What should we eat?

I have been called on/out by a friend in her discussion of local and simultaneously there has been a lively discussion occurring on the ASFS listserv (Association for the Study of Food & Society) regarding what sustainable means.

I don't see local, organic, sustainable as all or nothing scenarios. In fact, I probably exemplify Danielle's farmshare + Market Basket pseudo philosophy on eating. When you can, eat locally/organically/sustainably, but those words, rules and guidelines cannot be fixed. I think that might be my biggest problem with Michael Pollan is that he [attempts to] offer(s) universal rules that people in America should follow. But for ever rule that he, Alice Waters, or [insert food critic/chef/nutritionist/food movement/diet trend or fad HERE] offer up, the food industry can quickly subvert and/or capitalize on.

Remember when the word natural meant something?
Then came ads like the 7-up bunny burp and the Now 100% Natural commercials, which now have been replaced with Snapple's better stuff commercials that imply they have found new and better ingredients, sugar instead of high fructose corn syrup. (Pepsi throwback is following suit.)

So natural is out.
Organic has been co-opted by the USDA to mean something, but not really in the true spirit of the word - not to mention the fact that most small farms cannot afford the fees required to obtain that green circle of approval.
As much as I can disagree with Mr. Pollan on many things, his "everything is local somewhere" comment rings true with the confusing and manipulating usage of the word. (Is something really local if the feed/soil, pesticides and insecticides used to create it were created elsewhere and shipped across the state, or the country?)
Is sustainable just the latest fad word or marketing gimmick that is going to battle it out with "bio dynamic" or "minimally processed" for some sort of food authenticity?

QUESTION: What should we believe and eat?

ANSWER: I don't know.

Ok, that is really unfair. I eat, you can tell because I need those calories to blog. I have the free time to blog, so you know that I am able to collect enough food to not be spending this typing and thinking time working or procuring food. Yet I have to think about food and what I eat 3+ times a day because eating cannot be a mindless act when there are foods and food additives that can make me very sick.

Do I think about food more than most people? Probably.
Can I afford to eat the way I feel I should? No.
Does this mean I throw up my hands when I cannot afford a $35 chicken? No.

So, how do I eat?
Before moving to Chicago for the summer I had a diet is not easy to categorize, but here goes:
-greens, I try to eat these at least three times a week
-cheap, I shop at 4-6 different grocery stores and co-ops
-June-October/November I visit 3 different weekly farmers markets - my egg consumption rises during these months
-fish, I try to eat it once every week or two
-meat - I eat it about 2+ times a week. The Austin Farm family bring their meat to the Central Square Farmer's Market in Cambridge, MA and its the best beef I have ever tasted. I probably eat more meat in the summer for this very reason.
-dairy - I don't eat a ton of this, but Kate's butter is my favorite and worth the price
-processed foods - if its a new gluten-free product AND its on sale I have a tough time not buying it and trying it out. I probably eat more processed foods now than before I had to go gluten-free
-organic, I buy it when I can (availability and price); but this goes out the window when the farmer's markets come into town
-coffee - I love it. I drink it daily and it is not grown in New England, nor are most of the spices or gluten-free flours I use.

Are my dietary habits local or sustainable?
Sorda.

Local/Sustainable:
+I buy from a co-op & farmers markets
-Most gf products are not made in New England
+Buying more gf products might make their cost go down and make them more of an option for those that need them, thus more sustainable for the gf community

See how it gets into that tricky "sorda" area real fast?!

While it is endlessly complicated and perhaps there are no simple answers, I love talking about these problems. It is probably the biggest thing I miss about not being in school, but I am glad for it to be happening if only in cyberspace.

Paramount Room's kobe burgers

I haven't been exploring the city too much, but last night the draw of kobe burgers + a pint for $10 was too good to resist. The Paramount Room, in downtown Chicago, was a former speakeasy. The lower level even has a small landing, located at the halfway point of the descending stairs, with two tables that overlook the floor below.

