Tag Archives: local foods

Hitchcock plans expansion, lunchtime menu

Despite the economy and the upheaval caused by the Winslow Way reconstruction project, at least one Winslow restaurant is doing well enough to expand.

Hitchcock, a local foods fine-dining restaurant that opened on Winslow Way last year, is in talks to expand into the next-door space recently occupied by a bath supply boutique.

“I’ve got some big plans for a business that would be an extension of Hitchcock, philosophically, but deliver the products we’ve worked so hard to procure over the last year to consumers in a different way,” said owner/chef Brendan McGill.

He said he’ll divulge specifics once a deal for the space is finalized.

McGill is also expanding Hitchcock’s hours to include lunchtime service. The focus will be on traditional Neopolitan pizzas made in the restaurant’s wood-fired oven.

“Lunch is a good excuse to crank the oven up for pizzas – good, fast lunch food,” he said.

Lunch service is offered now on weekends. Once the reconstruction project is done this fall, Hitchcock will begin serving lunch during weekdays.

I profiled Hitchcock last year when three restaurants specializing in local foods opened at the same time in Winslow. One of the restaurants closed a few months after opening. Its space will soon open as a wine bar. Local Harvest is still going strong in the Pavilion. You can read about the little boom in local food restaurants here.

In other Winslow food news, Greg Atkinson (chef, author, regular NPR guest) is opening a French restaurant on Madrone Lane, near Mora ice cream. Read more in Rachel Pritchett’s recent story.

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VIDEO: Planting City Hall’s garden

Councilwoman Debbi Lester shot a short video introducing City Hall’s newly-planted edible garden. That’s Councilman Barry Peters doing the talking and Sound Food member Sallie Maron doing the planting.

A few days later, the planting began in earnest, with about a dozen volunteers planting corn, squash, tomatoes, chard and other crops that will be free for the taking. Read my story about it HERE.

And for more information on the guy who inspired all this, head over HERE and read one of his essays HERE.

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Bainbridge food blog applauded by Saveur magazine

Bainbridge is home to one of the nation’s best local food blogs, according to gourmet magazine Saveur.

Small Potatoes, Anne and Ryan Willhoit’s online exploration of good eats from close to home, is one of five blogs named in the local cuisine category.

Here’s the reaction over at Small Potatoes:

“Some evenings are more surprising than others. You sit down, check your email, glance at that the blog stats and… wait where did that massive spike in traffic come from? After a glance at the incoming referrers you discover you’ve been nominated for a “Best Food Blog” award by Saveur magazine. Really? That Saveur? Really?”

Small Potatoes is photo rich and has plenty of step-by-step tips on how to make use of seasonal and often island-grown ingredients. A few highlights: small batch ketchup, eating local foods while backcountry camping and how to eat local in winter.

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Community gardens bloom on Bainbridge

Dawn Snider digs in at the Johnson Farm community garden
Dawn Snider digs in at the Johnson Farm community garden

Below is a sneak peak of my story about Bainbridge Island’s community garden boom. Check the Sun on Monday for some additional photos and information….

Dawn Snider is hoping to deepen the shade of her faded green thumb.

It’s been almost three decades since she’s had a garden, but she can still remember the taste of backyard tomatoes, squash and herbs.

“It’s been a while, but I’m a gardener at heart,” the Minnesota native said as she and her partner Bruce White spread a load of rich, black soil into a small plot at the Johnson Farm community garden.

After a long stint living in the high desert of New Mexico, Snider and White recently moved to Bainbridge looking for an oasis of green.

The only problem was that their small patch of Bainbridge was crowded by concrete.

“We’re living in a townhouse in Winslow, with no yard and no room to garden,” she said.

Snider and White were ready to be caught up in a sudden burst of grassroots organizing to create community gardens on Bainbridge. Over the last few months, neighborhood and small-group gardens have taken shape on city-owned farmland, a low-income apartment complex and a half dozen private properties.

A gathering on March 2 provided the spark. Organized by a loose coalition of gardening groups and local food enthusiasts, the meeting didn’t have a specific aim, but it packed Bainbridge Commons with over 110 people.

“I was totally blown away by the response,” said Debbi Lester, one of the meeting’s organizers. Before meeting ended, attendees had already begun networking, assigning tasks and setting work dates for several of the gardens now underway.

The meeting, Lester said, tapped into a zeitgeist born out of souring economy, an increasingly urbanized downtown and a growing desire to eat healthy, locally-grown food.

Nationwide, more people are planting seeds for better food and bigger savings. The National Gardening Association reports that over 40 million American households will grow their own food this year. That’s a nearly 20 percent increase over last year.

Straddling the fence between suburban and rural, the island has plenty of spacious properties boasting sizable gardens. But many of the island’s most recent residents came to Bainbridge amid the condo boom of 2005 and 2006, when 330 units were built in Winslow.

With no space to enjoy one of the island’s most popular pastimes, condo dwellers were disappointed to find that the only two community gardens were either hard to get to or hard to get into; the garden at Battle Point Park is five miles from Winlsow and the downtown garden at Eagle Harbor Congregational Church often has a three-year wait list.

Continue reading →

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Farmers market opens Saturday

farminternThe Bainbridge Farmers Market kicks off another season this Saturday, 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. at the park between City Hall and Bainbridge Performing Arts.

Local farmers say crops are taking a little longer to grow because of unpredictable weather. Many are waiting for temperatures to warm up before they can offer their usual spring bounty.

“It’s a slower growing season this year, even slower than last year,” Jackie Aitchison, executive director of the Washington Farmers Market Association, told Sun reporter Brynn Grimley for a story this week on the county’s markets.

Despite this season’s weather challenges, the Bainbridge market’s growers told Sound Food’s Carolyn Goodwin that customers can expect some popular offerings on Saturday.

Here’s what Goodwin had to say on a recent post:

Early offerings will be mostly in the hardy greens category. But a fresh local salad tastes amazingly good after a winter of grocery greens. Crumble some creamy Port Madison Farm goat cheese over the top and you’ll finally get a taste of spring.

Butler Green Farm also has spinach, bok choy, leeks and carrots. Our favorite Island food blog, Small Potatoes, recently posted a tasty recipe for Spinach Pie that would be a perfect way to celebrate your first bag of local spinach. Brian’s bok choy is fabulous, this week I steamed it with some shiitake mushrooms and cod fillets in a super-simple recipe that is wonderful over some brown basmati rice. It will be even better with some of the fresh halibut that just hit T&C this week.

Betsey Wittick of Laughing Crow Farm will bring some overwintered potatoes and cabbage (I’m working through the box of German Butterball potatoes I bought from her at the end of last season, and they still make great eating). Rebecca Slattery of Persephone Farm always has some interesting early-season crops like cardoons, which are at their best in the late winter.

Read the rest of Goodwin’s post, as well as several recipes using local ingredients, at Sound Food’s Web site.

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