But in the past few weeks, my attitude toward local eating has taken a complete 180.  It started with a sign that I saw driving through my neighborhood for Isidore Foods.  Curious, I googled it and found that it’s a company that partners with regional farmers to deliver local produce, meats, pantry items, and dairy products, with many products being organic.  I perused their website for quite some time, intrigued by all the different types of food subscriptions they offered.

Now, let me say that I already subscribed to a CSA for fruits and vegetables, but didn’t consider myself a complete local food freak.  I subscribed to a CSA simply because local fruits and vegetables taste better than store-bought produce, not because I had lofty goals of saving the planet.

But after reading about Isidore Foods, I became more and more interested in the concept of local eating that I eventually rented a book from the library on the subject, The Locavore’s Handbook, by Leda Meredith.  I’ll admit that even when I started reading it I was still fairly cynical about the whole thing, and was pretty sure the book was going to make me feel guilty for not already eating locally and shame me into doing so.

However, what I found was the complete opposite.  Meredith addresses the history of our food production and food culture and explains many of the problems with it.  She also addresses many of the questions cynics like me usually ask, such as “isn’t eating local more expensive?” and “how can I possibly have time to cook local food?”  As I kept reading, I began to realize that eating local isn’t simply a hot trend, it’s a way of life that requires changing your entire way of thinking about food.  For example, we have gotten so used to being able to eat whatever we want, whenever we want.  Eating local has an entirely different attitude about it that starts with eating seasonally- looking to see what is in season and then deciding what we can cook with it, rather than the other way around.

Although Meredith made a pretty drastic lifestyle change by deciding to eat only things that were produced within 250 miles of her home, she includes a section in each chapter titled “If you do just one thing,” which makes the whole book much more accessible.  My fiance and I (ok, maybe it’s mostly me- but I think I’m winning him over) have decided that we’re going to take this ‘if you do just one thing’ approach.  We’re going to start doing one thing bit by bit, and build up to what we’re comfortable with.  This is much less overwhelming than going cold turkey from non-local food, and doing it step by step will probably mean we’ll stick with eating local rather than giving up along the way.

So, what are we doing to start eating more local food?

1) Subscribing to a CSA: Ok, so we already do subscribe to a CSA (Dillner Family Farm), but we plan on continuing our subscription next year.  Honestly, this is probably one of the easiest and most satisfying ways to eat locally.  The fruit and vegetables we’ve gotten have been a million times tastier than things we’ve gotten from the grocery store.

2) Eating as much local meat as possible: We just started a subscription through Isidore Foods that will provide us with 2-3 different types of meat per week out of the following: ground beef, ground pork, pork chops, bacon, and beef tips.  The beef is grass-fed and is from McElhaney Farm, whereas the pork is pastured and is from New Creation Farm.  Isidore Foods also has pretty much any other type of meat cut you could want.  The chickens are whole, so I need to learn how to cut one up before we get one of those!

3) Introducing local dairy into our diets: We also just started a subscription through Isidore Foods for half a dozen free range eggs, half a gallon of organic milk, and half a pound of grass-fed cheese every other week.  Weekly options also exist, but for now we’re going to ease into it to see if we can use everything.

These are the things we’ve committed to so far, but there are many other things that I’m interested in, including canning and drying food, gardening, and local grains.

Stay tuned to read more about our journey into local eating, and to see what new things we attempt!

Baking encompasses many different types of foods including yeast breads, laminates (layered doughs), cakes, mousses, custards, pies, tarts, cookies, chocolates, and more.  In my Baking 101 Series, I’ll walk you through each of these categories by giving you tips and recipes that I’ve learned through my baking class and personal experiences.  Today’s post is on digital scales, and the next post will focus on yeast breads.  Along the way I’ll also do my standard cost analysis on homemade vs. storebought baked goods.

Buy a digital scale

The first thing that you’ll need to do if you want to get serious about baking is to purchase a digital scale.  Although many recipes give volumetric measurements for ingredients, you really want to find and use recipes that give you weight measurements.  This is because one “cup” of flour will have a different weight depending on how you scoop the flour in (stick the cup in the bag and level is vs. using a spoon to scoop it in the measuring cup).  Also, different measuring cups are not precisely the same volume.  So, what should you look for when purchasing a digital scale?

