A Busy Food Week

Fabulous Mural at Roast House.

Tuesday Part 1: Roast House Field Trip

It's been a busy week in ethical eating.  On Tuesday I took my class to Roast House for a tour and discussion about coffee. They were impressed and we all had a really good time learning about the roasting process and how Deb and Dave choose which coffee to buy and how it meets their ethical and gustatory standards.  I always learn a lot and have a great time visiting them at their place.

Deb and Dave are great educators about coffee and how we can choose better quality coffee that is also more ethical.  I don't know if they think of themselves as teachers, but they are. I really ought to ask them if they do think of themselves that way.

Dave in his element--teaching about roasting!

One of the interesting things I learned has to do with coffee itself.  Perhaps I should have been able to figure this out myself, but I hadn't.  I knew that roasting coffee differently made a differently tasting coffee.  But it really had never occured to me that roasting the same beans in different ways made for completely different but perhaps an equally palatable finished product!  And, I had no idea that a just warmed green coffee bean would smell like a mixture of grass and fresh cut alfalfa.  But it does!

Mubarak, one of my students, asking a question.

Deb told us that part of the reason that specialty coffee prices are going up has to do with Americans buying good coffee.  The demand for the best beans has extended to the countries that grow them making those beans in far greater demand.  Coupled with some bad weather in coffee growing regions, expect prices to go up.  Given that--find some place that sells a good product and buy direct from them if you can.  And when I say good -- I mean at minimum fair trade (farm to cup or relationship is still to be prefered I think), organic and shade grown.  If you are in the Spoakne area--check out Roast House.  They even sell in Yokes now!

Tuesday Part 2: Spokane Regional Health District Meeting

Tuesday night I headed pretty much straight from class to a meeting sponsored by the Spokane Regional Health District.  It featured Jeremy Smith, author of Growing a Garden City, a wellness consultant, an economist interested in sustainable food and a presentation by the Heath District on the information gathered in their food assessment of Spokane county.

Smith was entertaining and inspiring.  I even bought a copy of the book which he inscribed "To Ellen, Keep Growing! Jeremy."  A simple sentiment that in the quest to educate about sustainable, ethical food, means a awful lot of things.

But the information that was the most important and disturbing came from the Heath District.  I knew things were likely to be bleak--too many kids living in poverty without good access to fresh food, too much fast food available, etc.  But food deserts in Spokane county?  Really?  We grow so much food here.  A food desert up in Green Bluff where there are all those farms, orchards and u-pick places?  It breaks my heart.  The USDA has defined "food desert" (like so many other important terms about food) in a really complicated way.  But the idea is that there are some areas where there are no grocery stores.  People therefore do not have reliable, easy access to fresh, healthy food.  They USDA now even has a "food desert locator" where you can put in your zip code and see if that region qualifies. 

Wednesday: Farmers Market

Went to the first Wednesday market of the season to get some produce for cooking in class on Thursday.  Chatted with my favorite farmers, bought some rhubarb for the crisp, some fresh parsley, onion, and zucchini.  For myself I bought some leeks, radishes and peas.

Thursday:  A great mail day and Cooking with Class

Good Mail!

Thursday's mail came early, or was it Wednesday's I never picked up?  In any event, I got two cooking magazine's, a spice catalog and some other nice mail and no bills!  I've looked through them all and there are some great ideas for things I have never made or haven't since last year--cherry clafutti and a coffee granita look so good!  (A coffee granita with Roast House Batzchocola?  How good does that sound?)

I am going to cooking this weekend even though it is already busy, I just know it!

I ran to the co-op to get a few things for my class's cooking adventure--I needed canned tomatoes and olives, vegan "cheese" and some margarine.  The mushrooms and summer squash looked so good that I picked some of the up and a red pepper.  The vegan pizza came out really well, except for some reason that bread dough for the crust required a lot more kneading and working than it has in previous makings.  Thankfully I had a student who really knew how to work with it and was a great help. He even explained to the other student working with the dough what he was feeling and when to change his approach.  It was like having a pizza dough teaching assistant!

alma mater.

Phew.  Is the week over yet?  Well, Fridays I have off so, sort of.  But I have a couple ethical eating ideas in the works--one given to me by a student who asked about the chocolate in nutella.  And much to my surprise, it appears that making a nutella type spread isn't too difficult and with more ethical ingredients, I think I can make that student's day!  I'm planning on testing it out first, though.  More on that later!

Nature's First Green is Gold

It may be a week into June, but spring has been long coming in the Inland Northwest.  I was reminded of the poem "Nothing Gold Can Stay" by Robert Frost tonight as I was making two salads for tomorrow.  One for lunch and one for dinner.  After teaching class and our field trip to Roast House Coffee, I am heading across town to a meeting about our local food community sponsored by the Regional Health District.  I'll surely have interesting things to say on both the field trip and the meeting.

