Fairhope: Iowa Seeds Bear Alabama Fruit

A wise bear, Wro says that "History loves irony." From a tree on the Grand Hotel grounds in Mobile Bay's Eastern Shore, he's meditating on the intermingled destinies of Fairhope, Alabama and Des Moines.

Had Ernest Berry Gaston been born when Iowa farmland was not considerably more expensive than waterfront property on the Gulf Coast, he might very well have changed Iowa dramatically. Iowa’s loss became Alabama’s gain when the Des Moines expatriate fathered one of America’s most eccentric communities on populist, utopian principles that survived the 19th and 20th centuries.

In 1889, even before graduating from Drake University, the precocious descendent of French Huguenot nobility bought the Suburban Advocate which served University Place, now the Drake neighborhood of Des Moines. Gaston used that newspaper as a platform to develop his ideas about social justice. During the next four years, he made a fortune in Iowa real estate, got married, started a family, invented a snow plow and was elected justice of the peace, town recorder and fire chief. He developed his "Single Tax" philosophy from a mixture of Henry George‘s social theories, Populist Party platforms and personal notions about human behavior.

Gaston organized his followers into "The Fairhope Industrial Association" (FIA) with the purpose "to establish and conduct a model community or colony, free from all forms of private monopoly."

Unfortunately, Iowa’s fertile land was prohibitively expensive and other utopian communities had already formed in the West and Great Plains.

Gaston’s followers researched several locations in the South and voted to plant the seeds of their dream on the eastern shore of Mobile Bay, in Baldwin County, Alabama where a wealthy Ante Bellum community had deteriorated into shanties. Land sold for just fifty cents to a dollar an acre.

Like today’s snowbirds, Gaston and his followers left Des Moines in November of 1894. Unlike other utopian communities, the heart of Fairhope remains free of private property today. That has attracted a community of artists, dreamers and utopians who anchor the Eastern Shore’s unique life style - called “Carmel on the Gulf.” Fairhope’s 13,000 current residents include colorful professional athletes like World Series star JC Romero and Leon ’”Wrong Way” Lett of the Dallas Cowboys, authors like Fannie Flagg ("Fried Green Tomatoes at the Whistle Stop Cafe") and Winston Grooms ("Forest Gump")

and artists like Nall (pictured in the Grand Hotel lobby), whose eccentric art is as well known in Europe as Christo‘s is here. Fairhope and its cool image has attracted resorts, golf courses and some of the wealthiest zip codes in America, in all directions around it.

A master gardener and student of history, Des Moines Mayor Frank Cownie confesses a long fascination with the Fairhope experiment.

“My ancestors moved to Des Moines the same time that Gaston lived here. I like knowing that the seeds of that town came from Des Moines, especially because it has blossomed into something so interesting, attractive and unique,” Cownie said.

Last spring, the mayor sent heirloom seeds to the eastern shore’s historic Grand Hotel, which has an illustrious guest register that includes nearly every US Presidents since the Civil War. (The hotel in Point Clear ooutside Fairhope, was recently named to Conde Nast's list of the world's greatest hotels, at #31.)

Grand Hotel Executive Chef Michael Wallace planted Cownie’s seeds in the resort’s Chef’s Garden. By late summer, guests from Iowa were being treated to the bounty of those seeds.

Sometimes, it takes years for a seed to bear fruit. Sometimes it takes centuries.

Fast Food Goes Green?

A "salad" at Wendy's

Is That Even Possible?

Nearing the tenth anniversary of the first “fast food made me obese” lawsuits, marketers are busy crafting a new “healthier” image for McIndustry. Most fast food chains have reduced calories, fats, trans fats and sodium in their fare. Marketers for industry whipping boy McDonald’s now point out that their signature Big Mac has fewer fats, half as many carbs, and only 38 % as much sodium as a burrito from Chipotle - the Oprah-approved, green darling of the food media. Most fast food giants promote salads now, some with recently reduced calories, and sodium. Press releases for Wendy’s “apple pecan chicken salad with pomegranate vinaigrette” enticed me into the brave new world of fast food greens.

