Last Wednesday, 10 Below’s executive chef, Brad Wood, took his weekly walk through Bend Farmers Market, sporting his white chef’s coat, and stopping at every farmer’s stand to find fresh ingredients to use in his restaurant’s kitchen at The Oxford Hotel that week.

“It melts,” said Wood when he arrived back at the kitchen and savored a ball of fresh mozzarella on a slice of a sun-ripened tomato he had bought at the market.

Wood’s walk is just one sign that the national “farm to table” movement has found its way to Central Oregon. A growing number of restaurants are advertising that their menus feature local farm produce and meats, such as chicken and beef. Consumers increasingly are aware of the importance of eating locally produced goods for their nutritional benefits as well as supporting a local farm economy. And the region’s farmers are searching for ways to increase their production to meet the demands of local chefs.

But even as the trend, also called the “farm to fork” movement, grows a lack of formal or even informal guidelines can make it difficult for consumers to know if restaurants are really committed to sourcing locally or if they are using the term “farm to table” as a way to set their restaurants apart from the competition. There are no government requirements either nationally or in Central Oregon for what constitutes “local” and restaurants aren’t required to disclose what percentage of their menus’ items actually comes from local farmers.

Katie Pearmine, specialty crop grant program manager at the Oregon Department of Agriculture in Portland, said it is tricky to create certification for what is local because people’s perception of local varies. The concept of local is based on trust, she said.

“The demand hasn’t been there for “local” certification like it is for food safety and organic certifications,” she said. “As long as restaurants are being transparent and open, then they get to decide what’s local.”

But in Central Oregon, the definition of locally sourced is quite broad.

Wood said the food on 10 Below’s menu is 90 percent local. But local to him stretches from Northern California to British Columbia and west of Colorado. If a restaurant is going to claim they use local ingredients, Wood said, they should expect 75 percent of the menu to be locally sourced.

Jerre Kosta Dodson, of Dancing Cow Farm in Prineville, raises heritage cattle, poultry and sheep and sells to local restaurants, said her definition of local is within 150 miles and if a restaurant claims to be local at least half of the menu should be locally sourced.

Shawn Harvey, co-owner of Chow on Northwest Newport Avenue in Bend, said the restaurant works with six farms in Central Oregon, and it also has its own garden. He defines “farm to table” as restaurants working with local farms to put the “best quality food on the table in the shortest amount of time.” Harvey also said using local products helps control the quality of the product, supports the local economy and reduces the energy used to transport food.

David Touvell, co-owner and Chow’s chef, goes to Rainshadow Organics 15 miles northeast of Sisters every week to pick vegetables, herbs and berries to use in the restaurant. But Harvey admitted that the amount of food that can be sourced locally is contingent on the time of year.

“Right now, 50 percent comes from Oregon, 30 percent comes from Central Oregon and 3 percent comes from the garden on the property,” he said. During winter, Harvey said Chow tries to get produce from the Columbia River Gorge, but sometimes he has use produce from industrial farms in Mexico and Chile.

Wood, of 10 Below, said he would rather spend more money at the market supporting a local farmer, than spend less and get more product from an industrialized food company. He said that if he runs out of a locally produced product, he will take the item off the menu because he refuses to substitute it with one from an industrial food company.

“I think it’s important to keep in touch with the community, helping their business thrive as well as my own,” he said.

For instance, Wood serves only locally raised chickens that he buys from the Great American Egg Farm in Powell Butte. Since he is ordering in bigger quantities, he said that may help bring the price down and possibly raise the price of industrial food products.

“To get locally owned is more expensive,” Wood said. “There’s a lot wrong with that.”

For people who want to go local, but can’t afford it Wood recommends not eating foods that are out of season and eating less to prioritize quality not quantity.

Chantel Titus, 30, office manager for Center for Life Chiropractic on Northwest Milwaukee Avenue in Bend and private pilates instructor, said she turns to the farmers market and Central Oregon Locavore, a year-round online farmers market, for her local products. When she goes out to eat, she said, she steers toward restaurants such as Mother’s, Deschutes Brewery and Zydeco that, she said, use local ingredients.

Titus said she does not completely avoid restaurants that don’t use local ingredients, but she won’t order their meat products.

