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Eat Local: An Albuquerque Thanksgiving Menu

This Thanksgiving, I'm attempting to cook a feast with only the natural mojo available near Albuquerque.

It's a modified 100 mile Thanksgiving, adjusting for life in the high desert so bear with me while I include ingredients like potatoes from Southern Colorado and pecans from Las Cruces. Honestly, I'm not sure the ambitious menu below will even be edible with all my modifications, but I'm not one to shy away from a challenge.

Here's my menu

This time of year, you can find pumpkin, turkey, apples, quince, garlic, quinoa, goat cheese, milk, cream, persimmons, pomegranates, sweet potatoes and more in the larders of Nuevo Mexico and Southern Colorado. Fortunately, New Mexico produces some quality wines as well as -- who'd have guessed it -- flour grown by the Sangre de Cristo Growers Coop in Northern New Mexico.

Following is the menu I'm attempting this Thanksgiving based on these local ingredients with only a few exceptions (butter, salt, and spices).

[Links to the actual recipes further below]

Appetizer

Pumpkin Tart Tatine

Champagne by Gruet, Albuquerque

Main

Red Chile Glazed Turkey
Quinoa Stuffing
Quince Compote
Spiced Persimmon Chutney
Dinner Rolls by La Quiche Bakery
Roasted Delicata Squash Salad
Goat Cheese Potato Gratin

"Serenade Blend" White Wine by Casa Rondena, Los Ranchos de Albuquerque

Dessert

Apple Galette
Pumpkin Pie Brulee
Persimmon & Goat Cheese Tart

Plum Wine by Anasazi Fields, Placitas

Where to shop

Your best bet for finding locally-sourced ingredients is the La Montanita Coop (locations in Nob Hill and the North Valley).
Wild Oats is currently carrying local tomatoes, sweet potatoes, pecans, and pistachios. Steve, the produce manager showed me some of his wares this past week.

For local wine and beer, try Whole Foods, Wild Oats, Jubilation, or Talin International Market.

Recipes, ideas and tips

Drinks
Try:

Beer from the Tractor Farmer Brewery in Los Lunas
Blanc de Blanc champagne from Gruet
Serenade blend white from Casa Rondena
Meritage red from Casa Rondena
Plum wine from Anasazi Fields in Placitas

Appetizers

Sorrel-Wrapped Goat Cheese
Skip the beets, they're not in season for us in New Mexico. Try substituting a slice of Fuyu persimmon instead.

Pumpkin Tarte Tatin
Not much to say here. This just looks amazing.

The Bird. Local Turkey.

Embudo Valley Organics delivers local turkeys to the La Montanita Coop the Friday before Thanksgiving. I got my 16 pounder yesterday.

Dressing the Bird

Quinoa Stuffing
Dried cranberries aren't local. And both zucchini and green onions are past their season. What you can find locally sourced in Albuquerque are: quinoa, butternut squash, mint, parsley, and maybe even dried local apricots.

Poblano and Pumpkin Seed Stuffing
Poblano? Whatever. To me, when I see "poblano" that really means New Mexico green chile and so that's what I'm using.

Cranberries Don't Grow in New Mexico

Quince Compote
Substitute honey for sugar (lower the amount of water a bit to compensate for the liquidity of honey), use thyme or rosemary for vanilla, and use a local white such as Casa Rondena's Serenade Blend.

After chilling this yesterday, I added some fresh pomegranate seeds for color and crunch.

Spiced Persimmon Chutney
We've got apples and persimmons in season. Everything else requires some cheating.

Veggies

Dandelion & Delicata Squash Salad
Sounds weird. Looks beautiful. I'm gonna try it. Not sure what I'll substitute for dandelions, but maybe I have some arugula in my back yard.

Butternut Squash & Apple Soup

Probably hard to find local celery, butter, vinegar and onions, but you can get local squash, cream, apples, garlic, and goat cheese. Maybe I'll try using Toasted Onion Goat Cheese from Sweetwoods Dairy for the blue cheese.

Sides

Goat Cheese Potato Gratin
Regional potatoes, garlic, cream, and goat cheese can all be had this time of year.

Quinoa Pecan Salad
Both quinoa and pecans grow in or near New Mexico. You can get mint and parsley grown in Rio Rancho.

Honey Red Chile Roasted Sweet Potatoes
So the recipe doesn't call for red chile, but add some powdered Chimayo Red to the mix for an extra layer of kick. Jake's sweet potatoes grow near Fort Sumner.

Bread

You could make your own fancy dinner rolls like this Pumpkin Nutmeg Dinner Rolls, but I plan on buying mine from Sage Bakehouse or La Quiche Bakery downtown.

Dessert

Persimmon & Goat Cheese Tart
Persimmons come from La Luz, NM down near Alamogordo. And goat cheese from several local sources including Sweetwoods Dairy in Peña Blanca. All the herbs are growing right now at Aroma Fresca in Rio Rancho.

Apple Galette
I still haven't found a source of local butter, but you can get flour from Northern New Mexico at the Coop. As for apples, both locally-grown granny smiths and winesaps are available right now in Albuquerque.

Pumpkin Pie Brulee
Just buy a local sugar or pie pumpkin from the Coop and follow these instructions to get the pumpkin part of the pie filling

Honey-Pecan Pie
It'll be hard to live without chocolate in my pecan pie, but I'll try this recipe and see how I do.

Cheater. Cheater.

Swapping honey for sugar in everything I'm making this holiday is a significant step in the right direction. Significant enough that I don't plan on confessing the following to my priest.

