Vegan Adventures - "The Healthy Vegan"

For more on my vegan adventures, there's a new guest post up by Yours Truly on McDougalling with Chile and Friends, "The Healthy Vegan."

Check it out!

Eat local, eat safe

I had a completely different post planned today, but decided to start a discussion instead. 

As I browsed my local paper on-line yesterday morning, I saw this, "Peanut recall grows as feds find problems at plant." The article goes on to say, 

Managers at the Blakely, GA plant owned by Peanut Corp of America continued shipping peanut products even after they were found to contain salmonella.

Peanut Corp expanded it's recall Wednesday to all peanut products produced at the plant since January 1, 2007...

More than 500 people have gotten sick in the outbreak and at least 8 may have died as a result of salmonella infection. More than 400 products have been recalled. The plant has stopped all production.

"We feel very confident that this is one of the largest recalls we've ever had," said Stephen Sundlof, head of the FDA's food safety center. "We're still in the process of identifying products."

"Here is a company that knew it had salmonella in a product and still released it," said Michael Doyle, head of the food safety center at the University of Georgia.

Of course, that's not all.  Wednesday, my husband sent me a link to another food-related article, this one from the Washington Post, "Study Finds High-Fructose Corn Syrup Contains Mercury."

Almost half of tested samples of commercial high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS) contained mercury, which was also found in nearly a third of 55 popular brand-name food and beverage products where HFCS is the first or second-highest labeled ingredient, according to two new U.S. studies.

If these were isolated events, then maybe we could brush them off. But we're routinely seeing reports like these now. We've figured out in the last year that we can't trust the banks with our money. We've figured out in the last year that we can't trust the government or food manufacturers with our health. So who can we trust?

When we eat local, buying from area farmers, we have the opportunity to know EXACTLY where our food comes from. I bought those collards from Lois, and my tomatoes from Tanya, and those onions came from my backyard garden. And I know HOW they were grown because I ask.

When we know where our food comes from, when we are face-to-face with the farmers asking questions, when we visit their farms to see first hand how our food is grown... we are taking back control. 

When we eat local, we eat safe.

Of course, as I write this I have 1/2 a jar of peanut butter in the fridge and some rice milk, neither of which is local. And then what about the organic rice I buy? It's local (grown here in Texas), but I buy it from a company - not a farmer. So am I sure it's safe? 

There has to be a happy medium here. Most of our foods should, I think, come from local sources (because they are healthier for us and the environment that way). But I also think that we should be able to enjoy some of the foods we consider staples without worrying about mercury, salmonella, and all those other "nasties" that make their way into our food supply. What about rice, whole wheat flour, baking soda, sugar, and salt? For some of us, a few of these things might be local, but most of us can't go 100% local without giving up baking entirely. Is it possible to find a happy medium between a local diet and nutrient-dense, environmentally responsible, but manufactured food? 

So, what are your thoughts on the recalls? Do you think they have a long-term effect on the buying habits of Americans? Or is it temporary? At what point will the general population say, "enough is enough." How to we regain control in the insanity we now call the food industry? Is it possible to eat entirely locally or do we need to demand better standards of manufacturers too?

Chile Got Me (Or 7 Random Things About Me)

That's right. Chile "I don't do memes" Chews got me this week with the most recent meme to run the blogosphere, "Seven Random Things."

She posted it on her spin-off site "McDougalling with Chile and Friends," which is a FABULOUS resource if you're a vegan. Of course, this is also a shameless plug for me since I'm one of the "And Friends" who guest-posts there from time to time. Anyway, since Chile launched the meme off a foodie-blog, I'm going to run with the food theme for my seven random things...

Let's see, Seven Random (food) Things about little ole me...

1. I'd never eaten spaghetti squash before last spring and now it's my favorite veggie (Lesson: never be afraid to try new things)
2. I can't be in the same room with sauerkraut without gagging. It's nasty, dude? Who eats that stuff? (Lesson: be afraid, be very afraid)
3. The cabbage growing in my garden are mutant-big! (Lesson: homemade compost rocks)
4. Peaches are my absolute favorite fruit (Lesson: Must live in proximity to father who is willing to deliver fresh, local peaches a bushel at a time)
5. My secret non-local cravings are peanut butter, bananas, mangos, and cereal (Lesson: being perfect is boring, give in to a craving every once in awhile)
6. I recently burned 4 loaves of pumpkin bread (2 recipes worth) and blamed that gosh-darn oven for running too hot. Come to find out I put the oven rack in one level too high. Ugh. (Lesson: never blame the oven before you troubleshoot the ditsy baker)
7. I often threaten to turn my kitties into Kitty Noodle Casserole when they are naughty. Does that count? (Lesson: be resourceful in the kitchen)

Hope I made you smile. I'm going to cheat here (I've never been good at "rules") and not tag anyone else. But I'd love to hear some random things about each of you. Do share...

P.S. This is WAY easier than the 25 random things meme I keep getting hit with on Facebook. Twenty-five things? I don't think I'm that interesting...

Market to Table - January 29, 2009

I don't know if I've mentioned this before, but I readily admit that I hate cooking. I love to eat, but hate the prep work. Now, baking is fun - I mean, seriously, how can you not like playing with all that sugar. Cooking? Yeah,  not so much. But, you  know, there's something about slipping into the backyard to clip spinach or pull green onion that's thrilling. Yeah, you see that? I grew it. Uh huh. Lunch time!

Because of my cooking aversion, I tend to stick to easy meals (as I'm sure most of you have noticed). I like the simple things - a bowl of fresh fruit, a hearty sandwich, a slice of veggie pizza, a bowl of brown rice (the kind the sticks together in a big mass of rice-y goodness)... Sure, nothing I make would be found in a five star restaurant, but you wouldn't find me there either. Simple works for me.

Rice Wraps - That being said, I managed to jazz up my rice dishes this week with some collard greens. With a cup of brown rice (Brazos Natural Foods) cooking one one burner, I chopped and sauteed some carrot (farmers market), green onion (backyard garden), mushrooms (Farm Patch Produce Market), spinach (backyard garden), and a tomato (farmers market) until the veggies softened; then added a 1/2 cup of cooked black beans (DiIorio Farm and Market). When the rice was ready, I added it to the veggie mix. Next, I scooped a few tablespoons of the veggie-rice filling into three collard green leaves (farmers market) and wrapped them up like a burrito. I added some to the side of the dish to nibble on and I even had enough leftover for dinner that night. Let me tell you, it was fabulous! Of course, that side dish of fresh watermelon (Farm Patch Produce Market) doesn't hurt anything (sorry, I had to rub it in a little). And it's all local!

Potato Stir Fry - Some of the rest of those farmers market finds from last Saturday became a wonderful potato stir fry. Let's see. I chopped up some carrots (farmers market), red potatoes (farmers market), lettuce (left from farmers market two weeks ago), green onion (backyard garden), mushrooms (Farm Patch Produce Market), and a tomato (farmers market) and tossed it all in a frying pan with some olive oil (Sandy Oaks). Once the veggies have softened, dig in! 

I don't think it gets any easier than that! And the beauty of a stir fry is 1) there's no limit to the variety of veggies you can add to the dish, 2) you can easily add more veggies to serve as many people as you'd like, and 3) it's fast and easy! My kind of meal AND I used all local foods!

Whole Wheat Rolls - Ok. One more picture. Talk about food porn - how about these gorgeous buns! Pictured here are only half of them. I made them for a Groundhog Day party this weekend. We're each supposed to bring "groundhog" themed food (be creative, our host said). Well, these rolls have been made from "ground" flour. I also thought about bring root vegetables, but these rolls are just too pretty and I wanted to show them off. Unfortunately, the only thing local about them is the honey (farmers market) and well, the water. But the organic whole wheat flour, the salt, the oil, and the gluten flour were all purchased at our local natural food store and both the flour and salt I bought in bulk using my own containers. So they aren't entirely local, but I feel good supporting a local business and there's just nothing like homemade bread!

Anyone drooling yet? Look, you don't have be a famous chef to enjoy the harvest at your local farmers market. You don't even have to like cooking. With easy meals like these, you can enjoy the wonderful flavors that only fresh, local food can provide, and still have plenty of time for fun!

So what local foods made their way to your table this week? 

