A Photo Opportunity Missed: Goat Mower

This afternoon I went for a little hike in the Oakland/Berkeley Hills near Temescal Recreation Area.  I saw a very pretty dog and then was shocked to see a bunch of goats - and then even more goats!  I had a chat with Martin, Bolivian goat herder hired by the city to clean up the grass on steep hillsides with his crew of 300 goats and goat herding dog Willie.  The goats were all very small goats - and some had big curly horns - but they were all very hungry goats!

He said that they will spend the night - he moves around an electrified mesh gate (he uses a car battery) to keep the goats from wandering out of the target area.

Martin also had a mouth full of the most amazing bling that I have seen up close!  He recommended that I visit his hometown of Oruro, Bolivia (see the wiki entry) and the Parque Nacional Sajama which has a biiiiiiiiiig mountain that is well worth visiting.  From Flickr:

Gracias Madre & Cha-Ya

In the space of one day - I took two people for their first visits to two different restaurants!  I met Captain Marty, a pilot of private aircraft, via Twitter.  He publishes reviews of vegan restaurants he encounters in his travels in his blog, Marty's NYC Veggie Review.

We met up for lunch at Gracias Madre and talked our way through a delicious meal.  He had been at Millennium the night before and had noted that the recent death of sous chef Jason Dunbar had, indeed, cast a shadow over the quality of his experience though he had not heard the news.

Our lunch at Gracias Madre was in a mostly empty (!) restaurant and our service was impeccable - all the servers were friendly and chatted with us.  We shared scrumptious small plates:

- empanada del dia:  on a small puddle of delicious mole, crispy and filled with sweet, caramelized plantain
- sweet potato quesadillas: perfect tortillas - just enough crispy/soft and filled with sweet mashed sweet potatoes
- gorditas: potato & masa Mexican version of a latke, served crispy on the outside and topped with shredded lettuce, green salsa, avocado and cashew creme
- guacamole & corn tortillas

We were pretty well stuffed on good food and very large horchatas (I think we each had 2!), then headed across the street to Duc Lo vietnamese market where Marty stocked up on all sorts of things he can't find in NYC (imagine!) such as Thai basil, curry leaves, key limes and other delicacies.  Marty has all the pictures so hopefully he'll get his blog posting up now that mine is up!

Later, I took a friend visiting from Florida to Cha-Ya where we had all manner of yumminess - he loves Japanese food and was totally stoked to try all the dishes.  He picked out some rolls in addition to my recommended avocado urumaki, agadeshi tofu and we shared a nice bottle of sake.  He was stuffed and glowing with pleasure as we strolled out of Cha-Ya -- I guarantee both friends will be back to visit those restaurants again!

A Tale of Two Lemon Cakes

As a special treat for a wine tasting trip with Matt, Aaron, Selina, Z-man, Richie - I made up two cakes - done with lemon instead of orange as specified:

Olive Oil Rosemary Semolina cake


Fran Costigan's Orange Almond Olive Oil Cake

The first cake required that the batter proof - it wanted yeast and I found myself up late late at night before I was supposed to be getting in the limo with my friends!  It had a drier, bouncier crumb - downright springy.

The second cake just came out perfectly the first time - it was very moist and dense.  Subsequent attempts to make it find it to be  - terribly fickle - and it just collapeses into a globby heap (not sure if it is because I tried using key lime juice instead of orange or lemon and if there is a difference).

And, of course - I made chocolate peanut butter cups, for which Matthew nearly murdered Aaron (who also enjoyed them).

Spice Blends: Baharat, Herbes de Provence and more

Today was spice blend refresh day in my kitchen.  From Matt's first experiments with tagines, I have been intrigued by baharat - there are apparently two predominant types of this spice blend: Turkish vs Northern African/Tunisian. The difference is that Turkish baharat recipes are all over the internet and feature cumin and a lot of other spices while Tunisian is basically black pepper, rose petals & cinnamon.  I found a great article on Chow with recipes for both: http://www.chow.com/recipes/10562-baharat

Here's a link to the Turkish version I made: whole black peppercorn, whole coriander seed, cassia or cinnamon bark, whole cloves, cumin seed, cardamom seeds, whole nutmeg, ground paprika.