I have been loving my salads recently, but likely only because they are the first salads of the season.  They really aren't very interesting or colorful.  The salads I made for tomorrow have red leaf lettuce, cucumber, English peas, roasted asparagus and leftover oven fried chicken.  The chicken is the only thing that isn't green!

I am hoping that soon there will be more colorful veggies to be adding to the salads, but that of course will mean the end of the asparagus and phasing out of the peas.  The seasons within the growing season do march on.  As I do more reading about local food and sustainability and the critique of the local food movement, I am struck once again that eating seasonally is a better compromise on a lot of these issues.  I eat locally because I want to eat more intentionally, more seasonally, even though it is often difficult being an urbanite as I am.  I have more information about my food this way, and that is reassuring to me given my food values.

Nature's first green is gold--as we anxiously await the green coming into our lives as leaves on trees, lush grass and good food, we are reminded that there is something bigger than ourselves that has a memory into the past and will stretch out ahead of us long past our lives.  The green that indicates the beginnings of life will eventually fall away, as the title says, "nothing gold can stay."  There is a life cycle at work both in our own lives and the plants and animals we eat.  We can't forget that.  Frost's words are a very nice way of reminding ourselves of this fact of life.

"Nothing Gold Can Stay"
           by Robert Frost

Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.

Dining for Dollars Part 2

So, it's hump day now. And how well have I been doing eating ethically on a budget? With the exception of yesterday, pretty well I think.

Monday I had coffee and yogurt for breakfast (total $1.05). For lunch I had some of the soup I made on Sunday, but I forgot to bring any cheese for a garnish (total $1.29). As a snack I had two tiny, Italian plums (the kind that dry into prunes) that were organic and local bought Saturday at the farmers market ($.60). Dinner was some left over pizza from Sunday (total $1.61). Daily total--$4.55.

Yesterday,well, my breakfast was the same--coffee and yogurt (total $1.05), but for lunch I was invited to the Jesuit Community at school to talk some shop with a new teacher and last night I had dinner out at a local brew pub with a friend (cost with tax and tip, $15.00). This is a bit of an aberration and not typical for trying to eat on a budget (although maybe there is such a thing as a free lunch).

Today was much more typical. I had my coffee and yogurt breakfast. It's still my Roast House coffee and local yogurt without any artificial colors or sweeteners (total $1.05). Today for lunch I had soup with chips as garnish (total $1.29). For a snack I had some homemade trail mix made with local apples I dried last fall, some nectarines I dried a few weeks ago, some dried unsweetened organic coconut and some walnuts. I have to do some estimating here since I can't remember exactly what I paid for those Green bluff apples last October. I am guessing it's around $1.50. Dinner tonight (since I am actually typing this while on a conference call board meeting and soon will be making dinner while at the meeting, too!) a garden burger (bought on sale, $.83) on an organic whole wheat bun ($.62), with home made french fries from Olsen farms potatoes ($.50). I'll use some organic ketchup ($.24) and some mustard (negligible) and some sliced tomato (grown by a colleague in his garden, thanks Doug!). Total -- $2.19--that's dollar menu prices at a fast food joint, but for much healthier local food. Not bad, if you ask me. For the day that comes to $6.03. That's less than half my dinner out from last night.

Dining for Dollars and Making Sense

An old high school friend, Allie, has been reading my blog (thank you!) and she asked about eating ethically on a budget. This is something that my college students ask about, too. And something that is important to consider as eating ethically concerns everyone and poverty issues about food and food security are not immune to consideration here.

So I made myself a challenge--this week I am going to write about ethical eating on a budget and post some recipes that can be done ethically easily and for low cost. This is not about compromising quality or ethics and I'll still be eating well.

I started on Sunday, and this meant prepping ahead for the week. I did some cooking on Sunday that will carry me through much of the week. This is a necessity for me during the academic year if I want to eat healthy, ethically, and less expensively. I know a lot of single professionals who eat a lot of take out, which gets expensive, and honestly, I would rather buy good quality ingredients and shoes than spend all my money on take out.

One caveat before I post my recipes and cost calculations for them, I am not a math whiz. So, if you find an error, let me know and I will correct it.

Sunday Breakfast: Coffee and Waffles
Roast House Fair Trade, Organic Shade Grown Coffee, bought on sale at the Main Market Co-op at $7.99, minus my member discount. I weighed the beans and it came to 1 ounce, so it was $.45 for the pot.

Waffles--I used to be an avid Bisquick user, but now I make a homemade version of Bisquick. This does involve using some less than ideal ingredients on occasion, but I can use local flour.

The recipe for the homemade "bisquick" is:

8 cups flour
2 tablespoons baking powder
1 tablespoons salt
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups dry milk
2 cups shortening

For waffles, 2 cups of this mixture ($1.20)
1 1/2 cups organic milk ($1.08)
1 local egg ($.50)
1 tablespoon oil ($.05)
1/4 cup local oatmeal ($.10)
1/2 cup chopped walnuts ($1.50)
1/4 cup organic shredded unsweetened coconut ($.50)

Served with local butter ($.12) and real maple syrup bought on sale ($.29), comes to $.45 per waffle. If you skip the nuts, etc, in the waffle mix (reduce milk to 1 1/3 cups), the cost comes down to $.29.