A "How To" Guide to Eating Locally

So, you've decided to be a locavore, or you're thinking about it and would like more information on what it might mean for your weekly grocery shopping. Here are a few tips to eating locally, no matter where you live:

Decide How "Local" You Want to Be. Many people define "local" with a 100-mile radius from their home. Others go to 200 or 250 miles. While others consider "local" anything within their state of residence. I do a little of everything. Most (about 80%) of my food comes from within 100 miles (more like within 40 miles). Fruit is a bit harder to find and I generally consider any rice, olive oil, or fruit that was grown in my state to be local (although when I have a choice, I choose as close to home as possible). This decision will become easier once you start identifying local sources of foods.

Finding Resources - Finding resources is, by far, the most difficult part of being a locavore. The good news is that once you identify your sources, being a locavore is almost as easy as shopping at those big-box stores. Except now, your food will taste better, it will be more nutritionally-dense, and you'll be helping the environment and your community in the process.

So how do you even begin to identify these local food resources?

1. Visit the Local Harvest website. Local Harvest is a great web resource that helps link locavores with producers anywhere in the country. Simply type in your zip code and discover information about the many producers in your area, or narrow the search and identify just farmers markets, or locally-sourced restaurants, or farms. The choice is yours.
   
2. Visit your Local Farmers Market. As the number of locavores have increased around the country, so have the number of farmers markets. Chances are, you have one near you. You can either ask around, look for announcements in the community calendar of your local newspaper, or use Local Harvest's website to find the farmers market nearest you. Some farmers markets run year-round, others only during the warmer months of the year. Typically what you'll find is a series of stalls or tables where each farmer displays his products. Feel free to ask each farmer about growing practices (organic/naturally grown), when the item was picked, and if they have any cooking suggestions (I've received tons of great tips on cooking from my farmer's market vendors). Be sure to bring cash (although some of the larger markets will take checks or credit cards) and don't forget the kids. This is a wonderful opportunity to get children involved in what they eat.
3. Join a CSA. Can't quite make it to the farmers market each week? Think about joining a CSA (that's Community Supported Agriculture). A CSA is a great way to get involved with a local farm. Basically you pay the farm a fee, and in return, you are given so many weeks of vegetables based on the farm's productivity. Was it a good year? You'll benefit from the farm's wonderful harvest. A slower year? You'll get a bit less each week. So be sure to find a farm with a great reputation. Always feel free to ask to talk to some of the current members. Some CSAs deliver your weekly bounty right to your front door. Others require a once a week pick up. Many offer "farm days" where you can come out to visit the farm or even opportunities to plant and participate in the harvest. What fun!
4. Visit your Natural Food Store. Is your farmers market closed in the winter? Perhaps you need a few staples that aren't available at the farmers market, but you're pretty sure they're grown locally. Check out your local natural food store and talk to the staff. Explain that you are looking for locally sourced food and have them help you identify items that came from local sources. My town even has a permanent produce market (open 7 days a week), but don't assume everything is local. Feel free to ask for help.
5. Visit Local Farms. Many farms will offer tours of their facilities (check your local paper or individual farm websites). Take them up on the offer. Some are free while others request a small fee, but they are always fun, informative, and a great educational tool for kids. While you're there, be sure to ask where you can find their local products (directly at the farm, at your local natural food store, the farmers market, or perhaps they deliver to a more centrally located place in town).
6. Pick your own Fruit. Nothing beats fruit right off the tree or vine. And there are opportunities all over the country where you can pick your own and take it home to enjoy. Try the Pick Your Own website. Search by your state and county to find local fruit orchards near you.
7. Check Out Your Local Grocery Store. Every once in awhile, you can even find local produce at your big-box grocery store. I don't shop there often, but I've been able to identify a few things there that are consistently local. Check out your grocery ads, the signs posted in the store, or check the back of the package to see if it was grown in your neck of the woods.
8. Ask. As you start to build your resource base, keep asking around. Chances are someone is providing the very product you are looking for. It's just a matter of talking to the right person. When friends, relatives, and your new farmers market vendor-friends find out your interested, they'll be sure to pass along tips as they hear them. And new resources pop up all the time. Be patient and persevere, and slowly but surely, resources will present themselves.

Note: If you are from the Bryan-College Station, TX area, I've already done most of the work for you! Check out my page, "Be a Locavore - Local Food Resources," for a list of food resources by product type.

Make a Plan - Don't panic! You don't have to switch all your food to local sources all at once. Take it one step at a time. Start with the farmers market or natural food store and determine what they have to offer. Call around to local bakeries to find out if they bake their own bread from whole and/or local ingredients. Bread, eggs, herbs, and veggies are usually the easiest items to find locally. Start there and ease into this new wonderful lifestyle while you search out sources of other foods like meat, dairy, and fruit.

Adjusting to Eating Seasonally - Eating seasonally is not the same as eating locally, but more often than not, it happens at the same time. When you are eating locally, you can still have summer produce in the winter, IF you've preserved it by canning or freezing. Eating seasonally is nothing more than eating whatever is in season at that particular time of year, and more often than not, you'll be eating seasonally AND locally.

The bad news is that means you most likely won't be eating your favorite food year-round. But really, it tastes so much better to eat with the seasons that you'll soon forget the instant gratification of those big-box grocery stores and long only for fresh local produce.

So what kinds of adjustments might you need to make?

1. Menu planning. Forget all those complicated recipe books and get ready to have a little fun. First of all, your farmers market finds (or your CSA share) will be determining what's on the menu. Be creative. There are many ways to substitute ingredients. For instance, I've never seen celery at our farmers market, but I've learned to use the stems from leafy greens like swiss chard instead. It has a similar flavor and that wonderful crunch - it's great for salads, soups and stir fries alike! Honestly, the first time I ever made soup from scratch, I spent hours searching for a recipe on-line. In the end, I just ended up chopping up some veggies, sauteing them in olive oil, filling the pot with water, seasoning with salt and pepper, and letting it simmer on the stove for 2 hours. Nothing special, no recipe, and it was the BEST soup I've ever eaten in my life! Just go with what you have, be creative with substitutions, and be prepared to devour a wonderful meal!
2. Shopping in multiple locations. Ok. So eating locally may mean an extra trip here and there. Unlike those big-box grocery stores, you most like won't find EVERYTHING in one location. Again, you'll get over it because the food will be so good, you'd no longer even consider buying produce shipped from across the world. Ick! You may get your veggies from the farmers market, your dairy from the farm (or a designated pick-up location in town), and your bread from the local bakery. It may take a little extra effort at first, but before long you won't even think about it. The time spent in each place will mean good food as well as newly established relationships with shop owners and farmers. You'll look forward to these new errands as much as the food you receive from them.

Becoming Fearless - I wasn't sure what to expect when I first started my journey as a locavore, but becoming fearless certainly wasn't one of them. Where once I was afraid to try anything new (I certainly could never do THAT, right?), I now am eager to take part in new experiences. Where once I thought I would never participate in "domestic" activities, I have learned to make my own yogurt, bake my own bread, cook soups from scratch, preserve foods through a variety of canning techniques and yes, I've even started my own garden. And it turns out, I've loved every minute of it.

For me, eating locally changed my life. Where once life was defined by all the things I couldn't do, now I have no limits. I'm empowered. I'm alive. I'm healthy. And where once I was shy, I now eagerly accept invitations to speak about the wonders of eating locally. Who knew one stop at our local farmers market would change my whole life.

Be alive, be empowered, be fearless - Eat Local!

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If you're not quite convinced and would like more information on the many benefits of being a locavore, visit the post, "The Benefits of Eating Locally."

And if you have any questions, you know where to find me! In the meantime, Happy (and mindful) eating!

The Benefits of Eating Locally

At one time or another, you've probably heard someone use the term "locavore." In fact, it was Oxford Dictionary's 2007 Word of the Year. If you haven't, here's the scoop: A locavore is simply someone who eats locally produced foods. Why would anyone want to do that, when the big-box grocery just down the street has a little of anything we've ever desired, available year-round?

The Benefits of Eating Locally

The advantages of eating locally are many. I'll touch on a few here:

• Food Miles - Did you know that most food travels an average of 1500 miles from where it is grown to our plates? I recently visited my mother-in-law in central California where avocados, one of my favorite foods, is available locally-produced, year-round. Yet, if you shop in the big-box grocery store right there in near her house, the avocados are labeled "product of Mexico." That just seems ridiculous to me. And with food prices soaring because the of the unstable price of gas, wouldn't it be nice to introduce a little sanity to our diets. Want to help decrease our dependence on oil? Eat local!
  
