New News is Good News

One - Illustrated Wild Foods Calendar Giveaway!!
A lovely local blog called Are You My Ghost? is having a calendar giveaway and all you have to do is post a comment and you may be picked! So awesome, so easy. Thanks Renai! Ends Tuesday afternoon, December 22nd.

Two - Its gift time, and it's almost 2010. It is time to move these babies! - The Illustrated Wild Foods Recipe Calendar is on SALE. At the farmer's markets or online on the Nettletown Etsy Shop - 2 calendars for $20! Now you don't have to wonder if you should get one for yourself when it buying as a gift for someone else! Just do it, someone once said.

Three - Emily Counts and I have put our friend powers together and formed an alliance of lovers of time, art, and food. Please join our The Illustrated Wild Foods Recipe Calendar Fan Club on Facebook!!! TIWFRCFC for short. I am kinda tired of typing out the name of the calendar, what were we thinking!?!

And a final blurb that really isn't news - A special thank you to all of you who have supported my calendar venture and this lil' blog called Nettletown. In this new year arriving soon, we hope to get better and bigger and to grow under the the warm wing of your continued interest and support!!!

This Week at Foraged and Found Edibles 12/12

It has been a week full of glorious clear days, intense winter sunsets, and .... icicle temperatures. Unfortunately these crispy frozen days are not the best for mushroom season. Frozen mushrooms are not to fun to pick. Once it thaws though we should see some new growth.

We do have chanterelles this weekend and will be starting a special on the the Wild Foods Calendar. It is also a good time of year to stock up on dried mushrooms. They are nice to have around for impromptu soup and stew nights warming up by the fire. Keep your eyes peeled for a tasty dry mushroom soup recipe coming soon on Nettletown.

This weekend at the market
Chanterelles
Recipe Calendar Special - 2 for $20
Frozen White Truffles

I just started a fan club for the calendar on Facebook - please join us!
The Illustrated Wild Foods Recipe Calendar Fan Club

Also check out these two recent articles by local food writer Rebekah Denn.
This is someones writing you should follow if you haven't already found her. In my opinion she is one of the best local food writers with more focus on regional local food producers and politics, and less on the restaurant fluff. She wrote an award-winning article a number of years ago about Foraged and Found and Jeremy that really blew me away. "Out of the Woods - Forager Faber is a Master in the Wild" from the ol' PI. It drew a accurate picture of the business from field to restaurant and she truly captured Jeremy's nutty personality.
Rebekah has a great blog -eatallaboutit.com

One short and sweet and one long and thorough -
"Washington Businesses Break Ties to Industrial Food Chain"
Seattle Times
Very interesting article about local food producers and their challenge to source high quality food and to know where it is coming from. A few of them were hit by the massive countrywide peanut recall and had to rework their systems of procurement and production. Caveman Bars, CB Nuts and Snoqualmie Gourmet Ice Cream are featured.

On the lighter side....
"Is there a better word for "foodie"?"
The Christian Science Monitor Blog
I have always struggled with this word myself. It is such a stupid word but it happens to perfectly encompass exactly what many of us are.

This Week at Foraged and Found Edibles 12/4

a small amount of matsutake available today!

Truffle time! Jeremy is digging the first black truffles of the year out on the Olympic peninsula today. It is time for moist truffle-y scrambled eggs and creamy cauliflower soup with shaved truffles lightly floating the top. Technically the prized local black truffle is called an Oregon black truffle but patriotic tendencies toward our home state trumps the rival state name. We call it by where the geographically correct hole in the ground is - Washington. Dug in Washington or Oregon it is still a Leucangia carthusiana- a prized underground fungi with complex musty aromas and a hint of sweet pineapple. These little earthy lumps are love/indifferent affair - you either understand the lump and it hits you right in the gut with an aromatherapy-taste bud tango or you shrug your shoulders and wonder if you didn't get the memo.

This weekend at the markets -

Chanterelles
"Dug in Washington" Oregon Black Truffles
Cranberries
Come early for these at U. District Market-
Hedgehogs
Matsutake

This Week at Foraged and Found Edibles 11/27

Note to West Seattle customers - We are no longer at the West Seattle markets until the Spring. Come see us in University District and Ballard through the winter.

