What's for dinner this week?

Dinner this weekend will be Vietnamese Beef Soup, thanks to a recipe in the Jan.-Feb. 2005 issue of Diabetic Cooking: Slow Cooker Recipes - one of those pocket-sized booklet-type publications you find at the supermarket register. It's not hardly authentic, but it was pretty easy to put together, which is bonus for me on a weeknight. Overall it's not bad, nicely filling in a soup-y way and flavorful.

This week's meals also featured the Jamaican tempeh curry taco mix from a couple of weeks ago, and Thai glass noodle salad (from my favorite Thai cookbook, the name of which eludes me, of course ... sorry ... I'll update it as soon as I get back into the kitchen!). I also enjoyed a snack or two of a Middle Eastern lentil and rice dish topped with yogurt from Wake Robin Farm, eaten as a dip with a torn piece of whole wheat pita.

Snack time's important to me, and as much as I'd love to savor a single serving of dark chocolate from Aldi's, I have to stick with more healthful options (at least for the time being). So I've been savoring Empire apples, bananas and juicy, ripe mangoes dipped in honey and sprinkled with cinnamon. Another snack has been cheese curds that I also picked up Saturday from Wake Robin Farm - something new from Meg! What a wonderful surprise!

Over the weekend I have a baptism to attend (my third grandchild; she's adorable) and more meals to plan for the coming week.

Here's the recipe for Vietnamese Beef Soup:

3/4 lb. boneless beef (top sirloin or top round steak)
3 cups water
1 can (14.5 oz.) low-salt beef broth
1 can (10.5 oz.) condensed consommé
2 tbs. reduced-sodium soy sauce
2 tbs. minced fresh ginger
1 cinnamon stick, 3" long
4 oz. rice noodles, about 1/8" wide
1/2 cup thinly sliced or julienned carrots
2 cups fresh mung bean sprouts
1 small red onion, halved and thinly sliced
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1.5 cups chopped fresh basil
2 jalapeño peppers, stemmed, seeded and minced; or 1-3 tsp. Chinese chili sauce or paste (wear rubber gloves if you're using the peppers)

1. Place beef in freezer 45 minutes or until firm. Meanwhile, combine water, beef broth, consommé, soy sauce, ginger and cinnamon stick in large saucepan; bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce heat to low; simmer, covered, 20-30 minutes. Remove cinnamon stick; discard. Meanwhile, place rice noodles in a large bowl and cover with warm water; let stand until pliable, about 20 minutes.

2. Slice beef lengthwise in half, then crosswise into very thin strips. Drain noodles. Place noodles and carrots in simmering broth; cook 2-3 minutes or until noodles are tender. Add beef and bean sprouts; cook 1 minute or until beef is no longer pink.

3. Remove from heat; stir in red onion, cilantro, basil and jalapeño peppers or chili sauce/paste. To serve, life noodles from soup with fork and place in bowls. Ladle remaining ingredients and broth over noodles.

Makes 6 servings.

One of my pleasures in life

... is cooking. I really enjoy crafting an incredibly delicious meal, preferably with fresh-from-the-farmer ingredients, and savoring the flavor. I'm constantly on the lookout for new recipes and ideas (just ask the librarian in the town where I work ...)

So I was excited to come home from an extraordinarily long day to find in my mailbox not just dairy-case coupons from Wegmans, but the latest issue of Wegmans Menu Magazine as well! The magazine's all the more exciting now that they've begun putting coupons in it.

The cover shows a luscious-looking piece of Cedar-Plank Salmon still on the slightly charred plank, garnished with some lime slices. In fact, the issue seems to focus on seafood in general. Not something that's in my budget these days, given recent events, but there's nothing wrong with quietly drooling over the food-porn images, right?

In addition to the seafood, sandwiches and smoothies (ample alliterations abound!), there is a section devoted to heirloom tomatoes. I saw a handful of these irregularly shaped and colored beauties at my local Wegmans the other day, so I'm not terribly surprised to find them featured in the Menu magazine ... but they aren't at all in season. Well, they must be somewhere ... just not here. I guess.

