Saturday, December 31, 2011

Meatless Monday: Ring in the New Year with a Hearty Bowl of Lentils!


At midnight tonight (Danish time), my cousin and her family will jump to the floor from atop their dining chairs, leaping confidently into 2012. [I know this is true. Kate has told me this is so.] I have never heard that they observe the second widely reported Danish custom of breaking dinner plates by throwing them against your friends’ doors; the bigger the mess, the more friends you have.

Niece Nora who is spending junior year abroad in Spain informed me yesterday of the Spanish custom of trying to eat 12 grapes between midnight and 12:01.

Ryan Seacrest’s list of interesting New Year’s customs includes the donning of colored underwear, throwing a bucket of water out a window, visiting a graveyard, and pouring molten lead into a bowl of water. According to another listin Germany and Austria, people gather around their televisions to watch "Dinner for One," an 18-minute comedy sketch about an Englishwoman celebrating her 90th birthday which has nothing to do with New Year's Eve or Day.

Many cultures ring in the new year by cooking and consuming a healthy serving of legumes of some kind. In the US South, the traditional dish is Hoppin’ John. When I saw my neighbor Gene earlier today, he was hurrying home to make a big batch. He had purchased some kind of meat on a bone which he was planning to simmer with black-eyed peas, to serve over rice with collard greens on the side. According to Epicurious, this tradition traces back to the legend that during the Civil War, residents of the town of Vicksburg, Mississippi, ran out of food while under attack. They discovered black-eyed peas and thereafter the legume was considered lucky.

My friend Kevin is of 50% Italian ancestry, as am I. He lived and worked in Italy for many years and I consider him my go-to source on things Italian. He is also an excellent cook and was kind enough to send his recipe for the traditional lentil dish Italians enjoy on New Year’s Day. Lentils are tiny, disk-shaped legumes thought to resemble coins. They swell when cooked, and eating them is purported to ensure prosperity in the coming year.

Lentils are an inexpensive source of protein, are high in fiber, and are packed with nutrients — an excellent food! You can read much more about their health benefits here.

The recipe follows. The traditional version includes some sort of pork, but Kevin has offered some suggestions to make it suitable for Meatless Monday. He also recommends using both red and green lentils to add a festive appearance to the dish. If you use both colors of lentils and add the suggested dollop of cheese, you will have the colors of the Italian flag!

Kevin’s New Year’s Lentil Soup
  • 1 lb. bag lentils, rinsed
  • 2 medium onions  chopped
  • 4 stalks celery  finely chopped (chop the leaves too, if present)
  • 5 carrots  finely chopped
  • 6 cloves garlic minced
  • 6 Tbsps. olive oil
  • 1/2 cup chopped pancetta, prosciutto, or unsmoked ham (omit for a totally vegetarian soup)
  • 2 large cans whole Italian tomatoes chopped, juice reserved
  • 4-6 cups broth (beef, chicken or vegetable)
  • 2 cups wine (I use red or Marsala, preferring the latter. If you don't have Marsala, use sherry).
  • Salt & pepper to taste (Substitute some crushed dried hot red pepper, if you want the soup to have more of a kick. And if you use canned broth go easy on the salt, unless it is unsalted).
  • 6 Tbsps. freshly grated Parmesan cheese
[Optional: If you have a ham bone, roast until browned & add it with the lentils. 
If you keep the rind from your Parmigiano (and you should— it's a great add to soups & spaghetti sauce while they cook & keeps for ages in the freezer), now is the time to pop it in as well.]
  • Sauté the onion in the oil until light golden brown. 
  • Add the celery, carrots, and garlic. Continue sautéing approx. 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.
  • Add the pancetta, if using, & sauté 2-3 minutes.
  • Add the chopped tomatoes & their juices. Stir & bring to a  gentle simmer. Simmer uncovered 25 minutes, stirring from time to time with a wooden spoon.
  • Add the lentils & stir to incorporate. Then add 4 cups of broth, the wine or Marsala, salt, pepper of your choice, & the optional hambone and/or rind. Stir, then bring to a steady simmer.
  • Cover & cook until lentils are tender, usually 40-45 minutes. Some types of lentils can absorb a surprising quantity of liquid, so check from time to time & add broth as necessary.
  • Remove the rind & bone, if used. Taste & adjust seasonings. Then stir in 6 Tbsps. freshly grated Parmesan. 
  • Serve as is or add some cooked brown rice with freshly grated Parmesan available on the side. In lieu of more grated cheese, you can put a dollop of mascarpone or cream cheese in the center of each bowl on top of the lentils.
  • Left-over lentil soup tends to thicken, so add some broth or wine when re-heating if you want to thin it out. 