• Knowledge is Power - The current infrastructure of the food system is so vast and complicated there's no way to know where your food originates. Think about the Summer 2008 tomato scare. How many months did it take the government to narrow down the source of those tomatoes? Too long, and even then, is anyone really sure? Knowledge is power. When we buy local produce, we have the opportunity to speak face-to-face with the farmers growing our food, we can encourage organic farming practices, and in many cases even visit the very farms that nourish us. Want to know where your food originates? Eat local!
  
• Tastes Better and It's Better for You - Food grown on small, local farms reaches your table faster, which means it was picked at its peak (often the day you purchase it). This means that not only does it taste better, but it's still packed full of nutrients, so it's better for you too! Want high quality, nutritionally dense food that tastes great too? Eat local!
  
• Better for the Environment - Small local farms generally practice crops rotation (nutritionally diverse plants occupy the same growing space in different seasons - tomatoes in summer, perhaps peas in winter)which creates a more rich, nutrient-dense soil. And those same small, local farms, generally follow more organic farming practices than larger corporate farms. That means less chemical pesticides and fertilizers in our soil, in our water, and in our bodies. Looking for a cleaner, healthier environment? Eat local!
  
• Better for the Community - A number of research studes have shown that of every $100 spent at a locally owned business, $45 comes back into the community. That's compared to only a $14 return when we shop at a big-box store. With the economy in a slump, we're all holding on to our pocketbooks just a little bit tighter. It couldn't be a better time to support our local farmers and businesses, our friends and family, and our community by buying local (and don't forget, it's better for our bodies too)! Want a heathy and vibrant community? Eat local!
  

So what are we waiting for? Local is the certainly the way to go. It's better for our bodies; it's better for our environment; and it's better for our communities.

Interested in eating local? Find out where to start in "A How To Guide to Eating Locally." In the meantime, happy (and mindful) Eating!

Local diet update - January 26, 2009

It wasn't so much the cold as the 15 mile an hour winds that had me feeling less than enthusiastic this past Saturday morning. I bundled as warmly as I could and passed up the bike in the garage for the warmth and speed of the Prius. Destination: Farmers Market. 

Despite the weather, we had our usual crowd at the market this weekend. Every few minutes, vendors would lose fliers, bags, even coffee mugs to the gusts of wind and everyone scurried around to retrieve these newly airborne materials. 

Knowing that fresh, local food is the best foundation for a good meal, customers didn't let a little weather keep them huddled at home. Vendors were there and business was good!

This Saturday's farmers market offered another amazing harvest. Available were tomatoes, spinach, collard greens, mustard greens, red potatoes, white potatoes, purple potatoes, turnips, beets, kohlrabi, carrots, broccoli, red onions, yellow onions, green onions, lemons, dried apples, a variety of salsas, pickles, canned okra, herbs, locally-roasted coffee, jams and jellies, homemade sandwich breads, cornbreads, and sweet rolls, tamales, eggs, olive oil, a variety of plants, cornmeal, grits, honey, and more. Pshew! There's just no way to go home empty handed with such a beautiful rainbow of home-grown goodness.

As for me, as you can see, I picked up a dozen eggs, red potatoes, carrots, tomatoes, broccoli, and mustard greens (I think, I'm still not very good at figuring out which greens are which). I already have plans for all these goodies - more steamed broccoli and carrots; stir-fried potatoes with some of the onions from my garden; wraps made from those beautiful greens with a little local rice and plenty of the veggies from the market and my back yard nestled inside. There are so many possibilities...

And here we are. No, your eyes are NOT deceiving you. That's a Texas watermelon there in the picture along with some local mushrooms. Sunday morning, we made a quick stop at the Farm Patch, our local produce market to find these goodies. The mushrooms, will of course, be added to just about everything I eat this week (rice dishes, stir fries, etc). The watermelon? Honestly, I couldn't believe it when I saw it. It's from Texas but not anywhere very close to home (about 400 miles away). It just looked so good and it was from Texas (which this time of year, I consider local - well, for fruit anyway). Besides, it really is an unselfish act. I mean, my compost bin has been pleading with me to add something other than citrus peels (what? your compost bin doesn't talk to you?) and when I tossed in the watermelon rind, well, the compost bin looked much healthier and happier and thanked me profusely (what lovely manners it has!). 

As I was cutting into the watermelon, I thought back to last summer when I had been eating watermelon week after week for months, longing for ANYTHING different. Now, here I am in the dead of winter (as dead as Texas winters get anyway) and feeling the same way about citrus while I drool over this juicy watermelon. Mmmm! It's a good one too! 

I also have plenty of Texas grapefruit and oranges in the fridge; and the pantry is stocked with about a dozen jars of all-local soups (canned over the summer) as well as some local dried black beans, and tomatoes (also canned over the summer). Good heavens! We're still bursting at the seams here with wonderful, fresh local foods. So, I suppose the question to ask is: Anyone interested in moving to Texas? We have an extra room...

Have a great week everyone, and as always, Happy (and mindful) eating!

Vegan Adventures - "A Breath of Fresh Air"

For anyone interested in following my vegan adventures... 

I have another guest post up at McDougalling with Chile and Friends - "A Breath of Fresh Air"

See you there!

Brazos Locavores- February Field Trip Announcement

For all you locals...

We have another exciting trip planned for February. As those of you who frequent our farmers market know, Tanya Miller of Millican Produce is now selling her home-grown, plump, juicy tomatoes year-round! In the midst of all those salad greens, cabbage, green onions, and potatoes, those bright red tomatoes really stand out; demanding they be noticed, taken home, adn enjoyed. How is it possible? Join the Brazos Locavores on our next field trip to find out!

Here's the scoop:

When: Sunday, February 22 (1:00 - 4:00)
Where: Brazos Natural Foods (we'll be meeting in the parking lot and carpooling out to Millican Produce)

Everyone is welcome and don't forget to bring the kids. These field trips are a wonderful opportunity to teach our little ones about where good food originates. Please RSVP by Thursday, February 19. Although the greenhouse we'll be visiting is large, it will only accommodate about 25 people. If more people are interested, we'll schedule a second tour. If you have any questions, just let me know. See you there!

The Brazos Locavores is a group whose mission is to connect with local producers in the Brazos Valley and support a lifestlye of mindful eating. The group gathers for monthly field trips to farms, orchards, and dairies within 100 miles of Bryan-College Station meeting local producers, touring their faciilities, learning more about why eating local is the way to go, and meeting others who are interested in living a local lifestyle.

For more information on the Brazos Locavores, check out our website at Brazos Grows, leave a comment below, or feel free to email me any time.

Market to Table - January 22, 2009

Yesterday, I wrote a pretty heavy post about "being the change we want to see in the world." And although these "Market to Table" posts are lighter in nature, it's the same message. It's one thing to talk about changing food policy. It's another thing for each of us to take matters into our own hands, making mindful decisions about where our food comes from, how it was grown, and how it gets to our table. 

One of my favorite quotes is from Barbara Kingslover's Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, "Eaters must understand, how we eat determines how the world is used." When we choose whole foods over processed; when we choose organic, local, and natural, over conventional and feed-lot; when we choose farmers markets, CSAs, and backyard gardens over big-box stores - We vote with our forks; we shape policy with our dollars spent; we become the change we want to see in the world. 

When it comes to food, I choose local. For me, that means a balance of our farmers market, our local natural food store, my backyard garden, and on occasion a few locally produced items carried by our big-box grocery. Of course, it's one thing to purchase local food and quite another to figure out what to do with it. Eating local means that the season determines our meal plans, not our recipe books. It means a little extra creativity and even a few experiments here and there. But it also means we eat the highest quality, most nutritious, tastiest food there is. 

That being said, here's what made it from market to my table this week...

I started out every morning with my homemade tea: Mint from the farmers market, mixed with sage from my indoor garden. Talk about making a statement - my tea, from fresh herbs, requires no chemicals, and since I use my own cloth reusable tea bag, there's never any waste. Of course I usually compliment it with a dish of local fruit and this time of the year, that means citrus. I have plenty of Texas oranges and grapefruits stocking the fridge to last until those berries start to ripen next month.

For noon and dinner time meals you'll just about always find me with a bowl of local rice or potatoes. The dish pictured here is one of my all-local lunches this week. Let's see. I started out with some chopped green onion (my backyard), spinach (my backyard), a chopped tomato (farmers market), black beans (DiIorio Farm and Market), and mushrooms (grocery but grown 40 miles from home), sauteed in olive oil (Sandy Oaks Olive Orchard). Then I added 1/2 cup of rice (Brazos Natural Foods), vegetable broth (from steaming veggies from the farmers market over the weekend), and some water. It simmered on the stove for about an hour, filled the house with a fabulous aroma, and was a real treat. Thankfully, I have another tomato and more black beans to make this dish again later this week.

