CSA all the way

So it appears that I'm only making new posts every four months. I apologize for my delinquent blogging, but I've begun something that will hopefully give me enough to write about each week. This year I'm participating in a CSA - community supported agriculture - with a share purchased from Silverbrook Farm in Dartmouth, MA. CSAs are a way for farms to earn a profit by pre-selling shares of their annual harvest directly to consumers. Typically, consumers can purchase CSA shares directly from farm websites, indicating what size share they want (family-sized, half-sized), and how they'd like to receive the shares - picking up at the farm, or at a nearby farmer's market. The consumer pays a set price for the year's harvest (usually June through October) up front, and then picks up their portion of produce, eggs, flowers, etc. from the farm staff each week.

I've picked up my share each Monday for three weeks so far at the Boston City Hall farmer's market, where Silverbrook runs a stand. Each week's bounty is different, based on what is being harvested at the farm, and the farm sends me an email a few days in advance to let me know what to expect, along with recipe ideas. Silverbrook has teamed up with other farms and local food producers in southern Mass to put together their shares, so I may get flowers, artisan cheeses and other treats each week. I figured this blog would be a good place to share what I receive each week, and how I cook it. So, without further ado:

Week 1:

Red lettuce, a bag of mixed greens and bok choy, kale, spinach, kohlrabi, scallions, and the treats of the week: strawberries and eggs.

I was most excited about the kohlrabi. I had never really looked at or eaten one before. I found this great recipe on the NY Times website for kohlrabi risotto and it was delicious! The kohlrabi root was a cross between a turnip and a pear, and the greens were subtly spicy.

The spinach went into one of my favorite hot weather standby recipes: Lemony pesto pasta with edamame and almonds from The Kitchn. 

 The kale went into a number of fresh fruit/veggie juices I made using the new juicer GP got me for my birthday :)

The red lettuce was perfect for pulled pork and kimchi lettuce wraps. I occasionally break my ovo-pesco-vegan diet for certain pork and cheese products, and this is one of them. GP and I saw these advertised once and figured that we could easily make them on our own. It's simple: all you need is lettuce, a jar of cabbage kimchi, and a package of pre-made pulled pork, marinated in a BBQ or soy-based sauce (whatever you'd like. I buy the Trader Joe's BBQ pork and mix in their soyaki sauce). Separate, wash and dry the lettuce leaves, and spoon on portions of kimchi and pork. Roll up and eat!

 The bok choy was stir-fried with shiitake mushrooms, and paired with mugwort soba noodles in a miso-butter sauce (taken from this recipe) mixed with the chopped scallions.

The remainder of the greens went into a giant chopped salad with Thai flavors, a favorite from Mark Bittman's Food Matters Cookbook.

The strawberries I ate for breakfast one day, and the eggs were fried up for weekend breakfasts.

Week 2:

A head of pak choi, a giant head of green lettuce, a head of Napa cabbage, Russian red kale, shelling peas, pea tendrils, radishes and the treat of the week: classic French Hannahbells cheese from Shy Brother's Farm in Westport, MA.

 The kale continued to go into fresh juices. My personal favorite, 'The Green Goddess': a green apple, a few stalks of kale, a few sprigs of mint, and half a lime.

 The radishes went into a radish and turnip salad with chives, which I paired with soy-glazed tilapia.

I recently bought The Complete Curry Cookbook, along with several bags of Indian spices to try and explore more Indian curry cuisine. I used up my peas in the cookbook's curried cauliflower recipe, and paired it with garlic sauteed pea tendrils.

 I had some extra kale, and used it in this great recipe for roasted kale and eggplant tapenade.

The pak choi went into a batch of cold soba noodles with wilted bok choy, the napa cabbage I stir-fried, we ate the Hannahbell's cheese by itself and spread on bread, and I made a massive salad with the lettuce for a dinner party.

