Tag Archives: Local food

Meet Your Farmer Happy Hour – June 13

One of the things city dwellers haven’t thought much about for years is where our food comes from. A few years ago I would have answered that question with the Giant Eagle or back in the day The Food Gallery – does anyone else remember that grocery store – it was located where the Shadyside Market District is now located.

Anyhow – we are learning – processed food isn’t so good for us, and shipping food around the country and the globe has some drawbacks too. So there are lots of people who are doing something about local food.

PASA is the Pennsylvania Association of Sustainable Agriculture – they are just one of the many organizations that is talking about where our food comes from.

PASA and Paragon Foods invite you to a summer farm season kick off on June 13 at Penn Brewery. If you are interested in meeting local farmers and learning more about local food here in Pittsburgh – this should be a great event.

Meet the Farmer Happy Hour
Monday, June 13, 2011
5:30-7:30pm
Tickets $5 available online here
Join PASA, Paragon Foods and Penn Brewery as they host the first “Meet the Farmer” Happy Hour at Penn Brewery in Pittsburgh’s Historic North Side.

Ticket includes light hors d’oeuvres featuring local ingredients, 2 complimentary draft beers and an opportunity to meet farmers from local farms.

Eat Local: Earth Day Edition

Thanks to everyone who commented on the recent Latin Goes Local at Seviche and Farm to Table, and More posts! Here are the lucky contest winners:

Winner of the 2010 EcoCents Green Guide: Becky Utech Gaugler of the Carnegie Museum of Art.

Winner of the Seviche gift certificate: Beautia Dew, a contributing writer for Gastronomic Exploits, a beautifully executed local food blog that I just discovered and fell in love with.

Since Earth Day is right around the corner, I wanted to share some great Eat Local Pittsburgh resources centered on making the environment in Pittsburgh a little happier and yummier for everyone.

Grow Pittsburgh is planning a viewing of FRESH, a movie that celebrates farmers and citizens who are re-inventing our food system. The viewing will be held on April 27 at E2, Enrico Biscotti’s hip new location in Highland Park, at 6:30. A generous tasting of real, local food prepared by Chef Kate Romane will be served and there will be a discussion about how you can become more involved in our local food system. The event is BYOB and a percentage of the admission cost of $25 will go to Grow Pittsburgh. Reservations are recommended; please contact Enrico Biscotti for more information.

Grow Pittsburgh will also be selling seedlings at the Phipps Conservatory May Market on May 7-8. The May Market is an event where dozens of garden clubs and vendors come together to bring you a great selection of plants, tools and garden items for a special sale. On May 8 at 2:00, Grow Pittsburgh will be giving a talk about organic gardening.

Mark your calendar for Local Restaurant Week: May 25-30. During this exciting week, dine out with friends and family in support of local, independent restaurants and experience incredible savings with dining deals for only $20.10.

Looking for a unique downtown lunch experience? Why not support local up and coming chefs at A Taste of Art: The Restaurant at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh!

Under the direction of experienced chef faculty at The International Culinary School at The Art Institute of Pittsburgh, students rotate through each position in the restaurant. Credit cards are accepted and reservations are accepted from 11:15 to 12:30. Please call 412-291-6532 for more information.

I’m getting hungry… see you next time!

Farm to Table, and more!

I had the pleasure of attending the Farm to Table conference a few weeks ago where several of the area’s farms and natural food companies were represented, showing off their goods.

Here are a few of my favorite organizations who were represented at the event:

The Green Chef PA is a collection of four lovely women based in Sewickley who are on a mission to change the way people think about, shop for and prepare food. They were preparing a few of their favorite fresh and fast treats for the crowd to munch on while they were checking out the event. They offer catering, personal chef services, instruction and gardening resources. Everything they make is prepared from scratch and made with the freshest local ingredients possible.

Buy Fresh Buy Local is a lovely website devoted to being a central resource for over a thousand places to find local food in Pennsylvania.

Continue reading →

Links Worth a Look – February 24th

Here are some links/articles/blog posts that are worth a look:

Franktuary is going green with the help of their CORO Fellows! – Our favorite local hot dog shop has been working hard on their sustainability practices – read what they have been up to and check out some of the other great posts about local food on their brand new website.
Call for Artists: Poster Contest – Three Rivers Arts Festival – Pittsburgh, PA – A division of The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust – The Three Rivers Arts Festival and the City Paper are holding a poster contest. The grand prize winning design will be used to help promote the 2010 Three Rivers Arts Festival throughout the Pittsburgh region. Four winning designs will be produced as posters.
Beer Hear! – Should I Drink That in Pittsburgh Magazine – Great article about Doug and Brad and their podcast about beer "Should I Drink That" in the March 2010 Pittsburgh magazine. Should I Drink That and IheartPGH have been friends since we first met at the first Pittsburgh Podcamp. They know their beer and are super nice guys to hand out with at blog and/or beer related events.

Follow IheartPGH on Twitter – we share more links there almost daily!

Eating Fresh and Local along the Penn Avenue Corridor

Everyone is surely thinking about food a lot more this week than usual. While planning your Thanksgiving feast, did you stop and think about eating fresh and local? This year for Thanksgiving, I’ll be enjoying my first taste of a fresh and local turkey from Pound’s Turkey Farm.

I wouldn’t have thought about a fresh and local turkey as an option for Thanksgiving if it wasn’t for my partner in crime, Rob de la Cretaz, who decided to weed out processed foods from his diet and eat fresh and local as much as possible after reading The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan.

In The Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan notes, “… the way we eat represents our most profound engagement with the natural world. Daily, our eating turns nature into culture, transforming the body of the world into our bodies and minds.” So, how would one go about eating fresh and local regularly in an urban setting? Continue reading →