Okay, I’m a lazy bastard, I admit it. I signed up for the One Local Summer challenge and risen to the challenge I have not. Between travel, illness, and my need to inject fanciness into my Weekly Wednesday meals I have yet to cook an entirely local dinner.

But that has now changed. Tonight I decided that come Hell or high water, I would have an all local meal. The first problem was that I had no local foods in my house. I was in Pittsburgh this Saturday and so missed the Greensboro Farmers’ Market. Fortunately the curbside market is open on Wednesday mornings from 7:00am-noon. I went to work as usual but took my lunch hour at 9:00am so that I could get to the market in time to pick out fresh veggies for dinner.

I’ve been very under the weather lately. I have a feeling that it’s strep throat. Because of this I wanted a soup, or if not a broth based soup at least a stew with easy to swallow pieces. I chose golden zucchini, tomato, red potato and yellow onion for the base. I wanted some type of hearty green bean as the protein, but couldn’t find any, nor could I find meat. Fortunately Baldwin Farm sells their beef at the local Earthfare, so I stopped by there to get a small pack of beef medallions (I was looking for stewing beef, but beggars can’t be choosers).

One of the only times I crave dessert is when I’m sick. It’s a comfort thing. Fortunately the season is with me. I found fresh blackberries, figs, and the first melons of summer at the curbside market. I had to exercise a lot of self control because I knew I couldn’t eat all three before they spoiled. I bought the blackberries and the figs only. I figure that if either start to get too squishy I can always bake the figs into a tart and make the blackberries into preserves. For now though they are getting popped straight into my happy mouth just as they are.

The stew came together very easily. Sometimes it’s nice to cook just for yourself and not have to worry about what other people will think of whatever you’ve planned. In my case it lets me take chances on flavors that I otherwise wouldn’t. I usually stick to thyme and oregano, but my poor thyme and oregano herbs are dying in the summer heat, so I had to use other herbs from my potted garden instead. I was happily surprised by the taste they provided. I used butter as the cooking oil because I cannot find local veggie oil, but if you have local vegetable or olive oil those would work fine as well.

• 2 tbsp butter
• 1 small yellow onion, diced
• 1 tbsp minced garlic
• 1 cup mushroom broth
• 2 medium red potatoes, diced
• 1 golden zucchini, sliced into bite sized pieces
• 1 large, ripe tomato, diced
• 3/4 pound beef medallions
• 1/4 cup wine or broth
• 2 leaves fresh sage, minced
• 1 tbsp fresh rosemary, minced
• 1 small hot pepper
• 1 tsp kosher salt

Toss the garlic (a whole head of cloves for me since my local heirloom garlic is so tiny!) and onion in a pan set to medium and let it cook until translucent. Add the mushroom broth and when it begins to simmer add the potatoes. Cover the pan and let it simmer for about 8 minutes. Add the zucchini and tomato and allow it to continue cooking.

In a separate pan sear the steak over medium-high heat until browned on both sides. Add the meat to the stew. Add the sage, rosemary, pepper, and salt to the pan and once it becomes fragrant from the heat add the wine or stock and deglaze the pan, scraping the browned bits off the bottom. Add the wine/stock and herbs to the stew. Cook until the meat is done and serve. I served mine with a wedge of crusty french bread from Simple Kneads.