Plant sale extravaganza!

Here in Minnesota, where Spring first peeked out two months ago, then retracted in to cold, rainy April, we are very ready to get our garden on. This past weekend, we were given the gift of two warms days on which to do our major plant shopping. Fortunately, it also happened to be a BIG weekend for plant sales.

I started my weekend with the annual Spring Plant Sale and Open House at Minnesota Food Association (MFA), which I have also volunteered at for the last three years. An organically certified farm, MFA’s plants are grown without pesticides, synthetic fertilizers or GMO seeds. I spent the day helping others decide what to take home for their gardens, and then filled my own boxes full of tomatoes, peppers and our family favorite – Brussel sprouts! I’d like to take a moment to put in a plug for my favorite sweet pepper, the Gypsy pepper, which I discovered through the MFA sale last year. They start out light yellow and progress to bright red (see picture), and become the most magnificently sweet delights you could imagine.

The next day, my friend who runs Norsejenta’s Seedlings, had her annual batch of tomatoes and peppers ready for pickup. For tomatoes, I went home with wonders like Anna Banana Russian, Isis Candy and Mortgage Lifter! And of course, I couldn’t leave without a KBX, my favorite I discovered at this sale last year.

Next I headed across the river to the Friends School Plant Sale for their final day when everything is 30% off. I love going on this day because I am usually not looking for anything in particular, which is good because its pretty picked over, but I always find some fun (or funny) treasure. Last year it was “Gretel” eggplant (I didn’t get there in time to get the matching “Hansel” plants). This year I picked up a Thai Green eggplant and two varieties of kohlrabi.

If you missed out on any of these (or you’re in another part of the country), don’t fret, there are sure to be more in the coming weeks. Wherever you are, be sure to check them out and this year, consider getting something fun and new to try!

Grapefruit and Chicken Thai Style Salad

Salads are a popular dinner in our house. Usually it is a typical tossed salad – lettuce and whatever random veggies I have chopped or shredded as mix-ins, a sprinkle of cheese, seeds or nuts and topped with a light dressing often of oil and balsamic vinegar, or Italian for my husband. Lately, however, I’ve had an interest in mixing things up and bringing together new flavors in the salad bowl.

Last weekend we went to a restaurant in Minneapolis where we had never eaten before and ordered the spring roll. Unlike many I’ve had before with shrimp, this was a vegetarian one, and when it came out, it was about twice the size of most spring rolls I’ve had. Filled to the brim with lettuce and other veggies, my husband and I agreed it was almost more like a salad in a sheet of rice paper, not a bad idea actually. That got me thinking I’d really like to make some sort of Asian inspired salads, so when the greens start growing in the garden this summer, I’ll have a few salad options up my sleeve.

Enter the Wedge Co-op and their handy “What’s for Supper?” recipe cards! A few weeks ago I had picked up one for a Grapefruit and Chicken Thai Style Salad and knowing I had most of the ingredients, I decided it was a good option for dinner last night.

With no further ado, here is the recipe:

• 1 tsp dried ground ginger
• 1 tsp dried ground coriander
• 1 tsp dried ground mustard
• ½ tsp salt
• 2 tsp Sucanat® or brown sugar, divided
• 1 lb boneless skinless chicken breast or thigh cut into strips
• 1 grapefruit
• 1/3 c peanut butter
• 3 Tbsp tamari (regular or wheat-free)
• ¼-½ tsp Sriracha or other hot sauce
• 1 head lettuce, chopped
• ¼ c roasted peanuts
• ¼ c finely sliced scallions
• OPTION: ½ c cilantro leaves

1.  In a large bowl, combine the ginger, coriander, mustard, salt and ½ tsp. of the Sucanat® or sugar. Mix well. Add the chicken strips and toss well to coat.

2.  Broil the spice-coated chicken strips for ~5 minutes, until the chicken is cooked through.

3.  Section the grapefruit and set fruit aside. Squeeze the remainder into a small bowl until you have 3-4 Tbsp juice.

4.  In a small mixing bowl, combine 3 Tbsp of the grapefruit juice with the peanut butter, tamari, 1½ tsp. Sucanat® or brown sugar and Sriracha or other hot sauce. Mix well until smooth.

5.  Arrange lettuce on plates. Top with chicken, grapefruit sections, peanuts and scallions. Pour dressing over the salads and top with cilantro, if using.

