Want best ingredients? Source local.

By Mike Mitchelson

If you’re not sourcing local, you’re not in the game.

The above statement was the overarching message from five of the top chefs and business owners in Minnesota—make that the Midwest—who assembled together in a discussion panel at Foodservice News’ second annual Local Challenge event last month at the St. Anthony Main Event Center in Minneapolis. (Harvest Foodservice Journal co-sponsored the event.)

That statement is not grounded in idealism, either, those chefs said. Simply put, local farmers grow some of the best products available—from meat to vegetables—than anywhere else in the country, and those concerned about quality use them on their menus.

More than 120 industry insiders attended the event, which included local producers who provided product samples. The five participating chefs (Russell Klein of Meritage in St. Paul, Erick Harcey of Victory 44 in Minneapolis, Ben McCallum of Three Sons Signature Cuisine in Minneapolis, J.D. Fratzke of The Strip Club Meat & Fish in St. Paul and Steven Brown of Tilia in Minneapolis) also brought samples from their restaurant menus that helped connect theory to practice.

The event also brought attendees together with one of the state’s major industry associations (the Minnesota Licensed Beverage Association) and the food and dining editor of the area’s leading consumer publication, Stephanie March of Mpls.-St. Paul Magazine. Both focused on trends in their respective area of expertise.

Panel insight

The five chefs on the panel have sourced local products for years, but haven’t staked their identities on it. All of them agreed that it’s not just about local; it’s about supporting small farms—if they have the best ingredients. Sourcing from local growers is important—and not purely as a feel-good measure, or a marketing angle. The ingredients simply are superior. “If you’re going to be competitive, you’ve got to source (local),” said Russell Klein, the chef and owner of Meritage in St. Paul. “You’re not even in the game with the best chefs in town if you’re not.”

Each chef makes no secret about the provenance of their ingredients, and takes time to educate their service staff about them as part of their knowledge about the dish as a whole. But there was unanimous agreement that they leave it up to the guest to inquire about specifics, rather than impress upon them the origin of each ingredient.

(Photo, from left: Erick Harcey, Ben McCallum, J.D. Fratzke, Steven Brown, Russell Klein)

Erick Harcey remarked that at his restaurant, Victory 44, a discussion about ingredients comes naturally after a diner eats at the restaurant more than once. After about the fourth visit, he said, they ask ingredient questions on their own.

Klein said he leaves it up to the server what to tell the guests—they have the best read on the customer. “They have a dialog with guests weather it’s how the dish was created or where (ingredients are) from,” he said.

For Ben McCallum, the executive chef and co-owner of Three Sons Signature Cuisine, a catering company, nothing specific about local sourcing is in their marketing materials, only that they specialize in custom menus—which includes, if the customer wishes, entirely local and/or organic menus.

The issue of cost always comes up when sourcing local, particularly when it comes to meats. McCallum said clients that ask for a locally sourced or “green” event get a quick education on those costs. “An event for 200, it becomes an issue to the client,” he said, adding that if the client wants grass-fed beef tenderloin from a local provider, he might recommend a different cut to manage their budget.

Keeping food costs in line is an obvious factor in managing an independent restaurant, and all the chefs on the panel utilized classic cooking and preservation techniques to maximize their products, hence the event’s subtitle: The Element of Craft. Among the items touched on: using whole carcasses (including scraps for rillettes, rendering fats, bones for stocks), canning and pickling, smoking and more. Klein remarked that he recently purchased a dehydrator, a tool he’s used to dry for storage a massive amount of mushrooms and other items.

It’s critical to know when the labor involved outweighs the gain, however. Steven Brown, the chef and co-owner of Tilia in Minneapolis, relayed a story from his past about how he and his staff, after hours, labored for hours to shell and pack fresh local peas to freeze, only to discover that the effort didn’t yield better results than the local peas harvested at peak sweetness by a packer, bagged, frozen and delivered on a truck.

Labor. The word struck a note with all of the panelists. To use a whole animal or primal cuts, to know how to make stocks, and charcuterie items (Harcey brought several of his charcuterie items to sample at the event), to can and pickle and otherwise preserve fruits and vegetables, take skills that the panelists described are lacking in new kitchen help—particularly from those coming in from culinary schools. J.D. Fratzke asked if there were representatives or graduates from Le Cordon Bleu in the crowd. “Tell them to bring back their butchering programs,” he said, and then addressed culinary students attending the event from Hennepin Technical College: “Learn butchering. Take the initiative.”

From butchering comes all the other skills to utilize the whole animal, all the way to grinding scrap meats for burgers, “and that way we can give that animal the respect it deserves,” Fratzke said.

Sourcing and distribution was also discussed, the restaurateurs utilizing traditional distributors, but largely maintaining direct relationships with growers. As a caterer, McCallum explained, he’s somewhat limited with sourcing efforts. With large events, he needs a lot of product in a short amount of time. He relies on his distributor, which has an extensive local growers program, to procure and deliver those products in the volume he requires.

Although, he added, he is looking at some local growers to produce a large volume of greens, from whom he could purchase the entire crop. “Otherwise, for local products on hand, I keep grains, legumes and honey—things with a long shelf life,” he said.

Larger distributors have a role in promoting local product—and they must, not everyone can have farmers stopping by their kitchen door. “Between the massive industrial complex and the little guy…somewhere there’s a sweet spot,” Brown said.

—Foodservice News Staff Writer Danielle McFarland contributed reporting to this story.