A knock on a stranger's door

Today after thinking about the neighborhood fruit sharing idea and how I would build a similar project here in Victoria, I decided I might as well act on it.

As I drove to work, with fifteen minutes to spare, I made a stop off Navarro Street two block before my usual turn to the Advocate. I pulled over, illegally against traffic, and turned off the engine to my car. I stepped out and onto some truly lush Saint Augustine grass. There was no curb next to the street so I stepped right onto it from the car. My heart was racing and I could feel the blood rushing to
 limbs and my brain signaling to pluck the precious fruits from their limbs. I was beginning to sweat.

Before I could think any further I was pulling open the screen door and knocking on the glossy black door to a house I had never been too. A small sign of a Boston Terrier, probably painted by hand, read "This home is protected by a Boston Terrier." Or at least something like that.

This is a different house that has a pomegranate
tree with fruit on it, but it's in the same area. 

A man answered the door and out poured these words, that I didn't rehearse but probably should have. I explained that he didn't know me and that I couldn't help but notice he had two pomegranate trees outside of his home. He acknowledged them and told me they weren't ready to pick yet but that I could help myself to them if I wanted.

Given a perfect opportunity to explain to him my idea, I told him that I would love to pick them but that I would wait until they were ready. Hopefully, in a not-too-hurried way, I was able to tell him what I was hoping to achieve by disturbing his afternoon watching television in his air-conditioned home. Fruit sharing community this, get people together that, share recipes and network, blah blah blah. I think he understood what I was getting at.

After I spilled my beans and handed him one of my business cards, then introduced myself – all ass backwards, I know – I want on my merry way to work. Oh, but I forgot to add, that he did mention he was interested in helping get this thing started. Its hard to tell what he was thinking – because I didn't know him – but I think he may have been interested in helping me out.

I'm pretty excited about it. There isn't much else to do, but to wait until more fruit pop up and I conjure up enough courage to knock on more doors to talk to people about sharing their bounty or knowledge of where the bounty lay.

No word from the community just yet, but like I said, I will have to keep you posted.

Help from Mother Nature

 The Crossroads were lucky enough to have some rain today. There was a fair amount off rain in the downtown are of Victoria and it brought a smile to my to know that O.U.R. Community Garden was getting a nice soaking from Mother Nature herself.

So far O.U.R. garden has produced a generous amount of vegetables. Rosa Linda Garcia, the mastermind behind the idea, and I tried to keep track of everything we pulled, but lost count along the way. Between the two of doing most of the picking, we need to find a way to document our harvests when the other isn't there. Luke found a nice art set in the dumpster next to the garden so hopefully, we will have our method of keeping track in line soon. But given the way the plants produce and how long ago we lost count, I know the numbers are right around or more than: 150 cucumbers, 200 chile pequin, 60 okra, 7 watermelons, nearly 100 tomatoes, 20 bell peppers, 20 summer squash and soon we will have a handful of weighty butternut squash.

Of all the vegetables we've been lucky enough to harvest a small handful go to those that work in the garden and the rest goes to Christ's Kitchen,  a local soup kitchen, the shut-in ministry and to the Our Lady of Sorrows ReSale Shoppe where it is distributed to other parishioners community members in need. The best thing about being a contributing member of the garden is knowing that the food is fresh and unadulterated but man-made fertilizers and pesticides. All the things in our garden thrive and grow via the dirt and sunshine exactly how we find them every morning or evening when we are there. Knowing the vegetables are fresh and healthy for everyone who eats them is the most gratifying for me.

Along those same lines, I have been trying to get a foraging community up and going. Here in Victoria there is an abundance of food growing out in the open. Not barricaded behind fences and or hidden behind houses. They're growing at the park, along apartment buildings and railroad tracks. I don't know what kind of response, but I hope to get something together soon. The pomegranates are turning red, the grapes are turning purple and its time to start making wonderful eats out of all that Mother Nature is telling us to eat.  I'll keep you posted.

Lent is upon us

As a littler one, I was raised Roman Catholic and remember going to Mass on Ash Wednesday and omitting red meat from our plates every Friday up until Easter Sunday. During that time I remember eating lots of fish and shrimp cooked in traditional Filipino ways, including shrimp sauteed with garlic or fished cooked on the grill.

Going out to eat can be a challenge sometimes, but you can see all the Lent-friendly menus out around town and they are all clad with fish and shrimp dishes that are sure to please. On the other hand, as a friend implied to me, why not accept it as a challenge and try to cook without meat?

Challenge accepted.

Unless I run out of recipes, I will post a Lent-friendly recipe on my blog every Thursday for readers to try up until Easter. Keep in mind that measurements are not entirely precise because have the tendency to fly by the seat of my pants when I am cooking. Also, a good thing to remember is that fish is interchangeable to a varying degree and can substituted by other similar fish. For example, a white fish like tilapia can be replaced by another white fish like halibut or cod. The prices and sizes will vary also, so experimenting with different fish or shellfish is the best way to learn what you like or don't like. Same thing may go for vegetable dishes, if you don't like Brussels sprouts, substitute another vegetable, like broccoli or whatever sounds good to you as the eater.

