(mostly) whole wheat bread

So I finally feel comfortable enough to really start improvising with bread baking. I guess it’s not rocket science or anything, but it has intimidated me, so I have tended to stick pretty closely to recipes. This is the second time I have made this bread and I am continuing to tweak it as I go along. Overall, I do think it’s pretty darn tasty, and I’ve gotten some good feedback about it, too (so it’s not all in my head…).

I’m not sure if I have mentioned it on this blog or not, and I know it might seem fairly obvious, but it bears repeating; read through all recipes (preferably a couple of times) so you know what is suppose to happen before you start.

Ingredients:

2 ½ c of warm water

1T of active dry yeast

2 ½ T brown rice syrup (or sweetener of your choice)

3 ½ c whole-wheat flour

2 ½ c unbleached all purpose white flour (more for kneading)

¼ c veg. oil (preferably a mild tasting one or a light olive oil)

1T salt

Yields 2 loaves

Directions:

Sprinkle the yeast over the warm water and mix in the brown rice syrup; let sit for a few minutes.

Mix together the rest of the ingredients and add in the yeast mixture, mixing well; let sit for about 10 minutes.

Prepare a lightly floured surface and knead for about 10 minutes; add additional flour as necessary (but try not to add too much).

Place the dough in a lightly oiled bowl and cover with a cloth; let rise for about an hour until it has doubled.

Punch down the dough and knead a bit and return it to a ball like shape on your floured surface; let it rise for another half hour.

Punch down the dough again and divide in half; form into loaf and place in well oiled pans and. cover with the cloth for about 20 minutes.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees; bake for 45 minutes.

Let cool on a wire rack before cutting.

turkey meatballs for B :)

Parsley Turkey Meatballs

Again, its been awhile...this grad school thing is really getting in the way of blogging about food! And I guess, to be honest with myself, I have let crafting take on the role of major source of procrastination lately. I'm still cooking, but for some reason just not getting around to writing about it :(

This little project, though, was inspired by my dear friend B, who has moved far, far away! We were talking about writing recipes and I thought it would be good to start with something simple so she suggested meatballs. That always sounds good to me! Since its the fall, I decided to make them into a soup and use some CSA veggies, namely the spinach, to make a spinach and rice soup (in a veggie broth) with turkey meatballs, to really make it a meal.

Recipe-

Ingredients:
1 lb. ground turkey (dark meat)
2 eggs, lightly beaten
2 Tbs chopped parsley
1/4 c grated Parmesan cheese
1/2 c bread crumbs
Salt & Pepper to taste

Directions:

Mix all ingredients together in a medium bowl. Heat pan (preferably a cast iron 12 inch skillet) over medium high heat. Form meatballs - I made small meatballs, about 3/4 inch in diameter, since I was using these for a soup. Feel free to make them what ever size you want, and adjust cooking time accordingly. Again, since these were destined for a soup, I just browned them and let them finish cooking in the broth. Spinach and Rice soup with Turkey Meatballs
(in a new bowl I just made - oh crafts!)

One thing that I think is helpful in a recipe is to give the ingredients in the order that they will be used (not so important in this example) and also in the form that they will be added if possible. I think that this helps cooks get there mise en place together, even if they don't tend to do this consciously.

A mid-summer's carbonara

So it appears that we have hit that point of the summer where the zucchini is flowing like and open tap. I love summer squash of all kind, but sometimes I find it a little bit of a struggle to keep things interesting. Yesterday I decided to try and play around with incorporating a few zucchini into a carbonara, which for some strange reason I kind of associate with the summer. I think I heard somewhere once that carbonaras developed because Italian miners would be away for days at a time sometimes, so they would take along foods that survived well without refrigeration, namely pasta, eggs (which my farmer friends confirm do not need refrigeration) cured meat (traditionally pig jowl), and Parmesan cheese. I'm not sure how true that all is, but it does add up to a quick and tasty sauce that requires minimal cooking (the hot pasta is added to the beaten eggs and tossed to quickly "cook" the sauce which also contains the grated cheese and usually some freshly ground black pepper).

