I've been trying to eat *mostly* local during this seeming-to-never-end winter (and fyi: winter is due to end at Mar 20 2008, 05:48 UT - phew).

Throughout my life...my nearly 41 years...I have experienced strange cravings for celery. The stranger thing about my current craving is that I've been eating celery regularly for at least 3 years. I like celery but I don't love it - but I love it if I have a craving ;)

So celery was a food item I only incorporated into my regular diet with reluctance before moving to a mostly fresh produce lifestyle completely about 3 years ago after fits and spurts of healthy food phases throughout my late 20s/early 30s. I am now very fond of celery but still don't love it.

Now...for me, eating any item regularly means that it is in my fridge (but not necessarily consumed daily) about 50% of the time.

A bunch of celery, for me and my teenage daughter, lasts about 2 weeks or maybe a bit less. She is not crazy about celery but will eat it...especially when it is hidden in blenderized sauces ;). I wait for at least 2 weeks before buying another bunch of celery and throughout this winter it has been less often due to the locavore diet I am trying to pursue. I also think that the regular rotation of our diet is important for digestive purposes i.e. not only ecological purposes.

So what's with this current craving I'm having for celery?

Methinks it is because my body is crying out for the abundance of fresh produce about to 'spring' from our land...and by fresh I mean LOCAL. Fresh is something that is within days of being harvested. Root vegetables and apples are the closest thing to 'fresh' that is available to us Ontarians at the moment.

So tonight I offer you my California grown organic celery with local hydroponic fresh greens chicken salad.

The hemp oil vinaigrette is quite yummy and I've been putting it on my salads for a few months now - but again, not all the time. I take breaks from all foods regularly so that my body is not constantly processing a limited number of food items. I happen to think that the abundance of a few type of foods in the current modern diet is a large part of the health issues that arising. I am not alone in that thinking either.

I was gonna call this salad: "I've fallen on the ice again so leftovers are a godsend" salad but I thought the celery craving aspect was a worthier title. I am mostly fully recovered from the fall. Nothing broke except maybe a little of my spirit. But, the spirit mends too. Sometimes much more quickly than our bodies.

Warm chicken salad with hemp oil ginger mustard vinaigrette
2/3 cup reheated previously cooked organic long grain brown rice $4.45/kg USA Karma
2/3 cup previously cooked pieces of diced organic chicken $16.09/kg ON Beretta
1 medium organic carrot $2.09/kg ON Karma 2 stalks organic celery$2.90/bunch CA Karma
1 cup organic baby arugula$2.55/bunch ON Karma
2 tbsp organic sunflower seeds$22.66/kg ON Karma
2 tbsp hemp oil ginger mustard vinaigrette (see below for recipe)
hot chili pepper/hot cayenne and sea salt and pepper to taste

Hemp oil ginger mustard vinaigrette (this is for a 1 cup batch which can be kept in the refridgerator)
1/2 cup hemp oil $15.00/L MB Manitoba Harvest
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar (Filsinger's ) $2.90/L ON Karma
1/2 tsp organic yellow mustard seed ? ? Karma
1/2 tsp organic ginger$36.17/kg ? Karma
1/2 tsp sea salt $1.06/kg ? Karma

and P.S. I took the below pic yesterday at Karma. 33 locally produced items in the fruits and vegetables section of the store on March 14th, 2008. That number will climb very shortly.....YEAH!!