This dish is one of my favorite seafood concoctions I came up with when I first moved out to Victoria. The H-E-B Plus! had fresh shark and catfish packaged and put on the rack at near the freezer section and I was eager to cook with them. In New Mexico, there isn't much fresh seafood, so you can imagine my excitement when I learned how close to the water I was and how often I would be able to cook fresh fish.

Citrus ceviche

1 filet of shark, cut into small 1/2-inch pieces
1 filet of catfish, cut into small 1/2-inch pieces
1/2 cup of small scallops
1/2 cup of shrimp, cleaned and cut into 1/2-inch small pieces
1 Tbsp. of apple cider vinegar
1/2 to 1 cup orange juice
1/4 cup of green chile or jalapeno, diced small (optional)
1/4 cup of yellow onion, diced small
1 medium orange, sectioned and juice reserved
1/2 of a small lime, sectioned and juice reserved
1/4 cup of cilantro, minced
Salt and pepper to taste
1 package of tostadas for serving
fresh cilantro, minced for serving
fresh avocado, diced for serving

The thing with ceviche, if you have never made it is that it takes some time. The trick is the acids in the liquid will essential cook the fish and the longer it sits, the better it gets. I serve mine on a tostada with fresh cilantro and tomato. This is the same way I had it when I lived in Zacatecas while I was studying Spanish in college.

There is no real method to this, but the easiest way to do it, so there isn't much cleanup to do in the end is to just use one bowl for everything. Cut up your shark and catfish and place it in a glass or ceramic bowl, as some metals will react to the citrus. Since the scallops are small, they don't need much attention and can be thrown right into the mix.

You can buy the shrimp cleaned already or you can do it yourself. Simply remove the head along with the shell and the tail. Once it is free of it's shell, you should have a shrimp body with dark vein along its spine. With a paring knife, cut just deep enough to reach the vein and continue to cut down to the end of the tail. Then cut the shrimp, depending on the size, into three or four pieces. Add the shrimp to the bowl with the other fish.

Moving on the cooking. Pour about apple cider vinegar and 1/2 cup of orange juice into the bowl, leaving the remaining orange juice as a standby if you need more. Peel the orange just as you would a cantaloupe, cutting off one of the ends and cutting off the rind from the top to bottom to expose the flesh of the orange. There should be no bitter skin left on the flesh. Once this is complete, holding the fruit over the bowl to catch all the extruded juices, cut the orange into sections (just like wedges) as close to the skin as possible. You want to try and get as little of the skin as possible, just the pulp and juice sacs of the orange are what you want. In the end, squeeze the last of the juices from the skin that remains and discard. Follow the same steps for the half of a lime, catching the juices in the bowl and sectioning the flesh of the lime.

Combine all the contents of the bowl together well and salt and pepper generously. At this point, you can add the cilantro, onions and chile. Mix again to get all the aromatics distributed throughout. Also, make sure that all the seafood is submerged under the citrus liquid. At this point you take a spoon and sample the mix. You can add more orange juice, more salt, more jalapeno or whatever you want and then you just wait. Place the bowl, covered with plastic wrap, in the refrigerator and let the acidity do its magic.

When you are ready to serve it, dice up fresh avocado and cilantro and spoon the ceviche onto tostadas and enjoy! You can also warm the tostadas in the oven, or a toaster works well on a low setting, just remember to keep an eye on it. The oils in the tostada can heat up and start smoking if you're not careful.

I've figured it out

For me, 2012 started a few days early. I had a nice long vacation where I had a lot of time to plant some seeds for thought. A few weeks later, those seeds have made their way deep into what I can only hope to be a bed of fertile soil and not some soggy mess in the corner of my mind.

While I returned home to Rio Rancho for the holidays, with my boyfriend Luke in tow, I couldn't help but think about whether I am supposed to return to New Mexico in my near future or if there really is somewhere else I need to be. Having moved around a few times and lived in almost all of the nation's time zones in my adult life, I am used to uprooting my life and moving onto something else. I avoid saying better, because who really knows if that is ever the case.

Moving to Victoria has been a wild adventure. It has been a roller coaster ride with loops and dips and those nosedives that put your stomach in your throat and I still haven't come to a stop yet. I'm strapped in and I am making the most of it. The question is, where does it end? Or does it. I was reading this post, that Luke emailed me and it got me thinking.

At the end of his post, the author asks readers, how are you going to change the world? And I thought to myself, do I have to? Do I have to change the world? It got me thinking about what the things I am passionate about, and I started scribbling things down on paper.