My twist on this dish added zucchini which I sauteed in duck fat (because I wasn't using pork of any kind I needed some source of yummy fatty flavor!) along with some green garlic. I then added some chick peas and chopped parsley (also from the CSA), with a little pasta water to round out the veggies. The cooked whole wheat pasta was tossed into four beaten eggs along with about half a cup of grated cheese and lots of freshly ground pepper. I then mixed in the veggies and served with a little more cheese and pepper to taste. This is really a pretty light sauce, as opposed to many American versions which add heavy cream (absent from the traditional Italian preparation).

A food co-op grows in Queens

So hopefully the word is getting out that we are working on starting a food cooperative in the great borough of Queens. The following is a press announcement sent out recently from our group.

Let me know what you think!



Queens Harvest Food Co-op Wants YOU to Eat Well

Queens Harvest Food Co-op, slated to open near the end of 2011, is entering its second year of planning and is recruiting members and volunteers to help make the project, which will bring healthy, affordable food to western Queens, a reality. The next general public meeting will be held on Monday, July 19th from 7:00-8:30 pm, at Queenswest Arts Loft, 21-25 44th Ave, Suite 105, in Long Island City (click here for a map). All are invited to attend.

The Queens Harvest Food Co-op recently adopted a working model that will enable anyone, regardless of membership or volunteer status, to shop there. The main difference between a food co-operative and a regular grocery store is that the members own the store, self-dictating pricing, sourcing and membership. Unlike the some other co-ops in the city, which operate on a “closed model”, in which only working members may shop, the Queens Harvest Food Co-op will be open to the public. Shoppers who choose to volunteer their time to help run the store will get a discount, and busy shoppers who do not have time to volunteer will pay market prices. Reflecting the economic diversity of Western Queens, co-op organizers hope that this model will allow as many people as possible to enjoy the benefits of co-op shopping.

This working model reflects the guiding principles of the co-op, which include social responsibility, sustainability, and community. The Queens Harvest Food Co-op will provide products affordable to all community members, employ socially responsible practices and product sourcing, and aim to accept food assistance programs (such as WIC and SNAP). Greener than your average grocery, the co-op will also employ sustainable practices, such as buying and selling minimally packaged products and selling items in bulk bins, support and purchase from independent, local, sustainable and organic sources wherever practical and possible, and be built and operate as environmentally responsibly as possible. For the community, the co-op plans to offer educational opportunities and resources for healthy living, social responsibility and sustainability, as well as to honor diversity and be a welcoming place for all people.

Queens Harvest Food Co-op (www.queensharvestcoop.com) invites you to our next meeting to learn more about the project. We have a need for enthusiastic volunteers from all walks of life and worlds of experience. Please email info@queensharvestcoop.com for more information or to RSVP for the July 19th General Meeting at 7:00 pm, at Queenswest Arts Loft, 21-25 44th Ave, Suite 105, in Long Island City.
###
For press inquiries only:
Contact Diane Kolack dkolack@gmail.com, 718-753-6938,
Co-Director of the Outreach Committee for Queens Harvest Food Co-op.

Okay, so its been a while...

Well I know its been quite a while, but I think I finally have time to get back to a little leisurely pondering... just in time to start working on my dissertation! I think that I will use this space to keep doing more of the same; recording what I'm cooking, reviewing books and films on food, commenting on various assorted food/environment/society topics that catch my fancy. I may also start chatting about my research a little more...because then it will feel less like procrastination. Let's see what happens!

Conscious crap - my response to a post on John Mackey in the Yale Sustainable Food Blog

The original post can be found here. In it, the author describes Makey, CEO of Whole Foods, vision of conscious capitalism as a way to " promote a healthy relationship to food in this country". I, as you can imagine, am a bit critical of this position.

