Simple pleasures

Well, whoever would have thought the Local Food Feast would be so easy, and yet so difficult at the same time! So many rules, and yet no rules! There are so many different levels that you can attempt the bioregional challenge, there’s the harvesting and preparing every single item that goes into every single dish (the true slow food challenge), or the purchasing of locally made produce, or the purchasing of value-added manufactured local goods. Not to mention my own sneaky exit clause to the challenge, which is that since I find it criminal to let food go to waste (especially if it’s traveled so far to get here and had so many impacts along the way), I allow myself to eat the food in the fridge that would have gone bad if I didn’t polish it off! Anyway, I really like the openness of this challenge, the way you can attempt it on so many different levels, and that it has so many spin-off effects. For example, initiating arguments/discussion with friends and family! (some of my family members incorporated the idea into the Christmas lunch planning, with a theme of 'Seasonal Mediterranean', while other friends were simply outraged at the idea!)

However, by far the most satisfying element is harvesting and preparing food right from the start. There is no finer way of spending a day than sitting out under a tree on a sunny day, periodically checking yabbie nets and shootin’ the breeze. Or cracking almonds from their shells using two bricks and a back porch, and once again enjoying the warm weather and shootin’ the breeze. Or even the simple pleasures of freshly squeezed juice or grinding up seeds with pestle and mortar. It’s all about existing outside the wage slave economy, spending a few small hours of the day hunting and gathering food, and turning the rest of the day over to doing all the things you need to do to feel human!

So here’s a littl’ recipe from Day 1 of the Diet. It’s adapted from ‘The Food of Spain and Portugal’ by Elisabeth Luard, and is in the tradition of good honest simple peasant/shepherd’s food, although it’s fairly light. ‘Migas’ means cubes of stale bread, soaked and fried in aromatic pork dripping! Here we take a raincheck on the pig slaughtering.

SPANISH SPINACH MIGAS
(serves 2 as main meal)

1-2 big bunches of spinach (mine came via Pyramid Organics, Virginia) – shredded
6 mushrooms (again via Pyramid Organics via the Goodwood Goodfood Co-op) – sliced
4 cloves garlic (Wilson’s or backyard crop!) – minced
1 chilli (backyard crop) – sliced
6 tablespoons olive oil (mine was Minenko’s from Currency Creek)
Pinch of salt (harvested near Ceduna – a little out of the bioregion)
4 slices sourdough bread that’s 3-4 days old (mine was from Dough at the markets) - diced
2 eggs (I used Fleurieu Peninsula eggs)
Dried thyme or oregano (backyard crop)

*Sprinkle diced bread in a little salted water to revive, leave it for a few hours or overnight.
*Steam the shredded spinach in a lidded saucepan in a small amount of salted water, about 5 minutes. Drain and set aside.
*Heat half the oil in pan, cook the garlic and chilli until the garlic has gilded. Add the thyme, mushies and bread – stir until lightly fried. Remove to a bowl.
*Heat the other half of the oil, fry the steamed spinach for several minutes until heated through. *Add mushroom migas mix and combine (make sure it’s heated through).
*Serve warm with a fried egg on top!

So congratulations to everyone who’s been taking the challenge in whatever way they can, I have been far from purist (I still allow myself one cup a day of tea or coffee, for example!), but I already feel I have learnt a great deal about what is local and where to get it from, which will alter my eating habits for the immediate future. Some of the things on the cards for the next few days include making pasta from eggs and flour, visiting a fish market, and figuring out how to grind and roast some wattle seeds we seem to have a tin of! xx