Anyway - immediately following the heirloom tomato recipe section is a special article on Wegmans' commitment to locally grown foods. It looks like a nice article, one that prompted a flood of thoughts.

First of all, I started scanning the article for mention of any of the farmers I know - Wyllie Fox Farm, Wake Robin, Stone's Throw Farm, etc. Nope; not this issue. (The magazine has a multi-state distribution, so the editorial board understandably took a sampling of farmers from around their operating area.)

I realized that I know at least half a dozen more local food producers this year than I did last year at this time. I've broken bread with wonderful people who I wouldn't have met if it weren't for one person who introduced me to the Eat Local challenge last summer.

And then it struck me - the difference just one person can make in a neighborhood, a community, a county, a state, a nation.

Because I learned of the Eat Local challenge, I was compelled to seek out locally produced fruits, vegetables, meats, cheeses, beverages. I found other people in town doing the same thing, and I got to know the people who grow the food I use to feed my family. And now my family and friends have learned about eating locally and where to go to find what they need, and they're telling their friends.

And that brings me back to a conundrum. Do I make the weekly 20-minute drive to the Regional Market, where there are plenty of local food producers I can actually chat with and who offer the most amazing veggies to be found anywhere ... or do I drive 2 miles to the Wegmans down the street any time I like in season and purchase my locally grown veggies there as an anonymous consumer?

The thrifty side says, Save on gas. Just go to the store and be done with it.

The rest of me says, But where's the fun in that? Where's the sense of community, of connection?

So I think I'll be making regular trips to the market (that is, when I'm not hiking in the woods somewhere) and savoring the experience as my weekly treat to myself. I'm sure I'll find whatever's called for in any of those Menu magazine recipes ... and then some.

April eat local potluck

Tonight was the April potluck with the Syracuse-area Eat Local crowd, down at Stone's Throw Farm in South Onondaga. Did we ever feast! It's hard to find locally grown vegetables this time of year in this part of the world, but somehow they did: a fresh beet and carrot salad with a lovely vinaigrette; fresh kale with a dollop of feta-garlic dressing; a spinach quiche with just the right "spinachy" flavor; a sausage and cabbage dish made from the farmer's own hogs.

And there was more to nibble on: Hors d'oeuvres included Lively Run goat cheese, homemade raspberry and "blackcap" (wild black raspberry) jams, and a selection of crackers. H- brought one of her legendary breads, a mix of white, whole wheat and rye that she whipped up ... someone brought garlic & cheese biscuits (divine!) ...

I brought a turkey casserole, using Plainville Farms turkey, garlic & herb raw milk Cheddar cheese from Meadow Creek Farm and topped with crisped bread cubes from Liberty St. Bakery's WW bread (the Mennonite grandpa from the Regional Market). I also brought dessert, in the form of 10x sugar-dusted lemon-rosemary cookies (using egg yolks from Meadow Creek Farm eggs and rosemary snipped off my own plant in the living room).

Lots of good conversation, lots of reconnecting with people I haven't seen since summer. It was so good to come out of the winter doldrums, the stress I was under all winter, and have a good time and share laughs with good people. I'm really looking forward to the next potluck!

The idea came up of putting together a cookbook ... something featuring not only the potluck dishes, but listing the farmers who set up shop at the Regional Market and the products they offer (veggies, meats, dairy, etc.). Apparently there are business grants for this sort of promotional venture. Plus I have experience in putting together cookbooks. Altogether, I'm considering it.

Eat Local potluck tomorrow!

I'm pretty excited about the Eat Local potluck supper tomorrow. I've been little more than a shut-in this winter, and like the lovely purple crocuses that have popped up in my front yard, it's time to come out of my winter doldrums and get back into the swing of things. What better way to do that than to join some like-minded folks for good food and good conversation?