My comment to the post:

I recently saw Gus Speth (Yale Dean of Forestry and Environmental Studies) speak at our college about environmental challenges that are ahead of us and the ways that various sectors have tried to address it thus far. Though he stopped short of providing any concrete solutions, his discussion of having to face a post-capitalist society was the most interesting to me. He identified, as the founder of such organizations as the NRDC, how working in the system to try to change has not worked. I think the type of capitalism Mackey suggests, is a continued attempt to gloss over the real structural problems that face the environment in general and the food system in particular. In short, it is just more "green-washing"; attempts to buy our way out of a problem that is fundamentally rooted in consumerism, while trying to make us feel better at the same time. So while Mackey runs a business, which means his first responsibility is to make profit for his shareholders, Whole Foods of course has found something people wanted to buy - a passive ethic and a pretense to real food consciousness - that at the same time does a great job of maintaining the status quo.

NYT article: Urban Food Systems and Better Nutrition

There is an interesting article describing policy initiatives that aim to promote better nutrition by increasing access to local foods. Proposed policies would provide incentives for supermarkets and farmers' markets to locate in areas of need while restricting fast food restaurants. This policy would also require some public agencies to purchase a quantity of food from local sources.
This type of initiative is exactly the kind of systemic change I have been interested in for shaping a healthy, just and sustainable food system. While studying for my "first exam" this winter, I have gotten really into thinking about Kurt Lewin's notions of life-space and channels and gate-keepers (I wish I could say I had picked up on the relevance of this during my course last year...) and the consequences of how these issues shape the way people eat. It really all came together for me when one of my study-mates (thanks T!) said that Lewin was saying that if you want to change the way people eat you have to change the ways food gets to them. That just crystallized all my interests in food-system change in a single -forward sentence. Given this idea, I think that these policy initiatives are a great step and its about time that officials start thinking about shaping the food environment instead of the continual focus on individual lifestyle change.

Eating green in the white house

Well, as you may have noticed I'm not a very big Daily News reader, but this article looking at the new assistant white house chef discusses the focus on eating locally and sustainably. Its interesting to me that this spot light on local food not only is an effort to green wash the new administration (who selected Tom Vilsack, aka best friend of industry, for secretary of agriculture), it also highlights the way in which eating locally is good for the economy (which I agree with on the local scale). Its not a very good article all in all - sort of short and superficial, but it does show how the concept of local food is continuing to rise to new levels of prominence in the contemporary discourse.
Any thoughts?

Feeling alienated because of commodity fetishism?

Then buy local... well not necessarily local, but one Brooklyn resident (in another life experiment for a year in the vein of No Impact Man, Barbara Kingsolver, Gary Nahban among others (as opposed to long standing lifestyle change found in folks like one of my heroes Joan Gussow)) tried buying only from producers whom he knew, or at least met one of the workers along the commodity chain. His project is called the Consumer Reconnection Project and his blog can be found here. He met producers from local farmers (my favorite!) to athletic shoe producers in an attempt to demystify the social relations of production (at least in my words). In his words he set out to "become aware of my own dependence on blind consumption, and gain an understanding of the people and processes involved in making commodities available to me." A noble project regardless of the underlying theoretical framework I would say. Check out his site and think about the "who" and the "how" behind what you buy (along with the food you eat).

Root veggies and Chicken Pot Pie

I decided to use up some root veggies by making a chicken pot pie - and yes, I literally baked it in the pot, which made it pretty simple and easy to clean up. I think you can use just about any hearty veg in this kind of dish. I made this right before getting the second share from our winter CSA, so I was happy to use up the rest of my carrots (of course we got more) and some of the potatoes (help, I need more potato recipes!) in something comforting and hearty to help warm us up in these gloomy gray winter days.

This is sort of a conglomeration of lots of recipes I have read and a bit of improvisation. Use your favorite pie crust recipe - I pulled together a quick flaky pie crust using the food processor, and it came out just right. If you want to avoid the pastry making, you could also top this off with a sheet of puff pastry to make things simpler.