1)      Make sure the scale can hold at least eleven pounds.  You want it to be able to hold your biggest mixing bowl and several pounds of dough.

2)      What’s the smallest weight increment the scale can measure?  It should be able to measure down to one gram or 0.1 ounces.

3)      Battery type: I made sure to buy a scale that takes regular AA batteries instead of the button type batteries just because I generally have AA batteries around the house.

4)      Tare button: this will allow you to place your mixing bowl on the scale and then zero it to weigh ingredients directly into the bowl.

5)      Anything else is just bells and whistles and you’ll likely be paying way too much for it!

1) Cheap eats In Thailand we routinely ate full dinners with fruit shakes, appetizers, and two entrees for around $10.  Street food was also extremely cheap and not once made me sick.  Pineapple for sixty-seven cents?  Yes, please!  Mystery meat on a stick for $1? OK!  Coconut donuts for $1 each?  Sure, I’ll have two!  It’s no wonder my weight loss efforts prior to the trip were quickly undone.

2) Roti Where have you been all my life??  These heavenly crepe-like pancakes are sold by street vendors everywhere, with a multitude of filling options both sweet and savory.  And of course, they’re cheap too (~$1-2).  My favorites were banana and chocolate topped with sweetened condensed milk, and egg/onion/tomato topped with chili sauce and mayo.  It still amazes me that something this simple can be so good.  I think the secret is the pound of ghee that the roti are cooked in :-O

3) Can you take the heat? Ask for ‘a little spicy’ and you’re likely to be wiping sweat off your face for hours afterwards.  My palate was just getting adjusted to the more intense heat by the end of the trip.  I distinctly remember not ordering water with my red snapper curry at one of the last meals I had in Thailand and thinking I was going to die.  But I actually ate the whole thing without a drop of water!  Woohoo!

4) The world needs more hawker centers Perhaps the thing I was looking forward to most on the trip was going to a hawker center in Singapore.  Boy, did it live up to my expectations!  If you’re not familiar with these, they’re somewhat like American food courts in malls on steroids and with much tastier food.  Row upon row of vendors served all kinds of ethnic food- Indian, Chinese, Malay- this is the melting pot of Asia, after all!  I was extremely lucky that my fiancé had scoped out the hawker center he took me to prior to my arrival.  Navigating the rows of stalls can be confusing and the number of options of food dizzying.  But just pick something and eat it; odds are it will be amazing.

Look for more posts on this trip in the future.  If you just can’t wait, check out the blog that my fiancé and I co-author: The International Food Project.  It details much of the food he has had on his trip all over southeast Asia and will focus on recreating it at home!

This recipe for Pad Thai is from a cooking class I took a while ago.  It’s really pretty simple- it can be a one-pot meal if you use rice noodles instead of spaghetti.  It’s the perfect balance of hot (crushed red pepper flakes), sweet (sugar), salty (fish sauce, soy sauce), and acidic (tamarind, lime).  The fun thing is playing around with the relative amounts of these elements to get the right flavor balance.  When I first tried my noodles tonight, the salty flavor was dominating (I was a little liberal with the soy sauce).  So I added some more hot pepper flakes and some brown sugar, and voila!  Perfection.  See, I’m emerging from my funk!  Here’s to the transformative power of Thai food!

Pad Thai

Cook the spaghetti, or if using rice noodles soak in cold water for ten minutes to soften.  Drain and set aside.

Heat oil and cook chicken until no longer pink.  Add garlic and cook for a minute.  Add the noodles.  Add the chicken broth and crushed red pepper flakes and cook for a few minutes.

Reduce heat to medium and add fish sauce, soy sauce, tamarind, and sugar.  Cook until the mixture bubbles, then add the beaten eggs and cook until no longer runny.  Add the scallions and sprouts and stir to combine.

Garnish with crushed peanuts, lime wedges, and cilantro if desired.

So, I’m on a new mission to decrease my dependence on recipes and increase my reliance on creativity.  This isn’t something that will happen overnight, but in the long run I think it will serve me well- instead of going to the store to buy lots of ingredients that a recipe ‘needs’, I can look at what I have and build a dish from there.

