dsm Dish - August 8, 2025

The best way to spend $100 at the Iowa Food Cooperative

By Wini Moranville

The Iowa Food Cooperative can be a bit of a mystery to the uninitiated. Yes, it’s a member-based system where dues-payers can order directly from local farmers. But you don’t need to be a member to shop the storefront at 4944 Franklin Ave. Open three days a week — 1-6 p.m. Monday and Friday, plus 10 a.m.-1 p.m. Saturday — the shop offers a curated selection of fresh produce, meat, dairy products, pantry staples, baked treats and more, all sourced from Iowa growers and makers.

We asked longtime board member Lisa Bean and marketing coordinator Zoe Hermsen for $100 worth of what they’re most excited about right now, at the height of the growing season. Their picks offer a snapshot of the shop’s ever-changing bounty.

Lisa, who bakes weekly, swears by RC Farm’s whole wheat flour ($11.50/4 pounds), ideal for hearty loaves. She also enjoys the farm's grass-fed beef. Zoe recommends rolled Kernza ($7.50/12 ounces), a perennial grain that’s high in protein and fiber and can be used as a hot cereal, in granola and in baking.

Lisa’s freezer always includes Scream Ice Cream from Fairfield ($11/pint), which uses dairy sourced from sustainable, organic and grass-fed Iowa farms. Pleasant Grove Homestead provides her with pasture-raised eggs ($7.50/dozen) and young chicken drumsticks ($16/1.25 pounds), which her grandkids love.

Cheese lovers shouldn’t miss Frisian Farms aged Gouda ($9.20/half pound), which is perfect for grating, like Parmesan, but even better since it’s made in Iowa. “If I can picture the person who produced the food, it just makes eating a different experience,” Lisa said.

Knob Hill’s Berkshire Pork Chorizo ($12/pound) from pasture-raised animals adds a spicy kick to tacos or scrambled eggs. Maple Syrup from Great River ($11.50/8 ounces) brings a sweet Iowa touch to breakfast, while DSM Pasta Co.’s bronze-cut semolina pasta ($9.20/pound) adds artisanal flair to dinner. Finally, don’t skip the seasonal produce: On my visit last week, that meant Iowa-grown fennel, carrots, greens, and beets (prices vary), among many other fresh and colorful choices.

While you’d expect great produce right now and for the next couple months, Zoe reminded me the coop sells fresh produce year-round thanks to greenhouse growers like Lee’s Greens — think herbs, winter spinach and fresh lettuce, even in the cold months. Not everything is certified organic, but all producers are vetted for responsible, thoughtful growing practices—so you can feel good about what you’re bringing home.

Wini Moranville has been covering the Des Moines food and dining scene since 1997. You can read her other recent shopping recommendations for AllSpice Culinarium, The Cheese Shop, Gateway Market and Purveyor, and her weekly dining newsletter at winimoranville.substack.com.

What's your favorite food movie or TV show?

“‘Julie & Julia.’ I've loved reading books on Julia Child, her life, her career and the impact she made on culinary arts and women in the industry.”
— Susan Hatten, chief marketing officer, Holmes Murphy; and chief operating officer, BrokerTech Ventures

“Maybe it's because I've seen it so many times with my kids, but “Ratatouille.” It makes me hungry!”
— Elias Johnson, vice president of corporate outreach and communications, Fareway

“‘The Great British Bake Off,’ hands down. I’m not a baker, so it’s fun to see how to make incredible desserts. The best part is really the competitors, who are fun, quirky and supportive of each other because they’re doing their best. They’re focused on winning, but they’re gracious, not ruthless. And who doesn’t love Mary Berry and Prue Leith?”
— Proctor Lureman, CEO, Broadlawns Medical Center

Quick Bites

Aposto’s recent 20th anniversary dinner raised $2,200 for the Italian American Cultural Center. Read more about its move to the Butler Mansion in the Business Record.

The Choose Iowa Kitchen offers free cooking demos and samples at the Iowa State Fair every day at 1 p.m. inside the Maytag Family Theatre Building. From bison meatloaf and dill pickle lemonade to artisanal honey and whole-chicken meal prep, each demo features ingredients grown, raised or made in Iowa. Kitchen visitors will hear cooking tips from notable local chefs like Ian Robertson of Oak Park, Kristen Daily of Pie Bird Pies, Jacob Schroeder of Crafted Food Services, Aaron Holt of Doolittle Family Farm and "MasterChef" champ Grant Gillon.

The Greater Des Moines Partnership created a list of six downtown spots with seasonal summer menus worth checking out, including summer cocktails from Table 128, Secret Admirer and Good News, Darling.

The State Historical Society of Iowa is hosting a "Iowa History 101" webinar Aug. 14 with brewing historian Doug Hoverson, who will discuss Iowa’s fascinating history of beer. It's free, but advanced registration is required.

Events

Through Aug. 17: The Iowa State Fair is back, in all its deep-fried, sugar-dusted, caviar-sprinkled, gold-flaked glory. See you at the Bauder's stand.

Saturday: Adel Sweet Corn Festival. The parade starts at 9:30 a.m. Afterward, let the all-you-can-eat feast commence near the Dallas County Courthouse.

