Eye on Williams: Sustainable Food Garden
Saturday morning at Williams was sunny but chilly. No less, it was a pleasure to have seen our schoolmates at work constructing a vegetable garden outside Parsons. Perhaps with hope, when they have their first yield in May, I'll be able to cook something with it. Here's a link to sustainable food at Williams; you'll get to see on a map of where some of our food comes from.
Also, do consider attending the lecture at 7.00 p.m. in Brooks-Rogers on April 20th, Tuesday, by Josh Viertel, President of Slow Food USA, co-founder and co-director of the Yale Sustainable Food Project.
For similar events relating to our community this week:
The Future of Living in the Northern Berkshires (Wednesday, April 14, 7.30 p.m., Griffin 3)
Michael Curtin: Fighting Long-term Unemployment, Hunger, & Poverty (Thursday, April 14th, 7.30 p.m., Griffin 3)
Dining Hall Specials: Microwave Simulated Stir-Fried Vegetables (season 1, episode 6)
Load up on your vegetables and try to avoid salmonella with this easy-to-make dish. Plus, if you like your vegetables stir-fried like I do, you'll be happy to have this when you've hit your tolerance for raw salads.
[Recipe]
Dining Hall Specials: Microwave Simulated Stir-Fried Vegetables (season 1, episode 6)
[Watch the episode]
Ingredients
Vegetables from the salad bar.
(Mainly romaine/iceberg lettuce. Some onion and mushrooms if you have them.)
Oil
Salt
Lee Kum Kee fermented black bean paste, optional
(if you add this, go easy on the salt, or no salt at all)
Cost: None, if you are on a meal plan at school. If not, it should be <$1.
Instructions
- Take 2 plates and a soup bowl, add vegetables to the soup bowl.
- Coat well with oil and add some water if necessary.
- Microwave on high for 3 minutes. The trick to avoid scalding yourself is to use the plates to sandwich the soup bowl, thus providing a cool surface to move your setup in and out of the microwave.
- Add salt to taste. Stir and serve.
Broth-Cooked Napa Cabbage and Water Spinach (season 1, episode 3)
Forget about simple salads or stir-fries. Here are some vegetable dishes with a twist.
[Recipe]
Broth-Cooked Napa Cabbage and Water Spinach (season 1, episode 3)
For broth-cooked napa cabbage
[Watch the episode]
Ingredients
Chicken broth
Napa cabbage
Oyster sauce
Dried scallops
Garlic
Shiitake mushroom
Cost: <$5
Instructions
Pre-cooking:
- Soak dried scallops over night in cold water (just enough to cover it; not too much water or you're losing all the flavor). Squeeze scallops to remove excess water before use for dish.
- Soak dried shiitake mushroom, for an hour or two in cold water (or 20 mins in hot water, or one-and-a-half minute in cold water put into the microwave).
Cooking:
- Preheat wok on high, remove leaves from cabbage, rough rinse (you can choose to cut the cabbage into smaller pieces, depending on how you would want to present them).
- Add garlic to the wok, when it is turns golden, add cabbage pieces, give them a rough stir. (I added the leaves all in the same direction, and stirred them without disturbing that arrangement; purpose is for ease of removal and beauty in presentation afterwards.)
- Pour in chicken broth, add rehydrated scallops and shiitake mushrooms.
- When broth is boiling, cover, and let simmer (turn flame from high to low or medium low), from anywhere between 10-30 minutes, depending on how soft you want your cabbage.
- Serve with some broth in a deep enough dish, finish with oyster sauce laced lightly on the surface of the vegetable. The dried scallops and mushrooms are meant to be eaten.
Note: if you want to make it a standalone dish, add a piece of chicken thigh, or strips of chicken breast thinly-sliced on top of the cabbage just before you cover it to steam. The meat depending on type and size takes anywhere between 10 to 25 minutes to cook.
For water spinach with fermented soy bean sauce
[Watch the episode]
Ingredients
Morning glory (water spinach)
Chinese fermented soybeans (In my sauce, I used those that come in little cubes in a glass bottle. In Cantonese, say to the storekeeper: FOO--YU'I [drag out that "e" sound]; in Mandarin, FOO-RUUH)
Garlic
Cost: <$4
Instructions
- Soak the vegetables for about 10 minutes in water (the vegetables, if from Asia, are bound to contain pesticides. I like to play it safe.)
- Cut into 3-4 inch segments, keeping the stem and leaves separate because the stems require about 1 minute longer to cook.
- In a preheated wok, add garlic, when golden, add stem and stir a little.
- In a bowl, add 2 cubes (or to taste when you're used to it) of ferment soybean. Add water and mix to create a watery sauce.
- When the stems are cooked (look for it turning into a luminous green), add the leaves, give it a quick stir (10-15 seconds), then add in the bean sauce. Cover and let steam for under 1 minute.
- Serve. (salt only in absolutely necessary, the fermented bean is itself salty)