This has been in my thoughts a whole lot lately, the seasonal bar ethos…Using as much of the ingredients as possible, remaining organic despite the cost, trying not to throw out the scraps (sorry to those who call it trim, don’t like that term), going to the farmer’s market, yada, yada, blah, blah, blah. What does it all mean and who cares? There’s only a handful of people that appreciate all of this or are even aware it’s happening. Most guests come in and have a cocktail or two and it never crosses their minds. We’re not going full Redzepi here serving twigs and grubs, and a good amount of our purchased liquor is from somewhere else, but I look around and I don’t see anyone else doing it. No one.

My question is does it matter? Is this some sort of first world bullshit where I’m “respecting my ingredients” or is it that we’ve gotten so far off from where we used to be that this is uncommon? I’m taking the latter. Yeah, this is how things should be. Yeah, I get that if you live in a place like New York City you won’t be able to get jack shit in winter. I guess it all starts there. Once again, I’m grateful for how spoiled we are here in Southern California. Any of us in any climate of this type are a little clueless.

Back in the day, in colder climates, people would spend a lot of time canning and jarring. Restaurants and bars with colder climates could do that, but I’m not sure where they’d get their fresh lime and lemon juice. They also don’t have the storage. It’s just not possible. And that’s why it’s important for us to do it out here in Cali, because we can do it. But, like I said, few are.

The wifey sent me this instagram video of this woman talking (@beyondwithnicole) about how here in America we’re so unhealthy that there’s all these services available to us to help us. That in Italy the supermarkets don’t have probiotics and supplements lining the walls. They pay attention to certain things like spending time talking actually to their friends and family, and are healthy without all the therapy and gyms.

I try to get my son to go on walks with me around the neighborhood. The area we live in is quite beautiful, but we’re hedged in on the north and south by Santa Monica and Wilshire Boulevards (below Bundy). Wilshire isn’t so bad but Santa Monica on this side looks like a scene out of Children of Men. Anyway, I do this thing I call “your choice” where he gets to lead us wherever the hell he wants to go. Nine times out of ten he takes us over to Smart and Final because he likes to pull a grocery cart around in there.

It’s pretty gross in there. Smells funky like spoiled goat. So we were in there the other day going through the aisles and I was looking at all the non fresh food items and saying to myself which of them were actually healthy. 99% of them had a combination of sugar, gluten, and vegetable oil, or all three. Most of us are completely unaware of how bad this shit is for us. Just eating vegetables and some meat, however, takes serious effort. A hell of a lot of time in the kitchen.

And don’t get me started on tap water…

I grew up in the country. We drank well water. My own diet wasn’t great. Mostly canned and boxed goods. Barely anything fresh. But this was also before glyphosate was in EVERYTHING. I spent all my time outside. I look at my kid now and I get him outside at least two hours a day, but that means he’s indoors for 22 hours a day. Goddam. What happened?

And to come full circle. We don’t really eat within the seasons and if we do it’s hella expensive. Drinking, yeah, it’s not so good for any of us and really bad for a lot of us but a really good margarita can take the edge off a long day. Just one is all you need. Some sort of seasonal cherry drink with rye, etc. And hey, we took the time to roast those damn cherry pits to make noyaux.

And yes, it does matter. I’ll give you two reasons: 1. It’s a hell of a lot better on the environment and cuts down on the carbon footprint. and 2. It supports small farms which are all mostly on life support.

So get your ass to the farmer’s market.