Thoughts on Mayonnaise, Paleo and Local Eating

So I decided to make mayonnaise today. I grabbed my blender (a cheapo from Superstore - maybe one day I'll have a really good one, but this will have to do for now), and my printout of Sarah Fragoso's paleo mayonnaise recipe, and off I went. I've made it before and loved it (especially with fresh ginger added!).

Turns out, I didn't have plain olive oil in the house (the extra virgin tastes too strong). But I did have a bottle of local, non-GMO canola oil, left over from the Manitoba Food Bloggers' bake sale. So I decided to give it a try.

Wow, that oil is deep yellow in colour. So is the mayonnaise, as you can see. It tastes fine, except that I think I put in a little too much mustard. But it has me thinking about the whole paleo vs. (and does it need to be versus?) local thing.

I love being a locavore, within reason. I do realise that I live in Manitoba, not California or even Virginia. There's been a lot of chatter recently about this new anti-locavore book, claiming that eating locally means going back to subsistence farming, which is horrible, inefficient and bad for the environment. I think that's a straw man argument - I don't know anybody who claims that people should raise inappropriate crops just to be self-sufficient. Except maybe North Korea and, according to the authors, Quebec. Still, anybody who thinks that everything in modern agriculture is just peachy needs to pull their heads out of the sand. The decision after World War II to turn the munitions factories into fertiliser production plants, sparking the "Green Revolution", has turned out to be a mixed blessing, to say the least. The ability to grow insane amounts of soy and corn was supposed to feed the world. Instead it seems to have led to the current obesity epidemic. But that's maybe another blog post, with serious research links. There are a lot of very smart people out there, with arguments on both sides of the question, and it is worth thinking about what they have to say.

The question that is vexing me right now, however, is embodied in two glass bottles. The paleo movement, which I think is doing great things for the health of North Americans, frowns on the use of seed or vegetable oils, because they are highly refined and processed. In the case of canola, it is also highly likely to be genetically modified, with all the potential health issues that follow. If you want to make paleo mayonnaise, the way to go is with olive oil.

However, there is no way in a million years that olives are ever going to grow anywhere near Manitoba, unless global warming reaches a point where we have much greater problems than what oil to use. If I am going to use olive oil, it has to be imported. I do use a lot of coconut oil without any hesitation, because I believe that the medium-chain triglycerides are good for me and my family. But you can't make mayonnaise with coconut oil.

So if I have a bottle of local, non-GMO canola oil, grown and processed on a farm right here in Manitoba, or a bottle of imported olive oil that I bought at Safeway, which is the lesser evil?

I would love to know what you think.

Spring Paleo Manitoba Supper

 

Yesterday I was at Petrasko Bros picking up some bedding plants, and of course I had to get a picture of this sign. It just shows how Manitobans feel about spring and summer, after six months of the white stuff on the ground. This year actually was pretty good, spring was early and we had some amazingly warm days in March and April. But now we have local asparagus (yes, I know it's June. We're in the NORTH here, people). We have local greenhouse tomatoes and cucumbers from Greenland Gardens. We are fortunate to have local mushrooms year-round from Loveday Mushroom Farms, and we currently also have local onions (of which unfortunately I don't know the provenance - but I trust Eatit.ca when they tell me something is Manitoba-grown). I've also been picking up local produce and organic baby veggie plants at the Red River General Store. A bit of a drive, but so worth it.

So, on to our dinner the other night. Sometimes we are fortunate to have pickerel or northern pike from the lakes of Northern Manitoba, but this was a vegetarian one, with free-run eggs from Nature's Farm in Steinbach. The garlic is not yet local, but I can't cook without garlic. Sorry. I'm not sure why I put the container of tomato sauce (homemade - that's another post) in the picture, maybe I was planning to use some, but in the end I didn't.

Paleo purists will complain about the bag of bagels in the background. All I can say is that my kids are not there yet. Baby steps.

Anyway, we had two main dishes - a mushroom fritatta, and of course, this time of year, we must have asparagus.The cooking oil of choice in paleo cooking is coconut oil, not local, alas. With global warming, though, who knows? Coconut palms at Portage and Main ...

These pictures are mostly just an excuse to show off my beautiful cast-iron pans, which I bought at Pollock's Hardware Co-op, a beautiful place in a beautiful city. Once you start cooking with cast iron, you will never want to go back to those nasty Teflon non-stick pans. Ditch that toxic cookware, people!

Anyway, you heat up your coconut oil, saute your onions and garlic until they are transparent but not brown, then add your mushrooms. Yum. Your kitchen smells good. You scramble up your eggs, add a little oregano, basil and thyme (very shortly those will be extremely local, from my garden!). Salt to taste. Add to your pan, turn down the heat, cover and let it cook merrily away. You may have to brown the top under the broiler, if your fritatta is too big to flip. I'm a wimp that way.

As mentioned, all meals this time of year must include asparagus, on pain of displeasing the Locavore Gods. So here's the braised asparagus dish that went with the fritatta. Start onions and garlic the same as before (although I think I may have used butter instead of coconut oil for this - anybody got a source for local organic butter??).

I think I added a little salt, as well. Fresh, local asparagus does not need any enhancements, in my humble opinion. The flavour of asparagus is what's called the fifth flavour (not sweet, salty, bitter or sour). I don't buy imported asparagus because I really don't think it can stand up to travel. So this time of year is especially precious to me.

So, here is the final product. I'm still learning about food photography as well as cooking and blogging, so bear with me. It was yummy, though.

I would love to see what you are cooking up this time of year!