If you catch Chef Tanya deep in thought, she’ll likely confess she was thinking through her next menu. If you ask her her plans, she’ll say that her favorite radishes should be coming or, if you confess an affinity for lamb, her face will light up because she knows just the farmer to contact. Occasionally she’ll page through well-worn cookbooks to garner extra inspiration. I love these conversations because it gives me insight into her deep knowledge of both food and farmers.

Let it shine

I’m continually impressed by Chef Tanya’s ability to make local food and seasonal cooking accessible to people of all ages and backgrounds. The dishes we make in our learning kitchen are deceptively simple, emphasizing quality of the ingredients over fancy technique. Under her patient tutelage, they coax together frittatas golden with pastured eggs and caramelized onions, crisp coleslaw of crunchy Nappa cabbage from the South Farm, or a simple bruschetta from vine-ripened tomatoes. These meals let the produce and the budding chefs with their newly acquired knife skills shine.

As much as I value Tanya’s way with novices, I also look forward to the few times a year that she really gets to show up and show out in the kitchen. One of those showcase times of year is our annual board of directors meeting in June. Even after two years of working side by side with Tanya and watching the gorgeous dishes she elicits from beginner cooks, I’m still awed by the meals she gifts us: a trio of salads that turn your least favorite vegetables (beets, kohlrabi, cabbage) into delicate gems, perfectly cooked lamb chops with a miraculous addition of a local lavender in the crust, and a simple berry cobbler so good I had to stop mid-agenda item to collect myself.

Find the time, make excuses, and get to the good work of living

I share this story in part to brag on Chef Tanya because she’ll never brag on herself, and I’m awfully proud of the work we do together. The larger point, however, is to celebrate the joy and beauty that come from knowing your craft and knowing a place. The meal we enjoyed was as much a product of Tanya’s years of studying in the kitchen as her years of walking our farmers markets and working directly with farmers. I should also add a sprinkle of the deep Kentucky roots that speak through her grandma’s tomato catchup and jars of jewel-like watermelon pickle that is better described as candy.

As we enter the height of summer, I hope you find the time and make excuses to develop your own art of local eating, whether that’s a sit-down meal with loved ones or sprinkling salt over a perfect tomato that drips into the sink while you devour it. Dig through your family’s cookbook collection to resurrect the recipes on the most battered pages, or ask a farmer their favorite way to eat something they’ve grown. The more we explore our local food systems, the more excuses we have to come together as a community and cultivate a more profound knowledge of the place we call home. Now go get busy exploring at the market, in the kitchen, or at your neighbor’s table, and I’ll expect a full report from you all at the end of summer!

Thanks to my far-flung friends, summer means a string of weddings that provide the perfect excuse to high-tail it out of town for a long weekend, and an opportunity to step out of my day-to-day perspective. Which is how I ended up in Nebraska for the first time this Memorial Day weekend and was reminded of how food plays a vital role in the enigmatic nature of what makes a place home.

The day after the wedding a group of us ventured an hour outside of Omaha, down a gravel road, past a church and two abandoned buildings to the Loma Tavern. We had to park well down the road lined with two-tone farm trucks, and a small crowd of people gathered outside the tavern. As our feet we crunched along the gravel I overhead a woman walking back to her car comment to her well-dressed friend “we should have skipped the winery and come straight here.” She clearly wasn’t from Loma, and I was excited to see what awaited us.

Squeezing inside we found the full tavern cheek to elbow with people from all age brackets sharing tables and cold drinks. Clustered at the back wall were a tuba player, a tattooed man behind a small drum kit, and a teenage girl cranking away on the accordion. Despite the close quarters, a middle-aged couple bounced back and forth to the polka music, and other folks clapped along. We managed to belly-up to the counter and caught the eye of a white-haired woman in a white dress with a white apron. She asked how many suppers we wanted (not what kind) and waved us to find a seat wherever we could.

Our plates arrived minutes later: duck thighs roasted golden with caraway seeds, a pile of potato dumplings hidden under an even bigger pile of slightly sweetened sauerkraut, a helping of sweet corn and a fluffy dinner roll perched on top. Our local guide, Anthony, announced that this was exactly the Sunday supper his Czech grandmother used to make. My belly full of sauerkraut and ears full of “The Saddle Horse Polka” I simultaneously felt at completely home, and that I’d never been anywhere quite like Loma. It was then I noticed the hand-made sign behind the tuba player: “LOMA MY SECOND HOMA.”

Back in Lexington, I’ve been thinking about how the work of fostering local food systems can feel overwhelming; the global food system is so vast, the trends towards convenience and homogenized food cultures so strong. Similarly, it can be challenging to communicate the importance of local food systems when we’re so used to talking about food’s value primarily in terms of cheapness.  Unlike clear accounting indicators of ‘gross margin’ or ‘net profit,’ the values of local food are intertwined with each other in particular histories, cultures, and landscapes.

I can’t express my experience at the Loma Taproom to you all with a number, but I hope the experience resonates with your own memories of home. For me, it was my favorite diner in the small town I grew up in that served simple meals made from scratch like chicken and dumplings and apple pie with a crust so flaky I’d sometimes skip class on Wednesdays just to be sure I got a slice. (To any of my current students, that is not an excused absence!) They closed when the grandmother running the kitchen finally retired. There’s a national fast-food chain where it used to stand, and that town feels a little less like home every time I pass through.

The Loma Taprooms of the world are kept afloat not by tourists like me, but by the grace of the farmers and other rural folks down the road who stop in for lunch or a cold drink as often as they can. Those same farmers probably get their pick-ups worked on at the garage in town, which may, in turn, keep the drummer of the polka band employed. Making the extra efforts to track down their potatoes for Sunday supper not only keeps those farmers on the land but also our traditions vital and that sense of ‘home’ alive.

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Dr. Lilian Brislen

June, 2018