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Deanna Lack
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I got an email from Slow Food USA about this coming week being National Farmers' Market week... apparently the USDA and Secretary of Agriculture issued a proclamation that August 4-10 will be National Farmers' Market week.
So I Googled it. There's practically nothing about it. So I went to the pages of all the farmers' markets I could think of on Facebook. There's nothing about it.
What the heck? Why so little publicity? So I took it upon myself to make this little graphic and share it around on Facebook... feel free, if you are a small farmer who goes to markets - no wait. If you are a person who eats food, feel free to share this graphic and if you haven't been to your local market - or if you have! - please go and support your local farmers this week.
In other news, the EPA recently approved an increase on allowable limits for glyphosate (Roundup and its spin-offs) on crops. Hey EPA... you're under a Democratic president, get a clue :( Here's a link with more info on why glyphosate is awful for the environment and awful for you.
Please, if you can afford to, eat organic or certified naturally grown (crops that are not grown with Roundup or other herbicides, artificial fertilizers and pesticides), and especially, support your small local farmer who is farming responsibly. Get to know them. There's nothing like knowing where your food came from.
Posted by
Deanna Lack
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| Pretty? Eh, kinda. Good? Yes!! |
I'm trying to ease up on the coffee, because I'm tired of having a headache by 1:00 pm if I don't drink it. So I cut back to 1 cup for a few days, now I'm drinking 1 cup of Chai tea in the morning.
Chai and my empty stomach didn't get along this morning, and I was getting a burning in the back of my throat and some reflux. Bleh.
So here's what I did for my green smoothie this morning... I took a handful of stomach-soothing herbs -- apple mint, and lemon balm -- and threw them in the blender with the greens, and made sure to use papaya as one of my fruits, because it's known for its stomach-soothing properties, too. Seems to have done the trick :) Here's the recipe.
Don't have lemon balm and mint? My god, why not? Find a corner of your property you don't want to mow anymore, stick one of them at one end and the other at the other end (seed, plants, whatever) and let them go to town. They will take over the area, and you will have all the mint and lemon balm you could ever wish for. They both make amazing hot teas and iced teas, and they add flavor and a load of nutrients to a green smoothie, and as far as green things go they taste fantastic. Last year I couldn't possibly have picked and dried and used all the lemon balm and mint I had growing. My plan this year is to pick it and freeze it with water in ice cube trays so I can throw it in my smoothies all winter long.
Stomach Soother Green Smoothie
10-20 mint leaves
10-20 lemon balm leaves
1 cup kale or spinach or green of choice
1 cup water
1 cup Silk coconut milk (I love this stuff!!!!)
Blend the heck out of it. If your herbs are stemmy you might want to strip leaves off the stems. If the stems are still tender and you have a good blender, throw 'em in.
1 cup pineapple, fresh preferable or if using cans you can use some of the juice instead of water
1/2 a papaya, seeded, peeled and sorta chopped
1 small-medium banana
ice cubes to taste... I like mine cold. You can seed and chop the papaya and then freeze, freeze the banana, pineapple, or all of it, for a nice cold one. If you put enough ice cubes in here and you have a Vitamix, you can turn this into their version of soft serve ice cream. Or freeze it into popsicles for little upset tummies.
Blend till smooth. This will serve 2, you can put it in a sealing glass jar or mason jar in the fridge and it'll keep for a day or two, if there's only one of you in the household braving the green stuff.
This is GOOD! Seriously, if you don't have mint and you're a smoothie-holic, get some.
Posted by
Deanna Lack
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Last week I started a Green Smoothie Challenge. I am loving it!! Want to join me?
Here's the deal. I am all about some whole foods, which is why we are in a CSA again this year. Well, with a full share and only 2 of us consuming it, I am finding that I have a lot of leftovers, most of which can be canned, frozen or preserved in some way, but not so much the greens, which, being springtime/early summer, we are getting a lot of.
Here's the deal. I am all about some whole foods, which is why we are in a CSA again this year. Well, with a full share and only 2 of us consuming it, I am finding that I have a lot of leftovers, most of which can be canned, frozen or preserved in some way, but not so much the greens, which, being springtime/early summer, we are getting a lot of.
So, what to do with them? I stumbled on this green smoothie thing. The concept is, you drink 1 smoothie a day. You can use it to replace a meal (you'll probably want to, they're filling, but you can snack a little too). That's it. You don't deprive yourself, you can eat what you're eating, but here's the thing. Since this is basically whole foods thrown in a blender, you're getting all the fiber with whatever sugar is in it, which for me is killing my carb/sugar cravings (yay!), and because of the fiber you don't get the same spike in blood sugar levels that you would just eating junk or even juice. The ingredients are PACKED with nutrients, so that's awesome.
