Another Friday, another Finest Foodies Friday! FFF is a weekly Friday post featuring favorites from The Foodie Blogroll! We do this so we can share in the rich diversity of what The Foodie Blogroll has to offer by featuring some of our favorites and some of yours! What is the Foodie Blogroll? It is the fastest growing blogroll for food bloggers and has become a wonderful community to share ideas about all things food related.

The only requirement to be featured here on FFF is to be a member of The Foodie Blogroll and be displaying The Foodie Blogroll code on your blog.
If you are not yet a member, but you have a food blog and would like to join us, please click here.

If you have a favorite foodblog on The Foodie Blogroll, that you would like to be featured here on FFF, please join us over on The Leftover Queen/Foodie Blogroll Forum, and post your favorite Foodie Blogroll foodblogs here.

Now on to this week’s picks!

One of my new favorite blogs is Cherie from Cherie Picked
She describes her blog as Ethical Recipes Reviews Resources Eating. When I review blogs for The Foodie Blogroll, I always read the about pages. I find it is a good way for me to get to know some of the people in the community and even if we never form a really personal relationship, at least I know what kind of people we have in the community. I was really struck by Cherie’s about page and it made me really like her right away. Maybe it was also because she has one of my favorite quotes on her blog as well, a Cree Indian prophecy: ” Only after the last tree has been cut down, only after the last river has been poisoned, only after the last fish has been caught, only then will you find that money cannot be eaten”. Not only this but she gave her opinions on everything from her favorite foods, nature and politics. Her site features simple and delicious fare with flair – I am noticing a lot of the Northwesterners I have met via food blogging share this kind of flair, and it is in moments like this that I wished I lived there. I think I would find many like minded people.

Next pick of the week is Old Timey Dave from Old Time Cider
Now Cider is one of those beverages that I really love, but I know that I have only hit the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what it is really all about. Cider brewing is a very old tradition and I really enjoyed it whilst traveling in Scotland and Ireland – I could order cider on tap, right next to the Guinness. It was dry, crisp and more refreshing than ciders I have tried here in the states. I always wondered who were the people who actually brewed this golden elixir? Well Dave, for one – his focus is on brewing traditional American style hard ciders. He has a lot of links on his site to educate us all about cider. Something I know I am going to enjoy knowing more about. So go over there and wish Dave good luck when he goes to Cider Academy.

Here is an oldie but goodie – Nina from My Easy Cooking
Nina is a blogger from South Africa and I swear she has the yummiest dishes featured on her blog and she makes them look beautiful always for her photos. Her presentation is inspired and I know that every time I get to head over to her blog (not often enough these days) that I am going to drool. With two children, I can tell that she is a very industrious person – she has some of the most aesthetically beautiful dishes in the blogosphere, and manages to do that while caring for her family. I really admire her efforts. I know that many of you are already familiar with Nina’s blog, but for those of you who are not, you definitely need to pay her and her fabulous creations a visit.

Another new to me blog is Tommi or “Rainbow Brown” from Brown Interior
She is a student who enjoys cooking, baking and everything to do with food. She started her own blog so that she could participate in all the great foodie events that are always being hosted all over the internet. I think it is time she join up with the Royal Foodie Joust!
I am drawn to her blog for the same reason I am drawn to so many others – simple food, that looks delicious and appealing and has some unique touches to it and a blogger who adds a bit of their personality to their posts. This is a very down to earth blog full of yummy goodness!

Last but certainly not least is a blog called Diva:Flava by Lynne.
She describes herself as “Not a writer, but an accountant who loves to cook and tell. I prefer crunching recipes in lieu of numbers” – did I mention she really has a way with words? She begun blogging in 1999, before it was even known as blogging, and as her posts began to focus more on food, rather than daily life, she purchased her own domain name and began this food inspired blog. Her blog is a chronicle and outlet of and for her creative and delicious food. Not only does he enjoy cooking, but she is also a dabbler in graphic design, this is apparent from her website design. She loves spicy and uncommon recipes and foods and her recipes really speak to that passion. It is certainly a blog to check out, if not just for the food, the design and the great writing!

So please go visit today’s picks! When you do, be sure to leave them a nice comment and if it is your first time there, let them know that you heard about them via The Foodie Blogroll Finest Foodies Friday!