I stopped by the Regional Market last Saturday morning and was surprised and delighted by what I found there - locally produced milk, cheese and butter, not to mention hydroponically grown lettuces and greenhouse-grown fresh veggies. I picked up another Greek oregano plant to replace the one that died suddenly over the winter (I'd dug it up and brought indoors so I could have fresh herbs, but it seems it was overwatered and suffered root rot), but there were so many other herbs that piqued my interest: chocolate mint, ginger mint, Thai basil ...

This year may be the year in which I invest in some lovely pots and begin a container garden in my front yard along the walk. I imagine it would be a delight for the senses to brush against fresh lavender, thyme, oregano, rosemary and other herbs as one walks to the front door. I'm going to start by bringing home some of the herbs I find at the market, and see what happens.

In the meantime, though, I need to decide what to bring to the potluck! So tonight I'm sipping herbal tea as I go through my favorite recipes to see what I can do with the local products I can find at the market.

What's for dinner this week?

I may have already mentioned this, but every weekend I take the time to whip up my meals for the week. I find that if I don't bring lunch and dinner with me to work every day, my blood sugar gets too low while I'm in the car on my way home - not good. So I prepare something for lunch and something for dinner (usually on Sunday afternoon), and I have fabulous leftovers all week.

This week's dinner will be sweet potato and cashew korma with coconut rice, courtesy of Cooking Light magazine. It's absolutely delightful! I left the sweet potatoes a bit firmer than usual to offset the softness of the tofu cubes. It's vegan unless you add the yogurt when serving, and to lighten the fat & calories a bit I used light coconut milk with the rice. (I also used a rice cooker.) I'd heat up a papadum in the microwave for a minute or so to accompany.

This is, by the way, that sweet potato recipe I thought I'd lost :)

Protein?

Today's big topic for me is nutrition. Specifically, I've been wondering whether I'm getting enough stuff like protein. Yeah, I eat my share of meat, beans, dairy and all ... but am I getting enough protein? Or too much?

One website said that for my height and weight, I should be consuming 83 grams of protein a day, minimum. Another tells me to double my weight to find how much protein in grams ... but gosh, that seems awful high. (I can't see how 300+ grams of protein a day can be good for you.) Still another tells me to multiply my weight by .4 to reach the magic amount. And isn't the USRDA something like 65g? Or 50? Too much, and too little, can each be harmful.

I had a problem many years ago when I was vegan: I didn't know much about proper nutrition and I wasn't getting enough protein, and (among other things) my metabolism crashed and burned. So I'm a bit nervous about protein.

In the face of so much conflicting information, the one thing I can do is determine how much protein I'm getting right now. So I've decided to keep a food diary for the next week, and jot down what I'm eating and how much. Since I rarely prepare meals for which I don't have nutritional information (ie., I normally follow recipes that a serving size and its nutrients), I'm hoping this won't be dull or burdensome. In the meantime, I'll keep researching.

EDIT, 4/11/08: I've managed to take in a good 30-50g of protein a day, which really just isn't enough for someone my size. A friend called a little while ago to inform me that according to her Weight Watchers leader and to a book called The Fertility Diet, the way to calculate one's protein intake is to multiply your body weight by .7. Under that formula, I need to double my protein! Which I can believe, since lately the more I eat, the more weight that comes off. (She adds that the Fertility Diet promotes a greater amount of vegetable protein than animal protein. I'm not that familiar with the diet myself, but I'll check it out when I get a chance.)

Photos and springtime thoughts

Just a quick post (as it's way past my bedtime) to remind myself: use that fancy camera you bought and take pictures! Pictures good!

In the meantime, here's a photo of what were probably the most delicious potatoes I've ever eaten. I can't wait to partake of the local produce again!

I know ... it's time to sign up for the CSA shares. Unfortunately, my pocketbook took a major hit last month, so no CSA for me. I hope to be able to do it next spring. Until then, I'll keep visiting the farmers market and work on building out the garden (we have two of the planned five raised beds built so far).

