I’ll try to keep this rant to food.

I’ve been preaching about the local foods movement and local business in general, not because it is cool but because it trumps the corporate counterparts by the presence of COMPASSION and that their bottom line isn’t the only line they care about. Have you caught any of the articles tattling on the sometimes disgusting antics of Big Ag and Big Food? Did you hear about the company that re-processed gallons of moldy applesauce to ship to schools? Or the countless recalls of E. Coli-tainted meats and vegetables that somehow still manage to get to the public? Maybe you’ve seen these corporate food lies: your “freshly” squeezed orange juice that has actually sat in a vat for up to a year, your meats that get doused with ammonia , the cellulose and other industrial by-products that find their way into more processed food than you would like to know about. Why isn’t this squawked about on mainstream news?

“So what can I do about this and why should I care?” you might say. “Eating healthy / organic / local is too expensive and I don’t have the time / desire / know-how to cook.”

My shopping reflects my values and I vote with my pocketbook. Start small and don’t try to re-invent the wheel in a week. I would rather spend an hour cooking something for my family than watching TV, but that’s me.

Don’t like factory farms? Seek out a local market and shop there. Spending money with local retailers strengthens the community and is a slap in the face of recession. Start a vegetable garden, and share your bounty with your neighbors – defy the “bedroom community” label and chat in person. Know that if we don’t start giving a damn about what we purchase, and where it comes from – that the quality of these things will continue to tank. The rich will get richer from our apathy. Our economy is based almost entirely on us buying stuff, so make every dollar count!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rsNUqK6saMU

This video of a farmer addressing the NYC Occupy group nearly got me bawling. I can’t help but feel sickened and a little enraged every time I hear a sound bite about how unorganized the movement is, or the “But what do they stand for?” bullshit. The food lies are as insidious as the lies about “trickle-down economics” – don’t believe the hype. There has been a great interview with Chris Hedges making the rounds that I think hits the mark, and I will leave you with this quote from his book, Losing Moses on the Freeway: The 10 Commandments in America:
“We watch impassively as the wealthy and the elite, the huge corporations, rob us, ruin the environment, defraud consumers and taxpayers and create an exclusive American oligarchy that fuses wealth and political power. We watch passively because we believe we can enter the club. It is greed that inspires us. It is greed that keeps us silent. Our greed is devouring us.”

Cheers-

Dark Martha

Conscious Urban Living

Carriage House Farm

PS – If you are in the Cincy area, and are interested in getting that garden going, join me for my class series coming up in a few weeks.

The doors were locked  and there was no sign of habitation. My first instinct was hope that this was a remodeling that I had missed hearing about, but the feeling in the pit of my stomach was already one of loss. This feeling was confirmed when I ran into Mike, the man who started it, just around the corner. He confirmed that Northslice has closed. I won’t elaborate on what he told me because he was not aware that I write for the public.

I can report that shortly afterwards while we were bemoaning the situation I did overhear conversations to the effect that the building had been sold out from under him. [Edit for Clarity: These were conversations overheard among random customers at Melt, where we had decided to go as our second choice. -Loki] No matter what happened it seems that we have lost the best pizza in Cincinnati. If whoever owns the name and or building reopens under that name it won’t be the same.

My heart goes out to Mike, he seemed crushed. I know I am. This is a horrible loss to the neighborhood and to Cincinnati in general.

As you may recall from my Downtown Grocery post, I’m a big fan of the Mayberry Foodstuffs grocery. While they don’t have enough to completely replace a trip to Kroger, they helped fill in the Downtown grocery void. I usually make a visit once week on my walk home from work and often chat a little with the person working. A couple of weeks ago he notified me that Mayberry will start grocery delivery in the Downtown and OTR areas. I figured business must be good. Sadly today our chat was not as positive as he told me Mayberry Grocery will be closing in late October. When I asked “closing? for good?” he said yes, unfortunately business has not been good enough to stay open. Some of the specialty products found in the store will be available in the other Campbell owned properties such as Skinny Pig and World Food Bar.

While I have noticed a reduction of hours and I’m typically the only customer when I do visit, I am surprised by the news. It seemed like a lot of money and work was put into the renovation of their space. I also thought the previous conversation about delivery was a sign business was ok. Unfortunately I guess it was not to be. At least we can still enjoy Josh Campbell’s food creations at Mayberry, Skinny Pig and World Food Bar.