Week 3:

A bunch of mixed kale, a head of Napa cabbage, a small head of lettuce, leeks, two bunches of sweet peas and one bunch of shelling peas, and the treat of the week: Cloumage cheese curd from Shy Brother's Farm. I also bought some garlic and a jar of Silverbrook's Gingered Pear Jam. (Cat not included.)

 I was in a bit of a pinch to use up this week's food, as I was traveling to Montreal on Tuesday night and wouldn't be back until Saturday. But I managed to use up nearly everything in three dishes that I left for GP while I was gone.

The first I invented myself and dubbed a 'Silverbrook tart', as I used almost exclusively ingredients from my CSA. I baked a puffed pastry sheet half-way, then spread on a thick layer of Cloumage cheese, and topped it with garlic sauteed leeks and cooked peas. I baked the tart until done and sprinkled with black pepper and chopped chives. It was quite delicious, I'm proud of myself!

 All of the kale became a large batch of kale chips. Yumm!

The cabbage, lettuce and leftover pea pods became another massive chopped salad with Thai flavors.

That's everything I've received and made so far, and I'm picking up another portion tomorrow. I'm really enjoying the CSA. It's forcing me to be more creative with my cooking, having to find/make recipes based on what I receive, rather than starting with recipe ideas then buying all ingredients at the store. I'm also saving a lot of money. I paid the cost of my share up front, which I calculated to be less than I would spend on produce from the store for the duration of the CSA, June through October, and each week I only buy about 8-10 extra items to make a week of meals. 

To end, I'd like to share my appreciation for a unique regional dish. As I mentioned, I traveled to Montreal and just got back. While there, I had one gastronomic goal: eat poutine. Poutine is an (in)famous Quebecoise dish of greasy french fries topped with gravy and cheese curds. I first heard about it on an earlier trip to Quebec province, but I wrote it off as disgusting and never tried it. I have since had my first taste at the Saus restaurant in Boston, and I really enjoyed it. It's salty and hot, heavy of course, but not the mess of flavors I assumed it would be. So, in Montreal, my friends and I made our way to La Banquise, Montreal's best and most famous poutine restaurant. 

We got an order of classic poutine and an order of 'La Taquise' - fries with gravy, cheese curds. tomatoes, guacamole and sour cream. They were wonderful, obscene belly bombs and a real taste of local flavor. I recommend that everyone at least try poutine, preferably with a cold beer and an empty stomach!

Until my next CSA pick up!

Aaand we're back

So after a four month hiatus, I've finally found the time and motivation to start blogging again! I've been busy most of the winter studying for the LSATs, but at long last the test has been taken (results pending) and I have some leisure time. I have a few ideas for new posts, but I figured I'd start with a roundup of some of the yummier and more photogenic things I've cooked since October. Recipes found online are, as always, linked in the panel on the right.

Roasted stuffed pumpkin on Halloween. My own recipe which came out quite well: a simple mix of roasted veggies (onion, carrot, celery, fennel, sweet potato, parsnip) and wild rice inside a small pumpkin roasted with olive oil and salt.

Savory miso soup with rice and a poached egg, seasoned as you wish with sesame oil, sriracha and soy sauce, from The Kitchn.

A great post-holiday meal, Egg Nests from how2heroes. It looks fancy but it's simple: press leftover stuffing into cup shapes in a muffin pan, then crack an egg into each and bake. It's suggested as a breakfast recipe, but it made a great dinner with coriander and almond green beans.

Mushroom bourguignon from Smitten Kitchen, an outstanding veg/vegan adaptation of Julie Child's famous boeuf bourguignon. Silky, hearty, devastatingly delicious I could barely wait while it simmered. 

For Christmas I decided to give homemade food gifts to friends and family. Everyone got a combo of the different jars I made. They are, left to right, vodka that I infused (all by myself!) with cranberries, cinnamon and pear, cranberry cocoa bread with walnuts, cranberry pistachio biscotti, wild rice and mushroom soup, and a southwestern spice mix. The vodka infusion I dreamed up, and the jar recipes came from a little $5 book I saw in a grocery store checkout line that had 50+ ideas for gifting food jars. They were a hit!