My Notes: I LOVE peanut based dressings and sauces, so this was a winner in that category for sure. The chicken was perfectly flavored with these spices and it is super fast with the cooking (just five minutes, once the oven is heated of course). My husband was a taste tester for me and agreed the flavors blended really well together, save one – neither of us liked the pieces of grapefruit in the salad and I will definitely not include them in the future. If you didn’t want to get a grapefruit just for the juice, I think you could easily substitute lemon or lime juice in the sauce. Also, the dressing would probably be better with creamy, but I only had chunky peanut butter, and I probably could have skipped the roasted peanuts on top since it was kind of the same thing. For a vegetarian version, this would likely be very good with “mock duck,” though I would not recommend tofu, unless you’re very good at cooking with it.

Ode to compost

I am pretty lucky to be employed at a place that works hard to practice what we preach. This includes a number of things like encouraging biking and busing to work, recycling, supporting a good work-life balance and providing space for a staff garden. As part of our effort to reduce our waste and to produce free compost for the garden, we also collect our food scraps during the warm months (though if I have my way, this will become year round in the near future). One of the challenges with composting is, like recycling, not everyone knows what’s in or out. We’ve struggled with getting folks to remember that yes, you can in fact compost the coffee, filter and all, but no, please do not put in your rotten cheese. And please, PLEASE do not put in fruit or veggie peels with those awful stickers (they are in fact plastic and DO NOT compost)!!

So, last summer I wrote a poem. I was on my bike, riding to work, when I thought that maybe something lyrical or poetic would help, so I started racking my brain for clever bits and phrases which might resonate with those standing confused over the food waste container in the kitchen. I created what I thought was a pretty good poem, which I shared with friends and family, but never had quite enough time to get laminated and posted at work. This year, with spring arriving early, I was determined to get this done before we started the garden. After a bit of revising (I really wanted to include something about those darn stickers), the following is my tribute to compost. I hope you enjoy it.

~

Ode to Compost
Written by Emily

The compost bin here doth stand,
Collecting our food scraps for the land.

In go your peels and apple cores,
Coffee grounds and so much more!

Thumbs up to tea bags and eggshells;
Bits of bread are okay as well.

Things not welcome are sticks and stones,
Meat and cheese and chicken bones.

Worst of all are those plastic stickers –
Don’t make our gardeners garbage pickers!

This may seem tricky at the start,
Just keep on trying, don’t lose heart!

If you’ve got a question, please do ask,
Making dirt from food waste is our task!

For help in this effort, we thank you now,
We’ll think of you next year when we plow. 

~

You are welcome to use this poem in your own home, office, garden, etc., I only ask that you please give proper authorship attribution, and please do not alter the text.

I would also like to add a few non-food items you are easily able to compost. These include leaves, grass clippings (though these really are better left on your lawn), egg cartons, black and white newspaper, the cardboard tube inside toilet paper or paper towel rolls and paper plates, napkins and cups which do not have large amounts of grease on them. In reality, it is possible to compost meat, cheese, grease, etc., (collectively known as FOG in the compost world, short for “fats, oil and grease), as well as bones, however many municipalities do not allow these items, as they can attract unwanted critters in ways that veggies don’t and have higher potential for being disease or pathogen vectors. Other things to keep out of your backyard bin are compostable plastics (sadly, these will not breakdown in a non-commercial/industrial setting) and pet droppings.

As always, check with your city about the rules for bins and see if they have a discount program for purchasing one. There are also easy ways to build one yourself out of wood and/or wire, which is also a great opportunity for using salvaged wood from other projects.

Happy composting!

I’m souped!

Roasted Root Vegetable Soup (top), Thai-spiced Pumpkin Soup (bottom) and Mushroom Soup (right).

Tonight I spent several hours making soup. I know my last post was also about soup, but what can I say, it is probably my favorite category of food to make. Plus, I collected a few recipes over the last month or so that I wanted to try and had some veggies in the fridge in desperate need of using, so it seemed like a good way to spend the evening.

