Locavore Challenge Days 3-7

This week has been crazy! Caleb started working at Augustine Classical Academy for the upcoming school year (first day was yesterday) Emily went to the Farmer's Market here in town for the first time this fall with our WIC checks, and we sent in a check to start our winter CSA! This may be a post full of exclamation points as I try to unpack all of the fun we've been having during this year's Locavore Challenge.

As you know we started with a day full of locally (within 250 mile) sourced foods. We also spent time on Day 2 going to roadside stands picking up squash, garlic, and whatever else local gardeners/farmers were selling out of their trolleys (it's an upstate NY thing, but I hope other places do this, too). Emily came back from the Farmer's Market with a huge haul of fresh vegetables and herbs. Take a look at the amazing produce she came home with: squash, herbs, carrots, celery, bell peppers, and green tomatoes.

While Caleb was at work on Tuesday, Ana (the 2 year old) and Emily used the Pretend Soup cookbook to make Green Spaghetti (pasta with pesto) for lunch.

 Caleb cooked up pasta sauce from our neighbor's garden, and Emily added fresh parsley and oregano and squash tonight for our delicious dinner

This is our whirlwind tour of the last week of our locavore challenge. Coming up we'll be reviewing Michael Pollan's In Defense of Food!

Eating from our neighbors' gardens

I love this time of year.  Gardens everywhere are exploding with squash and tomatoes, so much so that even the most avid canners and preservers have trouble keeping up.  Suddenly, little road side stands are everywhere.  "Squash and Zucchini $1"  "Homegrown Garlic"  "Free Tomatoes"
Have extra produce?  I am ever so happy to help you out.

Just this past week we: relieved our local co-op of an abundance of turning pattypan and baby crookneck squash, picked tomatoes from a friend's garden while they were out of town (with permission, of course); bought three 3 lb yellow squash at a roadside, drop-your-money-in-the-bucket stand; and got some "homegrown garlic" from a farm shed.

I have been making many bakes, casseroles and sauces with all of this goodness.  I even made zucchini brownies.  Some of it we've eaten already, but most went into the freezer.  I'm well aware that the school year starts on Tuesday and busy weeknights with no time to cook will fast be upon us.  Best to be prepared and keep Chinese and McDonald's at bay.

Locavore Challenge Day 1

Our last post we talked about the Locavore Challenge put out by NOFA-NY for the month of September. There are any number of different challenges you can take on as part of the month that have to do with what you eat, where you buy it, and what kind of foods you put your money into. Our own personal challenge (along with the challenges we selected on the website) was to see how many foods we could eat that were sourced within 250 miles of home. This isn't something we've given a lot of thought to, though we would say we have been casually locavore since we've been married. In general, our local eating habits have been limited to honey, apples, and meat (read: quarter of beef we purchased last year). This month, we're going to see how many of our regular foods can come from within that 250 mile radius.  Here's a look at today. (NB we will not just be posting about foods for the next 30 days, but today is day 1 and we thought it would be a good idea to get the ball rolling.)

Breakfast: Wheat Germ Griddle Cakes from More With Less

• Wheat germ purchased from local co-op
• Local eggs and milk
• Local maple syrup and (homemade) maple cream

Dinner: Vegetable Pasta Salad from Simply in Season

• Summer squashed from the roadside stand
• Tomatoes from the co-op
• Cucumbers from our friends down the road

More to come about money, food, being locals, et al. In the meantime, visit the NOFA-NY website and sign up!

Living simply: previews of things to come

This last weekend was really spectacular! After leaving family in North  Carolina, we drove north through Virginia to stay with some friends outside of Washington, DC. The plan had been to go to the National Zoo in the morning, but parking costs something like $20 and we didn't have that kind of money in the budget. Instead Ana and our friends' little boy played on the park while Zoë tried to nap, then it was off to DC to see family and meet new friends. We did get to stop in at the Air and Space Museum for a brief visit on Sunday afternoon, but not a whole lot of other sight seeing. Monday was spent entirely in the car taking the fastest roads north. We finally caught our breath Monday night, and work began for Caleb Wednesday morning. Summer is over already?

Starting in September, we're going to be taking part in the 2011 Locavore Challenge sponsored by NOFA-NY. We chose to take on the Meal Sized Challenge and are already gearing up for the month! We feel this is important to our goals and to this blog, because a lot of our life since taking Financial Peace University has been about taking control and being better stewards of what God has given to us. We already do many of these things and have found them cost-effective and our well-being has been positively affected by these choices. As we've said before: it's not about how much you make, it's about how you choose to use it.

Here are some things to be looking for here on Debt Free American Road Trip:

• Book reviews on titles including Simply in Season, The World at Your Table (written by a family friend), and In Defense of Food among other articles and books.
• Recipes we've tried using foods sourced within 250 miles from home.
• Menus and financial plans for paying for more local and organic foods.
• Ways that this project has helped us with our financial and personal goals

Happy reading!