Thanks for reading this month's One Block West Restaurant newsletter. I hope by sharing my excitement and passion for food and wine that some of it will rub off and you'll be tempted to try some of the things that I am discussing. That's what really keeps me going year after year: trying new things and experimenting with them. So far in 2009, I have used over 200 items that are new to me; I'm a chef on a mission!

I've been having way too much fun over the past month playing with really fun ingredients such as longissima squashes, Armenian cucumbers, peach tomatoes, dragon tongue beans, and holy basil as you will know if you are following along with my blog. This edition of the newsletter will acquaint you with cape gooseberries, Greek yogurt, and the Albariño grape.

And now that I have your attention, I'd like to ask you to come support the collective effort of a lot of concerned people in our community to support local agriculture via eating locally. I am hosting a fundraiser on September 24th that I hope you will consider attending.

Thanks for all your support! I hope to see each of you in the dining room soon,

Ed Matthews
Chef and Owner

It should be no surprise that I buy the vast majority of my products for the restaurant in the local market from small producers. In fact, I was on the Fresh and Local bandwagon for a decade before it became fashionable and I am gratified that others are now seeing the importance of eating local to our health, econonmy, and environment. To further my support of the local farming community, I am happy to be hosting a fundraiser here at One Block West on Thursday September 24th.

If you live in the local area, you will have already received a Buy Fresh-Buy Local Guide in your mailbox at no cost to you—that's over 35,000 Guides in Winchester and Frederick County! This past spring, Preserve Frederick worked with the Virginia Cooperative Extension Service and the Piedmont Environmental Council to produce, promote and distribute this guide, which lists farms in and around Frederick County that sell their produce and other agricultural products directly to the public.

In past years, similar guides have been distributed in other areas of the state, resulting in significant increases in direct sales by producers to local residents. Our hope is that distributing the Guide in this area will encourage Winchester and Frederick County residents to support our local producers in this same manner. That's where you come in. You can help us raise money to continue to fund the Guide for next year by attending this dinner.

On behalf of Preserve Frederick, I am donating my labor and revenue to create a multi-course “Buy Fresh–Buy Local Celebration Dinner” to support the Guide. I will prepare this dinner from foods donated by local farms, and thus acknowledge and celebrate the contributions that these farms make to the local economy and to our quality of life.

All net proceeds from the dinner will go toward continued efforts by Preserve Frederick to publish and supply future Buy Fresh–Buy Local Guides to Winchester and Frederick County residents. Please join me at this wonderful dinner and help contribute to our efforts to support local agriculture in and around Frederick County.

You must purchase a ticket in advance to attend. Call the restaurant at 540-662-1455 for more details.

Every year as part of ArborFest at Blandy Farm, I put on a cooking with herbs demonstration on Sunday afternoon and this year is no different. As always, my demonstration is free and I will be providing samples. Each year the audience has grown, starting with a dozen or so the first year and up to about 100 last year. Let's go for 150 this year! For more information, contact Blandy Farm.

Most of you know that I am a huge supporter of local cheesemakers, particularly those in Virginia such as Everona Dairy and Meadow Creek Dairy. But I'm also a huge cheese fan and am exploring other artisanal dairies around the country. In my explorations, I have come across a Wisconsin dairy called Carr Valley Cheese that makes fantastic cheeses.

I was really skeptical at first, but I tried first one cheese from Carr Valley at the urging of my sales rep, and then another and another and yet another. Heretofore, cheese from Wisconsin was synonymous with plastic-wrapped rubber blocks in the grocery store. I'm sure that this is a gross misrepresentation of the Wisconsin cheese industry, but that's the reputation in these parts.

Happily, the cheeses that I have tasted from Carr Valley blow this reputation out of the water. The first cheese that I tasted was the world class Bright White Goat Cheddar, yes, a cheddared goat cheese, cloth-bound and all. Having tasted it, I have no doubt why it won the Best in Show of over 1100 cheeses at the 2008 American Cheese Society Competition. And the Third Place Best in Show Marisa, a soft sheep's milk cheese is wonderful in its own way. You also need to come taste the Harvest Blend, a blend of cow, sheep, and goat milk that has quickly become our workhorse melting (and snacking!) cheese at the restaurant.

