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One reason why locally farmed food is more expensive because it isn't subsidized by the government. Also, how much more expensive is it really?
http://www.oregonlive.com/foodday/index.ssf/2009/07/which_price_is_right.html

Another reason why, for example, out of season gassed to ripeness florida tomatoes are cheaper is because the tomato pickers are paid slave wages. In fact, some of them are actually slaves.
http://www.ciw-online.org/

People seem to also forget that local, smaller farmers are HUMAN BEINGS, that work INCREDIBLY hard. A lot of them are barely making minimum wage even charging what some people deem "ridiculously high prices". It's a lot easier to grow things with tons of chemical fertilizer and pesticides. Farming is not even a recognized profession by the U.S. census.

Seasonal food tastes better than out of season food being sold in conventional supermarkets in January(i.e. tomatoes, strawberries). I realize that this is an opinion, not fact, but I'm more than willing to run a blind taste test. Conventional food is also higher in nutritional value than industrialized ag. When people say that in season, local food is only for the rich, one thing I think is "so you're telling me lower income people only deserve flavorless, nutritionless, pesticide laden food? And that isn't elitist?"

I'd also like to point out that cheap food prices are based on fossil fuel. With peak oil, the U.S. is likely going to go through a major food crisis. We could do well to learn from Cuba and try to prevent that by recognizing these local farmers and attempting to give them the status and pay they deserve.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special_Period

Lastly, there is a lot of flawed reasoning in McWilliam's new book. The reviews on amazon are a good place to read them.

I live for dessert! The first one that comes to mind is a chocolate trio I had at Grammercy way back when Claudia Fleming was still there.

I have a lot of problems with Ms. Damrosch's piece. It begins with this quote-

"But despite our infatuation with those who grow, butcher, cook, style, photograph and review our food, we still dismiss the people with whom we have the most contact in the food world: our waiters."

Her entire piece starts off with this us vs them attitude that bothers me. I don't know many butchers, farmers, cooks, or chefs with health or dental insurance, paid sick leave, or retirement options either. Being the rare chef in a magazine spread doesn't pay the bills. And farmers are constantly living on the edge. I'm also unsure of who these waiters that are being dismissed are.

I've had and worked with good servers and bad servers with all sorts of check averages and it's all sort of random to me. Shoot, I had extremely poor service at a 3 star, $$$ restaurant in nyc recently, wrote my first complaint letter EVER and got no response so I'm not even sure people care anymore if I get good service. In general I think service everywhere has gone way downhill. Is it because of the general economy? Perhaps. But on the rare occasion I actually go out for dinner now, I'd really like good service and will tip accordingly.

I have my own feelings on health care, but I don't think mandatory service charges are the answer. In SF they require restaurant owners to offer health care and most tack on a service charge to the bill. But just because they offer insurance, doesn't mean that restaurant workers can afford to buy it and so then where does that service charge money go?

As for the "employer-sponsored travel and dining", hahahahahahaha. Danny Meyer could probably afford that as could some of the larger restaurant groups but the person that owns one restaurant, has 12-25 employees type, not so much.

@fins-

Well, I don't remember everything, but, from what I remember, Chez didn't turn a profit for a long, long, time and probably never would have if Alice didn't turn over the books/business aspect to people that actually could make it profitable.

I also know from working with someone who came from Chez that they have a very low turnover rate, which is unusual in the restaurant industry. David Lebovitz was there for 12 years! The guy I worked with worked there for 4 years, which, in the industry, is a long time. There are cooks that have been there for much longer. Seems to me she does create a place where people want to work because otherwise, why stay so long?

The downstairs restaurant has 2 chefs. At Alice's suggestion(because they were both going to leave to live in France), they split the year and each work at Chez for a 6 month period. It seems to me that she appreciated them and wanted them to stay, so she worked out a system.

I also think, and I'm not sure, that the 3 out of 5 means 3 kitchen days. I know the chefs get one paid office day as well. From someone who has done it, it is impossible to work 6 days a week and be productive, especially long term, in a kitchen.

Everyone deserves a pleasant work environment and a high quality of life.

For a lot of the answers to these questions, you can read Thomas McNamee's book "Alice Waters and Chez Panisse". It's available at a lot of libraries(which is how I read it).

I've used it to finish pasta sauces.

Also, it's available mail order from Boccolone and in Portland they sell it at Foster and Dobbs.

chocolate-hazelnut or anything with pistachio.

Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm porterhouse.

mustard and really good cheddar.

Porterhouse!

Porterhouse. Med. rare.

No one has mentioned it yet, but Ten-01(which is right across from Powells) has a "power lunch" for $15. A first course, a second course and then a tray of asst' cookies, truffles, and gelees. A real bargain at in a beautiful space.

Pok Pok is also affordable and somewhat unique.

And, there are tons of happy hours here that offer excellent food, including Ten-01 and Clyde Common(also near Powells), which, I think I would normally put in the "pricey" category if I was an intern.

Biwa and Tanuki are also extremely affordable, japanese, izakaya style restaurants(although the owner of Tanuki considers it a bar. But excellent food).

I also recommend Sahagun chocolates if you're around Wed-Sunday in Portland. Excellent hot chocolate, great chocolates plus homemade sodas and ice creams.

Have a great trip.