Another winner from The Kitchn, orzo with caramelized fall vegetables. I went through a week long craze for sweet potato and swiss chard, and this fit the bill perfectly. Sweet, soft, and full of earthy heartiness. FYI The Kitchn also has a recipe for orzo with summer vegetables, a cold pasta salad with tomatoes, zucchini and greens, which is also fabulous!

Curried smashed potatoes courtesy of White on Rice Couple, with naan and some minted peas. Creamy, sweet and delicious. If only my photos could be as gorgeous as theirs!

For Christmas GP and I tried something new and made Amazon wishlists that we sent to our families when asked the inevitable "what do you want for Christmas?" Our mothers were very appreciative of how easy this made their shopping, and I'm advocating for everyone to make and maintain a wishlist of their own! Perhaps needless to say, but my list was full of cooking accoutrement: a food processor, a mandoline (squee!), mortar and pestle, and a slew of books by Mark Bittman, namely: How to Cook Everything, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, Food Matters, and The Food Matters Cookbook. Santa was very generous and I received a stack of all the books, so I've been on a Bittman binge since the new year, trying out at least one of his recipes each week. His How to Cook Everything cookbooks are a great resource for the dishes that I've heard of and want to try but don't know where to learn the basic recipe. Ratatouille was one of those recipes (I've wanted to make it ever since I saw the adorable and wonderful Pixar movie), and sure enough, Mark had a recipe for a basic, oven-baked version. I know in the film, one of the chefs calls ratatouille "a peasant's dish", and from the ingredients I think I understand: no meat, nothing complicated, just a mountain of fresh vegetables and herbs roasted until soft and sweet.

(the mandoline was a godsend here, my new favorite toy!)

Paired with a good red wine and rustic bread, c'est magnifique!

Guilty Kitchen's portobello burgers again, on ciabatta bread with plenty of avocado and spinach and a side of Trader Joe's sweet potato fries.

My new favorite things for breakfast! A simple and scrumptious recipe from The Kitchn for a fried egg on toast, topped with lemon-garlic wilted kale. I've been making this every weekend morning for a month - I'm addicted. I've also gone nuts for blood oranges and have been eating them daily for a couple of weeks (I might turn purple). 

Bibimbap. Isn't that the best word? I've only had this dish a couple of times when I discovered it on Korean restaurant menus, and thanks to The Kitchn I now know how to make it at home! Basically, bibimbap is a skillet dish of rice, sizzling at the bottom until slightly crunchy, topped with a mix of soft and crisp fresh vegetables, an egg and seasonings of sesame oil and red pepper paste. I worked off The Kitchn's recipe but made a few modifications. I replaced the tofu with stir-fried shiitake mushroom slices, fried the egg and made a makeshift version of gochujang (suggested in the comments) with sriracha and soy sauce. GP and I inhaled this and fought over the leftovers. We'll definitely make it again soon.

And last but not least, a recent dinner of sweet potato and black bean chili with a side of cranberry almond cornbread. The chili was my variation of this recipe; I took out the carrots and bell pepper, and added a diced jalapeno, lime juice and chipotles in adobo sauce to make it very sweet and spicy. For the cornbread, I used a basic recipe without sugar, and just stirred in dried cranberries and sliced almonds.

So that's a bit of a recap. Like I said, I've got some ideas for themed posts, so I should post again soon!

All treats, no tricks

Okay, so it's been two weeks. GP has been working late recently, which typically means I capitalize on leftovers, but I've captured my dinners for the past two weeks to share a sampling of my ovo-pesco-vegan diet. (As a side note, please forgive the poor quality of the photos. I unfortunately don't own a fancy camera and the flourescent light in my kitchen makes everything an ugly yellow.)

