Meet Your Makers!

This new series is about the people who bring us the goods. There is a great story behind the people and the products we sell at Provenance and we want to share this info with you. We hope you enjoy reading the answers to these questions, all selected by our staff members. Next, tell us who you want to get to know better and we'll ask!


Our first interview is with Lee Greene. Provenance struck up a relationship with Lee Greene and her line of imported handmade Italian Foods known as "The Scrumptious Pantry" in December 2009 when she first moved to Chicago. Lee is originally from Duesseldorf, Germany but spent five years in Tuscany working as vineyard manager for Cosimo Maria Masini. We are pleased to be working with her and wanted you to get to know Lee, the producers she represents, and their products a little better.
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What do you hope to accomplish through providing quality products/How did you get into this “line of business”?/What do you see as the biggest benefit you offer to your retailers and consumers?

Before I came to the USA, I worked in Italy and managed a small biodynamic vineyard. That experience showed me three things: First, sense of place, the so called terroir, was an established concept for wines, but it was only minor for foodstuffs, especially commodity type foods like vegetables, grains etc. Secondly, as a small quality oriented farmer you do not have the resources to tell your story and explain to consumers what makes your product different – and more pricey – than industrial foodstuffs. Lastly as a consumer it is hard to understand which product is truly artisanal and farmer grown and which just pretends to be.

I saw an opportunity of bridging this gap by creating a brand vehicle for small, organic farms growing food with a sense of place – using indigenous heritage crops and recipes based on the regional culinary heritage. It creates an opportunity for farmers to bring their food to market and an easy way for the consumer to identify these products on the retail shelf. That is why all our farmers smile from the front label of the packaging.

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Do you personally know the farmers that produce your products/What is involved with working with the farmers to get a product to market/What did you do before Scrumptious Pantry?

Oh yes, I absolutely know everyone, although the process for the Italian and US farmed products is different. As I mentioned, I managed a small biodynamic farm in Tuscany and through that job, I had the luck to meet the most amazing, passionate farmers – passionate about sustainability, about ‘terroir’. Over there, you can be assured that every farmer can give you an hour long talk why his tomato is different than the tomato grown by his neighbor and what to cook with it. Plus, the Italian economy is built on small businesses, hence the processing infrastructure for farmers to turn their produce into food is readily available. So all I had to do was to tap into the pool of these gorgeous products for The Scrumptious Pantry.
When I started working on the US farmed line, I quickly learned that things would be different and take more time. Finding great, motivated farmers that wanted to join was not the problem. We are so lucky to have one of the most vibrant real food movements here in the Midwest! But the products itself were the challenge. Although many farmers now grow heirloom (aka non hybrid) varieties, indigenous varieties are seldom planted. The regional culinary heritage has been flooded away by industrial food production. What is the taste profile of the Midwest? I spent a lot of time researching immigration patterns and cookbooks from 1750 to better understand what the culinary heritage of the Midwest is and how we can capture that in jars and packages. That was an unexpected twist to my job profile. And of course as soon as you have found a great farmer and have a great idea for a product figured out, you need to find a processor! The infrastructure for small food production is virtually non-existent. That poses a constant challenge. But we are finally about to launch two Midwestern - and one from California - in March. We are very excited!
Where do you find the inspiration for the products/flavors you select for your portfolio? How do you plan to grow your portfolio, horizontally or vertically, and why?
This might sound not very managerial, but we do not necessarily have a plan. We have a guideline of what The Scrumptious Pantry products are. And we are constantly looking for inspiration, meeting farmers, ranchers, fishermen to come up with new ideas for foods with a sense of place.

The one thing all our products have in common is that we are a PANTRY. We are building a line of food products that makes the busy lifestyle of our customers easier. A bag or jar that you can pull out when you need to prepare a quick dinner. I love cooking multiple course meals, but that is not everyday reality. The Scrumptious Pantry is composed of products, which allow you to prepare a quick and delicious meal, but at the same time can inspire the home chef to try something new. Like our Eggplant Tomato spread: if you are in a hurry you just need to whisk half a tablespoon in an egg to make a tasty egg dish. But you can also spread a thin layer on a piece of thinly pounded filet of veal, roll it up and broil it in the oven.
Of all the millions of food products you could have specialized in, why these? Describe your a-ha moment that made you say, "I'm going to do this!" What was the spark that led you to working with food?
Because this is the food I like to eat. There would surely have been many other products out there, foods everyone knows and that would have been easier to sell, or food with much higher margins. And although by Business School Profs will kill me for saying that: I do not care about making the highest margin. I care about what we put in our bellies, how we nourish our bodies, cause that also nourishes our soul. I needed to go to Italy and struggle up our up-wards sloping vineyards, spraying biodynamic preparations from a heavy copper tank on my back to realize that if this was the effort necessary to grow healthy food in a healthy environment, I had surely been eating wrong for the first thirty years of my live. Real food, small farmers needed a platform. So I set out to create one.
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What did you want to do as a kid, "when you grew up"?

