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Eating Locally on the Road

Posted at 2:55 PM on October 23, 2008 by Leslie Allen (1 Comments)

James and I have just returned from a much needed 2-week vacation in Utah. We spent one week at my uncle's time share in Snowbird, and the second week in Moab and Zion. What amazing landscapes! If you have never traveled to Arches, Canyonlands, Capital Reef, or Zion National Parks, I strongly encourage you to do so. That part of our country is magnificent.

The day before we departed for our vacation, we pulled up all of the tomato and tomatillo plants and hung them in the garage. The forecast was for SNOW (on October 4!) and we weren't ready to say goodbye to our garden. Good thing we pulled the plants, because it did snow and hit a low of 28! Welcome to Gardening in Nevada.

While we were in Snowbird, we researched the local food offerings of Salt Lake City. What a great place for local food. We went to the People's Farmers Market in the International Peace Garden where we found the BEST PEACHES. Yes! Excellent peaches in October. They were grown in Brigham City, which is known for its peaches. It was so great to have a second peach season. The ones we had been getting at the Reno farmers market were from California, and the season had definitely come to an end there.

We also discovered an excellent local food market, Liberty Height Fresh. What a little gem that place is! Not only did they have local produce, bread, milk, eggs and cheese. They had the best specialty oil and vinegar selection I have ever seen. We tasted the most amazing balsamic vinegars. Wow!

Our final night in Salt Lake City we splurged in dinner at Em's Restaurant. We found it on the Slow Food Utah web site. In fact, it was here that we also found a list of farmers markets, food co-ops, and restaurants that feature local food for every town we traveled through. Utah has a thriving local food movement and we found it very easy to eat local on the road thanks to the Slow Food web site. We just did a Google search for "local food Utah" and "slow food Utah," and it popped right up. If you aren't familiar with Slow Food International, I suggest checking them out. They promote a food system I can rally behind.

Comments (1)

Leslie, your voyage through the canyonlands and local foods of the American West sounds fantastic! I just finished reading Ed Abbey's Desert Solitaire, which is making me nuts for visiting the West while simultaneously mourning the loss of these wild places that existed in lonely, unspoiled splendor only a half-century ago. Oh if I had a time machine to take me back to Glen Canyon....
Stay warm out there!
Cheers,
Autumn

Posted by Autumn Long | October 24, 2008 7:07 AM