To start off, a big batch of chana masala via Smitten Kitchen. GP and I both love Indian food and chickpeas, so when I realized that such a thing as chickpea curry existed, I knew I had to make it. I will say that this receipe left the chickpeas a little dry, so I'd add some more water, but otherwise it was tangy and delicious. I ate it with some jasmine rice and Trader Joe's garlic naan.

With some extra rice, GP and I made this crab fried rice from a little book of Chinese recipes I was given. It was very light and fragrant, with bean sprouts, leeks, crab, egg and lime juice.

This is one of my new favorite recipes, pumpkin rotini from Hipster Food's Chickpea magazine. Though the blog's name is cringe-worthy, Hipster Food is a good resource for tasty vegan fare. This pumpkin rotini is, in my opinion, the perfect vegan substitute for mac 'n cheese. The sauce is a seasoned mixture of pumpkin puree and rice milk, and has all the ooey-gooey creaminess and warmth of a bowl of classic Kraft.

Sauteed mushrooms and kale over polenta. I found this recipe at Epicurious, used Trader Joe's pre-made polenta, nixed the pancetta and cheese and swapped vegetable broth for chicken broth. Maybe it was all of the modifications, but this dish was pretty bland and boring, and still required me to use 3 pots and pans! All it was was kale and mushrooms, seasoned and cooked down in broth, over warm polenta. I could probably find ways to improve upon the recipe, but overall the end result isn't worth all the cleanup.

Fall is here and I'm thrilled to take advantage of seasonal vegetables and get into the harvest/Halloween spirit. With extra pumpkin puree from the rotini, I made these pumpkin spice cookies working off of a recipe at Group Recipes. They turned out moist and tasty and I made sure to share them with co-workers, lest I eat three dozen by myself.

GP likes to pick on my general lack of knowledge when it comes to seafood. His father is an accomplished member of the industry, so he grew up eating and learning about a lot of aquatic creatures. I've never really liked seafood or fish in any form, but I've forced myself to open up and eat new and different kinds of seafood with more frequency, in order to take advantage of the excellent health benefits. However, as GP points out, I tend to pick the most complicated, exotic types of seafood that end up making me frustrated and nervous. Instead of trying a simple, versatile whitefish like cod or mahi mahi, I buy shell-on prawns and oysters. This past summer I excitedly made paella and was introduced to mussels. While they did make me a little nervous (How do I keep them alive in the fridge? What if I eat a bad one?) they were tasty and fun to cook and eat. Now that seafood is a main source of protein for me, I'm trying to make it the centerpiece of 2-3 meals each week. So I tried mussels again, and worked off of a recipe in the Good Housekeeping Cookbook, cooking them with wine, herbs and alliums and serving them with crusty bread (and more wine). The meal was light and felt oh-so fancy.

As I said, fall is here, and I'm trying to work in a lot of seasonal vegetables. Food bloggers the internet over seem to be squealing about brussel sprouts. I'll be honest, I had never had brussel sprouts before, but I was eager to try them. I made several meals out of two recipes. One was roasted potatoes and brussel sprouts from The Kitchn (nix the bacon) with a side of Trader Joe's Harvest Grains Blend (I love this stuff). The other I found at the fabulous blog The Bitten Word, which was for sauteed brussel sprouts with sriracha and cashews. The sprouts with potatoes and grains is a hearty (albeit starch-heavy) rib-sticker, while the sriracha and cashew stir fry is hot, nutty and crunchy. Two thumbs up for both.

Getting a little lazy and cooking for one, I made a couple of omelets, a huge veggie one and a kale and mushroom. With the veggie omelet I re-heated a weekend attempt at sriracha hashbrowns I invented. Shredded potatoes with chopped onions and jalapenos, seasoned with cayenne pepper and sriracha. I thought the idea was pretty good, but even after many attempts, I cannot make crispy, flavorful hash browns. Mine end up soggy and all the flavors are masked by oil. Anyone have some pointers?