For the filling:
3 c of a mix of cooked root veggies of your choice (I used about 2 c carrot and 1 c potatoes)
2 c cooked chicken breast, cut into bite sized pieces
1/4 c butter
6T a-p flour
1 c milk
2 c chicken stock
fresh or dried herbs of your choice
salt and pepper to taste

preheat the oven to 425 F
in a 2 1/2 to 3 quart pot:
make a roux by melting the butter and whisking in the flour, cooking until mixture turns golden
whisk in the milk and stock
stir regularly as it thickens and comes to a simmer
add herbs and salt and pepper
stir in cooked chicken and let simmer gently for about 10 minutes so the flavors come together
stir in veggies and check seasoning
let cool a little
tuck the pastry over the top of the pot when everything is cool enough to handle
bake for about 30 - 40 minutes until bubbling and the crust has turned golden

The winter CSA

So this is my first year with a winter CSA share. Its exciting to have a steady flow of veggies through the winter, but I am a little concerned about the variety, or lack there of. I've heard lots of complaints from those in last year's winter share that there was just too much of too few a variety, and lots of heavy roots can get tiresome. I have to admit, though, I love the heavy, savory root veggies of the winter and I look forward to the challenge of finding new ways to use them. For me, soup is always a "go to" option to incorporate just about anything all year round, but in winter I especially enjoy a bowl of warming and hearty soup with a little crusty bread on the side. I really enjoyed incorporating sweet potatoes into this classic black bean soup recipe; it gave the soup a nice contrast to the black beans - with the sweet and toothsome potato cubes - while adding a nice splash of color in an otherwise gloomy looking soup. To do this just add peeled, cubed cooked sweet potatoes, from one or two sweet potatoes, to your favorite black bean soup recipe. If you can, boil the potatoes in the stock you are using before adding the beans, it will add even more flavor to the soup. Take half of the solids out (in this case it was onions, beans and the sweet potatoes) and puree the soup directly in the pot with an immersion blender, then return the solids to the pot and season with salt and pepper and bring back to a simmer.

NYT article: Regional food in VT

OK, so I have a little bit of an obsession with Vermont. I perhaps overly romanticize the New England ruggedness of the culture there, and maybe I'm just a sucker for the landscape, but here is a new thing for local food lovers to love - for real. It appears that there is a food renaissance taking place in VT, and these shining star restaurants feature local foods on the menu at their backwater venues. Its exciting to see that this movement can contribute to reviving (or creating) culinary culture in place both struggling with the depressed economy (I know we all are, but...) and not otherwise known for find cuisine. Read more about it here.

NYT article: Returning to the (small) farm

It seems like the interest in turning long suburbanized landscapes into productive landscapes continues to grow. Even out in Rockland county, which seemed very sub/ex urban on my last visit to Bear Mountain, seems to be rediscovering the value of small scale growing. This is more than just the continued interest in gardening, but growing for sale in places that have long since left their farming tradition behind in favor of luxury living outside of the city. It is really encouraging to see the activities described in this article. I feel like this movement comes from a good place; a place of awakening to the need to connect to our own production, to participate in fulfilling our communities needs without turning to the common convenience of industry to fulfill them like we have so much for the last several decades. I hope that this movement continues, and does not fizzle out like the previous "back to the land" movements of the 1960's. I guess time will tell... in the mean time, keep growing!

Getting into the cabbage

This recipe is probably not remotely authentic since I learned how to make stuffed cabbage from my Vietnamese mother... but it is pretty tasty. The cabbage is rolling in to the CSA now, and its nor really slaw time anymore, so I thought I would go for something warming and comforting like my mom's stuffed cabbage braised in tomato sauce. Our CSA also recently joined the Louis Waite Farm CSA which is a meat farm that is also sort of a farm co-op working with a bunch of other vendors in the area (upstate and southern VT) to provide other goodies like bread, honey, eggs and jams - yum! These week we ordered some ground beef among other things, and I thought stuffed cabbage would be a perfect thing to make.

