Leelanau.com Blog
leelanau county news • traverse city news • michigan news

Visit Leelanau Farmer's Markets on Facebook or go to eatleelanau.org for up-to-date information!

Leelanau Farmer's Markets are underway in Glen Arbor, Lake Leelanau, Leland, Northport and Suttons Bay. They offer you a chance to get out and connect with farmers and other folks who produce food in Leelanau County. Tell us your favorite Leelanau farmers market in our poll!

Tuesdays in Glen Arbor 9 am—1 pm June 21 - August 30 Location: Behind the Township Hall on Western Ave Thursdays in Leland 9 am—Noon June 23 - September 1 Location: Parking lot across from the Bluebird Restaurant Fridays in Northport 9 am—1 pm June 17 - September 16 Location: The Depot, next to the marina Saturdays in Suttons Bay 9 am—1 pm May 14 - October 22 NEW Location: North Park; intersection of M-204 & M-22, water side Saturdays in Empire 9 am—1 pm June 18 - September 10 Location: Downtown, next to the Post Office Sundays in Lake Leelanau 9 am—1 pm June 19 - September 4 Location: Parking lot across from NJ's Grocery downtown

What's your favorite Leelanau Farm Market? Empire Glen Arbor Lake Leelanau Leland Northport Suttons Bay View Results  Loading ... Radishes, eggs, salad greens and garlic from Abra at Bare Knuckle Farm More photos on the Leelanau Farmer's Market Facebook!

Taste the Local Difference is a comprehensive guide that includes farm, farm market, CSA, winery  and other listings with addresses, phone numbers and an index to seasonal food availability. The guide includes farms and winery listings, CSA contacts, addresses, phone numbers and an index to seasonal food availability. A kind of phone book for food.  No need to shuffle through the yellow pages--just pick up a guide and start eating!

TV 9&10 News has a great video feature on Leelanau County's various fruit crops where they talk with strawberry farmer Steve Bardenhagen, MSU Hort Station Coordinator Nikki Rothwell and others about the state of the fruit crops.

While farmers (and honeybees) struggled through a cold wet spring, no hard frost was a plus. It sounds like we'll have strawberry shortcake for the 4th and everyone is pulling for the hot temps from recent days to continue!

Photo credit: A Bloomin' Good Time! by Trish P. - K1000 Gal

The Leelanau Peninsula Vintners Association presents their second annual LPVA Small Plates event on Saturday, June 18 2011 from 6-9 PM.

Participating wineries will be offering a full glass of wine with a well-presented and substantial tapas dish in their tasting room. You can purchase tickets online for $11 for any or all of the three seatings (roughly 6-7, 7-8 and 8-9). Many of our wineries are working with chefs to prepare and serve the pairing, and the event is designed to be a high-class food offering, catering to culinary aficionados.

2011 Small Plates Pairings

Black Star Farms
Wild mushroom dusted sea scallop with a bundle of truffle oil infused fries wrapped in prosciutto, asparagus tips and smoked yellow tomato coulis paired with 2010 Sur Lie Chardonnay.

Chateau Fontaine
Assorted Pates, Proscuitto, Sausage, Rillette, accompanied by a selection of Cheeses,Veggies,Bread, Crackers, and Mustards. Rillette is a shredded duck/pork mixture served warm and it is paired with 2010 Woodland White.

Ciccone Winery
Tony Ciccone (Owner/Vintner) will be attending the event featuring a Roasted pork loin with a sausage torteloni with black truffle cream from Tuscan Bistro paired with 2009 Tre Rossi.

Forty-Five North
Parmesan encrusted walleye over a bed of white wine risotto and an in season greenery prepared by Shawn Bottruff from the Bluebird. Perfectly pairing with the 2009 Pacific Rim Internationa Best of Class award winning Pinot Gris!

Gills Pier
Featuring a Costa Rican Chalupa & Beef Fajita Wraps paired with 2008 Leelanau Peninsula Merlot.

