EWG's 2013 Shopper's Guide to Pesticides in Produce™

DIRTY DOZEN PLUS^TM

Apples

Celery

Cherry tomatoes

Cucumbers

Grapes

Hot peppers

Nectarines - imported

Peaches

Potatoes

Spinach

Strawberries

Sweet bell peppers

Kale / collard greens +

Summer squash +

CLEAN FIFTEEN^TM

Asparagus

Avocados

Cabbage

Cantaloupe

Sweet Corn

Eggplant

Grapefruit

Kiwi

Mangos

Mushrooms

Onions

Papayas

Pineapples

Sweet peas - frozen

Sweet potatoes

Bebop-A-Reebop Rhubarb

 Rhubarb Lemonade (from Beth Dooley in the La Crosse Tribune): Put about 3 cups chopped rhubarb into a large glass bowl and cover it with water. Let the rhubarb sit overnight. Strain off the "lemonade" and sweeten to taste with sugar or honey. Serve over ice. We used honey, and it was delicious!

Asparagus Frittata (from Parents magazine): 5 eggs, 1/4 cup milk, 1/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese, 1/4 tsp. salt, 1/4 tsp. ground black pepper, and 1/2 cup fresh asparagus cut into 1-inch pieces (about 1/2 lb.)
1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Lightly coat a 9-inch pie plate with cooking spray and set it aside.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, cheese, salt, and pepper. Stir in asparagus and pour into prepared pie plate. Bake about 20 minutes or until set. Remove from oven and let stand about 5 minutes before slicing. Makes 4 servings. I also added spring onions, and again delicious!

And with whole-wheat toast and jam, we had ourselves a very scrumptious breakfast for lunch (no leftovers). Seasonal eating is the best. Credit to the Wiste farm for the eggs and honey.

~Becky

Home Again Home Again Jiggety Jig...

A view of Lake Como.

Unfortunately I was unable to bring back a fat pig (as transportation of meat products from Europe is frowned upon), but I did bring back plenty of pictures and stories. As I am sorting through these photos, I would like to share them with you here, as I was supposed to do while in Italy and Ireland. While I cannot promise regular installments, I will try to get through them all before the end of summer and will thus relate to you all stories of my 2 months in Europe within the next 3 or 4. Please have patience. Above all, however, I promise to do my best to entertain (and possible enthrall), and hope to never bore; I hope that through these photos and my words I can adequately narrate not only what I saw and where I went, but also some thoughts and impressions that I had while there.

A super night with good friends, good wine and good food!

 The rest of this blog-post is dedicated to Pizzoccheri. This is a dish I ate while at Bagaggera (the farm I worked at) and is particular to that small region around Lago di Como and Lecco. Cassie, the British girl living on the farm, made it for my parting supper and told me more or less how to make it. Fortunately, the cookbook my Mother gifted me a few years ago, and which I highly recommend, Cooking with Italian Grandmothers, by Jessica Theroux, also offered a recipe. Although not exactly the same, I used it to guide me in making the buckwheat noodles, topped with lots of cheese, butter, cabbage, leeks, potatoes, a hint of sage, salt and pepper. The below are pictures from here in Minnesota.

Eggs and flour.

Kneading it all together.

The finished dough.

Silly me! I forgot to take a picture of the finished product! Nonetheless, it was delicious. If anyone would like the recipe, feel free to ask!

It's that time of the year again (finally).

We love us some spring multiplier onions around here. While I'm waiting for my favorites- lilacs and peonies, to bloom, I like to have a few extra picked and cleaned so I can admire them in a clear glass as one would a flower bouquet, with the convenience of pulling out a few to use (just remember to change your water once or twice a day). We don't have as many this year because we moved them last year, but the ones we do have are dandies and it is so fun to start using some fresh veggies. For green vegetables, I only have a half bag of broccoli and a few small miscellaneous bags (asparagus and okra, I think) left in the freezer.