I began with McDonald’s “premium bacon ranch salad with crispy chicken.” Its greens impressed me with their freshness and generous ratio of mesclun to iceberg. Grape tomatoes were crisp but carrots were pale with age. A chicken filet was served hot on top of cold ingredients. A light Paul Newman dressing tasted like buttermilk. A fistful of shredded cheeses plus swarms of bacon bits challenged the claim that this salad has only 370 calories, 200 grams of fat, and 970 mg of sodium. All those numbers are down significantly from similar reports on the same salad a couple years ago.

I found the best presentation of the week at Taco Bell (TB).

“Chipotle steak taco salad” was served in a crisp tortilla bowl with beans and rice on the bottom. Lettuce and tomato topped that, covered with tender seasoned beef, cheddar cheese, sour cream, salty chipotle dressing, and multi colored tortilla strips. TB made no health claims for this salad’s 900 calories, 57 grams of fat, and 1700 mg. of sodium - numbers unchanged from a couple years ago. The lettuce was iceberg and TB’s condiment bar had no fresh salsas at all.

At the KFC by Drake, the company-promoted “zero trans fats KFC crispy chicken caesar salad” was not available. No specialty salads were. Does the company think college kids don’t eat salads? This was not the first time that KFC innovations have been withheld from the Des Moines market.

At Wendy’s, the new salad that had inspired my quest was not available either. In my mind, franchisees should not be the last people to know about a company‘s new products.

I tried a “Mandarin chicken salad” that had similar nutritional numbers to the one that had teased me. It included a good mix of greens, including mizuna and tango. Roasted almonds tasted strangely like peanuts. Crispy noodles tasted like salt. Mandarin oranges tasted like sugar. Chicken was bland with just a trace of paprika and garlic salt. White sugar, brown sugar, corn syrup, and pineapple juice dominated the sesame and ginger flavors in the sweet dressing. At 570 calories, 25 grams from fat and 1370 mg. of sodium, nutritional numbers were second to McDonald‘s.

Burger King’s (BK) “TenderCrisp chicken garden salad with Ken’s caesar dressing” defied the trend toward “healthier” salads. Its 1070 calories, 86 grams of fat and 2900 mg. of sodium (almost double the CDC recommended daily allotment) were up from numbers on a previous nutritional check of the same salad. The difference might result from three kinds of cheeses not included in the previous count. BK’s packaging was true to their motto “Have it your way.”

Tired lettuce was packed in a salad bowl with baby carrots, tomatoes, and shredded cheeses compartmentalized in a different bowl. Additional packets included dressing, croutons and a chicken breast. That created a lot of personal plastic and paper to rip open. This salad was named one of six “diet destroyers” by business travelers’ web site Divine Caroline.
Bottom line. Costing around $5, most of these salads are not bargains. Less costly burgers were actually “healthier” choices than most too.

Beautiful Buglers of Henry County

Elk’s story is an All American tale. They are descendents of fearless explorers who migrated, like most native Americans, across the Bering land bridge from Asia during the late Ice Ages. Once in North America they became indomitable pioneers, adapting to all ecosystems except tundra, deserts and the gulf coast. They lived symbiotically with American Indians of the west where Kootenai, Cree, Blackfoot and Ojibwas fashioned blankets, footwear, clothing and housing from their hides. Plains Indians considered elk holy. Their teeth symbolized the life force to the Lakota.

Elk population in America grew to 10 million before the coming of the first Europeans, who misidentified them and named after German-Scandinavian words (elch, elg) for moose. With bulls weighing 700 pounds and sporting antlers four feet long, elk came to represent all the Europeans thought brave and fearsome in the wild. Males would fight, sometimes the death, during the rut, or mating season. Females would kill anything that threatened their young. Their bugle, or mating cry, became the mighty music of the frontier.

Elk were so successful adapting, they became a threat to more domestic livestock. Farmers and ranchers feared their fierceness and their susceptibility to infectious diseases. Unlike the Native Americans, Europeans hunted them to near extinction. Less than 1 million exist today and of the six subspecies that inhabited North America in historical times, only four remain. The others have been gone for over a century.

