Baked Pumpkin Seeds

What a weekend. I spent a good part of it with my friends at the SYRCL Wild & Scenic Film Festival. Think Sundance, only smaller, quainter and no pretense. There were quite a few films focusing on food, farmers and sustainability. I was inspired. I felt hope! One film challenged the audience to know the farmer of one ingredient of one meal a day you eat. I am taking that challenge seriously. What do you think of that challenge? I imagined that it would be pretty exciting to really feel like you are supporting a farmer in your community and wonder if that could change how you feel about the meal you are eating.

Wendy Van Wagner, a local friend, colleague and entrepreneur served kale pesto and beet dip from this blog on crostinis she catered for the gala event for the film festival. I was honored! Mostly because she is a talented chef and teacher herself and owns her own local cooking school In The Kitchen and knows her stuff. Thank you again Wendy!

My recipe this week is from my sweet friend Nikiya. She is a fabulous cook herself. She introduced me to my local grain CSA I belong to. I went to her house one day and her partner Kevin gave me a handful of pumpkin seeds that she had soaked in water overnight and then baked in the oven with a bit of salt. I had to stop myself from eating the whole jar it was so tasty. Salty, crunchy, nutty and satisfying. I have been making them regularly since then and packing them in my bag before I leave the house for a snacks on the go. Soaking seeds make them more digestable and break down the enzymes that make nuts harder to digest. When you bake pumpkin seeds, the seeds puff up and then get crunchy. It reminds me of popcorn in a way. I am not kidding when I tell you that when I made these for a dinner party a week or two back the bowl was gone in less than five minutes and the adults had to stop the kids from taking handfuls and running down the hall to keep them for themselves. A sign of a successful dish! A wonderful snack, but great to put on top of soups, enchiladas, crostinis, oatmeal, chili, granola...a long list of compatible foods. And, this is super easy!

Puffy Pumpkin Seeds
makes two cups

2 cups raw green pumpkin seeds
1 tbls braggs liquid aminos

Soak pumpkin seeds overnight in a bowl of water. The next day, drain the seeds and combine with braggs in a bowl. Spread on a cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for around 15 minutes. Every five minutes use a spoon and gently stir the seeds. You will hear them start to pop as they start to dry and puff up. When they start to brown and are crunchy and not soggy at all, they are done. I let mine sit on the cookie sheet until they are cooled and then put into a glass jar for storage.
I use braggs liquid aminos because it is less salty then tamari which I think it overpowering to these little seeds. You could use sea salt too. Since you are not drying the seeds before you bake them, the salt sticks to the seeds. I know this recipe is easy, but you will never go back to traditionally roasted nuts after you try this alternative method.

Mandarin Marmalade

With good friend Marcellas over holiday break!

Mandarins are here. In my latest grain CSA I received a bag of mandarins and meyer lemons. I really love that winter in California has its own fruit ambassadors. Yesterday, I stopped myself after I ate six or seven mandarins. My daughter ate 4 after school. Oh how I love their tangy sweetness!
I ate those six mandarins before I sat down to meditate. They were on my mind. Meditating and falling asleep give me my best recipes. Today I was inspired to make mandarin marmalade. It was perfect because a dear friend of mine turned 40 just a few days before and I knew he would love homemade marmalade as a gift. I decided to add ginger for the warming properties it has as well as being a digestive tonic which makes it tailored for winter. Marmalade seemed the perfect way to pay tribute to a happy winter fruit. I did not add pectin to my recipe because I used mandarin peels which naturally have a lot of pectin, so just added the mandarins, peels, sugar, ginger and a bit of vanilla seeds. I did not get fussy at all with this recipe. I love rustic angles on food; the more untouched the better.

And with that I will share a few trends happening in my house right now gliding us into the new year...and say that I was in southern california after the holidays and was able to catch up with family and my dear friend, Marcellas!

1. big bowls of heirloom beans drizzled with olive oil and tamari. Good quality olive oil is spectacular drizzled over cooked beans.

2. turning the thermostat down to 60 to save on heating bills

3. taking lots of soaks in my ofuro to warm up from a cooler than normal house (dang! I am going to miss that ofuro when I move!)

4. making popcorn more often because it always seems like such a special treat (don't forget the yeast)

5. Frazey Ford...she is just singing the soul of where I am right now. Great interview and music clips from NPR...

6.The Swell Season... the duo that made the movie Once back in 2006. My favorite song of the album is High Horses

7. cooking dinner listening to #5 and #6.....

