New (and semi-depressing) blog Fed Up: School Lunch Project is written by a teacher who plans to eat her school’s hot lunch every day in 2010. I know we all know school lunch is crappy, but to see each lunch (like the one pictured above), one after the other, is downright grim.
And the polar opposite of that Salisbury steak? Pljeskavicas—or “Balkan burgers”—as seen in this week’s New York Times food section. I think a trip out to Astoria is in the near future for me.
…because I actually want to cook interesting things again and not just live off frozen food and take out.
A week or so ago, while I was out enjoying a shockingly 60-plus degree day, I picked up a loaf of Eli’s sourdough. The first half of the loaf was spectacular; the second half, sadly, went rock-hard overnight. What to do with half a loaf of stale bread? As I thought about what to do, something kept tickling the back of my brain. Some kind of soup… recipe posted by someone I like… has bread in it…? After several fruitless searches, I finally found it:
Titled, obviously enough, have stale bread? make bread soup! over at the perennially rad Everyone Likes Sandwiches, I quickly adapted the recipe to what I had on hand — most notably, I replaced the stock with water and a crusty old rind of Parmesan I had hanging around, which gave the broth a meatiness I think it would have lacked otherwise. It was fantastic.
(One caveat to this soup: don’t make more than you can eat in one go. This soup defies the First Law of Soup Alchemy [soup is always better the next day] and made for a really bland, squashy lunch the following day.)
After making something actually really good, I was so delighted, I promptly went online and ordered a slew of cookbooks from the library. Some of them have been disappointments (too complex and/or too many unusual ingredients I will use once and then let quietly expire at the back of a cupboard), but two of them have had me reading long after I should have gone to bed: Mediterranean Harvest and Olive Trees and Honey.
As I was reading Mediterranean Harvest last night, I leapt up from the couch, grabbed some yogurt, some coffee filters and a colander and made some strained yogurt.
I have not leapt up to do anything since Daylight Savings Time ended.
I think this is a sure sign of spring.
(Photo credit: Everyone Likes Sandwiches)
I have a pathological aversion to wasting food. I realized I had a problem the day I made some completely vile zucchini pancakes (I don’t like zucchini and my pancake skills are rubbish — what was I thinking that day?) and yet I still packed the leftovers and tucked them into the fridge. I like to think I started composting because I’m single-handedly saving the environment but really it’s because it allows me to sleep at night after I need to toss out old salad mix that went skanky.
Therefore, I am so indebted to Gerda for posting about this website:
Every year in the UK we throw away a staggering one third of all the food we buy. Love Food Hate Waste – a campaign from WRAP (Waste & Resources Action Programme) – highlights the fact that wasted food is a waste of money and a major contributor to climate change. And the most frustrating thing is that most of what we throw away could have been eaten – it’s not just peelings, teabags and bones. The Love Food Hate Waste website provides delicious recipes to make the most of the food in our fruit bowl, fridge and cupboards, handy hints for storing food, surprising facts on what can be frozen and much more… there is something for everyone, whether you are a keen cook and organiser or more spontaneous. Visit Love Food Hate Waste for more ways to love food and reduce our food waste.
The information is UK-centric, so some of the ingredients and measurements need some translation, but the recipes and tips are enough to keep me reading for a while.
My not-so-secret eco-shame: I am a magazine addict.
I give the excuse that, oh, as writers, my husband and I need them to see who’s writing about what, but mostly? I just really love magazines. Eff you, trees! I need to read about ‘Stars Without Makeup!’ and ‘Brady Bunch Bombshell!’ (I also read The Economist but their headlines are rubbish.)
Anyway, a new site called The Read Green Initiative is offering access to an environmentally-friendly way of enjoying favorite magazines by offering a free one-year subscription to a bunch of magazines, like Vegetarian Times and Saveur.
And unlike paper magazines, the digital versions are completely searchable (something I have wished for so often when flipping through old copies of Everyday Food for that one Brussels sprouts with bacon recipe I thought I saw one time). I also like that clicking on an article title in the index takes you directly to the article (instead of thumbing through the magazine, muttering ‘one-thirty-six, one-thirty-six, one-thirrrrrrrty-siiiiiiiix’).
The downside: none of the magazines offered are covering ‘Jamie Lynn’s Web of Lies!’ so I guess I’ll keep supporting tree-killers until then.
Indie Bound. Need coffee but don’t want to go to Starbucks? Want a book but would rather not go giant chain store? Check out Indie Bound to find an independent bookstore, coffee shop, bike repair, and more near you. Favorite indy retailer not listed? Add it and then list yourself as a fan.
Free TV online. Last month, we bit the bullet and got rid of cable. Logically, I knew it was a huge time- and money-suck. But… but… The Simpsons! The Office! The Daily Show! Enter Hulu.com. Obviously, it doesn’t have everything cable had, but it’s got quite a lot — a ton of new shows and plenty of I-just-want-to-watch-something random crap. (My personal favorite? The ultimate 1970s paramedic/hospital show, Emergency! Randolph Mantooth: still the dreamiest!) CNN and MSNBC‘s sites round out my overwhelming need for TV news, and PBS’s site fills in whatever gaps remain — like a searchable video database of Julia Child.
Radio Pop. I am a BBC Radio nerd. I also love anything that tracks what I do and gives me statistics about it. And now, both of these loves come together in Radio Pop. Did I really need to know I’ve listened to 7 hours and 53 minutes of CBeebies? Certainly not. Do I still love it? Oh, yes.
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