In addition to the burger deal, for $2 more you can add on an order of hand cut fries or tempera string beans. The bartender informed me that the beans were dipped in a rice-flour batter and were ok to eat too. Original Sin cider was on tap and qualified as a "beer" for the beer & burger special and started the meal off on a refreshing note. (Original Sin is not my favorite cider, but it is drier than Magners, Woodchuck or Harpoon, so I was glad to grab a pint.)

The burgers arrived hot and cooked to order. (This is an exciting discovery - a restaurant where you don't have to lie or mis-order to get your burger medium-rare!)
The french fries were hot, crisp and served in a wire cone lined with paper. Beyond show, this presentation kept the fries from steaming and getting soggy, so even the last spuds were crunchy. The fried green beans however, completely stole the show. Light, crisp and cooked so the beans themselves still had some snap to them, they came with a vinegary hot sauce that made it hard to stop eating them.

I don't know if the burger was really made from kobe beef - everything I have heard about kobe it doesn't exist outside of Japan - but it was in my top 3 burgers of all time and I cannot wait to have another.

Monster Cookies

This recipe was shouting at me from the back of a bag of gluten free oats. How could I resist the temptation to create MONSTER COOKIES?!

*The original recipe only called for 1/4 cup of butter, and the cookies held their shape (domed - I used a disher) and didn't spread. I stirred in the other half stick and the cookies made me happy, though they are very soft.

MONSTER COOKIES
1 stick (1/2 cup butter) at room temp.
3/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 cup peanut butter (I used the unsweetened kind and these were plenty sugary)
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 cups gluten free rolled oats
1/2 cup chocolate chips
1/3 cup pecans (or walnuts would be good here)
1/3 cup dried cherries

Preheat oven to 350F

1. Cream the butter and sugars until fluffy.
2. Stir in the eggs and mix well till combined.
3. Stir in the peanut butter, powder and vanilla, until combined.
4. Stir in the oats, chocolate, nuts and dried fruit.
5. Spoon cookies out onto a greased or parchment lined cookie sheet and bake 10-12 minutes, or until the edges are golden brown.

These were good, very very good.

Zatar Spiced Meatballs

Sorry for the lag in posting, but I jumped at an opportunity in Chicago and will be here for the summer. Most of it is exciting, though trying to navigate a new city is challenging in ways I hadn't expected. I got accustomed to having a decent grasp of grocery store isles and that has gone out the window. It took me 4x longer to buy a basket's worth of food because I had no idea where things were and kept finding new products and needing to pour over the fine print. I am excited about upcoming farmers markets and finding some specialty stores.

In the kitchen I have had a few dinner success; last night was an impromptu aloo mattar with brown rice that turned a few left over potatoes and half a bag of frozen peas into a great meal. Last week I made pupusas for the first time.

Tonight I embarked on Zatar spiced meatballs. This isn't much of a recipe, its more of a list of things I through together, but I am actually proud of this fact. Throwing things together in a bowl/pot/pan was how I used to cook and doing it more and more often know makes me feel like I am getting my kitchen fingers back.

Inspired by some delicious zatar I picked up at The Spice House in Evanston, IL, I decided to modified the lamb meatball recipe I made in January, and worked off this Food&Wine recipe to create dinner.

Zatar (also spelled Za'atar, satar, zahtar or zatr) is a blend of herbs, sesame seeds and dried sumac. I love it sprinkled atop hummus, but I always think of Lebanese flat bread, that my mom brought home from the deli, smeared with olive oil and zatar when the spice is mentioned. I think missing that bread might inspire my next baking project... but back to dinner!

Zatar spiced meatballs
-diced 1/4 an onion
-minced 1 clove garlic
-cumin
-zatar spice [WARNING - many zatar spice blends contain roasted wheat as an ingredient. Please read carefully!]
-salt and pepper
-1lb. ground chuck

The mixture wasn't coming together too well, so I added in 1 egg to help bind everything together.
Then I formed them into meatballs:

I pan fried them in a tablespoon of olive oil, drained them and served them up.