In Royal Foodie Joust News: The new ingredients have been chosen and they are as follows:

Apricot
Butter
Ginger

Make sure to get those entries in by 10 PM Eastern Standard USA Time on July 1st!

Eating healthy is a way of life, some may argue that it is a boring way of life. They might say, food is about passion, and that you shouldn’t dumb down that passion through making it healthy all the time. I am certainly one to splurge but I really believe that some of the healthiest foods are the tastiest. For me there is no question of what I would prefer given the choice of a nice juicy marbled steak with Bearnaise sauce or a sushi roll. Who can argue that fresh vegetables from the garden are something most of us look forward to every year?

A list of my favorite foods include cheese, beans, hummus, olives, yogurt, papaya, salads of all varieties, avocados, almonds, artisan bread, ice cream and nice fresh sushi. So for me, healthy does not equal tasteless or boring – to me it equals fresh, unrefined, un-tampered with goodness. “Healthy” means something different to different people. For me, it is about moderation and the above qualifications are more important than calories and fat, calories and fat are natural, they are in everything, there is good and bad and they are important for a balanced diet. For me it is more important that my food is free of chemicals, hormones, additives, preservatives and dyes. So when you think about that, a diet of all my favorite foods fit into my category of “healthy”.

Here is another Leftover Queen classic! It was one of those meals which kind of cleaned out the fridge of Farmers Market finds and the pantry of dry goods . I made this when we were spending a weekend at home and had some time to kill. Usually if we are home on the weekend, we spend one day making and prepping food for the following week. We made bread, ice cream, sauces and usually a nice meal – that will produce leftovers!

When we made this we had some for dinner one night and then the next day, ate it like a cold salad at the beach. It is so flavorful, healthy and full of goodness. This made quite a lot so we had lots for lunches the following week.

This is one of those recipes that you can substitute anything you like. For us, the combination of the shrimp, pine nuts and raisins backed by the curry flavor was amazing! I am submitting this in Ben and Ivy‘s Fat Chefs or Skinny Gourmets event promoting healthy foods. I wanted to show that cooking healthy is a lifestyle and not something that needs a lot of planning to achieve. If you have a well stocked pantry full of whole grains, legumes and whole wheat pastas, as well as a freezer and fridge full of vegetables that have already been washed and are ready to use, cooking healthy is a breeze. You can create awesome stir fries, couscous, hash and healthy pasta and bean dishes in a flash.

Healthy foods are not boring, especially when you are using local, seasonal produce that is at the height of flavor and freshness in tandem with what is already in your pantry.
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It feels like a very long time since I wrote a post about the winners of the Royal Foodie Joust. I guess that is because the two months prior, I handed the job over to Dharm and Ben to host whilst I was away getting married, honeymooning and gallivanting around. But now, I am back to my regular blogging, and so I have to honor of hosting and announcing the Joust winners again.

There have been some nice changes to the Joust since I last hosted. One, due to popular demand, we changed the voting to a peer vote, meaning that only members of the forum, thus other foodbloggers have the opportunity to vote for their counterparts. This has brought many more participants and very stiff competition to the Joust, making the voting so much harder. I wish I could give an apron to everyone for all the beautiful and tasty entries we recieve each time. The Joust is growing like crazy – with over 30 awesome entries this time around!

Next, my friend Ben over at What’s Cooking? has graciously offered to sponsor the Joust, meaning more prizes for the winners! Ben sponsors the Joust from his Tupperware business and it has been a lot of fun!

Last month’s winner was Elle, of Elle’s New England Kitchen. So not only did Elle receive her own personalized apron, and Tupperware prizes, but she also picked the three ingredients for this month’s challenge. Her picks? Raspberries, Limes and Almonds. We had a wide variety of entries – sweet and savory. To check out the entries for this month, and to enter the next Joust, please join us over on The Leftover Queen/ Foodie Blogroll Forum

This time we are a little late in posting about the winner, because we had an unprecidented tie – in all categories – first, second AND third place. So we just ended the tie breaker polls and it is time to post the winners.

