With any class I teach, I fully anticipate being asked a question that stumps me. Siona was one of my brightest students and challenged me to stretch my brain into an area where logic and knowledge meet up and battle for answers. It was during one such class when Siona asked if we could make vinegar.
When I was in elementary school, my mom packed my lunch every day. I wasn't one of those kids who glamorously got to wait in line for a hot lunch; I was the one with a grease-stained paper bag. On the very rare occasion, my mom would pack up a yogurt cup. I favored the kind with sweetened yogurt on top and jam-like fruit on the bottom.
By now, we know that the Pacific Northwest is an absolute cornucopia of farm fresh produce, so when I stumble on a new fruit or vegetable at the farmers market, it's a thrilling occasion. Last year I stopped in my tracks when I passed an unadorned table at the Broadway Farmers Market simply piled with big wooden boxes and a small bowl of cranberries.
In many states across the country it's time to get the winter garden going, if you haven't already. Late summer begs for cool loving crops that are quick to grow. For anyone starting now, smaller leafy greens are your friend.
Seattle cook, author and urban farmer Amy Pennington convinced us to skip the tried-and-true approach and roast our rabe instead. Twenty minutes in the hot oven softens the stalks and chars and crisps the leaves, lending the rabe an eye-opening combination of flavors and textures.
Skip the usual suspect of pickled peppers and try your hand at a batch of hot sauce. Homemade hot sauce can vary in heat from make-your-eyes-water hot to a more mellow burn. Adding fruit to hot sauces sweetens them up, and gives them a well-rounded appeal.
Come summertime, when the air is hot and the sun is high, everyone comes down with a little case of tomato fever. Today we present tomato tips and tricks, from pruning for maximum yield to easy DIY trellises.
Using All of the Crops You Grow
These DIY projects -- plant markers, milk crate planters, wine box planters, and more -- will both tide you over AND make your life easier during busier times.
Coveting your neighbor's herb garden? Grab a pair of clippers, "borrow" a clipping or a root, and grow your own plants -- no seeds required.
Shrubs aren't just good for topiary-they're drinkable! Amy Pennington's simple recipes combine fruit, herbs and vinegar for refreshing and traditional syrups that make outstanding summer beverages.
This is the eleventh in our biweekly series from Amy Pennington on how to start growing your own food, no matter how tiny your garden-to-be is. Today: Growing potatoes couldn't be easier -- as Amy explains, it's all in the bag. Literally.
A Washington state law allowing the sale of home-baked goods has been in place for nearly a year. So why haven't local bakers been able to take advantage of it yet?
This is the tenth in our biweekly series from Amy Pennington on how to start growing your own food, no matter how tiny your garden-to-be is. Today: Whether your balcony is bathed in sun or swathed in shade, Amy has the ideal plants for you to grow -- tomatoes, lettuce, herbs, you name it.
This is the fifth in our biweekly series from Amy Pennington on how to start growing your own food, no matter how tiny your garden-to-be is. Today: For those of us without garden space, Amy coaches us on the path to container gardening.
Asian greens, in particular, do very well in our climate as most are cool-season vegetables and can tolerate overwintering in much of Western Washington. While names and spelling can be confusing there are a few key features that distinguish one plant family from another.
Pioneer Square window shoppers can now peruse art, antiques, and the mushroom farm that has popped up in the storefront of architectural firm, Olson Kundig.
DIY vinegar project! Making your own vinegar at home.
The World of a Nine-Year Old Pastry Chef.
Starting today, Amy Pennington -- urban farmer, founder of GoGo Green Garden, and author of Urban Pantry and Apartment Gardening -- will be writing a biweekly column for FOOD52 on how to start growing your own food, no matter how tiny your garden-to-be is.
Add both color and flavor to your depleted pantry with Amy Pennington's carrot jam and spicy carrot pickles.
Sick to death of kale? You can still eat a seasonal, varied winter diet in the Northwest. Here's how.
Fall is cranberry season in Washington, meaning that, for once, these tart little berries are in easy local supply. Here's how to preserve them this holiday season, as a rich little relish with toasted pecans or in a tangy fruit salsa.
You might know Amy Pennington. She's a Seattle-based food writer and gardener, and her current apartment is her first and only place she has lived on her own. After a house fire that destroyed everything she owned, Pennington settled in to a small one-bedroom apartment in the heart of Seattle and never left.
Forget the well-being of chickens. Sustainable meat keeps you (and everyone else) healthy. Why and how to eat organic, grassfed meat without breaking the bank.
The late-ripening quince provides us with the last canning opportunity of the year. Amy Pennington's recipe results in two delicious outcomes: a fragrant syrup, and a rich fruit paste.
With the boom of the Northwest's local food movement, a new kind of vacation has emerged. More and more farmers are converting spare rooms into guest rooms, and offering city-dwellers a taste of farm life -- chickens and all.
Words of wisdom from a local green thumb for gardeners looking to extend their harvest into the fall months.
Amy Pennington suggests a pair of savory spreads, including a spiced tomato jam that she's been bragging about for months.
Eastern Washington farmers are increasingly worried about agricultural invasion from Monsanto's unwanted genetically modified and patent-protected seeds, which can threaten a farm's organic status and land them in court. Now a national coalition of independent farmers is fighting back.
Playing with apricots, creating an herbal jam and a savory mostarda.
It's too early for fruit, but the perfect time for blossoms. Amy Pennington shows you tasty things to do with elderflowers and maple blossoms.
Amy Pennington reaches past the state borders to put a little citrus-based warmth in the pantry.
Amy Pennington is never one to pass up a party-especially when that party brings together the movers and shakers of Western Washington's young farmers.
Welcome to soup season. Amy Pennington explains how to easily fill the freezer with homemade stock.
Autumn Martin might be the sweetest thing in the Northwest: She launched Hot Cakes Confections--take-and-bake molten-chocolate cakes she sells at farmers' markets--in 2008 and just started a nonprofit workshop that makes chocolate truffles and donates them to homeless shelters and food banks. Her take on the sweet stuff...
Tomatillo Salsa & Concord Grape Jelly -
Midsummer canning is about more than just jam. Amy Pennington gets the juices flowing with brandied cherries, mulled plums and a fragrant chamomile cordial.
Spring has Sprung! Get in the Garden With the Kiddos.
Excerpt from Urban Pantry, published April 2010
Reinventing Comfort with Chef Mark Fuller.
Chef Craig Hetherington of Taste Restaurant.
2,000 years of melons and one very bad joke
Amy Pennington confesses to stalking the ice cream man and suggests that the future of dining lies on a bus.
One man's dream works backwards and ends up forward-thinking.
Sitting atop a batik Persian tablecloth on the kitchen table is an earmarked book, New Food of Life—Ancient Persian and Modern Iranian Cooking and Ceremonies by Najmieh Batmanglij. The book is a bible in this home and Yvette Leland can’t loan it out for more than a few days—it makes her nervous.
Alternative Energy Fuels Food in Seattle.
Pierce County’s Emergency Food Network Provides Farm Fresh Food to Those Who Need it Most.
Give a girl a carrot, and she eats for a day. Teach a girl to garden and you feed her for a lifetime.
