Santa Cruz Local Foods: Connecting You and Local Producers

I recently discovered Santa Cruz Local Foods, an online food market that features sustainable, organic foods provided by local producers. The great concept owners Noah Pinck and Eleanor Taylor came up with brings the area's incredible wealth of produce, meats and dairy products directly to Santa Cruz shoppers.

"We came to Santa Cruz to work on a farm," says Eleanor, holding the couple's 3-month-old baby, Mira. "Then this idea presented itself. It gave us the opportunity to inventory the bounty that's here, and to show people they can eat most of their food from local sources."

The market operates year round, and each week the site features a new list of items for sale, brought to you by small and medium-size producers located from Boulder Creek to Pinnacles.

"We want to offer as much diversity as we can," Eleanor explains. "And we feel we have a good mix of producers."

The couple has a small farm as well, Sprout's Garden, contributing to the produce available from their online market.

Noah says, "Our true passion is growing the food, and then getting it to the people is an awesome feeling."

You can place your order starting each Tuesday at 7 p.m. until the "closing bell" the following Monday at 3 p.m. During that time, suppliers might add items, so check the site regularly throughout the week. On the Tuesday morning after closing, suppliers deliver everything to Santa Cruz Local Foods. That afternoon, you pick up your order—or pay for delivery by bicycle if you're within range—at one of five locations throughout the county.

A word of advice: Don't start shopping with something specific in mind. For my first shopping spree, I did just that, hoping to buy some organic free-range chicken. With no chicken available, I chose grass fed fajita beef—don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining. But not knowing what was available turned out to be the fun part of shopping with Santa Cruz Local Foods. Seeing and reading about each new vegetable—many varieties I'd never heard of—was an adventure. What did it taste like? How would I prepare it? If you like to cook, just looking over the available foods will get your creative juices flowing.

After picking up my bag of goodies, I headed home and planned my meal. The beef, from Paicines Ranch, comes frozen, so I put that package in warm water to speed up the thawing. I'd toss the fajita pieces with a smoked paprika rub and fry in a super hot pan. The organic shitake mushrooms from Far West Fungi would be sauteed in butter and olive oil with chopped garlic, thyme and a splash of red wine, and served over the fajitas.

I'd balance the fajitas with a platter of colorful vegetables: steamed Romano bean mix from Sprout's Garden simply seasoned with butter, salt and pepper, collard greens from Phoebe Farm sautéed with fresh garlic, a squeeze of fresh lemon and a touch of butter, and Chiogga Beets from Everett Family Farm roasted and then tossed with a dash of red wine vinegar, olive oil and chopped organic dill from Happy Boy Farms. Talk about a fresh tasty meal from farm to kitchen—it was delicious, if I do say so myself.