Daily Photo Inspiration

Homestead.

vintage studio portrait of a cowboy by freeparking

Daily Photo Inspiration

Shout out to a friend having a hard day...

Tomatoes and Bananas! by bethboya

Salad Rolls

Okay, so we had some pretty nice, hot, sunny days last week and I had this whole plan to make salad rolls on one of these eves for dinner because they are pretty much the best thing on a hot summer night. Then it got all crappy and rainy again and hot delicious stir fry has sounded much better than cold salad rolls. I am only telling you this because I was gonna take some nice pictures of them and share them here, but then I remembered I drew some illustrations of the process for another project so I will just share those and put some pics of salad rolls up when the sun comes back out. So here we go!

What you will need:

Rice paper
VEGGIES! I usually use:

• lettuce and/or cabbage (roll the leaf up and chop so you have lettuce strips, this makes it much easier to roll in the end)
• carrots (julienned)
• cucumber (skinned, use spoon to scrape out seeds and cut into long thin strips)
• basil and/or cilantro and/or mint
• those tiny rice noodles
• tofu or cooked chicken/shrimp (totally not necessary, but if it will be your whole meal a little protein makes it more filling
• avocado, red bell pepper, pear and other such things cut up in the same manner are good too
• Or pretty much anything that sounds good or you have lying around

1. So to start cook your meat and noodles and cut everything up so it is in strips no wider than 1/4" thick and 4-5ish" long. Cool your meat and noodles.

2. This is how I set things up:

I know, this might seem a bit excessive, but there is method to my madness. This just makes things into more of an assembly line and makes it waaaaay easier to crank out a ton of these puppies in a jiffy.

3. Now you can start assembly. Soak a rice sheet in your water pan until it is soft and lay flat on the cutting board. Make a pile of veggies/protein starting with lettuce/cabbage.

Then roll 'em up like this:

Use the empty plate to stack finished rolls! You can cut them in 1/2 when you are done or just serve theme whole.

I think they are best served with peanut sauce (my favorite is San-J Thai Peanut, one of the few condiments I can bring myself to buy), but you could totally dip em in anything that sounds good. I have been meaning to make a dessert version made with fruit and dipped in chocolate or something...

I like to take veggie ones to pot-lucks 'cause they are a favorite of both veggies and meaties. But on those hot summer nights when you don't want to turn on the stove they make a great meal (and make leftovers for lunch the next day!)

Daily Photo Inspiration

The sun is being such a tease these days in Portland...

One step off the sun - A un passo dal sole by Robyn Hooz

Farmers Market

So I did make it to the farmers market on Saturday. It was the perfect day for it, sunny and beautiful. So, um, now I'm gonna do a bit of the soap box thing now so bear with me for a moment...

I believe it is very important to buy local-organic-sustainable, blah, blah, blah... But this does not mean buying a package of organic baby carrots (processed!) from Walmart. I know some of you are like "duh!", but same goes for that "organic" product you are buying from Whole Foods (plus processed foods are real crappy for you anyway and breakfast cereal is basically the devil).

On that note you don't have to hold organic as the holiest of holies either. WHEN YOU SHOP AT THE FARMERS MARKET YOU CAN SPEAK DIRECTLY (most times) TO THE PERSON RESPONSIBLE FOR GROWING YOUR FOOD and find out what exactly goes in and on the food you are eating. This is good because:

1. Organic certification is expensive, some smaller farms that use sustainable practices simply can't afford certification. If something does not have organic signage just ask the farmer about his/her practices.
2. Local cuts down on transit pollution, good for local economy, and gives you fresher food, i.e. good for everyone, not just you the eater.
3. Fresh, local, sustainable food TASTES FRIGGIN AWESOME.

So all I'm saying is you don't have to get so hung up on the organic thing (I used to work for this organic produce company and we accidentally got a shipment of a non-organic item and accidentally sent it out and a woman noticed after she had fed some of this item to her child and actually called to ask if she should take the child to the ER!). Organic is GOOD! But so are local small farms that can use your support to get that certification! *stepping off soap box*, for now...

So, whilst at the farmers market I was taking a picture of this:

Because they were the most beautiful color of pink ever! And the guy gave me one! And now it looks like a huge pink pom-pom (like 8" across!!!):

And thanks for reading my rant! Comments and discussion ALWAYS appreciated.

Daily Photo Inspiration

Perfect running weather in Portland this morning. Dry and nice cool air. Although, I would not mind running on a nice beach with a nice dog...

The Runner by acampm1

Daily Photo Inspiration

Oh my goodness! I ate the best strawberry today! And I plan to go to the farmers market tomorrow!



Strawberries Too - DSM Farmers Market by Don3rdSE