Happy Monday everyone!

Before we get to the fun stuff, there are a few technical things we need to discuss:

1. Older feed subscriptions using Google Reader and iGoogle appear to be broken. Even though my first post from Summer Tomato went out to all subscribers without a problem, all Google feed readers (about 40% of you use these, by my calculations) seem to have reverted back to my old (broken) blog feed address. Thus new posts are not going out to you.

Google FAIL.

I am doing my best to resolve this, but in the meantime the easiest solution is to re-subscribe to the working Summer Tomato RSS feed. You can do that by clicking here. If you do not know what I’m talking about and your subscription is working without a problem, don’t worry about it.

Sorry for the inconvenience.

2. Tell me which advertisements you hate. In case you haven’t noticed, I care a lot about your health. But I also want this blog to be successful so that I can continue spending as much time on it as I do. One of the things that keeps this blog up and running are the Google advertisements you find throughout the site (also donations and purchases from my Amazon shop).

I do my best to keep ads that conflict with my message (e.g. diet pills, weight loss cures scams, etc.) off this blog, but it requires constant filtering on my part. I am not notified before an ad appears, but if I see one on my blog that I do not like I ask Google to remove it and it usually goes away in an hour or two.

Since I am not browsing my website 24 hrs a day, my vigilance will occasionally be insufficient and bothersome ads may appear. If you encounter ads that are particularly annoying to you, please let me know which ones and I will take care of them as quickly as I can. I am also interested in hearing your opinions on ads in general. E.g. Do you prefer the picture/flash ads or standard text link ads?

The advertisements should be a benefit to you, offering products you might actually be interested in. Please consider supporting our honest sponsors by visiting their websites.

I will be exploring new advertising options in the future when things are more settled here. Thanks for your patience.

Extra thanks to those of you who have provided feedback so far

xoxox

Darya

Tags: advertisements, feeds, Google, iGoogle, problems, RSS, subscriptions, techical

Chioggia Radicchio

I know, this is kind of mean. Many of you have expressed your frustrations about the shabbiness or nonexistentness of your own local farmers markets. But I can’t help but brag about all the great spring veggie action we have going on here in San Francisco. Try to think of it as inspiration for what you have to look forward to….

Sorrel

What I am most excited about today is that my bounty is markedly different from what I have been buying all winter. And it is all the more wonderful because it is easily 75 degrees and gorgeous today. (Don’t be too jealous of this, because one of the worst things about living in San Francisco is summertime fog–truly sunny days are rare).

At the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market a few different vendors were selling sorrel today, so I bought some from Capay organics. Sorrel is interesting because its flavor puts it somewhere between a vegetable and an herb. When it is older it becomes more acidic and has an almost lemon-like flavor. Younger it is more mild and tastes closer to spinach. I am thinking about tossing mine up with some grilled fennel and lemon scented oil. I had a similar dish (minus the sorrel) recently at Pizzeria Delfina, and it was incredible.

Flowering Arugula

Last weekend on the KCRW podcast, Good Food, there was a wonderful segment about arugula flowers at the Santa Monica Farmers Market, so I had to buy those this week too.

Other 2009 first purchases today were the small Mediterranean style cucumbers and Belgian endive from Madison Growers. (Maybe I will may actually make a salad this weekend?) The kumquats were also finally sweet enough to buy.

Mediterranean Cucumbers

Last but not least, Zuckerman’s is again offering their famous asparagus ravioli and I bought some. They recommended I prepare it with just olive oil and some grated Parmesan cheese, but I think I have had enough of taking serving suggestions from farmers for a couple weeks. I have a few of my own tricks I am excited to try on this springtime treat (hint: another excuse to use the lemon oil I bought today). I will certainly keep you posted.

