This may help ease me into the world of hosting dinner parties. I like the idea of not only trying new things myself but encouraging others to do the same. But I might be too much of a control freak to allow others to cook in my kitchen... Thanks, as ever, to Sustainable Table for blogging such creative ideas and solutions!
On another food-related note...but not related to the above...
I had an interview at ICE yesterday evening. I'm considering a culinary degree**. Because I don't have nearly enough to do already.
HAHAHAHA!
Eat, drink, and be adventurous.
* I'll be taking a short break from blogging - I'll be in Denver for ALA Midwinter until next Wednesday.
** Heaven knows, though, that I've done A LOT more research on this one than I did with the Food Studies program at NYU. Sheesh. It just wasn't my bag, baby...and I would've known that ahead of time if I had done proper research.
Showing posts with label Sustainable Table. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Sustainable Table. Show all posts
11.23.2008
A cornucopica, if you will...
Oh, for heaven's sake, you guys! I was having such a lovely, relaxing - albeit, cold - weekend...and when I sit down to my computer on Sunday night, I find that you all have been busy posting all kinds of awesomeness. On one hand, it makes for fascinating reading and I'm always for that. However, it means that I have all kinds of thoughts I want to blog so now I have to do that. And I worry about some of you not having a life away from the computer...but I suppose that's your business...and I don't really know most of you on a personal level.
ANYWAY, here are some of my favorites:
1. The gals at Haphazard Gourmet Girls have started an off-shoot blog: Obama Foodorama. Naturally, anyone interested in food and its policies is curious to see what impact our President-Elect will have on our future...on the food revolution. So the Girls are now tracking it. As I've said, I don't always agree with the Haphazard Gourmet Girls but, to their credit, they always get me thinking and mulling. Let's hope the upcoming administation can actually enact some CHANGE on agricultural policy in the U.S.
2. Chicken Spaghetti has a post up about the movement of Slow Blogging, as reported by the New York Times. Curiously, I get the weekend Times and somehow missed this article! Naturally, the movement of Slow Blogging is inspired by the Slow Food movement*. I love the idea, of course, of both slow food and slow blogging...however, especially in the U.S., I wonder how much of it is a trend and just paying lip service. As a country, are we really committed to slowing down? To doing less? To turning off the world for awhile? To being more intimate? I'd like to think so, but the skeptic in me is doubtful. The NY Times article quotes Todd Sieling as saying that "slow blogging is a rejection of immediacy...It is an affirmation that not all things worth reading are written quickly." Okay, I get it. I do. But isn't that the point of blogs? Immediate information? Having your finger on the pulse? If I want something contemplative, something poetic, something life-affirming...well, I certainly don't reach for the blogs. That's what books are for, n'est-ce pas? But ignore me. I'm just posting on my blog. Thanks, Susan, for the link - it gave me food for thought on a Sunday evening!
3. This is for all you New York foodies out there: Sustainable Table has linked to information about a "Food Wheel" that helps you ascertain which foods are in season when in New York state. This is going to be incredibly helpful to me because, like most Americans, I've become so accustomed to having year-round access to all foods that I have ceased to understand the seasonality of my local area. Hint: if you're living in NYC, this is NOT the time of year for asparagus...even though my nearest grocer recently had it on sale. Don't even get me started... Additionally, I have a copy of the Field Guide to Produce: How to Identify, Select, and Prepare Virtually Every Fruit and Vegetable at the Market by Aliza Green (which I named on my list of Top 10 Cooking Books) and I find it enormously helpful for determining the seasonality of different produce (though it doesn't help with NY specific). It also identifies what to look for in ripe produce and various suggestions (no recipes) for preparations.
4. Pink Me has the Cybils' graphic novels list up. I'm pulling for Mo and Jo: Fighting Together Forever by Jay Lynch and illustrated by Dean Haspiel. It's a huge hit with Kiddo, and it truly nails the sibling relationship...at least, the one I had as a kid with my brother. I love Jellaby by Kean Soo. Really, I looooved it - the spread where Jellaby is kicking the leaves is joy personified. But I found the ending SO abrupt. I can't get past it. It was a needle-scratching-across-the-record sort of ending.
5. This didn't come to me via Bloglines but, rather, through Facebook. My new friend, Ariel from Sesame Workshop, just handed over a recipe for "hot apple butterbeer." No measurements so apologies to you more exact baking-type people. But here's what she said: "apple cider, lemon, rum, maple syrup, butter, allspice, cloves, cinnamon. Just add all the other stuff to the cider and keep tasting". She also added that you need to "serve it HOT" or the butter starts solidifying. It's Sunday night so I'm not quite in the mood for this drink, but you can bet your arse I'll be whipping it up come this weekend when my Soul Twin and her husband come from North Carolina for the holiday!