It just so happened that all three of the soups I made were of the pureed variety – two according to the recipes and one by my own choice. Though I love a good hearty, chunky soup, I often enjoy a good pureed soup as a way to use a lot of different ingredients to create exciting new flavors, and they generally make excellent “comfort foods.” Also, though I have done no research whatsoever on this, I feel it might be one of the best ways to help my body really absorb and utilize the nutrients in food. As my husband will tell you, I am not exactly a slow eater, which unfortunately probably doesn’t do my body any favors when it is trying to digest the foods I ingest. I’m working to slow myself down and chew my food more (that sounds ridiculous for a 27-year-old to say, seems like something I should have learned a couple decades ago), but the pureed soups (hopefully) help in the meantime.

On to the soups. First up was basically a homemade version of Cream of Mushroom Soup. My husband and I both love fungi of almost any kind, so this was a great fit for our family.

Here is the recipe for Mushroom Soup:

Cooking the mushrooms

Ingredients

• 1 pound firm white mushrooms, cleaned
• Juice from 1 medium lemon
• 1 Tbsp unsalted butter
• 2 Tbsp minced shallots
• 1/4 tsp dried thyme
• 1/2 bay leaf
• 1 tsp salt
• 1/2 tsp freshly ground pepper
• 2 cups heavy cream
• 1 1/2 cups Chicken Stock
• 1 tsp cornstarch

Directions

• Sprinkle the mushrooms with lemon juice. In a food processor, fitted with a metal blade, coarsely chop the mushrooms.
• Melt the butter in a heavy saucepan over medium heat, and lightly saute the shallots. Add the mushrooms, thyme, and bay leaf and saute for 10 minutes, or until the liquid disappears.
• Add cream and stock and bring to a boil. Quickly reduce heat and simmer for 10 minutes.
• In a small bowl, combine cornstarch with 1 tablespoon cold water and add to the soup. Continue to simmer 5 minutes longer, stirring constantly.
• Correct seasoning to taste.

My notes: This one is definitely not for the faint of heart – it is a full on mushroom fest – loved it. I made the mistake of putting the whole pound of mushrooms in the food processor at once, that did not work, definitely split it in a couple batches. Also, I opted to pureed the whole batch at the end. In the future, I will probably just puree 1/2 or 2/3 and leave a little for texture. One other random thing, when cooking the mushrooms, they looked oddly like ground meat, which could put off the die hard vegetarian. Speaking of which, this could easily be made with veggie broth – though you might lose some of the richness of an animal fat based broth, so maybe add some butter – I did use some homemade chicken broth as suggested.

Next up was Thai-spiced Pumpkin Soup. 

My notes: If there are two things I love in food, they are squash and curry, so this was a definite winner. Also, this was a super easy recipe, largely because of the curry paste, which includes other spices, so it would be easy for any level of cook to make. I used the Thai Kitchen brand of red curry paste, which I found at my local co-op, but you can probably find many places. Your local Asian grocery will probably have a recommendation for other brands as well, but being new to cooking with curry paste, I can’t say for sure what the differences might be between Thai red curry and other red curry pastes. The flavor of this soup was superb (my husband said, and I quote: “This is probably the best squash recipe you’ve made,” which could be taken several ways – he hates squash, but I also make a lot of stuff with squash, so…)

Finally, I did some serious chopping and made a recipe I got via my weekly email from Blendtec called Roasted Root Vegetable Soup. I cannot, for the life of me, find this recipe online, so here it is:

Ingredients

1 celery root, peeled and cubed
1 large parsnip, peeled and thickly sliced
1 large carrot, peeled and thickly sliced
1 sweet potato, peeled and cubed
1 medium onion, thickly sliced
4 garlic cloves, peeled
3 Tbsp olive oil
5-6 C chicken or vegetable broth
1 ½ tsp white wine vinegar
1/16 tsp cayenne pepper
Salt and pepper to taste

Directions

Preheat oven to 400°F. Add prepared vegetables, onion and garlic to 9×13-inch pan and drizzle with olive oil. Toss vegetables in olive oil and bake for 45 minutes until roasted and tender. Add 3 cups of broth and roasted vegetables to blender and secure lid. Puree. Pour remaining broth into large saucepan and add pureed soup. Taste and adjust salt as necessary and add black pepper, if desired and serve warm.
For a creamy touch, try adding ½ cup of half and half or full-fat coconut milk before serving or garnish with a dollop of crème fraîche or sour cream. Serve with a sprinkling of paprika, cumin or fresh herbs of your choice.