Potatoes are my other local staple, something that you can always find at our farmers market. I'm afraid I've seen my last sweet potato for the season, but there are still plenty of red potatoes for the taking. The stir fry pictured here is about as easy at it gets. Some potatoes (farmers market), carrots (farmers market), green onion (my backyard), mushrooms (grocery, but grown 40 miles from home), and olive oil (Sandy Oak) made for quite a few quick dinners this week (oh, and the leftovers are great for breakfast if I'm hungry for more that fruit salad). 

Not pictured is the steamed broccoli and carrots (both from the farmers market) that we nibbled on all week; and Dave enjoyed scrambled eggs (farmers market) with my homemade toast and jelly as well as the local vanilla bean ice cream we picked up at Wateroak Farms on Saturday.

You know, becoming more mindful about our food choices can be difficult at first - finding local sources, eating with the seasons (a.k.a. not having year-round access to our favorite foods). But in a time when so much of our lives feels out of control (the economy, the war, the environment), we can make very clear, very deliberate choices about our food. We can change policy by voting with our forks. And THAT is change we can believe in, because we took part. 

Have a great day, everyone. And, as always, Happy (and mindful) eating!

Be the change...

It's official. The era of the Bush Administration has passed and, in a moving ceremony Tuesday, Barak Obama has been inaugurated as the 44th President of the United States. But what's next? From where will this "change we can believe in" come? Are we to sit back now, waiting and hoping that the Obama Administration will implement the necessary policies to make us once again a leader of hope and peace both at home and abroad? Absolutely not!

Regardless of the leader, a democratic president is impotent without the power of the people, both demanding and living the change we want to see. If we want things to change, we have to BE that change; we have to LIVE that change. Obama CANNOT do it, if we ourselves do not do it. It starts with you and with me. It starts in our hearts, our  minds, and in our homes. 

There are so many things that need to be done. There are wars to end and peace to pursue. The environment suffers as we continue to consume it recklessly. The evening news announces layoffs each and every night. Food costs more. Health care costs stop many from the care they so desperately need. Gas prices are again on the rise. And every last one of us is holding on to our pocketbook just a little bit tighter. When did we lose control? How do we get it back? 

The truth of the matter is that although there are some things out of our control, we still have the power to make choices that make a far-reaching impact on our lives; changes each and everyone of us can make - reducing consumption, conserving resources, and mindfully pursuing necessary purchases through local producers. No politician will say it, but the truth is we CAN, we MUST cut back. We need to rethink the way we live and the way we consume. 

Don't wait for the Obama Administration to save us from our dependency on foreign oil. Leave you car in the garage and bike or walk some of your errands. Quit buying produce shipped from New Zealand. Carpool. 

Don't wait for the Obama Administration to clean up our environment. Quit using plastic bags and carry your own reusable ones. Buy organic produce to keep pesticides out of our food, soil, and water supply. Refuse to buy anything in a package that can't be reused or recycled. Install low flow aerators and shower heads. 

Don't wait for the Obama Administration to reenergize our food policy. As much as we'd like Michael Pollan to be our next Secretary of Agriculture, it's not going to happen. So plant your own garden, even if it's just a few herbs. Quit eating at fast food chains. Stock your fridge with whole (non-processed) foods. Visit your local farmers market and support the people who are making a difference right now! 

Don't wait for the Obama Administration to fix our economy. Relief won't come in government bailouts and refund checks. Reclaim control of your finances. Kill the expensive gym membership and take a daily walk instead. Cancel the cable (is there really anything on anyway?) and quit "hanging out" at the mall. Visit a farm, a park, or the library. Play games with your kids, build a snowman, and teach them to cook cookies from scratch. Think before you buy. Don't buy something new if you can repair it or buy it used. And for heavens sake, don't buy something just because it's "green." WE DON'T NEED ALL THIS STUFF!

Don't wait for the Obama Administration to hand us "change we can believe in" on a silver platter. WE are the change. Let's do it!

Wateroak Farms - A Brazos Locavore Field Trip

The Brazos Locavores, a group whose mission is to connect with local producers and support a lifestyle of mindful eating in Bryan-College Station TX, gathered this past Saturday for our monthly field trip - this time to Wateroak Farms, a local goat dairy. 

In December, our field trip corralled 12 interested locavores. So when I issued the announcement about the January field trip and received RSVPs for more than 40 people... well, saying I was thrilled would be an understatement. That's right. More than 40 locavores (including a number of well-behaved children) gathered at Brazos Natural Foods, our rendez-vous point, and car-pooled out to Wateroak Farms, a less than 20-mile trip into neighboring Robertson County.

Owners Mark and Pam Burrow, met our cars at the end of a long, bumpy dirt road where their home rests beside the small dairy building. Although the farm claims less than 40 acres, neighbors have generously allowed Burrows' more than 70 goats to roam on an additional 150 acres. Always in attendance is one of the 3 large dogs that serve to both protect and direct the herd as they graze. As we witnessed their passing, both Mark and Pam answered our many questions and swelled with well-deserved pride in reporting that their ice cream has twice been named one of the "Top 10 Desserts" by the Austin Chronicle Food Editor and Wateroak's selection of cheeses are used by some of Austin's top chefs. What a reputation!

But for those of us looking for supplies a little closer to home, Wateroaks sells at our very own Brazos Natural Foods as well as Specs. And their products grace many a plate at local restaurants such the Village Cafe, Veritas Wine and Bistro, and Messina Hof. Want to order direct? Feel free to drive on out to the farm or have it delivered to Brazos Natural Foods just for you. It just doesn't get any easier to bring fresh local dairy home.

After a period of questions and answers, groups of 10 at a time were given a tour of the dairy where all the magic happens. Would you believe that Pam has personally created over 200 flavors of ice cream? All I want to know is where do I apply to be a taste tester? Ok, maybe not, but what an amazing achievement! And everything from yogurt to cheese to ice cream is made right there in that small building (check out that KitchenAid mixer!). Although milk production is low this time of year, there was plenty of ice cream for sale, and just about every one of us indulged.

By 4:30, the kids were growing weary from their adventures wandering the farm, petting the dogs, and personally admiring every goat, chicken, and of course the resident turkey (Mrs. T). Slowly but surely we trickled out - car by car, with memories to share and a little ice cream too. Dave remarked to me later how amazing it is that these small farms can do what the larger farms cannot - provide a superb product to a wide audience and yet still live in harmony with the land, support sustainable practices, and make a comfortable living. It can be done. It is being done. And what a beautiful life to live. A special thanks to Mark and Pam Burrows for hosting a wonderful afternoon. 

Interested in being a part of the Brazos Locavores? Look for upcoming field trip announcements here at SGF, or email me to be contacted directly. Happy (and mindful) eating!

Local diet update - January 19, 2009

There had been rumors that Saturday would be bitter cold; that many of the vendors wouldn't come out with predicted temperatures in the 20's. While the parking lot where we now meet is great for access, it doesn't provide any shelter from the weather. And 20 degree weather in Texas, well, that's just pushing it. But the cold front blew through on Friday instead and by Saturday morning, we were in the mid 40's. Not bathing suit weather, but warm enough. 

Bundled in as many warm clothes as I could manage, I hopped on my bike and peddled on downtown where the farmers market was well underway. Twelve vendors lined the lot selling all kinds of winter goodies. Check this out: red potatoes, white potatoes, red onions, yellow onions, green onions, cabbage, broccoli, kohlrabi, mustard greens, turnip greens, spinach, a variety of leaf lettuce, tomatoes, beets, carrots, turnips, dried fruits, jams and jellies, pickles, several different kinds of salsas, lemons, honey, eggs, canned okra, cornmeal, grits, whole wheat flour, tamales, sandwich breads, cornbread, pastries, fresh potted plants, handmade crafts like wooden bird feeders, firewood, and much more. How beautiful is it that week after week, the earth provides us with such an amazing harvest? 

As you can see from my photo above, I picked up a couple gorgeous tomatoes, 6 large carrots, 3 heads of broccoli, a bag of leaf lettuce, mint, and 4 pounds of red potatoes. I was sad to see that we have reached the end of the sweet potatoes, but with any luck, I'll be planting my own this spring. Sweet potato heaven is just a season away!

My few purchases are far from my total stock of local food. I still have jars of all-local soup, tomatoes, rice, cornmeal, jams, and beans in the pantry; local ground beef and mozzarella cheese in the freezer; and local mushrooms, nuts, eggs, grapefruit, and oranges in the fridge. Pshew! Anyone hungry?