“You have to view your health in a holistic way and stay away from things that are unnatural,” Titus said, noting that even though locally sourced food may be a bit more expensive, it’s a way of investing in her health.

Titus said she has made a shift towards local in the past three years. Before then, she said restaurants using local ingredients were hard to find, but there are more options now.

“I think there is a demand for (local ingredients in local restaurants) in our community,” Titus said. “Lots of people are wanting (local) and inquiring about it.”

But even with demand growing, buying local can be more expensive for consumers as well as chefs as farmers try to make a profit in an agricultural industry that has been built for huge economies of scale instead of small production.

Pat Sullivan, a cheese maker at Cada Dia farm in Prineville, said small-scale producers have to charge more because they don’t have the scale of larger industrialized farms. They have to make money on margin instead of volume, he said. “I could make a living at $5 a pound, but I charge what the market will bear,” Sullivan said, adding that he charges $10 a pound for his cheese.

Sullivan said he has noticed a more fearful social mood at the farmers market in the past month. People don’t want to spend $10, they want to spend $5, he said.

“If they don’t think buying local is very important we will disappear, “ said Sullivan. “The consumer has to decided whether they want us here or not.”

Judy Scherzer, 66, a former nurse in Bend who was leaving Devore’s Good Food Store on Northwest Newport Avenue in Bend,said she agrees with the local movement and tries to buy local, but understands finances don’t always allow for it.

“You can run around and live in an idealistic world, but when it comes down to feeding a family and trying to make your budget go as far as it can you have to shop anywhere that you can get the best deal. A lot of times that might be Costco,” she said.

Wood, who takes his family with him to farmers market, said he values the face-to-face contact with local farmers. “Something went wrong when food became corporate,” he said. “I’d like to think that I’m making a small impact and change on that, me and the dozen or so other chefs I know in this town.”

Damon Guatama, the shift manager at Common Table restaurant on Oregon Avenue in downtown Bend, said the nonprofit organization buys local as much as possible to support the local community and the environment.

Common Table holds a “Meet the Farmer” event every month where it serves a four-course meal based on the ingredients a local farmer brings in. During the meal, the farmer gives a presentation about what they do and how they do it, Guatama said.

Dodson said the farm tries to give restaurants a break because they want to see them succeed. Dodson said she provides beef for Baked bakery located at Northwest Columbia Street in Bend and Cafe 3456 off Powell Butte Highway.

But she also needs to make a living.

“The only way (the farm) will be able to survive is if we can get people to buy local and pay the price of what it costs to raise (products) here in Central Oregon,” Dodson said. “The farmer never gets paid, the price that is asked is the production price minus the labor wage.”

Dodson said it cost her $8,000 for electric and water last year and those prices went up a third more this year. Local farmers are trying to extend their season through greenhouses and hoop houses, but are struggling financially, she said.

She said she also believes people need to learn the value of fresh food. “It’s like day and night, it has much more flavor and taste and it will last longer,” she said.

“What you get out of (supermarkets) is often out of a feedlot. You don’t know what the cows are being fed or where the cow comes from,” Dodson said. “Control is lost, you can’t track the animal back. That doesn’t happen on small farms.”

Farmers, chefs, bakers and consumers are recognizing the health issues associated with the industrial food industry.

“Now we are realizing there’s a lot of mistakes that have been made in food culture in the past and we are working to fix those mistakes,” said Gordon Benzer, baker and owner of Baked.

Benzer said 30 percent of his products come from Central Oregon and the rest are from the Pacific Northwest, excluding his olive oil and chocolate which he imports from Europe.

“Industrial-produced food is filled with antibiotics and hormones and more than likely herbicides and pesticides,” he said.

Benzer said he is working with Rainshadow Organics to create a flour mill by the end of the year that will produce local flour from locally grown wheat. He explained that when flour is milled it loses nutrients because of oxidation that occurs when it is stored. To replace the lost nutrients, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration requires flour to be enriched. Benzer said when the local mill opens, the flour will not have to be enriched, which he said will make it easier for people to digest and assimilate into their bodies.

“The best medicine is good food,” he said.

“Consumers choose with their dollar,” Benzer said. “If restaurants know their customer would support the price increase for quality, it would give them the courage they need to buy local products.”