8. Sharing special wine with friends before I move that I have been collecting over the last seven years

9. Thinking, dreaming, wondering, manifesting my reality that showcases food, farmers, health and soul in marin county... preferably with the food network or style network ♥

10. practicing "surrender is not about giving up, it is about letting go"..thank you Christi



Mandarin Marmalade
makes a bit over a cup

2 cups mandarins inner piths removed
1 cup sugar
1/4 tsp. crushed vanilla beans
1 heaping tbls fresh chopped ginger
1/2 cup mandarin skins chopped

I peeled the mandarins with a paring knife. Then I chopped finely 1/2 cup of the skins. Remove the mandarin piths inside. It is a fantastic source of vitamin C, but in this case it will contribute to more bitterness than you might care for. Roughly chop mandarins into 1 inch pieces. Use a sharp knife so you don't lose too much juice on your cutting board.
Add mandarins, vanilla, sugar, skins and ginger to sauce pan. Bring to boil, then lower to simmer for 90 minutes.

Cardamom Butternut Squash Soup

January could be called the month of our resolutions. In the middle of nature sleeping, we are busy making plans for ourselves. Plans to become better mostly. On one hand it is our job as citizens of this great green earth to make things better. On the other hand, I think the standards and expectations we sometimes set up for ourselves can be pretty intimidating. So instead of resolving to change me this year, I am resolving to be more in my loving about me. My fears, my fails, my mean words, my tears, my wilted cauliflower and too much olive oil on the broccoli, my dingy whites and not folding the laundry quick enough, my sometimes I don't floss even though I know I should, my playing a song five times in a row on the ipod in the car, my occasional hopelessness, my inability to forgive just yet; all of it is going to get more loving than it did last year. The good and the bad are all getting more loving this year.

Because I did wilt the cauliflower tonight. I put it on the same cookie sheet as the potatoes and over-roasted it. And my christmas tree is still up, and my laundry is piled high, and I did not make my bed today. And I cried for about 2 hours. And my suitcase is still sitting by the front door where I left it a day ago. But at this moment,  I sit here and am beyond my housekeeping and grief knowing that I stayed in my loving by not judging myself for not getting it done.
I am especially in my loving about how I just turned 39 and not 40 in one of the most craptastic years in memory. Next year will be different though. Stay tuned. It should be good.

Well the day was not a complete wash.  I did make soup again today.  I roasted a butternut squash yesterday and made soup two days in a row with it.  It has been a bit cold here, so I  added cardamom along with cinnamon and a pinch of red pepper flakes to make a nice warm, cozy soup.  A small squeeze of lemon and maybe a bit more olive oil than I should have were added also. But if that is all I am having for dinner like last night, I go heavier on the monounsaturated fats for good luck. I put it all in the blender with some stock and was good to go.

A note about how I roast squash (all squash). I put it in the oven whole to roast it. I don't slice it, or split it or remove seeds. I am convinced I will cut my fingers off somehow and just put the whole thing (no matter the size) on a cookie sheet and bake it. After it is knife tender, I take it out of the oven, let it cool for a bit and then slice it in half, scoop out the seed and then scoop out the flesh for whatever I am making. It always works out well for me.


Cardamom Butternut Squash Soup
makes 4 servings

3 cups roasted butternut squash
2 cups stock (I used organic chicken stock)
2 tbls extra virgin olive oil
pinch salt
1/2 tsp. powdered cardamom
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp heaping red pepper flakes
1 tsp. lemon juice

Blend all ingredients in blender for almost a minute,  then cook on simmer for 20 minutes.

Asparagus with Dijon Butter

Do you have holiday traditions? I find comfort in my holiday rituals. These days my life is shifting so quickly I am needing extra time to center myself, sit in stillness and remain open to the gifts of life. I am finding that the gifts of life may not have the wrapping paper I imagined or am used to, but I am trusting what is inside life's gifts will be exactly what I need.

I am starting a new tradition this year of eating Dungeness crab for our holiday dinner. I know, so Californian of me, right? It is fresh and easy to get where I live though, and a festive addition to a holiday dinner. A few nights ago at my daughter's request, we each said what we are thankful for at dinner. I said I was thankful to live in California. And, as I am planning a move to the bay area this summer, I am especially thankful that I can move to such an amazing place. No more off-grid solar living. No more driving 45 minutes to town. No more driving 3 miles down a dirt road to get home. It is very idyllic living off-grid until you are alone trying to trouble shoot an inverter problem or a broken generator! I will be a 5 minute drive to almost anything I want. A very long way from the outhouse I had at Shobo-an when I first moved here. The things I will miss (and it is a long, long list) are part of the chapter in my life I am closing. I am very lucky that the friendships I have made these past ten years I will take along with me after I move. I hope to lure all my friends to Marin for any amount of time they are willing to visit.