Aug. 15-24: dsm Restaurant Week celebrates the city’s favorite dining destinations with 10 days of chef-curated menus and deals for lunch and dinner.

Aug. 20: The Garden Party Luncheon at the Wallace House celebrates seasonal flavors with a three-course lunch featuring edible flowers and a floral-infused drink.

Aug. 22-24: World Food & Music Festival at Western Gateway Park is a multisensory smorgasbord that regularly ranks among USA Today’s 10Best Readers’ Choice Awards. It returns for another weekend of food and fun.

Aug. 24: The Know Your Farmer Dinner at the Wallace Center in Orient introduces guests to the Wallace Centers of Iowa garden programs manager Kevin Blair and the organization’s geothermal greenhouse operation. Guests will enjoy a three-course dinner and a tour of the greenhouse.

5 years on, sourdough 'Alice' is still going strong

By Haley Scarpino

So how's everyone's 2020 sourdough starter doing?

Like many others during the pandemic, I also started one and baked heaps of bread. In the spring of 2020, I was in my second semester at DMACC's Iowa Culinary Institute in Ankeny when the whole world shut down.

After spring break, our classes moved online. So each week, we picked up a kit with ingredients and recipes, then cooked and photographed everything at home. I'll confess I was a little disappointed: I went to culinary school to learn how to cook in a professional kitchen, not how to cook at home. I already had that down.

Thankfully, we returned to in-person classes later that summer. Only first-year students attended, so the kitchens weren't crowded. We all wore masks for safety. Most professional kitchens are very clean places with ample air circulation. At school, the vents above each stove constantly pumped in fresh air, and I probably washed my hands 10,000 times. Somehow, we made it through the summer without a single case of COVID.

That spring, everyone seemed to be making bread. Since I had a baking teacher and unlimited flour (remember how scarce it was?), I decided to jump in.

My teacher helped me grow a sourdough starter from scratch using water and whole rye flour. It grew over the next couple of weeks into "Alice," and I'm proud to say she's still going strong to this day. I feed her weekly with water and bread flour. She's like a little loving fridge pet.

I've baked countless loaves of rustic boules and focaccia with Alice. There is nothing quite as delicious as a giant, thick golden loaf of freshly baked focaccia topped with rosemary and flaky sea salt.

Resources

One of my go-to online resources is Oregon-based Rosehill Sourdough, whose owner, Mike Vaona, breaks down the whole process in a way that's easy to follow. Most of his recipes have corresponding YouTube videos, so you can see precisely how he makes bread. I find that very helpful. (Seriously, how did anyone learn anything new before the internet?)

"The Sweet Side of Sourdough" by Caroline Schiff is another favorite, full of sweet sourdough recipes like her delicious Double Chocolate Chip Cookies.

Another favorite book is "Flour Power: The Practical Pursuit of Baking Sourdough Bread" by Tara Jensen. (Her first book, "A Baker's Year," is also great.) "Flour Power" is filled with clear, practical instructions and great recipes, such as the City Queen Loaf, Milk Bread and Olive Bread.

Tools and tips

A few tools make caring for a starter easier and more fun. I love my wooden sourdough spatula, also sometimes called a spurtle. There are many great options available, but I use a skinny teak model for stirring my sourdough starter.

I feed Alice weekly using a 2:2:1 ratio: 100 grams of water, 100 grams of bread flour, and 50 grams of Alice. Bakers often disagree about the ratios and schedules, but this approach has worked well for me over the last five years.

I store Alice in a 1-liter, tulip-shaped Weck jar with a plastic lid. I prefer glass for storage. I clean her jar weekly when I feed her. (I like a tidy house, and I think Alice does, too.) After I feed her, I let her eat for a couple of hours and then tuck her back in the fridge.

These days, I make bread in fits and starts. It's fun and so delicious that I never know why I don't just make it all the time, but sometimes it feels like a lot of work and I lose interest. However, I still feed Alice weekly, regardless of my bread-making mood. It keeps her strong, and she's always just waiting for me.

I'm curious what happened to all the folks started sourdough projects during the pandemic. Did you start one? Are you still making bread?

If you're curious about baking bread, the best thing to do is just start. Trying to learn everything all at once will drive you nuts, but honestly, it's not that complicated: just flour, water, salt — and practice. The more you do it, the more it will make sense. Find one resource you like and go with that.

And remember: Alice and I are rooting for you.

Haley Scarpino is a chef, home cook, recipe tester, food editor and graduate of the Iowa Culinary Institute.

In a recent post on the blog from Whippoowill Creek Farm, a sustainable operation in Lovilia, the eloquent writer and farmer Beth Hoffman wrote an account of what happened when she accidentally overbooked too many guests for a recent farm-to-table dinner. It's a very "Iowa" story, with some gracious friends, but what caught our attention was the following passage about why meals matter in the first place. Hoffman herself highlighted the sentence in bold, and we couldn't agree more:

"Getting together with strangers of like mind, over a great meal, creates something unique and special. It’s an act that is light-years away from sitting on the couch alone eating a frozen pizza. It is what forms a resilient community, a place where people come together to celebrate creativity and quality. It is our way to combat the generic nature of industrialized food that dominates our society. "