Health
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Food
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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: Spring Equinox
Cioggia Beets
Last week we sprung ahead and this weekend marks the official spring equinox. Woohoo!
We have had absolutely spectacular weather here in San Francisco, which could not feel better after the months of rain we endured.
To celebrate I got myself some morel mushrooms, one of the true delicacies of springtime. Excitement is an understatement.
Organic Chard
Morel Mushrooms
Another vegetable I couldn’t resist this afternoon were the beets. I am not particularly in the mood for beets, but they were everywhere and looked beautiful. I got one bunch of the lovely white and pink striped cioggia beets and one standard red bunch. Naturally I will use both the roots and the leaves.
Beet greens are an awesome substitute for chard or spinach. If you’ve never tried them I highly recommend it.
Beyond beets, other root vegetables including carrots, celery root and onions are in season and as sweet as they will be all year.
Shallots
Carrots, Fennel & Celery Root
I’m also really enjoying the delicate little broccoli I’ve been finding lately. These little guys are sweeter and more tender than the big broccoli crowns. I can’t go a week without getting a bag full. You can also find this Italian variety, broccoli di Ciccio (the sign is spelled wrong). The flowers, of course, are edible.
Broccoli di Ciccio
Artichokes are something else you shouldn’t miss this time of year. The big ones are great, but I also love to cook up some baby artichokes with leeks and walnuts as a side dish or pasta topping.
Leeks
Large Organic Artichokes
And no talk of springtime is complete without mentioning asparagus. I have a wonderful recipe for balsamic asparagus and carrots. It’s very simple and incredibly delicious.
Asparagus
Finally, don’t forget about all the wonderful citrus, it will be disappearing in the coming weeks.
Kumquats
Navel Oranges
Today’s purchases:
Cutest Pug Ever
- Morel mushrooms (Far West Fungi)
- Cioggia beets (Dirty Girl Produce)
- Red beets (Dirty Girl Produce)
- Broccolini (Dirty Girl Produce)
- Stinging nettles (Star Route Farms)
- Thyme (Star Route Farms)
- Parsley (Eatwell Farm)
- Green garlic (Knoll Farms)
- Ruby chard (Capay Organics)
- Navel oranges (Hamada Farms)
- Meyer lemons (Hamada Farms)
I finally visited the Ferry Bldg Farmer’s Market on Saturday, thanks to a food tour led by my niece. We had a great time and introduced my son to oysters (Hog Island) and nibbled on various citrus and apple offerings. i also introduced my niece to spring garlic. Since I was flying, I didn’t purchase any produce, but I did walk out with some Rancho Gordo dried beans. My first batch of Rio Zape beans are soaking as I type.
We also walked the Walnut Creek Farmer’s Market on Sunday. My son, who is going to school in the East Bay, wanted to check it out as he is getting into fresher food. Needless to say we helped in stock up. Its a nice market, with plenty of choices.
Thanks for the Farmer’s market updates.
Ha, that’s awesome you finally made it up here! I actually saw that you checked in on Foursquare, but I was already on my way out. Hope the rest of your trip was great!
Funny thing was I saw you went to Nopalito for dinner. We had reservations there on Saturday, but at the recommendation of the guys at Naked Lunch, decided to go Italian at Beretta, also an excellent choice. In the words of Get Smart “missed you by that much”
That’s hilarious. Though I like Nopalito better than Beretta, there is no reason anyone from SoCal should be eating Mexican food in SF. 🙂
Hahaha… exactly what you said to me!
That’s because it is a scientific fact that Mexican food in SoCal obliterates all that is available in NorCal. I’ve spent 13 years trying to disprove the null hypothesis to no avail.