We could not promote fresh, local fare without partnerships with and cooperation from local suppliers.  I will keep it short and sweet this week and quickly highlight a few of our vendors.  We are continuously sourcing new vendors to increase our local content so this list is very fluent and a work in progress...

Fox's Bakery & Delicatessen  www.foxsbakery.com

The Fox family have been baking their best since 1978. Every day they bake a wide variety of breads, buns, pies, dessert cakes, pizza shells, cookies, hot dog and hamburger buns, bagels and much more. All baking is done right on the premises, at 96 Victoria Street, Barrie, fresh for you 7 days a week.

All our bread products come from Fox's, delivered fresh daily!  Steve & Debbie Fox have been incredibly supportive partners and we have nothing but the best to say about them.  "From their Family to ours", Fox's truly delivers the highest quality to Beaches and we are proud to offer their products on our menu!

Fer-Mar Farms, Penetanguishene
205 County Road 6
Lafontaine, Ontario L9M 1R3
705-533-4148

Our fresh-cut fries have become a favourite for adults and kids alike.  Roasted Garlic Mashed potatos and our Potato Croquettes are produced fresh from these local potatos.  One of the most important (if not the most) and versatile foods is the potato and having quality producers like Fer-Mar Farms within a 30min drive from Barrie ensures the highest quality and nutritional value in our potato dishes!

Gwillimdale Farms, Bradford
2026 Coulson Hill Road, Bradford, ON L3Z 2A5 
905-775-2889

Gwillimdale Farms is a family operation run using sustainable agricultural practices. We have applied for Local Food Plus certification. Our goal is to provide local food for local consumers that is healthy, safe, nutritious, and fresh. Gwillimdale Farms is also involved in raising livestock in a sustainable manner.

Fresh produce has among the highest nutritional value of any food product.  Being able to have it delivered from a farm withing a 20min drive of Barrie ensures minimal loss of quality and nutritional value.  Year round supply of many items, specifically root vegetables allows us to guarantee and promote our FRESH & LOCAL products!

Pine House Farms  www.pinehousefarm.ca

Beaches is going "Maple for April" with Pine House Farm Maple Syrup.  Our newest local vendor, Pine House Farms is supplying us with fresh Ontario Maple Syrup weekly.  Look for them at the Barrie Farmer's Market every Saturday from 8:00am to Noon at Barrie City Hall.

Sakana
Douglas Taylor
5 Park Road, Collingwood, ON, L9Y 3B8
(705) 606-0132

We purchase our Fresh Rainbow Trout from this company based out of Collingwood.  Their naturally raised fish provides an excellent product we feature both fresh and smoked on our menu.

The pure, natural spring water that flow on Blue Mountain through various fish hatcheries provides a natural diet of freshwater shrimps, minnows an insects.  This diet is supplemented with a high quality natural feed free of animal by-products.


These are a few of our local partners who provide us with the raw product we use to ensure we can serve you the highest quality, fresh and local food available.  Please check back next week for the next installment of "Beaches Bytes"!  In the meantime, happy reading and if we have tempted your palate come to Beaches and enjoy our "Maple for April" features such as Maple Bourbon Prime Rib Bones, Maple Dijon Pork Tenderloin, Fresh, lightly spiced Salmon Filet with Maple Cream and to top it all off Maple Creme Brulee!

First I would like to thank Linda Dessau (www.contentmasteryguide.com) for the inspiration and guidance in keeping me on my toes regarding Beaches blog posts.  Running a restaurant, takes an uncanny ability to multi-task (sometimes things fall through the cracks) and things which are not current and pressing (as one might perceive writing a blog for a restaurant) often slide down the priority list until they are delayed beyond return or just plain forgotten.  So thank you Linda for keeping me on my toes (even though I am a few days late... :)

Before I start this discussion, I would like to dedicate a few lines to welcoming Daniel Clements to our culinary team.  Daniel brings many years of kitchen experience to Beaches and will be a great asset to Dale (my wife and creator of the fine meals we get to enjoy!) in ensuring we continue to enhance the dining pleasure of our guests.  His passion and many connections to local food sources, will help us to further expand our commitment to serving you as much fresh, locally grown food as we can.  As any business does, we need to be able to buy these products at a competitive price and have adequate supply, among other things, which brings me to my main topic; to discuss the pro's and con's of locally produced food.

