Integrated nutrition

Vacation time! Traditionally all diets are off when you hit the road. Since I'm not traveling far, I thought that I'd try to keep my locavorism intact on my weekend trip. After all, there is still plenty of local fare in the Hudson Valley.

I'm visiting my friend Lily in Beacon NY. We began today with a trip to the Coldspring Farmer's Market. Their web site provides directions, as well as a lists of vendors both general or week specific. http://www.csfarmmarket.org/fm-vendors09.html

What a different winter market than the one in Northampton! Noho has three prepared food vendors tops, one of which is a bakery, with 6 tables dedicated to farm direct foods. Coldspring's market is mainly prepared foods, with only one table occupied with fresh produce. However they have a fish vendor, the first I've seen at a farmer's market! Also, the one table of produce has mushrooms! Needless to say I was super excited.

Lily and I bought flounder, scallions, mushrooms, arugula, and a sour cherry tart. We ate most of it for lunch. The mushrooms were a combination of king oyster and fresh shitake. I marinated the latter in tamari and olive oil and sliced the former into thick scallop like rings. The mushrooms got prepared in batches- first the oyster "scallops" fried in a bit of olive oil until golden brown, then a quick stir fry of the marinated shitake which I garnished with diagonally sliced scallion green after I tossed them all together. Lily pan fried the flounder with scallion bulb, and seasoned it with salt, pepper, lemon and paprika. A quick salad of arugula completed the meal. Scrumptious!

Then we were off to DIA Beacon, a museum of contemporary art. I love museums, but my feelings about modern art are either to love it or hate it. This museum had lots of art that spoke to me: this piece begged me to get up close and personal with it.
Shortly after this we were told that photos weren't allowed.

Regardless, if you're in the area, I highly recommend you check DIA out. http://www.diabeacon.org/sites/main/beacon

All that museum walking had us hungry again, and for dinner we opted to order out. For this we turned to Poppy's. http://www.poppyburger.com/Poppys_Burgers_and_Fries/Welcome.html

Like Local Burger in Noho, their menu features burgers made from local grass fed organic beef. I indulged in a BBQ bacon cheeseburger.
(photo by Paul David O'Hanlon from the Poppy's website)

I wanted to compare this to Localburger's Westhampton. How did it measure up? Poppy's sauce isn't as sweet, their bacon is thicker, and they serve their burger on a flaky egg bread bun. In my humble burger loving opinion, Poppy's is tastier.

After dinner, it was tart time. Thanks to Lily's presence of mind, we have a photo of it before...
and after....



Made by Dutch Desserts in Kinderhook ( www.dutchdesserts.com ) Lily's opinion was that this delicious little gem had a " crumbly cookie like crust", that went well with "not too sweet" filling. She said she prefers tarts because "pies can be sickeningly sweet." I agree that this tart was a perfect balance of sweet and tart, neither overwhelming the other.

So, my local food integrity intact for another day, I am sated by a day's worth of nourishment. Not only have I eaten delicious, fresh food, but I've spent the day in great company feeding my mind, heart, and soul.