I started with this recipe and tweaked it to suit my tastes. Here’s my version:

Cocoa-Nut Coconut Snacks

• 1/2 cup each:
  • Almonds
  • Walnuts
  • Pecans
  • Hazelnuts
  • Pumpkin seeds
• 5 dates, pits removed (use 6 dates if yours are small)
• 1/2 cup shredded or flaked coconut
• 2 Tbsp virgin coconut oil (It’s best if the coconut oil is not totally solid; mine was liquidy with chunks & that worked well.)
• 2 Tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder (Use the good stuff, please. Ghirardelli is my go-to cocoa powder.)
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 cup shredded coconut to roll the finished snacks in

Grind the nuts and pumpkin seeds in a food processor until ground into a fine flour. Dump the nut flour into a mixing bowl. Grind the dates and coconut in the food processor until they make a uniform paste; it will look lumpy but if you touch it the texture will be sticky and pastey. Add the date-coconut paste to your mixing bowl and mix with the nut flour. Add cocoa powder & cinnamon and mix well. Be sure to break up all the lumps in your cocoa powder! Finally, add the coconut oil and mix very well, until it is completely uniform. Compress the mixture into balls and then roll them in the shredded coconut. I found that the best technique was to really squeeze the mixture hard and form the compressed lumps into balls with my fingertips because the mixture is kind of crumbly and doesn’t respond well to rolling. Use your powerful grip and pretend you’re making diamonds out of coal! Refrigerate your snacks to firm them up. They should also be stored in the fridge, in my opinion, to maintain freshness and because I think they taste better cold. Also, if you live in a warm climate they might lose some of their integrity if they get too warm because of the coconut oil turning into a liquid. Enjoy!

Yes, you read that correctly, I am doing an entire post on broccoli stalks. They are one of my new favorite foods and I bet you will love them too if you just give them a chance!

When you buy broccoli, do you just eat the crowns and then throw the thick stalks into the trash or compost? I used to do that because I thought they were too woody and tough to bother with. Over the past year or so I’ve become increasingly interested in using ALL of the parts of food we buy, both plant and animal. I was so disturbed by my own wasteful actions that I figured out ways to eat a lot of things we had previously tossed, including broccoli stalks. Oddly enough, I have come to prefer the stalks to the crowns. They have a mild flavor and a nice watery crunch. The trick is that you have to peel the tough outer layer off of the stalk (and yes, trash it or compost it…). The inside of the stalk is then ready to eat raw like a carrot, chop up into a salad, or sauté with radish tops and garlic as shown in the photo above. Those are just a few ideas. The stalks are incredibly versatile and would be delicious on a crudité tray, in soup, in stir-fry…the list goes on. I admit that the first time I decided we would eat the stalks I opted to cook them because I don’t like the flavor of raw broccoli and figured the stalks would taste similar. Not so! Removing the outer layer also removes that odd bitterness and the inside is, I dare say, almost sweet! Below is a recipe for my a delicious green side dish featuring two commonly thrown-away items, broccoli stalks & radish greens.

Garlicky Broccoli Stalks & Radish Greens

2-3 broccoli stalks
1 bunch well-washed & spun (or blotted dry) radish greens
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2-1 Tbsp olive oil
A pinch or two of sea salt

Peel the broccoli stalks using a paring knife (really, a peeler is pointless here), quarter lengthwise, and slice thinly. Heat olive oil over medium heat. When the oil is hot, add garlic and broccoli stalks. Sauté for a minute or two, until you smell that delicious garlic aroma and the stalks look a little less raw. Add the radish greens and stir to distribute the oil and get all of the greens in contact with the heat. You may need to add a tiny bit more oil at this point if it seems that you don’t have enough in the pan to cover all of the greens. The oil helps them cook and also helps you absorb the fat-soluble vitamins in the veggies, so don’t be shy. Toss in a pinch or two of sea salt. Continue to stir the greens (it’s really more of a folding motion, actually) until they are all wilted, which takes about 5 minutes or so. Enjoy!

We eat a lot of frittatas around here. A LOT. I make huge frittatas (the one pictured above was made with 20 eggs, which is the norm), so there is pretty much always some frittata in the fridge for breakfast or snacks. Frittatas are one of my favorite foods because they are healthy, easy, and can be made with whatever I’ve got laying around. They are an especially great way to use up veggies (or eggs, for that matter) that are getting a little past their prime.

The basic method I use is to sauté whatever ingredients I want in my frittata, add them to a bowl of beaten eggs, then pour the whole mess back into the pan, distribute the “fillings” evenly if necessary, and let it cook for a while over low heat. No stirring! At the end I throw the pan under the broiler for a couple minutes to thoroughly cook the top and get it a little brown. When the frittata is cool, I slice it into wedges and store in an airtight container in the fridge; it will keep for 5-7 days that way. You can eat the frittata cold, let it come up to room temperature, or heat it in a toaster oven or microwave. We don’t do the microwave thing and I find that about 7 minutes in the toaster oven at 350F gets my fresh-out-the-fridge frittata warm without drying it out.