In these days with so much hardship around the world, we are very fortunate to live in a relatively safe country, almost immune to large scale catastrophes and proprietors of an immense amount of land and resources.  We are the protectors of the largest fresh water supply in the world and our agriculture industry is among the world leaders.  That being said, it is not all about the grand scale of food production around this vast country of ours but there is something about eating produce fresh off the farmer's fields, meats butchered locally or cheese produced in our area among many others, giving us the opportunity to develop our own regional signature flavours. I could go on about my experiences in Switzerland with every village having their own butcher, dairy, baker, grocery, etc. but that is a topic for another time.

Below a partial list of benefits and detractors to locally grown food.  Make your own decision as to where you want to dine (and as always I welcome comments and discussion).

Pro's
-  Sources can be readily identified and verified for their compliance to food safety and quality standards
-  With gas prices soaring, the less distance food has to travel, the lower the cost
-  Food diminishes in quality and nutritional value with the distance it is transported.  Did you know that food travels 1500  to  2500 km in North America before being sold? (Source: www.helium.com)
- By supporting your local farmers, much like any other local business, a much larger percentage of the dollar you spend actually remains in the local economy
-  For those of you who cultivate vegetable gardens or buy from local farms, you know about the difference in flavour profile of food grown in your own backyard vs. the stuff you get off grocery store shelves

Con's
-  Food can be produced much more cheaply in other areas of the world, thereby reducing the global cost of food
-  Growing seasons in tropical regions allow for multiple crops annually, increasing food supply to the entire globe (Aside:  if it got distributed evely....???)
-  Supply of many popular foods cannot be sustained locally, especially in harsher climates such as ours
-  If everyone bought local, can supply keep up with demand?

In the end it is up to each individual to set their own priorities about where the food they eat comes from.  Let's be honest...most of us don't really care as long as we can eat what we are "in the mood for".  Our goal at Beaches is to provide you with ideas and inspiration!  We do our best to promote local food and local flavours because we are a local business and are proud to contribute to the local experience and support our local business partners.  We strive to provide you with the freshest, local ingredients we can find because we believe we can create our own flavours, unique to Beaches and this area thanks to the support of our regional partners!

Come try us out...our new Spring menu is launching soon!  We will continue to offer all your favourites and many more features daily, based on seasonal products available in our area!

Beaches out...I look forward to your comments.

 Frozen vs. fresh, local vs. foreign, processed vs. natural, green vs. polluting, healthy vs. fattening.  These are all discussions at the forefront of conversations in our society as we try to right the effects of generations of overindulgence and excess from the 60's to today.  Childhood obesity, increased heart attack rates, All You Can Eat buffets and specials, our "throw-away" society, two for one deals offering double the food at half the price, reduced excercise levels and many more symptoms accentuate our insatiable desire for more...of everything...all the time!  Much could be written about any one of the above topics but they are not my expertise.  Truly Fresh Prepared Food is...read on...

In the generations before mine, fresh food, prepared from scratch was the norm in many families and restaurants.  Prior to the globalization of our markets, people grew their own produce, got eggs from the local farmer and filled their freezers with beef, poultry or pork raised in the open and butchered locally.  It was never a question of "is this really fresh?" as the supply chain could be followed pretty much from planting the seeds to the prepared meals on the family dinner table.  Increasing populations, global markets and free trade as well as our lack of time in increasingly busy lives facilitated mass production of many foods, bringing with it a need to produce more, faster and it has to be perfect.  How many times have you stood in the produce section of your local supermarket watching a customer touch and turn every apple in the display to make sure each fruit purchased is 100% blemish free?  There was a time where small imperfections indicated naturally grown and harvested products!

Today's food supply chain is largely out of our control as products are shipped back and forth across borders, with large industrial farms producing most of the food we consume.  Food is processed in many different stages, from raw products to pre-cooked, frozen and ready to eat TV dinners.  Genetic modification, food additives, flavour enhancers (such as MSG) and preservatives are the norm rather the exception in most foods we buy.  Just recently the Canadian government designated Bisphenol A (BPA) as a toxic substance, yet it still lines the majority of cans and other food containers on our grocery store shelves.  In light of this, much more responsibility lies with the end producer to ensure the freshness and  integrity of the meals we eat.