Well, the usual dreams of little girls, I guess - princess, singer and figure skater. I realized pretty early though that neither of those would work out. The first “real” jobs I found attractive were either journalist or pastry chef. I cannot remember which one came first, but I do find it fascinating that my work now includes elements of both.

February Staff Selection - Sir Kensington's Gourmet Scooping Ketchup

From Staffer Joe Patt: Sir Kensington's Gourmet Scooping Ketchup 10% off thru the month of February

Back in 1981, when Ronald Reagan's FDA declared ketchup as a vegetable on school menus, everyone knew this was completely ludicrous. However, this was well before Sir Kensington's gourmet, all natural ketchup. We aren't saying that Sir Kensington's is more of a vegetable than say, Hunt's or Heinz, but we are saying that this stuff is much better for you than those high fructose corn syrup monsters, not to mention that it just plain tastes better. A ketchup revolution is underway led by Sir Kensington's to bring this beloved red yumminess back as America's favorite condiment.

Sir Kensington's uses all natural, non-refined ingredients in their product; vine-ripened pear tomatoes, cider vinegar, red bell peppers, agave nectar, honey, raw brown sugar, green onions, olive oil, dijon mustard, salt, lime juice, black pepper, allspice. This gluten and sulfite-free ketchup has 33% fewer calories, 55% less sodium, 75% less sugar and 50% less carbohydrates than typical, mass-produced ketchup. It also has no saturated fat or trans fat. If that doesn't do it for you then just try it, because this stuff rocks. It's so good you may even want to put it on your beloved Chicago-style hot dog and it's a must for Super Bowl Sunday on your burgers, meatloaf and fries. Mixed with horseradish sauce, it makes an unbeatable cocktail sauce. Now if they would just put it in those little one-use packs.

More uses and recipe ideas...

The Top Hat
While deep in a trick of Bridge with the Earl of Sandwich, Sir Kensington requested his manservant to prepare the following. Dubbed "The Top Hat," it consists of:
·Two slices of focaccia bread (each sliced delicately, yet firmly lathered with Sir Kensington's Gourmet Scooping Ketchup)
·Caramelized Spanish onions
·Four thick slices of premium (preferably imported) roast beef
·Watercress (For Vitamins)
·Melted Gruyere cheese
An alternative name for such a concoction, prepared with arugula rather than watercress, may be called "The Wild Duchess."



Rosemary's Toes
Upon completion of one of his first expeditions to the new world, Sir Kensington introduced the potato to Europe. The below recipe entitled "Rosemary's Toes", is best executed in a wood-burning oven.

Place three pounds of quartered potatoes in a single layer in a baking dish and pour half a cup of oil over them.
Add 4 minced cloves of garlic, 2 tsp of dried rosemary, salt and pepper to taste, and toss well to coat with the oil.
Bake the potatoes for 15 minutes in an oven preheated to 400°F.
Prepare half a cup of chicken stock blended with 2 TBSP of Sir Kensington's Gourmet Scooping Ketchup.
Add the stock to the potatoes, toss and bake for 10 minutes more.
Add 2 TBSP of lemon juice, toss and bake for 10 to 15 minutes more, or until the potatoes are cooked through. Finally, preheat the broiler and broil the potatoes for 2 to 3 minutes, or until golden brown.
Sprinkle with 2 TBSP of fresh oregano and serve at once.
Known to be a favorite of stock-jobbers and railway officers.

Food Rules #61-64 (this is the end)

I'm excited to say this is the last blog entry of this series. Always on to new and interesting things, I say! I hope that these blog posts, really a summary of points from Michael Pollan's "Food Rules", which is really a summary of points from his other books "In Defense of Food", "Omnivore's Dilemma", et al, have been helpful and enlightening. Though over the years I sometimes found myself conflicted over my food choices, the most important thing I have walked away with after reading these books is that I feel Empowered. I may not always be able to choose organic or local. But I can make more and better choices in my routine based on the knowledge I've accumulated through these books. For example, I more often than not will choose a vegetarian option when I am not familiar with where that restaurant sources its meat from. Or the fact that I have a sense of delighted recognition when I'm in a place that serves Cedar Valley pork or Dietzler beef or Seedling fruit or Prairie Fruits Farm cheese - and I'm often more likely to order it because I know the producers, the integrity of their products and practices, and because it Tastes better! I hope you experience that too. And I hope this blog over the last year (and our shop!) has inspired and introduced you to eat more deliberately. That is, to seek out the source, the practices and the quality that you believe in.