But that's not all... Saturday afternoon, I led the Brazos Locavores out to Wateroak Farms (a local goat dairy) for our monthly field trip where I purchased a pint of fresh vanilla bean ice cream (more on the field trip tomorrow). Mmmm. Ice cream! 

After a full day of local food purchases, I curled up on the couch back at home with a stir-fry dinner made from all-local ingredients - a perfect end to the day. That was until Dave snuggled in next to me with that pint of vanilla ice cream. Our whole family will vouch for the wonderful flavor and the soft, creamy texture. Wateroak Farms certainly deserves all the awards it has received for it's ice cream. It also receives a thumbs-up from Dave and Kelsey (our Shih Tzu who enjoyed licking the lid) - even I had a little nibble. Mmm, mmm, mmm!

Eating locally is a beautiful expression of community (saturday mornings at the farmers market, supporting local farms and dairies), but at it's heart is about the best our land has to offer - amazing food grown by even more amazing people. 

Have a great week, everyone. And as always, Happy (and mindful) eating!

Hot, flat, and crowded - A book review

Although I've seen him interviewed a number of times on The Daily Show, "Hot, Flat, and Crowded" was my first Thomas Friedman read. The premise of the book is that the Earth as we know it today is "hot" (in the wake of global warming), "flat" (technology in communication and commerce has made it a "small world after all" in that we have access to the world, it's knowledge, and it's products with a second's notice), and "crowded" (the Earth's population is growing at an alarming rate). 

As global warming meets instant gratification for a world full of people by today's standards of consumption, we get a host of problems ranging from what he calls "petrodictatorship" (the people against whom we are fighting the war on terror are the same people from whom we buy our oil - just a little conflict of interest) to widespread energy crisis (all the coal in the world can't get every human being up to the American standard of living).

Friedman stresses that America has fallen behind in it's status as a world leader; that while other countries have braced for the challenges ahead and are decades farther along in the pursuit of energy independence, economic stability, and sustainable living, the US has become lax. In generations past, we were such a leader and we can become one again, but only with determination, focus, and innovation.

We have been living for far too long on borrowed time and borrowed dimes. We need to get back to work on our country and on our planet. The hour is late, the stakes couldn't be higher, the project couldn't be harder, the payoff couldn't be greater.

He goes on to insist that

...if all the world's people start to live like us, it would herald a climate and biodiversity disaster. Does that mean that we don't want people to live like us anymore? No. It means that we have to take the lead in redesigning and reinventing what living like us means... Because if the spread of freedom and free markets is not accompanied by a new approach to how we produce energy and treat the environment, then Mother Nature and planet earth will impose their own constraints on our way of life - constraints and limitations that will be worse than communism... Without it, we are not going to be free much longer - and neither will anybody else.

So far so good. I'm following along nicely. With the middle classes in China and India growing and  demanding the "American" lifestyle, the Earth can't keep up with our consumption requirements. The Earth can't meet our demands and unfortunately, we're not really in a position to call the shots (aka Mother Earth certainly has the power to kick us kids out of the house). But then in his solutions, he contradicts himself from one chapter to another. In one chapter he says we can't "force" companies to go green and in other chapters, he says that in a green revolution, companies must be green or die. Ok. 

Another example, and a quote I heartily agree with, Friedman says

Green is a value that needs to be preserved in and of itself, not because it's going to make your bank account richer, because it makes life richer and always has. At the end of the day that is what the "ethic of conservation" is also about. An ethic of conservation declares that maintaining our natural world that is a value that is impossible to quantify but also impossible to ignore, because of the sheer beauty, wonder, joy, and magic that nature brings to being alive.

Sounds great, but in an earlier chapter, in a literary illustration of what the future might look like, he describes a very Jetsonian (as in the cartoon the Jetsons) lifestyle where every little nook and cranny of life is managed for us by a computer. Do you remember the Jetsons being very in touch with the "sheer beauty, wonder, joy and magic that nature brings to being alive?" His quote talks about being in touch with nature, yet an entire chapter earlier in the book is about how the green revolution will mean more "stuff" for everyone. Everyone can have the consumeristic American lifestyle. Yeah. Great. 

But if I had to sum up Friedman's solution to "hot, flat, and crowded" in four words it would be "technology will save us." This is where it all falls apart for me. Heaven forbid anyone actually reduce their consumption. That would be un-American. Now, I'm not saying that there's no place for technology (in a sustainable future there certainly is); but this utopia he creates where the US government leads the world to create an entirely new infrastructure where the whole world can live the American dream through constant economic growth as well as endless consumption (but who cares because it's all sustainably powered) theory is a bit unrealistic, no?

Not that I believe it's wrong to work toward that utopian dream where the world's supply of products is produced in sustainable buildings, using sustainable resources; and he is definitely on the right track when he explain how and why we need to rethink the way we build buildings, do business, and engineer vehicles... but that's only one piece of the puzzle and frankly, Friedman pokes fun at what I view as a very equal and necessary puzzle piece - the power of the individual to do great things.

In the chapter, "205 Easy Ways to Save the Earth," he remarks that the efforts of the current "green revolution" isn't a revolution at all, but rather a costume party where we all have fun and the only thing that matters is that we "look" green. It's the fashion of the day. To a point I agree. The movement HAS to be more than everyone changing their light bulbs, but at the same time there are REAL people out there making REAL changes. Tell No Impact Man (or the lives he's inspired) that his journey has been for naught because within seconds consumptive demands in China negate anything he has ever done. 

We have to fight this battle for life on planet Earth in two ways. Sure, our government (and I agree it HAS to be the US government) MUST lead the world in making innovative changes to reduce our impact on the Earth. BUT (and I think Friedman greatly underestimates us), there are people who know the stakes, they understand the odds, and they make changes in their life every day as well as inspire others in the process.  And so has evolved a generation of individuals who see this goal of endless economic growth as the joke that it is. They know that living a simpler, greener, and more frugal life isn't about deprivation, it's about reconnecting with what makes us human. It's about health, and happiness, and quality of life. Great. Fund technology, give us wind and solar power, give us greener options, but don't underestimate the power of a simpler life; a life more in tune with the earth; a life without the distraction of "stuff."

Ok. I'm off my soapbox. Back to the book. Honestly, I learned a lot and it's worth spending the time to read. I agree with his synopsis of the problems, but in the end his solution sounds like a world with  just more "stuff." I don't believe that is the answer. Technology can and will help us, but so will good old-fashioned values where nothing goes wasted. If you do check out the book, don't be discouraged that we are wasting our time in pursuit of a more simple-green-frugal life. I believe the only way out of what he calls "hot, flat, and crowded" is mindfulness. The kind us little guys practice every single day.

Market to Table - January 15, 2009

It was another fabulous week in food. Although I enjoyed some of my routine fare, like plenty of Texas grapefruit, homemade all-local soups (canned over the summer), steamed vegetable medley (broccoli, potatoes, carrots, and cauliflower) and an all-local stir-fry or two; I also tried a few new things this week that I'd like to show off...

Black bean patties with fried sweet potato - While on the road to and from California in December, I fell in love with the black bean patties at Chili's. Being a big chain restaurant, they were pretty easy to find since most of our travel was along the interstate. I was pretty sure there wouldn't be anything complicated about making a black bean patty from scratch so last weekend, I set out to make my own. I read maybe a dozen recipes on-line. Each recipe was different. Some were complicated, others had a ton of ingredients. My goal was to make something simple with mostly local ingredients and without having to buy anything new. The result, though it was a complete experiment, was delicious and made enough patties to keep me supplied for lunch for almost a week. Never one to keep a good recipe a secret, here's my version of black bean patties:

SGF's Black Bean Patties

• 1-1/2 c. cooked black beans (I soaked mine overnight and cooked them for 75 minutes in a saucepan over low heat - be sure to measure the beans after they've been cooked)
• 1 carrot, shredded
• 1 green onion, chopped
• 4 small mushrooms, chopped
• 1 c. oatmeal
• 1/2 tbs. whole wheat flour
• 2 tbs canned tomatoes
• salt and pepper to taste

While the beans are cooking, shred the carrot and chop the green onion and mushrooms. Saute them in a little olive oil until soft. Remove from heat and allow to cool. When beans are thoroughly cooked, drain well (I saved the water to freeze and use later in soup). Then place beans into a medium size bowl and smash them gently with a fork. Add sauteed veggies, oatmeal, flour, tomatoes, and seasonings. Mix well. Form into patties and heat thoroughly in a frying pan (with just a little oil) until browned on both sides (a few minutes on each side). 

