One of my favorite summer foods is basil. Basil is culinary ganja. I love to take a moment when I'm picking it to just breathe it in. It smells so pungent and rich and luscious.
One of my least favorite summer foods to pay for is basil. If you plant it early (we plant it from seeds), put it in a sunny spot, and water it frequently, you can have all the basil your heart desires. This summer, the hubs planted several pots of basil ('cuz he knows I like plentiful, generous amounts basil), including some Thai basil (see the copper planter in front), which is a bit more savory.
My favorite dishes with fresh basil are caprese salads--I make a little vinaigrette with balslamic, olive oil (usually regular as the extra virgin is strong tasting) some fresh lemon juice, salt and pepper--pasta with pesto, and any (preferable spicy) thai dish. But you can also sprinkle fresh basil on pizza, on pasta with marinara sauce, or on any pasta dish. If I only have a small serving of pesto leftover, I'l use it to make a pesto-mozzarella-tomato sandwich, or I'll whisk it into some eggs before I scramble them for a yummy breakfast or brunch.
I'll leave you with the recipe (my mother's) I use for pesto. I am a pesto purist. I don't generally get adventurous and add herbs other than basil and parsley. I always make this recipe. It is easily doubled or tripled. The amounts needn't be exact--if you have a little more or less of any ingredient, it won't matter. Just make sure you have plenty of basil. Frankly, I have never included the butter (my husband is lactose intolerant and even so I don't add butter to dishes when I can use olive oil instead). And I don't measure out the olive oil. I just keep mixing it in until the texture is right. I also sometimes use regular olive oil and I sometimes use extra virgin. I only use fresh parmesan. I am not that familiar with Sardo and I hate to admit it but I do not care too much for pecorino cheese. With the exception of Pyrennes Brebis, I am not a fan of sheep cheese. It's too sheepy tasting. Finally, I sometimes roast or sautee the garlic first (and in that case add more than two small cloves) because otherwise, the taste can be too sharp and linger longer than I'd like it to.
2 cups fresh basil leaves
1/2 cup fresh Italian parsley
2 small cloves of garlic
2 Tb pine nuts
1/2 - 3/4 grated Sardo, pecorino, or Parmesan cheese
3 Tbs butter
1/2 cup olive oil
salt to taste
Directions are simple:
1. In a blender or food processor, whirl together all ingredients EXCEPT the oil.
2. Add oil in at a slow trickle.
3. Enjoy!
I first heard about Sandor Katz when The Sun published this interview with him this past May. I was instantly fascinated by his ideas and his story. When I saw that he was profiled by one of my favorite food writers, Burkhard Bilger, in another one of my favorite publications, The New Yorker, this past November, I was thrilled.
Katz is a self-declared "fermentation fetishist." He studies and writes about how food can be preserved, enriched, and transformed via fermenting. Not only is fermenting environmentally sustainable as the process does not require fuel, electricity, or refrigeration, fermented foods are damn good for us--they are full of good bacteria, so much of which we regularly wash away with our glut of anti-bacterial products.
Before moving to rural Tennessee, Katz was a political, community, and gay rights activist in his native Manhattan. He didn't renounce that work so much as he moved on from it, finding his current work and lifestyle more meaningful. What I like so much about Katz, as opposed to locavore extremists, is that he's not ideological or prey to pseudo-science; rather, he's educated, knowledgeable, reasonable, practical, and scientific in his approach.
Katz is H.I.V. positive and tried for years to medicate himself with fermented and herbal remedies. Once he became severely ill, he acknowledged that to stay alive he needed to take anti-retroviral and protease-inhibitor drugs. This and some of his other capitulations, such as to humane meat, have earned him the scorn of some of his followers, to which he has responded with Jesus-like understanding. He believes, rightly so, that his diet has been a great part of his healing, but as he says to Bilger, "that doesn't mean that kombucha will cure your diabetes. It doesn't mean that sauerkraut cured my AIDS." Exactly. While I would assume that recognizes the value of consuming raw milk, he also recognizes that it must be done right, especially given how our current food system operates. Suddenly ending pasteurization would be he says, "the biggest disaster in the world. There would be a lot of dead children around."
I highly recommend reading the pieces in The Sun and The New Yorker in their entirety (and I highly recommend subscribing to both of these fine publications if you don't already). Katz has also written two books on the subject, Wild Fermentation and The Revolution Will Not Be Microwaved. Given his moderate success at pickling radishes, I am lobbying my husband to read them and become our household's Fermenter in Chief. What do you say, babe?