How to: The skinny is, you shoot for a proportion of 40% greens (leafy dark greens preferably - think kale, spinach, collards, mustard, turnip... I don't eat most of that crap except for the first two either, but I promise, you won't taste it) and 60% whole fruit, with a liquid - water, coconut milk, almond milk, you can even use teas sometimes, or regular milk, or yogurt. You can follow that challenge link above to get you started with great tips and recipes.
Recipes will follow here, or you can follow my Green Smoothie Board on Pinterest as I gather smoothie info and recipes from all over the web. Drink up!
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Deanna Lack
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My hubby and I were in Franklin (a Nashville suburb) last week and I had the long-awaited opportunity to go to Franklin Farmers' Market. It is awesome!!
While I was there I ran into some very cool people from Colvin Family Farms, who sold me these white cukes. Some of them (the lower one in the picture) were "regular" white cucumbers but some were these super cool translucent glowy looking things that remind me of jellyfish and were delicious (actually they were all delicious). Unfortunately they can't tell me the variety, they say they only have one variety of cukes. So I'm not sure what causes this awesome but I love it.
I have an interesting story to tell. My doctor diagnosed me with Tension Myositis Syndrome... this syndrome is the result of repressed emotions causing actual physical symptoms in the body. Lots of cases of degenerative disc disease, fibromyalgia, and other things, are the result of TMS and not necessarily a physical process. The disease keeps people living in fear of pain. And I've had both chronic neck pain and fibro type symptoms, and they are getting better with treatment.
But, when we went to Nashville this weekend, my foot suddenly started hurting, just an ache I thought was arthritis at first, but after we walked for hours at Cheekwood Botanical Garden, I started to worry that it was a stress fracture or something... any pressure on ONE point on the ball of my foot caused excruciating pain. I hobbled around all weekend.
Then on Monday I started to wonder if maybe this wasn't a new TMS manifestation... once you "conquer" one of them, others frequently crop up. So I basically told myself I didn't believe there was anything wrong and started walking on it normally, even though it HURT at first.
Within a few hours the pain was gone. The mind is a crazy thing. If you have chronic pain you owe it to yourself to read up on TMS, because there is a CURE. Here's a LINK for you.
So, we are CSA customers at Miracle Mountain Farm here in Cookeville, and we are getting more produce than I know what to do with (huge head of cabbage... oh my....). I frequently have way more greens than my husband and I can consume, so I decided to take the 30 day Green Smoothie Challenge. I have so much produce, I figured, why not? And if it makes me feel great... well, great!
Follow me on Pinterest if you want to scope out some green smoothie recipes, in addition to my usual repertoire of recipes both healthy and not so much, and also jewelry, horses, animals, and art, and lots of other eye candy because I freaking love Pinterest. I'll be sharing recipes and ideas here too... also, I'll be posting some stuff here about what to do with all that zucchini, blackberries, and other goodies that nature is pouring down upon us right now.
Follow me on Pinterest if you want to scope out some green smoothie recipes, in addition to my usual repertoire of recipes both healthy and not so much, and also jewelry, horses, animals, and art, and lots of other eye candy because I freaking love Pinterest. I'll be sharing recipes and ideas here too... also, I'll be posting some stuff here about what to do with all that zucchini, blackberries, and other goodies that nature is pouring down upon us right now.
Green Smoothie, Day One
Around two cups of mixed greens: kale, beet greens, & collard greens (I think they're collard, not 100%... we're in a CSA and I don't always know what I have!), gently packed.
3 cups of a mixture of: 2 bananas, frozen fresh strawberries, 2 small peaches
I added a teaspoon of chia seeds
2 tablespoons of frozen 100% apple juice concentrate
2 cups of water.
Go Vitamix go!
Assessment: I'm getting a little bit of aftertaste of greens (probably the beet greens and collards), but all in all I think I can handle this, it's pretty yummy. Not really pretty, because the red strawberries + greens makes it kinda brown, but good. With no added sucrose, so yay! I think it's gonna fill me up just fine, too, but we'll see.
This made way more than I can drink. I put it in the fridge in a mason jar to keep it from oxidizing; should keep till at least tomorrow.
If you're doing the green smoothie thing I'd love to hear from you and trade a few recipes.
Posted by
Deanna Lack
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CSA started this week! Which means, this early in the year, mostly salad :)
On a tragic note, the Refrigerator Apocalypse happened this weekend... my fridge broke and my epically awesome husband diagnosed it, which meant we did NOT have to buy a new one, and my epically awesome father-in-law knew someone who was willing to come and fix it on a Sunday morning. Saved the day, but not the food. I had to throw an awful lot out. But I was freaking out because I had a bushel of produce coming on Monday.
