Deborah Madison

Recently, I had lunch out with a friend and in the course of our conversation I mentioned that I was trying a new recipe that week: quinoa-potato croquettes (from Deborah Madison’s Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone). “That sounds good,” my friend said. “Will you have that with some baked chicken or something?” No, I explained, it was one of our meatless meals. “But it’s not Monday,” my friend pointed out. 

 

I explained that Meatless Mondays don’t usually work for us – Monday is slow cooker day, due to work and school schedules. However, we try to have at least two or three meatless meals a week; just not on set days. 

 

Last year I decided to approach New Year’s Resolutions in a different way: I would make a list of things to accomplish and to learn. I focused on just a few things that I enjoy, but seldom approach in a dedicated way: crafting, writing and cooking. My list included things I knew I could easily skate through the entire year without actually doing, unless I had something prodding me…like my pride. I printed out my list – in a big colored font nonetheless – and posted it around the house. That list lived above the sewing machine, by my desk and inside a kitchen cabinet door. 

My list looked something like this:

Dye sock yarn with Kool-Aid. Cook one new recipe a week. 52 recipes. Write more. Read more.Finish four unfinished projects. 

 

I deliberately didn't write "the last CSA of 2011" (CSA stands for community supported agriculture, where individuals can subscribe to a farm and in return receive shares of produce). Many farms offer winter shares of root vegetables, storage crops, meat, or prepared foods.

"The Single Most Important Piece of Cookware You’ll Ever Own." That's what it says on the cover of the little instruction book that came with my pressure cooker. My purchase was inspired by the amazingly healthy, hearty Italian farming family I lived with in Sicily for three weeks. The family followed a macrobiotic diet, and their pressure cooker was used at least three times a day. I decided that if I couldn’t bring their sunshine, olives, and almonds home with me, I could at least try to re-create their cooking methods.

A few months after returning to snowy Minnesota, my memories of perfectly cooked greens and grains fading quickly, I pulled a shiny but average-looking stainless steel pot out of the box, flipped through the uninspiring recipes included in the booklet, and rolled my eyes at the cookware company’s brash claim. Two years later, however, while I haven’t quite worked up to three times a day, I use my pressure cooker several times a week. I am a total convert.

My husband and I first joined a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program about 14 years ago. We shared a membership with friends and split the box of vegetables each week. It was the early days of CSAs in the Twin Cities, and the variety in the box was, well, not very various -- a three week stretch of nothing but bok choy pretty much ended our interest. But then, four years ago, circumstances conspired to bring us back into the CSA fold. Just when my husband and I were ready to reconsider, we visited some relatives in Madison and happened to be there when they received their CSA share from Harmony Valley Farm, located in Viroqua, WI.

There isn’t much more I would rather do on a crisp, fall day in Madison than visit the Downtown Farmer’s Market. With a sea of proud Madisonites dressed in badger gear foraging for the week’s local food offerings, chocolate-faced kids enjoying their morning treats, and the sun shining strong, I couldn’t help but spend hours meandering the market last week. However, I had more on my “to-do” list than shop for my fill of seasonal veg on that Saturday. It was REAP’s annual Food for Thought Festival on the Square, one of the best fall food events for passionate locavores, if you ask me.  

There were other things in last week's Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm-share box: basil, green beans, turnips, chard, tomatoes, onions. But the giant pile of potatoes kind of eclipsed everything else. The suddenly cooler weather plus those potatoes seemed to cry out for something warm and comforting. I glanced at my cookbook shelves, in search of recipes that would honor these humble midwestern spuds. Eureka, I thought, stew! Or, as it transpired, stews! Bland? Mushy? No way. These stews were going to be stars.