We had 96 amazing answers to our request to tell us about your love for fruit: in jam, as soda syrup base, poached in wine, used on meat, in a salad, etc… A comment won someone a copy of Sherri Brooks Vinton’s newest book, Put ’em Up! Fruit. First up, some amazingly personal & thoughtful comments: Terry: Since I…
{Grains Brain Challenge} Chicken and Farro Gumbo
Grain Brains Challenge A recipe challenge to help you get whole grains into your mouth, not just your kitchen. I grew up in Mississippi right outside of New Orleans. Down there, every family has a favorite gumbo, and everyone thinks theirs is the perfect recipe. But the truth is gumbo is about as variable as South Louisiana…
{diy project} Homesick Horchata
I’ve lived a lot of places but grew up mostly in Phoenix. Phoenix is a very interesting place. The things I love about it are pretty much what most tourists would find really stupid, or just plain odd. Since my whole family still lives there (How can they possibly still live there? It’s so hot!!)…
{diy recipe} Roasted Chickpea Flour (and Brownies!)
For my contribution this month, I figured I’d share one of my favorite go-to brownie recipes, and introduce its secret ingredient – roasted chickpea flour. Roasted chickpea flour is orders of magnitude different than plain chickpea flour as it comes from the bag. Roasting the garbanzo flour gives it a nice deep rich nutty flavor,…
{spring recipe} Beans, Beets & Sorrel Salad
Editor’s Note: Ellie Markovitch of storycooking.com is back with another seasonal recipe, this time with sorrel. -Christina The weather here is still fighting between late winter and springtime, but last week, I got a taste of Spring from Rebekah Rice’s 9Mile farm green house — a bunch of “azedinha” as we call them in Brazil. You may know it…
{giveaway} Put ‘Em Up! Fruit.
Its Earth Day and I get to gush about a book (and host a giveaway) that inspires and educates folks on the ins & outs of putting fruit up, whether that’s in jam-form, syrup-form, frozen-form or or or…the sky is the limit! Growing your own fruit or buying fruit from your local farmers market or…
{FSC Book Club} Meeting 4 & 5 Recap:Rye,Buckwheat,Millet & Barley
We read, we cook, we chat. That is the FSC Book Club. I might have jinxed us. On the last recap, I noted that these assignments might be tricky with its focus on some of the more uncommon grains like barley and buckwheat. I commented in the forum that I was nervous because those whole…
{diy project} Open Hearth Cooking
This year we decided to try cooking on our temporary outdoor fireplace while we boiled our sap into maple syrup. Cast iron is perfect for cooking on coals. Being pack rats, we just happen to have a vintage cast iron twelve-inch three-legged Dutch oven that someone gave us a couple of years ago because he…
{Grain Brains Challenge} Sprouting Grains
Grain Brains Challenge A recipe challenge to help you get whole grains into your mouth, not just your kitchen. Early in March, I met a baker who hates flour. Michael Perakovich makes sprouted wheat breads at Columbia County Bread and Granola and his hatred comes from what flour does to people’s bodies. He’s spent two years perfecting…
{gf recipe} Chocolate Chip Cookies, Two Ways
…(Or a how to make perfect chocolate chip cookies) Chocolate chip cookies are great conversation starters. People are passionate about them. Some folks like ‘em crispy, others chewy, then there’s the whole “with nuts or without” debate. And don’t even get people started on their feelings about raisins in chocolate chip cookies. (I’m firmly…
{drink it up} Carrot Ginger Mimosa
April is a transitional month in my neck of the woods. At the start of the month, cold winds still blow and snowflakes dot the air. By the end of the month, the tulips and daffodils are in full blossom, and everything appears a bit hazy from the delicate buds that start to pop open…
{diy project} High Achieving Slothfulness
We make maple syrup by tapping neighborhood trees every year and boiling the sap down in our driveway on a make-shift cinder block fireplace. This year our syruping partner Lin suggested that we try using the fire to cook while we sat around all day drinking rum and watching the sap boil; a kind of…
{brown baggin’ it} Freezer Friendly
I love living on a budget. And perhaps if I keep telling myself that, one day I might even believe it. Being on a tight budget for the last six months (living alone is really not as cheap as it sounds) has taught me how to keep things simple, and look for ways to stretch…
{recipe} Sweet and Spicy Chocolate Black Bean Dip
Yes you read that title right- Sweet and Spicy Chocolate Black Bean Dip. I feel like you need to understand my inspiration for this recipe before I go on… So a few years back during one of my many health kick phases, a.k.a. damn my ass got big I need to do something about it, I…
{FSC TIME MACHINE} Backyard Chickens Part 2
We’re spending this weekend talking chicken… …backyard chickens! Yesterday we had part one of the two-part series, with links to incubating & candling chick eggs, hatching chicks, sexing chicks and general ‘how to’ get started. Today, Liz shares her experience, tips & tricks all about the after-chick stage… Liz talks chicken coops Why bother…
