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Making A Salad From a Downtown Sidewalk

Photo of Mallow by lavilleautady via Flickr
Via Homegrown Evolution, a local blog dedicated to veggies, chicken, hoohes, bicycles and "cultural alchemy," we find an excellent Weekend America report about urban foraging in Los Angeles. That is, can you take a walk in your neighborhood and find and eat lunch without any cooking or prep back in the kitchen? Why, yes, yes you can.
Reporter Bill Radke met up with Nance Klehm, who while "here in L.A., she teaches weekend classes in how to find food all around you, including in urban areas." By the end of their journey around downtown Los Angeles, they put together a nice salad made up of mallow, the wood sorrell, chickweed and fennel topped with juice from a hand-squeezed orange. Listen to the full audio below:
If for some reason the audio box is not appearing, you can listen to the full report here.And there must have been something in the air this weekend because Evan Kleiman of KCRW's Good Food radio show on Saturday morning's featured a spot on First Person Dinners a concept where the participants in the meal must have a first-hand experience with all the food they eat. That means hunting the meat, collecting the honey, milking the cows, churning the butter and harvesting the wheat. Communication coach and exotic eater LeeAundra Temescu talks about herself and others traveling around the country for this one meal and how it changed her view on food. Listen below:
And then on Sunday in the LA Times, Russ Parsons heads over the Santa Monica Farmers Market to find out about a controversy brewing over there: "Santa Monica's Wednesday market began as a place for farmers to sell directly to home cooks. Then the top chefs came to buy -- until big distributors swarmed in, leaving them empty-handed."
Other unusual food finding in Los Angeles: The "Too Hot Tamales" Top 10 Places in L.A. for Deliciously Interesting and Exotic Ingredients
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