Monday, March 22, 2010

HAM RECIPE

Our Berkshire hams are ready-to-eat, so only need warming. Altho they are maple-glazed, this recipe adds a nice presentation and taste experience!

GLAZED FRUIT FOR BAKED HAM

Ingredients:

1/4 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup light corn syrup
1 tablespoon lemon juice
3 to 5 apples (depending on number of people you're serving), cored and cut crosswise ,(this will form rings), into 1/2 inch slices
8 to 12 organic Inari dried apricots

Method:

In a large pot, combine butter, sugar, corn syrup, lemon juice, 1/2 cup water. Bring to boil; stirring , simmer, uncovered, 5 minutes . Add apples; cook, uncovered, 5 minutes per side; remove. Simmer apricots in syrup, covered, 10 minutes. Remove from heat; let stand, covered, 10 minutes.

Place the warmed ham on a platter and arrange the apple slices around it. Fill the holes in the apple rings with the apricots, and serve!


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Tuesday, March 16, 2010

...new products in store this week, more recipes

We are expecting a delivery of fresh-baked BREADS( YEASTED and "Desem" NATURALLY- LEAVENED), BAGELS, PITAS, MUFFINS, COOKIES AND SANDWICH BUNS from the brick oven of INTEGRITY FOODS to be on our shelves Saturday March 20th.

Along with the familiar items, we will have a new bread and new sandwich buns this week.

They call the bread MANITOBA GOODNESS, and want you to know: " The stone-ground organic spelt is grown on the Pollock's farm near Brandon, the hemp nuts grown by Paul Bobbee at Arborg, sunflower seed oil grown by DeRuycks at Swan Lake and pressed in Winnipeg at The Forks by Grass Roots Prairie Kitchen, honey from the Gregory farm at Fisher Branch. It is 98% Manitoba grown and produced. The hemp provides sustained energy - almost 2 teaspoons per slice! It is a dense, hearth-baked bread packed with nutrition. What more does one want in March, Nutrition Month?!"

Sandwich buns are great for a sandwich every day! You can make 1 or 2 servings with one bun. Fill it with your favourite fillings and enjoy! Or slice into small slices for a bread bite with your meal. The long shape makes it really nice for a sandwich. It is about 110 gr. per bun.

Click on Integrity Foods in our producer links, and have a look at their website, which will tell you all about their bakery and products, as well as how to find them for their famous PIZZA NIGHTS in the summer when folks come from miles around for fresh pizza from the brick oven!
We can also carry their pizza crusts, so let us know if you are interested.

We now have a full complement of REAL DELI FOODS from Elman's Kosher Deli Products, a north end Winnipeg family institution for more than 70 years!
We offer their WHOLE DILL PICKLES WITH GARLIC, DELI SAUERKRAUT, PICKLED HERRING WITH ONION IN A WINE MARINADE, HORSERADISH, BEET HORSERADISH RELISH, AND HOT MUSTARD!
Look past the coffee shop, in the cooler by the deli, where these are all kept refrigerated. A real treat.
Click on the Elmans link and find out all about them on their website.

Want Recipes? We have been offering a fantastic ancient grain from South America called QUINOA (pronounced "keen wah") for some time now, in whole grain form, white and red, and also as pasta. No doubt this is something new to our area. There is so much to say for this great organic, high protein, low carbohydrate, GLUTEN-FREE food, which can be cooked in a multitude of ways, some of which we wanted to offer you recipes for, but our supplier can do that much better!
Click on the link to GOGO QUINOA and go to their GREAT website to find out all about the product and check out the huge list of RECIPES they provide.

REMINDER: If you haven't seen the selection of recipes we previously posted on this site, scroll on down to Sunday Feb. 28 posting and there they are.

HAMS for EASTER. A reminder that we now have Maple-glazed, ready to eat hams in the 3 to 4 lb. weight range from naturally-raised free-range pasture Berkshire hogs from Windy Lake Farm, Andy Grift and family.
We are also taking orders, so email us at getreal@xplornet.ca or call the store at 828 -3479, before they are all gone!
We also carry their roasts, chops, ham steaks, ribs, Farmers Sausage, Garlic coil, and a variety of SAUSAGES: Breakfast, Pork, Honey & Garlic, Hot Italian, and
GLUTEN-FREE SAUSAGES: Beef and Pork, Sweet 'n Spicy, Early Riser, Mustard & Basil, and Smoked sausage.

Don't forget, you can instantly contact us with questions or comments by simply clicking on "comments" directly below. Your input will help shape our store!

Wednesday, March 10, 2010

The Case of the Contract Killer


The Case of the Contract Killer

Violetta di Chioggia, Rosa Bianca Solanam melongena, Tom Thumb Latuca Sativa.

Recognize any of these names? Seen any of their faces around recently? No? This may come as a shock, but these are just a few of thousands who’ve gone missing. In fact, they’re on a hit list.

Oh, and did I mention they’re vegetables. Does that make a difference? It shouldn’t.

You see, we humans are accomplices in what could very well be our own demise. We’ve (if not knowingly) allowed a few corporations to whittle down our variety of food crops from thousands to a handful. I can see the mugshot of that herbicide-burping superbug now, chomping down and wiping another crop from our increasing paltry list. No, really, come back to the table and listen – you eat? Then this affects you.

We humans have eaten some 80,000 plant species over time. Now, three-quarters of all our produce comes from just eight species and, as biologist, author and locavore Barbara Kingsolver tells it, the field is “quickly narrowing down to genetically modified corn, soy, and canola.” Our food crops, Kingsolver says, could well make an endangered species list. We are, quite simply, undermining the security of our very own food system.