Considering the Fridgepocalypse (and the fact that after paying to repair the fridge I couldn't really afford to restock it), I'm pretty happy that I managed to pull together this meal. It was pretty awesome. You want the recipe? Sure, I'll share.
Crab Linguine in Marsala Cream Sauce
1 cup Marsala wine
1 cup 2% milk
1 cup evaporated milk
8 ounces uncooked linguine
4 Tablespoons of butter, separated
1 Tablespoon flour
1 stalk of green garlic, chopped
1 green onion, chopped
5-6 Baby Bella mushrooms, sliced
1-2 Tablespoons of lemon juice (more if you like lemon flavor, less if you don't)
1/2 teaspoon of salt
1 package imitation crab meat
Parmesan cheese (freshly grated, preferably, or flaky, NOT Kraft)
Finely snipped fresh parsley
Freshly ground pepper
Put your pasta water on to boil.
Put the Marsala in a small-medium saucepan with the heat on medium. Cook until reduced to 1/2 cup. Stir in 2% and evaporated milk, bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer until reduced to around 1 1/2 cups. Remove from heat.
Put the linguine in your boiling water and cook al dente.
Meanwhile, put 2 Tablespoons of butter in a deep skillet or wok. Saute the green garlic and green onion in the butter, until the white parts start to turn translucent. Throw in the mushrooms and saute lightly. Remove the sauteed vegetables to the other pan with your cooling milk mixture.
Put the other 2 Tablespoons of butter in the skillet/wok. Stir in the flour until a paste forms. Then, add the milk mixture. Add lemon juice and salt. Cook and stir (pretty much constantly, make sure you don't burn it) until the mixture thickens to a little smoother than alfredo generally is. Add the crab meat and cook until heated through. Keep stirring.
Put your drained pasta in a serving bowl, top with the sauce, garnish with Parmesan, parsley and pepper. Serve immediately.
This serves around 4 people pretty comfortably and I thought it kinda needed some fresh baked bread, but I think that about almost everything. Enjoy!
Posted by
Deanna Lack
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I've blogged about home made pizza before, haven't I? Of course I have. We've been making homemade pizza for years, often on Family Pizza Night where it's a social event as well as dinner.
Dough:
2 Tb olive oil
1 to 1 1/4 cup of water
3 cups of bread flour (can sub up to a third with wheat flour)
1 Tb sugar
1 tsp salt
2 tsp yeast
I also sometimes throw in some parmesan or crushed dried basil or oregano.
Set to your machine's dough cycle. Watch at the end of the knead cycle; sometimes you'll need to add more flour. Should be a smooth ball. When the cycle ends, take it out and divide in 2-4 balls. Drizzle a little olive oil into an equal number of bowls, roll your dough in the oil to grease it a little, cover lightly with plastic wrap, and let rise for an hour.
Topping:
olive oil
garlic
sliced tomatoes
Gyro meat
kalmata olives, halved
pepperoncinis
artichoke hearts
thinly sliced baby bella mushrooms
crumbled feta cheese
thinly sliced onion (saute if desired)
a handful of pizza cheese (better than mozzarella)
coarsely chopped fresh oregano and/or basil
Preheat your oven to 500 degrees. Yes, I said 500. Grease a baking sheet a little (nonstick spray works but seems to smoke in the oven a bit) and then sprinkle with cornmeal (optional). Spread out your dough on the sheet. This dough does not rise much, so it'll be about as thick as you spread it, so if you like a thick crust leave it thick (and it's soooo good thick).
Saute the garlic in the oil to give it a little flavor (helps to do this when you first take the dough out of the machine so that it has some time to infuse the oil with the garlic flavor). After you spread out your dough, drizzle with garlic oil, and top as desired with the toppings listed above. We generally stop by our local Greek/Italian (is this a southern oddity?) restaurant to pick up the Gyro meat since I've never seen it in a grocery store, but enough for the whole family is $2.95 there. The only topping that is not optional is the feta. There must be feta. I find that you don't need a lot of pizza cheese with these toppings and the feta and oil, but if you're a bigger cheeseaholic than I am, go for it.
If you like, hit the edges of the crust with a little parmesan or (YUM) fresh grated Asiago. Drop those babies in the hot hot oven for 7-11 minutes depending on your crust thickness. Let cool a bit so the cheese doesn't slide off, if you can wait, cut... and mangia! Or whatever the Greek word is for "Eat!"
Here's the story behind Apocalypse Pizza. We were driving to Atlanta for a craft show and stopped at a random exit looking for a specific kind of restaurant. Then we drove by a place called Apokalypse Pizza and I decided that that was epic enough to cause us to eat there even if it wasn't what we were looking for. And there, we had an amazing Greek pizza. I don't know if we could even find that place again.