Now for the winners:

First place is awarded to Erin of The Skinny Gourmet with her entry of Almond Crusted Shrimp Tacos with Raspberry Pico de Gallo and Spicy Lime Mayo

Second place is awarded to Maybelle’s Parents of Feeding Maybelle with their entry of
Almond Fried Chicken and Raspberry Sweet Potato Waffles

Third place is awarded to CookinPanda from Flextarian Menu with their entry of Raspberry Filled Almond Baklava with Honey Lime Syrup

CONGRATULATIONS WINNERS!!!!

Thank you everyone for participating in this month’s Royal Foodie Joust and making it a huge success, yet again. Please stay tuned for when I announce Erin’s pick of ingredients for this month’s Joust!

(Picture courtesy of earthssweetpleasures.com)

Yes all you chocolate lovers out there, I speak the truth. This is really good fudge from an excellent company. I have had the pleasure of exchanging emails with Reonne otherwise known as the “Choco Mama”, over the past few weeks. She and her husband, Hawk, known as “The Fudgemeister” started Earth’s Sweet Pleasures because although Hawk has been making fudge for 40 years, they wanted something better than chocolate, chocolate that is both earth-friendly and socially responsible. They found themselves among concerned consumers who feel it is important to transform chocolate trading practices through donating generous proceeds from the profits of their business to earth friendly and humanitarian causes that promote economic fairness for cacao farmers and their families. Well done. So, Hawk went to work creating their delicious organic recipe using fair trade chocolate and 2 1/2 years later, after setting up a business, here they are with a line of delicious treats – that are guilt free in a socially conscious and environmentally friendly way! This is the kind of company that people should support. A family business, run with the well being of the world considered in its product. This is a recipe for success.
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Another Friday, another Finest Foodies Friday! FFF is a weekly Friday post featuring favorites from The Foodie Blogroll! We do this so we can share in the rich diversity of what The Foodie Blogroll has to offer by featuring some of our favorites and some of yours! What is the Foodie Blogroll? It is the fastest growing blogroll for food bloggers and has become a wonderful community to share ideas about all things food related.

The only requirement to be featured here on FFF is to be a member of The Foodie Blogroll and be displaying The Foodie Blogroll code on your blog.
If you are not yet a member, but you have a food blog and would like to join us, please click here.

If you have a favorite foodblog on The Foodie Blogroll, that you would like to be featured here on FFF, please join us over on The Leftover Queen/Foodie Blogroll Forum, and post your favorite Foodie Blogroll foodblogs here.

Now on to this week’s picks!

Rita from Mochachocolata Rita
describes herself as “unbelievably cocky, unreasonably annoying, unbearably boring”. It is hard to wrap your head around how all of those qualities can describe a single person. It also gives you a clue that this is a person that does not take herself too seriously and might be a little quirky – qualities that I admire! Rita lives in Hong Kong which I believe is the official or perhaps unofficial food capital of the world. I have heard it said that you can pretty much eat anything there. It is an experience that I would relish and so by reading her blog, I get to experience a piece of that in a small way. All of this things put together in blog format and you can’t get a more interesting read.

Next is Stephanie from A Year of Crockpotting
This girl just loves her crockpot. Her New Year’s resolution is to cook using her crock pot every single day of 2008. Now I really am impressed by this. Think about it, it would be like saying I will use my cast iron skillet to cook every single day of the year. I have no fear of commitment, but, I just don’t think I could do it. What if you are on vacation? Do you have to bring it with you? Stephanie’s dedication to her crockpot is an amazing thing, and because of it, she has come up with lots of tantalizing recipes for this special cooking tool. So get those crockpots out, wipe off the dust and get cooking!

Speaking of amazing and dedicated people there is Marye whose blog is, Baking Delights
Marye is quite the baker, as her blog title could have informed you. In the kitchen she channels her “inner tart” (her words!). But seriously she really is a great baker. Not only that but she has a huge family – multiple children and grandchildren living under her roof, a roof of a house that she and her husband are restoring. Not only that, but she also used to own and operate a tea room. I really don’t know how she does it all, and does it so well. But here is a clue to her secret. In her own words: “Every time I knead a loaf of bread I am aware that generations of women before me have done the same thing, thinking similar thoughts, dreaming similar dreams, praying similar prayers.” To me, that is just beautiful.