My notes: As many of you already know, I do not use olive oil ever on high heat. It is BAD to do, no exceptions! So, the first substitution I did was using canola oil on the veggies, but you could easily use other high heat oils like sunflower oil. I did not have a celery root (celeriac) and didn’t really want to buy one, so to make up for the volume lost, I increased the carrots and parsnips and threw in a couple small potatoes. Also, the directions never said when to add the vinegar (which I did not have so substituted with a bit of white wine and apple cider vinegar) or the cayenne, so I added them both in near the end. For broth, since I had both chicken and veggie thawed out for the previous two soups, I used what I had left of each. The taste on this one was also excellent, as my husband said “rooty!”

You say tomato, I say tomato soup please!

For the record, I hated tomatoes as a kid. Except for ketchup and pizza sauce, this plant with the serious fruit-veggie split personality issue never touched my taste buds (at least not that I can remember). I think my disgust with them may have been at least partially caused by an experience as a young kid at a daycare where I was forced to eat tomato soup. But I can’t say for sure.

So, I successfully avoided Solanum lycopersicum for much of the first two decades of my life. Then came college. My junior year, I spent a semester in Denmark. Unlike most Danes, my two host sisters were vegetarians, so my host mom cooked with a wide variety of veggies I had formerly despised. Among them: bell peppers, onions, zucchini and, of course, tomatoes. It was “eat veggies” or “go hungry.” Amazingly, I was smitten. My palate was thoroughly pleased with the variety of tastes I had long been ignoring.

But my new found love for the plant kingdom is not the reason for this post. This is about tomatoes. Specifically (and maybe ironically) tomato soup. Done well, tomato soup is one of the best comfort foods around. Paired with a toasted cheese sandwich and a pickle, it’s a meal made in heaven.

The best tomato soup I’ve found has a twist I would have never expected. Balsamic vinegar – another of God’s great gifts to humanity. I was introduced to the recipe for Creamy Tomato-Balsamic Soup just over a year ago by a co-worker.

My notes: In making this soup, the big difference for me is no beef broth. I made the soup this week using some of the turkey broth I made and froze at Thanksgiving, and previously I’ve used homemade veggie broth. Additionally, you will find no cooking spray in my kitchen, so I use butter to grease the pan. Lastly, the only other difference in the way I make this recipe is to skip the straining step at the end. No reason to take out the best part!

One of the main reasons I like this soup in January is I get to use some of my own tomatoes. This week I used some of the heirlooms I canned in the late season when they were out of control.

In addition to the vinegar, this soup is unique in that you bake the ingredients (except the half and half) instead of cooking them in a pot. This really brings the flavors together in a way I don’t think you can achieve on the stove top. Not to mention the lovely aroma!

So, as winter (finally) sets in here in Minnesota, turn on the oven, pop open some tomatoes and bake. Soup that is.

Did I mention this is the best tomato soup ever?

Wasted

Alright folks, I need to take a moment to get up on my soapbox, the one with the podium. It’s not about politics or religion. It’s not healthcare, education or immigration. But it is definitely about a part of the American way of life which we cannot continue to ignore. It’s about a habit we’ve grown into as a society that our great-grandparents would have cringed at. It’s not prolific tattoos or baggy jeans. It’s not fast driving or talking on cell phones during dinner.

No, it’s wasting food.

During the two World Wars, wasting food in the United States was high on the list of social sins. In fact, one could say that wasting food was close to treason. Ok, that may be my own historical embellishment, but it is not far off when you consider that the American people were asked to abide by rations on sugar, wheat and meat in order to “save it for the troops,” and to not waste a morsel of what they did take home. Our grandmothers cooked, canned and cured every edible scrap they could get their hands on.

Somehow, over the last six decades, however, we seem to have forgotten that NOT wasting food used to be an act of patriotism in this country, and we now seem to carry an air of entitlement to waste. Whether it is kids in a school cafeteria, professionals in the corporate work place, a family out to dine at a restaurant or you and me at our own kitchen tables, Americans throw away 40% of the food we produce. FORTY percent. For a nation that generally claims we need to increase agricultural yields in order to grow enough to feed the world, we might do better to take an inward look at our wasteful gluttony first. The insanity of it really is mind blowing if you think about it for more than thirty seconds.