L. Mawby
Chicken Pad Thai with spicy green curry sauce (pick your “heat” level) prepared by 22 Vines Restaurant. This will be paired with 2 different ‘sec’ sparkling wines – Wet and Consort.

Silver Leaf
Petite crab cakes with a red pepper coulis paired with Silver Leaf Chardonnay 2009.

Pat Stinson has a nice feature in the Glen Arbor Sun on how Sugarfoot Saloon has formed a beer-making partnership with homebrewer Brian Bartos and is serving microbrewed beer:

“I thought it would be really nice to have crafted beer for our customers,” said Sugarfoot owner Pete Bardenhagen, who persevered through paperwork required for brewpub licensing, (which took seven months), while Bartos selected equipment and fine-tuned his brew recipes.

When he isn’t controlling sea lamprey populations in Michigan streams as a US Fish and Wildlife Service biologist, Bartos brews up trial batches of beer for the ’Foots. Currently on tap are “Liquid Sunshine” (4.5 percent ABV), described as a citrusy, Belgian wit (wheat) style ale with clementine zest and summery spices, “a taste of sunshine for those cloudy days;” “Bavarian Hefeweizen” (4.5 percent ABV), a light-bodied wheat beer brewed in the German tradition with a smooth, banana flavor and a hint of clove; and a higher octane porter (5.2 percent ABV) that’s “filled with flavor yet deceptively smooth.”

“It’s a good, rich, dark beer,” said porter drinker John Rabideau, a Sugarfoot neighbor and patron and the owner of Grand Traverse Timberpeg, a builder of timber homes.

Next up on the brew menu is a chocolate ale, soon to replace the vanishing “Hefi,” and too new to appear on the bar’s whiteboard descriptions. The saloon’s brew menu currently changes about every three weeks, which is a point of pride for the “pub” and a note of caution for those who fall in love with a particular style. Enjoy it while you can, because it may be gone all too soon.

Read more at the Sun and I have to say that Right Brain in Traverse City has done very well indeed with a similar format - good thinking Pete!

Taste the Local Difference has released their 2011 Northwest Michigan Food Guide. The pocket-sized guide is packed with information about more than 300 businesses that feature local food: local farms, wineries, breweries, distilleries, farmers markets and retail businesses and food artisans in our 10-county region stretching from Manistee to the Mackinac Bridge.

Leelanau is well represented and you can download the guide as a PDF or pick it up at farms, markets and other places that feature local food across the region. A highlight is their Spend 10 Local Dollars Campaign, which encourages people to make a pledge to spend $10 weekly on local food products. Taste the Local Difference project director Janice Benson says:

"The guide helps people find local food, and combining that with a commitment by families to spend at least $10 each week on local food will significantly boost our local economy. We have a lot of great produce throughout the summertime, but we also have meat, fish, eggs, dairy products, beverages, and much more that is available to us all year long."

You can get all the details and make the pledge, search farm markets & businesses for all kinds of products, view tasty recipes and more at localdifference.org.

Try some of these ways to make a difference in your community with $10 or more a week!

• Shop at one of the weekly Leelanau Farm Markets!
• Buying local meat, fish, eggs, and produce from your local grocer, restaurant, or farmer.
• Ordering a glass of local wine, cider, or other beverage that includes locally grown items at dinner.
• Ordering a menu item that includes locally grown items at a restaurant.
• Becoming a member of a CSA farm.
• Ordering food for office lunches and parties that includes locally grown items.
• Purchasing locally grown food products for holiday gifts and entertaining. (Jams, honeys, cheeses, dried cherry mix, salsas, etc.)
• Buying local cream for your daily coffees and local teas that include locally grown herbs and fruit.

Photo credits: Plumb Perfect and 9 Bean Rows CSA by Ken Scott

via Michigan in Pictures...

Cherry Blossoms, photo by leelanau2010.

Every May I'm asked "When will the cherry blossoms be out?"

It's been a slow, cold spring but I'm happy to report that the answer is "Right now!"