What do I love? Food! Duh.

But what about it? I love everything about it. I love to learn about where it comes from, how it's produced, who eats it. I ask questions about why people eat, why is it packaged that way, what are the beliefs that go hand-and-hand with that food, etc. I love food.

Than it hit me. This is what I wrote.

I want to work with food. I want to feed hungry people healthy food. I want them to have happy memories about food and forget about being hungry. I want to solve some problems about food supplies, child obesity and misinformation. Children should know where food comes from and how to make good eating decisions. I'm going to become a member of a community garden. I am going to educate kids about healthy, but tasty food. I want to share my love of food with other people.

I know it sounds like a lot, but I think I can do it starting with babe steps. I think the first thing to do, is to start my own garden and learn what it takes to feed myself on a budget and make health food choices. I hope I can do it. I know there'll be more loops and turns, but I'm already strapped in. If the ride stops, I can get back in line and do it all over again, right?

Cheers to 2012

I hope I can beat last year's record of only three posts. Really? That is horrible. I haven't even made it to the 50 posts mark yet.

Alas, this is a new year, and as most people do when the ball drops in Times Square, we pledge to make a change in our habits – whether they be to improve good ones or to abolish the bad ones. I, Jessica Rodrigo, make this pledge on this day of Sunday, Jan. 1, 2012, to write an entry on my blog at least once a week. I think I can do that. And if I don't then I challenge you, whoever you might be, to jump on my back about it. Send me a topic, at my email address, jess.rodrigo.26@gmail.com, or those that have my cell phone number, text me ideas. I would be more than glad to write about them. No topic is too taboo.

So, here is to 2012.

P.S. This doesn't count as number one, either.

Baconalia!

I'm not sure I'm proud to announce this, or thoroughly shocked, but Denny's has just rolled out its new campaign. Baconalia! That's right, seven new items that are built around that saltly, greasy breakfast meat we all love and salivate over: bacon. There is even a dessert that has bacon.

Here's the greasy spread:

Ultimate Bacon Breakfast – Six strips of bacon served with sides

Bacon Flapjacks – Two pancakes with crumbled bacon in them, served with sides

Pepper Bacon & Eggs – Two strips of peppery bacon served with sides

Triple Bacon Sampler – That's right - turkey, pepper and smoked bacon served with sides

BBBLT – A BLT stacked with eight strips of bacon served with fries or onion rings

Bacon Meatloaf –The original meatloaf, just with added bacon. Along with two sides

And... The one that takes the cake...

Maple Bacon Sundae – You read that right correctly. Start with maple syrup, a scoop of vanilla ice cream, bacon, more maple syrup, another scoop of vanilla ice cream, more bacon and more syrup. Yeah, about that...

It really just re-affirms the idea that Denny's is contributing to the obesity of America. Each plate comes with a side of hash browns and eggs for the breakfast plates, fries with the BBBLT and choice of two sides for the dinner, and all items are priced under $8.99. Not only is it a grip of eats, but its affordable. And in this economy, that's a big lure. To be honest I seldom see a plate go to the dishwasher with anything left on it, and that is not counting the people that take home eats for the the next morning.

I love food. Don't get me wrong, I really love my eats, but all this bacon is just going to add extra pounds to the waistline of America's consumers and the wallets of heart surgeons and the various branches of the medical industry everywhere. Too strong a statement to stomach, maybe? But its true, no?

Guest Topic: Splenda

"Because it's kinda food, and it's kinda not." – Nick Rogers

I don't know what's come over me, but I could not think of anything food-related to write about. I was thinking about what I had for dinner, but I didn't think that it was very exciting (I had a pork chop with browned mushrooms and onions with couscous). So, I sought some assistance. I asked Nick to give me any topic related to food. Splenda, eh?

The topic of Splenda got me thinking about alternative sweeteners – being that it is exactly that. People think about alternative sweeteners when drinking coffee, tea or other drinks, but there are other uses for it. There are also a number of cookbooks made specifically for use with Splenda, which benefit people with diabetes or people watching their sugar intake for specific diets.

Personally, I don't use Splenda. The only sugar I have at home is the raw, turbinado sugar. You know the kind that is all chunky and light brown. I decided I liked that particular kind of sugar better just because it wasn't as refined or processed as much as the the typical sugar that adorns our table tops and kitchen cabinets. However, after reading one of Michael Pollan's books, he made the point of mentioning that sugar is sugar not matter what form, and in excess will always be bad for your body.

But, I have seen people use other methods of sweetening drinks or other consumables without the powdery confections that come in pink, blue, yellow, brown or white packets. These alternatives include honey, agave nectar, corn syrup and other similar concoctions. They sell a lot of these kinds of products in natural food stores and places including Trader Joe's or Whole Foods. I've even heard that honey in your morning coffee will help take away from the bitterness of strong, roasted coffees.

Sweet, no?