Good Food

I love good food, I think most people do.  I have also been lucky enough to live in some great places where great food is available.  I grew up in Utah, where one can grow anything.  As a child, my summers were spent helping with our families massive garden.  After planting, weeding and watering, the great harvest would begin.  I snapped beans, shelled peas and helped can them all along with tomatoes, peaches, pears, pickled beats, just plain pickles, and corn just to name a few.  Summer and fall months were full of fresh fruits and vegetables which grew in abundance.  I remember grabbing fresh tomatoes from the bushel baskets that were waiting to be canned and eating them with the salt shaker like apples.  

My husband and I were also fortunate enough to spend quite a few years in the Pacific northwest, in the Seattle and Portland areas.  The fresh fruits and vegetables were also prolific there.  We had blackberries in our back yard.  There were wonderful deep red strawberries and peaches that were huge and so juicy it was impossible to eat them with out them dripping sweet juice down your chin.  Along with the great produce, we had wonderful fresh seafood.  Salmon, shrimp, crab, lobster, I can still taste it. 

I live in a great place now, but sadly, it produces more coal and oil than produce or seafood.  We have tried and tried to grow a garden here, but with limited success.  The soil is mostly clay and the growing season short.  Any seafood that is available is days or weeks old.  I find myself still purchasing tomatoes, peaches, strawberries and even seafood here.  Most of it is hard pale and crunchy.  I haven’t canned much since I moved here, there is not much to can.  I have to admit though, that we do get chokecherries and love the syrup that they make, but I would love to get my hands on some strawberries that were actually red instead of pink and crisp, or peaches that were large and tender and juicy, and not as crunchy as an apple.  The produce that I do buy here, I think I get so that maybe a bit of the rich flavor will come through their pale crunchy exterior and bring back just a slight memory of what great fruit really tastes like.  The dry, fishy clam,  I actually order in restaurants, and if I close my eyes and try really hard I can still remember what good crab is actually supposed to taste like.  All of you who live in places with great food, go and eat a crab, or a peach for me.  Don’t worry though, I will be alright ,we do make get really good jerky here.