Activities

The blustery weather provided the perfect backdrop for this past Saturday's free Peace Coffee cupping, attended by more than 20 coffee lovers. When we arrived at Peace Coffee's Minneapolis headquarters, we were treated to Peace Coffee's new seasonal Pollinator blend (which replaces the well-loved Winter Snowshoe Brew), muffins and scones from the Birchwood Cafe, and Marketing Director Mel Meegan's tour of the warehouse and its impressive roasters. A few minutes later, we were sitting at long tables, staring at delicious-smelling cups of coffee grounds. I don't think any of us knew what to do.

Would you laugh if I told you the key to human potential is a bowl of vegetable soup? Or a plate of meat loaf? A chocolate chip cookie? If the food is part of a delivery from Open Arms of Minnesota, then it is indeed key to someone’s independent and meaningful life.

Since 1986, Open Arms of Minnesota has run a meal delivery program for Twin Cities residents living with, and affected by, chronic progressive illnesses. (Full disclosure: I’ve volunteered in their kitchen for close to twelve years.) Its largest and original client population is people living with HIV and AIDS. Open Arms also serves people with ALS (Lou Gehrig’s disease), MS, breast cancer, and similar illnesses. The meals can be the difference between staying healthy and spiraling into disability. For many, this means living at home instead of going to a hospital or nursing home.

A wise friend once said “awareness rocks!” I couldn’t agree more. When I started down the detox path myself, I realized that all of my researching, experimenting and learning about less toxic eating was coagulating into a new form of awareness. If I cared so much about how hard my poor liver was working, I reasoned, I should probably find a way to bring all of this glorious non-toxicity into the rest of my world as well. What we consume certainly plays a big role in how we bring toxins into our bodies, but the air we breathe and what touches our skin matters too. With this in mind, I started looking around my house for sources and solutions.

Who out there is undertaking a January detox this year? I know I am, for the 4th time in about 2 ½ years. Somewhere in our collective consciousness, the detox has become a fairly commonplace practice, giving our bodies a clean slate on which to scribe the new year. But what about the rest of your surroundings? I don’t know about you, but once I start this ritualistic stripping away of toxic baddies and enriching my diet with all of this fabulously healthy local and organic food, I wonder what else around here needs to be buffed up. A detox for the home? You know, that sounds pretty sensible. But where on earth to start?

Alice Waters Photo Courtesy of Chezpanisse.comHere's a terrific opportunity to eat magically delicious local, organic food, prepared by some of the world's greatest chefs in support of a great cause. If only I had $500 and lived in Washington D.C.! But maybe you do? Check out the recent press release I received from the good folks at Chez Panisse:

Photo credit: Erincooks.comMy family celebrates both Hanukkah and Christmas, and with today being the first day of Hanukkah, I can practically fry a potato - or a sweet potato - in my mind. I've often wondered how the ancient Jews in Israel knew that I'd be wanting to serve up seasonal food in Minnesota this time of year. Proof that God exists? You tell me.

Chef Mike Phillips won't be serving this tonight.Tonight's the night, friends. Simple, Good, and Tasty is excited to host our December event at the Craftsman Restaurant in Minneapolis from 5:00 - 7:00. Here's a quick rundown:

A few weeks ago, in an earlier blog post, I joked that the most authentic way to find a pasture-raised, grass-fed turkey for Thanksgiving dinner was to hunt for it with a bow and arrow or rifle.

According to a recent article in the New York Times a new generation of meat eaters, who are interested in local, free-range, organic food, are doing just that.

I recently had a chance to catch up with Curt Ellis, whose “Big River” documentary picks up where his film 2006 “King Corn” left off - in the banks of the Mississippi River.

In the coat closet of my tiny one-bedroom apartment, next to a suitcase and my winter boots, is my blue plastic worm bin. I have been composting with worms for about a year, and cannot imagine going back.

I am still in awe of the efficiency with which my worms work, and I'm always amazed to open the bin and find almost no evidence of the food scraps and coffee grounds I fed them only a week earlier. I am not an expert in biology, agronomy, or even vermiculture, but right in my closet, I have managed to maintain a thriving little ecosystem, and produce a continuous supply of rich, dark compost.

Thanks so much to the nearly 50 people who came to last night's local food event at Spoonriver last night. It was terrific to have you there! Here are some photos from the event, taken by Kate Sommers of Les Petites Images.

Here's a picture of Spoonriver Owner Brenda Langton, thanking guests for coming. Jennifer Patterson from Unplanned Cooking, Molly Herrmann from Tastebud Catering, and Michelle Gayer from The Salty Tart are looking on (among others).

Obama campaigning in Iowa, January 2008.

While the debate over healthcare reform continues to rage in Washington, other political news can get lost in the cracks.

Case in point, did you know that President Obama recently nominated two "Big Ag" executives -- with connections to Monsanto and CropLife -- to key posts in the U. S. Department of Agriculture? The story wasn't covered by the mainstream news organizations, so I didn't hear about it until I received an action alert from Food Democracy Now.

We've got just a few reservations still open for this Sunday's local food event at Spoonriver. If you've been to a Simple, Good, and Tasty event before, you know that the food is just part of the fun (here are a few pictures from our last event at Lucia's). Still, the food is an important part. Here's a sneak peek at the menu:

Minneapolis Farmers Market Manager Larry Cermak is a serious man.  He's been managing the market for 25 years, he tells me, and "this is the most miserable October we've had." The weather has been damp and cold, making it challenging for the farmers to harvest their crops - corn and soy beans are still not ready - and the sun hasn't shown its smiley face in what seems like ages. Larry is realistic, but not necessarily optimistic. "We need people to come out this week and next weekend," he tells me, "we need a big Halloween weekend."

