Growing a Feast: The Chronicle of a Farm-to-Table Meal
At the end of summer, Timmermeister (Growing a Farmer, 2011) presides over a luscious feast for 20 guests at his 13-acre dairy farm on Vashon Island, Washington. In this beautifully written book, the former restaurateur details the long labor of love behind the feast that began two years earlier with the birth of a calf, Alice. Her cream is only one of the glorious ingredients that will go into the feast, nearly all of them produced at the farm. Timmermeister’s chronicle of milking cows and the making and aging of cheese months ahead of the dinner he prepares is interwoven with an overview of an evolving small farm, agribusiness, and concerns about the industrial food complex. Timmermeister guides the reader through the seasons and the rhythms of planting and harvesting, conveying the visual, aural, and tactile pleasure of growing food. Joining him in his enterprise are a host of food-conscious characters, from Leda, who trades seeds for cheese, to Bill, whose large, thin-skinned tomatoes will find their way into a cake. A delight for foodies, this astonishingbook includes recipes for the feast dishes. --Vanessa Bush