It is really cold here now, and we finally have snow. I think we haven't been out of the teens for several days now, pretty cold for December, but at least now it is wrapped in the peaceful white blanket of winter. Better than cold and just brown ground, which we had a few days ago.
I purchased a couple of hard mangoes several days ago. Each day I have been checking them to see if they are ready to eat. Today one was ready. It is not a local mango. They do not grow them here in Michigan, even in hoop houses! I guess it is a good thing that I was born after technology had gone far enough to bring mangoes to my Ypsilanti door, and any other citrusy fruit that saves us from scurvy!!! in the middle of winter.
I say this because I am, of course, known for my support of local food. And I do support the movement. I just made the first winter veggie roast the other day. It is so satisfying to have the heft of the root vegetables in a balsamic glaze when the weather is frigid. I even added some sweetness with maple syrup this time. All the veggies were local, either from the Ypsi Food Co-op or the AA farmer's market. I even make an effort to buy it from the farmer who IS growing it in hoop houses in Riga, Michigan.
But citrus, or mangoes are not on his or any other farmer's list.
So am I being bad?
I suppose to some die hards I am. That is okay. No one is perfect, and few if any are totally sustainable. I am okay with that. Here is the reason why.
Back in the day when i lived in LA I remember that everyone had their own "correct" and "healthy" diet, and few were tolerant of any one elses definition of healthy.
"What? you are serving meat?" I don't think anyone I knew when I left was still eating meat. when the average American eats nearly 200 pounds of meat annually, the vegetarian stance can be pretty radical to the rest of America.
"OMG how can you have dairy items that have rennet?"
"Tell me please that you aren't serving fruits mixed with your vegetables?"
"What no Soy milk for my coffee?"
It was getting so that I was afraid to cook anything. I was going to offend someone. Give me a break! (but of course they didn't). So I decided that this high than thou attitude had to end. I was going to serve what I was going to serve. nothing wrong with some moderation.(Can't we all get along?) If you don't like it, then don't come. Fortunately I had help.
My dissertation topic was hog CAFOs (concentrated animal feeding operations). Hard to be writing on that when you were a vegetarian. And the Oklahoma farmers where i was doing my research were very aware when I came to call. A woman from LA? Working on CAFOs? They (rightly) feared I was a member of PETA, and would slice through their world with a cleaver that is very specific to their milieu. But I was coming from that place I mentioned earlier in this missive. I believe in moderation in all things. i had to see the world through their eyes. their world was just a little bit different than the soy milk world of LA. And it was a good thing had had that attitude because the farmers were no fools.
The first thing they would do when we started to know one another is invite me to lunch. while I appreciated sharing the meal, what they really wanted to know was: DID I EAT MEAT?
I was newly recovered from a bout of vegetarianism. One had a hard time not being vegetarian as some point in their life while living in LA, but i was never hard core. Even in the depths of one of my bouts, if I found myself near some BBQ ribs, I was in trouble. Moderation.
So when I moved to Michigan to teach at EMU, I came as a moderate in my food concerns. I am even now pretty radical for Michigan, (the other day I was trying to find some barley to make a barley soup and the grocery clerks at the market didn't even know what barley was. "Is is a fruit?" It turned out this big box market had NO barley. What is this world coming to? I should have purchased it at the coop) but I am sure that unless LA has changed radically itself (I don't think so) I am a moderate.
Good. I should be moderate in some ways. It is not a bad thing. And it allows me to eat mangoes in the snow.
Sometimes it is okay to be a moderate.
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