Sometimes, post holiday it can be hard to get excited about cooking again any time soon. You just put in long hours in the kitchen and most likely the tupperwares are stuffed to the brim with leftovers. Turkey sandwiches are the likely five day forecast. Lots-o-leftovers are a fabulous excuse for creative transformation. How about turkey chanterelle noodle soup with Moroccan flavors like cumin and cinnamon or turkey chanterelle shepherd's pie with the gravy and mashed potatoes. Cranberry sauce, toasted walnut and ice cream parfaits sound good. Or what about fried turkey and mushroom risotto balls with cranberry sage aioli?! Well... maybe not.

This weekend at the Farmers Market

Chanterelles
Cranberries

CRANBERRY CRAZY!!!

cranberry quince chutney

To celebrate the cranberry harvest and Thanksgiving I have three cranberry recipes for you, including two using raw cranberries. Raw cranberries are extremely healthy. High levels of antioxidants, antibiotic properties very helpful for those with urinary tract infections, and a preventative measure for kidney stones are a few of this autumn berry's nourishing ways.

Cranberries are native in North America and were used by indigenous peoples for food, dyes, skin treatments, and preserved in pemmican. They have been popular for Thanksgiving meals for centuries, and as a juice since the 1960's thanks to Ocean Spray, a cranberry cooperative started in the early part of the century. They are in the genus Vaccinium along with fellow bush berries, the blueberry and huckleberry.

Washington State is the 5th largest supplier of cranberries, many of them being made into juice and Craisins by Ocean Spray. In 1919 the first cranberry farm was planted in Grayland (7 miles south of Westport) and this still is the center of cranberry farming in Washington. On the stretch along the Pacific between Westport and Tokeland the area is called The Cranberry Coast. Thirty percent of cranberry farms in Washington are located here. There is even a yearly Cranberry Harvest Festival and a self guided Grayland bog driving tour available on the Westportwa website. That driving tour would be a great combo trip with some razor clamming out at Grayland Beach State Park.

Most Washington cranberry farmers sell directly to Ocean Spray. It would be nice to see some of those cranberries being directly marketed to local consumers. This year was the first time Foraged and Found Edibles has sold cranberries at the farmer's market. In the past we have picked just enough for personal use. We harvest them in a old overgrown bog in Grayland next to our friends house. Before all this farming cranberries grew wild all along the Pacific Coast and were utilized extensively by the local natives and then the settlers when they arrived. There are still different varieties of cranberries growing in the wild, just a little harder to find than in the past.

a cranberry bog in grayland

Many cranberry preparations call for large amounts of cane sugar to balance out there sour and bitter flavors, unfortunately this greatly lessens their healing properties. I have been trying to increasingly use alternatives to conventional sugar in my cooking. These recipes take advantage of fruits and honey to sweeten the berries. Apple cider is one great sweetener that is easily available to us in the NW.

Cranberry Walnut Vinaigrette

This recipe is inspired by a salad in Starting With Ingredients by Aliza Green. I am not usually a fan of fruit vinaigrettes but this sounded interesting. The bright pink color is not the most appetizing for food but it does taste great. Serve with bitter greens like endives or in a carrot slaw with dried fruit. I ended up nibbling on it like dip with treviso, sliced raw cranberries and chopped walnuts, yum.

1/2 cup fresh cranberries
1/3 cup walnuts
1 Tbsp chopped shallot
1/3 cup olive oil
1/3 cup walnuts
1/4 orange juice
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
3 Tbsp honey
salt and pepper

Place all ingredients in a blender and combine until smooth.

creamy pink yumminess

Raw Cranberry Ginger Relish

This easy sauce is great with Thanksgiving turkey or with roast game. And so good on leftover turkey sandwiches. Add some chopped walnuts right before serving if desired. With walnuts it reminds me of haroset served at Jewish Passover meals. Adjust the dates and honey to your sweetened desire.

2 satsuma oranges, washed, halved, and seeds removed
6 - 8 medjool dates, pits removed
1/2 tsp fresh grated ginger
2 cups fresh cranberries
2-4 tsp honey, maple syrup, or agave syrup

Place satsumas, dates, and ginger in the work bowl of a food processor. Puree until fine. Add cranberries and sweetener and pulse to chop until medium-fine but not a paste. Alternatively toss all ingredients together and run through a meat grinder. This gives it a great texture. Let sit at least one hour for flavors to combine.

