Saturday January 8 was the first indoor Dane County Farmers’ Market of 2011, and more excitingly, the first Taste of the Market Breakfast of the New Year. As per usual, the serving line threatened to spill out into the 20 degree morning air.
I learned a ton this weekend at the Midwest Renewable Energy Fair on everything from straw bale building to how to make a solar food dryer that works in Wisconsin, but what I want to share today are five tips on how to eat in a way that is healthy […]
Saturday was workout for the windshield wipers as I drove through fog and rain to Weston’s Antique Apple Orchards in the Prospect Hill Settlement Historic District of New Berlin, Wisconsin. I went to learn how to graft antique apple trees onto modern, semi-dwarf root stock. Weston’s Orchards is one of […]
I garden like I cook – using a mix of intuition, inspiration, opportunity and random readings. This system works better for cooking, where any totally “out there” idea produces just a single adventure for the taste buds rather than a failed crop for the year. This spring I finally enrolled […]
PLAN IT NOW PLANT IN IT NEXT SPRING During World War Two, 20 million Americans planted victory gardens to free up produce and the means to transport it for the war effort. In their own back yards, they produced up to 40 percent of the vegetables America ate. We can […]
Sunday when I was sitting outside enjoying a potluck picnic at Tom Brantmeier’s farm near Monroe WI, the blustery wind was keeping the flies at bay on a balmy, cloud-scudded, 72 degree afternoon. The wind picked up, and that night a pounding rainstorm quite literally poured cold water on the […]
Food is more than nutrients – much more, as Michael Pollan told me and 7,000 other eager listeners at the UW-Madison Kohl Center, (See my post In Defense of Food and Books) where huge crowds gather to cheer and jeer at basketball and hockey games. Last night they were all […]
What tastes better than fresh hot – almost-too-hot-to-hold – corn on the cob, still sweet from picking? Whether each succulent kernel is coated in melted butter, or my new favorite, melted blue cheese (I get an award winning block of Blue Paradise from its friendly creators Tony and Julie Hook […]
If you love to cook, you will love Richard Wrangham’s cooking hypothesis. This British primatologist proposes that we humans stepped away from the other apes (who still spend most of their time grinding bitter berries and fibrous roots between their massive molars) when we tossed those tubers into a fire […]
I vividly remember the fireworks of flavor that erupted with my first taste of pizza. I was about 10, and our family was dining with friends. The pre-Martha Stewart mothers in our crowd competed to feed 10 to 20 people at a time with something tasty that didn’t break the […]
Digging in the Driftless 