Somewhat unrelated thought: I wonder if the eat local supper club is still happening?

I'm back!

First of all, it's good to be back! "Real life" happened in a particularly nasty way toward the end of January and I haven't able to put my mind toward blogging much til now.

Things are better for me these days, and my attention is back where I enjoy it most: thinking about what's for dinner. Lately I'm finding the answer to that eternal dilemma in the pages of food magazines.

I recently splurged a bit and got myself a subscription to Vegetarian Times. I don't usually subscribe to publications, as I don't often have the time to read them through, but lately I've been leaning more toward vegetarian/vegan than carnivorous. I found a recipe for tempeh chili in the latest issue (April 2008) that really worked out very well and stifled my reservations about the fermented soybean cake. As soon as I see that it's on VT's website, I'll post a link.

I made a couple of substitutions. The recipe called for a dark beer but I don't drink the stuff, so instead I dry-roasted some buckwheat flour and stirred it into the chili and added the 12 ounces of water that the beer would've provided. Also - whoops! - two teaspoons of maple syrup were called for but I ended up adding probably two tablespoons when the syrup came out of the jug much faster than I'd anticipated. Didn't hurt the taste! Plus ... I added probably a tablespoon of coriander powder and cayenne pepper for some added zing.

There's something else I wanted to make, something involving sweet potatoes, but silly me ... I can't find the recipe anymore. What do I do with 24 ounces of sweet potatoes? (I'm sure I'll find an answer!)

I did another uncharacteristic thing yesterday: I brought home a copy of Clean Eating magazine from the store. I'd never heard of the phrase "clean eating." Apparently it means eating foods that are as close to their natural state as possible, which I think is generally a good idea: the minimally processed food is more likely to be the healthiest, most satisfying food.

I couldn't resist the cover photo of a slice of veggie pizza. The magazine itself seems chock-full of recipes and all sorts of nutrition and health tips - there's even a 30-day meal plan with simple, healthful foods and a shopping list - and I'm really looking forward to checking it out more closely.

Quick eats on a lazy day

It's been a long week at my day job, and I'm not looking forward to spending a lot of time in the kitchen. I still want to eat well, however; and I don't want to blow a chunk of change at a restaurant. What are my options this weekend?

What's in the freezer? Ever since my husband rehabilitated the freezer chest in the basement, we've been careful to set aside leftovers and extras. As long as I've marked each container properly, I can simply pull out a Ziploc bag or a Rubbermaid container and heat a good, solid meal in the microwave.

Canned foods are also good choices, but watch out for the sodium (salt) content. If you select something that has more than, say, 30% of the recommended daily intake for sodium per serving, either consume less than a serving or drink lots of water to hopefully reduce the amount of water retention you'll experience later. I know my body will retain up to three pounds worth of weight after I eat something salty (that includes french fries and commercial soups), so be careful if you're watching your weight.

Having said that ... canned beans are a blessing and can be the basis for many a delicious, quick meal. You can add garbanzos (chickpeas) to salad veggies (which can come bagged from the store, which means even less effort on your part) and dressing. Beans add protein and vitamins/minerals to dishes.

Minimal prep time goes along with the homemade pastes I keep in the fridge. I have a basic mild curry paste that I like to heat up in a small pot while stirring in some plain yogurt. This makes a tasty sauce that goes well with cut-up cooked chicken or frozen veggies - just make sure the ratio of yogurt to paste is to your liking. You can buy all sorts of similar sauces and pastes at larger supermarkets, or make your own.

The nice thing about living near relatives is that you're always welcome to stop by ... and if your relative happens to be like my sister, her kitchen is always open :) I don't get to see her very often, despite the fact that she lives 10 miles down the road, so when I do stop by she's happy to play gracious hostess and pull out some of her best goodies. She makes a mean guacamole from scratch, and always has all sorts of fresh veggies and organic blue chips to go with. I do the same when she visits (even more rare, unfortunately), so it's all "even Steven."