It was about a year and half ago that I wrote this rather critical post in response to Michael Pollan's piece in The New York Times Magazine trashing the Food Network. (In fact, it's been a little over a year since I've posted to this blog. Is anyone still out there?) I really do value Pollan's work. In fact, if there were a Pulitzer Prize for food writing, he should win it. This clever piece by author Rowan Jacobsen really sums up how I feel about Pollan, though--he's right, but, man, is he patronizing.
I had defended healthy diet proponent and food television personality Jamie Oliver in that post, and I'll continue to consult his recipes, but for reasons that are different from Pollan's, I have become disillusioned with him. After reading this long but worthwhile piece in AlterNet, I realized how sensationalist, damaging, and misleading Oliver's show on ABC was, and how complicated our school lunch system is.
If you don't have the time or stomach for one of Pollan's books or for an episode of "Food Revolution," this piece by Nicolette Hahn Niman gives similar advice and is relatively non-preachy. She lives in California, however, and a lot of what she suggests doing is harder to replicate in other places, but she does cheer on even small steps toward changes in food consumption patterns. I look at the items on her list as long-term goals and not necessarily as ones my family and I can match entirely right now.
Speaking of California, it's also been almost a year and a half since we moved back to Central Virginia from Oakland. I thought it would be impossible to match the year-round, local, sustainably grown, diverse produce we got from our fabulous Eatwell Farm CSA, but the alternatives in Ashland are none too shabby. My husband harvested a modest amount of herbs and greens from some planters this past summer and some friends with gardens shared some of their bounty. The Ashland Farmer's Market takes place on Saturday mornings from May through October, but also includes special Thanksgiving and holiday markets as well as renegade markets, often every first and third Saturdays, during the off season. Route 1 (just north of its intersection with Route 54 ) hosts a couple of produce stands which carry local produce. My favorite option is Local Roots Food Co-op. I joined initially because I was having such a hard time making it to the farmer's market. It started out small with limited options, but I figured I would invest anyhow in the hopes that my support would help it grow. Well, it's definitely grown and I am absolutely thrilled with the selection and quality. Also, how can you beat shopping on-line and locally?
Finally, in this fascinating interview in The Sun, "Farmed Out: On the Need to Reinvent Agriculture," Wes Jackson proves to be even more radical, and humble, than Michael Pollan. You can't access the whole interview unless you're a subscriber, but, hey, it's a great magazine.
My first exposure to compost was the small compost bin kept behind the cabinet door beneath the sink at my maternal grandparents' house. My grandfather, a.k.a. Farmer John, was a chemist by trade but a gardener by passion. And so he composted. I remember my grandmother dutifully scraping plates off into the compost bin as well as discarding egg shells and coffee grounds there. But I didn't really understand what composting was all about. Although they are concerned about conserving energy and my mother is an active gardener too, my parents don't compost. In fact, when they renovated their kitchen in 1979, they added a garbage disposal.
A guy I was dating who worked at one of the DC-based environmental organizations informed me that using garbage disposals was actually worse for the environment than just putting food-based waste in the garbage. He may have suggested composting as a better way to manage and dispose of such waste, but if he did, it went in one ear and out the other. I think I was too busy listening to him go on and on about his ex-long time-girlfriend.
When I met my (then future) husband Cedar, I learned that his parents composted, even when they didn't have much of a garden. When Cedar and I moved in together and later bought a house, though, we didn't compost. I'm not sure why we didn't think to follow in our elders' composting footsteps. I think I still thought that composting was just for people who gardened, rather than a sound environmental practice.
Then we moved to Oakland, California, where the city composts everything: milk cartons, pizza boxes, food scraps, used tissues. We collected our compost in our beverage cartons and had our kids take it to the green (of course) compost cans outside, which were emptied once a week. Once we moved to Ashland , Virginia, one of the first things we did was take advantage of Hanover County's offer of free composting bins and made a compost heap in the back of our house. (And actually, Hanover County has a well-done bit about composting on its website.) Because the soil here seems to be pretty bare bones and we are renting (and Cedar, the gardener of our household, is working toward tenure), we don't garden, but we still compost. In fact, after life in Oakland, as we constantly work towards running a more eco-sustainable household, we can't imagine not composting. Here is a link to an article on what can be composted. Cedar says things like food-soiled paper products can not really be composted on a small scale (like the compost in our backyard), but I'm sure some would disagree with him.
