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As some of you know, in mid September, I published my first recipe with Nosh Green Bay featuring Booyah-- almost entirely shopped for at Green Bay’s Saturday Morning Farmer’s Market. Our local farmers are among our most treasured resources, especially so in an area like this that lends itself so well to the act of growing our food. Creating meals centered around what they produce has been one of the greatest pleasures of the year, and I intend to keep it up until the end of the season. However, as the season ends, I would be remiss not to highlight the farmers and artisans that have made this farmer’s market season a delicious one for my husband and I. We’ve done our best to visit every stall at least once this year while still supporting our favs-- so here we go! Ya’ll are in no particular order. I love you all!
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Zambaldi Beer has been doing these Community Supported Brewery Boxes for more than a year now. We've bought at least four of them over the course of this program, and we are now into two consecutive boxes for the first time in 2021 because of one simple fact: the offerings in the last two boxes are undeniable. Last week, we got to taste their special beer for Lorelei Inn’s Oktoberfest a week early, along with a great Good Dog Porter brownie. I single handedly annihilated that pan of brownies in a weekend. This week, we got a sample of their pumpkin spice beer-- along with brats made with their Meatball Man ale and a Good Dog Porter Mustard just in time for a Packers Home game. Their merchandise for the box is also timely for a home game-- a Zambaldi Beer emblazoned football that looks absolutely adorable in our kitchen right now. We may never take it out for a toss, but there are plenty of other patrons that will in the future. This is perhaps my favorite box that we’ve ever purchased given the full blown meal that can be made with the brats this time around.
Zambaldi partnered with local producers Pingel’s Meat Market in Shawano to produce these brats, and you can taste the care that went into them. The flavor of the brats’ namesake beer is light when you eat the brat by itself, but with the caramelized onions and the mustard together, everything sings in a zesty harmony. It was a perfect meal for football and dungeons and dragons.
Green Bay’s Saturday morning market has been my favorite event of the year since my first visit. This new, relaxed season with fewer COVID guidelines has opened it up in a whole new way, and over the course of this new season, I’ve become very familiar with a Green Bay Cheesemaker-- Kickass Cheese-- who is our highlighted vendor this week. There’s not much time left in the season, so they absolutely deserve the recognition while shoppers still have a chance to visit. We stop by their stall every week when we visit the farmer’s market looking for something new to try. Brie, cheddars, curds, jack cheeses, swiss, parmesan… They’ve got something for everyone, and their flavors regularly rotate. If you want to get an idea of what they have to offer before you make a visit to them at the market, you can visit their website to see pictures and descriptions of every variety that they produce on the reg. 
Morning comes, and the grocery order of the day before is safely stored in my refrigerator. The sheer amount of produce and meat that came from local sources is somewhat hard to believe even after a delicious spring and summer farmer’s market season with other vendors in Green Bay. Produce with Purpose Farm has a strong variety available for the time of year, and access to humanely raised and butchered meats propelled them up the list of my favorite places to shop in the last month. It only made sense that I would eventually set up a farm box pick up, and here we are using it as a challenge opportunity. Hi folks, long time no write. It’s been a hell of a few months. My health is still not quite where I want to be, but I’m very excited about a challenge I issued for myself starting Thursday, April 15th with a big farm box from Produce with Purpose over at Revolution Market in Green Bay. I’ve debated for a long time if I should start picking up with them weekly after several pleasant in person visits and their new delivery service through Eat Street, and I woke up on a Sunday morning with a fresh idea: let’s cook and eat local only for one whole week starting with them.
And trust me, I know I’ve been screaming on the rooftops about how much I love this place. It might even be getting annoying. I really believe in what they’re doing over there in trying to make these kinds of goods accessible throughout the year. Home delivery, farm boxes, daily vendor hours. It’s dedication, and I’m dedicated to it. It’s a mission I believe in, and to try to live it a little bit more myself, here’s what I’m doing. My husband and I try to stick to a $100.00 grocery budget a week, which I will surpass slightly buying local meat for our meals. I’m okay with a little extra money out the door to eat local. We’ve got a few weeks in our area before the farmer’s markets start opening and more and more vendors start selling. If this little challenge works out, we will continue to spend nearly every cent of our grocery budget on our local growers and producers. Here are my rules:
If this sounds like something you want to try yourself, Produce with Purpose is open for box building until 7 am on Tuesday each week to give them time to gather up what you order. Green Bay and Fox Valley locals have got some time to figure out what they want if you want to do this with me. Visit their Barn2Door ordering website here if you’re interested. Below is a list of what I personally ordered for the coming week, and if I come out of a recipe particularly proud, I’ll post it for you to try!