So here's my version. You make the dough in your bread machine (allow about 2-3 hours), and at least in our house, each family member gets to make their own personal pizza. When one of my adopted kids comes home from the military, this is what he asks for :)
Apocalypse Pizza
Place the following in your bread machine in the order recommended by the manufacturer (usually wet, then dry, then yeast):Dough:
2 Tb olive oil
1 to 1 1/4 cup of water
3 cups of bread flour (can sub up to a third with wheat flour)
1 Tb sugar
1 tsp salt
2 tsp yeast
I also sometimes throw in some parmesan or crushed dried basil or oregano.
Set to your machine's dough cycle. Watch at the end of the knead cycle; sometimes you'll need to add more flour. Should be a smooth ball. When the cycle ends, take it out and divide in 2-4 balls. Drizzle a little olive oil into an equal number of bowls, roll your dough in the oil to grease it a little, cover lightly with plastic wrap, and let rise for an hour.
Topping:
olive oil
garlic
sliced tomatoes
Gyro meat
kalmata olives, halved
pepperoncinis
artichoke hearts
thinly sliced baby bella mushrooms
crumbled feta cheese
thinly sliced onion (saute if desired)
a handful of pizza cheese (better than mozzarella)
coarsely chopped fresh oregano and/or basil
Preheat your oven to 500 degrees. Yes, I said 500. Grease a baking sheet a little (nonstick spray works but seems to smoke in the oven a bit) and then sprinkle with cornmeal (optional). Spread out your dough on the sheet. This dough does not rise much, so it'll be about as thick as you spread it, so if you like a thick crust leave it thick (and it's soooo good thick).
Saute the garlic in the oil to give it a little flavor (helps to do this when you first take the dough out of the machine so that it has some time to infuse the oil with the garlic flavor). After you spread out your dough, drizzle with garlic oil, and top as desired with the toppings listed above. We generally stop by our local Greek/Italian (is this a southern oddity?) restaurant to pick up the Gyro meat since I've never seen it in a grocery store, but enough for the whole family is $2.95 there. The only topping that is not optional is the feta. There must be feta. I find that you don't need a lot of pizza cheese with these toppings and the feta and oil, but if you're a bigger cheeseaholic than I am, go for it.
If you like, hit the edges of the crust with a little parmesan or (YUM) fresh grated Asiago. Drop those babies in the hot hot oven for 7-11 minutes depending on your crust thickness. Let cool a bit so the cheese doesn't slide off, if you can wait, cut... and mangia! Or whatever the Greek word is for "Eat!"
Posted by
Deanna Lack
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I found a recipe for herbed couscous but I modified it so heavily that I thought I'd share my modified version, partly to be generous and partly so I can remember it!
The original called for fresh parsley, which I didn't have, but I do have some kale bravely growing out in the leftovers of last year's garden, despite the freezing night temps we've had for most of March.
My family likes the Israeli couscous (the little balls) better than the other tiny crumbly kind... toasting it in the olive oil first gives it a little tooth that I really like. If you use vegetable broth instead of chicken broth and skip the cheese, it's vegan and still really flavorful. Personally I'm doing a pescetarian kind of thing and it went great with the lemon pepper tilapia I made tonight.
The original called for fresh parsley, which I didn't have, but I do have some kale bravely growing out in the leftovers of last year's garden, despite the freezing night temps we've had for most of March.
My family likes the Israeli couscous (the little balls) better than the other tiny crumbly kind... toasting it in the olive oil first gives it a little tooth that I really like. If you use vegetable broth instead of chicken broth and skip the cheese, it's vegan and still really flavorful. Personally I'm doing a pescetarian kind of thing and it went great with the lemon pepper tilapia I made tonight.
Israeli Couscous with Kale
2 Tablespoons of olive oil
2 cups Israeli couscous (I used the tricolor)
1/2 clove garlic
1/3 cup of fresh kale, chopped fine
4 cups chicken broth or vegetable broth
1 teaspoon dried parsley
1 teaspoon dried rosemary
2 Tb. lemon juice
salt and pepper to taste
a sprinkle of parmesan cheese, if desired.
Warm the olive oil in a medium saucepan, add the couscous, toss to coat. Add the garlic, cook and stir for 2-3 minutes until toasty. Toss in the kale and stir until it's just a little wilty.
Pour in the broth and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for around 10 minutes. Before all the liquid is absorbed add the lemon juice, herbs, salt and pepper. Sprinkle on a little bit of Parmesan cheese right before serving... I thought it was missing something so I added it as an afterthought and it was marvelous.
I halved this recipe, ate more of this than I should have and still had leftovers, so unless you have a family of more than 4, or you like leftovers, you might consider halving it too.
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