I also put together my favorite version of Herbes de Provence - I love lavender in this blend, though it is not typically something that appears on Southern French cooking - great history on the herb blend on Wiki.

Last but not least, I made up my favorite Za'atar blend - usually sumac, thyme, sesame seeds and salt, but you might include oregano and marjoram.  Wiki offers a great history of za'atar and there are tons of recipes out there - figure out what you like best and enjoy!

Garden 2011

Sadly no pictures - just news that I picked up plants from Kassenhoff (at the Farmer's Market) and Annie's in Richmond and put some plants:

• 12 Tomatoes (in addition to the volunteers)
• 4 peppers
• 2 squash
• 1 cucumber
• 1 giant ground cherry (to keep the smaller ground cherries company)

Seems early enough - let's see how it goes this year!

REVIEW: The Potato: How the Humble Spud Rescued the Western World by Larry Zuckerman (4-stars)

This is really a solid book - sort of a gateway book - it purports to be about the potato, but it's really about land tenancy laws, enclosure, the advent of crop rotation, population growth,famine, fuel costs, social history of home baking & the like.  The chapter "Women's Work" could be an article to stand on its own. He even gets into discussion of the use of utensils, dishes & pots - and given the late adaptation of forks in the US, and the ongoing use of knives for eating in England - it's no wonder that my granddad, who was born in 1910 to English emigrants to who moved SW Pennsylvania to mine coal, perpetually vexed my grandmother with his ingrained habit of eating off his butter knife.  He would always laugh and repeat the rhyme of "I eat my peas with honey..." before switching to a fork to please her.

 

REVIEW: The Potato: How the Humble Spud Rescued the Western World by Larry Zuckerman 

RATING: 4-stars

© Jennifer R Clark. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License. You may share and adapt this content with proper attribution.

Product Review: Nacheez - It Even Fools the Cats!

At Berkeley Vegan Earth Day, I had the opportunity to sample and bring home two jars of Nacheez - a vegan "queso" style cheese to pour over nachos.  I had all sorts of ideas about steamed broccoli and mac-n-cheese but to be honest - both jars of Nacheez Spicy ended up on Nachos.  My friend Scott (an omnivore) & I had nachos with 1 bag of organic tortilla chips, 4 chopped up spring onions and some spicy organic salsa - that made a pretty good dinner.  The Nacheez is mostly nutritional yeast based, and pretty low calorie - 1 jar is 7 servings, at 20 calories per serving that's 140 calories per jar.

To be honest - I didn't even sample the mild version.  The spicy version isn't too spicy but it has a nice flavor with bits of peppers in it, smoky, cheesy and rich.  My cats went loco when I heated up the nachos and while my friend & I were eating them.  George, especially, was all over my lap, begging for cheesy goodness. 

Right now, it's available at Never Felt Better Vegan Boutique and at Food Fight! (they do online orders).

This is totally NOT the sort of thing that I would have bought based on anyone's review or seeing it on a shelf.  I never bought the non-vegan versions but this stuff is way better in flavor than the horribly oily orange non-vegan queso stuff that gets slopped on tortilla chips. 

I'm all over Nacheez - looking forward to getting my hands on some more - but it does seem kind of silly for me to order it from a Portland store when it is made 100 miles away in Sacramento... so I guess I'll have to wait for it to show up here.

Plant Sale in Oakland on May 7!

Thanks to Girl on Bike for excellent news about an upcoming North Oakland plant sale

Spring Plant Swap in the North Oakland Golden Gate Community. 

Have plants you need to prune? Extras that don't seem to fit in with your home or garden? Started too many seeds this year? Why not bring them all down to the North Oakland Plant Swap and trade them with your neighbors for some new-to-you plants and gardening supplies.