Technique notes:

• Make sure your ingredients are in small pieces. Brian has a habit of putting gigantic pieces of kale in our frittatas and it’s really no fun to bite into the frittata and come away with an entire kale leaf hanging out of your mouth. Especially in front of company, oy!
• If you are using meat (we prefer sausage removed from its casing), cook that thoroughly first, add to the beaten eggs, and then use the grease from the meat to sauté your veggies. I typically use about a 1/4 lb of sausage for 16-20 eggs.
• If you are not using meat, I suggest the following fats for your sauté purposes: bacon grease (you should really have a jar of rendered bacon grease in your fridge at all times), butter, olive oil. My dad would put coconut oil on this list but he is crazy. If you don’t mind the taste of coconut in your savory egg dishes, go for it.
• Cook your veggies thoroughly before adding them to the eggs unless you want raw veggies in your frittata.
• Salt & pepper your eggs. I also add salt to my veggies while they are cooking.
• I typically plan 2 eggs per serving. We use large cage-free eggs.
• Greens cook down a lot so use more than you think you need, especially with really wilty greens like spinach or radish tops. You may need to cover tougher greens like kale to cook them through, it’s really unfun to get semi-raw, fibrous, hard-to-chew pieces of kale when you bite into a frittata.
• Obviously you will need an oven-save pan for this method. This is also one of the few occasions that you really need a nonstick pan, too. And please make sure your pan is large enough that your frittata is no more an inch or so thick or you will have a hard time getting it to cook through without burning the hell out of the bottom.
• Do not walk away while your frittata is under the broiler. It really only needs a minute or two and burnt eggs are yuck.
• You can mix cheese into the eggs or put it on top. Try both and see which you prefer, they both yield a slightly different flavor. I prefer it mixed in because cheese on top gets a little soggy in the fridge and in my opinion never fully recovers. Another option is to leave the cheese out of your initial cooking and keep a container of shredded cheese ready to go so you can sprinkle it on top when reheating your frittata.

Ingredient combination ideas:

• Spinach, onion, garlic (that’s the combo pictured at the top of this post)
• Chorizo, lacinto kale, onion
• Rutabaga greens, onion, parmigiano-reggiano
• Italian sausage (we like a mix of hot & mild), garlic, bell peppers
• Zucchini, onion, cheddar (cut the zucchini into small thin slices & get it a little brown)
• Spinach, mushroom, onion, garlic (be sure you cook the mushrooms until they are shrively and brown, otherwise your frittata will be wet)
• Mushroom, onion, garlic, bell pepper
• Spinach, feta, onion, garlic (this one is also good with zucchini)
• Garlic sausage (they have this at Whole Foods), radish tops, broccoli stems (peeled & sliced thin), onion
• Bacon, spinach, cheddar (broccoli is also really good in this one, just make sure it’s in small well-cooked pieces)
• Bacon, kohlrabi bulb (peeled & sliced thin), garlic

If you have questions please leave them in the comments below and I’ll do my best to answer them. And please leave your frittata ingredient ideas, too!

Also, on a semi-related note, did your mother ever use the phrase “Starving Armenian” when you were little? Mine did, but not in the usual context, which would be as a part of a guilt trip to encourage a spoiled and recalcitrant child to finish their food (similar to the “starving children in China/Africa/Wherever”). No, my mother, and maybe even my father, too, I can’t remember, referred to me as a Starving Armenian because of my unending appetite. How weird is that? And très inappropriate, too, like most things in the 80’s. The older I get the more frequently random memories from way back bubble up to the surface of my consciousness. But the older I get, the less I trust the truth of those memories. What really happened, and what has been turned into something different by the passage of time?

Did you know that if you remove all of the membrane from your grapefruit, it won’t taste bitter anymore? I’m not saying it’ll be sweet like an orange, but grapefruit sans membrane is much, much tastier than grapefruit with membrane. By “membrane” I mean not only the pith but all of that thin skin that forms the fruit into wedges. You’ll need to use a sharp knife to get rid of all of it, but it is worth the effort. To think I spent 32 years declaring my hatred of grapefruit and all I had to do was ditch the membrane to discover a new form of citrusy joy!

The grapefruit pictured above came in our CSA box and is both local and organic. We’ve been getting local grapefruit from a variety of sources since the beginning of this year and I still think it’s weird to live in a place where citrus is local.

