letter-A-luck, Internationaluck, Localluck, Social-Movement-luck, Soupluck, etc. We’ve also been participating in a weekly ‘family dinner’ in Brooklyn.

What’s on your ideal potluck spread? Feel free to describe a favorite communal feast you had in detail!

We had a great Thanksgiving meal this year in DC with pumpkin pies, zesty stuffing, figgy pudding, and sweet potato casserole. But the centerpiece of the meal was the Squrkey. We wanted the meal to be local and vegetarian, so we roasted a massive turkey-shaped blue hubbard squash from Pennsylvania, stuffed it with roasted veggies from local markets and built it up like a bird. Voila — a squrkey! It was delicious. And it kept our bellies full all weekend.

There were many things that blew my socks off at a dinner Sunday night, held in a cozy Brooklyn ground-floor apartment. The basil-ricotta gnocchi was one of them. The lamb pot pies (above) were definitely another. But the one thing that really struck me the most was when, while casually biting off chunks of his garlic sauce-smothered lamb breast and duck fat confit hors d’oeuvres, Tamarack Hollow Farm founder/farmer Mike Betit said, “The first two years [of starting his farm], I lost money. The third year, when I started selling at the NYC Greenmarket, I broke even.”

Holy cow (or lamb)! What in the world would make someone continue their work after such dire straits? Commitment. Passion. Principle. In a word, belief in humane, pasture-raised livestock and its subsequently delicious meats. To me this is a true example of the dedication, if reckless, of all the farmers who truck their goods in each week to the Greenmarket, and the strength of its support for small farms in return.

Before and during the four-course dinner that myself and twelve other New Yorkers enjoyed that night, Mike shared a few other tales of his trade. Between the lamb-based courses prepared by him and our talented chef-hostess, and the conversations about small farms and animal raising, the dinner was rich, meaty and oh so filling. Here are some of the things Mike had to say.

savory lamb sausages at the hors d’oeuvres table

What’s in these delicious sausages?

Rosemary, red wine and Feta.

Are there any more of these being sold at your Union Square Greenmarket stand?

No, these were a small run, and they’re all out. As with so many things [at the Greenmarket], investigation pays off. There are so many limited-run things from everyone.

Why does Tamarack Hollow Farm only sell on Wednesdays at Union Square? Why not at other Greenmarket locations, too?

Well, there are a lot of politics about who gets to sell at what market. But for better or for worse, I’ve purposely hung my hat on Wednesday at Union Square. I can cultivate a following of customers who always know I’m there then.

Mike Betit (center, standing) shares his farming philosophy

How long does it take you to drive to NYC each week from your home in Vermont?

Five hours, each way.

When did you begin farming?

I started raising pigs in 2003. The first year, I lost about 8k, the second year, about 16k. The third year, when I began selling at the [NYC] Greenmarket, I broke even.

Do you also sell locally, around Vermont?

Yes, I’ve always sold there, but there’s less demand for the type of meat I produce than in NYC.

What did you do before you became a farmer?

I taught. I was a field guide at an alternative school for at-risk youth. I was “Outdoor Mike.”

twice-cooked lamb breast (aka belly) with turnips and basil ricotta gnocchi. According to Mike, lamb breast is on the rise to becoming the new “in” cut

What animals do you currently raise?

Aside from sheep and pigs, I raise ducks, turkeys and geese. [After some table conversation about Berkshire pork and other heritage animal breeds]… Breed has less to do with the resulting meat than the production practices. Ten years ago, Berkshire pork was a nonexistent market condition. Now it’s a selling point, but you can produce Berkshire pork just the same way as the rest of [today's industrial, factory-like farmed] pork is, and come out with the same kind of quality. The way I see it, management comes first; breed is second. I really think if you manage the breed well, that will affect your product the most.

What else have you got on the horizon for Tamarack Hollow Farm?

We’re adding veal this year to our offerings, and eggs. We’ve got eggs that have yolks so dense it’s like tapioca. It’s almost dark red.

Now that is one good egg.

Catch Mike selling his savory meats at Union Square Greenmarket, every Wednesday!

Tamarack Hollow Farms-related posts:
Where To Get Your Gobble Gobble
Who Took the s’MACdown Crown?
Pommes de Porc Cassoulet

What’s more fun than cooking, learning and eating together spectacularly? If you’re someone like me, the answer is nothing. If you’re someone like Michael J. Cirino, founder of the educational workshop and supper club A Razor, A Shiny Knife – no wait, scratch that. There is no one on the planet like Michael J. Cirino. I guarantee you that.