Sweet cherry blossoms are out all over and the tart cherry blossoms will be along in a few days. That means this weekend will be the best one for photos.

David took this shot near Northport. Check it out background big, on his map or in his Cherry Blossoms slideshow.

Enjoy more blossoms and more Spring Wallpaper on Michigan in Pictures!

The Leelanau Enterprise reports that a new Processing Renaissance Zone in Grand Traverse County is expected to help many Leelanau growers by expanding what is already one of the world's largest cherry processing facilities:

The owners of one of Leelanau County's largest fruit growing operations - Bob and Don Gregory of Cherry Bay Orchards - are among principal owners of Shoreline Fruit, L.L.C. which operates a processing facility in Grand Traverse County's Acme Township.

Officials of Shoreline Fruit this week announced that Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder approved establishment of an Agricultural Processing Renaissance Zone (an APRZ) for the expansion of the facility in Acme. The APRZ designation waives most state and local taxes for up to 15 years for an expanded area of the plant only. The designation is expected to save Shoreline Fruit up to $1.9 million as part of a $7.5 million plan to expand the facility.

"Shoreline has been processing cherries from many more growers than just Cherry Bay Orchards," Don Gregory told the Enterprise this week. "We expect that a very high percentage of cherries that will be processed at the expanded facility will come from throughout northwestern lower Michigan in general and most of them from Leelanau County in particular."

..."We're in the right place in terms of food trends, too, because cherries are considered to be 'locally grown,'" Gregory added. "In the national market, 'locally grown' means anywhere in the U.S., and cherries along with blueberries and grapes seem to be gaining market share in comparison to some of the more exotic fruits grown in other countries."

Read more at the Enterprise and also check out the Shoreline Fruit website.

Photo credit: Cherry Blossoms by leelanau2010 (and yes, we have Cherry Blossoms!)

Cherry blossoms are starting to show around the county and I thought this cool photo from the 50s would help get you in the mood.

You can see more old cherry blossom pics in Don's slideshow and a whole bunch more shots in the Leelanau.com group's cherry blossom slideshow.

Leelanau.com has a ton of articles and photos of cherry blossoms - don't miss this great feature on cherry blossoms by Cherie Spaulding and a bit about the history of cherry blossoms in Leelanau.

The 2012 Leland Wine Festival takes place on Saturday, June 9, 2012 - 2012 details coming soon!

The 2011 Poster is titled "Fishtown from the Bridge" and was painted by Phil Fisher (click for website - new window). You can purchase the poster online along with posters from years past from the Leland Chamber's online store!

Mark your calendar for the annual Leland Wine & Food Festival. The festival is a northern Michigan tradition held on the second Saturday in June (June 11, 2011) from noon til 6pm.

Come enjoy a day near the Leland Harbor and Leland's historic Fishtown tasting wines from local wineries and tasting the specialties from local restaurants and vendors. There's also live music in the park all day and of course plenty of beautiful views of Lake Michigan and the Manitou Islands.

Admission is $12 and includes an etched wine glass and two tickets for wine tasting. Additional wine tasting tickets are available. Food vendors accept cash only and here's a list of last year's participating Wineries and Food Vendors (we will update when we get info!):

Wineries
Bel Lago
Black Star Farms
Chateau Fontaine
Ciccone Vineyards
45 North
Gill's Pier Winery
Good Harbor Vineyards
Raftshol
Silver Leaf
Willow
Bowers Harbor
Chateau Chantal
Chateau Grand Traverse
Peninsula Winery
Circa
Chateau de Leelanau

Local Beer: Shorts Brewing

Food Vendors
Bluebird Restaurant
Leland Lodge
Corky’s (Vineyard Inn)
Plevas
Village Inn
Drive Thru BBQ
The Cove
Martha’s Leelanau Table
Leelanau Cheese
Village Cheese Shanty
Stone House Bread

View Photos from the Leland Wine & Food Festival

For more information on Leelanau County's wineries, visit the Leelanau Peninsula Vintner's Association site at LPWines.com

Photo credit: On the Lawn by farlane