A new detour

While between gigs there's more time to comment on the food scene. The musings about food and the culture, most of it commentary on the hyperbolic and self-important, began before culinary school. But now there's time for more.

Rare is the restaurant now that does not claim to cook seasonally and locally (for example). It came to mind reading this review of Bar Jules, which sounds delightful, truthfully. But there's a level of bunk associated with the local/seasonal mantra. Every day, at most restaurants, at least one diesel truck parks in the alley and unloads much of the local/seasonal product. On rare occasion at Rumi the chef would carry in shopping bags of local vegetables purchased from the farmers market. But the fact that most food is delivered in smelly trucks begs the question: how local is it, really? The artichokes from Salinas, Lodi grapes, Mexican basil? How close does it have to be to qualify as "local?" For the foodier-than-thou I'm not sure what the answer is. For the reasonable, I'm not sure it matters a great deal. As always, you simply don't want your intelligence to be insulted. You know local when you see it, basically. But let's not pretend that "local" food offers some sort of culinary salvation when it's entirely unclear what the term constitutes. And yes, it is largely preferable to eat things that were grown/raised near ones home - I'm not arguing against that point. Let's just be careful about the puffery and advertising cache of terms like "local."

There are many examples of restaurants that serve what is grown on their own land, but here is my favorite: Gibb's Farm. A rare breed, and home to the single most satisfying meal of my life.