One of the reasons that I try to eat at locally owned restaurants, and cook with local ingredients, is to support my local economy. I live in Michigan, a state that has been hit hard by the downturn. Many people think of Michigan as one big overgrown Detroit, but West Michigan has a charm all its own.
Finding locally-owned restaurants is surprisingly easy, especially when you consider that Grand Rapids is not a very large city. I’m always finding new ones, and so excited that so many are making an effort to buy local ingredients. Winchester on Wealthy, where I recently met my friend Holly Bechiri for a brainstorming meeting, is just such a place.
You might remember her from my post about her Pages project. We were meeting to brainstorm employment opportunities for her, since she was recently downsized, and to strategize about how to make our dreams a reality.
See, Holly and I love the creativity that we see in our city and region. We believe that we need to make lemonade out of the lemon that our state is considered. There’s a great series on NPR called Three Things, where they ask people from all walks of life for what three things they think the people of Michigan can do to make things a bit better in the state.
My friend and I are all about the entrepreneurial spirit, and the buy/eat local movement. Holly epitomizes the entrepreneurial spirit, and the one whom my husband blames for my local food obsession.
She also has a passion for the arts, and was a curator for one of the Art Prize venues.
I can’t help but think that agrotourism and local food will be what helps Michigan back on its feet. Just take what we ate at Winchester as an example.
I had the pork loin special, which was roasted and served on a bed of cauliflower puree and roasted root vegetables.
I ordered a milk stout which was served on nitro. Unfortunately it wasn’t until after I ordered that I realized it wasn’t a Michigan beer. It was still very tasty.
My friend Holly ordered the Tavern burger, which is made of 100% fresh ground local beef, chipotle aioli, and haystack onions on french bread.
As you can see from their menu, they have quite a selection.
We realized that even though both of us like to eat at locally owned restaurants like the Winchester, and are both interested in buying locally, and in encouraging creativity among our community, it’s hard to find all the resources. It’s like a treasure hunt. So we have a dream of connecting like-minded individuals in our city. By the end of dinner, we had dreamed up an online community that would help people find resources, network, and encourage entrepreneurism. Our plans are still taking shape, but we still celebrated with some tres leches cake.
While we didn’t solve all the world’s problems, the local food and atmosphere gave us more than burgers to chew on.
Do YOU think that eating local has the power to change local economies? Please comment below.
This post linked on Real Food Wednesday.
Great post! And nice to see another GR person blogging about good and local food!! Seems the only way I find more of us is in the bloggy world! Glad I found you and can’t wait to see how you cook in season. 🙂
I don’t know if it can save an economy, but it certainly helps the owner of whatever restaurant you are dining at. I try to eat in locally owned restaurants as often as possible.
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I love the new format! And local food. 🙂
I think people definitely need to explore their local food economies. Think of all the money spent on food that could stay in the local community! Just based on my food spending alone, it’d make a big difference.
Not so sure that I, personally, make much of a difference as we don’t ever (OK, once in a blue moon…no wait…not even then!) go out to eat. I DO try to buy as much locally produced food as possible, hence the CSA membership. What I do try to do is shop local. My own little town of Allendale’s Mexican grocer. The dry cleaners. The doctors offices. The vet. Etc. I do my part, and pray it makes a difference when combined with everyone else.
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It can’t hurt. I buy a lot of my food from local sources because I want to support local farmers and producers and cuz I love stickin it to the Man and corporations!
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Use all that land that doesn’t need to be watered (like it would here in Colorado) to raise grass-fed cows and pastured pigs and pastured chickens. And organic veggies and fruits. Using the cows manure to keep the soil rich and healthy. Now that might save Michigan’s economy.
I feel like I could have written this article (although you probably did a much better job than I would have). I DO feel it can help save Michigan’s economy. I’m extremely impressed with Michigan’s food artisan industry and new food entrepreneurs, and you know we were listed by Gourmet as the most agriculturally diverse state in the nation after California.
And the kind of movement you and your friend are thinking of is certainly something of interest to me as well.
You should check out the local food summit ning, which grew out of last year’s local food summit in Ann Arbor. There will be three similar events in this area in the next couple of months.
If I ate anywhere else that isn’t my house it would definitely affect the economy… MY ECONOMY! LOL! Dh and I usually eat home! I cook everything around here! sometimes when we want to “go crazy” we have a frozen pizza LOL!!! and some other times someone else invites us out or probably on VERY VERY VERY SPECIAL occasions we will eat in a restaurant! We try to buy everything from local places and/or produced locally too though!! VERY GOOD POST! 😉
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We just ate local tonight and were discussing the benefits for the local economy. We went to a local taco shack instead of Taco Bell. I feel like a larger portion of my money goes back into the local economy that way 🙂 Thanks for leaving a comment on my blog about cloth napkins. I think you are correct, I will be running a load of dishtowels anyway and it usually isn’t very full. But with my cloth napkins in there is will just be a fuller load 🙂
I totally agree. I always try to purchase local. I think it is very important. Also when I purchase online I try to purchase from mom-owned businesses. I just like knowing I supporting an individual instead of some huge corporation.
Though I live in California (where most of the “Non-Michigan” food is grown), I super support all your efforts to eat locally. I too believe it is a great step in saving so much that we love about life! GREG
I am really excited to read this. I grew up in the GR area, and my parents still live there. My dad works at a local butcher shop and that has helped open my eyes to see how eating locally can really make a difference… now I just have to figure out how to do that in Washington DC!
He’s at Byron Center Meats (in Byron Center, if it isn’t obvious!). He gets to know the farmers and learn about their perspective too…