"The Feast," by SubwayHere’s what I’m dealing with. I’ve got these 2 boys, 7 and 11 years old (yeah, yeah, just like “7-11”), and they always seem to take forever to get going in the morning. Like this morning they woke up at 7 am, and they took about 20 minutes to get dressed. I was totally annoyed. I mean, the boys took so long we didn’t even have time to let them eat their cereal in front of the TV. We basically had to rush them out the door as soon as their coats were on, which meant that - again - they’d be eating breakfast bars in the car in the way to school.

Last night's Simple, Good, and Tasty local food event at Lucia's was truly amazing. Sure, there was the menu, created by Lucia Watson herself and perfectly executed in every way. And there was the great service, attentive and generous. There was the opportunity to meet and mingle with an astounding collection of people, just over 60 of us in total. There was the beautiful setting, the terrific organic wine, and the t-shirts that Lucia sent us all home with that said, "We know our Farmers better than we know our Doctors."  But what really made the night so especially fulfilling wasn't any of that.

It was the farmers.

I can't remember an event I've been as excited about as the one I'm co-hosting with Lucia Watson this Sunday, 10/11. The Twin Cities' first official "Know Your Farmer" event, fittingly held at Lucia's, is a chance to meet - and eat with - some of the best, most interesting farmers in our state. Even better, Lucia has designed a menu entrely from the foods these farmers have produced.

Last May, in my family's backyard garden, we planted five varieties of tomatoes, three varieties of lettuce, plus fennel, squash, cucumbers, beets and onions. Oh, and one pumpkin seed that our daughter found on the floor of her first-grade classroom.

The first thing to ripen, the lettuce, was fantastic. The cool weather was perfect for nurturing those tender leaves. But the tomatoes were a major disappointment; not enough heat and humidity for them. And neither the fennel, the squash, the cucumbers or the onions had a great year. The beets, the last I saw of them, were just one day away from being picked when some nighttime visitor – a raccoon? an opossum? – got to them first.

Youth Farm and Market Project, a Twin Cities community treasure since 1995, has lofty goals. These include:

• Building young leaders
• Promoting healthy lifestyles
• Creating neighborhood connectedness and opportunities for contribution
• Developing and nurturing healthy relationships

The program focuses on kids ages 9 - 18, and uses a hands on approach to urban agriculture and gardening to teach life lessons. Started in 1995, the Youth Farm program now teaches more than 500 Twin Cities youth every single year.

Lucia's Restaurant at NightWho is your farmer?

Most people know their hairdresser, insurance agent, doctor and many others, but few today know their farmer, perhaps the most important person in their lives. Knowing your farmer can change your health, your approach to cooking, your respect for food, your stewardship of the earth and even your social and political circle. This dinner will introduce you to 12 different farmers and producers.

I recently spent a day at the MN State Fair with my friend and cohort Tracy Morgan, and we did our best to eat as much local food we can could cram into our eager bellies. Here are a few of our favorites.

I started with a big ole turkey drumstick, the kind I've watched people carry around for ages at all sorts of festivals and fairs (Tracy passed on this). I had to admit to Tracy that I'm not much of a food "toucher" - I'm kind of a knife and fork guy - but the drumstick was tender and delicious, with a bit of sweet sauce on top. I didn't do too much gnawing on the bone, partly because it's not my thing, and partly beause I was saving room for more food.

I foster a years-long ritual at the Minnesota State Fair. No, it doesn’t have anything to do with anything that's deep fried, on-a-stick, or makes you throw up the more you ride it – which is not to say I don't also go for such dalliances. But I’ve grown into a few adult-onset educational adventures as well. I’ve found myself checking out the animal barns (although the lamb wearing the “which cut is this” t-shirt last year firmly reinforced my inability to eat that particular animal … baaaa), visiting the Fine Arts building, and buying beautiful locally produced wools for my 2-year old knitting obsession. And each year, I simply must buy honey at the state fair. I adore honey in all its different flavors and colors.

Last week, I blogged about the exquisite Simple, Good and Tasty local food dinner at The Strip Club in St. Paul. Today, I'll let the beautiful images, taken by Kate Sommers from Les Petites Images, speak for themselves.

Chef JD Fratzke, Todd Lein (from Thousand Hills Cattle Company) and I kicked things off by talking a bit about what we do and why. Here's a picture of JD holding court.

Tonight's the night for the August Simple, Good, and Tasty dinner at the Strip Club, sure to be another terrific local food experience with friends. For the 50 of us lucky enough to have signed up first, Here are the details:

My family and I had a fun time at the Sustainable Farming Association of Minnesota's Garlic Festival this past weekend in Hutchinson, MN.

It's pretty hard not to be inspired by Fred Haberman. Although he apologizes profusely - and repeatedly - during our lunch for being exhausted ("I was at the farm before 5 this morning," he says, "I'm starting to feel dizzy"), Fred is articulate and passionate as he describes Haberman's company sponsored organic farm.

Image Credit: Maven MamaAccording to Japanese legend, a young man named Sen no Rikyu sought to learn the elaborate set of customs known as the Way of Tea. He went to tea-master Takeeno Joo, who tested the younger man by asking him to tend the garden. Rikyu cleaned up debris and raked the ground until it was perfect, then scrutinized the immaculate garden. Before presenting his work to the master, he shook a cherry tree, causing a few flowers to spill randomly onto the ground.