“Elk flourished in Iowa but the last wild elk here was believed to have been killed in Kossuth County in the mid 1880’s, though one stray was seen in Marshall and Jasper counties in 2006,” explained Richard Garrrels, a past president of the Iowa Elk Association.

Today, Garrels is one of about 30 Iowa ranchers have re-introduced elk to the state. A retired schoolteacher/farmer from Henry County, he decided to convert some corn and bean fields into an open range for elk in 1995.

“I had arranged to go elk hunting out west and that didn’t work out. So I decided to raise my own right here. I had raised quarter horses for years, so this wasn’t anything too new. Elk have breeders associations and pedigrees just like other livestock,” Garrels stated matter of factly, adding that elk are a transitional step into full retirement.

“I rent most of my acreage for cash crop farming and save this section for the elk. And I don’t ever have get up before dawn for chores. The elk are pretty independent and low maintenance,” he explained.

Garrels’ 30 head of elk are all Rocky Mountain sub species. He’s never had a problem with diseases.

“I have never had a veterinarian visit other than for calving,” he said.

Garrels thinks that’s a result from the measures he takes to keep his elk up to safety standards for meat sales. He tests his herd regularly for brucelosis, TB and chronic waste disease. That also facilitates sales of live elk across state lines. Meat sales weren’t the main motivation for most elk ranchers.

“Lots of people got into elk in the 1990’s when velvet was going for $60 a pound,” Garrels explained.

Male elk bulls grow and shed their antlers each year. Growing antlers are covered by a soft layer of vascularized skin known as velvet. Velvet is shed in the summer when the antlers have fully developed and is medicinally valued, particularly by Asians, for is aphrodisiac and mood elevation properties. A male elk can produce 25 pounds of antler velvet annually.
“This decade, the price went down to $10 to $15, after Asians backed out of the market after the mad cow scare. I don’t even bother with it. There’s more value in selling whole antlers without the hassle. I just sold a bull for $5000,” he explained.

“I can cover my costs selling elk meat to four restaurants and a few private consumers, plus selling at my concession stand at the Old Threshers Reunion (Labor Day weekend in Mount Pleasant). What I can’t cover of course is the lost income from prime farm land that could otherwise being earning with cash crops. The people making real money are the ones with low overhead, meaning cheaper land than this, who raise elk to sell for hunting,” Garrels explained.

Garrels keeps his bulls separated by a system of double fencing he developed over the years.

“If I leave the animals in one pen, the dominant bull will wear himself out keeping the others away from his cows. If I separate them with a fence, bugling will go on 24 - 7 during rutting season and the fence will come down. I lost one bull that way, gored to death by another. I don’t keep a bull who’s too aggressive.

Both Richard and his wife Liz described bugling as “beautiful sound” - the males whistle and the females chirp, “sort of like a cat’s meow.” They said they have never heard a complaint from neighbors.

“Compared to peacocks, it’s musical,” said Liz, who has raised both.
Richards feeds grain to the elk grain for a few months before rutting. Otherwise, their diet consists of grasses in warm weather and leaves after grass goes dormant. The fall and winter diet has a particularly Iowa adaptation.

“They love oak leaves but they seem really disappointed when I throw out a bag of maple leaves. They also prefer leafy alfalfa to grasses. It works out well, I get leaves from the city.

Elk ranching is seasonal. During the summer, elk eat almost constantly, consuming between 10 to 15 pounds daily. Fall brings rutting season and since gestation periods are 240 to 262 days, all Garrels’s calves are born between mid May and June.

Richard has won blue ribbons for his elk recipes at the Iowa State Fair, Taste of Iowa, Farm Bureau’s cook-offs “Wine & Tuxedo” and “Buckskinner.” He divides his elk meat into backstraps, which include tenderloins and ribeyes, and burger trim. Elk has a very healthy profile for a read meat, with only about 40% the calories, 20 % of the fat and 80 % of the cholesterol of lean ground beef. Tasting somewhere between beef and venison, elk is also higher in protein than either beef or chicken, and it’s a good source of iron phosphorous and zinc. So burgers are guilt free for dieters.

