Since Seema Prasad opened Miel in Sylvan Park in 2008, she’s been Nashville’s reigning queen of sustainable cooking and eating. Before it was in fashion locally to talk about knowing your farmer and reducing food waste, Prasad was walking the talk, so I reached out to her about how to navigate this weird time in vegetable shopping.
“I like to visit the farms. When I know a farmer, we can be very confident in the quality of the product that we’re getting,” she says. “They will tell us if they’re concerned about a crop ahead of time. Because the weather is not the same every year, the crops are not the same every year.”
In addition to buying from farmers Prasad knows, Miel grows several of the ingredients it uses, some from its small plot at the restaurant and some from Prasad’s home. Herbs, for example, can be expensive to buy, plus the flavor doesn’t last long once they are picked. So, the chef lets Prasad know how much tarragon the kitchen needs, and she snips some that day.
Prasad’s a big fan of Green Door Gourmet, which, in addition to offering CSAs, runs a market open Thursday through Sunday. They sell foods they’ve grown on their River Road farm, plus other goods from artisan farmers who share Green Door’s vision.
If you want to try to grow some of your own herbs and vegetables, Prasad will help you set up your first container garden. (Container gardens can be more manageable when it comes to weeding and pest control than planting directly in the ground.) “I always tell people I’m happy to come to their homes and help them start a container garden. It’s the easiest thing when you get used to it, and it’s so rewarding,” she says. “I never, never buy lettuce. I go out to my garden and clip, and then it comes back even more robustly. I clip all that arugula, and three days later, let’s get more arugula on that sandwich. It’s easy to maintain once you get comfortable with it. Just five different little greens in a big pot can really support two people year-round.”
