It’s Farmer’s Market Time!

The weather is warming up and that can mean only one thing: summer is coming and with it farmer’s markets will be popping up all over the landscape. Farmer’s markets are a great opportunity for communities to bring consumers together with local growers, bakers, beekeepers, ranchers, and more. Buying at your farmer’s market supports the local economy, promotes a health environment (by purchasing those blueberries and peaches from a local farm rather than those trucked to Walmart from 1500 miles away), and gives you the opportunity to meet the person who grows your food. Concerned about pesticides and chemical fertilizers? Just ask. More and more growers are following organic growing practices, but cannot afford the fees for USDA organic certification, allowing them to use the familiar organic logo.

There are at least two summer markets near my home and last Saturday I visited one of them. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much there in the way of produce, but I found a local baker who makes excellent bread. I will definitely be buying from her again.

If you don’t have a farmer’s market in your area, you can still buy local seasonal produce at your natural foods market. My Whole Foods hosts a farmer’s market once a week during the summer, and year round they clearly mark local produce and other products in the store. Prominent signage also keeps customers informed about what produce is in season at the moment.

 
What about you? Do you shop at farmer’s markets?

One Year . . . And Counting

Today marks one year since I started eating vegetarian, and what an interesting year it has been. I’ve tried foods I had never tried before, recipes I had never made before, and I’ve loved every meal of it. I can’t imagine ever going back to a meat-eating lifestyle.

Making a conscious decision to leave behind eating animals is one of the best decisions I have ever made in my life. From it I have gleaned an awareness of how important food choices are for one’s overall health. When I purchase food that is good for me, good for the environment, and reduces the demand for meat it does more for me than contribute to my physical health. Making a compassionate decision with my wallet is also good for my spirit. At the risk of sounding new age-y or mystical, being connected to my food in such a good way just makes me feel better all around.

I cannot imagine that the Lord ever intended for His creation to be used and abused in the way it has been over the last several decades. Once confronted with the evidence of factory farming, I knew I had a decision to make. I could continue to provide money to companies who exploit animals (and even people) for profit or I could spend my food budget dollars more wisely. It is a question of stewardship, and I have made the choice to distance myself from factory farming, from pain and misery, and from poor health.

It’s not always easy and sometimes it’s downright inconvenient, but doing a good thing isn’t always convenient. Sometimes it means eating peanut butter or salad more often than I would wish, or having a small snack and delaying a meal, but it’s worth it. Lord willing, I look forward to many years of vegetarianism ahead of me.

Darcy vs. The Pressure Cooker, Round 1

Several months ago an acupuncturist and expert in Eastern medicine recommended that I buy a pressure cooker. Since I eat so many beans she thought I could save money and eat better even if I only used it as a bean/rice cooker. She said I could cook beans in mere minutes with no added sodium and they would taste better too since they wouldn’t be swimming in canning liquid for who knows how long. They also store well in the freezer. Potentially I could have the equivalent of a pantry full of beans for a fraction of the price of canned. I filed away this information until a week and a half ago when I finally bought that pressure cooker.

While doing some research, I learned that Macy’s carries Fagor pressure cookers, a great brand (no affiliation), and I decided that if I wanted a cooker that would last me for years with no trouble then I needed to invest in a good one. I couldn’t be happier with my purchase though I was rather intimidated by it at first. I took it home, opened the box, flipped through the instruction booklet and cookbook and then put it away. It looked even more complicated than I had originally thought. Also I had not a dry bean in the house. OK, I was really just trying to work up my courage to try it out.

The next time I was at Whole Foods I bought one pound of black beans to experiment with and set them to soak over Friday night. Bright and early Saturday morning I was in the kitchen ready to attempt to trust what Fagor was telling me: that I could get fully cooked black beans in only 8-10 minutes. I had read all the instructions (yes, I’m that type of person) and even watched the demo DVD. It seemed pretty straight forward.

