Meatless Monday: A Mushroom Feast

Happy Monday everyone. Some of you have been asking what ever happened with my mushroom farm. I may have have gotten sidetracked by other topics, but I didn’t forget about the post I promised you. If you’ve been wondering about my fungi, your wait is over!

We got a good crop of mushrooms from our kit, and I celebrated them by making this delicious dish for a special Saturday night feast — Mario Batali’s Pasta with Oyster Mushrooms, Sweet Garlic, and Arugula — found online using Google search with recipe view. I searched for pasta and oyster mushrooms. After I checked that I had arugula and garlic, but not pumpkin, this recipe came up as the first result. Since I did not make my own pasta, my guess is that the difficulty level became easy rather than intermediate, that is unless you factor in the time and dedication required to grow the mushrooms in the first place [more on that in a future post]. I did have to run around the corner to buy some sweet vermouth, but the little extra effort was definitely worth the trouble. 

The mushrooms imparted a texture and taste reminiscent of seafood to the dish, and we could see how they acquired their name. The 5 star rating on this recipe is well-deserved, and it was very cool that we had grown the featured ingredient. Thanks Chef Batali. Thanks Back to the Roots. We are looking forward to the leftovers tonight…

Have a great week. And come back again soon.

I try to blog on food or food issues each 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.”

Freebie Friday 4.1.11

Worthy Things to Do, Listen To, or View that Won’t Cost You a Dime 

Welcome to the April 1 edition of Freebie Friday. Cooking was my original theme. This week's tip is so awesome — NO FOOLING!— that I had intended just one tip for you today — Google Search with Recipe View.

Here’s how it works. Search for a recipe or ingredient using Google, then select “Recipes” in the left-hand panel on the search results page. You can customize your search by filtering your results by ingredients, cooking time, or calories. What a great way to turn what you have on hand into a feast or to find a way to turn that daring purchase from the farmers’ market into something wonderful. An illustrated summary of all the features is here. 

If you would rather have Google’s executive chef walk you through the process, you can watch a short video on YouTube:

I used this tool last week when I had a giant cauliflower in the fridge and was in the mood for soup. I entered “curried cauliflower soup” into the search box and then filtered for recipes that DID include honey (which I had) but DID NOT use butternut squash, ginger, or spinach (all things I did not have available). I also checked “less than 60 minutes” and “less than 500 calories.” I was left with this recipe from food.com which boasted a secret ingredient — an apple. It was delicious and deserves all the stars and great reviews it has received.

Give Google Search with Recipe View a try. You’ll never again have to resort to cold cereal OR make a last minute run to the store for a missing ingredient. Have fun.


It's my blog and I have the right to change my mind. It's April Fools’ Day today, and those Googlers love this holiday. I'm turning today back into a 3-tip Friday. I can't pass on the opportunity to share this year's Google pranks with you.


First up, the one with the video. Go to google.com and note the small print under the search box. [Hint: it begins with the word “new” in red.] Click the purple words which follow the red “new” and you will be taken to a video about an amazing new feature for Gmail. After watching the video be sure to click the box indicating you want to give the product a try, because I'm sure you will!


The second prank is for font lovers. Enter “helvetica” into the Google search box and check out your results. 

TGIF. Keep your wits about you today. Have a great weekend! And be sure to come back for a new topic on Meatless Monday.

FYI Why a piñata? Just like a blog link, until you open it, you won’t know what’s inside.