Loving my CSA

I am loving my CSA. Every other week I get a box filled with fruit in season from Collin's Family Farm in Wenatchee. The fruit quality is A-1, as you can see I start eating it right away. Nothing better than a fresh ripe plum or peach. So tasty and so juicy..and so much better  than those hard golf balls they try to pass off as fruit at Safeway (and other stores). Tdis is my first year in a CSA and most definitely won't be my last!

BLOG REPOST: Eating the dandelion day by day

This week's repost is one I did on the joys of eating dandelion flowers; note Binky, my yorkie, has since passed away but still keep Chile away from Romeo- especially if she is licking her chops!

My apologies to Lord Tennyson. This post is dedicated to Ms. Chile- who advocates eating bugs, rats and god knows what else (keep her away from my yorkie!) - This is but a simple weed flower, that grows in everybody's yard, especially mine- finally something that Everyone can grow and harvest! Y'all welcome to stop by and get all the dandelion flowers you want!

Dandelion Fritter Recipe and a video:

NALC Food drive 2012

Fish Eggs

All my life I have heard how the haute de taute eat caviar and snails. I always wanted to try both. I ate snails for the first time years ago. last night I tried caviar. Didn't like either. Guess I won't be entering the 1% anytime soon!

B-Patch Garden Day

Due to some confusion over dates (officially Kitchen Garden Day is August 22 - I am glad to announce that

August 29th is B-Patch Garden Day
August 29th 2-6 pm at the B-Patch (Burien Community Garden)
POTLUCK Please bring a dish inspired by your garden
DEMOS- Everything from Self Irrigating Planters to Winter Gardening
Fun and Sun at the B-Patch
More info go to the B-Patch Blog

How to Pickle anything (2010 edition)

Wondering how to pickle things? Readymade Magazine has a great article on fresh pack pickling and blanch and seal pickling- pickle everything! Good freshness extenders! My favorite? Pickled Red Onions(Beefmaster) with Garlic!

Bring a Lunch

Click on pic to enlarge

Well august is here... time to start thinking about School! It's also time to start thinking about lunches! You know you will save a ton of money if your kids brown bag it. But what to send those great lunches you make in?
There is always the paper bag. Or the plastic grocery bag (if you want your child to get beat up a lot). Or you can make the decision to give Junior or Princess a neat lunch box that makes a statement. Your kid's lunchbox says a lot about them. I know.

The lunch box that gets you beat up!

From experience (I was the kid who had the nerdy plaid lunch box in elementary school and yes got beat up for it) What was my mom thinking?
If I was a kid today I would want a really cool lunch box. Lunchboxes.com has a lot of really cool choices. From a Jimi Hendrix Experience lunchbox to a Roy Rogers Cowboy Lunch Box . They have metal lunchboxes like when we were kids, plastic Bento Boxes and Laptop lunch boxes, tiffin's, and all sorts of reusable lunch bags.
I like the aforementioned Jimi Hendrix, but also they have a really cool lunch bag from the Kid's Konserve series- an all cotton lunch bag with napkin and sandwich wrap,a couple of snack cups and a stainless steel water bottle. Great for an eco-conscience kid. There are also Gator Tots- a company offering up personalized reusable lunch bags, backpacks and stuff.
Speaking of Bento Boxes, there are a lot of them geared for kids. LaptopLunches.com has a good variety of them. And junior can walk around like a little business person with his or her laptop style lunch box. Kind of a bento box redesigned for kids. I am not against a plastic lunch box, as I assume it will be used over and over but if you don't want to give you precious little person a bpa lunch, (NOTE: Laptop Lunch products are BPA Free) there is an alternative to the plastic bento- Planet Box.com offers a stainless steel laptop box that even comes with different magnetic stickers so little Picasso can redesign his or her lunch box everyday! And the stickers are not just for the planet box... Happy Tiffin has some unusual shaped steel tiffins to make your child (or adult) happy.
As far as lunchboxes, you could also add some extras like Lunch Bots for holding a sandwich or snacks in. I think the one lunchbot for sandwiches at a price of $15 is the cost of 8 boxes of ziplocks-or an estimated cost savings of over $50 during a school year!
A lot of choices out there. But think about it- this is something a child carries everyday. It should say something about who he is. So take some time before deciding to go out and just buying the first lunch box you see when shopping for school. That way your son or daughter won't end up with the stupid plaid lunch box that makes bigger kids want to beat them up.
And think about getting the adults in your household lunch boxes as well. Tomorrow- how to save $$$ on your lunch box!