We have about a dozen artisanal cheeses in the cooler that make up our three standard cheese plates: a red wine cheese plate (mellow cheeses for round red wines), a white wine goat cheese plate (higher acid goat cheeses for high acid whites such as Sauvignon Blanc), and our Port and Blue Cheese plate. I invite you to come taste these fantastic cheeses.

Recently, customers tried to order a bottle of a big grapefruity Sauvignon Blanc that we have discontinued: it ceased to be a good value because of price increases and all that grapefruit was really fighting with a lot of our food. Rather than get angry as some customers are wont to do when things don't go as planned, these customers asked me for a recommendation to go with their fish.

Each of us who works the floor has a short list of go-to wines and one of mine for pairing with fish is Albariño, which I recommended to these customers. The other servers must recommend it a lot because it is always at the top of our sales each week. That is probably because its lemony crispness complements so much food; it is just an all around wonderful white wine. The nose, which often hints at peaches and apricots, though less so than Viognier, is a bonus.

This wine is grown principally in the Rias Baixas area of Galicia in northwest Spain. The name means white (alba) from the Rhine (Riño), so speculation is that it came to Spain from along the Rhine, perhaps from Alsace, but it is has been in Spain for so many centuries that nobody knows for sure. Although intimately connected with Galicia, Albariño is starting to gain footholds elsewhere in the world, especially in Australia. There are some plantings in California and even Jenny McCloud over at Chrysalis in Middleburg, VA bottles a fair amount each year.

This is a grape worth knowing. Next time you are tempted to order Sauvignon Blanc reflexively, try an Albariño instead.

Oh, and those customers, they're Albariño converts for life.

This year at the restaurant, we have stopped using plain runny American yogurt and switched entirely to Greek yogurt, a yogurt that has been strained to remove more whey and is consequently thicker, creamier, higher in protein, and lower in lactose. This Greek yogurt, often labeled yiaourti sakoulas (plain yogurt), is a lot closer to yogurt that you'll find everywhere else in the world and we have switched because it has finally become available in the large quantities that we use at the restaurant. I am thankful, too, because I do not tolerate lactose very well and this yogurt is a lot more Ed friendly. We use Krinos brand at the restaurant and if you cannot find that, you should be able to find Fage or Stonyfield's Oikos brand at a grocery store near you. Me, I'm never going back to that runny stuff we call American yogurt.

Do you have tomatoes, peppers, and cucumbers coming out of your ears like I do? Here is a great way to use up some of your bounty and a good use for that Greek yogurt I just told you about.

Summer Chopped Salad

1 European cucumber or 2-3 smaller cukes
2 large tomatoes
1 large yellow or red pepper
2 cloves garlic, minced
1 tablespoon fresh oregano, minced
1 tablespoon fresh mint, minced
juice of half of one lemon
1 cup Greek style yogurt or more to taste
salt and pepper, to taste

I feel kind of ridiculous giving quantities for a salad whose recipe could be expressed as "chop up some cucumbers, peppers, and tomatoes and mix with yogurt, garlic, mint, oregano, salt, pepper, and lemon juice to taste." Disclaimer aside, do just that and you will have a wonderful side dish for any roast meat. Or wrap this salad up in a pita with some lettuce for a vegetarian meal.

While you're at it, marinate some local lamb kebabs in Greek yogurt, garlic, cumin, and cinnamon and grill them. Serve with some rice and the Summer Chopped Salad and enjoy!

Let me encourage you to try some heirloom tomatoes. I am prompted to do this because I see so many people at the farmers market skipping over the oddly shaped and colored tomatoes in favor of the round, red, perfect looking ones. Let me ask you a question. What do you see me buying? I'm buying all those funny looking tomatoes. Why? Try them and find out. The answer should be obvious. Keep cooking!