Homegrown holidays: how to give, eat, and make merry with local goods.

Are you strolling down Main Street to purchase your holiday gifts, or are you browsing on cheapstuffandfreeshipping.com, credit card in hand? Dusting off the roasting pan or dialing in to make reservations?

In the Hollywood version of Christmas, we're all getting to know our families and friends better again and warming our toes in front of the tire while enjoying Mom's timeless home cooking. In reality, our holidays are increasIngly disconnected from our homes and communities. Seventy percent of shoppers this year plan to do most of their holiday gift buying online. Thanksgiving is the twelfth-busiest day of the year for restaurants, and (for those that are open) Christmas Day is the fifteenth-busiest.

Many of us like the idea of making buying choices that support local businesses and farms. But when it comes to late November and December, by far our biggest money-spending months, as a nation we're voting with our wallets to support big faraway companies rather than the local little guy. For the small retailer, losing Christmas is deadly: the Christmas shopping season provided as much as half of yearly revenue for some types of small business. In many places, small locally-owned businesses don't even exist anymore (try shopping local in Winston-Salem), and the lost strong holiday season was likely the nail in the coffin.

In Western North Carolina, though, we do enough local buying year-round to support a thriving growing small business and farm community. In preparing for the holiday season, we can usually find all we need, from food to gifts to trees, right around here.

TURKEY, HAM, CORNBREAD, AND APPLE PIE: THE HOLIDAY MEAL

A large baked, stuffed, and/or glazed piece of meat is the traditional centerpiece of a holiday meal. Several local farms offer meat, and all use more humane, less chemical-intensive raising practices than the typical off-the-shelf supermarket product.

Mulberry Gap Farm in Madison County sells lamb, pork, turkey, and chicken. Owner Aaron Grier uses no hormones or antibiotics, and can be reached at 828-649-2194.

Jamie and Amy Ager's Spring House Meats in Fairview is selling pork, lamb, and beef this holiday season. This year they have raised a heritage breed of pigs called Ossabaws. The Ossabaw pigs' fascinating story began when they were left behind by Spanish explorers on remote Ossabaw island off the coast of Georgia in the sixteenth century. A small group survived on acorns, clams, and turtle eggs and multiplied. Fast forward five hundred years: facing state orders to be shot to protect loggerhead turtles, the pigs were rescued by scientists interested their unique metabolisms. Another group was moved to a farm, and breeding stock has spread from there. Because they evolved to store fat over long island winters with few food sources and then live off of the stored energy, their fat is less solid and likely healthier for humans to consume than that of other pigs.

Sunswept Farms in Hot Springs will have chickens and turkeys available this winter. Contact [e-mail].

Talley Valley Farm is located in Cleveland, in the Upstate of South Carolina. Glen and HollyAnn Crowe are the fourth generation on the farm. They sell grass-fed beef, pork, and chicken, and can be reached at 864-836-0840.

Pork can also be purchased from Willow Creek Farm in Bakersville, NC. Contact Sara Runkel at 828-688-3269.

What to serve with the meat? Southern tradition says to stuff your bird with a cornbread-based substance, and then to make cornbread again for the traditional New Year's meal along with collards and black-eyed peas. If you've never tried locally-grown, small-batch milled cornmeal or grits, you should. Local cornmeal sources include Wayne Uffelman of Blue Hill Farm (828-649-2792) and the Old Hampton Store and Gristmill in Linville, which has milled corn on site for many decades.

Dessert anyone? Nothing beats a good pie, and if you thought ahead, you probably went apple-picking in Western North Carolina back in October. If you didn't, you might find local apples on the shelf at smaller area retailers. Look for the Rome variety: it's great for baking, and has historically been Henderson County's cash crop.

THE GIFT THAT KEEPS ON GIVING

Studies say that the local economic benefit of a dollar spent on a local business is $2.60. So by choosing to buy local gifts, you're generating benefits you can't begin to imagine. Here are some local gift ideas that put money in the hands of local people who grow and produce goods:

Pick up a Madison Farms Gift Basket at Greenlife Grocery in Asheville, NC. These baskets come in three varieties: the Mountain Spa, the Sweet Basket, and the Savory Basket. Each contains handmade crafts and food products from Madison County.

Look up Imladris Farm, the enterprise of Walter and Wendy Harrill, who make gift sets of local jams and dips from berries and Shiitake mushrooms grown on their seventh-generation farmland in the mountains of eastern Buncombe County.

Order a CSA Share for a friend. CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture) are a subscription to a farm in which a basket of fresh, in season produce is delivered once a week for the entire growing season.

Support Local Crafters by shopping for gifts at one of the three Southern Highlands Craft Guild stores or at Mountain Made, the store in the Grove Arcade which features a wide range of craft items, all made in our Southern Appalachian region.

O. CHRISTMAS TREE!

If you're one of the forty percent of U.S. households that display a real Christmas tree for the holidays, there's a good chance you were already buying local without even knowing it. Christmas tree production is a strong agricultural industry in Western North Carolina. Our Fraser Fir, a species that only thrives above three thousand feet in warm summer climates, is sold in all fifty states and leads the country in dollars earned per tree sold. More than fifty million Christmas trees are growing in North Carolina right now, mostly in the High Country area around Boone. A North Carolina Fraser Fir has been the White House Christmas tree nine times.

Rather than shopping around for a cheap tree, consider bringing more economic benefit to the farmer by taking the family to a Choose and Cut Christmas tree farm. A list can be found online at: www.ncchristmastrees.com/choosecut2005.pdf. Other holiday decorations such as creative and unusual wreaths can he found at local farms. Jenifer Miller of Fisher Branch Farm and Aubrey and Linda Raper of Rogue Harbor Farm create splendid wreaths and other holiday finery.

Peter Marks is Local Food and Farm Coordinator for Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project (ASAP). The farms listed in the article can be found in ASAP's Local Food Guide, available in area retailers or online at www.appalachiangrown.org.