This year I tried a new dish vegetable dish for the holiday. Asparagus is starting to come into season here on the west coast, and I thought to include it in our crab dinner. I told my dear friends last night at Christmas dinner it was a potential blog recipe and to be honest. Thumbs up or thumbs down. I got all thumbs up. I made it twice this week. The first time I shaved the asparagus with a vegetable peeler into thin strands I sauteed. The second time I just chopped the asparagus into 3 inch pieces. I liked it chopped into three inch pieces (less work!). The picture above I took when I shaved the asparagus. I toasted sesame seeds from my grain CSA to top the dish with. Don't forget the sesame seeds. They really add a wonderful nuttiness that contrasts the dijon.
 
Happy Holidays!


Aspargus with Dijon Butter
serves 4

1 bunch asparagus (bottoms trimmed off) cut into 3 inch pieces
1 tbls butter
1 tbls dijon mustard
pinch salt
2 tbls toasted sesame seeds

Sautee asparagus in butter for 8 minutes. Add dijon and salt. Mix well and cook covered over low heat until tender  (about 2 minutes more) Top with toasted sesame seeds.

Going Off-Grid

Path at Bald Mountain....

When I talk to people about how cooking can add to their lives, I think about a list of tools that make things easier, greener and more exciting for this journey. I get some blank stares when I suggest to folks that cooking most meals at home while still maintaining a busy life is possible. I think back to my grandmother, Mormor. She cooked everything from scratch while being a farmer's wife, mother and running a busy rural house on a dairy farm in Connecticut. How did she do it? How did all of our grandmothers do it? Sometimes I think technology is taking up too much of our space, but I think too that the energy of life is different now and there is room for everything in our busy lives including room to think about and create food that is "off the grid" so to speak. The grid is the dream we plug into or the story we are told by society that we should be following to keep up with the pace of the busy world. I am part of the food revolution that is creating a new dream for how we feed ourselves.
When I first moved to California from Chicago ten years ago, I did not shop at farmers markets and did not subscribe to CSA's. I did not know any farmers. I had never been to a working farm that I ate food from. I did not think about how far food traveled to get to my plate.  I was clinical in my approach to nutrition and helping my clients. I relied on lab work, supplement companies and reading food labels. I walked through grocery stores in a matter of fact manner with my clients showing them "how to shop". It is not that I think I was missing the point back then, it is just that my view has grown to encompass all the parts of a person when I think of how they might change their lives in a way they are wanting for themselves. Older, wiser and more heart centered now, I am off-grid in my view of nourishment and I see people's connection to nourishment as just one part of our experience of all things. I say off-grid, but actually what I think is happening is when you pull away from the dream and you plug into what is happening now, in this moment in your body and heart, things change to become more tailored to you and how your journey is unfolding.

So, here is a list of my kitchen essentials. The tools in my toolbox.

1. Pressure Cooker
2. Sharp knives
3. Cast Iron Skillet
4. Micro-Plane Zester
5. Cuisinart (food processor)
6. Blender
7. Olive Oil
8. Sea Salt
9. Hand Grater
10. Love

A pressure cooker is number one. I try to think about how I lived without one, and it boggles my mind. A pressure cooker has made it possible for me to keep the pace of cooking up so that I can remove canned food from my house. It has allowed me to cook things quicker. The thought of having vegetable soup or a pot of beans for dinner without spending 3 hours cooking has radically shifted my cooking perspective. I will go far as to say that I think pressure cookers are the green kitchen tool of the food revolution we are experiencing. A pressure cooker is essential to have if you are eating on a budget. If you are conscious of having to spend "too much time" in the kitchen. If you are trying simplify your life. If you are shifting to eating less meat. If you are increasing your fiber intake. I could go on....
There is a wonderful website: Miss Vickie that is dedicated to pressure cooking. Recipes, cooking times, pressure cooker reviews. I highly recommend browsing the site. Happy Cooking!

Beet Dip

I have been thinking about how nourishment moves through us.  And by that I mean how do you shift the idea of nourishment of yourself, family and the people around you to something deeper. It has to be more than just eating the good food. It has to be more than curing childhood obesity. It has to be more than harvesting the corn. Could it be about our hearts? The center of all these things could be an acceptance of ourselves in the place we are in this moment and the loving that happens in this spot.  Believing my heart can love it all.  The starvation, the disease, the chemicals, the global warming, the jealousy, the anger, the heartbreak, the forgiveness, the destruction, the wonder, the beauty, the solutions. That in my loving there is transformation. The act of my love for all things now is the nourishment. I thought about that yesterday while making my beet spread ....which today I am eating on toast. Watching the fog in the meadow creep up the hill.