To aid me in this transformation, I’ve been reading The Flavor Bible.  Oh my goodness.  I love this book!  It’s basically lists of flavor combinations that work together.  Here’s how it works: you look up “sausages” and it tells you that apples, basil, bay leaf, beans (white), beer, bell peppers, breakfast, broccoli rabe, etc. accompany sausages well.  Additionally, it grades the flavor combinations, so most things are in regular type, better combinations are in bold, the next best are in BOLD CAPITALS, and the best (or, as the author says, “marriages made in heaven”) are BOLD CAPITALS* with an asterisk.  Awesome!  Also, at the end of some of the lists are “flavor affinities” which will list a combination of ingredients that might work well with the main ingredient.  So, for example, at the end of the “sausages” list one of the flavor affinities is “sausages + radicchio + white beans.”

Now, I know that technically these lists are still somewhat like recipes.  They still give you ideas of what ingredients to combine; however, they don’t tell you how much of them to add or how to cook them.  But this is ok- it’s not like I need to be told at this point how to sauté onions and garlic or use a food processor.  I think this book is actually a really good step towards culinary independence and freedom from recipes.  In fact, tonight I made a pasta dish with a sauce that I made up all on my own (post to follow soon).  No recipe at all!!  The best thing is that it was actually quite good.  I’m sure not all experiments will end as deliciously as this one, but I’m willing to take a few missteps to reach my goal of being less by-the-book and more creative in the kitchen.

1. Convenience: There are twenty-seven vendors listed as being there every day, and an additional five on Friday, nine on Saturdays, and three on Sundays.  All this shopping under one roof is fantastic (or dangerous if you are an impulsive buyer like me!).
2. Unique vendors: Although there are some familiar ones to the Strip (La Prima; Fudgie Wudgie) and the Pittsburgh area in general (East End Brewing Company; Spice by Tamarind), there are also vendors that are just getting their start in the area (Tupelo Honey Teas; Crested Duck Charcuterie).
3. When winter comes, you can shop in an enclosed area and not freeze your tookus off!

I just got back from my first visit to PPM, and I have to say I am really impressed.  I thought maybe it would just be rows of vendor tables, but it’s actually really cute- a lot of the vendors have obviously taken time crafting the style of their booths.  A lot of products are displayed in baskets or wooden shelves, giving the market a homespun kind of feel.  Vendor signs hang from the ceilings for easy navigation.  Free samples abound, including hot teas from Tupelo Honey Teas, and amazing olive oils/vinegars from Cosimano e Ferrari.  If you’re in the mood for a meal, there’s also a few vendors here for you (Sito’s Mediterranean, Rowdy BBQ), with more to come in the next few weeks.  I’m looking forward to Gosia’s pierogies opening myself.  The market has a few tables and chairs to relax and enjoy your food, as well as public restrooms.  I’m so elated about the Pittsburgh Public Market’s opening, and I plan to return next weekend for their grand opening festivities!

The recipe has multiple steps, and seeing as I hadn’t cooked at all in about three weeks (my boyfriend had been visiting from out of town and was doing a lot of the cooking), it was somewhat overwhelming.  But, it makes a ton of food, and it is delicious and addicting.  There’s the sweetness of the corn, the saltiness and crunch of the bacon, the creaminess of the sauce, all brightened up by bites of basil.  Yum!

A few tips: I thought I would be all smart and save time by cooking my pasta first, even though the recipe doesn’t have you do that til midway through…big mistake!  I forgot that fettucine becomes one big sticky blob of carbohydrates if you let it sit, drained, in a colander for half an hour.  This made re-incorporating the sauce with it difficult.  So just follow the recipe and you should be good to go.

The pine nut substitution I chose was pepitas (hulled pumpkin seeds).  If they imparted any flavor to the pesto, I couldn’t really tell.  I think it was more of a texture enhancer.  However, now that I have a gigantic container of pepitas, I’m interested in trying them in a real basil pesto.  I’ll let you know how that turns out!