Four restaurants use Garrels’ elk burger. Jerry’s, Keo’s Bar & Grill, and Butch’s River Rock Café in Mount Pleasant, plus Short Stop in New London. The BrownStone in Mount Pleasant uses his steaks.

“I sell the elk burgers like crazy,” explained Kim Butch Bittle, who owns both the River Rock and the BrownStone.

Both Bittle’s restaurants have an pioneer spirit in which elk fits well. On a Skunk River park site, the River Rock building was built as a railroad depot in the mid-1800s. It has been a restaurant since the late 1940s.

The Brownstone has the look of Victorian hotel, with a lobby and different dining rooms. Bittle named one Edison, the other Carlyle, and there is the ballroom which is intended for banquets. Bittle said the building's history includes being a stop on the Underground Railroad, a vocational school and an elementary school.Bittle was chef at the Iris, an icon itself. After closing of Iris, after more than 50 years, Butch opened Brownstone for a test run one Sunday last fall and 175 guests showed up.

Richard Garrels’ Elk Ribeye

4 rib eye elk steaks
For marinade
Fourth cup honey
Three fourths cup vegetable oil
Fourth cup soy sauce
Clove garlic, minced
1 T. dried minced onion
2 T. white vinegar
Half t. ginger

Marinate steaks overnight.
Sear both sides of steaks. Grill to desired doneness. 140 degrees (rare) is recommended for flavor.

Hydrocodone King

He wanted customers to have a really ahppy meal.

News 4 in Jacksonville FL reports a Burgeer King employee who pled guilty to slipping painkillers into customers' food has been sentenced to five years in prison.

Woody Duclos was initially charged with poisoning food with intent to kill or injure a person. He was facing up to 30 years in prison.

Duclos was arrested in February after one woman got sick from eating a sandwich from Burger King. Another man said he found a blue pill in his burger at the same restaurant.

Police said the 21-year-old woman spit up a pill of the painkiller hydrocodone out when she took a bite of her sandwich, and she ended up having a seizure.

Duclos and another Burger King employee accused of selling him the pills were each fired.

Some people have been asking what could possess Duclos to do this. I doubt they ever worked at a Burger King in Florida.

FDA Wimps Out Shamefully

In response to public health concerns, on Monday the Food and Drug Administration urged meat producers to limit the amount of antibiotics they give animals. The FDA admitted that antibiotics in meat pose a "serious public health threat" because the drugs create antibiotic-resistant bacteria that can infect humans who eat it. But the agency only “is recommending that producers use the drugs judiciously, limiting their use unless they are medically necessary and only using them with the oversight of a veterinarian.”

"Developing strategies for reducing (antibiotic) resistance is critically important for protecting both public and animal health," the agency said in draft guidelines printed in the Federal Register.

The FDA also admitted that antibiotics are given continuously through feed or water to entire herds or flocks of animals. Then the agency said it is expecting to issue more specific guidelines soon, but FDA Principal Deputy Commissioner of Food and Drugs Joshua Sharfstein was not sure when that might be. He would not say whether the agency eventually plans to issue stricter regulations. He said patheticalaly that the agency will be watching industry response and also patterns of antibiotic resistance.

Goodstewarding’s bottom line - The FDA could not have been any wimpier if it were a lamb going to Smithfield for slaughter. MRSA has been killing more people than AIDS-HIV now for many years and the FDA is still “watching” the industry respond to their "urgings." Grow some balls FDA if you are able to after all these years of eating the crap that Big Ag has been feeding you.

Chicken leg bailout

USDA announced that it will purchase $14 million in dark meat chicken products for federal food assistance programs such as food banks. This IS likely the same bulging inventory of chicken legs that have been piling up since Russia banned US chicken legs imports from plants that use chlorinated water in processing.

