Friday, April 02, 2010

Local Talent

We're in London Ontario on this Good Friday, and everything is closed here except this blog.  You can't go anywhere, and you can't do anything.  It's downright unrecognizable to New Yorkers like us.  There is an upside, though.

Yesterday, we took a 40-minute ride to a farming community, and stopped at an Amish farm where you could buy maple syrup and all kinds of dairy products.  The woman had just finished making cheesecakes, and asked us whether we wanted them covered with blueberries or cherries.  We opted for half and half, and it cost us 5.50 Canadian (about 5.50 American, for those of you who haven't brought your calculators).

She also had cheese and fresh cream, and now we do too.  It's pretty decadent putting fresh cream in your coffee on Good Friday, so I hope the word doesn't get out.  Now here's the thing--where I live, you can't really just drive to a farm and buy food.  Sure, in the summer you can drive two hours into Long Island and buy fresh vegetables, but by the time you get them back to your house they're probably spoiled already.

There's something really special about being able to buy farm-fresh ingredients, something that Zabar's does not really compensate for.  If I lived here, I'd travel to places like that to buy food all the time.

Maybe we're not as smart as we think we are.  Please don't share that thought with the mayor or chancellor, though.  Doubtless they'd find a way to use it against schoolteachers.
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