I work hard everyday to make this day Greener in my household than the last. It is a constant struggle between convenience and doing what I know is better for the earth. This year I have made a commitment to my local farmers by purchasing over 75 % of my food items from the Farmer’s Market and changing my recipes to suit what is available seasonally. I am still as committed as ever to using leftovers and not throwing away food AND taking less trips to the grocery store because of it.

I recycle like crazy – people call me the “recycle nazi”. I use recycled paper products when I use paper products – but mostly use cloth napkins and placemats for eating. I ration paper towels and plastic bags – rewashing them for later use. I use environmentally friendly cleaning products. We have even stopped eating non-organic meats and have cut way down on meat intake altogether. I am a self-professed Tree-Hugger, no I am NOT a hippy or flower child – though there is nothing wrong with those labels, they just never really fit me.

I get asked a lot why I went to college to study Native American studies. Being a white anthropologist comes with its baggage, but for me, it was not about learning about “the other” it was about me needing to learn from Native peoples how we can better take care of the earth. It is something I have always been passionate about, but not something ingrained in our culture, so I wanted to go to the experts.

I have always respected and it has always resonated with me that Native people have a spiritual and environmental approach to the way they look at the earth, which cannot be separated from each other – they go hand in hand. It has always been the same for me as well. The earth is our mother, we cannot own her and we should not ravage her – we should be more considerate about how much space we take up in the world – or we will have no world left to take care of. This does not mean we all have to become militant about being Greener, but just being conscious about it and doing little things in our daily life to make our imprint on Mother Earth a little smaller. Small changes can make a big difference.

So today, in honor of people who are doing their part, I want to feature my Top 5 Green Blogs – these blogs are managed by people who are doing what they can to look out for our Mother Earth – through the food choices they make, how they prepare their food and how they purchase it. I commend them for their conscious effort to make the world a little Greener. So go check these blogs out – get ideas, and that can be your one step closer to Green-ness TODAY!

First there is Eat Here Now. This blog focuses on eating locally and sustainably. The mission of the blog is to bring awareness and understanding that there are social, political and environmental factors to what and how we eat. Not only does it give you a more cerebral take on food, it offers up some yummy recipes that you can feel good about preparing!

Food Revolution: This blog is relatively new and currently having some technical difficulties due to a change in blog hosting – but please go check it out – it is a great concept for all of us foodies and we can all learn something – how to make a food budget and really stick to it – buying only what you really need and trying to make that food last! It causes you to be really creative and really think before you buy! When you purchase food with this concept, you can’t help but eat healthier!

Food Stories: This is a great blog all about the experiment of eating seasonally and really doing only that. Many studies relating to health show that having a seasonal diet is better for you, because it is genetically what our bodies are looking for. I love that this blog because behind it is a second philosophy – food as a celebration. Good food tastes good too!

The Year of Eating Seasonally: The philosophy behind this blog is, the fresher the food, the better the taste. It all came from eating a strawberry fresh, when it was in season, and getting so excited about the concept that when foods are in season, they taste better. This experience launched a whole experiment – to see if food is really better seasonally and if one is stuck eating only cabbage in winter. It is also an experiment to learn more about the hunger gap – if you eat what is only in the ground that season, is it really that bad or do you really feel deprived or hungry? Very cool stuff. Her family is going to learn so much about the environment – I think it is great to raise kids this way!

Then there is, Straight From The Farm. It is all about living in an urban area, but still committing to eating locally, or straight from the farm. In this blog you get the perspective of the farmers as well as those that support them by using their food exclusively. It is a wonderful project and so inspiring!

And here I need to honorable mention Judy, from No Fear Entertaining. Over the past several months there has been a HUGE transformation in Judy and the focus of her blog. She has been frequenting her local Farmer’s Market as well – and has made a commitment to eating locally. I feel a special bond with Judy, because not only are we both Florida girls, but we both started this journey around the same time. We get inspired by each other’s bounty and the dishes we make from our finds! So way to go Judy! You Rock, Girlfriend!

I am so honored and pleased to announce that I am being featured in this month’s (March 2008) issue of Yogi Times Magazine!!!

It is a Los Angeles based Yoga Lifestyle Magazine and they contacted me to create a meal out of leftovers and staples for their Yoga Yummies Section in this month’s issue focusing on abundance. Roberto did the photo shoot and I created the recipes and made the food! It was a great joint effort. So thank you very much to Yogi Times Magazine for giving me this wonderful opportunity. I want to especially thank Nicole over there who interviewed me and wrote the article. It was such a pleasure to work with them and to speak with Nicole on the phone.

Healthy eating and lifestyle is something that is very important to me and of course the use of leftovers is paramount in my cooking philosophy. So it was so great to be able to bring these two things together and create a whole new menu from that inspiration.

And of course I must formally thank Roberto for his help and his beautiful photography and PATIENCE and for being my partner in everything!

Hope you guys enjoy the recipes!

To read the feature and see the recipe for
Spicy Carrot Soup click here.

For the Potato and Spring Onion Frittata recipe, click here.

For the Chai Spiced Bread Pudding recipe, click here.

To see more of Roberto’s awesome photography, check out my gallery page.

HUGE FOODIE BLOGROLL UPDATE!!!! PLEASE READ IF YOU ARE ON THE FOODIE BLOGROLL!!!

Well in the past several months 2 things have happened consistently that brought me to a major decision regarding The Foodie Blogroll and its fate. Number one, I have been wanting to use it as a better tool for community building. As I have said before, this is the first blogroll for foodies and we are over 1000 members strong. We have a forum, where we hold a monthly event – The Royal Foodie Joust and it has been so great getting to know all the world’s foodies better. I have started showcasing the best of the best of The Foodie Blogroll each Friday in the Finest Foodie Friday installments. But I want more community! So Roberto and I have been working on a way to make this possible. We went through several different ideas, but finally decided to give The Foodie Blogroll it’s own home: www.foodieblogroll.com. In the upcoming months we will be making this more user friendly. Right now, as Roberto puts it, it is a skeleton.

