Good News: Citizens Take Food Sovereignty into Their Own Hands

Haha! I've had that gloomy post at the top of this page long enough. I strongly believe in focusing on what you want instead of on what you don't want.

Cheers to folks standing up for their freedom to choose the foods they want to nourish their bodies, and to farmers standing up to sell wholesome food to folks who want to buy it!

And this is one city of a few US cities who have taken this step. Exciting!

Here's the link about Santa Cruz's Food Freedom Resolution.

Raw Milk: Under Militant Attack by US Government

Uggh. I should've written about this weeks ago, but. If you want to know what really gets my blood boiling ~ it's this and I just didn't want to face it. Many armed SWAT-style raids on small, honest, family-owned farms and businesses selling clean, nutritious raw milk to people who go out of their way to get it and pay top dollar for it. On a planet where many people every day die from lack of access to food, in a country where millions are ill and dying for lack of proper nutrition, our government is pouring out gallons and gallons of uncontaminated, healing, nurturing, life-supporting raw milk. Of all things sick and twisted about The System today, this ~ that is happening much more than you'd think ~ is huge and criminal.

Get in touch with your food supply. Know the people who raise your food, support them, and, even better, raise some of your own food. We can't keep leaving our nourishment up to big businesses (including the government); it's killing us.

This quote was left as a comment after a YouTube video linked below and it rings true with me, too.

"If people let the government decide what foods they eat and what medicines they take, their bodies will soon be in as a sorry state as the souls who live under tyranny."
— Thomas Jefferson

Here's a press release about the most recent raid on a food buying club in LA, called Rawesome.

And here is a collection of video footage from the raid, and then from the protest following it. I like one of the signs a protester held, saying something like, "Raid Crack Houses, not Food Buying Clubs."

Then finally, and most importantly, here's a link to the movie, called Farmageddon, which tells the story of so many small farms and farm families around the country who are going through the exact same thing. If you can watch the trailer and not get your feathers ruffled, you probably came to this blog by accident. ;-) Find a way to see it. I'll let you borrow my copy of the DVD when it's available for purchase.

If you don't want to eat real food, keep eating the packaged garbage sold to you by advertisements on TV. But please let me and my family have the right to choose to eat real, wholesome food from the earth, the way Nature intended it.

Food Sovereignty!

To help, Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund is a great organization.

Deciphering Meat Labels

(whew! Been gone awhile!)
Here(down the page a ways) is a helpful article explaining all the various labels on meat these days, from the folks at CUESA.
Bottom line, as always, if you want to trust that the food you feed your family is all it claims to be - especially animal products! - get to know the people who grew/raised it.

Scrambled Eggs, or: Know Your Farmers

Large-scale "Organic" companies are taking advantage of our good intentions and misinformation. The Cornucopia Institute has released Scrambled Eggs, a thorough report on their investigation of "Organic" egg company practices. Though it's worth reading, Food Renegade gives a summary. If Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma didn't hit this lesson home to me when I read it years ago, this report is a painful reminder: it is absolutely essential to know the people who raise the food you eat. The large-scale industrial food system doesn't work. The environment, animals, workers, neighbors of industrial operations, and finally, the person at the end of the fork, all suffer. And while large-scale "Organic" is better than conventional agriculture, it still doesn't get you what you think you're paying for. Buying food from a CSA or at a Farmers' Market costs more. But it's an up-front cost ~ the actual value of food worth growing, raising, and eating.

If you don't raise hens yourself (which I recommend! what fun!), buy eggs from a farmer you know and trust. It's an investment in health. Since moving to Sacramento, we're getting eggs from St. John's Family Farm. If you are unfamiliar with farmers in your area, Local Harvest is a great site to find them.

As fresh as they get! Eggs from our backyard girls ~

with access to dirt, bugs,

and as much sunlight as the Bay Area has to offer,

fed whole organic grains (no soy), kitchen scraps,

clover and kale (in the dry season).

Farmers' Market Love

Here's another shout-out to the farmers' markets. I still love them and they are still a highlight of my week. Sometimes I attend all three Berkeley farmers' markets in one week. It's just that good. Here are some outrageously red radishes I saw at Blue Heron Farm's booth, where I get my weekly fix of baby lettuces.

Outrageous, no?

Addicted

I have heard that a person can be called "addicted" when they want not just any drug, but a particular one, and not taken just any way, but a very certain way. Well very urgently I have become addicted .

I need cherries. Not just any cherry ~ I need Bing cherries; don't give me Rainier or even Brooks. Bing cherries from Kashiwase Farm at the farmers' markets. I need them three times a week. And if there is a pound bag in the shopping basket as I'm leaving the Kashiwase stand, half the cherries could be gone by the time I make it home. I can't stop myself. I eat one right after another.

