"local" news and stories

Wal-Mart practically had us at hello with their sustainability announcement yesterday, and we weren't alone. News that the retailing behemoth was launching a new global commitment to sustainable agriculture, with a focus on small and medium-sized farmers had blogs and Twitter feeds ablaze.

The announcement wasn't vague. It outlined specific goals that Wal-Mart is committed to reach by 2015. Among them:

* Selling $1 billion in food sourced from 1 million small and medium farmers.
* Asking suppliers about the water, energy, fertilizer and pesticide used per unit of food produced.
* Implementing a requirement for sustainably sourced palm oil for all Wal-Mart private-brand products.
* Sourcing only beef that does not contribute to the deforestation of the Brazilian Amazon.

"Grocery is more than half of Wal-Mart's business," Michael T. Duke, president and chief executive was quoted as saying in The New York Times. "Yet only four of our 39 public sustainability goals address food.

Fred Kirschenmann, distinguished fellow for the Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture and president of Stone Barns Center for Food and Agriculture told Slashfood he met with Mike Duke in Iowa last month while the executive was visiting a farm committed to sustainable practices.

A weekly look at the draft selections in beer-friendly bars across the country.

A good local pub is something special -- a place where you can hang out with friends and meet neighbors by socializing the old-fashioned way... in person. Blogs and social networks and webcams are great, but one of the most traditional ways people have connected isn't with a computer, it's with a pint.

My neighborhood has a number of spots I love, but when it comes to that classic pub setting -- with a fantastic beer selection to boot -- my favorite watering hole is Brooklyn's Washington Commons.

When people think friendly bar, the show Cheers often comes to mind: a place where "everyone knows your name." This point isn't lost on Kirk Struble, one of Washington Commons' owners. When asked what makes a bar a great local hangout, he immediately points to the staff.

We've all heard about CSAs - Community-Supported Agriculture - and many of us have participated in CSA programs in our towns. Essentially, you fork over some cash (usually from $500 to $800), and each month, you get a bounty of whatever fruits and veggies are in season, courtesy of a locally-owned farm.

For some people, the boxes of produce are as close to they get to the farm, though they can feel secure in knowing that they're supporting their local farmers and not supporting grocery store-sold produce. Other CSA participants go a step further and purchase a small piece of the actual farm, which they visit and keep up themselves.

My question: why is the New York Times just now learning about this? A recent article on CSAs calls it "a loose but growing network," making it sound as if they just stumbled upon the movement yesterday. Really? I have friends who have been participating in these programs for years. Perhaps it's just new in more rural areas?

In the meantime, I will continue to enjoy locally-grown veggies, and go back to my love/hate relationship with the Times.

The feature story this week is on the "greening" of Chicago, with farmers' markets returning to new locations with sustainable produce. The Tribune shares some tips for shopping at the farmers' market, as well as recipes from cookbooks that focus on market fresh produce: Scallops with three peas and prosciutto from Blue Eggs and Yellow Tomatoes, Savory mashed potatoes with garden herbs from Rosalind Creasy's Recipes from the Garden, Butter Lettuce Salad from Fresh, and Watercress, snow pea and shiitake mushroom stir-fry from The Farm to Table Cookbook: The Art of Eating Locally.

Food prices are rising, so shop smartly at the grocery store, and take a hint from the Leftover Queen.

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Writing in The Root, Slate's online magazine covering African-American topics, Bryant Terry makes the argument that soul food has gotten a bad rap. Soul food is portrayed in popular culture as salty, fatty, sugar-laden comfort dishes like mac n' cheese, greens with ham hocks, fried chicken and lard biscuits. But half a century ago soul food meant the simple dishes Southern African-Americans ate for dinner, with plenty of fresh local ingredients - sauteed okra, stone ground grit cakes, homemade peach chutney. Sure there was fried chicken and cobbler, but that was hardly the whole picture, Terry says.

Terry, a Bay Area cookbook author originally from Memphis, hopes that bringing back locally focused, veggie-heavy soul food can help lower rates of obesity and diabetes in African-American communities. The article includes recipes for grit cakes and citrus collards with raisins. Yum.

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