This news just in… Kevin just sent me a message that he has just made a batch using three pounds of lentils. That should yield a whole lot of prosperity!

Happy New Year, and here’s to a healthy and prosperous 2012.

I often blog on food or food issues on Monday in support of Meatless Monday, one of several programs developed in the Healthy Monday project, founded in 2003 in association with Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Communications. Meatless Monday’s goal is “to help reduce meat consumption 15% in order to improve personal  health and the health of our planet.”

Thursday, December 29, 2011

On My Radar 12.29.11


Recent News. Happenings. Discoveries…Here are some of the items on my radar.

NEWS from ALL OVER:
The ethanol subsidies have come to an end. You can read more about the history of ethanol support and the long road to its final demise in many sources. Here is a particularly good summary by John Voelcker for GreenCarReports posted at TPMIdeaLab. 

The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has posted an interactive map which leaves no doubt that this was a year of extreme weather events across the US. The bold copy above the graphic announces:  In 2011, there were at least 2,941 monthly weather records broken by extreme events that struck communities in the US. The summary for my state of Connecticut lists the following events: “Record-breaking heat in 5 counties and a total of 13 broken heat records; Record-breaking rainfall in 3 counties and a total of 8 broken rainfall records; Record-breaking snow in 6 counties and a total of 12 broken snowfall records; Multi-million dollar losses from extreme flooding and hurricane damage; 3 billion dollars in damage from October snowstorm; Snowiest January on record.” [I remember that month very well.] Visit the site to check out the graphic and also to read more about the NDRC’s view that extreme weather and climate change are directly related.

In late November, a report by author Elizabeth Grossman in Yale Environment 360 warned that the acidification of the world’s oceans from an excess of CO2 has already begun. Author Carl Zimmer had issued a similar warning in February 2010. 

For the last few days, it was widely reported in a number of blogs that McDonald’s had pulled out of Bolivia. Today’s Marketplace Morning Report confirmed this story. Here is part of the exchange between Marketplace’s Adriene Hill and Reuter journalist Monica Machicao in Bolivia: “Hill: …Tell me, why did these McDonald's in Bolivia close? Machicao: There are a number of hypotheses. One of those — people prefer local food rather than McDonald's. It's the fact that it's more cheap; and in fact, it's really more tasty. Hill: So the local food is actually cheaper than McDonald's fast food? Machicao: Absolutely. Local food can even cost a third of McDonald's.” The same report also stated that Wendy’s was returning to Japan with a premium menu after a two year absence.You can read the rest of the transcript here

Gray whales are arriving early and in record numbers off the coast of Southern California. Check out the photos here

NEWS from NEW HAVEN:
Frank Criscuolo, a beloved figure from the downtown New Haven restaurant scene, died unexpectedly at home on December 14, at the age of 62. Husband of Claire Criscuolo, Claire and Frank were co-owner and proprietors of the 35-year-old vegetarian restaurant Claire’s Corner Copia and Basta Trattoria (for ominvores) next door. He will be greatly missed. You can read his obituary at the New Haven Independent.

The number of owner/members in the Elm City Market continues to grow. When the store opened its doors on November 2, membership was at 750. There were 1200 members when the store’s site was last updated.

The new Connecticut chapter of Slow Food USA, Slow Food Shoreline, has held a number of events including happy hours and a food-centric art gallery tour. Read more about them at their new website.