According to WCPO and the Enquirer, the Skyline Chili in Oakley is trying to build an expansion onto their existing building. Their plans don’t conform to zoning regulations regarding the square footage of transparency (read: windows) on the front of the building. There are currently two windows on the front of the building, but the regs require a third. The issue is that the only space there is for a third window is currently occupied by a 1940′s mural of the city’s skyline that is very dear to both the owner and customers. This regulation is not a ironclad rule, but any variance from it requires a public hearing with 14 days notice to surrounding property owners.

You’ll notice that the WCPO article/video basically accuse the city of purposefully throwing up roadblocks to the expansion for over two months, and that owner Stan Misleh accuses the department of “impeding him”. Several members of City Council also jumped into the fray, expressing their disgust with the situation in general. Leslie Ghiz went so far as to blame the department in particular.

I was curious about what the planning department itself thought of those accusations. I was able to speak with Charles Graves, who is the Director of the Department of City Planning and Buildings. He told me that the department was working with all possible speed to get the issue resolved, but that they are themselves restricted by the zoning laws and regulations that they oversee. He also made it a point to mention that the regulations in question were approved by Cincinnati City Council when they came into being (make note of that; there’s a quiz at the end of blog). When I asked him if he felt that the Skyline situation was being dealt with at the same speed as other projects, he said that it was actually progressing more quickly than normal for a project with similar issues.

Additionally, Meg Olberding, Assistant to the City Manager, sent me the city administration’s report to city council (which you will find here). According to the City Manager’s office, the original expansion plans were indeed submitted for review on 21 June, roughly two months ago, but the Plans Examiner found that the application was incomplete on 8 July. There doesn’t appear to be any further correspondence from the applicant until 19 July. The department stamps those in on 25 July, and then the required public hearing process begins a few days later. It’s also important to note that, at least according to the City Manager, “these requirements cannot be administratively modified or waived”, so I think there’s some confusion between council and the department on what the request for “emergency status”, as described in the WCPO report, would yield. Additionally, it’s worth mentioning that the report points directly to a reduction in staff, from 7.5 employees to 1.5 employees, as an additional reason for the length of time it took to complete the review.

I think you can draw a few conclusions from all this. Having grown up as a pretty frequent customer of this restaurant, I can tell you for sure that the people that work there place a great deal of pride in that mural; it was displayed in a similar spot inside the old location, and it really is quite striking. I would personally be sorry to see it go. I also think that it would be pretty unfortunate if Mr. Misleh decided to just scrap his expansion plans out of frustration (though I think it’s unlikely that he will; you don’t invest in the planning just to give it up due to a delay). I certainly understand his frustration at those delays, however I think his anger is somewhat misplaced. It seems pretty clear that the delay is at least partially the fault of his architect for submitting plans which were going to require a variance. I don’t deal with architects very often (ok, ever) but I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume that they should be familiar with the zoning process and thus should have anticipated the delays that the variance would have caused.

This is not to say that I’m a fan of the system as it currently exists. Clearly, something isn’t functioning at full efficiency if this is how the process looks when things, as Mr. Graves asserts, are moving along faster than they normally would. I think that sends a bad message to business owners and investors. It doesn’t matter if it’s because the department isn’t properly staffed (as the city manager has asserted, and the numbers would seem to support it) or because it doesn’t work efficiently (as the City council members are arguing). Shoddy projections of project length by the architect aside, would you be encouraged by this fiasco if you were looking to build or invest in something anywhere inside the city limits (say, for example, along a streetcar route)?  The city already has a somewhat shoddy reputation for this sort of thing among small business owners that I have worked with and for over the years, and I think that reputation could provide a stumbling block to future prosperity in the city if the government doesn’t address it in short order.

So, how should you fix it? Well, whatever the solution is, it seems that it will have to come from City Council. That’s the body that approved the zoning regulations to begin with. Here’s the quiz that I promised you earlier:

The most effective way to correct the problem would be to:

A) Do nothing,

B) Grandstand and rail on television and in the paper about what you would consider failures of the bureaucracy, and to call for the dissolution of the planning department for the offense of operating within the rules and laws that it is required to operate within. (It should be noted here that even if the city’s planning department were dissolved tomorrow, Mr. Misleh’s expansion would still be subject to a public hearing as a matter of law; it would just be that much more difficult to administrate )

C) Begin work immediately on changing the zoning rules and processes to make them more business and investor friendly so that this never happens again and the city has a better chance of attracting future investment.