Spiced Cranberry Quince Chutney

I adapted this sauce from my own recipe in the 2010 Illustrated Wild Foods Recipe Calendar for Evergreen Huckleberry Chutney. It goes with out saying - this is turkey dinner material. Also a perfect candidate for a holiday chutney cream cheese roll.

1 cup small diced shallots
3 tbsp olive oil
1/8 tsp salt
¼ tsp ground cardamom
¼ tsp ground allspice
¼ tsp ground clove
¼ tsp ground black pepper
1 cinnamon stick
1 ½ cups small-diced quince (about 1 med quince)
2 cups apple cider
3 1/2 cups cranberries, fresh or frozen
3-6 tbsp of honey

Sauté shallots in olive oil over medium-high heat until they begin to lightly brown. Turn heat to medium, add salt and spices, and cook for a few more minutes, until spices are fragrant. Add quince and apple cider; bring to a boil over medium-high heat, then turn down and keep at a simmer. Cook for about 15 minutes until quince is tender. Add cranberries and 3 tbsp honey and cook until berries pop, about 20 minutes. Taste and add more honey if too tart. Let cool to room temperature to serve, or store in refrigerator for up to one week.

Thanksgiving and This Week at Foraged and Found Edibles 11/20

Thanksgiving means family, friends, and celebrating the American cornucopia. Though many Thanksgiving food traditions have steered away from seasonality (green bean casserole), it still is at its core a harvest celebration. I love to hear about different traditions within families and regions of the US. I think it was James Beard who said - if you tell me what you eat for Thanksgiving I can tell you where you are from. If in New England the feast may include mashed carrots and rutabagas, from the South it may be scalloped oyster saltine casserole, sweet potatoes, and pecan pie. Here in the Northwest wild mushrooms, winter squash and apple pie are common.

There is a very interesting article on Slashfood about the decline of shellfish, specifically oysters, in the Thanksgiving repertoire. Pre 1950 it was a mainstay on holiday menus, but with the decline of the oyster harvest at that time and rising prices over the years it has been pushed to the back burner. With our oyster bounty in the Northwest we are perfectly poised to bring back this tradition - oyster stew, oyster Rockefeller, oyster dressing! - all of these would fit into the turkey dinner feast.

My family's Thanksgiving menu doesn't stray to far from the classic dishes, though over time the traditions change and evolve with the times and tastes in our ever expanding family. We play a bit with turkey seasonings, the salad, the cranberry sauce. Brussel sprouts are a addition in the last couple years, but my mom doesn't like them so we had a vote to keep 'em in or not. Brussel sprouts vs. my Mom - brussels won.

The Choi family menu- sherried pumpkin soup with croutons and chives (this is something my Grandma always fed us earlier in the day while we waited for the feast), roast turkey with herbs, chanterelle gravy sometimes with truffles, plain gravy (for the mushroom haters!?), mashed potatoes, brussel sprouts with lemon, shallots and hazelnuts, dressing with chestnuts, green salad with persimmons or pears, cranberry something (I like to play around with different recipes, two recipes for cran sauce coming soon on Nettletown), pumpkin pie, pumpkin cheesecake. This year I am going to make that southern scalloped oyster casserole too, with the pre-shucked oysters from Taylor Shellfish to make it easy. And maybe it will become a new Choi family tradition.

Tell me what you have for Thanksgiving!

This weekend at the Farmers Market

Chanterelles
Cranberries
Frozen white truffles
Frozen Mountain huckleberries
Matsutake - small amount available at the U District market

Also on Saturday from 3-5pm I am doing a calendar signing at Eat Local on top of Queen Anne. There also will be live music in the store from Pro Musica.

Also, this may be our last weekend at the West Seattle Market. Our harvest is dwindling and it is hard to support two Sunday markets. We may be at the one or two more before Xmas though.

This Week at Foraged and Found Edibles 11/14

We have some exciting stuff this weekend. Finally some black trumpet mushrooms and really ripe and beautiful cranberries from coastal bogs. These sweet cranberries would be great in a raw cranberry relish.

It is pretty much over with the porcini season but our mushrooms were featured in a Design Sponge recipe with pictures by local photographer Lara Ferroni yesterday. Check out the Porcini Mushroom Tapioca here.

At the markets this weekend -

Chanterelles
Black Trumpets
Hedgehogs - just a bit available early at U District
Watercress
Cranberries