With its roll-out in the Hill neighborhood in mid-December, the new brown toters for trash have now been distributed in every neighborhood and single-stream recycling in the large blue toters (formerly used for trash) is the rule of the day. You can read about more about the nuts and bolts of the program at the City site and reports of the program’s successes and challenges at the New Haven Independent

DISCOVERIES:
During a recent tour of New Haven specialty shops, I was happy to learn that many socks are made in Vermont. Idiom featured colorful non-matching socks from Solmate Socks from Vermont's Sock Lady. At J. Crew I learned that all their socks were sourced from Vermont. After checking out the company websitemy guess is that they come from Cabot Hosiery Mills. Chances are if you bought “Made in the USA” socks from L. L. Bean, Orivs, or Bass, they came from Cabot. The mill also makes its own private brands, Cabot & Sons Vermont and Darn Tough Vermont.

UPCOMING EVENTS:
January 1
11:00 am - 1:30 pm
Lighthouse Park, New Haven
New Haven First Day Winter Festival featuring the 
Polar Plunge for Parks and Community Gardens
You can dive in and collect pledges, or sponsor a hardy soul if you don’t want to take the plunge yourself. Your choice. Either way it sounds like a good time. Check out www.firstdaynewhaven.org/ for more info.

January 4th
6:30 pm - 9:00 pm
Pint Night
Co-sponsored by Trailblazer and Box 63 
in the Broadway District of New Haven
Also in support of the New Haven Land Trust. 
More details here.

BLOG NEWS:
On December 8 I briefly left my comfort zone and gave a talk based on some of my blog discoveries. Finding Your Own Way to Greenness: Tips and Tools for Greening Up Your Holidays was part of the Sustainable Quadrangle speakers series at the Yale Divinity School. Notes to what I discussed that day are posted here

On Thursday, January 5th, aspiring Master Gardeners in New Haven County begin their studies at Edgerton Park. I am one of the new students in this intensive course which is part of the University of Connecticut Cooperative Exension System. I guarantee you will be kept abreast of my progress and discoveries over the next four months. Wish me luck!

Meatless Monday posts will return on January 2, after a one-week break.

Happy New Year. I hope you will visit often in 2012. I like to think that together we can make a difference!

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Freebies and Tips in Time for Christmas


Ho, Ho, Ho. It may be only Tuesday, but I have some good stuff for you.

FOR THE KIDS (and the Young at Heart)

  • Send a personalized call from Santa to the favorite people in your life. 
  • Visit NORAD (as in North American Aerospace Defense Command) Tracks SantaOn Christmas Eve follow Santa as he makes his way around the world.  Visit Countdown Village each day leading up to Christmas for a new activity. 
  • Let it Snow. Go to the Google homepage. Type in “let it snow.” Hit Enter. Watch what happens. This article on the abc news blog lists some other Easter Eggs you may have missed. So take a little break and have some free fun!

FOR THOSE INTERESTED IN THINGS GREEN
  • Make your own 2011 Green Scrapbook. Google has given you a fun way to take a quick tour through this year’s top environmental searches. Here is the link to mine. And, yes, I learned a few things during this brief experiment.


LAST MINUTE GIFT IDEAS
  • For the person who has everything, consider a gift to Kiva in his or her name. Kiva makes micro loans ($25) to worthy individuals around the world. Here’s how it works: Choose a borrower. Make a loan. Get repaid. Repeat if you wish. The choice is yours. Since Kiva was founded in 2005, there have been over 652,000 Kiva lenders and $265 million in loans. The repayment rate is almost 99%!
  • For a truly unique gift, check out personal genome service 23andMe, who is offering a discount of $23  on their kits through December 27. All 23andMe needs is a little spit in a vial, and you are on your way to unlocking the secrets of your DNA. 23andMe provides genetic testing for over 100 traits and diseases, as well as DNA ancestry. If you are even remotely interested, check out their site. The videos are concise, easy to understand, and entertaining to watch.

Happy Holidays.

Monday, December 19, 2011

Meatless Monday: Food in the News


Remember the online petition I started a while back? It was the petition asking Stop & Shop supermarkets to stop sourcing their frozen green beans from China. Well, it’s still chugging away. I have over 270 signatures now and I have just extended the petition deadline to January 15. I’d really like to reach my target of 500 signatures by then. Can you help?