Besides encouraging them to buy sustainably produced meat and seafood and to cart home their groceries in re-usable shopping bags, I have been encouraging my parents to compost. My mom keeps telling me she will as soon as she teaches herself how. This is a woman who has taught herself about a dozen languages, has a PhD in linguistics, and a law degree. So here, Mom: Adapted from an e-mail from my father-in-law: 1) Get a half-gallon plastic container (we use yogurt containers).
2) Fill it with all of the stuff you'd normally out in the garbage disposal (plus any food scraps you normally put in the trash like banana peels and corn husks).
3) When full, transfer to a five-gallon container outside and then when that's full transfer to a small hole in the ground. Or empty each small container directly to a small hole in the ground.
4) Shovel some leaves and dirt over the top and "presto, chango, it goes back to Jesus in no time" (in about six months).
5) Every once in a while turn the mixture over with a shovel to mix up the new and old compost.
For a more comprehensive look at composting, here is a link to thecomposters.com site.For example, some people don't use a hole in the ground but buy or build one of the high-tech jobbies you see below.
I agree with many of the points in Michael Pollan's article in the July 29, 2009, New York Times Magazine. Julia Child was awesome. Americans are too fat. Americans eat too much processed food. Americans should cook more. Junky, high-fat foods that are hard to make are now easy to buy and hence, to their detriment, Americans eat them more often than they would otherwise. Americans are spending less time cooking and more time eating junky food. The Food Network is the root of all food evil. And so are canned tomatoes. What? Whoa Mikey! After a page or two, I started to envision myself cast on a Maury Povitch show as the fallen "Woman who Cooks with Frozen Vegetables."
The ideas in Pollan's books, In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto and The Omnivore's Dilemma really resonated with me (okay, the ones in the book reviews did). The Omnivore's Dilemma especially presented a fresh look at sustainable eating, farming, and food production; it gave structure and form to a lot of my thinking about food. For example, although I don't care to eat much beef, pork, poultry, or fish myself, I don't think that it's immoral for humans to do so, but I do think meat and fish eaters should do so responsibly and sustainably. Since I can't afford to fork over eight dollars for a can of eco-friendly tuna, I mostly eat vegetarian and so do my husband and our children. We also compost, cook, limit processed and prepared foods, shop at our local farmer's market, join CSA's, have vegetable and herb gardens of our own when possible, and in general try to spend our food dollars wisely and responsibly and to eat as healthfully as possible.
I agree with Pollan's recent tribute to Julia Child. She was an admirable woman who did great things for American cuisine, and apparently for Michael Pollan's diet, but didn't she also cook with a great deal of animal fats and beef? And I don't think she was purchasing them at the cruelty-free organic butchers, either. What was really off in the article, however, is how much Michael Pollan has it in for the Food Network for not filling the gap Julia Child left. But the problem isn't the Food Network. The problem is the quality of television in general and that Americans watch way too much of it (and it sounds like Pollan's son watches quite a bit himself--what is that family doing with cable anyway?) Most of the shows on television are crappy, sappy, predict-o-dramas or reality shows replete with gimmicks, stunts, and over-sized personalities. Does Pollan really expect the Food Network to be like P.B.S? And, not showing Martha Stewart sweat has more to do with American culture's perfection-fetish and discomfort with the human body than it does with a conspiracy by the Food Network to make us eat processed foods and keep us out of our kitchens. That's like blaming soap operas for a rise in divorce. If I want quality television, I don't seek it out on the Food Network.
Even so, there are some decent programs there. That's where seven years ago, Jamie Oliver inspired my husband and me to grow herbs at home and to shop at local farmer's markets. Okay, so he is really cute and has that charming British accent, but he isn't just some celebrity chef boy toy. And, I do watch, ahem, Iron Chef. And I do learn something from it. I use ingredients or kitchen tools I wouldn't have known to otherwise. Anyway, not all of us are looking for recipes a la Julia Child--some of us just want ideas and inspiration. I know plenty of people who organize cooking parties and gatherings around the main ingredient of that week's show. And yes, I am (Heavens to Betsey!) actually entertained by watching people armed with cool cooking toys scurry around, mince, baste, encrust, garnish, and create. Sue me!
The food industry certainly contributes to our not cooking and increasingly sells us deceptively unhealthy food, but in his article Pollan glorifies the era of Julia Child as some sort of golden age in cooking which a) it wasn't and b) even if it was, he fails to take into account major societal shifts: real wages have declined, benefit packages have shrunk, and it's become more difficult for families to have one parent stay at home. We do an abysmal job of supporting parents who stay home with their children. Most of those mothers and fathers are not abandoning their kitchens to sit on their butts and watch the Food Network-- they're working! Pollan dismisses this by saying that even parents who stay home don't cook as much, but I wonder if most of the parents that Pollan describes are more affluent and would outsource their cooking and household chores anyway.
