December 3rd, 1955

Today would have been my mothers 57th birthday. She passed away suddenly and unexpectedly when I was just 17, a few days after Mother's Day and my junior prom. I remember I made her a card with my new cool program on my computer, and she loved it. I also got her a pound of the really nice coffee from the mall, flavored like hazelnuts. That was her favorite. It was quite a gift since I thought $20 was a BUNCH of money back then. 

De-seeding a pomegranate the easy way.

     Need to de-seed a pomegranate but dont want to turn you kitchen in to a bloody murder scene while you rip the pomegranate apart and the red juice flies? Here's a nice way to quickly and efficiently get the seeds out! You dont need this, or this, or this. Just normal kitchen supplies people!

     When you are picking out pomegranates, you should look for a smooth surface with no puckering or dry spots, and it should be heavy. This means there is still a lot of water in there and you pomegranate will be delicious. 

     Please dont laugh at my cell phone video: 

CSA begins

For those of you unfamiliar with a CSA, this is a great way to get local veggies! 

CSA stands for Community Supported Agriculture. Long ago when I was getting into healthy eating and discovered Weston A Price, the issue of raw milk and local produce entered my realm. Actually I found out about my local raw milk from my local Price foundation and the raw milk seller told me about a little husband and wife couple who just bought a farm and were starting up a CSA. I had no idea I could have access to this. I mean I know it was around but I didn't know it was so available! Cue my (now) 5th year with a CSA and countless other years before hand going to local markets. 

Basically you prepay for a season, here in Florida that's about November through May. Then once a week or once every other week you go to a predetermined site and pick up your veggies.

Cozy Cauliflower Cheese, gluten free

         The other day we hosted a “Hipster Thanksgiving” for our friends. Named so because we did turkey day before everyone else! Clever, right! Right? It was definitely something that couldn’t happen without all of our friends bringing dishes! We had everything a proper thanksgiving should have... including almost 20 people stuffed into my apartment, and a too small kitchen! It was crazy, and fun, and just what I love to do.

     Ever since then I have been craving comfy cozy foods. This is especially difficult because I live in coastal Florida, which you know definitely never feels cozy like a cool fall day. In my search, I ended up on an english website where I saw this dish, albeit a much simplified version. ANY new way to make common things is great in my book. So I read the recipe... and promptly changed it to something way delicious (at least to me).

Return, & Shrimp and Pineapple Curry

      I'M BAAACK! I guess its been a couple years now. Things got in the way, work, study, school, new relationship, all awesome things but they took up time. Well... study and work paid off. I am now in med school year 2! Also, now engaged to a most wonderful person who makes me inadvertently smile all the time (D). More about those things later (I feel like I could write a book on these past two years)! 

      I have recently decided that it would be a great outlet to have something creative in my life, that can break up the endless hours of studying (okay I havent actually studied hours in about a week... but back to it tomorrow!). I remembered my old rusty food blog, with its mediocre pictures and Im-too-tired-and-not-creative-or-verbose-enough descriptions, and I had a glimmer of an idea. Maybe I could do a couple GOOD posts a month, and not stress about content or frequency? Use the blog for ME and if anyone loves it along the way... well thats just icing on the [gluten free] cake! I do hope some of you love, or at least like, the blog. If nothing else I hope you find it instructive in at least one thing. Extroverted and Socratic by nature, I hope nothing more than to bring smiles, joy and learning to myself and those around me! 

      The pictures may not be any better, and I am trying harder at making it worth reading a little but... its mine. Its mine and there may be others like it, but this one is mine. On to the recipe part...