It seems apparent which two answers most, if not all, members of City Council have chosen, at least in the short term. I wonder if some of them seized an opportunity to rail against what they would portray as the Cincinnati version of “Big Government”. Now, to be fair, Choice C could potentially include reorganizing the department, but I think the evidence is clear that the rules themselves are mostly to blame. Personally, I can’t see the wisdom in further reducing the staff at the department which is responsible for issuing such permits, but I’m not intimately involved in such affairs, either. Perhaps we’ll see them begin work on some kind of revisions down the line, but right now, I think they’ve failed the quiz.

Megan will be serving deserts to celebrity guest judges including: Beastie Boys’ Adam “Ad Rock” Horovitz, The Cast of Willy Wonka & The Chocolate Factory, Renowned Pastry Chef Francois Payard and Acclaimed Chef Cat Cora among others. Megan recently took some time to chat with me about the competition and her life as an acclaimed pastry chef in Cincinnati.

CincyVoices: What are you most looking forward to and what is your biggest fear going into this competition?

Megan Ketever: It is an amazing opportunity to work with some of the best Pastry Chefs in the country. It is an unbelievably talented group of people that were brought together for this season. I love to challenge myself, and improve my skills so this was a perfect chance for me. I was just so excited to get there, get in the kitchen, and see what the show had planned for us in the challenges and see if I could keep my cool in competition. To be good in this field, I think you need to be a little obsessive about details, and I am used to controlling the environment in my pastry kitchen, and I think as a Pastry Chef that control is really hard to give up.

CV: You work with acclaimed executive chef Todd Kelly, what advice has he given you for this competition? And what other useful advice have you received?

MK: Yes, I am very lucky to work for such a incredibly talented Executive Chef. Todd gives me good advice every day! The experience is confidential, so we really could not talk about it before I left, so there was not specific advice for Top Chef Just Desserts, but I always appreciate our conversations about food, and the way he challenges me to continue to produce the best desserts possible. When Todd tries a new dessert, he will honestly tell me what works really well, and what elements need tweaking, and I always appreciate that feedback. It may have helped me to prepare for Judges’ Table!

CV: When and how did you decide to become a chef? Has baking/cooking always been a passion of yours?

MK: It has always been a passion for me. I have been learning about it for years. I remember my Mom buying me my first cake decorating set when I was 8, and I would spend hours piping icing out of the different tips to see what shapes it would make. I always joke that I became a Pastry Chef because my parents never would buy me an Easy Bake Oven, so instead I had to teach myself to bake for real. I used to read cookbooks and then practice it. Look at a picture and then try it. I taught myself a lot that way. A few years ago, I decided to go to pastry school, and give this career a real chance. I love that pastry combines my love of the science of baking and also allows artistic expression, with a chance to make people happy when they eat delicious desserts. Being a Pastry Chef completes my soul.

CV: You work at one of the best restaurants in your hometown. Is that your dream or do you have bigger aspirations?

MK: I love that Orchids at Palm Court is a Cincinnati restaurant that receives national attention, and hope to continue to build upon the reputation we have. You know, I get the question a lot about leaving Cincinnati, and if I have bigger aspirations. I am a big fan of Cincinnati, so I do not view it as a bad choice to build my career here. Cincinnati has a rich culinary history and I hope to be a part of our culinary future. I think we are accomplishing amazing things here.

CV: What is your favorite dessert to make?

MK: I love making french macarons, the way the crunchy cookie melds with the creamy chewy filling is like a bit of heaven. I am always amazed when perfect ice cream comes out of the ice cream freezer. I love working with chocolate. I am also always honored to make cakes that help people celebrate big moments in their life; weddings, birthdays, anniversaries, it is an amazing opportunity to be able to help create memories.

CV: I know desserts and pastries are your specialty, but do you have any non-dessert dishes you love to make? Is there anything you don’t enjoy making?

MK: Unfortunately, I am a much better Pastry Chef, than Culinary Chef! I love to cook light and fresh meals at home, but I am not always very good at it, so I eat out at restaurants a lot. My husband Dave will tell you I make some pretty good fish tacos. He rarely eats desserts, so he misses out on most things I cook. I think he would prefer if I chose differently when going to school! I think Chefs work in a much different way than Pastry chefs.