This recipe is pretty simple and straight forward. I took the whole head of cabbage and submerged it in salted boiling water for a few minutes, until it begins to soften. I then strained it and cooled it under a little cool water to stop the cooking and make it easier to handle. Meanwhile, I diced an onion and began sauteeing it in a pan with a bit of olive oil. I peeled away the largest leaves of the cabbage - about 12 leaves in all - and cut out the tough base of the vein at the bottom. After the onions were cooked through I mixed in about a pound of ground beef (I think the package said 0.92), and a half cup of uncooked rice, with some salt and pepper. I scooped a heaping spoonful into each leaf and rolled it up, securing it with a tooth pick. I laid them in large, wide based pot and simmered them in about a cup and a half of red sauce which we had already made in the fridge, with about a cup of water or so to surround the cabbage about 3/4's of the way up, and add a little drizzle of olive oil. Cover and simmer for about an hour. It should be ready to go, but once you take the cabbage rolls out, if the sauce isn't as thick as you would like it, reduce it about until it is the desired consistancy. Enjoy!

The meanings of local

There is an interesting article on the meanings of local food posted on the USA Today website. It explores the concept of local using the narrative perspective of a farmer. The farmer considers the various uses of the label local found in grocery stores near him and in the region and points out the multiple interpretations (40 miles, 100 miles, on up) that are used to brand produce and other products as local, obviously in an attempt to capitalize on the rising popularity of this food trend. I've been really hesitant to frame local food as a trend, but it has reached a tipping point where there is clearly a cache to labeling products "local" and it is being used regardless of the other meanings and values many engaged participants in the "movement" hold. This is particularly interesting to me as these are the themes emerging from my own research. There are a whole set of practices involved in the broader notion of local that I (we) have a hard time matching up with the Wal-Mart notion of local (which is their new strategy post-organic). I think its important to continue this dialogue in order for "local food" to maintain some meaning, value (use, exchange and otherwise) and integrity.

So lets keep talking about it! What does "local food" mean to you?

Collards with Garbanzo Beans and Sausage

Tonight we had an extremely satisfying dinner that was so easy to put together after a long day at school. In an attempt to use more dried beans I had some garbanzo beans (aka: chick peas) waiting to be used. While using dried beans seems labor intensive, it really couldn't be easier- you just need some time. I soaked the beans overnight and then simmered them yesterday morning for a few hours- they are never quite as soft as canned beans, but will be just fine with a little extra cooking. I also had sauted collard greens (from the farmer's market) with olive oil and garlic yesterday. Tonight, when I got home, I browned some sausage (English Bangers from our friends at Violet Hill Farm) in a large frying pan. When the sausage was almost done I deglazed (to get all the flavorful bits) with a splash of water, tossed in the garbanzos and collards, drizzled a bit of olive oil, et voila! Dinner was ready.

It is very satisfying to look at my plate and realize that most, if not all, of the ingredients were produced locally. This is something I strive toward and achieve with regularity. Since the sausage and collard greens were from NYS it got me wondering about the chick peas...where exactly do these beans come from? The package says they were distributed in Colorado, but where were they grown? I did a little research and learned that most garbanzo beans come from India and other far away places even though they are supposed to be very easy to sprout and grow. The wheels are spinning for the garden next year...

The magic and mysteries of soup

Fall is here and I can really see it in the CSA share these days. We are now transitioning from all the lovely summer veggies to nice, hearty produce like the beautiful savoy cabbage, sweet potatoes, carrots, and of course squash of all kinds (including, acorn, dumpling, sunshine, butternut and buttercup). Squash can be a little intimidating to make and it does take a little time and care to prepare. This is especially true if you want to peel it and cube which can be a challenge for anyone (darn those sturdy skins!). I find myself roasting them a lot, particularly if I don't know what I'm going to make!