Personally I prefer visiting my sister - not to "mooch," but because she's lots of fun and I get the bonus of getting to hang out with my 8-year-old nephew! When my only contact with the outside world is either co-workers or the grocery store, a few hours with family feeds my spirit as well as my tummy.

What other ideas do you have for eating well on a lazy day?

... so how did that korma come out?!

I promised to report back on the korma I made for New Year's Eve. It came out wonderfully! Admittedly, it was very different from the cream/cardamom-based restaurant style of korma, but it was still creamy good and delightfully rich and complex in its taste. In the same bite, you could taste the pungent lamb, the pistachio and the yogurt. It was rather time-intensive, but it was worth it to have my dear husband insist I teach the cooks at the restaurant how to make it!

For New Year's Day I made a much simpler dish, a recipe from Madhur Jaffrey's "Invitation to Indian Cooking" involving black-eyed peas called lobhia. I used to make it often back when I was a vegan who wanted to make delicious food without a huge grocery bill. Some tomato, some black-eyed peas, some onion and some spices ... and the net result is YUM! I used to eat it with dry toasted whole-wheat bread instead of an Indian style of bread; this year, though, I made a dozen chappatis and we "dined in style" for the first night of 2008.

As a korma simmers in the kitchen ...

One thing (among many) that I enjoy about having a day off from work is the opportunity it grants me to take the time to make something elaborate, something special, for dinner. Doesn't happen very often, but when it does I like to make something out of the ordinary. Tonight is one of those nights.

I'm sneaking in a quick post while tonight's dinner, lamb korma, simmers in the big nonstick pan for an hour.

I was lucky enough to find a good price for semi-boneless lamb (not a whole leg, but slices thereof) this afternoon at the supermarket, so I picked up a can of coconut milk and some cilantro (among many other items; I intend to be busy in the kitchen in the next 24 hours!). To me, lamb = Indian food, most likely korma (although I want to make a makhani, too), which = love. My husband and I both love Indian lamb recipes, so this would indeed be a special treat (I rarely bring meat home, and lamb is almost unheard of except for a holiday meal).

The recipe for korma that I chose, from "1,000 Indian Recipes," calls for 1/2 cup of cashew paste - soak cashews in hot water for 45 minutes, then blend in a blender with a few tablespoons of water until a paste emerges. Well ... I ran out of cashews but I had plenty of pistachios (my husband's next favorite nut) and sliced almonds, so I used them instead. And rather than using water, I poured in a bit of lite coconut milk. Naughty me!

I do my best to avoid substitutions or deviate from a given recipe. At least, not til I've made it so many times that I feel comfortable enough to try something different. So for the rest of the recipe I stayed within the lines: cardamom, whole dried red chiles, bay leaves, ground coriander and cumin, a dash of nutmeg and mace. The smell of minced onions, garlic and fresh ginger filled the house and drew my husband out from his office in the back with exclamations that boy, whatever that stuff is, it smells great! I put everything together and he can barely wait for the contents of the pan to gently boil down to a thickened sauce of spiced goodness.

If there are two spices that complement each other perfectly, it's coriander and cumin. One is gentle and sweet, a subtle backdrop with a supporting role to its sharper, more vivid companion. Pair them together, as in so many Indian recipes, and you have the makings of something wonderful, something you can never quite put your finger on but you know it when you find it: a luscious balancing act that dances on your palate like two divinely orchestrated dancers. Cooking with coriander and cumin is like reuniting lost lovers, and it brings a smile to my face every time.

Time to stir the pot - I'll let you know how dinner goes!

Dinners and desserts

This weekend was a blur of cooking and general puttering around in the kitchen. From beef stew and Italian wedding soup to lemon bars and whiskey balls, I kept the home fires (or oven, or stovetop) burning and the air redolent with the rich fragrance of shortbreads, fruit and wine. The two feet of snow that fell all day gave me all the more impetus to stay indoors and make delicious food happen.