CV: Outside of your creations at the Hilton, where is your favorite place to get a dessert?

MK: I always eat Graeter’s before I leave town, I think it is good insurance that I will come home. My favorite is to keep it simple with their vanilla chocolate chip, the chips are always so huge! Their ice cream just reminds me of my childhood, so it always has good memories for me. I remember walking down Ludlow with my family, and it was always a competition to see who had the biggest chocolate chips.

CV: Cincinnati of course is also known for its chili, are you a fan and if so, what is your favorite parlor?

MK: Oh, I really love Cincinnati chili, I could eat it every day! Skyline is my favorite. I think it always so interesting to see if visitors eat it; it is such an unusual combination, and certainly not your standard tomato chili. But it is always so good with the huge mound of cheddar cheese!

CV: When you aren’t in the kitchen baking your culinary creations, what do you enjoy doing in your spare time?

MK: The best days are when I get to spend time with my husband and play with my dog Hank. He is a rescued pit bull, and is just the sweetest little dog I have ever met. Most of my free time revolves around food, and eating something yummy. This industry is intense, so I like to relax in my spare time. When the weather is good, nothing is better than happy hour on a patio with friends.

CV: Any advice of your own for aspiring chefs and bakers?

MK: Learn to take criticism and use it to make yourself better. Nobody ever does anything perfect all the time, so don’t take yourself too seriously. I think it is vital in this industry to continue to grow, and keep learning, and too many times people allow their personal feelings to be involved. It is not always the most glamorous industry, so be ready for some hard work, but it is well worth the reward to be able to do this for a living.

During my time away from Kroger I found some good and some bad with my downtown shopping experience. First the good; meat and produce make up a big portion of my grocery list, and luckily I did find some options downtown. One of the first stores I stopped in was Cianciolo’s Main Street Grocery. The person working described it as an old produce stand. They did have a decent selection of produce, and I picked up some fruit for the week. The quality was decent; cost was about .50-1.00 more than a grocery store. I would say it’s a combination of produce stand and convenience story. Around the corner from Ciancolo’s is Mayberry Foodstuff which labels itself as an “Urban Grocery Store”. While Mayberry might be the smallest of the downtown stores, it actually has the most variety and selection. Mayberry uses their limited space very wisely. All of their homemade food items are very tasty which should be of no surprise with Josh Campbell, one of Cincinnati’s top chefs, being the owner. Some of the items can be pricey, but the quality is top notch. They also have a great rotating craft beer selection. There are also some household items for sale. Another plus for Mayberry is during the week they are open til 9PM.

One gem I did find during this experiment was Avril Bleh Meat Market. Avri Bleh has a wide variety of meats and the staff there is very friendly and helpful. I bought some chicken and steaks there, and they were high quality. The big drawback of Avril Bleh is their hours are limited. During the week they close at 5:30, the work day ends at 5PM for many people, so there is a small window to get your meat if you plan on doing it after work. If you are looking for lunch meat there are a decent number of options. Silverglades, Sunshine Fine Foods Too and Café Barista all have a deli that features Boar Head meats and cheeses. Each of these stores also has a limited grocery selection and close by 7PM.

If you are looking for household, health and beauty items Walgreens is your best bet. There is also CVS but I find the downtown CVS has a lot of clutter and is dingy, while the Walgreens is fairly clean and organized. Since it is mostly a drug store, Walgreens has more household, health and beauty items than the other store. One thing I find surprising is Walgreens on 6th and Race has a decent craft beer selection and there are some food items. Walgreens also has the best hours, staying open til 10 Monday-Saturday and 9 on Sundays. However there is one major drawback: the price. Everything is more expensive at Walgreens, food cost twice as much and the other items are definitely marked up.

Up until now this piece has been fairly positive about downtown grocery. However, I can’t say it was a pleasant enough experience to do all my regular shopping downtown. Yes, if you are in a pinch or just can’t get to the big Kroger, you can do some grocery shopping. Unfortunately there are some major drawbacks that make it difficult to do your regular shopping at these stores. First are the hours. Only Mayberry and Walgreens have decent hours, everything else closes near the end of the regular work day. Second, say what you want about the trend of mega-groceries, they do offer more variety and selection. You might be able to find some of the products you want at the downtown shops, but typically there will only be one brand of each. Also the stores aren’t as fully stocked as a large grocery is. The third and final major obstacle is the price. Every store I visited was more expensive than you would find at a major supermarket. The previous two attributes mentioned, hours and selection, play into this as well. If there were markets with a wide selection and good hours, I could be ok with paying a little more for convenience, but as it is now you are paying more money for an incomplete experience.