Pressure cookers work best with gas ranges, where adjustments to heat respond more quickly than with electric ranges. Alas, since I have an electric range I had to choose between one of two methods for cooking. With the two-burner method you turn one burner to high (for building up pressure in the cooker) and another burner to low (to maintain pressure for the actual cooking). You can also use a one-burner method with which you set the burner to medium (for building up pressure) and then turn it down to low for the cooking. I decided to try the two-burner method.

Into the pot went the beans, water, and vegetable oil (to prevent the beans from building up foam in the pressure cooker). I locked the lid in place turned the burner up to high and waited. Sure enough after several minutes the water started to boil, building up steam pressure within the cooker. The pressure indicator popped up and a blast of steam shot out of the operating valve. I set the timer, moved the cooker to the second burner and watched and waited.

Here’s where I started to lose confidence. The instruction booklet said there should be a steady, gentle flow of steam from the valve. Hmmmm. My idea of “steady and gentle” might be a “trickle” to Fagor or vice versa. I still wasn’t trusting that beans could cook completely in only 8 minutes so I opted to keep the heat up a little higher than what my range considers low and waited for the timer to go off. As soon as it did I moved the cooker to an unused burner and waited for the pressure to drop naturally (per Fagor’s recommendation). Once the little pressure indicator retracted I unlocked the lid and found half a pound of quite overcooked beans. Wow. I was disappointed that I had overcooked them but was delighted to discover for myself how well this pressure cooker works.

The beans were usable anyway. Some went into a pot of soup that night, and another bunch went into a pureed black bean dip for a party. I can’t wait to try it out again. My shopping list already includes kidney, garbanzo, great northern, and of course more black beans. Now I just need to find more room in my freezer.

My Favorite Granola

People are always asking me: “Darcy, what do you eat for breakfast? How can I make it to lunch without eating an enormous amount of cholesterol –laden, fatty foods?” OK. So they don’t actually phrase it that way, but I do frequently get asked what I eat, so I thought I would share with you all my favorite weekday breakfast: granola. I love it, love it, love it.

I began playing around with this recipe about a year ago, tweaking things here and there to get it to where I think it is perfect for me; not too sweet, and with far less fat than other recipes. One of the great things about granola is that it is so forgiving. You can add and take away and play to your heart’s content. So please, take this recipe and make it your own.

Darcy’s Granola

4 cups old fashioned rolled oats

2 T whole flax seeds

¼ cup raw sunflower or pumpkin seeds

½ - 1 cup raw nuts (my general rule of thumb is ½ cup for chopped or sliced nuts, 1 cup for whole nuts)

½ cup raisins or dried berries

¼ cup vegetable oil such as sunflower

¼ cup honey (or other liquid sweetener)

1 ½ tsp. cinnamon

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine all ingredients in a large bowl. Stir well to make sure everything is coated with the oil and honey. Transfer oat mixture to a large baking sheet or jelly roll sheet and spread evenly. Bake granola for 15-20 minutes, stirring well every five minutes or so. For a darker granola bake longer, but check on it every two or three minutes. Once the granola gets past 20 minutes in the oven it begins to darken rapidly. Cool granola in the pan, continuing to stir every few minutes. Store cooled granola in an airtight container in the refrigerator. Also freezes well. Makes approximately seven 2/3 cup servings.

Book Review: Veganist by Kathy Freston

If you ever were interested in exploring reasons to transition to a vegan diet (or even a partial vegan diet), this is the book for you. It, of course, covers the common anti-cruelty reasons, but Freston also pulls in experts in the area of nutrition, medicine, and the environment to explore myriad other reasons to leave behind eating animal products. The tone is non-judgmental and encouraging. The point, she says, and the reason she calls herself a veganist rather than a vegan, is the attitude. It’s not about being preachy, dogmatic, or self righteous, but making a positive change in your life and influencing those around you.

The book is organized into chapters Freston calls “promises.” Her promise is that switching to a vegan diet will change your life. Having eaten mostly vegan for nearly a year, I can personally attest to what she is saying. There is something to be said for making conscious and conscientious food choices every day. It connects you to your life, your body, your health in a way that not even physical exercise does. You will feel lighter and more energized, healthier. That is a promise.

