Devour Summer! Blog July 1, 2010 by TR
The vernal equinox/ solstice has come and gone and summer has arrived here with a full-on sunny vengeance. After all that previous extended and tedious rain and cold, with no prelude or foreshadowing, summer suddenly is just purely and simply HERE. The Russian River stopped rising and raging and started meandering- the Summer Dam is almost in at Memorial Beach and rental canoes and kayaks are once again floating downriver dodging the flotilla of jolly and sometimes raucous (ahem) rafters and tubers. Outdoor music and movies are again on the Wine Road Event Calendar along with winery outdoor cooking celebrations. Vegetation is starting to become lush- the vines are leafy, bright green and vibrant as the burgeoning grapes head towards the incipient and inevitable harvest. Farmers’ Markets abound- like local favorite Healdsburg’s own which takes place on Saturday mornings and Tuesday evenings pairing up with the popular Healdsburg Free Concert Series on the Plaza. Windsor and Geyserville Markets follow suit with their seasonal market places. Ample opportunity for healthy eating and the capturing of small- town America abound.
All this local 
produce means that once again it is time to pair this Sonoma County bounty (a rhyme too tempting for me to resist- sorry) with our Wine Road member wines while resting at one of our Wine Road lodgings and enjoying all the fun restaurants, events and local More Fun Stuff that go on in July. Or, if you live here, just be sure that you get out and about to enjoy it- remember, summer will soon be just a memory- it seems to be the most ephemeral of the seasons even though it weighs in at regular weight.
I have a little cardboard sign on my desk that I got at the Taste of Sonoma Event at Fred MacMurray’s ranch two years ago- someone had discarded it and I grabbed it because it made me smile- it says: I DRINK LIKE A LOCAL. So add to that eating like a local. Summer–time eating makes you a true LOCAVORE—and probably a bit of a SLOW FOODIE PERSON. Locavore- a word recently and somewhat amusingly coined by joining “local”, meaning “close proximity”, with a contraction of “carnivore” which technically means “meat eater” but in this case refers back to the roots of that word that harken back to “devour” or “voracious” as in “consume with pleasure”. Pair that with drinking Wine Road wines, truly a local endeavor and practice. Mix with being a Slow Food Movement Person- quite an admirable aspiration for summer and think how marvelous we will all look this July devouring locally with pleasure:
Slow Food is a non-profit, eco-gastronomic member-supported organization that was founded in 1989 to counteract fast food and fast life, the disappearance of local food traditions and people’s dwindling interest in the food they eat, where it comes from, how it tastes and how our food choices affect the rest of the world. To do that, Slow Food brings together pleasure and responsibility, and makes them inseparable.
Today, they have over 100,000 members in 132 countries.
Valuable info. Lucky me I found your site by accident, I bookmarked it.
Thanks so much! TR