The Maine Grocery List
*** Update 5-31-09: More sections of The Maine Grocery List are on the way. If you sell local foods and you'd like your business to be included in The Maine Grocery List, please send the following info to me at paul@tastingintonguesmaine.com: your name, business name, location, products, where your products are available (specific names and locations of stores, farmers markets, etc.), and the best way for customers to get in touch with you. There is no fee for a listing on The Maine Grocery List. ***
As I continue in my search for local* foods I keep hearing the same thing - "I would love to eat local but, frankly, I don't have the time to look for local foods." So, for the people who think of finding food in terms of which aisle of the grocery store to traverse, I offer the first step - The Maine Grocery List.
In The Maine Grocery List you will find a page for each aisle or section of a typical grocery store. On each page you will find listings of each food category with listings of producers and information about where to find these items in your area.
The three "aisles" that are up right now are Produce, Bakery, and Deli. (I will be adding meats and other deli items to the Deli page, but in the meantime you can find information about the many Maine cheese makers throughout our state. THAT was a fun list to research! There are some delicious Maine cheeses out there.)
*There are many definitions of "local food" and, although some are much broader than others, perhaps none of them are wrong. Defining "local" is as exact as defining "near". So, to my readers, I owe a definition so that you understand what I mean when I refer to "local foods". I define local foods as foods that are primarily grown and produced in Maine. I know that doesn't sound like a purist definition. It isn't. While I'm not interested in featuring locally mass-produced (another relative term) foods, there may be a few producers who are on the fringe of my definition. That said, my focus is on foods that are grown and produced in Maine. As I work on my "Maine Grocery List" and add more and more producers, I am considering ways to distinguish the producers of "purist definition" local foods from the ones who locally produce foods, the ingredients of which are primarily grown elsewhere.
As I continue in my search for local* foods I keep hearing the same thing - "I would love to eat local but, frankly, I don't have the time to look for local foods." So, for the people who think of finding food in terms of which aisle of the grocery store to traverse, I offer the first step - The Maine Grocery List.
In The Maine Grocery List you will find a page for each aisle or section of a typical grocery store. On each page you will find listings of each food category with listings of producers and information about where to find these items in your area.
The three "aisles" that are up right now are Produce, Bakery, and Deli. (I will be adding meats and other deli items to the Deli page, but in the meantime you can find information about the many Maine cheese makers throughout our state. THAT was a fun list to research! There are some delicious Maine cheeses out there.)
*There are many definitions of "local food" and, although some are much broader than others, perhaps none of them are wrong. Defining "local" is as exact as defining "near". So, to my readers, I owe a definition so that you understand what I mean when I refer to "local foods". I define local foods as foods that are primarily grown and produced in Maine. I know that doesn't sound like a purist definition. It isn't. While I'm not interested in featuring locally mass-produced (another relative term) foods, there may be a few producers who are on the fringe of my definition. That said, my focus is on foods that are grown and produced in Maine. As I work on my "Maine Grocery List" and add more and more producers, I am considering ways to distinguish the producers of "purist definition" local foods from the ones who locally produce foods, the ingredients of which are primarily grown elsewhere.
Posted by Paul at Tasting in Tongues at 12/6/2008 8:08 AM 
Categories: local, meal planning, Maine
Tags: local meal planning Maine
Categories: local, meal planning, Maine
Tags: local meal planning Maine
We had the pleasure of tasting and then buying up most of the rhubarb/granola/blueberry bars that Tuva Bakery set out at the Maine Crafts Show in Bar Harbor some summers ago. It was hard watching the disappointed faces of small children and the elderly as they came looking for the bars, only to be offered something else.
Tuva is an elusive group but wonderfully gifted innovative bakers. They are in Lincolnville 04849, tel. 207-763-4349. As technorati, we were frustrated at first by Tuvan Ludditism since they apparently don't want a website, but we called their number and a very kind baker actually and very patiently dictated out the recipe for these fabled bars on to our telephone answering machine, so we have it. The ingredients are of such high quality and abundance as we thought when we saw them, and as we knew once we had tasted them, that the price of several dollars per bar was not unreasonable. We planned to have them accompany us all the way to Quebec, but they didn't make it out of the county.
I would estimate that a steady diet of Tuva bars AND exercise would yield a life expectancy of close to 200 years! Must be the food of Shangri-la of Tibet in the old book and movie, "Lost Horizon," even though Tuva itself is in Mongolia.
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