For lunch today I ate:

• Salmon salad
• Sprouted grain toast with butter and homemade fig spread
• Mixed Greek olives in spicy marinade

In case you are wondering, it was delicious! Also, because I’m sure you’re curious, I did not make the fig spread, it was a gift from a very talented friend who has also bestowed upon us blueberry jam, salsa, and grapefruit-ginger marmalade. Oh, yeah.

Salmon salad is one of my go-to meals when I need something quick. It takes 5 minutes to whip up and the ingredients aren’t set in stone so you can really make it with whatever you have lying around. Because this is the inaugural What We Eat post, you also get a recipe! So here it is, even though you probably don’t need one for this dish:

Salmon Salad

1 7.5-oz can sockeye salmon, drained
3/4 cup chopped red bell pepper
3/4 chopped green bell pepper
1 scallion, chopped
Dill (1 tbsp if using fresh, 1 tsp if using dried)
Juice from 1 lemon wedge
1 tbsp olive oil
Salt & pepper to taste

Toss the ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Enjoy!

Other vegetables that work well in this dish are tomato, cucumber, red onion, and radish, but you really can use anything you like. Fresh parsley is nice, as is fresh garlic if you are feeling crazy. If you want your salmon salad to resemble more of a traditional seafood salad, dice your veggies up small and mash everything together with slightly more olive oil and lemon juice than is listed in the recipe above. Just please don’t add mayo, it makes salmon sad. Lastly, I drain off the juice/oil that is in the can and give it to Cooper, but Brian prefers his canned salmon with all of the juice, it’s really a personal thing so try it both ways and see which you like better.

I feel it necessary to note that the deliciousness of your salmon salad is directly related to the quality of the canned salmon you use. Please don’t use that nasty Bumblebee stuff, okay? We buy ours from Vital Choice and get the salmon with the bones & skin–it tastes much better and is way more nutritious. We eat the skin and the bones, except for the little salmon vertebrae because they totally freak me out.

I also feel it necessary to note that the photo above is in fact NOT an iPhone photo. I don’t believe this is the first “real” photo to appear on this blog, but it’s certainly the first one in a long time. I deserve a pat on the back!

Unfortunately these terms can really just be a lot of jargon. Who defines what food is “whole,” “organic,” or “local” anyway? For me, it all comes down to eating real food: something that has recognizable origins and is minimally processed if at all. I also try to choose foods that are grown near where I live because they are fresher and thus more nutritious, and because they have a much lower environmental impact than foods that are shipped from far away. Eating local foods also ensures that we eat seasonally, which I personally believe is better from a health standpoint. Organic is probably another topic that deserves its own post (I actually did an independent study on organic foods my senior year of college!) but the short, very general, answer is that it means the food has been grown sans pesticides and in an environmentally responsible way. Sustainably-raised, the way I use it, refers specifically to meats, fish, and eggs–are the animals raised in ways that are healthy for them and limit the negative environmental impact?

Where am I going with this? Well, something that I’ve wanted to do for a long time is use this blog as a way to disseminate information that could help other people live more consciously and healthfully. Eating is a huge part of everyone’s lifestyle, so it follows that if you want to change your lifestyle, altering your eating habits is part of puzzle. Because I get a lot of questions about what we eat, how to eat healthier, or how to eat whole foods/local foods/etc., I thought it would be fun to start a regular feature here that would highlight some of our meals. Hopefully the photos and descriptions of what we’re eating will inspire you to try something new, or at least entertain you a little bit. I am also going to be posting a lot more recipes here, and while I already have several requests please leave a comment if there is something you want to know how to cook!

We joined a CSA here in Austin recently and got our first box of food last week. It was very exciting for me, as I am still unfamiliar with the seasons of food in this strange climate. In DC we bought all our food at the Dupont Circle farmer’s market and thus became very familiar with what was in season when. Austin has unpredictable cycles of warm and cold, which, combined with my limited knowledge of edibles, means that I don’t really know what is in season at any given time aside from the very obvious stuff. Our box contained a typical mix of winter veggies as well as some fruit:

Carrots
Radishes
Collard greens
Kohlrabi
Cabbage
Parsley
Spinach
Broccoli florets
Scallions
Green garlic
Lettuce
Oranges
Grapefruit

Kohlrabi

The quality of the food was incredible. It was picked the morning that we received our box and was clearly extremely fresh. When Brian came home with the box he set it on the floor and Dylan immediately crawled over, pulled himself up to standing using the side of the box, and began playing with all of the food inside. Somehow he snuck part of a spinach leaf into his mouth. We noticed something in his mouth 10 minutes later and fished out the little piece of spinach, which was not chewed up or anything (the kid only has two teeth!) but was thoroughly slimed. He must have learned that trick from Cooper, who was notorious in his younger days for carrying things like a blueberry or an acorn around in his mouth for long periods of time without chewing them. You’d give him a blueberry and he’d be all like, “Thanks!” and you’d think he had swallowed it until two hours later when it rolled out of his mouth and onto the rug. He actually did this recently and our baby helper had the misfortune of sitting upon the blueberry; luckily she was wearing dark pants.

