Until a friend recently told me about his foraging experience last week somewhere in a Bronx “forest,” I had never before heard of ramps. Ramps, also known as wild leeks, are a springtime treat on the East Coast. Ramps cannot be cultivated; they need to be foraged. That’s why they’re so expensive, so valued among New York City gourmands. My foraging friend harvested so many that he bartered a portion of his harvest for a meal at a nice restaurant, which featured the foraged treats.
Two days after hearing this story I began selling ramps at the farm stand in Brooklyn where I work. I talked them up all day long to those who hadn’t heard of them (before I even tasted them), but lots of folks were actually waiting all year long for them and ran up to the stand, usually exclaiming, “finally, you have them.”
One of the perks of operating a farm stand is that at the end of the day you get to take some extra stuff home.
A resolution passed in the New York State Senate this week in support of Farmworkers, just in time for May Day. It was introduced by Sen. Perkins of Harlem, because Farmworkers (like domestic workers) are not covered under labor laws and are treated differently from other workforces.
Thanks to Jordan Wells of Justice for Farmworkers for this news tip and for sharing the language of the resolution which you can read below:
LEGISLATIVE RESOLUTION honoring the many contributions of New York State farmworkers and recognizing their need for fair labor practices
WHEREAS, It is the sense of this Legislative Body to commend the efforts of our farmworkers as they continue their hard work of cultivating the land, facing the many challenges of nature such as flood, drought and heat, in order to grow our food; and
I have become a huge fan of beets as of late. It wasn’t that I hated them before, they just weren’t one of my favorite foods. I think you know by now how this story continues but I will share anyway… We started getting beets in our CSA box and I had no idea what to do with them. I did some research online and found a plethora of ways to make beets!
Usually I just steam them, cut them up, mix them with some fresh lettuce and goat cheese and call it a day. However, a came across some recipes online for pickled beets so I decided to try a variation of these recipes. After all, I am a huge fan of traditional pickles as well as other pickled veggies. Check out Happy Girl Kitchen Co. if you’re at the San Francisco Ferry Building Farmers Market during the summer. They also make an amazing lavender lemonade!
Speaking of the farmer’s market, I stopped by on a Tuesday at during my lunch and saw some gorgeous beets. They were each about the size of a softball! Though I didn’t really need the beets I bought a bunch. After all, they were huge, cheap, local, organic and both the boyfriend and I really like them. You will notice that these beets in particular have a gorgeous color.
The recipe I’m going to share with you is basic and can and should be tried with variations. I will say that I loved the beets just as they were. I decided to use white wine vinegar as opposed to a stronger vinegar (like cider) so I wouldn’t quite qualify my beets as pickled, but they were very tasty. They are a perfect addition to a salad but I enjoyed them by themselves!
I hope you enjoy them as much as I did. Please share your variations or any other beet recipes you love. You can count on the fact that I will try your recipes since I love beets so much!
Congratulations and Yasher Koach to Dan Kestin on his selection as one of the Jewish Week’s “36 under 36!” No one knows better than Hazon and The Jew & The Carrot just how talented and generous Dan is. Read the full story here and shep naches (feel joy and pride) with the Hazon family.
This week White Castle treated us to yet another problematic fast food burger commercial. The commercial features a person in a full body pig suit performing a highly sexualized dance on the stage of strip club. You can view the ad in all its BBQ-sauce money shot glory on whitecastle.com. You can channel your discomfort by reading this interesting article on the relationship between meat and gender issues, with some specific studies from, of all places, Israel.
Happy Yom Ha’Atzmaut! Thanks to your comments on my St. Patrick’s Day post I decided to set a challenge for myself. To try and recreate the blue icing cupcakes of my youth with natural food dye. You must understand that I do not have an extensive test kitchen and loads of time and energy so I tried one option… extracting blue coloring from blueberry jam.
I must say I think I failed miserably and so I created a tried and true second batch using good o’l fashioned food coloring. The test will be completed tonight when I see which platter is done first. I’ll let you know.
Like many Jewish travelers, I have a tendency to seek out the Jewish connections in any city I visit. Stumbling across a generations-old deli, say, or a stone building etched with a Star of David from its former life as a synagogue, helps me feel at home when I am abroad. For Jews spending time in Rome, no trip is complete without a trek to the Roman Ghetto and a taste of Carciofi alla Giudia, literally “Jewish Style Artichokes.”
Known for their delicate chrysanthemum shape and crispy, salt-kissed taste, fried artichokes are a popular dish in restaurants across Italy’s largest city. Their history however, stems back to 16th century, when Roman Jews were confined to an overcrowded, impoverished ghetto. Deep fried artichokes might seem like a delicacy now, but according to Matthew Goodman who authored, Jewish Food: The World at Table, “food [in the ghetto] was scarce [and] frying was the cheapest and easiest option of food preparations.”
You are invited to apply for a highly subsidized five-day Tour of Israel (November 15-19, 2009), from the unique perspective of: food! Brought to you by Hazon and the Heschel Center for Environmental Learning and Leadership, this tour will not be a culinary Tour of Israeli gastronomy (though there will amazing eating). Instead, this one-of-a-kind mission will highlight developments in Israel towards more sustainable food production and consumption, including:
Even if you don’t live in Brooklyn, and won’t be at the Brooklyn Food Conference this Saturday, this is a really terrific video you should check out anyway.
While reading Eli Margulies’ recent recipe for poached pears using apple juice, I was reminded of my favourite apple juices. For our readers in England, this is a reminder of two delicious products they may already know about. And for our other readers, here is something you’ve probably never heard of, let alone even tasted. These juices are something I always look forward to drinking whenever I visit the UK. Even if they were exported (and I’m not sure they are: the food miles would be fearsome and the quality might suffer significantly!) there’s something about English apples that always makes me delighted to come back to the UK. So first, here are some thoughts on apples in general, in the US and the UK; for the juice recommendations, you’ll have to read to the end.
The Undercover Vegetarian hummed softly to herself as she snipped and set aside the kohlrabi greens. They were to be roasted like kale and served up still crispy and warm. Humble Husband, skittish around root vegetables, eyed the proceedings warily. “Are those onions? Those look like onions. You know how I feel about those.” Shifting from one foot to the other, he seemed determined to underscore his discomfort, lest she think this experiment was welcome. The Celeriac Debacle of 2007 had left an indelible mark on the family, and the spirit of culinary adventure had been slow to return….
Just a strange little pick me up for all you Jew and the Carrot readers out there. This Huffington Post story about a “bull” wandering into an Irish supermarket demonstrates irony just delightfully, yes? My favorite part is how they keep referring to it as a bull though it is, at best, about six months old and totally freaked out. Well, enjoy.
This is a traditional Soviet party dish, so put on your party hat, cause it’s gonna be GRATE! (Sorry, I just can’t help myself. Bad puns are like a disease.)
Since pig is forbidden, and ultra-Orthodox Israelis want secular Israelis to refrain from eating the animal, wouldn’t the outbreak of “swine flu” be welcome news? It could build the negative association between worldwide pandemics and swine, and make pig-breeding really unpopular, right?
This new Israeli government didn’t quite see it that way. Instead the swine flu outbreak was just another opportunity to politicize eating in Israel.
, “food [in the ghetto] was scarce [and] frying was the cheapest and easiest option of food preparations.”
