I had the excellent opportunity of participating in the dinner event Outstanding in the Field this holiday weekend. Their mission is to “re-connect diners to the land and the origins of their food, and to honor the local farmers and food artisans who cultivate it.”  For this most recent Bay Area dinner this translated into amazing chef Nicole LoBue creating a masterpiece of a dinner with my rabbits.

The weekend started with my processing the first litter I raised. I had a helper along the way with the care and handling (thanks Ellie!). Dressing the rabbits went exceedingly smooth and I discovered they are much faster to process than even chickens. Via Nicole’s magic, the rabbits were transformed into grilled rabbit confit with plum and preserved Meyer lemon, with greens’ they called “everyone’s greens.” This I am assuming meant they took the collective greens from the various urban farmers.

tea break with hides

legs in duck fat

Rabbit confit dinner

For some lucky reason, several urban farm purveyors sat at the same table. I had the delight of speaking with Brooke Budner and Caitlyn Galloway from Little City Gardens whose products were featured in the Little City Gardens salad of greens, cucumbers, fava flowers, borage and goat cheese from one of the Pineheaven Farm (an goat farm in Monclair). Next to me were Kevin Bayuk and Ben who provided the duck eggs for the crazy good duck egg, frilled porcini, nasturtium custard.

duck egg Ben and other attendees

And across the table was a woman named Lisa who interned with Donkey and Goat Winery and incidentally helped make the 2009 Isabel’s Cuvee, Grenache Rose we had with our first course.

Lisa, Danielle, Olivier, & Novella

And natch, Novella was there. Her Ghost Town Farm produce made its way into several dishes including a heavenly dessert of grilled figs with berries and green coriander chantilly. Damn that was good.

There was an interesting viewing in the winery from the Edible City series. In preparation for our dinner, this clip featured Jim Montgomery processing a rabbit. The summer night was a typical crisp night, so cold in fact that the organizers moved the tour bus alongside the table to block the Arctic wind.

Aside from the wind chill factor the event seemed a success with lively conversation, great food and connection to how the food was produced.