Recently In The Gardening Section
Once you’ve tasted the perfect roasted green bean, you may not want green beans cooked any other way — ever! The key is reaching that “perfectly roasted” state. If you haven’t found that point yet, here are some considerations. Choose the rounded slim beans that grow to about 6 inches long. Most filet beans fit…
For many people, spaghetti squash is like a vegetable come from outer space. What in the world do you do with that thing? Roast it and use it once and you will be an expert. If you need a little help on that first time, here are the steps: Roasting Spaghetti Squash Cut in half…
For years my routine has been to pick the largest (and most likely to ripen) green tomatoes just before our first killing frost. Needless to say, many smaller green tomatoes fell victim to the freeze. Then somehow I came across You Grow Girl, who wrote about roasting green tomatoes. I had never heard of such…
Have you heard about phytic acid in food? Perhaps you have not only heard of it, but you are obsessed by it? Phytic acid is a common component of grains, legumes, nuts, and seeds that actually reduces your absorption of minerals. One study found that you can increase your iron absorption by over 1000% if…
With growing interest in health and nutrition, interest in beets is on the rise but most people do not know what to do with them. Roasting beets is a wonderful entry-level skill to develop. In fact, learn to roast beets and you can use those little darlings as the base for some of the most…
We’ve enjoyed this dish for well over three decades now and have not come up with a suitable name. “What’s for lunch?” “A pan of steamed vegetables.” Everyone in the family knows what that means and will not be late to lunch. The steamed vegetables vary depending on the season and what is over-producing in…
I remember having a lovely lunch in a restaurant by Fisherman’s Warf in San Fransisco. Everything was perfect: wonderful view of the ocean, sterling service and then I felt a crunch of sand in the spinach Florentine. How could such a high caliber kitchen fail to thoroughly wash those greens? It happened years ago but…
Many people ave discovered the value of coconut oil in baking — the flavor and texture compliments many baked goods well and coconut oil allows you to replace shortening or vegetable oils high in detrimental Omega 6 oils. You may get a slight coconut flavor in your finished baked good, but even the most coconut-tasting…
One of the favorite baby foods in this house has been butternut squash. How wonderful to be able to turn out your baby’s own food where you know there are no additives except the love you put into it. If you grow your own butternut, all the better. And if you don’t…butternut is available in…
I had my introduction to roasted vegetables in a small Armenian restaurant in Fresno. We ordered a salad piled with roasted veggies and drizzled with olive oil vinaigrette and fresh parsley. When the salad was gone I wanted to lick the plate. The vegetables were room temperature but you could tell they had been roasted…
Roasted pumpkin is the key ingredient in pumpkin pies, other custards, and as a base in soup. The pumpkin is roasted and then pureed. However, as roasted vegetables become increasingly popular, we have also begun to enjoy roasted pumpkin as a side dish. Learn each method to enjoy the great flavor of pumpkin. Roasted Pumpkin…
Roasting butternut squash is a simple way to enjoy its flavor and beauty. Once its roasted you can puree the butternut squash and use it in a variety of recipes for soups, breads, and desserts. The puree can be frozen in recipe-sized containers for ease of use. However, consider roasting butternut squash to serve as…
When summer is here and the garden is in full swing, you can sometimes get overloaded with eggplant. After using your three favorite recipes a couple of times each, you need a new plan. Here is a primo suggestion for enjoying eggplant today or saving it for winter. These are roasted eggplant cubes that serve…
If you are like 90% of the American cooks in the kitchen under the age of 50, you do not have a home-grown model of cooking tips, meal planning, and organization. Most of our mothers worked outside the home. Either they picked up “something quick” on the way home or had a stash of TV…
An efficient kitchen has a plan for how to wash vegetables. If your plan is working for you (whatever it is), then you should definitely keep it. If you fly by the seat of your pants in the vegetable washing department, consider mom’s suggestions in this video (and her written instructions below) to reduce your…
Some of the best Mom video classics come from that same camera designed by a team of pilgrims. Such is the case with this gem on composing a salad. Mom is great at being able to take seemingly random items in the refrigerator and combining them artfully on a plate to make a “composed salad”…
If you are going to cook from scratch on a regular basis, you will save a heap of time by chopping your produce in advance. We use one of these two approaches depending on what is going on in the household. Typically, we fall into the second. 1. The Well-Planned Week If you have your…
Minced garlic: How do you do it? If you know how to chop garlic cloves, it seems like such an elementary question, but somehow, over 8,000 people to date have found my mom’s video on YouTube about minced garlic. What they have found is a six-minute discussion of many details surrounding minced garlic. In fact,…
The Traditional Foods site comes to you from the Sequoia National Forest in a house designed by Irving Gill. We are a mother-daughter team strong in both the science and the art of cooking. We chronicle our cooking here and our adventures in the forest at Gill on the Hill. Read more about our background and food philosophy.