Once the patties were cooked, I placed one on a slice of my homemade whole wheat bread, added a little organic ketchup (not local unless you're from PA) and some pickles (from our farmers market); and topped it with a second piece of homemade bread. 

With a side of fried sweet potatoes (sweet potato, onion, and mushroom cooked in a little olive oil), this was an absolutely fabulous and hearty meal. Even better, it was almost all local: black beans (DiIorio Farm and Market), carrot (farmers market), green onion (backyard), mushrooms (grocery, but grown in Madisonville about 40 miles from home), canned tomatoes (farmers market tomatoes canned over the summer), sweet potatoes (farmers market), bulb onion (farmers market) and olive oil (Sandy Oaks). The only things that weren't local (salt, flour, and oatmeal) were purchased in bulk from our local, natural food store.  Mouthwatering would be putting it lightly. I'll definitely be trying these again!

Fruit salad - Having nibbled on mostly grapefruit for the better part of the last few months, I was ready to enjoy the last of summer's goodness. With one quart of blackberries left in the freezer and one quart of peaches canned and in the pantry (both local), I decided to break the winter fruit monopoly up with a fruit salad. A cup of summer fruit salad each morning has made for a wonderful break. I don't foresee any problems making it through the rest of the winter on fresh local fruit (which is great since this marked the last of the fruit I put up over the summer), but you can bet I'll be looking forward to berry season this spring. Strawberries are only a month or two away!

Pizza - I know, I know. Pizza isn't really new for me. I've both made and blogged about it a few times. It just makes great food porn! So here it is. Another of my homemade pizzas. I made my homemade, all-local sauce as I usually do with local onions, tomatoes, and mushrooms (cooking instructions here). The crust, however, was different. This time I tried a commenter's recipe (Kerrie from the comments section of one of last week's posts). Some local mozzarella cheese from Sand Creek Farm topped 1/2 the pie (Dave's half). Mine just had that fabulous homemade sauce. Mmm, mmm, mmm! Another home run on the pizza. We're still working on our ideal pizza crust recipe, and with enough pizza sauce in the fridge for another pie, be looking for more pizza next week.

Even now in mid-January, moving from market to table is pretty easy, too easy. Sure, when you eat locally, the market and season decide what you eat rather than any predetermined menu plan. But good food is made so much better by eating in season, eating fresh, eating local. And trust me on this, it just doesn't get any better.

Even if you don't have a farmers market open this time of year, chances are you can find some local food in a natural food store, a nearby farm, or even your local grocery. Be sure to check it out, and as always... Happy (and mindful) eating!

Guest post on McDougalling with Chile

Earlier this week, Chile (of Chile Chews and McDougalling with Chile) asked me to be a guest blogger on McDougalling with Chile. Being a avid reader of both her blogs, I eagerly responded with a "yes!"

A little bit about McDougalling with Chile - Chile regales her adventures in becoming a more mindful eater. For her, that includes the vegan diet best known as the McDougall Program, one I adopted soon after she launched the blog (though I confess to doing the "weenie" version since I still eat nuts and use copious amounts of olive oil). 

Since in Simple-Green-Frugal, I encourage people to adopt a mindful diet as it relates to all local foods (which include meats, dairy, and eggs), guest posting on Chile's blog gave me the opportunity to tell of my own adventure into veganism. And for those of you who have been with me since I received the alarming news of my high cholesterol last August, you might want to check out my guest post. I have good news...

So be sure to check out McDougalling with Chile and my guest post, "With results like these, I wouldn't change a thing!"

Happy (and mindful) eating!

Staying toasty the Simple-Green-Frugal way

Earlier this month, when we received our gas bill, I totally freaked. We went from $21 last month to $52 this month! Surely this must be a mistake. But no, there was no mistake. The difference? Heating the house. That did it. We cranked the thermostat down really low (I'm not sure it has gone off in the weeks since) and braced ourselves for some colder indoor temps. 

This is probably a bit easier for Dave than it is for me. I get cold easily and can't seem to warm myself up without some serious intervention of direct heat (a nice cup of tea works well). During the day, I've been layering clothes, snuggling under blankets (Kelsey likes to snuggle under the blanket with me), taking walks, and sipping that nice warm tea. But bedtime? Well, that's a whole other matter. 

We've never been big on heating the whole house at night when it's just the two of us using one room all night long. So at least this thermal intervention wasn't without trial. We attacked the nighttime with two a two pronged approach - the one that works for Dave and the one that works for Heather.

Intervention #1 - The heated blanket. Why heat up the whole house when you can simply heat the bed? Some people get nervous at the thought of an electric blanket, having visions of waking up on fire. Not me. If I catch fire, at least I die warm. Gotta stay positive, right? No really, the electric blanket never really scared me, so it's a fabulous, very frugal solution to staying nice and toasty in the cold nighttime hours (yep, it gets pretty cold even way down here in Texas).

Intervention #2 - The heating pad. While the electric blanket is great, it doesn't take much to warm Dave up. And to be honest, the temperature setting at which he's most comfortable, I can't even feel the heat. Enter the heating pad. This little gem also plugs in (I must be a fireman's worst nightmare) right next to the bed and is placed underneath me so that I have the heat coming from below (the heating pad) and above (the electric blanket). This definitely does the trick. Then if I wake up at night and feel a little chilled, I just whip that heating pad on and within seconds, I'm warm and right back to sleep. (BTW, that's the temperature in our bedroom when we got up Tuesday morning, but we were toasty warm in the bed for sure!)

If you have children, or others in the house, heating the entire house may be your best bet, but keeping it local/only in the rooms you are using at night is a definitely a simple-green-frugal way to go. This time, I'm looking forward to our heating bill. Come on, gas company. Show me what you got!

P.S. If you're still freezing your tushie off during the day, bake! No one needs to know you spent your day in a lawn chair in front of the oven...

Garden therapy - A backyard garden update (Jan)

It's been a month since my last garden post and what a amazing difference a month makes! Thankfully, it rained enough while we were away over the holidays and just about everything survived (one of the younger broccoli bit the dust). Anyway, over the last month, I've been routinely picking cabbage leaves, onions, spinach, and even a few snow peas (though those snow peas rarely make it as far as the house). 

It won't be long before I'm picking my first head of cabbage. There are 5 in all and I'll pick one as I need it, letting the others grow until I need yet another. I see lots of salads, stir fries and plenty of cabbage soup in my future. Get Big Bertha out, honey! We're going to be doing some major canning before long. 

Each one is growing nicely (ok, the leaf span is so large it borders on mutant, but the heads too are growing larger by the day) and are about the size of two fists. These are certainly my favorite veggie to show off!

The broccoli is growing slowly but surely, and I can just now start to see the little broccoli thing-ies in between all those leaves - is there a technical word for those? broccoli follicles or something? Anyway, the broccoli will surely be harvested late in the season, but even they are coming along. Well, all but one. One little broccoli didn't make it through our vacation away from home, but I had a few extra onions and a kale to slip in its place. 

The snow peas definitely have had issues. Technically, they could be grown without supports. Practically, it SOOO wasn't working. So as you probably can tell from the photo, I've tied them to a wire mesh to keep them vertical. Not only does this keep the bugs off them and up and out of the moist soil, but it makes it WAY easier to see those little snow peas when they're ready to be picked. Next time, we'll put them in the back row with a trellis. I'm learning...

More than anything else, though, my favorite veggie so far is the green onion. There's just something about going out to the garden, digging around in the dirt to loosen that little bulb, pulling it up by the roots, and walking proudly into the kitchen to make whatever veggie concoction I've come up with for the day. They are so incredibly easy to grow, they multiply on their own, and they are so wonderfully tasty. Yeah, for onions!

This 4 ft x 4 ft square of veggie love was the right way to start - small and uncomplicated. I've learned a lot in just these few short months and have been taking notes to do a few things differently next year (like making sure those snow peas have some support and being prepared for gargantuan cabbage). But the time has come to expand this little garden. With all that wood I received from my Dad for the holidays, we have enough to cover the back yard with gardens. I'm not ready to tend to that much veggie love just yet, but we will definitely be adding to our little plot. I've already purchased more bags of vermiculite and purchased seeds for the spring planting. So far, I have seeds for carrots, bush beans, cucumber, spaghetti squash, and bell peppers. I have plenty of leftover basil, oregano, and sage seeds from last year. All I need to get now are some tomato plants and seed potatoes for sweet potatoes. I've examined the planting charts for our area and I should be ready to plant in early March. That means we need to get the beds built, the grass pulled and the soil mixed in the next 6-7 weeks. 