Tonight I'll be whipping up a batch of butternut balls and sour cream cutout cookies.

Those who know me tend to be surprised that I crack open the oven door: I am not "the baker of the family," that would be my sister. But it's holiday time, and for me that's the one time a year I get out my recipe collection and start thinking about Christmas cookies.

I make the same cookies every year at holiday time, goodies that have meant "home" and "happiness" for thirty years. I don't need new recipes because they don't hold any memories for me.

I don't have any children with whom to share the tradition of chilling the sour cream cookie dough in the fridge overnight (and having to make another batch because little fingers were at the dough in the wee hours) or carefully handling the dough itself so that it behaves as it ought when it's rolled out and cut into Santas, trees, stars and bells. I don't have any children with whom to make new traditions. So it's just me and my own childhood in the kitchen as I roll the warm butternut balls in 10x sugar or make a quick batch of icing for the cutouts.

I remember my sister making doughnuts, cookies and countless other goodies with me when I was little. Usually my main role was holding the hand mixer's electrical cord to avoid the short in the wires (that lasted until my brother overheard "a little to the left ... now to the right a bit" one too many times and bought us a new mixer) or stirring a bowl of goodness (and getting to lick the spoon!). I have happy memories that I gently fold into each cookie that I will carry with me forever.

What memories do you have of holiday cookie-making time?

recipe: my linguine in clam sauce

My dear husband decided he was going to make linguine in clam sauce last week, using the recipe on the side of the linguine box. It came out ... okay ... except it was too salty, too thick and he used dried parsley. He swore that next time he had a craving fr the stuff, he'd get the recipe from me.

For anyone who'd like to try my recipe for linguine (in my family, "linguine" means only one thing: a white clam sauce), here it is. Again, as with mom's pasta e fagioli, quantities are estimated (are you a garlic lover? etc.).

Linguine (serves 1-2)

Half a box of linguine
olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
three or four big cloves of garlic, minced
two cans of clams, chopped or minced (doesn't matter; interchangeable)
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1/4 cup cold water
cayenne pepper
1/4 cup (est'd) fresh parsley, chopped

Cook the linguine according to the directions on the box.

Open the cans of clams with a can opener and let the lid settle to the tops of the clam bits. Set aside.

Coat the bottom of a saute pan with the olive oil and heat on medium-high. Melt the butter in the olive oil. When it's melted, add the garlic. Heat garlic until it's softened and juuuust beginning to brown (do not let it burn!). Immediately add the juice from the cans of clams, reserving the meats at the bottom. Bring all to a gentle boil.

In a small bowl, mix the cornstarch and water to make a thin, watery paste. Drizzle the cornstarch mixture into the clam sauce in the pan, stirring constantly, until the sauce begins to thicken. Turn off the heat and stir in the reserved clam meat. Sprinkle with cayenne pepper to taste and the parsley.

Drain the linguine when it's done and combine with the clam sauce.

Hope you like it - let me know how it turns out!

experiments with plants

I'll admit it, I'm not much of a plant person. I don't know much about gardening - just enough to produce usable produce - and I know even less about house plants. But that doesn't always stop me from trying new tricks!

My mom came over a few weeks ago and taught me to snip off parts of my long-languishing begonia plant and place the cut ends in water to encourage the leggy stalks to create roots in the water. I looked at that and figured, why not try that with other plants?

For my first experiment, I took a 4-inch stalk of spearmint from a plant that I'd put in the kitchen windowbox at the beginning of this past spring, and placed it in a small, clean jelly jar filled with water. The results? Two weeks later, there are no roots, but there are new leaves!

Puzzling, but I'll keep an eye on it to see what it does next.

And the begonia snips? Three weeks or so later, and still no roots - but they look perfectly healthy so I'll keep them going for as long as they keep up the good work.

back to my first culinary love

The long holiday weekend gave me a chance to catch up on some recreational cooking. Since I work anywhere from 8 to 11 hours a day with a nice, healthy commute, I haven't really had opportunity to whip up anything that really spoke to my spirit in a good long time.

