It’s that time of the month again! You know, the one where I talk about the Food Penpal program? In case you don’t feel like going through all of the effort and clicking over, here’s my brief explanation:

The Foodie Penpal Program, hosted by the Lean Green Bean, is a way for people who love all things food to connect with other people who love to eat. When you sign up you are assigned a random person out of over 1,000 participants and you send them a box of cool food. Someone else gets randomly assigned to you and they send you a box of cool food.

Cool, right?

With love, from Ohio

This month Kristy was assigned to me. She’s from Ohio. She sent some goods from their local gourmet grocery store, Dorothy Lane Market. Since I always specifically request local goods, I thought it might be interesting to look into the history of the store a little bit.

Dorothy Lane Market, like many American food stores, began as a fruit stand. In 1948 Frank Sakada and Calvin Mayne began selling quality fruits and vegetables in the south Dayton, Ohio, area at the corner of Far Hills Avenue and Dorothy Lane (hence the name of the market, or DLM for short). Calvin and Frank cheerfully greeted their customers and shared their love for good food.

Today Dorothy Lane Market is a company of three well-known gourmet supermarkets, and continues to be locally owned and operated by Calvin and Vera’s descendants. The stores offer all the staples with an emphasis on healthy and specialty foods. The company has been recognized for great food and service in national publications as well, including The Wall Street Journal, Fast Company, and Gourmet Retailer.

Thank you Kristy, what a cool store!

She sent me a number items including, but not limited to, a huge pretzel. Because– get this– they have a PRETZEL FESTIVAL every year. No kidding, I looked it up, and here is the Germantown Pretzel Festival. Pretzels just happen to be one of my favorite snack foods. Would it be crazy to travel to OH just to go to a pretzel festival? Hmm…

Also in the package were some products made with minimal ingredients. Nothing processed, no words I can’t pronounce. Some spinach pasta, seasonings, and naturally sweetened apple butter. There was also a cookie in there but it got all crumbly, so I decided to eat it instead of photographing it.

Eating Locally

As I was perusing Dorothy Lane’s website I found a great page on eating locally. Even though this food isn’t technically local to me, it’s still an important message to pass along. We preach about it all time, like here, here, here and here (and many other heres as well). I’m going to leave you with another great big ol’ thank you to Kristy and  DL’s reasons on why you should eat locally!

• Supports our local family-farming community
• Fruits and vegetables can ripen naturally
• Keep food miles to a minimum
• You know who is producing your food
• Enjoy food in season at its peak taste

PS: I know a few of you guys out there participate in the program as well. Feel free to leave us a comment with a link to your posts so I can check them out as well! (This means you, Elizabeth and Claire)