Pasta pasta pasta! I tried a new pasta dish called 'Harvest Primavera' from Whole Foods, and turned to an old favorite from The Kitchn, soba noodles with wilted bok choy. I was skeptical about the Whole Foods recipe, as I've had a 50% success rate with their recipes in the past, but this was a winner. Seasonal vegetables mixed with a pound of penne in a tangy, spicy tomato sauce. As you can see, it made enough to feed me for quite a while and I never tired of it. The night on which I made the soba noodles may not have been the best, it was freezing rain outside and this is a cold, slimier dish, but it's easy, light, healthy and delicious.

Of the few types of seafood I did grow up enjoying, scallops were second only to shrimp. I love their delicate, distinct flavor, and the fact that they are visually unintimidating, like the seafood equivalent of a chicken nugget (not to insult the scallop). They are tender, juicy bites of yum. I found this recipe for smoky scallops with fennel at The Kitchn. I love fennel, I love scallops, I also love wine and tomatoes, so this sounded amazing. Unfortunately, it turned out very bland. Both scallops and fennel have very light, delicate flavors which I think were lost in the cooking and the wine base. Everything also lost it's color and looked a bit grey. I omitted the tomatoes as GP doesn't like them very much and served everything on brown rice. I wish this turned out better, but it fell short.

Lastly, the first recipe I've tried by Mark Bittman, practical healthy-eating advocate, author and food writer at The New York Times. He is one of my four 'food heroes' as I call them, Mark, Mike, Jamie and Joel, otherwise known as Mark Bittman, Michael Pollan, Jamie Oliver and Joel Salatin (please Wikipedia as necessary). But more about them later. Bittman has written several compendiums of '101 recipes' for the Times, which are lists of quick, cheap meal ideas following a certain theme - Thanksgiving, summer, salads, etc. This is #4 on his summer recipes, a simple mix of seasoned white beans and shrimp. I added some crusty bread and thoroughly enjoyed this light but savory dinner. The leftovers also made a fantastic lunch.

So there you have it, my dinners (and most lunches) for two weeks. For breakfast I consistently eat either cold cereal with rice milk, or fruit, so that's my ovo-pesco-vegan diet. I'm even more excited about the upcoming meals I have planned. I'm diving headfirst into hearty fall cooking (I think I was forced to, considering it snowed two days ago) and making stuffed pumpkins tonight for a Halloween dinner, followed by Ribollita soup, sweet potato and black bean chili, puttanesca pasta, and a squash and egg skillet.

To close, I'll share this year's jack-o-lanterns: a portrait of my cat, Count Rugen, and Me Gusta.

I've enjoyed carving the annual jack-o-lantern for as long as I can remember. However, I think I was in middle school when I discovered the magic of jack-o-lantern stencils, and every year since I've made at least one detailed carving - everything from Jack Sparrow to Gollum to Barack Obama to Eric Northman. This year I kept my focus more at home, choosing a picture that looked like the real  man in my life, Rugen, and what can I say, Me Gusta was made to be put on a pumpkin.

Happy Halloween!

Ovo-pesco-whuh?

I don't know whether it's official or not, but October seems to be the month for food-related events. Last weekend was the Boston Local Food Festival which GP and I attended. It was a huge event full of local vendors and organizations with lots to eat and drink! There was a special local craft brew tasting event held at the Daily Catch where you paid $25, got a cup and got two hours to taste as many samples of local beer, wine, mead and cider as you could handle. Considering we hadn't eaten breakfast when we showed up, we took it a little easy, but it was still delicious and fun.

