New MFA Week: Pittsburgh-Specific Edition: On Food and Where to Find It

Kara Hughes is a third-year fiction student from Columbus, Ohio by way of New York. She entered the MFA program at Pitt with a background in sociology, rather than creative writing, which she invoked in order to lower expectations of her work; this gambit was successful until she won Second Prize in Pitt’s Turow-Kinder fiction contest and now her cover is officially blown. Kara is a connoisseur of foods from frothed milk to turkeys to Teddy Grahams to–as discussed below–fresh, locally grown produce.

FOOD. Seriously, it’s something to consider about Pittsburgh. Graduate student budgets are usually tight and though we have a smattering of quite nice restaurants here, I’ve found that locating (or, well, growing) produce is cost-effective, quite satisfying and an excellent use of time (as opposed to, say, writing). Anyway, Western Pennsylvania has good local produce options and I think it’s a charming thing so I’ve decided to give you a few links.

CityParks has a roving farmer’s market, effective May through November. Look for the mermaid-man (merman?) who works wearing a red shirt and he will sell you nice melons, broccoli, etc.: learn more here.

Pittsburgh also has a few services through which you can subscribe and have organic products delivered to your home. Below I’ve linked to a small database of CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture–I didn’t know what this acronym stood for until right now–always learning). It might sound pricey but maybe you want to split it with a friend or friends or else you love vegetables and here you go.

You can also grow things even if you don’t have space in/around your apartment/house. There are quite cheap community gardens that, again, you can either go bold and tend to yourself, or else try to wrangle up friends so that you all can share gardening duties: see here.

There is much more (this, for instance) but I’m getting self-conscious and kind of feel that for every additional paragraph I devote to food, I’m putting on five extra pounds, upping my pig-status or generally just becoming more gross. “Welcome to Pittsburgh” buy some food (!)