Given my wholesale criticism of all of us here, I will sadly acknowledge the three fingers pointing back at me. A few weeks ago, after a crazy month of meetings, dining out and otherwise ignoring our kitchen, I went through our fridge and threw away an embarrassing amount of food. This is not the norm for me these days – I have worked hard to shop for what we need and not in excess. Unfortunately, as a colleague sometimes jokes, that week I had “really expensive compost.” Fortunately, I am able to compost most of our food waste, but it still does not sit any better with my sense of responsibility. A responsibility for caring for the land (that produces our food), the people (who tend and harvest it) and the resources of this planet (extracted to process, package and truck it all)

In May 2011, I participated in an EPA webinar on food waste.  It was definitely not the first time I’d thought about food waste, but author Jonathan Bloom had some excellent commentary, which he shares with folks on the blog Wasted Food and in his book American Wasteland. On the same webinar I learned about an awesome marketing campaign against waste in the UK. Called Love Food Hate Waste, this creative effort uses humorous imagery and blunt facts to remind food lovers that we’ve got to cut our wasteful ways.

Not wanting to be a complete Debbie Downer on this, here are some ideas for reducing food waste – recycled, revamp and regurgitated – from others to me to you:

• Reconsider bulk. I’m not talking about the bulk bins at your local co-op. I’m talking about the Costco kind of bulk. The kind where you buy a (sometimes ridiculously) large quantity of food – amount uncontrollable by the purchaser – because it seems like a good deal, then end up throwing half of it away because you are unable to consume it all in time. Consider instead finding a smaller volume of those perishables from a more sustainable source. Then pay the producer (probably the same as you would at the Big Box) so they can make a living. And finally, waste none.
• Shop more frequently, buy less. This is a super hard concept for Americans in particular I think, but it fits in with the first suggestion. We like the shopping carts large enough to haul an SUV worth of groceries, but what we end up taking home largely becomes trash. Doesn’t that seem silly? We pay money for food so we can pay more money to have it hauled away on Tuesdays? Consider buying your fruits, veggies, dairy, meat and other perishables on a more frequent basis and then use them up before heading out again.
• Remember what’s in your fridge. Alright, this one is a “personal experience” idea. My husband and I were members of a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) farm for several summers and would often get way more food than we could deal with in a week. In addition to not knowing what to do with all of it before the next box came, I also struggled with remembering what the heck was in the drawers and on the shelves in my fridge. Enter magnetic white board. Left over from my days in the college dorm, this went up on the fridge door and I now track everything in the fridge (at least in the summer when we have lots of fresh produce from the garden and farmers markets). I kid you not, if you keep it updated, it will help with reducing waste, as well as meal planning. Not to mention that it will help reduce the energy wasted every time you stand there with the door wide open deciding what to eat.
• Leftovers – eat ‘em or freeze. If you and your family cannot eat leftovers within a few days (or get “leftover fatigue” after a few meals), consider freezing a portion. For example, I love to make soup in the summer when the ingredients are fresh from my garden, but my husband doesn’t like hot soups in the heat. So, I make the soups, put a few portions in the fridge for me and freeze the rest for fall and winter. We use produce in season, reduce waste and have homemade frozen dinners ready in the cold months. Triple win.

So, those are some of my tips for keeping us moving down the path of less food waste. What are your ideas? How will you use 2012 as the year to be a better steward of your food?

Blue Cheese and Crispy Sage

Though I didn’t know it a few years ago, I love sage, particularly when it is cooked to a crisp in a lot of butter. I also have a serious love for blue cheese, the more flavorful, the better.

That said, sage isn’t exactly something one eats in quantity on its own. The same can largely be said for blue cheese. So tonight I made a dish that I thought was just going to be a good way to use my kabocha squash and a few leeks I had in the fridge, but quickly realized is mostly an excellent vehicle for eating crispy sage and blue cheese. At the same time. Yum.

Enter the recipe for Squash Risotto with Blue Cheese and Crispy Sage. I had this recipe stored in my Springpad account, a resource I suggested to readers a while back as an excellent way to organize your recipes. Luckily, I also had all the ingredients at home, so no shopping was required. 