Why did we do it this way? Well lately we have been having trouble with blogrolling.com our hosting company for the blogroll. I think it is just too big for them to handle! I was getting a lot of complaints from members that the blogroll was slowing their blogs down. So we knew something had to be done immediately. Unfortunately with our wedding coming up in just weeks, we knew if we gave the Foodie Blogroll its home NOW, it wouldn’t be all we hoped, but it was better than nothing and would make life easier for all the members. So it was the lesser of two evils.

THIS IS WHAT YOU NEED TO KNOW:

1)The blogroll html contains only 3 links now: a link to join the blogroll, a link to foodieblogroll.com where the entire list is being hosted and a link to the forum. If you have altered the html code I originally gave you, at all, none of these 3 links will show.
So please put the entire foodie blogroll code as it was originally sent to you in your sidebar template. I promise it will not take a long time to load three links! Also, now that we are doing all this maintenance we are visiting lots of blogs at random to check that the proper URLs are in use, if you joined The Foodie Blogroll but are no longer displaying anything about it, you will be removed from the blogroll.

2)The blogroll list is spartan at best right now and if you are one of the first 150 blogs to join the blogroll, it was before, Roberto, computer whiz, created the foodie blogroll database that I now use to do everything I need to maintain the blogroll. This means that your blog will be (temporarily) in the W section (for www.) – since we had to import all of your blog info from a word document I was using in the beginning to track members – something that proved very hard to do at 2 AM this morning. So I apologize for this inconvenience, but it is better than slow loading time, right????
I promise this will be fixed soon – but we have to go in and manually change it all – something that wasn’t happening early this morning.

However, this is the bad news. The good news is that in the coming months www.foodieblogroll.com will be full of great features. Each member will have their own customizable page – where you can include a picture and there will be stats to show you how often you blog is viewed through the blogroll. You can also chose a subcategory that best describes your food blog so it will make it easier for people to find you, when they are searching for something specific. There will also be a section showcasing random blogs from the blogroll, something many of you from the second half of the alphabet expressed an interest in. Right now the page features the last 10 blogs that have joined introducing all of you to our newest members. These are random right now, because we had to imput those 150 first blogs last night, with today’s date – so now you will see old favorites and later the newest. So it is going to be great – but at the present time, due to personal obligations, I am not able to give you all that I hoped straight off the bat. I do apologize for that. That is not how I like to run things.

So you asked and we delivered! Boy Genius and I have given The Foodie Blogroll a new home so that your pages will load faster while still supporting the blogroll and reaping all the benefits of being part of this diverse, original and unique community of food bloggers!

So I hope everyone will be okay with this temporary solution. We will really do the best we can to get the total package up and running for you guys as soon as possible! Thank you so much for our understanding and support through all of this and I am very sorry for any inconvenience!

Since this is taking up all the room in the house today, I am not going to showcase the Finest Foodie Friday today – I don’t want to steal their thunder will all this Foodie Blogroll stuff. But stay tuned next week, I will feature my Top 5 Favorite Green Blogs!

Have a great food filled weekend everybody!

Well it is that time of the month again! Time to announce the winners of this month’s Royal Foodie Joust!
Last month’s Joust was won by Heather of
Gild The Voodoolily . So she not only won her own personalized apron but she also picked this challenge’s 3 ingredients: Pork (or Barley), Citrus (any kind) and Pink or White Peppercorns. Every month this challenge gets bigger and better with the contestants bringing their best and most creative energies to the floor! If you are not familiar with this event – 3 ingredients are chosen by the previous month’s winner. All the contestants must use those 3 ingredients and any other ingredients to create a new signature dish. We have had some very creative entries each and ever month!

So if you have not joined us in the past, please stop by the forum today and sign up, so you can participate as well and get our chance to win the Queen’s Favor and your own personalized apron!

Now for the winners:

In FIRST PLACE we have Valli of
More Than Burnt Toast with her succulent and tender Citrus Spice-Rubbed Baby Backs Ribs.

Valli has been a participant in the Joust since its earliest days and came this month with a real knockout! Everyone’s mouths were watering with her entry! Way to go Valli! Well deserved indeed!

In Second Place we have Michelle aka Us vs. Food from Thursday Night Smackdown with
Five-Spice Pork Tenderloin with Blood Orange Gastrique and Carrot-Squash Puree

A real show stopper, with beautiful presentation! Great job!

In Third place we have Allen of
Eating Out Loud with his Pork Adobo.

Allen is new to the competition but wowed everyone with his use of the ingredients! Thanks for participating Allen and we’ll see you in the next Joust I am sure!

My thanks to all the participants – everyone did a great job and I hope to see everyone in the next addition of
The Royal Foodie Joust!
To see all the entries, click here.

Click here for more information on how you can participate in this month’s event!

I love polenta – it is total comfort food and a great base for a variety of vegetables and great with tomato sauce and cheese. My favorite way to make polenta is with sundried tomatoes, olives, cheese and spinach-  put it in the fridge until it gets hard, dust it with flour and pan fry in olive oil. Served with a hearty tomato sauce it is really one of the best things to eat. This time though, I didn’t feel like frying the polenta. I wanted something lighter but still comforting and flavorful, so I decided to use the polenta rectangles as a base for lasagna. It was really good and something I will certainly make again.

This is also my contribution to Marie of Proud Italian Cook and Maryann of Finding La Dolce Vita ‘s Event: Festa Italiana. All Entries due March 22nd. Please click on either of their links for participation guidelines!
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