About Sally
Recent insight: Were it not for the urgency of trying to save a planet for our children, living sustainably would just be another way to enjoy the good life.
Childhood drama: A snapshot might feature pastures, fields of potatoes and sugar beets, the fumbling pursuit of chickens and horses. Each made their impression, but my grandmother’s half-acre vegetable garden and its sun-warmed tomatoes were the clincher. With the deliciousness of those earliest tomatoes began my visceral relationship with the character of certain foods. I must admit, for example, that I’m involved in a pretty serious long-term relationship with tomatoes.
Destiny: When I began making dill pickles, canning tomatoes and sauce, jam and chutney with produce from our garden and farmer’s markets, I recognized the inevitable, that we do eventually become our mothers and grandmothers.
Past, present & future: A career educator, learning and teaching continue but are revitalized with new tools, my own version of those rural roots, and a vision that includes food, photography and sustainability.
A mission: It seems like the right time to become acquainted with the distinct produce of the Pacific Northwest and seasonal cycles unique to our place on the planet.
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What’s Up With the Paper Cup?
Oscars tonight. In the meantime something else to ponder, and sorry, no gowns involved. It’s the not-so-glamorous, but equally frivolous paper cup. Use them once and discard. While others have been carrying their reusable cups into coffee shops the past few years, I rarely have. Truthfully, I don’t buy much coffee out, but still, I [...]
Be Kale My Heart
Kale plants in the backyard are a show all winter long. Hardy and steadfast, they dominate a big patch of the winter garden, and lately they’ve turned seasonal warmth and light into effervescent new leaves – garden sirens beckoning me to look, to photograph and to eat. Be kale my heart may be a frivolous [...]
Great Granola, No Gluten
During our 28-day detox diet, just finished, no wheat was allowed, along with dairy, sugar in any form – yes, that includes chocolate – alcohol, soy, caffeine. Our plates were full of fruits and veggies, rice, some meat, nuts and legumes. A limited repertoire, but a healthy way to eat for a short while. It [...]
Carbon 101, Foodprints
In the past few years I’ve read several books about food and meat production, Omnivore’s Dilemma (Michael Pollan), Grub (Anna Lappe & Bryant Terry), watched the film, Food Inc. I reached a tipping point recently while reading Eating Animals (Jonathan Safran Foer). A perfect storm of revelation and repulsion happened. I guess you could call [...]
Chocolate Pudding, Not Kidding
Valentine’s Day next week, and a few days ago we toasted our Mixed Greens’ two-year anniversary (thankyou dear readers). In celebration – okay, Super Bowl too – chocolate pudding. Like retro sleek-winged sofas and my mom’s Russell Wright dishes of the fifties, chocolate pudding deserves a comeback and some respect. Plus, it was among our [...]
Versatile Vegetable Soup
Groundhog’s Day yesterday and Imbolc mean we’re halfway to spring. There are wee signs in the garden – the earliest flowers unfolding, and rhubarb gallantly punching hot pink nubs and crinkled neon leaves through its own mulch.
Still, it’s winter and the hardiest vegetables rule. A steaming pot of homemade soup is winter’s snooze on a [...]
Perfect Protein Quinoa
Growing up on a ranch in eastern Washington, quinoa never entered the culinary picture, nor couscous, rarely rice, not much pasta either. But potatoes aplenty. My father and grandfather grew them which I guess explains it. Food cultures vary from family to family, regionally, and internationally, and time makes a difference too, food fads come [...]
Back to Our Roots, Roast ‘em
Now’s the time to roast any vegetable, and I think I mean any vegetable. If there’s an exception I don’t know what it is. Maybe lettuce. Warm up the house, kick up the flavor, which caramelization via high-heat roasting accomplishes (the Maillard Reaction), and dinner, maybe two, is halfway done. It’s an efficient way to [...]
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