Last week I had some time and roasted a buttercup squash that I made into a delicious "pumpkin" cornmeal cake (alas, I forgot to take picture, but I'm sure I will make it again), and the rest of the squash turned into my favorite chocolate chip squash bread recipe (which I posted here last winter). Yesterday I had a little time, and a lot of squash from this week's share, so I cut an acorn squash in half and roasted it in a greased baking dish at 375 for about 45 minutes. I didn't yet have a plan for it, but I knew that if I roasted it the idea would come. This is also great for me, since I work a pretty full day on Fridays and would be a little pressed for time when I get home. When I finally did get home I decided to make Diane's Friend's "Pumpkin and Cheddar" soup. I happened to have everything on hand, including some home-made veggie stock in the fridge (which I substituted for the chicken stock in the recipe). I love making veggie stock and freezing it for later with all of the wonderful veggie scraps I have left over from prepping everything. Its great to have on hand and is a great last use for these scraps before they head to the compost bin!
The soup was delicious, which I already knew since Diane had made it last week. I love the smooth creamy texture and sweet and spicy flavors. I also added a bit of smoked salt to give a little more smokey flavor as well.

This recipe was featured this week in our CSA newsletter.

NYC Compost Giveback

Last weekend was the annual NYC compost giveback. I eagerly await this time of year so I can get as much free compost as I can shovel, load and transport home to nourish my garden. This year I went alone and I figure that I ended up with about 300 pounds of the "black gold." I had such nice experiences with other compost shovelers (I was given a baby shovel to use and also a bottomless bucket to ease the bag-filling), but also learned that this may be the last year for the giveback. Due to budget cuts, the city will no longer pick up leaves (which is the main ingredient in the city compost!) I was horrified when I heard this bit of news...at a time of economic uncertainty it seems that programs like this should be a priority. Between the plunging economy and the locavore movement, people may grow more of their own food. The compost is a wonderful addition to any garden, one that will be sorely missed if the information I received is true. There is one last compost giveback this year, in Staten Island the weekend of October 18th- go and get it! See the NYC Composting Project for more details: http://www.nyccompost.org/program/givebacks.html

I think I can!

I finally embarked on the big project of canning tomatoes to save for the winter. It was so exciting, if not a little intimidating. I signed up for the 2o lb tomato share from our CSA, and chatted with a lot folks about just how to go about preparing these beauties to save a little summer for later.
After a lot of chatting and a little bit of reading, I decided to "hot pack" them for processing. This involved a great deal of peeling, and I would like to thank Diane for kindly helping. We used serrated peelers that I think was a great way to go, and a lot more appealing than blanching on this last warm summer day. It was great to sit at the table and chat and peel away - Diane pointed out that it was almost meditative in way, and I totally agree. She had to leave shortly after the peeling was done, so I set out to prep them the rest of the way on my own. I pureed a few of the peeled tomatoes with water to fill up the pot and keep the acid up and set out to boil the tomatoes. Luckily, Maggie called right around this point and stopped by to help me with the rest. It only took about five minutes of gently boiling to get them ready to can. I had already prepped the jars and lids, so Maggie set about helping me add the lemon juice (to add a bit more acid since the cans will be packed with the tomato water) and filling the jars. We used a chopstick to remove any air bubbles that might get stuck inside the jar and topped them off with the lids, giving a gentle, yet firm squeeze to tighten. We processed the jars in a water bath canner for 40 minutes or so. We pulled them out and waited for that wonderful "pop" that lets us know the seal is good. It was so exciting and I am really looking forward to my summer tomatoes come January!
Thanks for all of the help!

Oh the abadoned eggplant....

So last week it was abundantly clear that those beautiful globe eggplants were the CSA rejected veggie of the week, leaving an overflowing box full of them at the end of the evening of deliveries. I can definitely relate to the intimidating feeling one my get looking at these large beauties, but I don't quite get the objections to things like their flavor or texture... I think if you do it right, which can include not doing much at all but simply grill them and give a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil, they're pretty delicious! But if you need further convincing to keep the eggplant from your share this week (if you are receiving them) here is an interesting article in the New York Times, that also espouses the health benefits of this mysterious and lovely veggie.