Making Locality a Priority: Turnips and Greens Risotto

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“I suppose my generation is farther removed from food production than any other, just one more step down the path of the American food industry. More than our parents, we rely on foods that come out of shiny wrappers instead of peels or skins. It still surprises a girl like me, who actually lives on a real farm with real animals and stuff growing out of the ground, that so many young adults couldn’t guess where their food comes from, or when it’s in season where they live,” Camille Kingsolver, “Taking Local on the Road” from Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

Earlier this year, I read Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, a book that describes Kingsolver’s family’s endeavor to keep a small farm in Virginia, complete with chickens and turkeys, and to eat only foods grown in their county for a year. The book is filled with some trials, but mostly successes from Kingsolver’s family’s year in local eating. The book is also littered with colorful and informative essays from Kingsolver’s then-teenage daughter Camille. Continue reading

A tater tot breakfast casserole on the stove.

Brunch: From the Other Side of the Menu

img_8578I’ve worked in the restaurant business since I was a junior in high school, so the terror, stress—whatever you would like to call it—that Gabrielle Hamilton describes about her restaurant, Prune, is oh-so very real for me.  I began as a host and I remember looking at the staff around me on a Sunday morning brunch shift and saying a silent prayer for the hell we were about to experience.

Hamilton’s emphasis in her excerpt from Blood, Bones & Butter is on the importance of not “going down” throughout the long hours of your shift.  She says, “You are always, always going to face forces that can bring you to your knees.” Whether that means pouring pancake batter over yourself and your station (it was blue cheese in my case), or going hungry in a place that is literally full of food, the food service industry is one that can definitely make you look yourself in the face when you’re at your worst. Continue reading

I Have My Reasons.

 yummy-sammich

 Well, now I am back again for my second blog post and guess what? Instead of failing at sardonic wit and questionable humor now I am just straight up pissed off. And here’s why.

I am assigned with the happy task of writing about the bizarre and the taboo in food. My inspiration comes from a vegan author. Can you believe that?

Yes; there are indeed vegans. And now they have pens.

Continue reading

A Cure for That Stubborn Tunacity

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“…it would be unfair of me to reject all new dishes and all innovators, since, for the past thirty years, eminent chefs have honored me by lending my name to a dozen original dishes.”

-Curnonsky

 

We’ve all been there before when a dish is presented and we turn our nose up at it and all before we even give it a chance. I can remember countless times as a kid—and let’s be honest, as an adult—when I suddenly become the biggest food snob when I am presented with a dish that I have never tried before. Continue reading