Coming up, October 24 is National Food Day, sponsored by the Center for Science in the Public Interest. I've been excited about this event since last winter when I first learned about it, and I'm glad that there are going to be a number of events taking place around Boston that day. There is no standard event, the CSPI is simply encouraging organizations, restaurants, schools, governments and the public to host events, large and small which highlight food and the myriad issues surrounding it, namely diet-related disease, farming, hunger, environmental health, junk food marketing to children, and farm labor. The CSPI has been holding monthly webinars which touch on each of the issues and I have been listening in. The CSPI functions as an independent consumer advocacy organization who are basically the watchdogs of the food industry and the government. They step in to advocate for public and environmental health and seek to educate the public about major food issues. I'm appreciative and excited about the work they are doing and about the Food Day events which are in the works. Because it's on a Monday, unfortunately I won't be able to go to any daytime events, but I plan on going to a documentary film screening at Harvard - I'll update once it's happened!

Then there's even more! The weekend after Food Day, October 29-30 is the Boston Vegetarian Food Festival, which as GP rightly assumed, I plan on going to. So yeah, I don't know if it's because of the harvest season with it's last hurrah of agricultural yield before the New England snow hits and the color green disappears from the natural world for a solid five months, but everyone is celebrating food this month. I'm not complaining :)

As for my cooking adventures at home, I finally watched one too many documentaries about the numerous health, moral, economic and environmental woes that arise from eating meat (this one actually) and took the inevitable leap to cutting out red meat and poultry from my diet. A little bit about my dietary history, I've always eaten a pretty average, not extremely unhealthy nor uber-healthy American diet. In high school I was a 'loose' vegetarian for two years, trying it out to support animal welfare and lose weight but I was never fully dedicated to it. I was 'loose' because I'd allow myself a meat-filled dinner of takeout Chinese food or a burger about once a month. I eventually gave it up entirely. My diet changed again when I studied abroad in China for five months. While there, I didn't eat any dairy (it's not part of the traditional diet and is pretty hard to find) and I ate a great deal more fresh fruits and vegetables, along with smaller amounts of less-processed meat. I lost 30 pounds without trying to. Since I returned home two years ago I've tried to maintain the same diet more-or-less which has had it's difficulties. Even if I ate the same kinds of bread and meat as in China, it was inevitably more processed and less fresh, and of course cheese is pretty much inescapable in the U.S., so I've slacked a little and allowed myself a bit of fromage here and there.

But no longer. I'm putting my foot down. Since GP and I have gotten our own place it's much easier to control my whole diet, and with my new healthy food obsession we've been eating better and better. The only junk food we buy is some chocolate and tortilla chips, and the majority of our dinners are vegetable and grain-based Asian cuisine (Indian, Japanese, Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai). I've been balancing our meals as 50/50 vegetarian, so without dairy, we've been eating a lot of vegan meals for awhile. With this new decision to cut out red meat and poultry, I'm technically eating an ovo-pesco-vegan diet, aka eggs and fish are the only animal products I'll eat. I decided to leave these animal products in because I think a strict vegan diet is a little unpractical for me, I won't have to worry about getting enough protein and vitamin B-12, and can still enjoy the many health benefits of eating fish/seafood.

I didn't expect GP to adopt the diet with me, I was more than willing to cook him his own portions of beef, pork and chicken, but surprisingly, he said he'd make the transition too. He is one of those rare people who enjoys eating healthily. His favorite 'junk' food is bread and he loves vegetables and seafood. He also has no sweet tooth which I simply cannot understand as I pine for a cookie after dinner every night. Also, as he pointed out, this isn't a huge change from how we were already eating.

So there it is, we are ovo-pesco-vegans as silly as it sounds. I'm not sure if the terminology is 100% correct, as we're technically not vegans by including eggs and fish, but we're not ovo-pesco-vegetarians, because that would imply that we eat dairy. Whatever, they're all buzzwords anyway. So what do two ovo-pesco-vegans eat, you ask? I'll be documenting what I eat for a full week (dinners at the very least) and will share it in my next post.

Until then!

