September 2011

Autumn, Cooking, Motherly Love: Part 2

The first part of this story began with me reminiscing about my mother, her cooking and why it is the most real food ever. After writing Autumn, Cooking, Motherly Love: Part 1, I decided to invite my mom out to spend the week cooking with me. Before I share her recipes with you, I'd like to relay a few lingering thoughts I’ve learned from these experiences in the kitchen, with my mom. 

Read more »

Autumn, Cooking, Motherly Love: Part 1

I’m going to dedicate this entry to my mom, my dearest, best friend in the world. My favorite memories from childhood are simple and often connected to three simple things: fall, my mom, and my mom’s cooking. My mom’s cooking, in my mind, is the most authentic, wonderful and delicious that I have yet encountered. I now live near L.A. where the wealth of restaurants in a one mile radius outweighs the number of people in my entire hometown, but I would rather have her cooking on any given day than that of a premiere restaurant with an award winning chef. I say all of this only because I absolutely cherish what she was able to accomplish in our home and in her kitchen on a meager budget and without a Whole Foods anywhere in the state. That’s sort of like a modern day miracle.  (Don’t tell, but I still don’t think she even knows what a Whole Foods is).

Read more »

Food: The Universal Gift

Today is my birthday and despite my being removed from childhood or even adolescence by a good many years, people still buy me presents. I'm not big on getting a lot of "stuff", so I have tried to have years where I refuse gifts, I include on party invitations the words, "no presents necessary", I even use ALL CAPS. I also know how hard it is to feel obligated to find someone a gift. I wanted none of that for my friends and relatives. Alas, it seems that our society is stuck on the idea and forever there will be wrapping paper and bows coming my way. The good news, there is an answer. A million dollar, never get stuck at the mall again idea. Food (That's it...the idea is food). Brilliant, yes. Simple, yes. Easy to justify and feel good about. I think so.

Read more »

Its Not Easy Being Green: Reflections On A Summer Of Yard Work

Over the past few years, my family and I have integrated various “green” practices into our home life. We eat more home-grown vegetables, have joined various community shares agriculture  programs (CSAs) and co-ops and have faithfully visited our local farmers’ markets.  “Going green” also means being considerate about the amount of waste generated by our family and about being good stewards to the land by monitoring our usage of various chemicals.

Read more »

Healthy Eating/Healthy Living with Brenda Langton: A Preview

This fall, Brenda Langton, owner of Cafe Brenda and Spoonriver, will be leading a must-attend workshop series in partnership through the University of Minnesota's Center for Spirituality & Healing. The Healthy Eating, Healthy Living course, now in it's third year, offers a full view on the simplicity in learning how to nourish your body with tasty food. This is done in a three-part series covering breakfast through dinner including those much needed mid-day snacks. All classes take place in a real kitchen as a hands-on engagement. This week, I had the opportunity to speak with Brenda about the course, in advance of attending.

Read more »

Local Lefse Lovers Unite

If, like me, you’re still mourning the end of the fair’s foods-on-a-stick, I have great news for you. There’s a new portable delicacy in town: Varma lefse, the creation of South Minneapolis’ Nathan Matter and Alyson Sweet. Varma recently starting offering its lefse wraps at the Midtown Farmers Market.

Read more »

Teach Kids To Grow, Eat and Share

If you have not heard the name Laura Greene or Grow, Eat, Share, take note. She is an example of yet another bold and ambitious food lover who is trying to fill the gaps in our food education system. The story starts when Laura was working as a volunteer with a local kindergarden and she came face to face with the realities of what kids were eating.

Knowing that the parents are choosing to pack their kids junk food for lunch did not deter her from trying to teach the kids, in spite of their parents. What really "sealed her fate", if you will, was when she brought one of these kindergardeners to Riverbend Farm, only to discover that he did not know what a farm was. I suppose that when your lunch is glowing with artificial color and absent of vegetables, how could anyone even think that food comes from a farm?

Read more »

September SGT Book Club: Stuffed and Starved

This month, the Simple, Good and Tasty book club is tackling Stuffed and Starved by Raj Patel. Get ready to dive into the global food system and begin to think in new ways about how it serves or fails to serve humanity. Instead of focusing on individual choices, Raj Patel asks questions about how food is delivered to people, whether it be big box stores in America or third world farmers growing crops for the industrial world. Patel also gives us new insights on why the food system fails to equally to all. Perhaps one of the best qualities of his writing is that what is offered here is not simply a book for the Western world.

Read more »

Saving Beans, Making Chili

As an avid but admittedly novice gardener, there is always one area where I tend to let things go. Some years I put everything in the ground, remember to water, but let the weeds go crazy. Other years, I get behind in sowing seed and too much or too little comes up. Sometimes watering is inconsistent and my garden suffers and bears little. However, there is one problem I have every year: keeping up with the beans. 

Read more »

Pin-Up Girl Eggplant - A Savory Dish for those Purple Beauties

I don't know about you, but I find it virtually impossible to walk by an eggplant and not pick it up. They are just so beautiful. The heft, the mysterious deep purple skin, the smooth contours just speak to me. They are the plump and saucy pin-up girls of the vegetable world and I am always seduced. I had visions of creamy curries and crusty parmesans as I filled my basket with one, two, OK, three too many at the Kingfield Farmers Market on Sunday. But as much as the aubergine beauties might have been calling to me from my kitchen counter, the last honeyed days of summer were calling me even more.
Instead of hopping on the computer and hungrily searching my favorite food blogs for recipes, I went for a long and lazy late afternoon swim at Lake Harriet. My son and I swam way far out past the buoys until we could barely recognize the rest of our tiny family on shore.
Read more »