This is the profile I’ve been waiting with great anticipation to share. You see, what began with my simple curiosity about his supper club scheme and a desire to post a recap of a dinner, perhaps, has resulted in months of collaboration, experimentation, sharing and overall apprenticeship in the kitchens of A Razor, A Shiny Knife. (When a cousin asked me if I would enroll in culinary school at Thanksgiving, my first thought was, now why would I do that when I can just keep cooking with all the people in A Razor, A Shiny Knife?) Needless to say, the concept of this supper club is one that I’m a great fan of. And judging from the number of subscribers to the club’s email list, not to mention this New York Times article from a few months ago, I’m not the only one.

pesto trenette pasta “bird’s nest” with a poached quail egg, mushroom hot whipped cream and a fried basil leaf

pumpkin seed “risotto” with ham hocks and vacuum-compressed pumpkin balls

golden beet custard cubes with turnip ribbons, beet noodles with passion fruit juice and aji and pectin-glued sliced beet sheets

dinner/workshop guests learn and lend a hand

Having hosted dinners ranging from a five-course menu interspersed with theatrical acts to an all-night backyard pig roast with a Korean theme, Michael is always seeking the next unsuspecting food target to conquer. This December and January, he intends to recreate, dish-for-dish, the twenty-course dinners presented by Thomas Keller and Grant Achatz in a series of workshops and dinners in New York, Chicago and L.A. called “Breaking Bread and Boundaries.” They may not be prepared by the master chefs themselves, but knowing this meticulous maestro, I’m certain they will be perhaps the greatest achievement in culinary facsimile ever.

I stopped Michael from cooking and planning for ten minutes to answer the following questions.

What does the J stand for in Michael J. Cirino?

Joseph after my grandfather on my father’s side. He was the son of a chef and came from the beautiful port town of Milazzo in Sicily. It was said that my great-grandfather only ate the hearts of the romaine because the rest was for horses. My grandfather Joseph was an amazing baker who got celiac disease, loved to melt blue cheese on the steaks that he only cooked in pans on the stovetop. He also hated air conditioning.

Where in tarnation did you learn to cook like that?

My grandparents, my parents, books, Heather Walleston, Daniel (Parcé) Castaño, the internet, Harold McGee, you and everyone who I have ever cooked with.

What’s the mission of A Razor, A Shiny Knife?

To create an atmosphere where people can exchange ideas and allow for a venue and path for those new ideas, no matter which art they lie in, to foster and grow.

Why did you start it?

Because I do not like to go out and it was more fun to entertain at home. Because I missed having my friends and family in the kitchen with me while we prepared dinner instead of just around the table for supper.

The New York Times article was titled “The Anti-Restaurants.” Are you or is your supper club anti-restaurant?

We have nothing to do with restaurants. We do not think of ourselves as an underground restaurant. We strive for an entirely different set of goals. We look to create an environment that will allow for social interaction, education and our theatrical presentation of the food and the larger event. We hope to elevate the dining experience to a level that is higher than just serving food.

What percent of your skills would you say were learned from hands-on demonstration from other chefs or instructors, as opposed to reading/watching/hearing?

I would say that 20% of what I learned was by being taught, but the 20% I was taught were the base lessons; knife skills, pasta making, sauce making, bread baking, and the book and secondary education allowed me to take these base skills and progress with them.

Do you have a favorite gadget?

Vacuum chambers are one of the most useful devices in a kitchen. It is truly a shame they are so expensive because it is amazing what can be accomplished with one.

Worst mess-up of a dish?

Serrano ham and ancho granita. I liked it because it was sweet and savory with a touch of spice but people resoundingly said it was wildly offensive.

Best thing you ever cooked?

Slow-poached ravioli stuffed with homemade ricotta and pheasant yolks, served in a duck buerre blanc and topped with sautéed ramps, toasted long peppers and a shaving of locatelli cheese. I made it for Father’s Day. I don’t think my dad liked it at first but then the garlicky flavor of the ramps really won him over.

Look, I tried to make this interview not come off so cheesy. I tried to avoid the corny jokes and snafu of food puns that riddled my last in-depth profile. But seeing as cheese and corn are both main ingredients of Emily’s signature “Seduction” Casserole, Mac and Corn 2.0, the conversation naturally veered off to the deliciously lighthearted. And that’s not such a bad way of describing her just-published cookbook, Casserole Crazy: Hot Stuff for Your Oven!.