Eat, drink, and enjoy all the warm alcoholic drinks that winter brings!
* Ironically, I'm on the mailing list for Slow Food NYC...but never have time to go to any of their events.
11.19.2008
And, now, the more practical side of food...
Aside from its sensual pleasures, food keeps us healthy, too.
For most of my teenage and adult life, I have been hit by the flu at least once, if not twice, a year. However, in the past 3 years since I’ve been eating healthier and wiser, I have vastly improved my record. I haven’t had the flu at all, only minor colds and sniffles (though I did get strep throat, which the flu shot wouldn’t have prevented anyway because the flu shot doesn’t prevent 7-year-olds from bringing every imaginable disease home from school). Even when I am sick, I tend to get over it so much faster; rather than a week, the snifflies only last 2-3 days.
My point is that I attribute my improved health to my diet and I’m a big believer that, if you’re getting most of your vitamins and nutrition from your food, you can stay healthier naturally. Sustainable Table has some good specific suggestions, such as incorporating oregano into your diet for antioxidants. And I don’t need Sustainable Table to encourage me to eat more garlic – as it is, I already add an extra clove to most recipes I make! Luckily, as a perk, it keeps me healthy too!
Eat, drink, and do both to stay healthy this winter season!
For most of my teenage and adult life, I have been hit by the flu at least once, if not twice, a year. However, in the past 3 years since I’ve been eating healthier and wiser, I have vastly improved my record. I haven’t had the flu at all, only minor colds and sniffles (though I did get strep throat, which the flu shot wouldn’t have prevented anyway because the flu shot doesn’t prevent 7-year-olds from bringing every imaginable disease home from school). Even when I am sick, I tend to get over it so much faster; rather than a week, the snifflies only last 2-3 days.
My point is that I attribute my improved health to my diet and I’m a big believer that, if you’re getting most of your vitamins and nutrition from your food, you can stay healthier naturally. Sustainable Table has some good specific suggestions, such as incorporating oregano into your diet for antioxidants. And I don’t need Sustainable Table to encourage me to eat more garlic – as it is, I already add an extra clove to most recipes I make! Luckily, as a perk, it keeps me healthy too!
Eat, drink, and do both to stay healthy this winter season!
4.29.2008
President Bush Urges Support of Local Farmers
Courtesy of The Daily Table, President Bush has declared that the best way to deal with the rising cost of food is to give your local farmers' markets and your local farmers your business. Hallelujah! It's certainly a first step and I hope he (and whoever follows in the next administration) puts their policies where their mouths are. Part of supporting the non-subsidy farmer is making sure he/she can actually sustain themselves so, in other words, stop the criminally uneven commodity crop subsidies.
Finally, I feel like our country is at a point where we can seriously talk about how we're feeding ourselves and in what direction we want to go. Food is at the forefront like it hasn't been in decades.
Am I wrong to feel somewhat pleased about the skyrocketing food prices in the U.S.? After all, that's what happens when much of your food distribution relies on petroleum...
Eat, drink, and discuss.
Finally, I feel like our country is at a point where we can seriously talk about how we're feeding ourselves and in what direction we want to go. Food is at the forefront like it hasn't been in decades.
Am I wrong to feel somewhat pleased about the skyrocketing food prices in the U.S.? After all, that's what happens when much of your food distribution relies on petroleum...
Eat, drink, and discuss.
3.28.2008
A Nibble of This and That
I was a tad more eager than usual for this week’s NYT Dining section because I was really curious to see the Letters section re: last week’s “The Fat Pack Wonders if the Party’s Over” by Kim Severson. Alas, no Letters section in the physical paper and no section in the online version. Not one that I could find, anyway. No one had anything to say, that was printable, about that article? Really? I was hoping for some great discourse and was totally disappointed to not get it.
Once again I find that combining food and children’s literature in a single blog isn’t entirely random. Check out Allison’s post over at Shelftalker about Mud Pies and Other Recipes: A Cookbook for Dolls written by Marjorie Winslow and illustrated by Erik Blegvad. Allison has included a couple of the “recipes” in her post and it sounds so “completely and utterly charming.” I’ve put a hold request on the one single copy at Queens Library.
