Saturday, August 23, 2008

What's in the Box?

Every Thursday I get a box of locally grown fruits and vegetables and a half dozen eggs from Eatwell Farm. Every Thursday I have an afternoon snack: a veggie egg scramble. And every Thursday, the veggie scramble is amazing.


I originally join Eatwell’s CSA program because I knew it would force me cook at home. Before moving to San Francisco, I cooked almost every night. Then I moved within three blocks of Yummy Yummy Vietnamese, Jimisan, Park Chow, Pomelo on Judah… I couldn’t possibly cook with all those restaurants to try. Even after trying all the dining establishments in my neighborhood, why cook when there are other neighborhoods with fabulous restaurants?

The Box worked. Not only do I cook more, the Box forces me to be creative and find recipes to use up the week’s ingredients. It has noticeably improved my cooking skills. Seriously, before the Box I’d never even seen a whole fava bean. And now? I’m a Fava Bean Master.

Yesterday I made my veggie scramble with chard, zucchini, heirloom tomatoes and a little garlic. The vegetables are picked ripe. The zucchini is crisp and the tomatoes so sweet, you hardly recognize them as tomatoes.

The yolks of the eggs are fat and bright orange. The first time I ate an Eatwell Farm egg, I freaked out. I’d never tasted a scrambled egg like it. I immediately cooked a second egg, but fried it instead.
(I have a thing for runny egg yolk.) The rich taste of the pasture raised egg yolk was… well, it changed my life. That was the moment I realized that food produced nearby, in the right way TASTES BETTER!

It is hard to describe the egg thing. You have to try one
for yourself. Just drop by on a Thursday afternoon. I’ll make you a veggie scramble that’ll blow your mind.

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Ode to Oklahoma

I went back to Oklahoma this weekend. My trips home have traditionally been an obligatory visit for family and a few close friends. I would sit through lunches and dinners listening to who got married and who’s having babies, which made me want get right back on a plane to San Francisco - where people wait until a decent age to commit themselves for eternity, if they ever do.

This trip was different. Maybe the novelty of San Francisco is wearing off. Maybe the more I get to know myself the more I realize Oklahoma made me who I am. Or maybe I just don’t know myself like I thought I did.

I spent my few days home with old friends who appreciate Irish whiskey, work in the wine industry, and give me tips on meditation. I was introduced to a great cup of coffee and a damn fine microbrewery. I went skinny dipping in warm lake water, saw shooting stars and enjoyed an old-fashioned Oklahoma thunderstorm – all the simple things I forgot I missed. Not to mention, there is just something about those Midwestern boys.

Although I know I’ll never move back to Oklahoma, it wasn’t such a bad place to grow up. It made me grounded and practical. And now that I think about it, I still catch myself calling it home.

Wednesday, August 6, 2008

and again...

I get bored easily. That might explain why I abandoned my blog after four postings. Or it could be that I’m not disciplined. It’s not that I haven’t been good at life, because I have. I struggle with writing, even though writing is essential to my marketing career (not to mention my journalism degree). I struggle with finding my voice. But in the end, this is just a documentation tool… And there are plenty of good-at-life occurrences worth documenting.

So I try, try again.