I added lime juice to some hummus and served it with the meatballs on a corn tortilla with a slice of pickle - hot sauce on the side, a bit reminiscent of the falafel at Rami's in Coolidge Corner, Brookline, MA. For some crunch, there is cumin slaw and a watermelon & feta salad on the side.

Cumin Slaw
-head of cabbage, sliced thin
-half lime juice, half apple cider vinegar to coat cabbage
-a few pinches of salt (this is less than you think you need, its ok)
-whole cumin seeds (to taste)
Toss well to combine. This tastes better the next day.

Watermelon & Feta Salad - this is something I saw on Top Chef last season and thought was weird sounding, but always wanted to try. A sale on whole watermelons, $2.99 at Stanley's, sealed the deal. (Stanley's is seriously the most amazing place I have been to in a long time! They have the cheapest produce I have ever seen. The organic section is often way cheaper than the conventional. I was in sensory overload, and loved ever second.)
For the salad I...
-watermelon cubed
-chopped or crumbled feta
-thinly sliced onions (I used Vidalia)
-balsamic vinegar and olive oil to coat, really just a little because the watermelon will weep
-a few pinches of salt and black pepper

Dinner was a success and there is enough for left overs!

Perhaps not all seitan is evil

This recipe is a bit of a mind-bending idea: gluten-free seitan.

Thanks to Danielle for sending it along.

Capone Foods

A place known for its fresh pasta might not be on the top of your list of go-to places, but Capone Foods in Union Square in Somerville, MA should be. Small and narrow, the shop is packed to the gills with homemade and imported foodstuffs to tickle the taste buds. A cheese case, meat case, freezer and fridge filled with fresh pastas and sauces just make up one side of the store. The other is floor-to-ceiling oils, vinegars, olives, mushrooms and beverages - all things you did not know you needed but feel compelled to take home. I made a visit this past weekend, with a goal in mind but came out with something I did not expect--perhaps its a contradiction but perhaps it is the reason I go into small, specialty markets in the first place.

I stopped in Sunday and the owner, Albert, stands behind the counter with a smile beaming through his mustache and urges me to taste a new red wine vinegar. (It is good, surprisingly good. Sweeter and complicated than 89 cent stuff I have at home and it makes me wonder how I have made a salad with anything else. $12.95 a bottle tells me why, and that I won't be bringing it home today, but most certainly will be back.)

I ask if he carries abbrusseze, and an eyebrow goes up. He responds no, but have I tried this salame, and offers me a slice. It is better than it looks, and it looks beautiful. No two are perfectly alike and there is a nice dry, white mold on the outside and it smell cave-aged. Its looks were not deceiving. I gush over its tenderness and he smiles widens. We discuss the shop, the neighborhood and where one does find obscure, dried sausages.

The conversation meanders a bit more about different products -their pasta and why I am not buying any - and I mention I used to work at a specialty food store and he insists I try his sun dried tomatoes in olive oil. I tell him they are not my favorite things, but he picks one up with tongs, out of a long glass vase and holds it out towards me with pride. I gingerly grasp it between two fingers and take a bite. The tomatoes were soft, not leathery and sweet. Before I go, he insists that I try some of their pesto, on the house.

I was so excited to go home and try out new foods and cooking techniques (the pesto warns DO NOT HEAT) and figure out how to make a meal out of these new treats.

***

I tried there house made sun dried tomato pesto last night; it was better than I anticipated (I had set the bar pretty high). My big gripe with sun dried tomatoes is that they can get bitter; this pesto not taste bitter at all. I place the semi-thawed pesto atop the hot pasta and allowed it to melt gently. It was bright, not too oily and clung nicely to my rice pasta, making for a delicious dinner and left over.
The container says not to heat the pesto - but cold rice pasta is gritty and disgusting, so I gently warmed it in the microwave.