Pasta with Corn Pesto

Cook the bacon in a skillet until the fat is rendered and bacon is starting to crisp, about ten minutes. Remove the bacon from the skillet and drain on paper towels.  Now comes the fun and sinful part: cook the corn and garlic in the bacon fat and season with some salt and pepper.  Cook until the corn is tender, about five minutes.

Reserve ¾ c. of the corn (or more if you have a small food processor like me) and put the rest in a food processor.  Add the pine nuts or pepitas and parmesan cheese and blend.  With the machine running, add the olive oil and blend.  Add some water if it’s too thick.

Bring a pot of water to boil and cook pasta according to package directions.  Drain (reserving 1 ½ c. of the pasta cooking water) and put the pasta back in the pot.  Add the corn pesto, reserved corn, most of the basil, and most of the bacon.  Cook over low heat and stir to combine, adding reserved pasta cooking water as necessary to thin out.  Season with salt and pepper.  Plate the pasta, topping with extra basil, bacon, and cheese.

Oakland Farmers Market This tiny market takes place Friday afternoons from 3:30 to 6:30 on Sennot St. between Meyran Ave. and Atwood St.  Although it’s tiny, it has a very important feature that could keep me coming back: multiple bakeries!  There are about 3-4 bakeries with all manner of regular loaf breads, pies, and other baked goods.  If you’re in the mood to munch, there’s a great stand that has Polish donuts (paczki) which have cinnamon and raisins inside.  Tasty!  There are also the standard fruit and veggie vendors, and a Lebanese stand with hot food to eat there.

East Liberty Citiparks Market This market takes place on Monday evenings from 3:30 to 7:30 pm at 5800 Penn Circle West in East Liberty, next to the Midas.  I was really, really impressed with this market!  The sheer number of vendors is enough to make me a regular here, not to mention the variety!  There are plenty of the standard fruit and vegetable vendors, as well as a few organic produce vendors.  I bought some absolutely gorgeous tomatoes from the main organic vendor (pricey, but worth it).  There are also numerous other vendors selling things like meat, cheese, salsas, Italian ice, flowers, smoked meats, jams, jellies, pies, etc.  The only thing I was disappointed with in this market was the lack of a bread vendor.  Not a deal-breaker, just something to keep in mind so you don’t end up going there to buy a loaf of French bread and come away disappointed like I did.  Still, this market is probably my favorite out of all the ones I’ve reviewed on this blog.

Southside Citiparks Market Taking place on Tuesday nights from 3:30 to 7:30 pm at Sidney and 20^th St., this market has a lot of the same vendors as the East Liberty Market (smoked meats, salsas) and the Oakland Market (the bakery with the Polish donuts, Lebanese food stand).  There’s also a pierogie vendor, which sells hot or cold pierogies in different quantities.  I got four hot ones to eat there for $2.50 and they really hit the spot- so cheesy and topped with caramelized onions…yum!  I also stopped at an Amish bakery and got a huge maraschino cherry whoopee pie for $1.  Dessert!  Who needs dinner when you can eat your way through the market?

Bean and Veggie Quesadillas

Mix the diced chipotle, sour cream, and lime juice; refrigerate for an hour.

Preheat broiler.  Shuck the corn and place under the broiler for about 10 minutes (or until golden brown), turning halfway.  Remove from heat; once cool, cut the kernels off the cobs.

Sauté jalapenos, red onion, bell pepper, and black beans in olive oil until the onions are translucent.  Add the tomatoes and corn.  Add salt, pepper, cumin, 3 T. cilantro, and sauté for 3 more minutes.

Spread cheese, rest of cilantro, and filling evenly over 4 tortillas.  Fold in half and toast on a George Foreman grill until golden brown and cheese oozes out the sides.

Ratatouille

Prepare grill (medium-high heat) or preheat the broiler.  Place eggplant, zucchini, red bell pepper, and onion on a baking sheet.  Drizzle with oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper; turn to coat.  Grill/broil veggies until tender and tinged brown, turning frequently.  Transfer veggies to a bowl, add vinegar, cheese, and basil, and toss to combine.

]]> http://chubbygrad.com/2010/07/27/ratatouille/feed/ 0 chubbygrad ratatouille