Gardening!

Nathan and I started a garden a few months ago. Neither of us have any idea what we're doing, despite the fact that I'm an intern at Seattle Tilth (which has been so much fun, and a great learning resource). Our fantastic yard at our house came with two raised beds and a few pots. We enhanced the dirt with chicken manure and got some seeds from Uprising Seeds and Seeds of Change.

A few months ago, we started by sketching out our gardening space and planning out where we wanted to plant different things. Keep in mind that neither of us have any experience with gardening at all. We planted carrots a centimeter apart, onion starts an inch apart, and lettuce in tiny little rows. The chard sprouts were nearly decimated by a slug infestation and we spent hours mulling over slug trapping solutions. I carefully tended plant starts indoors, including a dozen wee tomatillo plants, only to kill them all when I transplanted them to larger pots. (We've since purchased tomatillo and tomato starts and gave up on growing them from seed.)

But now! Success! Our funny little first-timer garden is taking off, and we could eat giant salads 3 times a day since we have lettuce bursting forth in crazy quantities. (Annie's mom asked me to bring a salad to her graduation party last Saturday: thank goodness because I wasn't sure how to use all our lettuce!)

We harvested our first leaves of chard a few days ago and sauteed them with garlic and lemon- they were delicious! We're eating salads pretty much every night (anyone need some lettuce?), and our tiny little carrots are growing away. I'm still nurturing a couple dozen basil plants indoors (pesto!), and our tomatoes, zuchinni, cucumber and kale are starting to take off.

It's really exciting. I feel like a little kid every time I go wander around the garden and see what's poking up. Even though I took tons of biology and botany courses at UW, it's still kind of crazy magical to me that it actually works to poke a seed in the dirt and have something sprout up and then EAT IT!

Adventure to the Chocolate Factory

Oompa Loompa loompity doo, I've got another riddle for you... 

As part of my Food Challenge 2012, I wanted to explore the world of fair trade chocolate. (Who doesn't, really?!) Fremont, a quirky hipster neighborhood in Seattle, is home to the Theo Chocolate factory. I've been treating myself to Theo chocolates for special occasions for a few years and love it- it's super fancy stuff and incredibly high quality, and so, so delicious.


A classmate of mine in grad school started Kallari Chocolate, and I think this is the first time that the importance of fair trade chocolate really resonated with me. She was (and is) passionate about working with cacao farmers to increase their income and get a fair wage for high quality chocolate, all while preserving the environment that the beans are grown in.


It's becoming a better-known fact that large industrial food corporations like Hershey's get their chocolate from sources that use slave and child labor to farm the cocoa. In my opinion (and I hope yours), it's important to be aware of where your food comes from, and I have no desire to support child labor, human trafficking or slavery. (Plus, once you have high quality chocolate like Theo or Kallari, it's pretty clear that crappy chocolate is a waste of calories and money.)


Theo Chocolate is the first organic, fair trade, bean-to-bar chocolate factory in the United States. They source their beans from a variety of regions and roast and process them in the factory in Seattle. This means that the farmers who grow the beans get paid fairly and respectfully. Their chocolate is made with high quality ingredients, and wow! can you taste the difference.


                                        

My mom's new husband, Eric, and I are both big fans of chocolate, so we took a tour of the factory together a few weeks ago. Our peppy tour guide spent the first 15 minutes talking about the history of Theo and what it means to be fair trade, all the while dispensing samples of the chocolate (almond cherry! chai tea! orange!).

I can't remember what this machinery does but it looks really awesome, right?

Then our little group proceded to a glassed in room in the center of the factory. Unfortunately we were there on a weekend so there was no activity. Or oompa-loompas. Or chocolate rivers. He talked us through the process of roasting the beans, making them into a paste, adding cocoa butter, sugar, vanilla beans, and maybe milk, and then we wandered around. The factory smelled like roasted cocoa beans and was really warm (which makes sense, I guess).

The kitchen at Theo Chocolate. I'd LOVE to explore in here! The marble slabs on the right keep the chocolate cool as they're creating confections with it. 

Then we went to the gigantic kitchen, which was my favorite part. Theo makes a lot of chocolate-covered caramels and "confections" on-site, and it was fascinating to see the equipment. The perky tour guide kept the samples flowing. At the end, the sugar-buzzed tour group was deposited in the retail shop and collectively probably spent hundreds on quirky chocolate bars- "bread and chocolate", "ghost chile caramels" and "fig and fennel".

I also don't remember what this was used for, but there's bowl full of chocolate on it.
Tell me... why didn't I go to culinary school??

                             
Eric and I both enjoyed the tour. I actually wish that they'd gone further in depth about the politics of chocolate and what it means, financially and politically, to be a fair-trade chocolate producer, but I guess they have to reach out to a diverse audience and be somewhat accessible to someone who isn't a total foodie. I'd like to return for a tour, but on a busy weekday. I really enjoy factory tours- I like the big machines and watching the repetitive process of chocolates getting wrapped or beer bottles getting filled. I recommend the Theo tour for chocolate fans and Seattleites alike- for $6, you get a decent amount of samples and a pretty interesting, informational tour. And you'll hopefully never go back to eating crappy chocolate.

These gigantic vats are full of chocolate. They're huge- maybe 9 feet tall? 

                           

Strawberry Rhubarb Crumble

One of my favorite uncles is a very picky eater. I've always found it funny, because he's very well travelled and presumably has had to eat strange cuisines all over the world. You'd expect that he would have--at some point--shed fears and dislikes along the way and become immune to unusual flavors and textures. But no, he's still picky- but one of those weird picky eaters who likes peanut butter on everything, including hot dogs. 

But he's one of my favorite uncles, so I can overlook his food quirks. Growing up, I always thought it peculiar that despite his finicky-ness, his favorite dessert was strawberry-rhubarb pie. Rhubarb? Isn't that a little intimidating? Weird? Sour? 

I've come to love rhubarb too, and recently baked a strawberry-rhubarb crumble that my uncle would probably love. Rhubarb, that scarlet, celery-shaped fruit, is one crazy edible plant. It is so unbearably tart on its own, but when it snuggles up with hot strawberries and a generous heap of brown sugar it becomes perky and incredibly flavorful. The hot, buttery crumble on top takes this dish over the edge, and when paired with ice cream... oh my. I ate half the dish (whoops) in one sitting. 

Filling
One quart strawberries, washed and cut in half
1.5 cups rhubarb, chopped in 1" pieces
2T flour
2T cornstarch
juice of one lemon
1/2 c brown sugar

Topping
1 c oats
1 stick butter, melted (yes. one stick. embrace it.)
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 t cinnamon
zest of one lemon
3/4 cup flour
1t baking powder

Heat oven to 375F. Combine filling ingredients, and place in a baking dish. Mix dry topping ingredients in a bowl, then drizzle the melted butter over it, and combine. Sprinkle the topping on the filling, and *important* place baking dish on a cookie sheet, then place in oven. (If you skip the baking sheet, you risk hot bubbling rhubarb dripping all over your oven.)

Top with ice cream for extra bonus points!