What really inspired me was a cookbook I picked up at Borders on the day before Thanksgiving: "1,000 Indian Recipes" by Neelam Batra. Just glancing through the book made me see that here were a vast number of recipes just waiting to be made. I couldn't put it down at the bookstore, and kept leafing through it when I got it home. I simply had to try it out!

My kitchen is full of Indian spices, since I used to cook almost exclusively Indian, so I didn't have to invest a lot in preparing to return to my first culinary love. Some of the ingredients were new to me, such as boondi (tiny drops of besan, or chickpea flour, that is lightly fried and sold commercially) and ajwain. But I live in a metropolitan area that can support multiple Asian grocery stores within a mile or so of each other, so I was lucky enough to simply drive down the boulevard and stop at a couple of shops along the way.

Within an hour, my kitchen began to once again take on familiar aromas. South Indian chicken, with its use of unsweetened shredded coconut as well as coconut milk, took on a lovely fragrance with the use of shredded curry leaves. Fresh curry leaves, I found out, have an odor that's somewhat off-putting at first ... but when simmered in a curry base they come into their own and transform the dish into something delightful.

This weekend I plan to have more Indian-inspired fun, making chapatis and naan to go with my curries ... maybe picking up some more papadums ... and making some paneer - possibly paneer pakora or saag paneer - for the coming week. Yum!

"Coming Home to Eat"

I started reading "Coming Home to Eat: The Pleasures and Politics of Local Foods" by Gary Paul Nabhan this afternoon. Just reading the preface and introduction to this handy-sized book has me eagerly awaiting the rest of his story!

Nabhan is of Lebanese ancestry and he tells of traveling from his home in southern Arizona to Lebanon to visit with aunts and uncles and assorted relatives. Along the way he finds himself at an exclusive Middle Eastern casino, where he realizes the exotic foods - Caspian Sea caviar and the like - and even the building materials come from outside of the country. Such sharp contrast to the meal with which his family welcomes him to Lebanon: foods produced or grown, and certainly prepared, locally. That contrast sticks with him through his first night in that faraway land, and starts him thinking of what it means, what it takes, to bring the food wealth of other nations to one's table.

Book's off to a lovely start - I think I'll enjoy the rest of the trip into Nabhan's world.

A visit to Vince's Imports

I stopped by Vince's Imports in North Syracuse this afternoon to see what kind of imports Vince has. Vince specializes in Italian imports ... lots of different sauces, biscotti, loads of cheeses, a fascinating selection of fresh pastas and sauces made in-house, pasta makers and espresso machines (electric and, apparently, stovetop).

I was intrigued by the selection of spaetzle makers; what were they doing among all the Italian stuff? But seeing them reminded me of how my stepkids (who are part-German) used to enjoy making spaetzle from scratch and squishing the dough through the holes in a semi-melted plastic colander. I almost got one of the spaetzle makers, having almost convinced myself that I would be making spaetzle soon ... then I walked away quickly: I know better.

Checking out the jars of olives in brine, salt capers and giardenara, not to mention the vast array of smoked, pickled and dried meats and cheeses, I was reminded that what we think of as Italian cuisine is actually a relatively modern selection of dishes derived from a time when there were limited methods of preserving foods. It's actually kind of exciting to walk into a specialty shop like Vince's and realize that you're looking at more than 2,000 years of civilization dressed up in modern clothes. All those hard salamis have an ancient history behind them.

As my father once told me when I was still very small, "You don't like olives? There is no way you can be Italian if you don't like olives." Eschewing olives meant turning my nose up at his culture, his people, his heritage, his very identity. To him, we truly are what we eat, and in a fundamental way he understood that our foods define us. If he were still alive he'd be proud to know that (thanks in large part to the Wegmans Mediterranean bar) as an adult I've developed quite a fondness for olives.

pictures of my garden on Halloween

A couple of people have asked to see pictures of my garden, so this morning I brought out the camera before I went off to work and snapped a few quick shots. I can't say it's all that impressive, but here goes!