There is enough downtown that you couldn’t call it a “food desert”. However, with the downtown population growing, there is definitely a need for better grocery options. A mega grocery isn’t necessary, but there should be something bigger than what we have, whether it be a scaled down Kroger or something along the lines of Trader Joe’s or Whole Foods. I think Mayberry is doing the best job of catering to the downtown resident but are unfortunately limited to their small space. As the downtown population grows, I hope a retailer will realize the community is a ripe market and a worthy investment.

The stores I visited for this article:

Avril-Bleh Meat Market – Court Street (near Walnut St intersection)

Cafe Barista – 4th and Plum

Cianciolo’s Main Street Grocery – Main Street (between 7th and 8th streets)

Mayberry Foodstuffs – 7th (near Main St intersection)

Silverglades – 8th and Sycamore

Sunshine Fine Foods Too – Garfield and Elm

Walgreens – 6th and Race

Red Ear Brewing’s First Ever Beer & Sauage Festival

When: Saturday, August 13^th 6:30pm-9:00pm

Where: Red Ear Brewing, 208 Pike Street, Covington, KY 41011 (enter zip code if using GPS or you’ll end up in wrong place.)

What: Red Ear Brewing is a nano-brewery founded by partners Matt Wehmeyer and Mike DeDomenico in 2009. They’ve slowly, but surely been growing this in their spare time while maintaining other full time jobs.  Recently, they completed the move from within Vito’s Café in Fort Thomas, Kentucky to Covington. Matt (a fellow member of the Cincinnati Malt Infusers), works as the brewmaster. They’ve put together an event complete with live music from Mark Goodwin, featuring sausages/hot dogs from Bluegrass Meats, and Red Ear’s Catail Pale Ale, Red October Ale, and Big Al’s Nut Brown Ale. They will be also introducing Matt’s very first effort at an IPA for Red Ear. Cost is $15 for any 3 beers & a sausage/dog of your choice. Cash only.

Why: Besides giving you the opportunity to enjoy some locally made beer and have a good time, this will give you some insight into what a nano-brewery looks like. Matt intends to upgrade to a larger brewing system in the future, so this is your chance to see what things looked like in the beginning and see history in the making. Plus, you’ll get the opportunity to talk to Matt & Mike, get some one on one Q & A about what they do and how they became inspired to do it.

Brew-B-Que

When: Tuesday, August 16^th 6pm-9pm

Where: The Piccolo Wine Room (Piazza-Discepoli Wine Merchants), 23 Village Square, Glendale, OH 45246

What: Bell’s Brewery & Velvet Smoke are teaming up to offer some excellent craft craft beer with award winning BBQ. Greg Pilch of Bell’s Brewery will be there to talk about the phenomenal beers on hand and answer any questions. He will be joined by Matt Schneider and Marc Stitt of Velvet Smoke, an award winning BBQ competition team. Cost is $15 for admission, includes 5 featured Bell’s Beers, 1 pulled pork slider, 1 beef brisket slider, and 1 choice of a side from Velvet Smoke. Additional food available for purchase. Please RSVP to piccolo@fuse.net

Why: Bell’s Brewing makes some first-rate beers well worth enjoying, plus Greg Pilch is an extremely knowledgeable beer rep, with years of experience in the industry. Let’s also face the fact, Cincinnati is known much more for our chili, ice cream and other exports than our BBQ. Most ardent BBQ enthusiasts feel Cincinnati’s restaurant BBQ scene is somewhat lacking in many quality options. But outside the restaurant business, a grassroots BBQ scene is growing in backyard smokers all over the area. Some the area’s best BBQ can be found by sampling that which is made by amateurs, including those whose passion for BBQ has taken them into the competition circuit. Now is your chance to sample some of the local delicious, results that this passion has spawned. Get a glimpse of two fast-growing Cincinnati subcultures at once, plus one on one Q & A with Greg Pilch, Matt Schneider, and Marc Stitt.