As part of the prerequisites for NYU’s Food Studies program, they require you to have some hands-on experience that extends beyond your own home kitchen. So I’m looking through the course schedule at the Institute of Culinary Education (aka ICE) with absolute delight. A Greenmarket cooking class! A knife class! A “Fine Cooking” class! A salt class! Where to start???? I’m thinking of the knife class – it’s only a 3-hour class I can take after work so I don’t have to worry about too much commitment at this point. If it goes well, I can do the “Fine Cooking” class, which is much more money and five 5-hour classes. Between those two classes, I will have satisfied the prerequisite. I’m on my way!
I recently heard about the journal Gastronomica and thought a subscription might be in order. So I went to the website to check it out and read an intriguing letter from the editor that is in a similar vein to our earlier discussion about NYT’s “Fat Pack” article. She discusses the juxtaposition of providing healthy, delicious, affordable food to disadvantaged families and communities with the idea that good food – or any food, really – should cost more. Those ideas seem completely contradictory to each other. She’s right, though: I live in a lovely part of Queens with decent restaurants, a fish monger, a cheese store, and a great market for my other needs. And I spend a significant portion of my income on food. But I work in a disadvantaged neighborhood, right across the street from the bus depot, and it is incredibly difficult to find healthy food around here. I usually bring my lunch to work but, occasionally, I’ll forget and need to buy lunch here. You wouldn’t believe the difficulty in doing that. There’s a market nearby, but the produce is sub-par and comes from everywhere but New York. Forget good bread or any unprocessed cheese. Everything comes frozen, in a can, in bulk, or vaccuum-packed. Not surprisingly, you’ll see a significantly larger number of overweight and obese people in the neighborhood I work in as opposed to the one I live in. During my info session, the director of the Food Studies program repeatedly threw around the term “food crisis in this country” and I don’t think that’s stating it too strongly. Darra Goldstein’s letter just added one more voice to the dull roar.
On that note, the Sustainable Table has a wonderful blog and they posted about a curriculum package by Equal Exchange. It teaches kids about fair trade, food production and sustainable living. This seems as good a place as any to start turning this thing around.
Once again I find that combining food and children’s literature in a single blog isn’t entirely random. Check out Allison’s post over at Shelftalker about Mud Pies and Other Recipes: A Cookbook for Dolls written by Marjorie Winslow and illustrated by Erik Blegvad. Allison has included a couple of the “recipes” in her post and it sounds so “completely and utterly charming.” I’ve put a hold request on the one single copy at Queens Library.
As part of the prerequisites for NYU’s Food Studies program, they require you to have some hands-on experience that extends beyond your own home kitchen. So I’m looking through the course schedule at the Institute of Culinary Education (aka ICE) with absolute delight. A Greenmarket cooking class! A knife class! A “Fine Cooking” class! A salt class! Where to start???? I’m thinking of the knife class – it’s only a 3-hour class I can take after work so I don’t have to worry about too much commitment at this point. If it goes well, I can do the “Fine Cooking” class, which is much more money and five 5-hour classes. Between those two classes, I will have satisfied the prerequisite. I’m on my way!
I recently heard about the journal Gastronomica and thought a subscription might be in order. So I went to the website to check it out and read an intriguing letter from the editor that is in a similar vein to our earlier discussion about NYT’s “Fat Pack” article. She discusses the juxtaposition of providing healthy, delicious, affordable food to disadvantaged families and communities with the idea that good food – or any food, really – should cost more. Those ideas seem completely contradictory to each other. She’s right, though: I live in a lovely part of Queens with decent restaurants, a fish monger, a cheese store, and a great market for my other needs. And I spend a significant portion of my income on food. But I work in a disadvantaged neighborhood, right across the street from the bus depot, and it is incredibly difficult to find healthy food around here. I usually bring my lunch to work but, occasionally, I’ll forget and need to buy lunch here. You wouldn’t believe the difficulty in doing that. There’s a market nearby, but the produce is sub-par and comes from everywhere but New York. Forget good bread or any unprocessed cheese. Everything comes frozen, in a can, in bulk, or vaccuum-packed. Not surprisingly, you’ll see a significantly larger number of overweight and obese people in the neighborhood I work in as opposed to the one I live in. During my info session, the director of the Food Studies program repeatedly threw around the term “food crisis in this country” and I don’t think that’s stating it too strongly. Darra Goldstein’s letter just added one more voice to the dull roar.
On that note, the Sustainable Table has a wonderful blog and they posted about a curriculum package by Equal Exchange. It teaches kids about fair trade, food production and sustainable living. This seems as good a place as any to start turning this thing around.
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