At the plant swap you can bring plants, cuttings, seedlings, starts, foraged plants, and seeds of edible & non edible plants.
This is also a great place to bring any extra gardening supplies you have: pots, natural fertilizers, vermicompost/worms, garden tools, stepping stones, etc. 
Pass them all on to a new home and come pick up some new-to-you plants for your garden and home.

Need to donate your plants earlier than the swap date? No problem. We will be accepting donations at the swap location May 4th, 5th, & 6th. 

The only entrance fee is something brought to add to the swap.
*Please remember to label each of your plants with these Plant Information Sheets

Spring Swap:

Saturday May 7th

12-3pm

5927 San Pablo Ave.

Oakland, CA 94608

(on the Berkeley/Emeryville border)

Marshmallows

Vegan marshmallows are the height of decadent vegan junk food, right?  I've always been a big Sweet & Sara marshmallow fan since they are easily picked up at Whole Foods.  Vegan Essentials had a discount, so I picked up some Dandies with my last order.  I also took advantage of a Groupon for Sweet & Sara and bought a bunch of stuff I haven't tried yet from them.

There are some distinct differences between the two marshallows -- the Dandies are big, round & puffy like their gelatin-derived cousins.  Perfect for putting onto a stick and melting.  They are lighter and fluffier.  The Sweet & Sara marshmallows are denser, chewier & have a richer vanilla flavor - their strawberry marshmallow is pretty fantastic, too!

THE S'MORES TEST:   The shape of Sweet & Sara's marshmallows makes it really easy to use scissors to cut it in half across the middle for two flat squares to lay out on a graham cracker, with chocolate on the other side.  I just slide that into the toaster oven on "broil" and by the time the marshmallows are puffing up, the chocolate is melted just enough and I snap the cracker in the middle and press the two sides together.  The lower profile of the Sweet & Sara marshmallow works better in the toaster oven.

The Dandies marshmallow got kind of crispy (still delicious) and works better for the outdoors s'smores, toasted on a stick version.

THE FONDUE TEST:  Since they are so big, I usually find myself snipping up the Sweet & Sara marshmallows into little squares to dip into melted chocolate & chill as a super yummy treat!  They are just too big to eat whole with fondue.  As they are fluffier and not quite as rich, the Dandies work really well in fondue.

RECOMMENDATION:  Buy them both!  I like Sweet & Sara for toaster s'mores and Dandies for fondue, but both have excellent & distinct flavors.

Other Sweet & Sarah treats I tried included the Cinnamon & Hazelnut biscotti - they were delicious - they had a rich crumbly texture like pecan sandies, weren't too busted up in shipping and went really well with my coffee.  I'm half-Italian by heritage, so that makes me a dunker - these cookies stand up pretty well to the dunking test (just don't dunk the same area more than twice or you will have mushy coffee).  I also tried a sample of the Rocky Road - that was quite delicious but I prefer making that kind of treat at home since it's so easy to toast some pecans/almonds, chop up marshmallows and melt chocolate.

Singer Sewing Machine Table

Singer Sewing Machine Table, a photo by jennconspiracy on Flickr.

I am so happy to share a picture of my new table! My grandmother had an old Singer treadle operated sewing machine - which worked (I used it often as a child). Unfortunately, I didn't acquire it in the break-down of her household (or my mom's) but have always harbored an interest in having an old treadle machine base for a table.

A few weeks ago, I found this gorgeous slab of cocoa-colored granite streaked with caramel and flecks of chocolate/espresso - already mounted on plywood with a slab of particle board on the back. It was so heavy that it was all I could do to wrangle the thing into the back of my friend's Toyota Tacoma pickup truck and it stayed there for nearly a month while I fantasized about making it into a table.

Two days ago, someone offered a Singer treadle sewing machine base on Freecycle and I happened to have use of my friend's truck and went out and got it. Since I had left the table top in the truck for so long - the particle board was ruined and it took me 2 hours to pry and chip it off, but after much work, a little sanding and four #16 1.25" screws, I made my new table! Click through for more pictures of the nice slab of stone. This goes so well with my antiques!