Thumbs up for super fresh, still-dirty veggies!

Supposedly one box is enough to feed a family of 2-4 people for one week, which is pretty much a load of crap as far as I can tell. We eat a lot of veggies around here, but not an obscene amount, and have had to supplement with non-local veggies and fruits from the grocery store (a travesty, really). But of the veggies we received, nothing went to waste. I am actually quite proud of myself for figuring out how to use everything we got, including things we’d never eaten before like kohlrabi. Oh, it was all so delicious! Here’s what I made:

Sauteed radish tops, kohlrabi bulb, & green garlic
Carrot-quinoa soup (using both the roots and the tops)
Pureed carrots for Dylan
Cole slaw (cabbage, carrots, parsley)
Sauteed collard greens & kohlrabi greens
Spinach salads with radishes, scallions, and carrot tops
Steamed broccoli
And of course we ate the fruit straight-up as snacks

Sauteed radish tops, kohlrabi bulb, & green garlic with cole slaw

We have three more weeks in our 4-week CSA trial. I would like to continue with it because the quality of the food was so good, and because it is very important to me to eat local, sustainably-produced food, but we will need to see if the cost comparison comes out in favor of the CSA or not. I don’t mind spending a little bit more for quality local organic produce, but with my nursing-mama appetite it’s a challenge to keep our food costs under control so we’ll need to see how things shake out.

• Two cases of chocolate (this has been discussed previously)
• Corn popper toy for Dylan
• Magazine subscriptions (Rolling Stone for Brian, Vogue & Allure for me)
• Cast iron stovetop grill/griddle
• A case of produce wash

The cast iron grill pan arrived yesterday. It is 20 inches long and weighs 16 pounds. It is clearly intended for some serious two-burner cooking action. I have wanted one of these for a couple of years because I thought it would be a good alternative to our detested Foreman grill. (Really I just want to get a house and have a proper outdoor grill, but all things in good time.)

I feel I should note at this point that in the previous 24 hours I had roasted two chickens and six yams, made chicken salad out of one of those chickens, made 17 hamburgers (two flavors), and made eight cups of a new trail mix creation (recipe to be posted soon, I promise). I still had eight burgers to cook so I was super excited about the grill pan because I could fit all eight of the burgers on it (our Foreman grill only fits four). Though I’ve used cast iron previously, I really had no idea what I was doing. I just wanted to use my new pan and save myself the trouble of cooking two batches of burgers. I cranked the stove up to high and when the grill was hot, put the burgers on. They immediately began smoking. A LOT. I thought once they got seared that the smoke would stop. I was wrong. Our entire kitchen, dining room, and living room immediately filled with smoke. Thick smoke. A lot of thick smoke. I couldn’t see six feet in front of me. I thought maybe I had the heat too high since cast iron is such a good heat conductor so I turned it down to medium and then opened all the windows and the door and put a box fan in the doorway to blow the smoke out. I was coughing the whole time, freaking out about whether Dylan was inhaling all the smoke (he wasn’t because he is short!), and shutting the doors to our bedrooms so they wouldn’t get smokey. I flipped the bugers and celebrated briefly because they had grill marks. Grill marks! The lower heat seemed to reduce the amount of smoke spewing off of the stove, but that is like comparing the flow of a river to that of a firehose. Less, but still a lot. The box fan was doing its job, as evidenced by the thick plumes of smoke billowing out our front door. I was certain that one of our neighbors would call the fire department.

It took about 45 minutes before the air in our apartment was see-through again, and I made an incredible mess. There were grease splatters everywhere, and thanks to the fact that I forgot to oil the grill, we were still trying to liberate charred bits of burger from it this morning. Despite the smoke and the mess and the panic, the burgers did turn out really well, much better than on the Foreman grill. And when the maintenance guys showed up later to fix our eternally-running toilet they were all like, “Mmmm, what are you cooking? It smells really good in here!”

Today I will be making my first rump roast. The rump is denoted by the number “3″ in the image above. I will be attempting to do my roast on the stovetop, as my 6-quart pot is not oven-safe. (Yeah, I know, I need to remedy that!) I’ve roasted chickens, turkeys, and pork shoulders (also know as pork butts; that probably deserves its own post), but all in the oven. I’ve made beef stew on the stovetop, but that was different because the beef was in chunks and I always use my mom’s foolproof beef bourguignon recipe. Anyway, my rump is small (Ha! Sorry, I couldn’t resist), only about 2 lbs., so I figure the stovetop method shouldn’t pose too much of a problem. I will report back with stories of my grand success!