Salt
Butter
Spices
Onions
Vinegar
Oil
Lemon juice

More Info

How to sub honey for sugar
100milediet.org

Food Sources

Rasband Dairy
Sweetwoods Dairy
My friend Spring's backyard
My backyard
Heidi's Raspberry Farm
Aroma Fresca Herbs
White Mountain Farms
Sichler Farms
Sangre de Cristo Agricultural Producers
Jake "The Melon Man" West
Shiraz Vineyards
Casa Rondena Winery
Anasazi Fields Winery
Embudo Valley Organics
B's Honey Farm
East Mountain Organics
Del Valle Pecans
Lori's Farm
South Mountain Dairy

A Map of My Meal

Here's where the ingredients I've purchased for Thanksgiving Dinner came from.

[View larger, interactive map]

If you have Google Earth installed, it's even more illustrative to view a map of your local food sources in that application. Here's the same map as a KML in Google Earth:

Download Eat Local: An Albuquerque Thanksgiving.kml or view a screenshot below of Tomas with his garlic from just east of Albuquerque.

0 members like this

Comment by Kelly on November 17, 2007 at 8:31am: Great story Chantal. I applaud you for shopping and buying local. It supports local growers and businesses, keeps money circulating within the community and encourages more growers to start providing us with local fare. Plus, when your food doesn't travel an average of 1500 miles from farm to plate, it gets picked when ripe and has better flavor and nutrition, not to mention reduces the energy needed to transport it.

Technically, only foodstuffs grown within our local foodshed count for the 100 mile diet challenge. Purists (and I'm certainly not one) consider it cheating to include things purchased from local stores that use ingredients sourced outside the zone. So your bread qualifies since the flour was grown within a reasonable distance, but unless the hops, barley and malt for your beer were, it doesn't.

Strict adherents to the local challenge allow themselves 5 wildcards, and any number of spices, herbs and other items that fall under the "Marco Polo exclusion," or trade goods that a 13th Century sailor could have brought back to Europe from a voyage to Asia (average travel time 6 months). So use salt, pepper and other herbs and spices with abandon. And if chocolate is a must, call it one of your wildcards. Personally, I couldn't give up tea. Don won't (can't) give up coffee. We both use olive oil liberally. The 100milediet.org website has great information about how to participate in a challenge, so thanks for linking to it.

We're making an effort to buy more locally grown produce, meats, poultry and breads, and shopping at local stores like Keller's, La Montanita, etc. for our other staples.

I'm also nursing along winter greens under my hoop house, and planning next years garden for even more canning, freezing and preserving of vegetables and fruits to take us through the winter. My freezer is full of tomato sauce made from my 4 varieties of tomatoes this year, as well as pesto and parsley pistou for soups and stews. Next year I want to pickle cucumbers, freeze green beans and corn, to add to this year's canned peaches and pears.

Keep up the good work! Buy and eat local!

Comment by Adelita on November 17, 2007 at 8:37am: Chantal,
It is tradition in our family to use Chimayo red chile instead of gravy for the mashed potatoes and turkey. Thanksgiving 'Burque style!

Comment by Spring Griffin on November 17, 2007 at 8:50am: Great story! Thanks for all of the links to locally oriented resources. I may not take the Thanksgiving challenge but I think I'll try to work more local foods into my daily fare. Love the map!

Comment by chantal on November 17, 2007 at 8:51am: Kelly, awesome information! Thank you. You were the inspiration for this article in the first place after we spoke about your upcoming Localvore article. When is it coming out and where can we read it?

Adelita, love the suggestion for red chile "gravy." What's your recipe?

Comment by Kelly on November 17, 2007 at 9:07am: My article is in the November issue of LocalFlavor, on the stands now. Unfortunately, LF doesn't yet put their content online. The amazing Alice Waters is on the cover! She was in Santa Fe promoting her Edible Schoolyard initiative which encourages schools to plant gardens and use the produce in their cafeterias.

Comment by Adelita on November 17, 2007 at 4:50pm: Not the most traditional way to make it - I buy powdered chile from the Fruit Basket on 12th Street. You can get the ristras from them too if you want to make it from scratch. For me, good red chile has to have a little bit of oregano and lots and lots and lots of garlic. I prefer my chile meatless, whereas my mom always makes hers with pork.

Comment by Coco on November 17, 2007 at 6:08pm: Great map!

Comment by Zia on November 18, 2007 at 12:59pm: Your Thanksgiving meal sounds quite tasty, especially the butternut squash & apple soup and the apple galette! The idea of the 100 Mile Thanksgiving is quite admirable!

For Chrismahannukwanzika, Festivus, and in general, also remember Keller's Farm Stores (http://www.kellersfarmstores.com/) for local meats and organic food. Much of it is raised and grown in the geographic radius shown on your map.

I don't have a turkey-loving family and we have a good veggie-omnivore mix, so many years ago we decided that our Thanksgiving feasts would consist of dishes that we would be truly thankful for. What we eat doesn’t always fit into the 100 Mile diet but since we shop mostly at the Coop, one assumes that much of our food is, more often than not, locally-ish grown.

There were a few Thanksgiving feasts that were especially memorable, primarily because of the effort that went into their creation. One of them was a double crowned roast of pork with roast loin of pork sausage stuffing (Rosso, J., & Lukins, S. (1989). The new basics cookbook. New York: Workman Pub., pp. 542-543). When I ordered the crowned roast from Keller’s, the butchers were very excited because they so rarely got to make it.

Then there was the year dinner was 100% vegetarian except for the lone holdout, Pater Familias, who is an unabashed carnivore. He enjoyed a nice filet mignon.

Please accept my warmest wishes for all life’s best to you and those you love on this Thanksgiving holiday!

Comment by chantal on November 18, 2007 at 1:13pm: Thanks, Zia! Same to you!

And thanks for the Kellers tip. They're great, but I'd forgotten to include them on the list of places to buy local turkey.