Health
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Better Than Butternut: Roasted Delicata Squash Recipe
10 Simple Ways To Eat Less Without Noticing
Juicing: Stupid and Pretentious or Nourishing and Enlightening?
10 Tasty Carbs That Won’t Make You Fat
How To Start Working Out When You Don’t Like To Exercise
Focus More on Your Brain and Less on Your Diet if You’re Serious About Losing Weight
Home Court Habits: The Secret to Effortless Weight Control
10 Reasons You Aren’t Losing Weight When You Think You’re Doing Everything Right
How To Burn More Calories Without Breaking A Sweat
The 7 Habits of Highly Effective Foodists
Farmers Market Update: First Asparagus!
First Asparagus
I guess spring is here for real. Behold: asparagus!
And it didn’t come alone.
Every week I’m seeing more spring produce popping up as if it were, um, springtime.
Cardoons
Fiddleheads
Fiddleheads are baby fern shoots that show up at Far West Fungi for a few weeks or so every spring. Cardoons–a unique and unwieldy vegetable–are also a rare seasonal find. Neither of these make my top 5 vegetables list, but they are fun to play around with if you are feeling adventurous.
I admit I’m a little more excited about the artichokes that are appearing everywhere. The past few years I’ve fallen in love with the baby ones, but I enjoy artichokes of all sizes. And it looks like I’m not the only one.
Artichoke Slug
Cauliflower is peaking in season right now and trust me, you don’t want to miss it. Try roasting cauliflower florets at about 450 degrees with a little olive oil, sea salt, curry powder and coriander. Cover it with foil for the first 15 minutes, then remove the foil and let it brown until tender. Stir every 10 minutes or so. So easy and ridiculously tasty.
You can also find cauliflower’s prettier and more delicate cousin, romanesco.
Romanesco
Cauliflowers
Eggs are also easier to find at the farmers market this time of year. Right now I am smitten with the ones at Marin Sun Farms. They aren’t cheap, but they will blow you away. And you won’t get Salmonella.
Blood Oranges
Marin Sun Farms Eggs
The citrus season is also booming. Blood oranges and navels are wonderful right now, while the cute little clementines are almost gone. Also be sure to grab some Meyer lemons to squeeze on your asparagus and artichokes.
And root vegetables are still awesome.
Beautiful Turnips
Is it becoming springtime at your market?
Today’s purchases:
- Broccoli shoots (Chue’s Farm)
- Garlic (Chue’s Farm)
- Tuscan kale (Capay Organics)
- Red Russian kale (Dirty Girl Produce)
- Cauliflowers (Dirty Girl Produce)
- Navel oranges (Hamada Farms)
- Walnuts (Glashoff Farms)
- Eggs (Marin Sun Farms)
I saw asparagus at the Westside Market yesterday. I almost bought some because … well because it’s asparagus! But it didn’t look quite like yours. In fact, it looked sad. Not light purplish but sort of darkish. Not standing up straight but leaning over like it was tired.
I’m glad I didn’t buy it. It would still be in my fridge right now (we had other dinner plans last night) and after seeing that picture I wouldn’t have want to eat what I had.
Wahhhhhhh! I want the snow in Maryland to GO AWAY and for it to be springtime. 🙁 At least we have plenty of kale.
If you have kale there is much to be thankful for 🙂
I love asparagus and was checking health benefits, it says on this site: Helps getting rid of warts and helps with treating HIV??
HIV? Interesting.
That is weird.
I bought some wonderful asparagus at a popular natural foods supermarket the other day, and since my 10″ frying pan was the only thing that was clean, I cut it into 1″ pieces and put it in the fry pan with some olive oil and garlic, topped with salt and pepper. Cooked it a bit, added a bit of water to help steam it and let it sit with the lid on for a few minutes. It was probably the best asparagus I ever had and I ate it ALL.
Decent produce is hard to find here in Vegas, but when I find it I’m all over it like a fly on honey. And I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I can’t wait for summer – when it’s 110F outside all I want to eat is yummy salads.
Haha, I do that all the time–just eat an entire bunch of a veggie and call it dinner. It’s just so tasty sometimes!