Thank you for reading this over the last year. I'm planning a new series starting in February on something new. I'm still debating the topic - I'm not a food writer or journalist...I don't even really consider myself a "blogger" by profession. But I love teaching people and turning them on to new things. If you have any ideas for a new blog series, though, please let me know! I'd like for it to somehow be tied in with what I already spend 60 hours a week doing, which is ultimately to foster and promote small food entrepeneurs and provide a service to our customers as a small grocer/wine shop.

'Nuf said! Here are the last bits from "Food Rules":

#61. Leave something on your plate. Rather than take way too much food, perhaps we can all practice taking a little less, thereby eating less & developing more self control. (a work in progress for me, I must say!)

#62. Plant a vegetable garden if you have the space, a window box if you don't. The past few years my partner Joe and I have tried container gardening on our tiny balcony outside our condo here in Chicago. It's yielded some food, for sure. But more than that, I recall such a sense of excitement in both of us when we could walk out our door and see the little tomatoes growing - literally - each day! How gratifying! This past season we also invested in a plot at the Peterson Garden with 4 other people and while we opted for the "Farm 4 You" tier, where garden volunteers tended the plot for us, we did get around $150 dollars' worth of veggies for a $35 investment. Pollan lists a statistic from the National Gardening Association which says that a $70 investment will yield $600 worth of food. Another thing? Growing your own food helps you find more of a connection to it. I was recently told a story by Grant Kessler, a food photographer, customer and locavore, that his son won't eat a tomato at the dinner table but put him in a garden so he can see it on the vine and he'll pop it right into his mouth. There is definitely something to be said for seeing where the food comes from - besides the plasticy-wrapped, stemless vegetables we see in so many grocery stores. Growing some of your own food (or investing in a local farm via a CSA - community supported agriculture) also helps with the next rule:

#63. COOK. As a retail grocer I've observed more and more people trying their hand at cooking. When I first opened the shop (5 years ago next month!), it was very much a shop for cooks. I love to cook - it's thoroughly enjoyable and cathartic for me - and I thought Chicago being such a food town would mean there are many home cooks out there, right? Wrong. People wanted (and still want) prepared foods - we have such little free time that it's easier to grab something on the run and go. Over the last 5 years, though, with all the new cooking shows, a couple of top chef winners from Chicago and certainly a downturn in the economy, people are cooking more and ordering in less. I hope that people are becoming less intimidated by cooking, more inspired by all the great local food artisans out there and I also believe that Pollan has had an impact on what and how we are eating!

I love hearing about meals that our customers prepared, hearing the stories of how they or our staff utilize the products at our stores and I love sharing those ideas with others. And let me tell you - simple is really best. Eating well CAN be less expensive, less time consuming and less difficult than anyone would think. It just takes a bit more effort (self discipline?) on our part to do it.

#64. Break the rules once in a while. Pollan says (and I agree!): Obsessing over food rules is bad for our happiness. Many of us say it time and again: "All things in moderation". What matters is not breaking the rules once and a while for a special occasion, but what we do the rest of the time in our everyday routine.


Thank you for reading.

January Staff Selection: Carmelina Tomatoes

Carmelina Tomatoes: Buy 3, Get 1 Free All Month Long

Submitted by Staffer Richard Sparks

How quickly that last fresh tomato of the season passes over the taste buds, and I'm rudely thrown back to the reality of those anemic-looking, spongy, off-season, hothouse varieties. With the help of some savvy customers here at Provenance, a few web searches, and some extra home-schooling in the kitchen, I have been discovering the merits of canned tomatoes, especially for the winter months.

Who knew that off-season, canned tomatoes actually pack a more powerful flavor punch than even the prettiest of mid-winder romas? Did you know that you can roast canned tomatoes to bring out not only the classic tomato flavors, but some unique elements not even found in fresh? Have a look at the first recipe below, which includes some excellent uses of these beauties.

A few weeks back, a customer and her son came in looking for cans of Carmelina tomatoes. She informed me it was "the brand" absolutely required for getting the authentic taste of her mama's marinara from the old country. To help you reproduce that taste of Italy this month, Provenance is marking down all varieties of Carmelina tomatoes (12 and 28 oz. cans) to "Buy Three, Get the Fourth Can Free." Stock your pantry now!