My Notes: This recipes makes a lot of food, so either make it for a group or with the intention of having leftovers. Most of the cooking time is in baking the squash, so be sure to start that right away. And don’t forget to save the seeds for roasting! Otherwise, there really isn’t a lot to comment on this one except to say that it is exceptionally easy, and that you definitely want the blue cheese and sage, as there isn’t a lot of flavor in the squash and risotto. In other words, that part would be pretty plain without the straight-from-heaven toppings.

On being Norsk: Krumkake

Ya, sure, ya betcha! Uff da! Ha det! Mange takk!

You guessed it: Jeg er Norsk. Twenty five percent anyway. My great grandparents (my mother’s father’s parents) came to America from a place called Bømlo, a small island south of Bergen off the western coast of Norway. All my life I have learned about being Norwegian. The art, national costume (for women, called a bunad), some of the language and of course, cooking and baking.

Christmas is one of the main times of the year when many traditional Norsk baked goods are made. The cookie my mother always did when I was growing up is called krumkake (pronounced kroom-kaka), literally meaning “crumb cake” (though Wikipedia says it means “bent or curved cake.”) They are incredibly delicate, like a very thin ice cream cone, and are wonderful filled with whip cream.

Last night I made krumkake, an annual ritual I have done each Christmas since I have been married (since I no longer live near my parents and my mom bought me my own iron). The recipe I use comes from the booklet that came with my Bethany Housewares iron (though I usually add a little milk), and each batch makes about six dozen cookies. As I’ve written in the past, I usually make 14-18 dozen before the holidays, and last night I made 17 dozen. While the ingredients are cheap and the cookies easy to make once you get the hang of it, krumkake is most definitely a labor of love. My iron makes two cookies at a time and takes about 35 seconds to bake. Then you roll them on a cone (before they harden). Before making the next cookies you must make sure the iron is hot again. Making a dozen krumkake probably takes about the same time as a dozen of any other cookie, except you can’t walk a way and let your oven do the work!

While making the cookies last night, I remembered something I did one of the first times I made krumkake by myself using my mom’s recipe. As any good Scandinavian cookie recipe should, it called for a stick of butter (which is unfortunate right now, given the shortage of butter in Norway). I mixed everything in my food processor, but couldn’t figure out why it wasn’t very smooth like when my mom made it. I started making the cookies and they really weren’t turning out well – they had a lot of unevenness in baking and holes I’d never seen in krumkake before. I called my mom and only then did we figure out what I’d done wrong – you have to MELT the butter first!!

I was able to salvage part of that batch, I think I may have tried to take out some of the larger chunks of butter and melt them, but it was weird because of the eggs. These days though, I am always sure to remember this very important detail. Ah the joys of learning to cook sans mama!

Let me plant a seed for you

As I’ve discussed in the past, I love the bounty local foods, like beets and potatoes, available in the fall, and my enthusiasm for winter squash is no exception. Butternut squash soups, baked acorn squash with maple syrup, pumpkin pie and the list goes on.

One part of squash that many people overlook, however, is the seed. Most of us are used to toasting pumpkin seeds when we carve jack-o-lanterns for Halloween, but many people aren’t aware that you can eat the seeds of other winter squash as well. While the volume of seeds you get from other squash is smaller than a pumpkin, I would argue that they are a tastier snack. The hulls are thinner, so the seeds get crispier and require a shorter baking time. Nutritionally, they are low in sodium and every source I’ve read states they are full of zinc and magnesium. Also, if you leave the shells on (which I definitely recommend, it is way too much work to remove them), they are a good source of fiber.

Preparation for baking any seed is simple. After scooping them from the squash, rinse them well to remove any strings or bits of squash that may remain. It is good to let the seeds dry out a bit, as it will help shorten the baking time. Some recipes suggest patting them dry with a paper towel, but I usually leave them in a colander for several hours to let them air dry. You can even leave them in the fridge overnight.

Preheat the oven to 250-300º Farenheit. I recommend a lower temperature for smaller seeds, a higher temp for larger seeds like pumpkin. After they are mostly dry to the touch, lightly coat them with olive oil. You can use other oils if you like, but I usually use olive oil, which is safe at this low of a temperature. Select some of your favorite herbs and spices for flavoring. You can do sweet or savory, though I personally find the savory ones more appealing. A very simple option is garlic powder or garlic salt. Pre-made mixes also work well. It all depends on the flavors you like. I encourage you to test out different options until you find something you like. Because the batches are small, if you don’t like one batch, you don’t end up with a bunch of seeds you’re not interested in eating.