Today’s Purchases:

Belgian Endives

• Sorrel (Capay Organics)
• Belgian endive (Madison Growers)
• Mediterranean cucumbers (Madison Growers)
• Arugula flowers (Marin Root Farm)
• Assorted kales (Marin Root Farm)
• Fennel (Chue’s Farm)
• Baby leeks (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Cioggia radicchio (Dirty Girl Produce)
• Carrots (Star Route Farms)
• Asparagus ravioli (Zuckerman’s Farm)
• Kiwi (Four Sisters Farms)
• Heirloom navel oranges (Bernard Ranches)
• Kumquats (Bernard Ranches)
• Rio red grapefruit (Hamada Farms)
• tofu (Hodo Soy)
• Lisbon lemon olive oil (Stonehouse Olive Oil)
• House blend olive oil (Stonehouse Olive Oil)

What are you most jealous of?

Tags: cucumber, endive, Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, lemon oil, Pizzeria Delfina, sorrel

This is the official launch of Summer Tomato! Welcome!

Summer Tomato is an upgrade of the blog Thought for Food I have been running on Google’s Blogger for the past 9 months. While Blogger was a fantastic place for me to get started, its limitations could sometimes detract from the readers’ experience. And because my readers deserve the best, I have created Summer Tomato!

If you are a Thought for Food loyalist, never fear. All the old posts and comments from summertomato.blogspot.com have been moved here safe and sound. My main goal for this site was not to start from scratch but to make it easier to navigate and find what you’re looking for.

Here are some new features at Summer Tomato:

• Categories One of the biggest factors in my decision to migrate to the WordPress platform was the ability to sort posts into categories. Because of how I approach food and health, my articles can range from science to recipes to politics. You can now navigate all Summer Tomato categories using the colorful menu at the top of the page.
• About I finally have an About page! Everything you’ve always wanted to know about me or this blog can be found there. Navigation options can be found on the About page sidebar.
• Healthstyle I am sick and tired of the word diet and am now using the word Healthstyle to describe healthy eating. You can read all about it here.
• Ask Me People have lots of questions about health and nutrition and I love to answer them! There is now a section of this blog where you can post questions about health and nutrition, and I will do my best to address them in a future article. I think this could be really fun, and I hope you participate. For now it is just an experiment, so we will see how it works out.
• Contact Form Summer Tomato has an official form if you would like to contact me personally. This is a perfect place to address private inquiries and suggestions.
• Shop Summer Tomato has a new store powered by Amazon! I am really excited about this feature because Amazon usually has the best prices on the internet and now I can easily point you to my favorite books, kitchen gadgets and other fun foodie things and you can make purchases directly from within this site. At the Summer Tomato store you can find everything you need for learning about food, health and cooking. You can stock a new kitchen, take your Healthstyle on the road or upgrade to the coolest toys. Many of the products also feature my personal reviews and I will continue to update these whenever possible. Any purchases you make through the 

I encourage you to explore the new Summer Tomato site and let me know what you think. All suggestions are welcome and I will do my best to reply to any comments or questions you may have.

If you currently subscribe to the Thought for Food email or RSS feeds, your subscription should continue to work with Summer Tomato. If it does not, please contact me as soon as possible so I can fix it. Also, if you are currently linking this blog from another website, it would be great if you could update your link to SummerTomato.com.

This site will continue to evolve over time and I hope that the changes reflect the needs of the readers. If you like this blog, please share it with your friends and family. Summer Tomato can only be as strong as the community we build together.

Thanks to everyone who has already helped make Summer Tomato possible, I couldn’t have done it without you.

xoxoxo

Darya

Tags: welcome

It seems all the nation is abuzz with organic fever. The number of farmers markets has increased dramatically in the past several years, sales of organic products have more than doubled and even the new First Family has jumped on the organic bandwagon.

But in uncertain economic times, some people are asking if the higher cost of organic foods is worth the benefit. And when it comes down to it, what benefit are we really talking about anyway?

When discussing organic food, most people are referring to food that complies with and has been accepted as “Certified Organic” by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA). USDA’s Organic Standards were set in 2002, twelve years after the Organic Foods Production Act of 1990.