Freston does not recommend making a drastic switch from a junk food, fast food filled diet to vegan all at once, but transitioning, one animal or animal product at a time. Soon, she says, you will find that you want to make more changes and by giving your taste buds a chance to transform themselves, you will desire real, whole foods even more than the cholesterol and saturated fat laden things you had been eating.

Veganist demonstrates that there is no down side to eating vegan. It improves your health, helps the environment, diminishes the demand for meat, thereby diminishing the public health risks associated with factory farms, and even can save you money. For example, the price of a pound of organic black beans at Whole Foods is $1.69. One pound of chicken breast at Walmart would cost me $2.99, and doesn’t feed nearly as many people as a pound of beans. And what about the environment? Freston argues that if every American ate vegetarian only one day a week it would have the environmental impact of removing half a million cars from the road.  

What about you? Would you be willing to cut back on your animal consumption if it meant a healthier you, a healthier wallet, and a healthier planet?

Just Substitute Tofu

Lately I’ve been trying more Asian cooking, primarily a little basic Chinese and Indian-style food. Nothing too fancy or complicated. Once I started this culinary ball rolling I began thinking of favorite Chinese take-out dishes, especially kung pao chicken. I love the spicy sauce, the crunch of the peanuts, the green onions. Could I, I wondered, recreate this favorite in my own kitchen using tofu instead of chicken?

A simple Google search for “kung pao tofu” brought up thousands of results through which I began slogging looking for recipes that didn’t require an unreasonable amount of ingredients or those that would require a trip to an Asian market. I settled on this recipe, substituting a red bell pepper (my favorite veggie) for the water chestnuts and celery. The result was delicious if just a little salty, though I think that was my fault. When salting the sautéing vegetables I forgot to account for the soy sauce and salted peanuts I would be adding later. Woops.

I also had a little trouble with my tofu. I had read that freezing the tofu, even just over night, would change its texture, making it a little chewier, and more like chicken. The only catch was that it needed to be well-drained before going into the freezer to keep water crystals from forming all throughout. Guess who didn’t drain her tofu thoroughly enough? The tofu ended up being a little more spongy than chewy, but still tasted good. Again, my fault.

One of my favorite things about cooking is finding a recipe I want to try again and again to tweak it until it’s exactly what I want. This kung pao tofu recipe will definitely be showing up on my menu again in the pretty near future.

Chaco Canyon Organic Cafe

I love food. Wait. Strike that. I LOVE food. And no trip home to the fam is complete without shopping for it, cooking it, ordering it, and eating food. Lots of food. On my recent trip to Seattle my mother introduced me to Chaco Canyon Organic Café. Located on the corner of 12^th Avenue and 50^th Street in Seattle’s university district this café represents the best of the Seattle lifestyle in food form. As the name states, the ingredients are organic (the restaurant itself is USDA certified organic), and the menu is vegan (the exceptions being dairy milk as an option for smoothies and coffee drinks). They even offer raw vegan dishes, such as the blueberry cheesecake I sampled (okay, I ate half of a slice, but to me that’s a sample).

Sustainability and responsibility are also hallmarks of Chaco Canyon. They use stainless steel beverage cups instead of breakable glass or plastic. Their dishes and furniture are second hand. The walls are filled with denim, repurposed as insulation. As I sat there eating my pesto melt sandwich (cilantro and pumpkin seed pesto, alfalfa sprouts, tomato, vegan mozzarella, and marinated red onion on ciabatta) I wondered if my corner of South Carolina offers any restaurants with a similar menu or philosophy. I simply have to find out. Downtown perhaps? If I find anything I will certainly try it out.

 
As I mentioned, I ordered the pesto melt sandwich. I also sampled the hummus and cucumber sandwich, the Tai peanut grain bowl, and (ahem) a few desserts. They also offer freshly made juices. I tried the Belly Rub, made with apple juice, lemon, mint, ginger and fennel. Everything I ate was wonderful. Those of you living in the Seattle area owe it to yourselves to try Chaco Canyon. The food is great, the desserts are scrumptious (and that is not a word I use in everyday conversation), the atmosphere is relaxed, and you can be happy knowing that your money is supporting a local business that cares about more than the bottom line.