Sunday, March 7th, my husband and I went out on a whim to a little building on Holmgren Way that I've watched from a distance for the better part of a year now. Crippled by closures this time last year, Revolution Market got off to a slow start while they prepared to welcome vendors into their space. Those restrictions are gone. Vendors are in their stalls, and Sundays are for Produce with Purpose as one of the only vendors on site during the weekend. We didn't know what to expect when we arrived. Google Maps told us the whole building was closed, but Facebook told us better. Signs outside let us know that someone was indeed on site and selling. That someone was Rick from Produce with Purpose, holding down the fort at his indoor farmer's market with product availability across the board. The Exchange Coffee, Mercantile, and Eatery - Winter Menu
The Exchange started their Winter menu 12/1/20. Those lovely pumpkin flavors have passed into memory, but that doesn’t mean their offerings are any less good. Check out the new menu and order for pickup or delivery! Luna Cafe and Roastery, Bellevue Location - New Menu Luna also started a new menu at the beginning of the month with some tasty looking breakfast favorites. Copper State Brewing Co - Brew Decks Available 2021 Brew Decks from Venture Wisconsin are now available at Copper State, but many other town breweries will have these available this week as well. Check out your favorites for an interesting 2021 keepsake. We’re picking one up soon too! Lox, Stock, ‘n Bagel - Weekly Specials Been a bit since we talked about one of our local breakfast favs, and in the spirits of a bunch of coffee and breakfast favs also on the list this week, we wanted to remind you that Lox, Stock, ‘n Bagel have a different specials menu every week from their bakery that you can check out on their Facebook page. Different Scones and Different Muffins every single day! Hinterland Brewery - Igloos are Up Hinterland has set up outdoor seating with those igloo things we’ve all seen on the internet lately. Cozy and warm and socially distant. Main Street Bourbon Room - Wednesday half off Apps during Happy Hour 4-6 PM What it says in the header: Half off shared plates during happy hour on Wednesdays with MSBR so long as you dine at the bar. If you’re brave enough to eat inside, it’s a great deal! Mr. Brews Taphouse: Bellevue - Slider Flights available, Also Igloos Slider flights started this week, and Mr. Brews Taphouse also set up igloos last week if you’d like to find another place to eat outside and among people you aren’t afraid to sit in a tiny plastic, heated container with. Uncle Mike’s Bake Shoppe and Monzu Bakery - Envelope Sales Both Uncle Mike’s and Monzu, two of our fav bakeries in town, have started their holiday envelopes which MAY contain sales and giveaways on their items, but you can’t open them til after Christmas. What a fun promo! A good charcuterie plate is the centerpiece of the pre-meal Thanksgiving table as far as I’m concerned. If there is no wooden board with a variety of cheeses both high quality and low, nestled in with mystery sausages and meats, then it’s a bad sign for the actual meal to come. I want to snack on cheese, meat, and crackers while I’m waiting on the whole shabang to hit the table. Mingling with snacks and drinks before the feast is just as important as the actual food. This year, there won’t be much mingling at my Thanksgiving, but a good charcuterie board is just as important as ever. My husband and I have made plans to play board games and maybe watch some TV while the more time intense food is cooking in the background. Balancing at the end of our game board absolutely should be a spread of delicious snacks to keep us fueled through the course of the long day.  2020 has thrown us all our fair share of curve balls. As Thanksgiving approaches, many of us are forced to make the choice of staying home or trying to find ways to continue family traditions safely. I will never judge anyone who decides to see their families during the holiday, but this is the first time in my entire life that I have stayed at home for the Thanksgiving Holiday. There will be no long drive home for an extended weekend, no packing a to go bag for my cat, or even a three hour dinner in my aunt’s garage ten minutes down the road. No part of any Thanksgiving I have ever had in my life will be present for 2020-- except for my husband. This is going to be a Thanksgiving for Two.
How do you cook Thanksgiving for just two people? The holiday is an ode to gluttony at it’s most basic level. Depending on your household, the beer starts to flow as early in the day as you want-- breakfast is ginormous, snacks are out for the entirety of the day, and then the real meal comes to the table so large you can barely see the turkey decorated tablecloth underneath it. Someone--or multiple someones-- are in the kitchen cooking from sun up to sun down. This year, that someone is me, and I am thrilled for the opportunity. So, what’s my game plan? Am I ruining it for my husband by composing an entire article based around what I want to do for the greatest eating holiday in the American Pantheon? Naaaah. Let’s do it. There is a lot to consider during shopping for the feast this year as a result of the suffering placed upon our local small businesses. Relief money has ran out, and they can only survive with our business. I have decided to shop for my Thanksgiving needs from as many local stores as possible, which is sometimes difficult to do when it comes to grocery shopping. Luckily, Green Bay is blessed with a number of small specialty vendors to consider during my planning. If I didn’t make us a charcuterie board (AKA a cheese board, for the non-bougie readers out there), to snack on over countless board games and movies as the day progressed, I would be a horrible wife. Green Bay is home to Nala’s Cheese and Wine in Bellevue. They are currently donating to a local food pantry for every 50 dollars spent in the store. That sounds worth the splurge to me for some goodies. Previous visits to our local Asian Markets has shown me that I can rely on them to have meats that I won’t regularly find in our major supermarkets, so I’ll be stopping on the east side of downtown in search of duck or pheasant. If I can find neither, I know that the East Side Festival currently has geese. That may be where I land if my fancy bird search goes poorly. There is also The Original Austin’s Grocery Store on Webster that may need to be a stop. Their meat counter is 100% manned at all hours, and it’s all good quality. If the bird search can’t even land on a goose, then I may be able to find something there to fill the void in the form of a fancy prime rib roast or something. Multiple food media outlets have written piece after piece about how ‘this Thanksgiving will be unlike any ever celebrated’, but let’s face it, America has suffered pandemics before. We’ve suffered through a lot as a nation that has directly impacted the way we celebrate this holiday. Share it with the people you care about however you can. You won’t get any judgement from me if you decide to find a way to share it with your family. We all need a little something to get us through things right now: celebrating with family may be that for you. Stay tuned for more Thanksgiving writing! |
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