S. Jersey eateries celebrate summer with Farm to Fork Week

Philly has glitz, but South Jersey's got farm, and in a couple of weeks, menus throughout the tri-county area will be strutting their stuff.

July 21 through 27 is Farm to Fork Week, an annual celebration of the bounty of South Jersey fields by South Jersey restaurants.

Farm to Fork is a variation of the traditional restaurant week, offering multiple-course dinners from special menus for $25 to $35, and at some eateries $10 lunches. The difference is that Farm to Fresh focuses on using ingredients from local farmers.

Thirty-four restaurants will take part this year.

The relationship between local restaurants and farms isn't just a one-week wonder. Fred Kellermann, president of the South Jersey Independent Restaurants Association, said most of his members have had arrangements with local farms, purchasing much of their produce from them from May through October.

"We use Farm to Fork to highlight that association," said Kellermann, owner and chef at Elements Cafe in Haddon Heights. He regularly buys from the 1895 Organic Farm in Lumberton.

Local produce is less expensive than fruits and vegetables from a large purveyor, he said, with no tacked-on shipping costs. Plus, Kellermann said, he can tell a local farmer exactly what he is looking for.

Kohlrabi, a vegetable from the cabbage, broccoli, and kale family, always came from purveyors too big, too woody, he said.

And locally grown just tastes better.

"Without a doubt. It's not even close," Kellermann said. "You can't mimic the freshness of a tomato or zucchini fresh off their vine."

Farm-to-table and eating local are hot national trends. Restaurants in major cities often list on the menu farms that supply their ingredients. Philadelphia chef Jose Garces supplies his restaurants from his own place, Luna Farm in Bucks County.

"The trend is getting bigger and bigger," said John Pilarz, chef of Anthony's Creative Italian Cuisine of Haddon Heights. "The last three or four years, it's really boomed."

The South Jersey association holds two other restaurant-week events each year, Pilarz said, but "for Farm to Fork, we draw from a larger range."

One year, they even had a party of restaurant people from New York City, he said.

All this is welcomed by the farmers.

"Eating local and fresh is definitely a good thing for any farmer," said Kim Batten, a hairstylist before she and her husband, Wayne, bought their 1895 Organic Farm in Lumberton in 1999.

Whenever a restaurant or the Medford ShopRite advertises that it uses her produce, her farm stand gets new customers, she said.

Tracy Duffield, a member of the Duffield's Farm family in Sewell, said that in addition to the patronage, local restaurants have broadened her culinary horizons. She said she had never thought of marrying pork with those famous Jersey peaches until she had it in a restaurant. And she had never eaten the collards they grow until she tasted Pilarz's bacony greens at Anthony's, which buys their produce.

The collards went over so well, the Duffields had Pilarz make them a batch for their Thanksgiving dinner.

Farm to Fork week has helped participating restaurants draw more than 30,000 diners, Kellermann said. The recession and ailing economy was the death of quite a few local restaurants, but the last year, he said, has seen the number starting to climb again.

Many chefs are starting to put together Farm to Fork menus. They can't do it too soon; the whims of weather and product availability can derail plans. Cooking local requires flexibility, said Darren Watson, a co-chef at Haddonfield's Little Tuna.

But cooking local also has its reward.

"At the end of the day, chefs are like artists. They need to be inspired," Kellermann said. "And what better place to be inspired than on a farm?"