Monterey Market

A friend of mine told me that this market was the best in the area, and I have to admit that I was hesitant to go. I've been by there many times (the Berkeley Horticulture Nursery is right across the street), but I'd never ventured into Monterey Market. I frequent Berkeley Bowl West and Trader Joe's and farmer's markets when I can. But farmer's markets often aren't open past the early afternoon, and that doesn't always work with my schedule. But the Monterey Market is open 7 days a week, and they have great prices. My little brother graduated from high school yesterday, and for the party my mom asked me to make a veggie tray and salsa. I also just wanted to get some produce for our house. I bought four brown paper bags full of produce for $35, and that is quite a deal, especially for really fresh, flavorful produce!

That $35 included almost four pounds of tomatoes for $3.50, which is much cheaper than any

grocery store or even most farmer's markets.

Here's a shot of the veggie platter:

Birds

The birds have eaten all of our seeds and seedlings, but they shall not keep us down! Tomorrow, I will be replanting when I get home from work. Luckily, our "summer" goes till October in the Bay Area, so I can still start the tomatoes and real summer veggies from seeds. I will post another blog tomorrow, with pictures of our new set up!

Spring

I have decided that I love Spring. I planted sugar snap peas in November, and this spring they have taken off! Pat and I munched on them the other night while we were making dinner, and they are delicious!

I found another good way to use andouille sausage. I chopped half an onion and sauteed those it with the sausage in the wok, while we made whole wheat pasta. We had some tomatoes that were starting to get soft, so we cut them up, and threw those in the wok too. It was pretty yummy.

Planting Day

Last week Pat and I both had Spring Break, so we did some planting! We did most of our starters, using Coco Fiber and Dot Pots from Runka.

We have tomatoes, melons, peppers, radishes, turnips, bok choi, and lots more. We went to Orchard Supply and bought a plant light and put it in the terrarium, and some of the seeds have already sprouted. I'm pretty excited about them!

Yay!

Foodin' #2

Sometimes, I get bored of chicken. Like, really bored of it. We seem to eat a lot of chicken, since it is an easy item to cook, healthier than other meats, and cheap. Emphasis on the cheap part. I like to buy the whole "broiler" chickens, and break them up if I don't want to use a whole one (I learned how to butcher a chicken here). If they're on sale, I'll buy a few, butcher them, and freeze them in packets of two breasts, two thighs, etc. I've found the cheapest place to buy them is Trader Joe's. You can't really beat $1.99/lb for a humanely treated chicken, but I do admit that I will buy the Foster Farms chickens from Safeway when they're $.77/lb.

But like I said, sometimes I get bored of plain old chicken. So I've been buying the chicken sausage that they have at Trader Joe's ($3.99 for five sausages) and Raley's ($3.99 for four sausages). Trader Joe's has a great mango chicken sausage, and they had samples of it prepared with a ginger mango chutney and plain couscous. I got some that night and made it for Pat, and we both really enjoyed that.

Last night, I went to Raley's on the way home from school. I was looking for something easy and healthy to make, since Pat and I have both had midterms this week and are feeling the pressure this week before spring break. I found some chicken andouille sausage by the Raley's Full Circle brand, collard greens, and crimini mushrooms. I grabbed some garlic bread and headed home.

This was my first time with collard greens, although I am familiar with swiss chard, since we have it growing in our backyard. I decided I would cook the sausage in a little bit of water in the wok, just to get the andouille flavor into the water that I was going to use to essentially steam the collard greens. I par steamed the collard greens, put them aside, and then continued to cook the sausage, with the mushrooms, until they were pretty much done. Then I added the collard greens back in to really get them nice and limp, how I've had them before in restuarants. The result was quite delicious, and took about thirty minutes total.

Pictures

The Terrarium

The part of the backyard we aren't really going to use,

complete with Hank, the "dolpharoo" sculpture.

Our old potato/tomato pots.

Some beans growing on the left,

the compost pile in the far right corner,

and our herb and greens section on the right.

And, we need to do some weeding, but this is what the backyard looks like now. It's been raining almost every "off" day that Pat and I have had recently, but we're excited for the summer!

Foodin' #1

I already talked about our farmin', now it's time to talk about about the foodin' part of this blog (although, fair warning, I may put some things about my art on here too). Pat and I are both big foodies, and we really enjoy going out for meals, but we also enjoy cooking and eating in. I have four sisters and three brothers, so growing up, I learned from my mom how to cut costs on food. So to start off the food entries, I'll give you my recipe for black beans.

I modified this recipe from the New Deli's recipe for black bean chili (minus the chili). I started making this recipe on one of my many vegetarian stints, because, at that time, it was hard to find good vegetarian canned black beans (especially any like this more refried version). Now, a lot of stores sell refried black beans, but I still prefer the flavor of these ones, and the fact that I can control what goes into them (no, thank you, lard). And let me tell you, they are so much cheaper! The recipe is a pretty big batch, so I make it (and sometimes double it) and portion it into 1/2 or full cup servings, saran wrap, and freeze. When you want blackbeans for your tacos or burritos or whatever, just grab a portion out of the freezer and defrost. It's super easy.

what you need:

1 pound dried black beans

2 tablespoons oil

1 large onion, diced

3 garlic cloves, minced

2 tablespoons ground cumin

salt to taste (I sometimes leave the salt out till I reheat it later)

what to do:

Presoak the beans. This makes the cooking time shorter, and allows the beans to cook more evenly. You can either soak them with an inch of water above the beans overnight, or do the "quick soak method." To do this, place the beans in a pot and cover them well with water. Bring water to a boil and boil for a minute or two. Turn the heat off, cover, and steep one hour. Drain the water out, and the beans are ready to cook.

Heat the oil in a large, heavy pot. Add the onion and garlic and cook for five or so minutes, until the onion has wilted.

Add the drained beans to the onion/garlic mixture, along with enough water to cover by 2 inches. Add the cumin and bring to a boil. Reduce the heat to low and simmer, uncovered, for 3 hours or longer, until the beans are very tender. Stir every once in a while, and make sure there's enough water. Add the salt in the last 1/2 hour.

A couple of pointers on this recipe:

• sometimes I use butter instead of oil (like when I forget to buy oil) and it adds a different richness to the flavor.
• don't cover the beans during the 3 hours, unless you want a really soupy bean concoction. Believe me, it happens.
• to "simmer" the beans for that long, you really need to leave the temp on medium or a little lower.

Also, the cost of the two or so pounds of beans that this yields is roughly $3. Enjoy!