Green: Eat Like You Mean It!

Too long...

It's been awhile since I've updated this blog. 'Been busy, it seems, with other things. But Green is still cooking, to be sure, with lots of pots set to simmer while we wait for things to develop. 

A primary Green focus has been wholeness, eating with health and life values in mind. Eating Green is about being conscious of what we do and why and how we do it. It's about making connections between body and spirit, food and land, grower and cook and happy diner. It's about being intentional in our lives (...do I REALLY want to put that in my body?!?!?) and in our choices.

Even so, Green is in transition. Like I said, we're still cooking, with no plans to stop any time soon. One of my greatest joys is nourishing people. Making a meal--whether for one or one hundred--offers me the opportunity to provide an enjoyable experience through taste and texture and color and shape and all the myriad elements of what makes good food...good. Feeding you is one of the ways I have to love you, and to offer something of healing and wholesome value to you.

But Green has always been, since its inception, a stepping stone to other places. Beth and I have long held a vision that feeding you in this way now has been a precursor to feeding you in a bigger way later. While we could certainly open up a larger shop and go into "production mode" with our food, that idea does not bring us joy. Instead, it is our hope to one day be able to offer nourishment with your whole health in mind...i.e. a healing or retreat center or centers where you can come and be loved up righteously, body, mind and spirit!

Until then, here's to good eatin'!

A Sweet, Simple Tale of the Bread Pudding That Could...

Confession:  I have always hated bread pudding. While I could always give a nod, even as a child, to the somewhat Victorian romance of a good old-fashioned holiday bread pudding, I fundamentally just never "got" it. Bread soaked in custard and somehow cooked was French Toast. Dessert was supposed to be cake or cookies or maybe pie. Never bread pudding. Never any kind of pudding; I guess I'm just not a pudding kind of gal (now creme caramel or creme brulee is another story all together...yum!).

Even so, I have made myself try many a bread pudding over the years, and always with the same outcome:  Why on Earth would I want to eat it? Fast forward to the intrigues of Green Catering. For Thanksgiving, Beth & I decided to offer desserts-by -order to our school community (and beyond; see order form below!):  pumpkin and apple pie, pumpkin cheesecake with maple toffee pecan topping, chocolate loaf cake with cinnamon cream filling and, yes, a bread pudding. Beth was in possession of a perfectly lovely bread pudding recipe which she made (gluten-free) for me to try.

Now I don't think I actually told her how much, in sheer principle, I disliked bread pudding. But agreeing that it was a rather holiday-ish dessert, I said, "Sure! I'll taste it..." Lo and behold, I actually like it. It wasn't mushy or overly "pudding-y" in the mouth, and had a very nice overall flavor and appearance. But it also wasn't "Wowie! Zowie!" enough to include on our list of holiday dessert offerings. So we decided to experiment.

We knew  that we wanted to create a bread pudding that 1) Could be made successfully gluten-free and 2) would pack a powerful flavor punch. We very quickly decided on the somehow (in our brains, anyway) autumnal flavor combination of apricot-amaretto. Think firm, molded bread pudding laced with amaretto-soaked apricots and raisins and drizzled with an apricot-amaretto caramel sauce.

Thinking it best to have more than an idea in mind before filling holiday orders, we got together on a recent evening to experiment. We went to the co-op for our goods (and to the liquor store for some primo Amaretto which, yes, we did use to make organic Amaretto Sours to serve as our inspiration!), came back to my kitchen, and set to work. We soaked the dried fruits in Amaretto (and a secret ingredient or two!), tossed them into an almond and apricot-laced batter with bread from a local gluten-free bakery and baked the pudding in a ring-cake mold.

After enough time in the oven (and Amaretto Sours and "Girl Talk"), the pudding was done. It looked beautiful. While it cooled in the pan, we whiped up the amaretto caramel sauce. In the end we had us one fine-looking bread pudding ring drenched in Amaretto toffee and topped with sliced almonds. But looks can be deceiving. So as painful as it was to cut into our gorgeous creation, only the "core sample" could be definitive. And it was. Let me just say--and forgive the boasting tone--that I have been converted. The pudding was heavenly:  piquant, zesty, sweet, with a multiplicity of flavor tones on the tongue and the perfect consistency. Who knew a bread pudding could be so good?

To order your Thanksgiving desserts (for delivery in the Twin Cities Metro area only):

_____ Pumpkin Pie $24

_____ Apple Pie $24

_____ Pumpkin Cheesecake w/ Maple Pecan Crunch Topping $32

_____ Apricot-Amaretto Bread Pudding w/ Caramel Sauce $24

_____ Chocolate Loaf Cake w/ Cinnamon Cream Filling $18

All desserts can be made gluten-free or dairy-free upon request. We accept checks and cash only with order; contact us directly to place your order (contact info in the "About" section). Thank you!

What's Catering Got to Do With It?

Indeed, what DOES catering have to do with gastronomic eco-consciousness? To answer that question, I need to back up a bit. As I've written before, I've been feeding people--lots of people--for quite some time now. On a very basic level, people give me money (and satisfaction for my near-pathological need to feed people), and in return, I give them food. Catering. As it happens, the food I have been giving people happens to be healthful, tasty, quality, organic food. Hence, "green" catering, or catering with a conscience. Now Beth is joining me in this delectible pursuit. In the process, we are maintaining the same practices I have held both personally and professionally all along:  We buy fresh and bulk and local and usually from the co-op. Scraps produced in the process of culinary creations are given a second life (veggie scraps to the chickens or rabbits or compost bin; meat scraps to the dogs and cats; leftover bits and pieces worked into meals at home, extra chocolate sauce made into hot cocoa for the kids, etc.) Food is delivered and served on ceramic dishes and retrieved later. You get the picture.

 

On a recent catering adventure (in the photo above; individual dishes posted below), we served up  mushroom caps stuffed with a crunchy parmesan-parsley mixture, mini spinach-goat feta fritatas, jalapeno & red pepper rice balls, tomato-potato gallettes, a simple fruit platter, and gluten-free shortbread, half sprinkled with cinnamon & sugar, the other half drizzed with chocolate. A healthy 98% of the ingredients were certified-organic, and purchased from a certified-organic cooperative retailer. All of which is to say that beautiful, sophisticated food can be healthy, organic, and created in alignment with one's eco-sensibilities.

But there's another level, besides the exchange of good food for money, in which the concept of "catering" comes in to play. When working with a client, the first step is to determine the need:  What does the client want/love/enjoy/need from the food ordered? For whom is the food being prepared?  Wedding guests? Dear friends? A family gathering? One beloved, special guest? What flavors do the clients prefer? What is the intended nature or ambience of the gathering? In what way will the food create, support or enhance an overall experience for the client and guests?

Once the clients' "needs" are determined, it is our job to fulfill the need, in other words, to "cater to" the desires of the client with their satisfaction, enjoyment and well-being in mind. If you think about it, the food then becomes the messenger, and not the message itself. So when Green caters an event, the point is to create an experience that is at once healthful, whole (closely related to "holy," you know!), engaging and beautiful. Such an experience is really about connections, about reminding the body about the spirit, the spirit about the earth, the stomach about the farmer, even though nary a word is mentioned about any of it.

Just as the old adage claims that "the way to a man's heart is through his stomach," we at Green believe that the healthy experience of eco-conscious, healthy, organic and truly beautiful food is one path by which people can reconnect with eachother and bettter enjoy and truly nourish the Self. If we can be a part of such a process with and on behalf of our "clients", it just means more joy all around, even for us.

Happy eating! --Sheila