Check out these recipe links:

http://www.cooksrecipes.com/sauce/oven-roasted-canned-tomatoes-recipe.html

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/27/dining/271mrex.html?_r=2

http://smittenkitchen.com/2010/01/tomato-sauce-with-butter-and-onions/

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/moroccan-lentil-soup/Detail.aspx

Food Rules #56-60

We are almost at the end of "Food Rules"...these last couple of entries are from section 3 of the book, which is subtitled "HOW should I eat?" . To this question Pollan answers "Not too much". Here are the next 4 rules to consider:

56. Limit snacks to Unprocessed plant foods (vegetables, fruits & nuts)
57. Don't get your fuel from the same place your car does - I didn't realize this (although it does make sense) but gas stations sell way more snacks and 20oz bottles of sugary drinks than they ever do gas. I'd like to think that it's because we are using public transit, carpooling & biking more - but I think it's more likely that we're just eating in our car more - reaching for the cheap stuff to tide us over because we don't have the time to sit and eat a meal.
58. Do all your eating at a table. See Rule 57.
59. Try not to eat alone. We eat less around a communal table, when conversation and other distraction is involved and we're more prone to overeat when we are alone.
60. Treat treats as Treats. Pollan suggests going by the "S Policy" - no snacks, no seconds, no sweets except on days that begin with the letter 'S'. This rule is harder for me to follow, not becuase I love sweets but because I like to snack. I'm just trying to keep my snacking to more healthy foods like nuts, yogurt & dried fruits.

So there you have it! We'll have the last 4 rules from this book before year end, I promise! Then onto a new blog series in 2011.

Food Rules #51-55

Here are the next 5 Rules in part 3 (How Should I Eat?) of Pollan's book Food Rules, along with some of my comments on said rules:

Food Rules #51: Spend as much time preparing the meal as you took to prepare it. One of the big reasons why I enjoy dining out is because I can often make the mealtime last longer, lingering over each course and savoring each plate. However, eating out gets expensive, so I'm cooking a lot more at home. Cooking for me is cathartic, so I enjoy the ritual of it. Now I'm challenging myself to enjoy the eating part of it just as much, in terms of the time it takes to eat meals I prepare. Still working on that, especially since eating more slowly makes me eat less because I'm more aware of when I'm getting full.

Food Rules #52: Buy smaller plates & glasses. This works! I have started to use a salad plate at home for my meals instead of the larger dinner plates and I do eat less. I will often choose the larger wine glass though. Don't know if that will ever change...

Food Rules #53: Serve a proper portion and don't go back for seconds. I am getting better at this and it's easier to do so following the 2 rules above. Pollan suggests if you are going to go for 2nds, wait a few minutes before doing so because you may find you are not as hungry as you thought and you may actually eat less that way.

Food Rules #54: "Breakfast like a king. Lunch like a prince. Dinner like a pauper". This is a REALLY hard rule for me to follow, since I am usually getting ready in the mornings with little time to get to work and because I have so much to do before actually opening the shop. And because I skip meals and eat dinner late at night. I do find that eating breakfast, even if it's a smoothie, puts me less hungry later in the day than if I don't. If I had a lunch hour I might be able to follow this more easily. And I'm going to try, as Pollan says front-loading eating early in the day helps us consume fewer calories over the course of the day.

Food Rules #55: Eat meals. Ah yes, mealtime. What's that? One study showed 20% of American's eating took place in a car. We are stretched for time, plain & simple. Even on road trips, we're encouraged more to eat in the car as opposed to dining in somewhere. But getting further and further away from the Big Three (breakfast, lunch & dinner) pushes us more towards unnecessary snacking, drinking (sodas, etc)...usually on the unhealthy side of things.

These rules sound so simple and there was once a time, in my life at least, that they were very easy to follow. But we're busy, cash-strapped and we don't make time, quite honestly. I try to make up for it for cooking well later in the day, but again, it's usually a late dinner.

What about you? Do you make sure you take the hour for lunch? Do you always have time to eat a good breakfast? What about dinner - mostly take out or cooking at home? Do you make a big batch of something early in the week and freeze it or have leftovers the rest of the week? And what are any tricks you can share?

December Staff Selection

Oleum Vitae Olive Oils 10% off All Month Long!

The Oleum Vitae olive oils from Spain are very unique, very flavorful and very fun stocking stuffers! We currently carry the Chive, the Tomato and the Coffee versions and I love them all for different reasons. The chive oil adds a nice bit of herbaceous acidity to dishes like risotto, or for dressings & marinades. A drizzle over creamy risotto adds a nice fresh flavor. The tomato is fabulous drizzled over pizza or fresh ricotta gnocchi. My favorite? The oil infused with Kenyan Coffee was amazing over Chocolate Almond Ice Cream - it added depth and another layer of flavor that was surprisingly good. I also think it works well with Jamon Serrano or a coffee-rubbed steak. These oils are a steal at $9.99 each and, through the month of December, they are 10% off!


Here are some recipe ideas (just substitute the Oleum Vitae oils for those mentioned):

http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/White-Onion-Soup-with-Chive-Oil-15102

http://foodandpaper.blogspot.com/2007/03/spring-fever-tagliatelle-with-chive-oil.html

http://find.myrecipes.com/recipes/recipefinder.dyn?action=displayRecipe&recipe_id=10000000523763

http://www.food52.com/recipes/2007_cowboy_rubbed_rib_eye_with_chocolate_stout_pan_sauce