I ate it with a salad and a few slices of the salame. Columbus artisan salames are gluten free and amazing. Not overly salted or seasoned, with a nice mix of fat and meat, but the real treat was the beautiful rind. I tried the smaller, harder cacciatore, that was beautiful. It has the texture of an abbrusseze, but much milder.

Uno's Chicago Grill's National Dough Rai$er for Celiac Awareness

I received this email from the American Celiac Foundation and thought its worth passing on.

Starting TODAY and continuing through May 31st, Uno's Chicago Grill is hosting a National Dough Rai$er for Celiac Awareness. Uno is the first national, casual dining chain to launch a Gluten Free Pizza and to offer a Gluten-Free menu. They understand people with celiac disease want to eat out and must have safe options.

Gather your family and friends and celebrate awareness month by visiting your local Uno's Chicago Grill. Why not have your support group meet for a night out!

The National Dough Rai$er is one more way Uno's is supporting the celiac community. Show your appreciation by enjoying one of their gluten free pizzas! Twenty percent of sales generated by participants in this event will go to support the ACDA's efforts to raise awareness and to improve the lives of those with celiac disease.

Be sure to print this voucher ( also at www.unos.com/acda.pdf ) and give it to your server. Go to www.unos.com and click on 'locations' to find the nearest restaurant. This is not valid at Pizzeria Uno or Uno Due.

Thank you and Enjoy!

The American Celiac Disease Alliance

www.americanceliac.org

Resources: Gluten-Free Books

I love cookbooks. I inevitably gravitate towards them in any new or used bookstore. Flipping through dogeared pages with stains and crumbs accompanying well-used recipes makes me smile - notes in the margin are even better. (Yes, I wash my hands afterward. Crumbs are sneaky devils.)

I grew up with the large, red 3-ring bound Better Crocker, a hardcover Joy of Cooking and a paperback version of The Frugal Gourmet, that would always open to the hummus recipe. My culinary tomes expanded when I took a cooking class, and later one on cake decorating, in high school. We worked nearly exclusively out of a plaid-bound Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook. Even though most of my recipes now come from new books, or blogs, I find myself looking for old copies of these four books. There is something about wanting to (re)create the dishes of childhood that is more than enticing, its compelling. I have tracked down 2 of the four, but am still on the look out for Betty and Mr. Smith.

When it comes to gluten free, here are my top go-to grabs:

Celiac Disease: A Hidden Epidemic
Dr. Peter Green
This is a good book that talks about science but without scientific terms. No recipes, but interesting information to help get ones head around what celiac is, isn't and how to talk to doctors and other people about it. (I now do a little puppet show with my fingers as small intestinal villi. I am a hoot at parties.)

The Gluten-Free Gourmet
Bette Hagman
This was one of, if not the first, gluten free cookbooks. Its been republished a bunch and you will notice that almost all gf recipes start with her flour mix or an adaptation thereof. She tends to use a lot of powdered milk in her breads, which I am not a huge fan of, but its a good starting point.

Gluten-Free Girl: How I Found the Food That Loves Me Back... & How You Can Too
Shauna James Ahern
All of the recipes in the book are on her blog: http://glutenfreegirl.blogspot.com/
The book is written like a memoir/novel with recipes thrown in here and there.
I do not like her writing style and she often uses expensive, obscure ingredients and her book isn't indexed well, so its a pain. Just search her sight if you are looking for something.
She does have a lot of recipes, so its worth looking at.

Gluten-Free Baking
Rebecca Reilly
I like this book a lot and have found myself going to it first for recipe ideas and basic cake structures.