Another blog I really enjoy is Cuisine Quotidienne written by Betty.
A native of Olympia Washington who has been living and raising a family in Southern France. Her blog features everyday French food, something that I know way too little about. I am always intimidated by French food and all the fancy names and accent marks. Many see it as the be all, end all in the Culinary world. French chefs seem unapproachable and slightly menacing, looking down their noses at home cooks. But Betty brings it all down a notch, to the basics. She is a home cook, in France, that really gives you the feel for what regular people in France do when it is time to put the food on the table.

This week it is appropriate to feature Elle from Elle’s New England Kitchen. She is the winner of last month’s Royal Foodie Joust and therefore won herself a personalized apron, some nice Tupperware prizes and also the chance to pick the ingredients for this month’s Joust. Elle has been focusing on some of her favorite flavors of the summer and limes and raspberries feature prominently. Her dishes are always fresh and full of flavor and her pictures are something to drool over. I honestly don’t know how she does it, being a mom to 4 kids and 6 pets! If you haven’t been to Elle’s blog yet, it is high time you get there.

So please go visit today’s picks! When you do, be sure to leave them a nice comment and if it is your first time there, let them know that you heard about them via The Foodie Blogroll Finest Foodies Friday!

And in other RFJ news, you still have time to vote for your favorite Foodie Jouster! The polls have been up for a week now, but voting goes until tonight! So go support your fellow food bloggers by voting for your favorite dish. If you are not yet a member of the forum, be sure to register today, so that you can vote in the next round, or perhaps, if you dare, present an entry of your own!

So we are going to go back in time a little with this post. I hope you all don’t mind the time warp this blog sometimes is! It is hard sometimes figuring out when to post what! The life of a food blogger is all about organization…and sometimes the lack thereof.

Anyway, as you all know, the week before our wedding, Anna, Roberto’s mom came to stay with us. She is a food blogger and member of The Foodie Blogroll!

Her blog AnnaGarau.com features recipes from her native Sardinia. It is a great blog, full of wonderful anecdotes about Sardinia as well as beautiful pictures and she is quite the chef. It is in Italian, so if you want to check it out, and I recommend that you do, use one of those handy dandy translators like this translator from Google. You can even watch a video of traditional Sardinian dancing and singing – something Sardinians are known for. When she was here at our house, she was updating that post and we were having such a good time. I was really pleased to be able to have a “private” lesson with this great Italian cook in my own kitchen when she was here visiting us from Rome.

When I ask Roberto about his favorite foods that he remembers his mom making, the first thing out of his mouth is always Involtini or stuffed, rolled beef. However, he is always vague about exactly what her involtini are stuffed with. Out of desperation, once, I made these “involtini” stuffed with sun dried tomatoes, spinach and feta cheese.

They were delicious, but not involtini. So I was thrilled when Anna was here that she was delighted to show me how to make her involtini. She also made these fabulous eggplant patties that were very tasty. I am certainly making both of these again…in fact in honor of writing this post we are having leftover involtini tonight (The day I post this, may not be the day I wrote this…you know how the time warp is…)

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Summer is here and with it comes a fresh plethora of herbs! If you are like me, sometimes you get really excited about that and can’t help but scoop up big bunches of fresh herbs when you see them at the Farmers Markets or the grocery store. Then you end up throwing half of them away after they have sat rotting in your fridge for days on end…well that is just no good. Herbs are a wonderful way to get more greens into your diet and many of them also have other health properties – not to mention they improve the smell of ones breath!

So what does one do with an over abundance of herbs? On a recent trip to the Farmers Market I procured rather large bunches of Arugala, Basil, Mint and Dill. I brought them home, filled up some vases with water, stuck the herbs in the vases and put them promptly into the fridge to use whenever the mood took me. Then, said herbs, sat all pretty in my fridge for about 2 weeks. I had barely touched them. They were still looking pretty good, but I noticed some were starting to take a turn for the worse. I knew if I chopped them in salads or put the mint in iced tea, it wasn’t going to cut it and I was going to end up losing much of the rest. So I took drastic measures. I pulled everything out of the fridge and looked at it on the counter until I figured out what to make with them. Here is what I came up with!
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