Pizza and beer - kitchn style

Hello again, it's been a while. I'll admit that the errands of everyday life, coupled with my malignant laziness, have kept me away from the computer. I was also in a bit of a culinary slump for a couple of weeks - turning to easy staples such as enchiladas, stir frys and noodle dishes without trying anything new. But I snapped out of it.

Here are some of the more interesting things I've made since my last post:

Portabella burgers via Guilty Kitchen

 Moo Shu tofu via Weight Watchers

Salmon cakes with lemon yogurt sauce via Epicurious

Honey cornbread muffins via Food Network

Elote with guacamole

and, per the title:

Sweet potato, caramelized onion and rosemary pizza

Beer popsicles

These last two recipes both came from Apartment Therapy's cooking blog, the kitchn (seriously, if you haven't gone yet, GO) which always has quirky ideas for all types of food. The entire blog has a specific vibe to it, and that includes the recipes. Browsing through the site I imagine all the contributors and readers to be well-off twenty and thirty somethings (yuppies) who have part-time or work-from-home creative careers, (interior design, graphic design, clothing design, food photography, florists), and who are always looking for the next simple beauty to delight at (magnetic spice jars, chalkboard paint, bookshelf lighting, herb-muddled cocktails, a new boutique devoted solely to organic agave nectar, etc.) It's a clean, simple blog of young people swapping domestic ideas. Every contributor, whether detailing how to decorate your mantle with vinyl records, or giving must-have tips on preparing Thanksgiving dinner, is eco-conscious, health-conscious and economical. Local foods and products are encouraged, cleaner, healthier alternatives to ingredients and building materials are trumpeted, and the best flea markets for mid-century furniture are announced with glee. The posts and comments can sometimes be pretentious - even laughably so (read the general consensus about the Netflix price hike here), but I love this site like I love chocolate. It's fun and comforting to lose yourself in the minutiae of domesticity: "Oo I could paint a statement wall." "I could design my own zany computer desk." "I could grow my own heirloom tomatoes!" "Mmm I should add some lemon zest and pomegranate seeds to that dish." Needless to say, it's the perfect place to find ideas for an unconventional, vegetarian, herb-infused pizza pie and homemade grown up sweet treats.

More recent food news in my life: I accidentally ate a habanero pepper. This event taught me that I knew nothing about the varieties of chili peppers and that I really need to learn. As it turns out, a friend of the family has a family farm in New Hampshire. I headed north to visit my parents last week and we visited to buy some veg and support the owners. I was blown away by the variety of produce they had available (see the website) and I bought a ton of food - kale, soy beans, potatoes, onions, corn, tomatoes, popcorn, garlic, carrots, squash, and chili peppers - for a very low price. The bin said only 'Chili Peppers', so I grabbed a handful of short and long, smooth and wrinkly, green, red and orange peppers. The other night I was making Jamie Oliver's recipe for sweet and sour pork, and it called for a chili pepper. I looked at my farm-fresh assortment and decided that the round little orange one was fun and colorful, so I seeded it (thank god), sliced it and tossed it in with all the other ingredients. As soon as it hit the pan, capsaicin seared the air and GP and I were choking, coughing and crying trying to finish the dish. He showed up after I had chopped everything, and when I told him that I had used the orange pepper, he explained, laughing.

Once we managed to cook everything through, still coughing a bit, it was time to eat. Talk about trial by fire. The entire dish burned lips, tongue, throat and stomach. The capsaicin heat masked the sweet and sour flavor of everything, so it was pretty much just 'spicy pork'. It wasn't so overwhelming as to be inedible (and GP and I both like things as spicy as we can handle), but we had to break every few minutes or so until our tastebuds stopped tingling enough for us to try another mouthful. We then trained ourselves in chili pepper recognition, and studied the Scoville scale (see illustration above the habanero in the first image), so overall it was a learning experience - albeit a slightly painful one.

That's all for this post. I have more food-related events to share but I'll save them for next time. Be sure to check out links for most of these recipes in the panel on the right.