Sure, there's a lot of work ahead for me, but I'm ready. The feeling of going into the backyard to fetch veggies for a dish you'll serve within the hour? It's fulfilling. It's empowering. It's the best kind of therapy there is. Garden therapy. Bring it on!

Local diet update - January 12, 2009

The mission before me looked easy on paper. In fact, it literally WAS on paper - a list of five items to buy at the farmers market; only five items. But the reality of the situation is that when I set foot inside the farmers market boundaries, I loose all self control. I see all those tables covered in local harvest and I lose my resolve, convincing myself that I need one of practically everything. 

But it was getting a little crazy at home. I have a garden out back from which I can harvest green onions, spinach, a few cabbage leaves, and snow peas. I have a pantry full of homemade all-local canned soups, tomatoes, pickles, jelly, rice, and black beans. The fridge is also well stocked with eggs, cornmeal, carrots, leftover fried sweet potatoes, the remaining black bean patties I made on Friday, a drawer full of Texas grapefruit, a fruit salad made with the last of my frozen blueberries and my last jar of canned peaches, and fresh mushrooms. Then there's the cheese that's been shredded and lying in wait in the freezer for our next pizza craving as well as the cornbread pancakes I made last week with about half of the local cornmeal I bought at the farmers market a week ago... All this wonderful all-local food just waiting at home and I need to start reducing their numbers before it gets anymore out of hand. 

Right. So I woke up on Saturday morning to weather in the 40's. Doable, other than the fact that we were also experiencing sustained winds at 15 mph and gusts up to 25 mph. Ok, scratch the bike, we're taking the car.  Canvas bags in hand and my shopping list tucked into my purse, Dave and I headed for the market. Just follow the list, Heather. Just follow the list. I suppose I could have (I don't know) skipped the market since we didn't need much, but that would be unthinkable. Hanging out for hours at the market constitutes my favorite morning of the week and I did want to pick up a few things: broccoli and red potatoes to steam with those leftover carrots for Dave; mint for my morning herbal teas; some fresh plump tomatoes and a bulb onion to make pizza sauce (yep, pizza is back on the menu this week).

As usual, the market was well underway when I arrived. The vendors (all bundled up in their heaviest winter gear) were set up and tending to customers at just about every one of the dozen booths. As we parked, I retrieved my list and silently prayed to the farmers market gods to help me keep my cool. Just follow the list, Heather. Just follow the list.

I took my time at each booth, speaking with each vendor, catching up on the weeks events, talking to a few people about the possibility of Brazos Locavore trips to their farms, and reminiscing about the warm weather we had experienced just the day before. I even ran into several friends. One of those friends was Tammy, who I actually met because of the blog. For the holidays, she had given handmade gift bags full of fruit to each of her loved ones. Well, she brought a gift in for me this weekend as well. In the photo is one of the bag sold at the farmers market (which is just GORGEOUS - I love it!) as well as a handmade bowl made by a local artist I met in December, and a variety of fresh fruit (organic Texas grapefruit and oranges; and organic apples). Thanks, Tammy! This is awesome! 

So how did I do with sticking to my list?  Well, as you can tell from the photo, I did end up with a COUPLE extra things I hadn't planned on. Let's see. I picked up 2 heads of broccoli (check), red potatoes (check), 1 bulb onion (check), 5 juicy tomatoes (check), purple cauliflower also know as "graffiti" cauliflower (wait, that wasn't on the list), and a large coffee cake (yeah, I'm sure that wasn't on the list...). Well, you win some, you loose some, right? And I'm not thinking I lost too much here. That purple cauliflower? Well, it was darn pretty and just had to be tried. And the coffee cake? I remembered late on Friday that I needed to bring "refreshments" to my book club on Saturday night and why not homemade coffee cake? Besides, it looked awesome and the woman who sold it to me said it had just been baked the night before. Mmmm!

The only thing I didn't pick up was mint for tea. And there's kind of a funny story behind this... Lois told me she didn't have any more mint because one of my readers admitted to buying the mint to try the homemade herbal tea I recommend, and she bought the last two bundles of mint. Wait! You mean you guys actually listen to me? That's awesome! Thankfully, I have plenty of tea herbs growing here at home in pots so all is well with the world. I also found out, in talking with John Flynn of our local "What's the Buzz Coffee Company" that just over 5% of his internet traffic is being referred from Simple-Green-Frugal! Woohoo! I'm so pleased that my resource pages are helpful. You guys rock!

Ok, so back to the farmers market. Here's a list of the amazing spread the market had to offer... olive oil, coffee, herbs, lots and lots of salad greens, red potatoes, sweet potatoes, purple potatoes, kohlrabi, spinach, beets, red onions, yellow onions, green onions, carrots, cabbage, lemons, regular cauliflower, cheddar cauliflower, graffiti cauliflower, tomatoes, broccoli, wheat flour, cornmeal, eggs, freshly baked breads and sweets, jams and jellies, dried fruits, honey, plants, fresh tamales, pickles, salsas, fire wood, a few handmade bird houses, and much more. Wow! If it weren't for the weather, I'd never have guessed that it's winter here in Texas. You just can't beat this harvest!

On the way out, I always end with Lois and Garlin Vaughn just as I always start each market with them. By this time, Joe (one of the egg sellers) was handing out doughnuts to anyone who wanted one. Dave, cold but hungry, snagged a doughnut and brought it back to the Vaughn's  booth and began to toast it in front of their space heater. The idea soon caught on and the next thing I knew both the Vaughns and Dave were huddled around me and the heater each with their own doughnut to toast. We must have truly been a sight to see. Lois commented we must have looked like hobos with our sweats and hooded jackets hovering over the heater trying to make sure the jelly didn't get too hot and spill out of the gooey pastry. Of course I forgot to bring my camera! More silly memories made at the market for sure before we hugged and headed for home. Hmm. I still giggle to myself when I think of how ridiculous we must have looked. And I'm pretty sure I've never huddled in front of a heater toasting doughnuts with any of the big-box grocery store employees. Man, I love the farmers market!

So that's what's new at this week's Bryan-College Station farmers market. With so much wonderful food to be shared, there's just no reason not to buy local.  I picked a couple extras I hadn't planned on, but you can bet I'm going to enjoy every bite. Mission accomplished!

Have a great week, everyone. And as always, Happy (and mindful) eating!

Community Events - GardenCamp 2009

Another heads-up for you locals!  The Village Cafe in downtown Bryan is hosting this year's GardenCamp 2009 on Saturday, January 31st. Here's the scoop:

Come learn, speak, eat, and get your hands dirty at Garden Camp!

We will start the day off at noon at Village Cafe with an open-forum of speakers on varied topics to help guide you and your community in building and maintaining your spring garden. We will have several scheduled speakers, but also feel free to sign up and contribute your knowledge with the group.

Bring vegetables and fruits from your garden or your local farmers market to donate to the meal Village Cafe will prepare for us to share after the seminar. At 5PM, we will transport ourselves and the food to Neal Park to share the bounty with our less prosperous neighbors at their regularly scheduled Saturday Pot Lucks. We will also be sharing our newly gained knowledge with their community garden and help them with the tending.

I'll be speaking about eating locally and looking forward to all those great tips on spring gardening in Texas (I can use all the help I can get). Hope to see you there!

If you are interested in attending, RSVP to Kylie at the Village Cafe.

King Corn - A movie review

Because I rent all my movies from the library, I tend to be a little behind the times on checking out the latest and greatest. Here it is 2009 and I just recently had the opportunity to watch "King Corn" (2007). See the trailer here. 

"King Corn" is a documentary detailing the journey of corn from field to plate, as told by Ian Cheney and Curtis Ellis. Cheney and Ellis, upon hearing reports that their generation will have a shorter lifespan than their parents, decided to do a little investigating into what we eat and discovered that our diets are monopolized by corn. Corn? Most people would assume wheat, right? All those pastas and hoagies? I thought we were bread eaters.

But it's true. Our food is swimming in corn. And Cheney and Ellis, in their journey towards discovery, share with us two very important lessons: 1) farming is different today than it was in past generations and 2) corn is in just about everything we eat. Let's start with Lesson #1.

Lesson #1:  Farming is different today than it was in past generations

Food shortages in the 1970's created new national food policy. It fostered the philosophy of "more is better" - basically, "get big or get out." Corn subsidies were introduced and with them came monocultures, acres and acres of crops. Farmers were encouraged to farm every acre with corn, and if their neighbors wouldn't expand, just buy them out. More, more, more. 