While doing my holiday shopping, I discovered that with a little extra effort it is possible to buy many gifts manufactured in the USA (or at least North America), especially sox! [More on this after the presents have been unwrapped.] Whole Foods and the Elm City Market both carry organic frozen beans sourced from North America. It would seem that Stop & Shop could, too. Sourcing frozen green beans from a world away makes no sense.

On another note, for those in need of an artificial tree, including those who are allergy-prone or travelers during the holiday season, it would seem impossible to find an artificial Christmas tree NOT made in China. [Please correct me if I’m wrong.]

King Arthur Flour, whose products have been staples in New England pantries for years, is featured in an ad being aired by Google. If you’ve missed it on TV, you can catch it on YouTube. This is the short version; there is a slightly longer one as well

The ad, promoting Google Chrome, tells the wonderfully inspiring story of how this 220-year-old Vermont flour company has used the web to transform itself into a baking company known the world over.

New Haven’s Elm City Market now has over 1,200  member/owners.

Slow Food USA posted this link to an article at Civil Eats promoting ways to reduce food waste during the holidays.

Last Minute Gift Ideas
For the person who has everything, consider a symbolic gift in his or her name to Women for Women, an organization which helps women survivors of war rebuild their lives. By a couple who love to bake, I was gifted with a symbolic baking kit (rolling pin, flour, and tins designed to help women in countries like Bosnia and Afghanistan to learn the skills and get the tools they need to start bakeries) and my husband with a carpentry kit (for women in Kosovo training to become carpenters). There are many gifts in a wide range of prices including: fabric, carpentry sets, okra seeds, gardening tools, dirt…you get the idea.

And there is still time to order through LocalHarvest (the subject of last week’s Meatless Monday post). A number of vendors are offering free shipping on selected products from Page oranges to pecan pie.

Please come back tomorrow for some free stuff for kids and more last minute shopping ideas.

Happy Monday.

I often blog on food or food issues on Monday in support of Meatless Monday, one of several programs developed in the Healthy Monday project, founded in 2003 in association with Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Communications. Meatless Monday’s goal is “to help reduce meat consumption 15% in order to improve personal  health and the health of our planet.”

Monday, December 12, 2011

Meatless Monday: Supporting Family Farmers with Your Holiday Dollars


Not a fan of Buy Nothing Christmas? Then you are fast approaching the last possible date for getting your holiday shopping done and your parcels in the mail. 

With a busy week ahead, online shopping is probably become more and more enticing. Well, do I have an idea for you! Farmers across the country have had a particularly challenging year — from those in New England hit by a late-season hurricane followed by an October blizzard to Texans plagued by drought. I know a great way to lend them a hand, while bringing joy to your loved ones and cutting out the need to stand in line at the post office.


Skip online food gift retailers like Harry and David, and go right to the source. Check out LocalHarvest, a website where you can locate produce and other agricultural items in your area AND shop online for items not available locally or for items you may want to send as gifts. 


LocalHarvest, located in Santa Cruz, CA, was founded in 1998 by activist and software engineer Guillermo Payet. According to information on the organization’s website, “LocalHarvest is now the number one informational resource for the Buy Local movement and the top place on the Internet where people find information on direct marketing family farms. We now have more than 20000 members, and are growing by about 20 new members every day. Through our servers, our website and those of our partners, we serve about three and a half million page views per month to the public interested in buying food from family farms.” 

This well organized site is easy to navigate. “Farms” is where you can search for shopping opportunities in your area. “Shop” is where you will find an illustrated catalog broken down into categories such as fruits, honey and bee products, wool, lavender, meats, and many others. If the item is available only for local pickup, it is clearly indicated with a bright yellow banner. While  on my tour of the site, I discovered many lines of alpaca wear, Texas pecans (and pecan pie), frozen heritage turkeys, beeswax tea lights, jams, citrus fruits. I finally ordered some Page oranges from the Orange Shop in Citra, Florida with FREE SHIPPING. This fruit was described as “an heirloom USDA hybrid between Honeybell and Clementine released many years ago, widely considered to have the best flavor of any variety. They're small in size, fairly easy to peel, and have a rich, sweet taste…” I hope this gift will bring a smile to a couple who love fresh fruit but don’t have the chance to enjoy it every day.