Fresh food, prepared from scratch, using local (Ontario) products, when available, is our guarantee and we pride ourselves in upholding that standard!  So just how are we different from other restaurants who claim their food is prepared to the same standard?  The pretty plates depicted on the menus of chain restaurants lead the consumer to believe their food is freshly prepared using only the best ingredients.  Unfortunately these menus are produced by marketing experts, most have never stepped foot in a real restaurant kitchen, whose focus is solely on selling the pictured items to as many people as possible.  I worked for a chain for many years and assure you that while they recognize that food is an important part of what they do, cost control and labour efficiency are much more important to each location than the integrity of their food.  The difference lies in the procurement of the original product, the preparation methods used and the cooks preparing your meals.

Is food truly DELIVERED fresh if:

• Dressings come in a jug, prepared offsite in a factory
  (WE MAKE ALL OUR DRESSINGS IN HOUSE)
• Soups are pre-cooked or dehydrated offsite, just add water and heat
  (REAL INGREDIENTS ARE BLENDED DAILY AT BEACHES TO CREATE OUR FEATURE SOUP)
• Gravy or Jus is powdered in packages, just add water and heat
  (MAKING OUR REAL JUS IS A TWO TO THREE DAY PROCESS)
• Frozen, pre-portioned, marinated or seasoned meats are thawed (many times in water) before cooking
  (OUR PROTEINS COME IN FRESH, BY THE PIECE, NEVER FROZEN AND ARE PROCESSED ON SITE)
• Mashed potatos and fries come frozen and seasoned in the bag
  (WE CUT OUR OWN FRIES FROM WHOLE POTATOS DAILY AND OUR MASHED ARE MADE FROM REAL POTATOS, ADDING FRESH CREAM, BUTTER AND ROASTED GARLIC)
• Sandwich meats are processed (contain nitrates), pre-sliced and frozen
  (WE OVEN ROAST WHOLE TURKEYS AND ROAST BEEF, DELICATELY SEASONED THEN HAND SLICED)
  

 

Is food truly PREPARED fresh if:


• Pastas are prepared the day before, combined in a plastic bag with all ingredients then re-heated in a microwave
  (EVERY ONE OF OUR PASTA DISHES ARE PREPARED TO ORDER USING BASIC FRESH INGREDIENTS)
• Preparing sauces entails using a can opener and pot to reheat (see above comment about BPA)
  (OUR SAUCES SIMMER DELICATELY FOR HOURS USING ONLY FRESH INGREDIENTS, HERBS AND SPICES)
• When you ask about the ingredients in a dish, you are brought a description where you only recognize a few items as natural amongst a variety of chemical compositions
  (OUR STAFF IS ABLE TO TELL YOU EXACTLY WHAT FRESH INGREDIENTS, DOWN TO THE SPICE, ARE IN EACH OF OUR DISHES)
• The cooks have never worked in a kitchen, prepared anything from scratch and do not know the basics of cooking
  (OUR KITCHEN IS STAFFED WITH SEASONED PROFESSIONALS WITH YEARS OF EXPERIENCE, WELL VERSED IN ALL AREAS OF FOOD PREPARATION AND FOOD SAFETY.  INDIVIDUAL FLAIR IS ENCOURAGED!)

It is truly a mystery to me why anyone would choose to dine in a chain or fast food restaurant other than out of convenience.  If food is truly what you are going out for do some research!  Find the local, privately owned restaurants where more often than not the owners are directly involved in every facet of operations, including food preparation.  You may discover a meal you have had many times at a national chain suddenly tastes much better with crisp flavours and some personal touch.  I will always believe that people really want the best and freshest food they can possibly get...unfortunately I don't have the big marketing dollars as a private owner to convey to the general public that this is precisely what we serve!  Next time you decide to spend $25+ per person on a nice meal, try one of your local, family owned eateries.  Contrary to popular belief, we are generally not more expensive than your favourite chain but our food is 100% GUARANTEED FRESH!

Beaches out...thanks for reading!  I look forward to your comments.  Until next time! 

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