My first experience with locally sourced, home grown food was through my grandmother and her sisters. They had grown up poor in the mountains of north GA on a self sufficiency farm. With that behind them they continued to raise their own food for all of their lives. They always had green beans. Some of my earliest memories involve snapping green beans around her living room. I never liked beans except green beans.
I grew older and never really thought much about how my food tasted compared to where it came from. I never really valued the taste in my food except to avoid things I never liked growing up. This began to change after going to Italy on our honeymoon 13 years ago. I was exposed to a culture who valued the taste and freshness of food above a great many things. I had food I had never been exposed to before and I am sad to say I mostly had pizza the entire time. After that, I felt a need to have this food experience on a regular basis. I started on a quest to make my own pizza. This was really the beginning of the search for tasty, quality food.
As I began to make my own food and had other fine dining experiences over the years, I began to understand that quality ingredients were the key to a good meal. Soon I realized that making my own food with quality food could out do most restaurants. When I had kids, it ignited a need to make sure I was feeding my kids quality healthy foods. Eventually I read The Omnivore’s Dilemma and began researching the food industry. This lead to the conclusion that if I wanted real food, without concern of chemicals or contaminants, I was going to have to grow it myself.
I had come full circle from my grand mothers living room, snapping my own green beans grown in my own garden. It just took a few decades for me to realize the reason I liked green beans was because it was grown local and was fresh from her garden.