So today, with spring onions, I made Rice with Carrots. I do have a lot of frozen blanched carrots left, and this is so far my favorite way, besides soup maybe, to eat them. They just aren't as good cooked and eaten plain as fresh ones are. This is the first time I didn't over cook my rice (it only took me three times), and I substituted about 1 1/2 cups of chicken broth I needed to use up for some of the water. I'll probably halve the recipe next time, but it went over pretty good with marinaded pork chops. I would put that recipe on here, but it wasn't a favorite. It was still good and moist, and the pork chops themselves were amazing, but it had more lemon juice and vegetable oil in it then I have used before. Typically I like a marinade with a lot of vinegar, and small amounts of soy sauce and Worcestershire with a little bit of olive oil.

I figured why not blog a little bit more about food. Gardening is our biggest summer hobby so its actually a good insight as to what we've been up to, and Katie and I both listened to a public radio broadcast this week about Michael Pollen, who is an author of many food books. Trav also brought home an article from the star tribune in which they interviewed the same guy! The premise of his book is that cooking is one of the most important things we can do, and yet the average person spends only 27 minutes cooking and 4 minutes cleaning up. That's per day!
I think this is the correct link, if you'd like to listen:
http://minnesota.publicradio.org/features/npr.php?id=180824408

~Becky

Aged Cheddar

My mother was going on about grilled cheese sandwiches made with aged cheddar, so I had to try it for myself. We also used it plain, on sandwiches, and of course melted in tomato soup (I think we are down to just two pints of soup left for the year). It is made from grass fed cow's milk, and was rich and creamy as advertised. I'm not sure really what the consensus is on the kerrygold brand, however so far we've liked all three varieties that we've tried.

~Becky

April 2013 - Thought y'all might enjoy these...

Spring - 2012.

1 year ago

There will be grass!  (This is last year.)

The Chimichanga Challenge. (or What Trav did with his one day off.)

 Chula Vista in Winona has deal that if you can eat 3 (BIG) chimichangas (1 beef, 1 chicken, 1 spicy) AND a huge plate of rice, you get it for free. You get one hour, and you can't get up from the table.

I honestly thought Trav could polish it off, no problem. It didn't really look THAT impressive. I've seen him eat before; normally I have to feed him. He did pretty good, though. He finished the chimichangas off fairly easily, and within the first 20 or so minutes; but that's when he started to feel full. And it turned out to be a LOT of rice. He still had 15 minutes or so left, but decided that since it wasn't going to happen, he might as well stop while he wasn't feeling too awful. The waiter said that the four people that have actually accomplished this challenge (in about the last 3 years), usually start out by cutting everything up and mixing it all together, so the rice is mixed up with the chimichangas, and the spicy taco is mellowed out. Plus they eat it all within the first 25 minutes. He said if you save the rice for last, there's no way, and it expands in your stomach. He said Trav made it farther then he's seen anyone do for a while, though. Trav decided that he has met his match (I guess that's why I thought this would be no problem, I've never actually seen him be too full before! Perhaps its age? A couple of years ago, or at least when he was a teenager, he totally could have done this.)

And brewing beer with Charlie. Charlie loves to help, but it can be challenging to keep him from touching things after I've sanitized them. He's also gotten really bossy lately, and I'm sort of at a loss on how to deal with that. Must be an oldest child thing :)

~Becky

Charlie.

He loves those Carhartt bibs, but they are major high-waters at this point. Still, so cute. Charlie loves to be outside.

(Stupid picture orientation!)

~Becky

Clarence & his Da-da.

Little boys.

Say Cheese!

I think Charlie was rubbing Clarence's back in this one. It reminded me of when Liz used to brush my hair. I should have liked it, but it ticked me off. Now I would let her brush my hair or rub my back.

Charlie the builder- they put an "engine" together. Later, while Trav was at work, Charlie took it back apart. I guarantee he'll be begging for help to put it back together again tomorrow, and Trav will sit there explaining how to change the direction on his cordless drill.

I love little boys, and little boy's bibs!

~Becky

Vermont Sharp.

Hoffman's Sharp Vermont Cheddar Cheese. I felt I should note we have still been eating new cheeses, I just have a difficult time thinking of things to say about it. This one tasted like... sharp cheddar. Everyone ate it in a variety of fashions (loved it with apples, but we're sadly out of apples again, and tomato soup, and we're almost out of that, too! plus plain and on sandwiches). One block really lasted for quite a while.