Weihenstephaner Das Boot Party and Fest Beer Keg Tapping

When: Thursday, August 18^th 5pm-11pm

Where: Neon’s Unplugged, 208 E. 12^th St., Cincinnati, Ohio 45202

What: Kicking of the Oktobersbest Season in grand style, with Weihenstephaner Fest Bier, Weihenstephan Hefe Weiss, and Weihenstephan Origianal Lager. Special 2L Glass Boots, 5 Liter Stein Mugs, and Hefe Glasses will also be available for purchased.

Why: Cincinnati’s German roots play a major role in why beer is so important in Cincinnati. Get a glimpse of this in a contemporary setting, nestled within a historic German neighborhood in Cincinnati’s Over-The-Rhine. Much has changed over the years, this neighborhood is now a bustling model of diversity, as it has begun to be reborn. Weihenstephaner is the world’s oldest, continuously operating brewery in existence. Their beginning can be traced back to the year 768, at the Weihenstephaner Abbey. However, Weihenstephaner considers its founding date to be the year 1040, when the German town of Freising in Bavaria formally licensed the brewery.  Today, they continue to prove why they remained in business all this time, still producing some excellent beer. Cincinnati’s strong German roots are about to unleash an area wide, six-week period of multiple German Oktoberfests beginning at the end of August. Many seasonal releases of Oktoberfest beers(or should I say biers) are about to be unleashed upon us even sooner. Get a taste of Cincinnati’s German legacy now, both by visiting Cincinnati’s largest, historic district and experiencing beer from the world’s oldest operating brewery.

Beer and Sweat, The World’s Largest Keg Only Homebrew Competition (Private Homebrewing Event)

When: Saturday, August 20^th. Competition 12pm-4pm, Awards & Party

Where: Drawbridge Inn, 2477 Royal Drive, Fort Mitchell, KY 41017

What: Beer and Sweat is a BJCP-sanctioned homebrew competition, run by the Bloatarian Brewing League, another Cincinnati homebrewing club. This is the Bloatarian Brewing League’s major annual competition and it is an excellent, well planned event! The competition happens on Saturday beginning at noon. Afterwards, it is followed up by an awards ceremony and a fabulous homebrew afterparty, complete with live music.  If you are a homebrewer who enters a keg by the extended deadline of August 14^th or a volunteer for the event, you can attend. If not, you must have become a member of the BBL by this past August 1^st. If you happen to have a keg of homebrew to enter or wish to help the BBL as a volunteer, you still can participate if you register NOW. If not, please remember that Beer and Sweat is a ʻMembers Onlyʼ event and not an ʻopen-to-the-publicʼ event. For more information on volunteering, please email bblminister@fuse.net. For other information, please go to Beer and Sweat’s website.

Why: While Cincinnati has a relatively young craft beer scene, its homebrewing roots run deep and strong within our community. Participation in this event is an excellent way to connect with everyone in the local homebrewing community-all at one time. It is also a great way to sample some brilliant homebrew creations without being a judge. The local homebrewing community is another great Cincinnati subculture well-worth exploring.

Additional Comments: Though I am president of the Cincinnati Malt Infusers, I am also a member of the Bloatarian Brewing League, just as their president, Ray Gerdes, is a member of the Cincinnati Malt Infusers. The Cincinnati Malt Infusers and Bloatarian Brewing League enjoy a good working relationship, bought together by our shared passion for brewing great beer. The Cincinnati Malt Infusers support Beer and Sweat, just like the Bloatarian Brewing League supports our annual Oktobersbest Homebrew Competition. These two clubs may do some things differently, but we are all part of the same, great local homebrewing community.

Josh Osborne and I will cover Beer and Sweat for Cincy Voices, so look for a post from us, along with some photos. I will participate as a judge for the competition, as I have done for the past few years. Josh will be participating as a volunteer, so we will be able to share two different perspectives with you.

As it says in my bio, I am a life-long Cincinnatian who moved Downtown 3 years ago. I have lived in various places in the Tri-State region, but Downtown is my favorite area of residence. I love the growth I have seen Downtown (and OTR) and look forward to more progress being made in the region. Whenever I tell someone I live Downtown I get a wide range of reactions and questions, so I will have many posts about city life.