Healthy Gluten-Free Cooking
Darina Allen
This is written by a woman who studied in Ireland but has a lot of Australian/New Zealand recipes or influences. Because it is not US-based, they have both the weight and volume of measurements.
There are some odd recipes, but even though I don't cook from them regularly, they do inspire me. All of my pancake attempts have been based off this book and they have a fantastic breakfast bar recipe that freezes well. (I make these when I am traveling and unsure about early morning food options.)

Wheat Free Tamari

Discovering that soy sauce contains wheat was a big surprise. I am not going to lie, I was bummed out about kissing most Chinese and Japanese foods goodbye. I was elated to discover wheat-free tamari!

Tamari is a Japanese fermented soy sauce. Most traditional tamaris do contain wheat, so read the labels carefully. San-J Wheat Free Tamari is my favorite. It has a round flavor, softer and sweeter than soy sauce. Its less salty, but since its naturally fermented, there is also a complexity to its flavor. It has become a pantry staple, right alongside fish sauce, siracha and toasted sesame oil - items that can sometimes be found in the grocery store, but are worth the adventure out to an Asian market to find.

(I love this stuff so much that I bring a small bottle of it with me when I go out for sushi.)

Scones

I had every intention of following a recipe. (I know this is hard to believe because I have no photographic proof, but take my word on it, just this one time.) I could blame the big bands and crooners sailing out of my radio, from AM radio 740WJIB, but it is my own fault for not paying attention to which measuring cup I pulled, not the melodic sounds of Frank. My goal was to attempt scones, specifically the fruit scone recipe from Healthy Gluten-Free Cooking by Allen & Kearney, but it went awry around the time that I realized I didn't buy enough yogurt, and decided to make things up as I went, oh and yeah, grabbing the 2/3 measuring cup rather than the 1/2. Here is what I cobbled together and if I may say so, THEY RULE! The original recipe uses more yogurt, so keep some extra dairy handy; yogurt or cream will work well if your dough won't come together. Just add a little at a time till you have a cohesive dough.

Raisin Scones
2/3 cup sweet rice flour
2/3 cup potato starch flour
2/3 cup tapioca starch
3/4 cup corn starch
1 tsp salt
4 tablespoons sugar
2 tsp xanthan gum
4 tsp baking powder
3/4 cup golden raisins - you could substitute regular or dried cherries
1 stick butter
7 oz (small tub) of Greek yogurt - plus a few tablespoons of cream on hand
2 eggs
+1 egg for egg wash (egg well mixed with a splash of cold water)
plastic wrap or extra rice flour for rolling out dough

Preheat the oven to 475F.
1. Combine the dry ingredients.
2. Cut in the butter. Shoot for pea-sized bits of butter. Then stir in the raisins.
3. In a separate bowl, combine the 2 eggs and the yogurt until they are well combined.
4. Make a well in the butter-flours mixture and pour in the egg-yogurt mixture. Work it together till at least half of it is a dough.
5. Turn the dough out onto 2 sheets of plastic wrap (you can use a counter, but keep reading and see why I think the plastic wrap is useful). Work the dough together, kneading and folding it gently to form a cohesive dough.
Using the plastic wrap, lift and fold the dough over and onto itself, then turn it a quarter turn and repeat. This technique will keep your hands off the dough - keep the butter cold - and make it so you do not have to work more flour into the dough by flour the counter.
6. Roll out the dough so its 1" (I did this by folding over the plastic wrap and gently rolling with a pin). Cut into 12-15 scones with a cookie cutter or sharp knife.*
7. Brush the top with the egg wash. You can sprinkle with sugar if you wish, but not necessary.
8. Bake at 475F for 10-11 minutes until the edges are golden brown.
9. Transfer to a wire rack for cooling.
*Don't futz around or handle the dough too much, you want to keep the butter cold so the scones puff when baked.

These came out so much better than I could have hoped for. The texture was spot-on scone: moist, but crumbly, a little sweet but not that much, a good, consistent crumb!



Next time I would add a pinch more of salt and some buttermilk for some tang.