Here's the broccoli I wrote about. I've about given up on it.


Here's my rosemary bush. It grew nicely this year ... unlike the basil, which really wasn't all that photogenic this morning. To the right are (some weeds and) the strawberry plants that produced exactly one misshapen, bitter berry before abandoning the concept altogether and moving on to other pursuits, such as sending tendrils out on a reconnaissance mission to the failed experiment known as my cucumber plants. Maybe next year will be better. Or maybe I'm supposed to be doing soil amendments or something, I don't know.


Loads and loads of green tomatoes that undoubtedly will never actually turn orange, let alone red. I'm not sure I'm very excited about eating fried tomatoes - I've heard about it but never tried it, but I tend to avoid fried foods on general principle (and the recommendation of my gall bladder). Maybe there's another way of preparing green tomatoes ... I just need to do some research. If I find anything I'll post about it - or if anyone has any ideas please share them!


The Greek oregano did very well this year! Nice, big leaves and such a marvelous fragrance. I surprised myself this year with how much fresh oregano my recipes wanted: I found myself plucking the tender, soft leaves several times over the summer, including the stuffed eggplant dish I brought to the first Eat Local potluck supper.



The "macro" feature on my camera focused on the green leafy background, but you can still make out the unmistakable shapes of little proto-peppers. I still can't believe that those plants are still trying to make peppers months after the season allegedly ended!

At the supper, in spirit anyway ...

Tonight was indeed the night of the next Syracuse Eat Local supper, and I had every intention of attending (especially since it was taking place so close to my house) ... I even went out to the Regional Market and the Syracuse Real Food Coop to make sure I had everything I needed ... but by the time I got home from the memorial service that was held this afternoon (a friend from church passed away the other day), I knew I was just drained and wouldn't be able to attend. :(

However, I still had all my ingredients and so I put together a lovely winter greens and potato casserole, courtesy of a recipe I found in the Jan-Feb 2004 Cooking Light magazine. Finding the ingredients was an amazingly simple task, thanks to the hard work of the folks at Stone's Throw Farm, home of some gorgeous organic veggies. They had pretty much everything I needed - a pound of kale, a pound of mustard greens and two pounds or so of some incredible red potatoes. The only thing on my list that they didn't have was locally made cheese, which I found at SRFC.

(I'll be adding a photo to this post when I'm done, showing you what I mean by "gorgeous" - I've fallen in love with their red potatoes, which are actually pink right through the center and seem to be far less starchy than any other potato I've ever sliced. They're not like those, well, the typical little red potatoes you see in the supermarket ... they're kind of elongated, not round, and a bit knobbly but not really ... well, you'll see.)

So even though I can't be at the supper tonight, I'm there in spirit with my potato casserole cooking in the oven.

Here's a bowl of fresh kale next to these luscious potatoes:


And this is a sliced potato, up close and personal.

I looked in the garden this afternoon and found one viable red tomato and dozens of big fat green ones. Most of the tomato plants have begun dying back, including the ones that overshadowed the bell pepper plants - which are now producing little peppers as if it were springtime. I can't blame them for being confused - today's weather was glorious, mid-70s and totally cloudless. Most of the month has been similar. Gotta hand it to the pepper plants: they managed to produce one or two nice big peppers before the monster tomatoes took over. Now they're trying again! That's the spirit!

I'm starting to think about autumn and what to do with my garden. I'm wondering about what to do with the herbs. Specifically, what do I do with the Greek oregano and the nice, tall rosemary bush? it would be great if I could transplant them into pots in my house and enjoy them all winter long.

One thing I very much want to do this fall is roast some vegetables, drizzling them with olive oil and sprinkling with chopped fresh rosemary before going in the oven. My sister does this and the results are incredible! I've never done it, and I have the rosemary, so I want to give it a go. Anyone ever roast veggies this way? How'd it go for you?