Granted, it's an efficient system. Machinery made it easier for less people to manage more farmland. Smaller farms no longer had a place, families moved to the city. How could they compete? As Cheney and Ellis report, in one acre, they plated 31,000 seeds. "It was not exactly a hands-on experience, but then again, it only took us 18 minutes."

Food and farming became measured in yield. Not that the plants are producing more, but the plants have been modified to tolerate living closer together. Iowa farmers are now producing up to 200 bushels per acre (that's 5 tons of food per acre)! More, more, more. Corn gets cheaper, government subsidies bail the farmers out. More, more, more.

So what happens to all this corn? How does it all end up in our bodies anyway?

Lesson #2: Corn is in just about everything we eat.

First, let me clarify that when we're talking about corn here, we're not talking about corn-on-the-cob, that wonderful summer-time treat. We're not even talking about canned corn here. Sorry Mr. Jolly Green Giant. You're not really part of this equation. What we're talking about here is corn that is meant to be processed - into animal feed and sweeteners. Go on. Get up and go in the kitchen. Check those labels. I'll wait until you come back... What did you find? Corn starch, high fructose corn syrup, hydrolized corn protien, etc...

In an effort to figure out how all this corn ends up in our diet, Cheney and Ellis went on a 1-year experiment of their own. They contacted an Iowa corn farmer and "borrowed" one acre of his land to grow their own corn. They jumped right in, applying for government subsidies and all. Learning from the corn farmers of Greene, Iowa, they planted seeds, fertilized, harvested, and deposited their crop in the local grain elevator. But what happens next, they found disturbing. 

Of the grain they grew, 32% will be exported or turned into ethinol. So that doesn't enter our food supply. But of the rest of it, most will become sweeteners or be fed to animals (aka that juicy hamburger at your favorite restaurant). 

Corn in lifestock - Anywhere from 60-90% of food rations for feed-lot cattle is corn. Here's the catch. Cattle aren't meant to eat corn and by the time they are slaughtered, their are dying from a host of other diseases. Mmm. Burger anyone? But grass-fed, the way nature intended, the cattle take far longer to mature and fatten to slaughter-weight. Corn-fed sure seems to be more efficient, right?

Of course, then there is the antibiotics that have to be given to cows to help cattle survive the conditions of confinement. A burger anyone? Still no takers?

Ok, enough about how we are killing cows with our cheap, overproduction of grain. How about some sweet talking - corn sweeteners. Well, Cheney and Ellis weren't permitted to take a film crew into a high fructose corn syrup factory, but they did get one factory to give them a recipe, which of course, they made. "It's definitely sweet," one of them said after tasting it and quickly spitting it back out in the sink.

High fructose corn syrup, or HFCS, became a player in the 70's. With corn being so cheap, it was a way to make all those wonderful processed foods cheaper for the manufacturers. And we all like cheap food, right? No wonder it took so much time to get it out of our house. It's in everything. No really. Go back to the kitchen again and check it out. I'll wait...

What we've really found in all this is that the efficiency, the so called "improvements" to the food system have actually degraded the nutritional quality of food. It has led to obesity and diabetes epidemics. Been to McDonalds lately? The burger (corn fed), the soda (high fructose corn syrup), the french fries (fried in corn oil). Getting the picture?

Ok. So that's the problem, but what is the solution? Here's the thing, people once spent twice the amount of money on food than we do today. Yes, the affordability and availability of food is important, but is the extremes in efficiency to which we've taken that goal healthy? Is it sustainable?

As 2009 proceeds, we reflect on the year that has passed and make plans for the future. I'm willing to bet that many of us have made resolutions with regards to food. Where does your food come from? Is it processed? Filled with corn, soy, and a lot of mystery ingredients? Do you want to fill your body with cheap, nutritionally devoid foods, or reward your body with quality, nutritionally dense foods. Eating well doesn't have to be a wallet-emptying experience, but we have to change our focus, becoming mindful of our food choices. 

Check out the movie. I've heard much of it before (from Michael Pollan mostly, who appears in this video WITH HAIR), but it's still a great reminder of the way our system works - for increased efficiency and productivity... not for our health and wellness. But we do have a choice. So in 2009, may your resolution be to eat well, enjoying whole, unprocessed foods. Explore your local farmers market. Renew your love of good food one bite at a time. I'll be with you the whole way!

Market to Table - January 8, 2009

It has been a wonderful week in food. Normally, I'm pretty bad about eating the same things day after day. I mean, when the food is this fresh, this good, why not enjoy it every day? Ok. Fine. So maybe I'm a tad monotonous on the food front, but this week is far from my normal routine. So what did I do with all those farmers market finds last weekend? Let's see...

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Steamed veggies - Another farmers market trip, another beautiful rainbow of veggie goodness. This has to be one of the easiest medleys to make. I just washed and cut 2 large carrots, 4 medium red potatoes, and a head of broccoli; steamed it in our steamer; and sprinkled a little salt over top. Everything but the salt came straight from our local farmers market. Making this over the weekend in a large quantity meant that it was ready to be added to any quick meal this week. Or what the heck - these veggies can be a meal on their own. Mmmm!

Polenta and sauteed veggies - Remember the carrots from those steamed veggies? Well, I'm not one to throw out good greens. Nope. I chopped the carrots tops, along with 1/2 an onion, and those two tomatoes from a neighbor's back yard, and sauteed everything in olive oil (all local). It made a wonderful sauce for a serving of polenta, made from the cornmeal I picked up at this past Saturday's farmers market. Simple but hearty!

Spaghetti squash with homemade pasta sauce - Little did I know one year ago, but I was about to eat what was to become one of my all-time favorite foods. I can hardly believe that I had never had a spaghetti squash before last spring. Now I can't get enough of them (be on the lookout for them in my Summer 2009 garden)! This squash we picked up at the Aptos Farmers Market while we were on vacation in California over the holiday. I just couldn't pass it up. Back home, baked at 350 degrees for an hour, this gorgeous veggie made a perfect substitute for pasta (I'm not a big pasta eater) and an even more perfect base for my homemade pasta sauce (tomatoes, onion, mushroom, basil, olive oil - all local; flour, sugar, salt - not local).

Thankfully, the spaghetti squash was large enough to provide the meal pictured plus enough strands for another 2-3 meals. I'll be enjoying more of this in the days to come. And of course I can't forget all those beautiful seeds inside. I toasted them with a little salt and olive oil for a fabulous afternoon snack.

Whole wheat vegan pancakes with pineapple ambrosia - Ok. This one isn't entirely local, but stay with me for a second. Lois Vaughn from our farmers market, whose farm has pretty much fed me over the last 15 months had been talking about her wonderful ambrosia for months. So when she promised to make and can it over the holiday, I made her promise to save a jar for me. Last Saturday, I picked up my jar of pineapple ambrosia and brought it home before I realized I didn't know what exactly to do with it. So I opened it, took a quick bite, and then it hit me (those of you who know me won't be surprised by this...) pancakes!

So I made a batch of my homemade vegan pancakes. Nothing in them in local, but the whole wheat flour, the sugar, and the salt were all purchased in bulk from our local, natural food store. Several mornings this week, I warmed up a pancake in the toaster oven and slathered on a little of that ambrosia. I don't know what I was supposed to put the ambrosia on, but a syrup substitute in definitely in the running for one of my better ideas.

Vegetable stir fry and rice - What would my "Market to Table" post be without my standard rice dish? I wouldn't want to disappoint anyone right? This week's dish started out with chopped carrots (tops and all), onions, mushrooms, spinach, and snow peas (all local AND the spinach and snow peas came from my backyard garden) sauteed in a little olive oil with just a pinch of salt. Next, I tossed in 1/2 cup of brown basmati rice (local and purchased in bulk from our natural food store) and 2 cups of water. Simmering on the stove for an hour, the aroma filled the house with the most wonderful smells. There's just nothing like fresh, local food! And the taste, as always, was as rewarding as the aroma. 

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Plenty of other things graced the table this week that aren't here in photos. Each day I nibbled on Texas grapefruit, as well as the clementines and dried apricots we bought at the farmers market while we were in California. I also enjoyed some of my homemade, all-local soups from the pantry and sweet potatoes stir-fried in olive oil for easy evening meals.

Sometimes I wonder what I did before I embarked on this (so far) 15-months of eating locally. The only thing I know for sure is that nothing has ever tasted better. Have a great Thursday, everyone. And as always...

Happy (and mindful) eating!