I am a home cook and when I am not failing to make a living as a writer, I am mostly taking care of my children. I cook a lot. My mom cooked a lot. I grew up in a house where an all-natural fruit leather was a big treat. My parents shopped at the Eastern Market and New Morning Farm's farm truck. But my mom also used canned tomatoes and frozen vegetables and so do I. Besides jump-starting my home herb garden, Jamie Oliver sold me on the idea that it's okay to take some short cuts--use canned tomatoes or frozen pie crusts, for example. In his article, Michael Pollan makes no distinction between cooking with thse items and "cooking" microwave pizza. Does he really mean to equate using canned tomatoes in the winter to make my vegetarian chili to eating at McDonald's? The decline of home cooking is a serious problem, but does he really want me to stew my own tomatoes, bake my own graham crackers, and boil my own bagels? Is he anti-technology? Isn't there something to be said both in terms of the number of people that can be fed and being sustainable for capitalizing on the advantages of efficiencies of scale and technology? I don't want salmonella; I want someone with canning machinery who knows what they're doing to can and stew my tomatoes. Isn't it more energy efficient if some people do that on a mass scale rather than most of us on a small scale? If I buy some prepared foods in my neighborhood, say a quiche from Homemades by Suzannes or bread from MacShack Acres at the Ashland Farmers Market, is that really the same as "letting corporations do my cooking for me"? How about if I'm supporting small or local companies and restaurants that purchase locally and treat their employees responsibly and fairly? That cook healthfully and sustainable? Is that so wrong?
Ultimately, I felt that Michael Pollan was exhibiting ivory-tower paternalism at its worst. Yes, Americans need to exercise more, to eat healthier, more responsibly and sustainably, and that means cooking more. And we need to find more sustainable and efficient ways of producing food. But we're not going to encourage Americans to cook more if we skewer them for cooking with frozen vegetables (and tell them they're not really cooking when they do so) just like teaching teenagers that abstaining from sex until marriage, rather than teaching them to have sex responsibly, is a good way to ensure that they throw the baby out with the bathwater. Michael Pollan has done so much to start a conversation about food, health, and sustainability and to get people to think in different ways about all of the above. I would hate for snarkiness, arrogance, and reductive generalizing to destroy all of that. On that note I suppose I should get my ass out of my home office chair and into the kitchen. Sorry Michael Pollan, I have no more time to get offended--I have to cook.
For further exploration of some of the topics brought up in Pollan's article and books, please read:
1) The Omnivore's Delusion: Against the Agri-Intellectual, by Missouri farmer Blake Hurst, counters critics of industrial farming and shows that big-business industrial corporate farms are not necessarily thoughtless, inhumane, corporate, or non-family entities. The piece is well written, skillfully reasoned, and valid. Some of the language and information is a bit over my non-farmer's head and I'm a bit sheepish about advertising anything that comes out of the American Enterprise Institute, but I got the gist of what he was saying and I think this guy and the people he represents deserve to have their say in these matters. If we're going to consider the ideas of people like Michael Pollan, we should also consider what actual farmers have to say. The reality is that no matter how we do it, food and livestock production and consumption are eco-destructive processes.
2) In the March/April 2009 edition of Mother Jones, Paul Roberts describes the complexity and difficulties of doing sustainable farming on a large scale and shows why shopping at farmer's markets and buying locally aren't necessarily as eco-friendly as one might think. The article also explores some of the sustainable farming methods in the pipeline.
4) Elizabeth Kolbert, my favorite environmental journalist, wrote a review of four books in the July 20, 2009, edition of The New Yorker about obesity in the United. The piece is well-balanced, well-written, reasonable, and mostly objective.
5) San Francisco chef Chris Cosentino of Incanto Restaurant and his business partner, Mark Pastore, wrote Shock & Foie, a thoughtful, thorough, and rational response to well-intentioned but misguided anti-foie gras protesters.
One of my least favorite summer foods to pay for is basil. If you plant it early (we plant it from seeds), put it in a sunny spot, and water it frequently, you can have all the basil your heart desires. This summer, the hubs planted several pots of basil ('cuz he knows I like plentiful, generous amounts basil), including some Thai basil (see the copper planter in front), which is a bit more savory.
Posts
