What Julie Ate

What happens when you send your good friend Tara in Colorado some earrings that you made so she can wear them in the photo for the book jacket of her upcoming young adult novel, The Delicious Double Life of Gladys Gatsby?

I’m sure you ask yourself this very question all the time.

First she wants to send you money. And you’re like no, just no. And then she’s like, “I’m going to do something.” And you’re like, “Okay sure, Ms. Nonspecific.” And then a box arrives in the mail AND IT IS FILLED WITH FOODS OF COLORADO. Like a Foodie Penpals package you didn’t sign up for.

Awesomesauce! So many neat things!

I got foamy whipped honey from the bees of Boulder County, which are obviously the best bees, and the salsa made by the descendants of Japanese immigrants. This salsa sounds supercool. Apparently the Japanese immigrants 100 years ago found chile peppers the same texture as seaweed, so they made a really hot salsa to sell decades later to the descendants of Jewish immigrants.

She also sent Love Grown apple walnut granola and Union Station sesame sticks, ginger pastilles and lemon sour candies. There is a fruit leather that’s really a fruit-and-veg leather. (!!!!) And a giant candy cane which is supposedly 100% natural, deriving its red color from  - no, not crushed beetles – but caramel color (okay that sounds unnatural), red beets, red cabbage, turmeric, and something else I forget. It make me want to make a giant mint chocolate dessert so I can crumble it on top.

There were wasabi rice chips made in California – aka “ew, not-Colorado” – but they were free samples, so all is forgiven. And there are fancy potato chips that I left a my office because they wouldn’t fit into my purse. (Long story.) I may actually give those to my boss, who is constantly offering me potato chips in his office.

Finally we finish up with a Celestial Seasonings tea sampler, which is totes perfect for me because I love samplers, sampling, sampletons, and other comparable made-up words. But also because I made  loads of herbal iced tea in the summer and this is great for that.

Would anyone else like some jewelry in exchange for amazing foods? My goodness! I feel like I got the amazing end of the deal!

The table, prettily set.

A couple of my friends told me they like Twitter more than Facebook, and I have to say, I was a bit incredulous. Before I got into it a few months back, I thought of Twitter as the place where people overshare the most mundane moments of their day. (A la “I just tripped over a rock! Boy am I clumsy! #whocares”) And there’s plenty of that, but I’ve also found it a great way to connect with a community of like-minded people who you don’t know, and in some cases, actually meet them in real life.

As I began to follow more Philly foodies, I have actually learned about food events and activities, from the Philly Food Swap and Foodie Penpals to one-off events like Alexis from Teaspoons & Petals hosting a Japanese Green Tea 101 class. Alexis is an honest to goodness tea consultant, with certifications from the Specialty Tea Institute. Back in the stone ages, I wrote an article about a tea business and learned a little bit about tea, but I have always gravitated toward black tea rather than green. I thought this might be a fun opportunity to learn a little more about the grassier side of tea, so I signed up.

Goat cheese, chocolate, and shortbread

Each of the three teas we tasted – sencha, genmaicha, and matcha – was paired with a goat cheese. Randomly and delightfully, the woman next to me turned out to be Madame Fromage, who has a new book out about cheese.

And now the maddening part of this blog post: I am not going to tell you about the teas or the cheese. Madame Fromage did that quite well in her blog post, which you can read here. Alexis was really knowledgeable and interesting, but I decided not to scribble notes as she spoke. I felt as if I should, but I just didn’t want to. After a long day at work, I just wanted to be in the moment and enjoy the sensory experience. What I learned, I learned. I’ll retain whatever I was meant to retain.

So green is my sencha

I am one of those people who inhales my food. It just feels like an inevitability: a plate in front of me demands to be eaten. But this tea tasting was different. The teas took a few minutes to steep. And we would just have to sit there and wait.

Oh, hello, genmaicha. How nutty your toasted rice puffs taste.

This tablecloth is so cool. What is “honeybush”? 

Imagine if my finger hasn’t been in front of the camera lens. Just imagine.

