For those of you interested in reading the Slow Food podcast transcript, here you go!

Aurora Porter: Green Gate Farms is a little agricultural oasis east of Texas Highway 183 and north of 51st street in Austin, Texas. On Saturday October 24th just before sunset, 82 guests descended on the farm to attend a Slow Food Feast in the Field, where they could admire the early fall harvest and savor a thoughtful, simple menu cooked by the chefs at Ecstatic Cuisine. The feast proceeds went to benefit the Austin Discovery School, which offers, among other courses, an organic Junior Master Gardener program and a zero waste school lunch initiative.

Slow Food is an international, member-supported, non-profit organization that works to promote biodiversity in our food supply, gastronomic education in our communities, and facilitate connections between ethical and delicious food producers and co-producers.

Jesse Bloom is head chef and owner of Ecstatic Cuisine. Bloom says he has always been interested and inspired by the Slow Food movement.

Jesse Bloom: The menu was really about what was available. Slow Food is supposed to be all local and all organic, as much as possible.

Aurora Porter: On this mild late October evening, between an open field and the lettuce patch, Slow Food supporters ate a completely locally sourced meal, including butternut squash soup with goat milk crème fraiche, duck confit with Kefir pear, and Green Gate greens salad with pickled persimmons. Before the entrée, guests gathered at small tables near a Sweet Leaf Tea stand and built their own bruschetta with eggplant caviar, mushroom capanota, Cheesy Girl Chevre, and a Green Gate grilled green tomato caprese.

For the main dish, the chefs served smoked pork loin with persimmon lavender sauce, green beans amandine, sweet and spicy cabbage, a butternut squash gratin with caramelized onion, walnuts, and Veldhuizen Gruyere. Dessert was Mary Louise Butters’ Chipotle Brownies with Amy’s Mexican Vanilla ice cream.

Jesse Bloom: A couple of months before the event I was talking to the farmers trying to figure out what was going to be coming out of the ground and really the menu evolved like, up until the actual day of, because you know, no one actually knew what was going to happen, because the weather was do dry this summer and we were in such a big drought and then there was a ton of rain and so the tomato crop just never turned because there was no sun so we ended up using green tomatoes…we had planned to do a blackberry sauce and we couldn’t get local blackberries so we ended up using persimmons.

Aurora Porter: Bloom says the spontaneity and last minute fluidity of coming up with last minute menus makes the process that much more interesting for him. He said the main inspiration for the menu was all about the farm. The smoky pork loin was made from a pig that was raised on the farm and the green tomatoes in the caprese came from Green Gate tomatoes that didn’t turn in time for the event.

Jesse Bloom: We had a food blogger ask if she could have our butternut squash gratin recipe. A lot of good compliments about the food and the timing of the event.

Aurora Porter: Bloom says his company tries to do a donation charity event about once a quarter.

Jesse Bloom: We are going to be at the Zhi Tea festival in December…that’s December 5th at the Zhi tea gallery on Bolm Road. December 5th through 12th is Edible Austin Eat Local Week and we will be running all local food in the café all week long, so that’s a huge thing. We’re gonna be doing our own cured bacon. I’m definitely looking forward to that.

Aurora Porter: Ecstatic Cuisine caters weddings, business lunches, parties and food-centered events in Central Texas and also serves lunches at Region XIII five days a week. To view photos of the event check and read blog posts and news about upcoming events, go to Ecstaticcuisine.com.

This is the podcast describing the Slow Food Austin Feast in the Field. Enjoy!

On Saturday Oct. 24th, Slow Food Austin will host the third annual Feast in the Field fundraiser at Green Gate Farms. The event will benefit the Austin Discovery School, a local elementary school that teaches children to garden outdoors. Jesse Bloom and Ecstatic Cuisine will cook a multi-course, gourmet dinner using local produce and meats from Green Gate Farms for the event.

Slow Food is an international, member-supported, non-profit organization that works to promote biodiversity in our food supply, gastronomic education in our communities and facilitate connections between ethical and delicious food producers and co-producers. Slow Food seeks to help people rediscover excellent food and better understand where their food comes from, who makes it and how it’s made.

The organization has chapters in every major city throughout the U.S., Canada, Europe, Brazil, Singapore, Australia, Japan and many other countries.

Slow Food organizes fairs, markets and events locally and internationally to showcase products of excellent gastronomic quality and to offer discerning consumers the opportunity to meet producers.

The Austin Discovery School/Slow Food Feast in the Field is Saturday October 24 from 7pm – 11pm. Purchase tickets for the event or become a Slow Food member.

As far as I’m concerned, the bible of cooking is ‘The Joy of Cooking’ by Irma Rombauer. The recipes are simple and easy to follow along with while I’m cooking. If you want a recipe for sofrito, an authentic Chinese stir-fry, or an old fashioned New England slump, it’s all there.

I would recommend anything written by Michael Pollan. A good start is with ‘The Omnivore’s Dilemma‘. He describes what is going on with food in this country.

‘Healing with Whole Foods’ by Paul Pitchford is a way of looking at cooking through the lens of the Chinese five elements.

‘The French Laundry Cookbook’ by Thomas Keller is amazing. He is one of the best chefs alive. He has a way of taking food from the source and transforming it into a gourmet.

All of the Beautiful cookbooks, like ‘Southwest: The Beautiful’ by Barbara Fenzel and ‘Mexico: The Beautiful’ by Susanna Palazuelos are gorgeous, authentic, and creative.

‘Creating a World Without Poverty’ by Muhammad Yunus. This book is a must read for those interested in the developing world.  Yunus created the Grameen Bank and is considered the father and creator of micro-credit lending.

‘The Starfish and the Spider’ by Ori Brafman and Rod A. Beckstrom is about a decentralized organizational business structure and the power of having a leaderless organizations.