What am I doing typing? There are still a few left in the bowl from our trip to the market last night! I'll seek treatment if I fight Anjali for the last one...! ;-)

Mediterranean Lamburgers

Lamb might just be my favorite meat. I should say - good, well-
prepared lamb; more than once, I've ordered it out and been
disappointed with the tough gaminess of what was called lamb. We love
ground lamb from Marin Sun Farms and Highland Hills about as well as
any nice cut. It is just so flavorful and juicy!
Here is a guideline for lamburgers I've seasoned and Sealion has
fashioned and grilled several times with mouth-watering results. It
could easily be a kebab recipe, but Sealion pats them into sphere-ish
patties which don't need skewers, or aluminum foil to prevent them
from being sacrificed to the grill god. ;-)
These would go nicely with a Greek salad or a light couscous pilaf-
type dish. Tonight we grilled beets, onions, and garlic with olive
oil, seasalt and pepper. and sesame seeds. Um. Yum.

Lamburgers - makes 3 or 4 patties
Marinate 1 lb pasture-raised lamb* with
5 med garlic cloves - pressed
1tsp red pepper flakes
Juice of 1/2 a lemon

1tsp cumin and
1tsp coriander - both freshly toasted (toasting in a dry skillet
brings out the flavor!)
2+tbsp mint - minced
2+tbsp red onion - minced
Sea salt
Black pepper
Whole grain sourdough bread crumbs
Olive oil

Feta on top
Yogurt for dipping

Pat into thick, rounded patties. Grill to your liking, or fry in a
cast-iron skillet. Melt feta on top in the last minute or so.
Serve with yogurt for dipping.

*I've heard that all lamb is pastured, but it's always best to buy
from someone you trust.

Dandelion Greens with Onion

Oh! Dandelion greens season! I look forward to it every year. Dandelion greens are one of Spring's loving ways of helping us cleanse and tonify our organs after Winter's heavier and heartier fare. They're bitter! And that is indicative of their medicinal quality. I have come to relish the bitterness because my body just craves these greens! She knows what she needs. And lately I have been buying them at the Farmers' Market every time I go, and cooking them as soon as I get home.
This is how I've been preparing them - with bacon grease and sauteed onion. Of course you can use another fat, but bacon grease really counters the bitterness nicely. Nutritionally, the fat helps make the green goodness available to your body; just as importantly, it tastes good!

2 tbsp bacon grease*
One onion - chopped
1 tsp seasalt, to taste
1 bunch dandelion greens, chopped no wider than my pinky

In a cast iron skillet, sauté the onion in the bacon grease until very soft. Chop the greens before soaking - cut the whole bunch off above the twist tie. Then start at the tips and chop down, making sure the pieces are very small. To clean, soak in a bowl of water. Then, pull them out of the soaking water by the handful directly into the skillet so that some water comes with the greens to help with cooking. Fold the greens in with the onions and cover at medium-high heat. Stir occasionally. Cook until the greens are soft, and serve piping hot. I've been enjoying them by the bowlful with a little bit of brown rice. Here's to Spring - Salud!

* about bacon grease ~ Only use nitrate- and nitrite-free bacon that has been humanely raised. It's worth the occasional splurge! Lately we have been loving Prather Ranch bacon. Makes my mouth water just to type it! Here's how to save the delicious grease: after frying the bacon while the skillet is still very hot, rubber band a clean kitchen cloth (like an already-stained kitchen towel or napkin) over the mouth of a clean jar. Then slowly and carefully pour the bacon grease through the napkin. This will strain out all the bits so that the grease can be used again. Refrigerate until you're ready to enjoy it in another meal. Yum!

Summertime Tapenade

Technically, this is not a true tapenade. But the bold presence of the black olives made me call it that. I think it has a nice ring..

chopped perfectly ripe tomatoes (don't even think about making this in the winter! use olive-oil-soaked sun-dried tomatoes if you do. and leave out the cucumber.)

~ I have discovered dry-farmed tomatoes this season. oh. my god. ~

diced Armenian cucumber (discovered that this season, too.. )

minced garlic

chopped oil-cured black olives, with the brine set aside

freshly toasted cumin

freshly toasted coriander

sea salt to taste

chili flakes to taste

Combine these ingredients to meet your needs. I used enough small early girl tomatoes to fill my two hands, and diced enough cucumber to fill it out nicely, but not densely (then I ate the rest of the cucumber slice-by-slice as I prepared dinner!). I minced 4 regular-sized garlic cloves, and chopped.. 8 olives, because that's what was in the fridge. I toasted a little more than a teaspoon of cumin seeds, and a little less than a teaspoon of coriander. Toasting spices brings out their flavor; I can't recommend this highly enough. It's really worth the few extra minutes of effort and attention. You will smell when they're done. Trust your nose. Add the reserved olive brine to your taste. Then the sea salt and chili flakes.

We ate this atop grilled lamb chops.

Then the next day, after it had had a chance to meld overnight, I ate the remainder on my scrambled eggs.

Yum!