Happy New Year!

          May you and yours be more food secure this year, enjoy more local foods and restaurants, and grow closer to Christ.  We look forward to sharing our journey and the stories of local food and increased resilience from around the North Alabama area this year.  Please share with us your ideas and the activities of  your neighbors and groups who are working toward growing food and increasing opportunities to buy locally grown food.
New Year's Food From the Yard?

We feasted on Arkansas razorback purple hull peas dried on the vine in the back yard summer before last, simmered with hunk o’ hog left over from a hunting trip to south Alabama, some onion and garlic from the yard with a bit of bay leaf from a friend in Lacey’s Spring.  We are going to grow bay leaf as soon as we find a good spot in the yard for it, it’s a very useful spice and seems to tolerate our climate.  Since the pork wasn’t salted, we added some to taste. 

Greens are traditional too? Well, from the garden today, we have a choice of hot cabbage, collards, spinach, and/or turnip greens, or we can go cold and crispy with red lettuce or Buttercrunch and/or spinach.  Since Lee’s mother brought her famous French salad dressing a few days ago, we’ll go salad today!

Bread?  Cornbread with cornmeal grown and ground on Sand Mountain, or wheat grown here in the yard and made into crackers or rolls?  Or I’m really lazy and we’ll just do some hot water cornbread .

                Time enough later in the year for fancy feasts, right now, tis the season for simple and relaxed.

Lee and Shannon McBride