As Emily Farris‘ first cookbook, Casserole Crazy culls the best examples of that one-dish comfort food from a wide range of sources, including herself. Nostalgic favorites like Classic Tuna Noodle Casserole and nouveau innovations like Beet and Potato au Gratin are all represented throughout its 125 recipes. Easy to flip through and find your next supper, the book even features recipes by superstars Bobby Flay, Donatella Arpaia and Camille Becerra. But of course I love the fact that it contains so many homespun recipes from average-folk friends and family of Emily’s (including me!). There’s also an Introduction by Julie & Julia author Julie Powell.

But how did Emily get so casserole crazy and what were her motives for spreading this disease? I got to dine at Emily’s on her Beefy Mac Casserole, wine and lots of cheese for a super formal interview-cum girl talk.

the house special: cheesy, spicy, Beefy Mac

When I hear “casserole” I think distinctly unsexy, middle-American home cooking. Are you trying to give it a makeover by calling it “Hot Stuff For your Oven?” Or embrace the kitsch?

I hesitate to use the word kitsch because casseroles are something that I’m very earnest about. I grew up in the Midwest [Missouri] on casseroles. When I moved to New York eight years ago, my roommate and I threw this party. I made a Mac and Corn Casserole, and this one friend, a total food snob, ate three servings of it. I thought, whoa, I’m onto something here — I need to revive casseroles. I think that anything you make from the heart can be really sexy. Anything that’s personal to you, or that you spent time on.

Is that how the famous Casserole Party got started?

The Casserole Party began as an idea to get people excited to come over, make casseroles and eat with us. People bail on parties a lot, but if there was a competition and you had to RSVP for it, people suddenly got serious. The first two Casserole Parties were held in my apartment. By the third one, we had so many entries that I had to move it to a nearby restaurant, Brooklyn Label. That’s where the next one will be held, too [on November 10th, FYI! --Ed.].

hunks of smoked gouda, pre-melting

How do you define a casserole, and what’s the most important ingredient?

I say casseroles are two or more ingredients, mixed, not layered, and baked with some sort of liquid. Structure-wise, there should be moisture, something that will bind it all together. As for ingredients, almost all of my casseroles call for one large white onion. But I think the recipes are really about inspiration — I’m not one to stick to recipes. So if you like cheddar and Gouda, for instance [the combination of cheeses in the Beefy Mac Casserole we were eating --Ed.], you can replace it for something else in another dish, or create something new with it.

Why do we so often associate casseroles with canned foods?

It was economic at the time casseroles were being made popular. A “casserole” is technically the baking dish, so when it was being marketed to housewives in the 1950′s, companies includied little cookbooks for one-dish recipes and such. And back then, anything canned was considered modern, too. From the 1980′s on, people have moved away from canned food a lot, but people who make casseroles for economic thriftiness still use it. A lot of my recipes swap fresh for canned food — like my Sweet Potato Not Pie was sort of my take on my dad’s favorite canned candied yams.

a few pieces of Emily’s vintage cookware collection

So is the casserole a distinctly American food?

What we think of when we hear the word is probably Midwestern, suburban family-style meals, or “hotdishes” as they call it in Minnesota. But there are a lot of similar foods in other cultures, like enchiladas, lasagna, baked kugel or ziti.

Is there a reason casseroles haven’t been embraced by restaurants too much?

Well, going back to casseroles being the dish itself, yes. But a lot of restaurants are serving casserole-like foods. Like mac and cheese, there’s tons of it — people crave comfort food. Paloma has a great poblano gratin on the menu. Casserole cooking is more about the method than the presentation — when you bake, all the flavors mix. And casseroles are not so pretty by nature.

isn’t she lovely: Ms. Farris with her finished entree

What’s this about you and a bunch of guys named John?

It’s a project in the works, called Dinner with John. It’s going to be based on a series of 52 dinners I’ll make for different guys named John.

Can’t wait to see how that goes. Finally, who do you think your book is for?

I think that it’s a book for people who like to eat and don’t always have a lot of time. It’s not for people who are really trying to impress someone, but it’s about accessibility — there aren’t really any recipes that you can’t find all the ingredients for in an average grocery store. That’s what I was going for.