I’ll be hosting two events tomorrow, May 10:

Healthy Cooking with Whole Grains, 10:00 am, Roane County Public Library (Spencer branch)

- learn what exactly a whole grain is and how to identify one in the grocery store

- taste new whole grains

- make a simple one-pot dish featuring whole grains

Enjoying and Cooking Fresh Herbs, noon, Roane County Public Library (Spencer branch)

- sample different herbs

- learn to make herb vinegar

- taste an herb salad

- learn how to make a wonderful easy herb vinaigrette

Thanks to the Master Gardener Leader, we’ll have plenty of herbs to sample and play with.  Oregano plants will be available for those interested in starting their own.  Hope to see you there!

My series with the Roane County Libraries continues.  Check out the next event, ”Cooking with Spring Vegetables,” at the Spencer Public Library on Tuesday, April 17 (12:00 to 1:00 pm).  We’ll be demo’ing a few good uses of sugar snap peas, spinach, and pea shoots.

Cooking demos and tasting will also be presented through the Master Gardeners monthly talks in May, June, and potentially July.  Presented by the Extension Service, Master Gardener events are open to the public as well as those who have completed the course or are interested in taking the course.  Keep in touch (Twitter: StephanieBostic) for updates!

If you want a traditional meal, but aren’t hosting or visiting elsewhere, I’d suggest a roasted cornish hen with baked sweet potato (or turnips? cauliflower?), roasted brussels sprouts or green beans, and either a baked apple or individual pumpkin custard. Gravy is optional, and a good piece of bread or some stuffing can fill in any empty corners.

Whatever your plate holds, pause and eat consciously– whether in joy because you grew enough food to (hopefully) survive the winter, in hope that the following year will be better, with great love for family and friends, or for any other reason. Maybe you are thankful your dog finally stopped eating your shoes, or your closest friend found a needed job, your country is not at war, or your grandchildren actually called. Breath, think, and enjoy!

With packaged and (some) restaurant food, there are numbers available. Are those numbers accurate? No. Everyone is always horrified, but when students and researchers go buy food and then burn it in a calorimeter (to determine the actual number of calories), they don’t match. “Not matching” can be by 5%, 10%, or by 40%. Using inaccurate numbers to determine your daily intake is counterproductive when they may be telling you that you are eating far less (or maybe even more) than you actually are. Unsurprisingly, whole foods vary quite a lot naturally… one pig may be leaner than another while one plum has more sugar than another.

Recipes are particularly vulnerable to change. Within One Bowl, there are many options for substitutions, and I’m quite sure many of you will use it as a resource for ideas and skills rather than as a prescription for how to make a salad. Topping something with a different kind of cheese can half or double the calories, as can guessing how much oil you are actually pouring into the pan. For example, in the very first recipe, using blueberries and non-fat yogurt leads to a breakfast that is 353 calories while using bananas and whole milk Greek vanilla yogurt leads to a breakfast that is 459 calories. Eating the skin on the Duck Breast adds almost 150 calories (primarily fat). Both versions of each dish follow the recipe.

Finally, while weight control is vital to managing some conditions, developing healthful eating habits and an awareness of how hungry or full you actually are would serve most of us better than knowing that the Sweet Potato and Black Bean Soup with Lime had X number of calories. Stepping on a scale or keeping an eye on your belt size can give you a close view of how your habits are affecting your waistline. However, if you are interested in calorie counts, I’ll be posting a list of some free calculators next week.

Busted! Many soups work very well in single portions, the exception being some very long-cooking stews where it is simply impractical (and very energy inefficient!) to cook one bowl’s worth for 4 fours. Try making a quick vegetable soup, lentil or bean soup, chicken soup, or miso soup. The trick to keeping your portion under control is fitting your ingredients into a 2-cup measuring cup or bowl, then adding just enough broth/water/tomato sauce to fill in the cracks. Don’t overflow it, and you’ll have just one bowl. Some ingredients do shrink, like onions and greens, or expand more, like rice and lentils, as they cook than other, but the 2 cup rule tends to work fairly well as long as you have a mixture of ingredients.

Example:

1/4 c small red lentils
1/2 c chopped onions
1/2 c chopped carrots
3/4 c chopped kale

Then, of course, you add your herbs/spices and liquids.

Need to cook it quickly? Save your leftover cooked vegetables and grains to add to broth along with an egg or canned beans. Herbs and spices are optional, but delicious. 10 minutes = homemade soup, just for you.

Here are a few rough guidelines:

1) Heat dried herbs and spices, in oil or fat, if possible. Many of the compounds that create the wonderful taste and scent of seasonings are soluble in oil, so it distributes the flavor evenly. Toasting them without fat also helps– it removes the “raw” flavor that many herbs and spices can have and intensifies different flavors.

2) Add dried herbs and spices toward the beginning of the cooking time to maximize the amount of the flavor released into the dish.

3) Add fresh herbs toward the end of the cooking time to maximize their fresh flavor.

4) Crush dried and fresh herbs before adding them to a dish to release the flavorful oils.

There are, of course, exceptions to every rule. When in doubt, start with these.

1) Buy custom amounts. Ask for two slices of cheddar at the deli, or 1/8 lb from your cheesemonger.

2) Freeze hard grating cheeses like parmesan or pecorino romano in small containers (I’ve seen 1 to 2 oz condiment cups with lids in kitchen supply stores) or cut into chunks and place in freezer bags. Pull out a small container or chunk the day before and they’ll be ready before you’ve boiled the pasta.

Thus far, the most popular dishes include:

• Egg dishes (sandwiches, omelettes)
• Salads
• Stir-fry or fried rice
• Oatmeal

I was a little surprised by the oatmeal! Oddly enough, I think of cold cereal for supper but not cooked cereal. Great empty pantry option, though.

How does it work? There’s a thermometer, and a switch that depends on a designated temperature. When the rice cooker reaches a certain temperature, it switches to warm. The contents of the pot only reach that temperature when all the water has been absorbed or boiled off; therefore, if you put the correct ratio of water to rice in the pot, you have perfectly cooked rice when it switches from cook to warm.

What to consider? First, how often you eat rice or other whole grains (rice, wild rice, millet, quinoa, etc) that can be cooked in a rice cooker. Second, whether you would eat them more often if you had a rice cooker. Third, whether you have storage space. Finally, whether you want a fancy one with many features or a basic rice cooker. A fitted steamer tray makes it feasible to steam vegetables or meat (poultry/fish/tofu) over your rice. Some rice cookers have specific brown rice settings, but any rice cooker will cook brown rice.

What sort of one pot meals? Typically, you cook your grain and add vegetables along with fish, tofu, meat, poultry, beans, or egg to the grain as the timing is appropriate. For example, quinoa takes about 20 minutes in the rice cooker; after ten minutes you could add diced string beans with carrots; after 15 minutes, you could add tofu; just before serving, you could add a dressing or sauce of your choice. Typically, I wait until it switches to warm and then add sauces or dressings. The temperature often cannot be controlled, so any cut of meat that needs to be simmered should not be cooked in a rice cooker. Basically, you can use it like a pan on the stove, but it will switch off before burning.

Whether you have a rice cooker or not, it’s worth considering their uses. It may help you to eat healthier by making it easier to eat whole grains; on the other hand, it may just become a dusty implement bound for the thrift shop. If you have one, don’t forget to explore the breadth of meals that can emerge from it.

Tip: Keep the measuring cup that comes with your rice cooker; they are often 180 ml (smaller than the standard US cup).