Sustainable Thanksgiving

Mindful Metropolis, November edition

Say “thanks” this turkey day with local and organic foods that honor nearby farmers and the land they tend.

I am not politically aligned with my in-laws, with whom I spend Thanksgiving. When we vote, we support different values and visions. But when it comes to food — what we eat, where it comes from, and how it’s prepared — we might as well have grown up on the same farm. And our common relationship to food may be more important than which lever we pull at the ballot box every four years.


I called my mother-in-law a few weeks ago and suggested that we team up this November to produce a Thanksgiving feast full of local and, if possible, organic foods. She fully supported the idea. A schoolteacher in rural northern Michigan, she’s been on a buy-America kick for a while now, partly out of patriotism and partly to enhance the quality of what she brings home.

When we gather for the traditional harvest meal in a few weeks, the turkey and stuffing, mashed potatoes and gravy, sweet corn and squash, green beans and cornbread, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie will taste great. They’ll be full of healthy nutrients. And our purchase of them will support the local economy.

Whether you’re a city mouse or a country mouse, whether you like your T-day meal traditional or whether you introduce creative flair, whether you eat turkey or prefer tofu, and whether you do it yourself or like to go out, you too can celebrate a sustainable Thanksgiving. In Chicago, here’s how:

Organic turkeys

All talk of Thanksgiving begins with the bird. It’s the centerpiece and the main act, the sun around which the other courses revolve. You’ll give the turkey hours in the oven to cook it just right, and you’ll stuff it with bread, and possibly vegetables, herbs or fruit, to spread the good tastes all around. So make sure the main course lives up to its hype.

Caveny Farm, located in central Illinois near Springfield, is a card-carrying member of the Slow Food movement and raises heritage turkeys, ducks and geese in pastures that grow grasses, clovers and amaranth. Caveny’s Bourbon Red Turkeys are a hit among Chicago foodies, and John and Connie will deliver to Lincoln Park, Evanston and the House of Glunz on the Saturday before Thanksgiving and to Heritage Prairie Farm in Geneva, Ill. the next day. (The Lincoln Park pickup will happen at the Green City Market at the Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum, between 8 a.m. and noon.) Caveny’s birds cost between $50 and $110, depending on how many mouths you have to feed. Visit www.cavenyfarm.com or call (217) 762-7767 to order.

Fresh Picks, just north of town in Niles, offers free-range, broad-breasted bronze and white turkeys from Triple “S” Farms in Stewardson, Ill., and TJ’s Poultry in Piper City. Pick up the bird yourself, or Fresh Picks will deliver to most Chicago zip codes between the Wednesday and Saturday before Thanksgiving. Reserve one at www.freshpicks.com or call (847) 410-0595.

Organic, Pasteur-raised turkeys from the Wettstein farm in Carlock, Ill. will be available for pickup the Saturday before Thanksgiving at the Buzz Cafe on Lombard Street in Oak Park. Call the Wettsteins at (309) 376-7291 for information.
Good Earth Farms in Milladore, Wis. offers pasture-raised Broad Breasted Whites with plenty of meat on them. You’ll be eating organic birds that lived out their days happily scratching, eating clover and grass and chasing grasshoppers. Good Earth will ship them for $15 each within a seven-state upper-Midwest region or for free if they weigh over 40 pounds.

If you don’t mind buying from a chain store, Whole Foods offers organic turkeys (though shipped in from Sonoma, Calif.) and non-organic birds from Michigan. And Trader Joe’s will offer some organic birds, though a company spokesperson declined to state where in the Midwest they originate.

Vegans get creative

My friend Chris Brunn, who doesn’t consume animal products, reports that vegan-friendly holiday meals aren’t as tricky as they might sound. He recommends perusing holiday editions of mainstream cooking magazines, like Bon Appétit, which offer recipes that are either vegan, or can easily be modified to be vegan.

In a post two years ago on the local blog GapersBlock.com, Chris mentioned unique and delicious recipes that included wild rice with roasted grapes and walnuts and a three-mushroom dressing. He followed the instructions but recommended substituting margarine, or good olive oil, for butter. Adding rosemary, white wine and sautéed onions to the mushrooms didn’t hurt.

Moving onto potatoes and vegetables, Bon Appétit’s mouthwatering suggestions included a bourbon-walnut sweet potato mash, red potatoes with ancho chiles, a wasabi mash, a hash of sweet potatoes, a recipe for roasted fingerlings, caramelized shallots, smashed rutabagas with ginger-roasted pears, green beans and almonds, parsnips with carrots, rosemary and roasted fennel.

Not everyone enjoys all meat substitutes, Chris admits, but some can be really good, and you can have fun making your own. The Chicago Diner, located at 3411 North Halsted, offers a host of great recipes on its website (www.veggiediner.com) including one for tofu roulade, which Chris has used for several years. Basically, roll heavily seasoned tofu around a savory crouton stuffing. Chris and his brother added another layer one year. They wrapped the whole thing in phyllo dough and brushed it with olive oil. The concoction turned out super flaky on the outside and piping hot and tasty on the inside.

The Chicago Diner will also take reservations and offer carryout for its 27th annual vegan Thanksgiving. Visit the website to drool over the menu or to book a spot at the table. And check out GapersBlock.com for more of Chris Brunn’s vegan culinary odyssey.

Bountiful sides

The Green City Market in Lincoln Park is Chicago’s only year-round farmer’s market, so stop there for produce and ingredients for all your delicious sides. Because the turkey would look awfully bare without the tasty stuffing, potatoes, sweet corn, squash, green beans, cranberry sauce and pumpkin pie. The aforementioned Fresh Picks, and other turkey-growing farms, are also good options to fulfill your produce needs. Or check out FamilyFarmed.org for a list of family-run farms that will help you set your table this Thanksgiving.

Remember, you might not see eye to eye with your family members about some things, and avoiding discussions about politics or religion at the dinner table is good advice. But if you can all agree that the food in front of you is tasty, healthy and ethical, then you already have more in common than you realize. Besides, the first taste of that delicious squash is a hell of a lot more enjoyable than a protracted debate about health care.

Jacob Wheeler is an adjunct teacher at Columbia College and publishes the Glen Arbor Sun newspaper (GlenArborSun.com) in northwest-lower Michigan