The baking time will vary depending on the type of seeds, but the small ones usually only take 15-20 minutes. Pumpkin seeds will take longer, sometimes up to 40 minutes. You may hear the seeds begin to pop, which usually means they are done. “Doneness” is also a matter of preference, we prefer a nice crispy seed versus a chewy one. You can store the seeds in any container at room temp, but if it is like my house, they won’t last more than a few hours!

So, the next time you make winter squash, don’t forget to keep the seeds for an easy and healthy snack. Happy toasting!

My “Midwest Food Fest Quest”

Alright, I’m a sucker for rhyming, but can you really blame me when it has to do with food festivals?

A few summers ago, I started to notice a number of food related food festivals in Minnesota. I am someone who, obviously, loves food, and I also have an affinity for random gatherings of strangers around shared interests. Even if you only directly interact with the food in your mouth, I think the feeling of interconnectedness I get at these events is quite fantastic.

Now, as I share with you the festivals I’ve found, you must promise to get out your calendar, pull up a search engine and find a food festival you will go to in the next year. Seriously, you’ll have a blast.

For me, my first food related fest was the Cannon Falls Wine and Art Festival. Not being one to turn down the chance to sample wine of any kind, I loaded my husband in the car and drove the hour or so down to Cannon Falls from the Twin Cities. The festival features Minnesota vineyards and wineries (yes, grapes do grow in places other than France and California), some of them which have been around for many years and others which have just arrived on the scene of viticulture. Some of them make traditional grape wines, while others venture into the world of berries and other fruits. Some are really good and others…well, let’s just say they need some aging. Either way, for only $20 you get quite a sampling of what Minnesota has to offer, which may not meet high expectations of a wine connoisseur, but does give you an idea of the creativity oenologists must have in northern climes. For more info on that topic, check out what the University of Minnesota has been doing in grape breeding for just over 30 years.

My next festival may, in fact, be my favorite, largely because who doesn’t love GARLIC? The Minnesota Garlic Festival is held annually every August in Hutchinson, Minnesota. For only $5, you can watch cooking demos featuring the area’s finest chefs, dine at The Great Scape Cafe, sample dozens of kinds of garlic from as many vendors and purchase a supply of garlic that will last you until at least the following March. Leave the breath mints in the car and bring your appetite for fun because this one will leave you longing for more.

The last festival I went to that first year was the Warrens Cranberry Festival, which requires a jaunt over the river to Wisconsin for any Minnesota folks. Though not my favorite food festival,  it is an intriguing one to hit up. There are many cranberry foods to try (cranberry cream puffs anyone?) and activities (you must go on a bog tour, if for no other reason than to meet a cranberry farmer!), but be forewarned that this one is also SUPER busy and has a ton of vendors completely unrelated to cranberries, kind of like a giant flea market of sorts. But again, most festivals are worth checking out once, so if you’re in the area in September, consider a stop.

This summer I added a new festival to the list and it features one of my all time favorite summer foods, the ever-versatile rhubarb.

Rhubarb Fest tasting menu

The Annual Rhubarb Festival is well worth the drive to the lovely town of Lanesboro, Minnesota. Also know as the Bed and Breakfast Capital of Minnesota, Lanesboro is located on the scenic Root River, which makes for a great backdrop for a tasty festival. When you go to the Rhubarb Fest, be ready to wait in line to taste test all the rhubarb recipes cooked up for that year – to give you an idea, they included everything from the classic Rhubarb Crisp to the more adventuresome Rhubarb Grillin Salsa. Also, don’t forget the entertainment – the Rhubarb Sisters  and rhubarb games. Definitely a fun event for the whole family. And lest I forget, be sure to take a walk down the street to check out Das Wurst Haus. Even if you’re like me and don’t eat brats, the homemade rootbeer and the possibility of an impromtu accordion performance by owner Arv Fabian are well worth it.

So, I realize this may seem like a random time of year to be thinking about summer food festivals, but I felt compelled to write this post today because I just came across the next festival on MY list – the Minnesota Cheese Festival. Though their event page may still be under construction, I’ve already budgeted for the $30 ticket and marked my calendar for next June 2nd.

Have you?