The site also includes a section on CSAs (Community Supported Agriculture) and a tool for locating CSAs near you. [There was quite a list for the New Haven area.] And a calendar of events… and a newsletter… and member blogs and photos. Local Harvest is clearly about supporting small farmers, in every way they can and  wherever they are.

Yes, I believe in shopping local first. But in my experience you can’t always get what you want in your own little corner of the world. If you check out this site, you might find you can get exactly what you need.

I offer up this discovery as one more way to help out the little guys. They may not live next door. But they still need your support to stay in business. Their communities need them to stay in business. And we all need the family farmers to ensure the availability of safe, flavorful, and varied sources of food.

Happy shopping. 

I often blog on food or food issues on Monday in support of Meatless Monday, one of several programs developed in the Healthy Monday project, founded in 2003 in association with Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Communications. Meatless Monday’s goal is “to help reduce meat consumption 15% in order to improve personal  health and the health of our planet.”


Thursday, December 8, 2011

OTRTG Roadshow 12.08.11


Today I’ll be speaking to a friendly audience up the hill at the Yale Divinity School. The topic? Finding Your Own Way to Greenness: Tips and Tools for Greening Up Your Holidays. I will have a slideshow in Keynote, and business cards with a QR code to this page. Following is a summary with links to some of the topics I will cover.


SOME OF MY INSPIRATIONS

BUY NOTHING CHRISTMAS/OCCUPY CHRISTMAS
Buy Nothing Christmas was started by Mennonites on the Canadian West Coast in 2001.

Occupy has morphed this idea into a campaign to support local businesses and alternatives to corporate retailers. Check out the movement's Facebook page for more. One suggestion is to support local, independent businesses.

Etsy is another way. Etsy is an “online marketplace” to buy and sell things handmade, supplies, and vintage items. Etsy's mission is “to enable people to make a living making things, and to reconnect makers with buyers.” Its vision is “to build a new economy and present a better choice.” Its tagline is “Buy, Sell, and Live Handmade.” Buyers and sellers come from 150 countries, and Etsy sellers number in the hundreds of thousands. 

Here are some of my suggestions:

LOCAL MERCHANTS
  • Atticus Bookstore and Cafe
  • CitySeed Farmers Markets
  • Devil’s Gear Bicycle Shop 
  • Elm City Market Co-Op
  • Foundry Music
  • Group W Bench
  • Hull's
  • Katahdin Furniture
  • Knit New Haven
  • Trailblazer
  • Willoughby’s Coffee and Tea

SHOPPING TOOLS
Yelp 

A NIGHT ON THE TOWN
Farm to Table Restaurants
  • 116 Crown
  • Caseus 
  • Claire’s
  • Kitchen Zinc

Entertainment
  • Criterion Cinema
  • Long Wharf Theatre
  • New Haven Symphony Orchestra
  • Shubert Theater
  • Yale Rep

Check out Info New Haven for current promotions for shopping downtown.

SHOPPING FOR GOOD
  • 10,000 Villages 
  • CAW
  • Peabody Museum
  • Yale British Art Center 
  • Yale University Art Gallery
  • Albers Kits 

REPURPOSING/VINTAGE SHOPPING

GIFTING FOOD


FOR THE PERSON WHO HAS EVERYTHING

FOR SOME OF MY OWN PERSONAL GIFT IDEAS
Check out some of my other 10 Things Thursdays on a variety of topics from stocking stuffers, mementos for those who live far away, gifts for kids.

CULINARY ADVENTURES
Check out this great tool: Google with recipe view 
And tales of my culinary adventures with:

FOR MORE ON WASTE

CREATIVE WRAPPING IDEAS
Check out these and these
And for shipping something heavy, or to a rural area, learn more about If it fits, it ships!