So, once again, the Europeans will not eat the shit that our governement feeds to our chicldren with our tax dollars.

Old Skills & Sneak Previews

Cochon 555

Last month, Cochon555 brought its Midwest Regional championship to Des Moines for the second straight year. This Taste Network national tour puts our city in the select company of serious culinary destinations - New York, Napa, San Francisco, Boston, Atlanta, Portland, Seattle, Stillwater and Washington D.C. Cochon is an elite event hosted by several of America‘s most famous hotels and resorts. Chefs come from the country’s best restaurants (Boulud and Blue Hill in New York, The French Laundry in Napa). Time magazine and the New York Times cover the tour. In prestige, it’s the culinary equivalence of hosting an NCAA men’s basketball tournament. It might not return to Des Moines though. Ticket sales slipped and the event hasn’t interested any civic or state group that promotes this city’s image.

Five chefs competed by utilizing five heritage hogs, snout to tail. Guest-voters sampled pork while being treated to excellent wines from five boutique vineyards. Mike LaValle (Embassy Club) said that Chase Family Cellars’ Zinfandels were the best he’s ever seen in Iowa. This year’s competition included local chefs George Formaro and Hal Jasa, defending champion Matt Steigerwald from Mount Vernon, and two chefs from Kansas City - Cody Hogan and Howard Hanna.

Formaro and Jasa debuted some new applications for future restaurants. Using a Farmers Cross/Berkshire hog, Formaro premiered an all Mexican menu he’ll selling at the Downtown Farmer’s Market, and hopefully in a new East Village café soon.

His pozole was the best I ever tasted.

He fried carnitas in duck fat and coated Milanese style cutlets in pumpkin seeds. His huevos motuleños were a poached, Yucatan variation on bacon and eggs. His chiccarones were tender enough to pass for shoulder meat.

Jasa, who’s also hoping to open an East Village café this summer, presented ten dishes made from a Duroc. A deeply flavored consommé with pork cheeks and goat cheese tortellini stood out.

So did a fried ear salad of watercress with quail egg, and his corned tongue with pickled ramps. Jasa fried his rillletes, served his trotters with blinis, and presented a liver/heart pâté with a pistachio puree.

He served belly with poached grapes, cassoulet with orange gremolata, and sausage with parsnip puree and a pâté of roasted dates.

Recreating personal pan-served pasta from Lidia’s, Hogan kept things simpler with his Berkshire hog.

Ravioli were stuffed with braised whole hog and served with roast pork and headcheese. His ravioli were the most popular single item of the night with the public.

At Hanna’s River Club, members pay dues to support things that Cochon advocates - preserving heritage breeds, and utilizing whole hogs. Like Steigerwald, Hanna brought a staff familiar with butchering, brining, rendering, smoking and pickling. Using an endangered Glouscestershire Old Spots hog, they executed five familiar dishes exquisitely: headcheese; trotter garlic soup with fresh nettles pesto; a Cuban sandwich made with sous vide of shoulder, ham and organ pâté; pork & beans made with legs, heirloom beans, sausage and “KC salt” (crushed cracklings).

Hanna said he harvested the main ingredient for his stunning blood pudding “by squeezing every vein and artery.” It also included chocolate, hazelnuts, cinnamon and shortbread.

Steigerwald, whose Lincoln Café purchases whole hogs exclusively, won the competition again with a Red Wattle hog a breed that would become infamous three weeks later when it was again the pig of a winning Cochon chef, in Portland, Oregon. That so incensed another Oregon chef that he attacked both a winery representative and Cochon organizer Brady Lowe, sending the latter to the hospital with a broken leg and concussion.

His menu began with pork belly spring rolls with kimchii and an avocado/yuzu puree. It progressed to a “wattle head slick” with boiled peanuts and greens. He served a white sausage that included innards with fennel kraut. His hickory smoked shoulder was served on corn masa with turtle beans and pickled chilies. His ciccioli (compressed, dried fat) was treated to pickled ramps. He also served charcuterie that included ham and capicola. I have been dreaming of them ever since.