If you follow me on Twitter, you know I am a big sports fan. Of course being a Cincinnatian most of my sports fandom has been filled with disappointment. “Wait til next year” is a common reality that a Bengals and Reds fan faces. Along with watching sports, I try to stay active. One of the most shocking developments in my life is I have become a runner. When I attended the best high school in Cincinnati (Walnut Hills, and I will fiercely argue with you if you disagree!) I could barely finish the mile in gym class. Fast forward to 2011 where I completed my first marathon and now consider a 5k a short run.

I studied Radio/TV at Northern Kentucky University, but lately I have discovered a passion for photography. I have a lot to learn and am by no means a professional, but taking the camera out and taking photos of the various sites in town and the country has become one of my favorite hobbies. Of course I still do have a love for TV and motion pictures. I do enjoy a lazy day on the couch watching a marathon of my favorite shows and movies.

One of my favorite subjects to take photos of is my dog Dexter. My girlfriend and I adopted Dexter the Pug from the SCPA in January and he has become a very welcomed addition to our household. Dexter had a rough life before we adopted him, he was a stray and almost died at the SPCA with a severe case of kennel cough. Luckily he survived and we arrived to rescue him! After this experience we highly recommend adopting from the SPCA if you are looking for a pet.

Food, downtown, sports, digital media and my dog Dexter, that basically sums up who Clint Spaeth is.

Mari Gallagher presentation

Farming has not completely devoured me.  I’ve been teaching more classes, on nationwide radio twice (!) and I spoke at the 2011 Cincinnati Food Congress (I strongly recommend you check out the full report), which was back in April.

The Food Congress facilitates conversation amongst community leaders and stakeholders regarding the state of our region’s food supply and the impact it has on our population.  This year, the focus was on if/how the local Agricultural Community can contribute employment opportunities to the Greater Cincinnati job pool.  I spoke as part of a panel of local growers… as both an independent contractor on a small-to-medium scale farm, and as a mother.

There are SO MANY THINGS I have to tell you about this, too many for one post.  Bear with me for a little while and I’ll get as much of it out to you as I can.

First, a definition:

Food Desert:  A region where the population does not have ready access to fresh food.  The general consensus for what “ready access,” i.e. – within walking distance, reasonable bike ride, or a single-leg public transit trip (i.e., a bus ride without a transfer).  Keep in mind, food deserts are not necessarily urban.  Many rural communities fall under this classification.

The phenomena of the food desert has been an obsession of mine, and it was also the first topic addressed at the Food Congress.  Mari Gallagher presented some sobering figures illustrating just how bad it has gotten in the region, with the most disturbing point being that the best access to high quality food lies squarely in the suburban areas.  Poor, non-nutrient-rich food choices have been shown to lead to health problems, like obesity and diabetes… which spike higher numbers in the less affluent, more urban areas.

Full disclosure – I live in a fortunate, happy bubble here in Northside, because of Picnic and Pantry, which is arguably one of the best micro markets I have ever been fortunate enough to patronize.  They also source some of their goods from the Farm, as well as a number of other local artisans and growers.  Northside also has one of the most diverse farmer’s markets in the City.  I think this is in no small part due to the community being enthusiastic about their food.  For contrast – my parents, having recently relocated to a more rural part of the state, now have a 30 mile drive to the closest market.  They knew this going in, but how many of us choose our home’s location based on where the closest grocery is?

I’d love to hear about how many of you can / do walk / bike / bus to get your groceries… and how content you are with what you get.  I would also like you to consider what it would be like if that “convenience” store a few blocks from you carried some fresh produce and healthy protein choices, instead of the bevy of processed drek that usually fills the shelves?  Would you buy from them?  Are we, as consumers, too used to “one stop” or destination shopping for a smaller, more locally-based model to work?

Cheers-

Dark Martha

Garden Manager, Carriage House Farm

www.consciousurbanliving.com

If you find yourself in Findlay Market do your taste buds a favor and pay these guys a visit. Just go look at the pictures on their Facebook page, your mouth will be watering in no time.

Hot Tip: If you want a real treat they’ll be at The Famous Neon’s Unplugged Sunday around 5 pm serving Bahn Mi (badass Vietnamese sandwiches), while Cue Cao from Kajun Crawfish serves up one of the only authentic New Orleans style crawfish boils I’ve seen outside of Louisiana. It will be fine evening of food at one of my favorite bars in the Queen City. Evil Uncle Loki rates this one five stars!