In conclusion, as a new Seafood Watch Advocate, I handed out the Northeast version of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch pocket guide as stocking stuffers. Here is the link to the Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Advocate Program.

Thanks to everyone who joined me on the road!

Monday, December 5, 2011

Meatless Monday: Taking on Monsanto


Big, greedy, strong-arming, corporate bully. That’s pretty much the image I had of Monsanto after watching King Corn and Food, Inc.,  both of which paint Monsanto as a chemical company with the goal of cornering the market for seeds of corn, soybeans, and other commodity crops and willing to to shut down anyone who gets in the way — small farmers who do not want to buy Monsanto’s genetically modified (GMO) Roundup-ready seeds, organic farmers, and those who make a living harvesting or selling seeds. My opinion changed for the worse after hearing patent attorney Dan Ravicher’s October 26 talk at the Yale Law School: "Suing Monsanto: Intellectual Property, Genetic Contamination, and Farmers' Rights.” 

I am not a lawyer. I have to confess that although I had heard of this suit, I was unaware of its particulars. Dan Ravicher is leading a preemptive suit by organic seed growers, farmers, and farmer organizations to prevent Monsanto from suing farmers or seed producers should their crops become contaminated by Monsanto’s patented seeds. The suit, filed in March of 2011, is titled organic Seed Growers & Trade Association (OSGATA), et al. v. Monsanto. The CT chapter of the Northeast Organic Farming Association (CTNOFA) is one of the plaintiffs.

The 80+ parties in the suit are requesting that Monsanto sign a simple covenant not to sue. Although Monsanto has stated that they would not sue farmers who were “inadvertently” contaminated or farmers whose crops contain “trace amounts” of GMO, they have refused to sign such a covenant that would bring an effective end to the lawsuit. Monsanto filed a motion to dismiss, and in August the plaintiffs, with the support of 12 agricultural organizations, filed a brief in opposition to the motion. 

Ravicher walked us through the reasoning behind the suit and the four grounds for the suit. All of this material is well summarized in a post by Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds, another of the plaintiffs.  Ravicher emphasized and the post re-iterated that if any of the four grounds is proven, it should be sufficient to cause the court to issue a judgement against Monsanto. 

Such a judgment would be a welcome bit of good news for small farmers. Food Democracy Now writes that “Monsanto controls more than 93% of soybeans and 80% of corn grown in the U.S.” 

Ravicher did offer up some hope that the tide is beginning to turn against Monsanto. GMO seed is expensive, and after several years of planting it, life in the soil begins to die off, leading to lower crop yields. He spoke of a surge of interest among farmers to wean themselves from the Monsanto seeds.

It seems appropriate to be writing this post on the day of the planned Occupy Wall Street Farmers March. According to the Food Democracy Now blog, family farmers from around the country will march to Zuccotti Park on December 4th, in a “celebration of community power to regain control over the most basic element to human well-being: food.”  One of the scheduled speakers is organic farmer Jim Gerritsen of Maine, president of the Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association, the lead plaintiff in the suit against Monsanto. If all goes as planned, the day will end with a circle of solidarity and seed swap in the park. 

A New York Times blog profiled Jim Gerritsen in a post titled: “A Maine Farmer Speaks to Wall Street,” which you can read here


Eddie C covered the day's events with words and abundant images on the Daily Kos. The National Young Farmers' Coalition was a visible presence in a number of the photos. Speakers spoke. Farmers and friends marched. Drummers drummed. Great signs and banners were everywhere. And, at the march's end in Zuccotti Park, seeds were exchanged. Eddie C wrote, “Free seeds were handed out, heirloom seeds and seeds that were cross pollinated by farmers, anything but the patented property of some major corporation.”


Take that, Monsanto.

Have a great week, and stop by again soon.

I often blog on food or food issues on Monday in support of Meatless Monday, one of several programs developed in the Healthy Monday project, founded in 2003 in association with Columbia University’s Mailman School of Public Health, Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health and Syracuse University’s Newhouse School of Communications. Meatless Monday’s goal is “to help reduce meat consumption 15% in order to improve personal  health and the health of our planet.”