You all know I am very lucky to live in California where things are moving at lightening speed in the realm of food, and food consciousness. . There is a great radio program (that you can podcast) on weekly that covers things both in California and beyond called An Organic Conversation. It is hosted by Helge Hellberg and Mark Mulcahy. You can join their facebook as well.  A show dedicated to all the things I am sure you will love if you like this blog. Olive oil, canning, flowers, local farmers, food in schools, the environment. You get the point. The recipe I am posting today was inspired from their blog.  I  made a version of this dip last week and have changed a bit. An unexpected, colorful, vegan dip that is beautiful to look at and eat. It has a wonderful herbal quality that balances the earthy beets. The cashews mellow the whole thing out. I might add that it looks like Christmas in a bowl....I roasted a big plate of beets and used three medium/small beets for this recipe. Beets are in season right now, so it is a perfect time to find them locally. I used my food processor to blend the dip, and it took less than 5 minutes to make after the beets were roasted. Incredibly easy, and very festive. If you bring this to your next holiday party it will most likely be a topic of conversation. It might break some food barriers too. Beets are like that. They cut through the normal with their intensity. But whatever you do, don't let a six year old eat the beet dip on your white couch near your furry white pillows. Try not to let that happen...

Beet Dip
makes about 2 cups

1 1/2 cups roasted beets
1/3 heaping cup raw cashews
2 tbls. extra virgin olive oil
2 tsp. balsamic vinegar
pinch salt
1 heaping tsp. fresh chopped rosemary
zest of 1 orange
1 tsp. ground cumin

Wash the beets and put in an oven safe dish. Drizzle with a bit of olive oil and cover. Bake in oven for one hour at 375 degrees. Test for doneness by piercing beets with a sharp knife. If the knife goes through the beet easily, they are done. Let beets cool and remove beet skins with you fingers. It should slip off. Rought cut into cubes and measure out around 1 1/2 cups. Add to food processor with the other ingredients. Blend until smooth (mine took a couple of minutes)Yum!

Hierloom Lima Beans with Beet Chips and Leeks

I have been a bit absent from my blog lately. I have been folded up in the deep layers of my heart. I have been surrendering to waves of change. I have been silently sitting, trusting my life. I am cleaning out the closets of dreams, relationships and home. I am digging in the dirt with the divine to create a new picture for myself. I am leaving a place that I thought was love and moving inside myself. Being broke open is an amazing process to experience. I see a space to take big leaps in my life that I would have not had otherwise. Big stuff. A most humble place to be. Everything is being rearranged in my life. The only constant is change itself and the beating of my heart.

So, in the middle of pondering moves to the bay area and appreciating friends and family surrounding me constantly, I have been thinking about cooking.  Not actually cooking very much, but thinking about it. I have walked passed the newly filled mason jar of heirloom lima beans from my grain csa for a full seven days and felt no pull to transform them. Today though,  I am conquering the lima bean. These beautiful heirloom lima beans are deep purple, yellow and burgundy. I soaked them overnight and then cooked them in organic chicken stock for extra flavor. I sauteed leeks in olive oil until they had nice crispy brown edges and started to soften and give way to the sugars inside. The beet chips I tossed in olive oil and salt and cooked for a quick time in the oven. I think this has similar components as my spring stew deconstructed, but is more simple to put together.  I did not use my pressure cooker to cook the beans due to their fragile nature. I wanted to make sure the beans stayed intact and did not fall apart under the high pressure. It is a rainy, cold winter day here in northern california. A perfect day for beans and a fire. A perfect day to be alone with my own loving heart.

Heirloom Lima Beans with Beet Chips and Leeks
makes 2 large dinner servings or 4 small side servings

Heirloom Lima Beans
1 cup heirloom lima beans (any varietal is fine)

3 cups organic chicken stock
water for soaking
Soak beans 6-8 hours. Cook in chicken stock covered until tender on simmer until tender (about 50 minutes)

Leeks
2 large leeks cut lengthwise, trimmed and washed
1 tbls olive oil
pinch salt
Wash  and trim leeks. Cut into 1/2 inch pieces. Sautee with olive oil  and salt until brown and tender, about 15 minutes. Set aside.

Beet Chips
(this recipes makes more than the recipe, so use as a snack for lunch tomorrow!)
2 large beets
1 tbls olive oil
pinch salt

Wash beets and trim off tops and bottom. Slice the beets as thinly as you can. I tried for 1/8 of an inch. You could use a mandoline and make it easy on yourself.
Toss in olive oil and salt in a large bowl. Arrange on a baking sheet and bake at 375 for about 15-20 minutes or until they start getting brown. Cooking times will vary depending on how thin you cut your beets.

To assemble, put a large spoonful of the lima beans in a shallow bowl. (Plate each serving separately)
Add a large spoon of leeks and teaspoon of olive oil. Put a few beet chips on top. Lovely!