In order for a food to become Certified Organic, the grower of the food must be inspected for compliance with the USDA’s “Organic Standards” by an accredited state or private agency. Generally this means the foods are free of chemical fertilizers, herbicides and pesticides, and have not been irradiated or genetically modified in any way.

There is extensive evidence that adults and children who eat exclusively organic foods have lower levels of pesticides in their bodies. How these pesticides can affect your long-term health is not clear, but they are unlikely to make you healthier and may in fact have lasting, negative consequences. If pesticides are a concern to you, organic is certainly a better option.

Beyond pesticides, the benefit of organic foods becomes a little murky. As recently pointed out by Mark Bittman in the New York Times, organic certification offers no guarantee that foods are either better for you or for the planet.

But that is not to say that how food is grown is not important. Soil quality is in fact one of the most significant determinants of the nutrient value of foods. Another important factor is the genetic make up (the strain and variety) of plants being grown. That is, ice burg lettuce will add little value to your diet whether it is organic or not.

But as Bittman points out, the reason Certified Organics “fall short of the lofty dreams of early organic farmers and consumers” is because Organic Standards make no mention of how far food may travel from soil to sale, nor do they promise anything about a food’s safety or nutrition. In other words, organic food is not local food.

It is generally accepted that the farther food travels to reach your plate, the less nutrients it has and the bigger its carbon footprint. Slapping a Certified Organic sticker on it does not change this fact. Better than buying Certified Organic is shopping at smaller, local farms that may or may not have the resources to comply with costly organic regulations.

But these subtle distinctions are largely irrelevant to most American’s who consume little, if any, fresh vegetables and fruits. At a certain point, arguing about the costs and benefits of organic produce is of little value. For most Americans, the first step in eating healthier is to focus on freshness.

That being said, there are many good reasons to avoid big agriculture whenever possible, organic or not. Whole Foods organic peanuts were not immune from the recent Salmonella outbreak. Large processing plants come with their own unique set of risks in food production.

Local produce is also better if money is your biggest concern. The fuel cost of shipping organic asparagus from Chile to San Francisco is substantial, as is the price of becoming a Certified Organic grower. For these reasons, locally grown but non-organic foods are less likely to carry the hefty price tag that most of us associate with Certified Organic.

Do you buy organic produce?

Tags: local, Mark Bittman, New York Times, organic, Synapse, USDA, Whole Foods

I love watching the seasons change at the farmers market. Although it was lightly sprinkling today at the San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, spring was definitely in the air.

After a long winter of thick kale and collards, it is easy to forget how delicate greens can be. Now you can get almost all your favorite greens with the flowers or sprouts still attached. Until today, I didn’t even know you could buy arugula flowers to eat. If that isn’t elitist, I don’t know what is.

Apparently I also found the “only heirloom navel” oranges at Bernard Ranches today. I didn’t buy any, but it sure sounded cool.

I’m also excited to finally try the Black Calypso beans from Rancho Gordo. But I also decided that next time I buy beans it is going to be from Tierra Vegetables. They have slightly different varieties and they look absolutely beautiful.

Today’s purchases:

• Assorted wild kale (Marin Roots Farm)
• Assorted wild broccoli (Marin Roots Farm)
• Carrots (Star Route Farm)
• Aspargus (Zuckerman’s Farm)
• Fennel (Chue’s Farm)
• Green garlic (Chue’s Farm)
• Broccoli rabe (Chue’s Farm)
• Black Calypso beans (Rancho Gordo)
• Meyer lemons (Hamada Farms)
• Clementines (Hamada Farms)
• Kiwi (Four Sisters Farms)
• Midnight Moon (Cowgirl Creamery)
• Chevre (Cowgirl Creamery)
• Lots of chocolate (Scharffen Berger)
• Sour baguette and pain epi (Acme Bread)

What are your favorite spring greens?

Tags: Ferry Plaza Farmers Market, heirloom navel oranges, San Francisco