And after sipping a green tea, we got a green light to eat the cheese with it, noting how the flavors play off of one another. Oh the restraint! I never eat like that. While part of it was torture, another part of me was delighted by being forced to savor each bite of rich food. I do think I enjoyed it all more as a result.

Salad with oranges, goat cheese, and matcha dressing

We finished off the class with this matcha dressing salad, the recipe for which you can find here. I’m not a huge matcha fan, but I liked it more in this dressing. Alexis sent us home with matcha and genmaicha samples, so I will definitely make this salad some time soon. And I will wolf it down. I never learn.

As much as I enjoy fiddly and/or labor-intensive food projects, I have always stayed away from fermentation. What a bother, I thought. Making pickles? Just use vinegar. Homemade yogurt? Why bother – buy it in the store. But as with many things, all that bother isn’t much bother at all if you have a little knowledge.

Having none myself, I turned to Amanda, who runs a great blog about fermentation called Phickle. She also teaches fermentation classes. I was — and still am — keen to try her kimchi class, but the best fit for my schedule was her fermentation basics class, in which we learned about lacto-pickles, a type of Finnish yogurt called viili, and sourdough.

Completed lacto-pickles

Amanda gave us some of her finished carrot, turnip, and green bean lacto-pickles to try, and it was a major eye-opener. They have a salty, tangy complex flavor, yet they were simply vegetables in plain salt water when she started six weeks ago. Often I skip eating pickles because of garlic mouth, but lacto-pickles can easily be made garlic-free. There is nothing difficult about making them. And they’re yummay!

Future pickles

The Gentleman agreed to come along to the class, which was supercool of him. These are our jars of vegetables in salt water, along with some celery seed and juniper berries. Right now they’re sitting covered in my living room, covered by cloth napkins, fermenting away. In two weeks we’ll have pickles!

I like everything spicy, so the one with the jalapenos is mine.

I liked Amanda’s opening statement, which is basically this: bacteria is your friend. It is everywhere. Our bodies have waaaay more bacteria than cells. To hate bacteria is to hate yourself. All of this is to say that we should not worry about eating fermented food. When they’re spoiled, you will know because they look gross and taste gross. Really, really gross.

Amanda talking about fermentation. The Gent thought I should take this photo. I thought it was sort of grim lighting and composition, but here you go – a faithful chronicle of the event.

I have never been a big fan of sanitizing or living hermetically. I know that bacteria really are everywhere. I ride the city bus. I cuddle my dog, whose paws walk the streets of Philadelphia. I seldom use nasty chemical cleaning products. And guess what – I rarely get sick. You just gotta live. And the microbiome of our guts are being shown more and more to have major effects on our health. Diversity is good. So even without knowing the science behind it, I am totally on board with the idea of consuming more bacterial flora. Ferments help us do that.

[Stepping down from soapbox.]

Viilianous

Next up in our lesson is viili, an ancient Finnish secret. Smear this stuff in a bowl, add milk, cover at room temp, and 24 hours later you have yogurt. Awesomesauce. Amanda gave us each a little viili starter in a jar, so on the way home from class I went out to buy some local whole milk in a glass bottle. I will begin making it tomorrow. (I normally only have Lactaid at home, which won’t work since the viili starter ferments lactose. That fermenting should help reduce the lactose, which is good because the Gent and I are both lactose intolerant.)

Viili starter – our take-home.

Finally, we moved on to sourdough. My brain was already whirring with how I was going to keep my viili starter alive – you have to feed it once a week. So the idea of doing the same thing for a sourdough starter made me feel like I was taking on the burden of houseplants, something I have long known not to do. Not even the best of intentions can prevent plant death at Chez Julie.

My take-home jars, sourdough in the foreground

I’m not huge on breadmaking, nor really on bread eating, so I don’t think I’m going to bother keeping the sourdough alive for too long. But I’m at least going to keep feeding it until I have enough to make one loaf. Give it a shot. I like the idea that this is Philly sourdough, that the bacteria in Philly will take over the starter in short order, no matter where the starter originated.

What a great bit of food knowledge to have in my arsenal! I am far from an expert, but I feel like I got the basics down to the point that I’d feel comfortable venturing forth on my own with it. Thanks, Amanda! Great class.