It warms the cockels of my qualitarian heart to see more and more farmers selling real meat at farmers’ markets. Produce is a wonderful thing, but real meat — that would be meat from animals that actually graze, mill around outside enjoying themselves, and generally live the way they’ve evolved to live — is much [...]
Unless you’re allergic, you’ve probably had sesame in one form or another: tahini (which is sesame paste), sesame oil, or outright sesame seeds. But have you ever tried toasted sesame oil? It’s pressed from seeds that were roasted as opposed to raw. Much like the seeds themselves, the oil from the roasted version has a [...]
Everybody loves bundled food. Wraps, burritos, calzones, you name it — they’re all popular. Grape leaves make great bundles, too, especially when you wrap them around Mediterranean ingredients like herbed olives, roasted peppers, and za’atar. (That spice blend includes sesame seeds, thyme, sumac, oregano, and salt.) With all of that plus whole-grain rice, these grape [...]
Although whole grains require longer cooking than their parboiled or refined counterparts, it’s hands-off cooking — you don’t have to stand over the stove while the grains quietly burble away. All you have to do is stir it once or twice. And if you put your grains in their water/broth a few hours ahead of [...]
Roasted kale and popcorn are probably my two favorite snacks (or dinners, for that matter). They’re both crispy-crunchy and can be tossed with a variety of spices and umami-rich flavors: kale with tamari and sesame and popcorn with anything from Ethiopian berbere spice blends to Indian curry powders. My only problem is that I tend [...]
Continue reading about Kale: It Just Keeps Getting More Delicious!
It’s officially fall: the pears are falling off of the trees. (Especially when you have gusting winds like we’ve been having lately.) One of my friends has so many pears lying on the ground underneath her tree that she keeps giving me more and more — she can’t bear to see any wasted. Wish I [...]
Although you can’t beat juicy-fresh fruit, dried fruit has its own set of charms: it’s non-messy, it’s very portable, and since it has such low water content, not only is it a better source of fiber than its fresh counterpart, dried fruit also has a more concentrated flavor. Berries in particular have a refreshing sweet/tart [...]
