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Where Y'Eat: When Eating Local Means Branching Out

Ian McNulty
Eating local can mean exploring a world of possibilities these days.

Just where is “local?” In the food world these days, the answer is everywhere.

Local is emblazoned on your grocery store ad and woven across your restaurant menu. It’s at the core of the growing network of farmers markets, and local is fueling the explosion of new cottage industry producers and specialty suppliers. Local food is big, and around New Orleans it’s booming.

When it comes to the question what is local, however, the answer is changing, and in some very interesting ways. This month in particular is a good time to catch up on what’s new.

June brings around the annual Eat Local Challenge, a free form happening that encourages people in the New Orleans area to eat more local more often. It’s called a challenge because people who register for it pledge to eat foods produced within a 200 miles radius of the city for the whole month. That can mean eating local exclusively, down to every ingredient in every meal, or it can mean coming in at some less stringent levels, more to try things out. They’re off and running now, so when you see people scrutinizing that label in the store or quizzing their waitress about a dish, the Eat Local Challenge might be the reason why.

For the rest of us, there are other ways to give it a go. Dozens of restaurants are participating by serving dishes made entirely with local foods. These range from upscale dinner destinations to coffee shops and pizzerias. It’s fun to see how different places work within the local framework, and with more local suppliers they have a lot more to work with, from the seasonal haul of the farms to tofu and tortillas made close to home.

And all through the month there are events, open to the public, for a different look at local. There’s a trash fish tasting and a wild game cook out; there’s a you-pick-it, you-cook-it educational lunch, an all-local breakfast bash, a rooftop dinner of wild, indigenous Louisiana foods, guided farm tours and social restaurant crawls, to name just a few of the outings.

All this talk of local does have the potential to make it into something of a mantra, and like all mantras that means it can get annoying, especially when the notion of local food is used as some badge of virtue. It’s enough to give a guy a guilty conscience when he starts casting eyes at that Alaskan salmon instead a Gulf catch or breaks down and just ravages a bag of Fritos.

But a little perspective goes a long way. Eating local isn’t about compliance, but about awareness, about knowing what’s really out there. It’s the pleasure of local food and drink and the thrill of discovery, not the sacrifice of foregoing stuff from farther afield. In fact, keep your eye out for local as more and more of it rolls in, and you may end up craving tastes of home you never even knew you were missing.

Get details on the Eat Local Challenge and its month of events at www.nolalocavore.org.

Ian covers food culture and dining in New Orleans through his weekly commentary series Where Y’Eat.

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