With genetically modified foods, we’re further undermining the security of that system with crop species being held against their will by a handful of powerful corporations intent on fooling around with their genes. Splicing together traits that aren’t even nodding acquaintances in nature can produce a vigorous plant for one generation, but the next generation is likely unpredictable and has no staying power.

But let’s back up and see how and why these disappearances started. Well, it has to do with the craving for tomatoes (or raspberries) at a time when even songbirds are sucking on dried up dogberries. And it also has to do with advances in long distance trucking. You see, up until the middle of last century, most North Americans were still eating fruits and vegetables that came from nearby farms, which also meant eating in season. Then marketers realized a market for out-of-season produce, like those tomatoes (or raspberries) titillating the taste buds of a society that was getting used to instant gratification. And then those tomatoes (or raspberries) needed larger and refrigerated trucks, and a super highway system to get these aliens to market.

Enter agribusiness into the contract. New breeds of produce were bred so that those tomatoes (or look at any produce at your local grocery retailer) could stand up to mechanized picking, packing, shipping and displaying on supermarket shelves. This uber tomato proved it could go the distance, but a few things got lost in the meantime: like flavour, often pest resistance and, no surprise, genetic diversity. There can, after all, only be one uber tomato, so uniformity and blandness became the trade-off signatures. Long distance travel, says Kingsolver, lies at the heart of the plot to murder flavourful fruits and veggies. Then the agribusiness breeding of indestructible produce ensured a market for tennis ball-like tomatoes. Farmers had little choice but grow what people (thought they) wanted, and seed catalogue offerings dropped more and more old-time trusted varieties. Today, not only plant varieties but whole species have been lost while six companies—Monsanto, Syngenta, DuPont, Mitsui, Aventis, and Dow—now control 98 percent of the world’s seed sales.

There’s a few organizations that are on the look out for Violetta and friends. Slow Food International promotes agricultural biodiversity and has a twist on the save-the-endangered species line. Eat it. To save those rare species, the seed must be grown, plant harvested and eaten. Ditto that heirloom pig.

Closer to home, groups such as FEAST (Food Education Action – St. John’s), Farmers’ Markets and community gardens are springing up across the province, putting local food back on the menu and in the minds of residents.

Bottom line? Come clean. Don’t continue to be an accomplice to contract killing. Eat local. Reject uniformity. Check out grandma’s garden. Dissent. And have a flavourful day.
© Alison Dyer 2009

Alison Dyer is a freelance writer in Newfoundland, and can be found blogging at
www.thesquidink.blogspot.com

Thursday, March 4, 2010

Get Real Local Organic Produce

...from your garden!

The Real Thing. The freshest, cheapest,"local-est" nutritious organic vegetables you can get! The taste you've been missing all winter, and the least loss of nutrients in travel to your table. Its time to start thinking about gardening even though the snow is still on the ground. And in your garden, you won't need the chemical fertilizers and pesticides the industry relies on, so you know just what you're feeding the family come harvest!

The Roseisle Co op is negotiating with a new, more local supplier of organic bedding plants for a sale day at the store. Sadly for us, David Neufeld, Room to Grow Greenhouse in the Turtle Mountains has decided to limit the truck traveling he does to deliver his fine bedding plants to customers as he has done for us for several years now. Good for the atmosphere, too bad for us! We will let you know when a list of plants is available, and the ordering and pick-up schedule.

Actually, seeds travel more economically than plants, and your labour is...well, free! We now have a selection of garden seeds for sale in time for outdoor planting, including bulk corn and peas, as well as seed potatoes and onion "sets". So check your seeds and your plans for this fast-approaching season while there's still time to mail-order for those special, harder to get items.
Some of our favourite garden crops have to be be started early indoors to take full advantage of our short season. We don't all have time or space to start all our own plants, so watch our blog for news from our new greenhouse supplier for bedding plants.
They will supply "open-pollinated" varieties, non-g.m.o., non-hybrid varieties.


If you are concerned with growing "open-pollinated" non-hybridized plant varieties so that you may save your own seeds for next year, it will take a little looking for the seed, as most commercial seed houses specialize in hybrid seeds. These are bred for specific special characteristics like higher sugar, bigger fruit,longer shipping/shelf life etc., but these qualities don't transmit to the next generation , so you will have to buy new seed again. (Here's an extra cost).

If you are interested in traditional open-pollinated varieties, you're looking for what is known as "Heritage" seed, and we happen to have an excellent source for a most amazing variety of carefully collected historical"vegetable and flower seed in our area.
Tanya Stefanec, HERITAGE HARVEST SEED of Carman has an astounding catalog of the world's fine seed variety, many of which have been grown for centuries, passed from generation to generation. Check out the amazing list of tomato varieties, several of which have proven Excellent in the Roseisle area, and will continue to produce year after year from saved seeds!

Look at the website: www.heritageharvestseed.com


"TERM OF THE WEEK": OPEN POLLINATED SEEDS

"Open-pollinated varieties are the traditional varieties which have been grown and selected for their desirable traits for millennia. They grow well without high inputs because they have been selected under organic conditions.

These varieties have better flavour, are hardier and have more flexibility than hybrid varieties. Breeders cannot manipulate complex characteristics such as flavour as easily as they can size and shape.

These seeds are dynamic, that is they mutate and adapt to the local ecosystem, as opposed to modern hybrids, which are static.

Commercial breeders lack the incentive to produce new open pollinated varieties from which farmers could save seed and replant.."

SEE: www.primalseeds.org


For our customers who don't grow a garden, we're also negotiating to get a supply of fresh locally grown produce in the store through the summer-fall season, when we don't need to be trucking in produce from as far away as we do in the winter/spring season!

Comments or Questions?