"New Normal" Chef Demo Icebreaker
Farm-to-table pioneer Paul Virant stirred things up at Green City Market
Ramping Up and Spearheading a Demo
Cooking demos were popular features for many of our region’s farmers markets when COVID brought them to a sudden halt in 2020, and public health concerns kept them on the sidelines at most markets through 2021. So the Return of the Cooking Demo today at Green City Market in Lincoln Park was a cause for some celebration.
The demo was conducted by Chef Paul Virant, a pioneer in our local farm-to-table culinary community and former Green City board member. Paul, who formerly owned Perennial Virant just across Clark St. from the market, is chef-owner of two excellent restaurants in Chicago’s western suburbs — Vie in Western Springs and Vistro Prime in Hinsdale — as well as Gaijin, a Japanese-themed restaurant in the city’s West Loop that provided the inspiration for the very seasonal dish Paul prepared.
I’ll have more details below, but first, a request for a little bit of help on a story.
Help A Guy Out With Some Quotes
I am working on an article about local, healthy, sustainable food for a national publication and they’ve asked me to get some personal perspectives from real-world buyers and consumers. Since I’m aiming for a geographic and demographic range, I’m hoping a few of you will be game to share your thoughts.
You do NOT have to be in Chicagoland… I’d love to hear from folks who live outside this immediate area. It’s really a light lift — I can use anything from a sentence to a couple of paragraphs on any of the following topics (or anything else you want to share).
How you engaged or re-engaged with farmers markets and local food vendors as a result of the pandemic.
Why values such as healthy, local, sustainable and humane are important to you, and whether this prompted you to change your buying habits during the pandemic.
How in general you prioritize healthy, sustainable food in your spending budget and whether you have affordability or access issues.
Statistics show that inflation has caused the price gap between organic and conventional food to shrink — does this make it more likely for you to buy more organic/sustainably produced food?
Convenience has become an increasing factor in the “Good Food” and local food markets with the increase in home delivery options. Do you utilize home delivery for these products and what kind (direct from vendors, farmers market deliveries, CSAs, national companies such as Thrive Market and Imperfect Produce)?
If you are a vendor or market manager, please share your thoughts about the surge in consumer interest in local food during the pandemic.
Please share your thoughts at bob@localfoodforum.com or in the comments. Any help you can provide will be greatly appreciated.
More on the Cooking Demo
The dish that Chef Paul Virant prepared at his Green City Market demo was based on an asparagus and bok choy stir-fry that’s on the menu of his Gaijin restaurant in Chicago. To be super-seasonal, he paired the asparagus with ramps (both ingredients from Mick Klug Farm of St. Joseph, Michigan) and hothouse SunGold cherry tomatoes from Nichols Farm and Orchard of Marengo, Illinois.
Those ingredients were rapidly cooked in sesame oil, seasoned with fresh garlic, sesame seeds and soy sauce, and topped with a sprinkling of fried shallots.
The demo certainly whet the appetites of the attendees, who lined up for the samples offered at the end.
Green City will soon be announcing more events in what they have re-branded as Culinary Demos, with the lineup to include nutrition experts, food-and-health advocates and others, along with chefs.
Attention other market managers: Please send your info about your cooking demos to bob@localfoodforum.org and I’ll get it in the newsletter.
Today’s Green City Market Haul
Pretzel bagels from Flat & Point (Chicago), asparagus from Mick Klug Farm (St. Joseph, Michigan), cremini mushrooms from River Valley Ranch (Burlington, Wisconsin), artisan blue cheese from J2K Capraio (Walkerton, Indiana), and cucumbers, SunGold cherry tomatoes and lilacs from Nichols Farm and Orchard (Marengo, Illinois).
"New Normal" Chef Demo Icebreaker
Hi Bob! Here to help a guy out some comments :] I hope you will share the article you are working on with us!
Healthy and local food is something I have valued for some time, but the pandemic definitely reminded me about why healthy and local food is vital to healthy individuals and communities. I found myself thinking real dystopian and wondering if people would be able to survive if grocery stores crumbled! That scary thought train reminded me that I want to learn how to be more self-sustainable and develop more self-sustaining communities. Supporting local farmers and food producers helps communities grow stronger and healthier. Personally, I would love to see more organic farmers at markets in the Chicago suburbs. Part of why I also enjoy shopping local is to interact with food producers. There is something so comforting about meeting the people who are responsible for making the food I am eating. I know where it comes from and the general process of how it was created. Food is personal. Buying from local farmers and producers helps me feel more connected to my food, which is something I am thinking about more and more as a consumer.