Not bad even if you have two waffles.

Sunday Lunch: Pizza
I admit, I love pizza. And I love it even more if it is homemade. Something about it reminds me of good childhood dinners. I have written about making pizza before, so this will be a bit quicker.

The pizza I made had a mixture of local white and wheat flour for the dough, organic crushed canned tomatoes, whole milk mozzarella from the co-op, some Parmesan, and a collection of red peppers, pappadew peppers and pepperoncini. About a dollar's worth of flour, a negligible amount for sugar, salt, oil and yeast, but let's put a price tag of $.35 for all of it, likely the yeast is the most expensive part. Cheese came in at $2.05, tomato sauce at $.42 (I buy organic tomatoes by the case--I used to do it at the local grocer's case sale, but will do so now at the co-op), and assorted peppers $1.00. That's $4.82 for the whole pizza by my estimation. It serves about 3, so we're talking $1.61 per serving. Again, not bad.

Sunday Dinner: Chicken Tortilla Soup
Weirdly, the first time I had chicken tortilla soup was when I was living in Minnesota. I went to a Christmas time soup party. We made two kinds of soup and ate and everyone got to take some soup home. It was like a cookie swap for soup. I have no idea what the other kind of soup we made was, but this one I really liked and have been making and modifying it ever since.

I love making soup, too. It is great to take for lunch to school. I am always the envy of those who are having canned soup in my department. It can be healthy, is a great way to eat your veggies, and by making it yourself you can adjust the sodium level a lot. Plus, making soup is economical and makes a lot of servings. This recipe makes 12 1 cup servings, which could be lunch and dinner for a single person for most of a week. I tend to make several kinds of soup over several weekends freezing some so I can have different kinds for lunch during a week.

Ingredients:
1 chicken breast, organic, ($3.50)
32 ounces organic, free range chicken broth ($2.00) on sale
16 ounces frozen corn kernels ($1.99)
can of organic black beans ($1.29)
organic, local onion ($.75)
organic local red pepper ($1.00)
lime ($.39)
2 cans fire roasted organic tomatoes ($2.78)

Comes to $1.14 per serving, with garnishes of organic corn chips and cheddar cheese (another $.30) it's $1.44 per serving.

That means for Sunday my meals cost $4.40. That's about the same as a medium flavored latte on campus. That really puts it into perspective, I think.

Eating ethically on a budget does require some forethought and some planning. It requires some time in that I have to cook myself and not rely on prepared, processed or packaged.

I'll be back later in the week with some more about how my ethical eating on a budget goes this week and where I likely faltered some! Happy eating!

Coffee Talk

This morning I visited a local coffee roaster, Deborah Di Bernardo, at Roast House Coffee. They are doing some really great things there with coffee. Beyond fair trade, Roast House is developing what is now being called "relationship coffee." The idea is that fair trade is great, but if you can get to know those who are growing the coffee, guarantee them a place to sell it season after season, help them figure out how to grow coffee in the best way for them, for the environment, for the market and for taste, even better.

Over half a cup of a new blend and a cup of their Guatemalan blend, we talked ethics and coffee and food. We talked sustainability, making small different choices that lead to big differences, and the best ways to educate gently about the choices we all make. We even talked a little philosophy as Deborah told me how she thinks of things and my response was--that's Aristotle! And we talked like only two Italian American women from northeast cities can talk -- a hand gesture here a polite interruption there that leads to the fullness of conversation.

Deborah told me that some of the people they buy from used to grow their crops, come down from the mountains to the streets and hope someone came by to buy from them. That's just not sustainable--people have to be able to make a living. Growing coffee is hard work, it's hot work, too. Relationship coffee takes some of the risk out of the endeavor for the grower and that is a good way to support the value of the work. These are people growing this coffee and they are trying to eek out an existence on it.

The coffee from Roast House is the private label coffee for places like the Main Market Co-op and other local restaurants and shops. It's organic, meets standards that are higher than fair trade, and shade grown. This coffee is what I call "trifecta" coffee. "Shade grown" is just starting to get into people's coffee vocabulary. A lot of places where coffee is grown were clear cut to put in the coffee trees, but that is completely unnecessary and reduces the habitat for birds and other creatures that make for a balanced eco-system. It also means the workers spend more time in the blistering sun. So the concern over shade grown is one of the environment, one of animal welfare, and one of working conditions as well. And as a student wrote in an essay on her final exam, we should look for fair trade organic coffee, and if you want to be a "super star" shade grown, too.

I guess that makes Roast House a super star!

Thanks much to Deborah and Dave of Roast House for their hospitality this morning. It was a delight. (And thanks for the cups of coffee to get me through my grading, the good conversation and the beans, too!)

If you want to learn more about Roast House you can find them at www.roasthouse.net.