Notes from the Flourish kitchen
Finally, the days are starting to warm up here in Reno, NV and my favorite time of the year, spring, seems almost to be upon us, thank goodness! It’s still cool in the evenings though, so even though I’ll feel like a salad occasionally I haven’t quite given up yet on warming soups, casseroles and stews. I’m particularly drawn to those that include lamb as I just returned from 6 weeks in New Zealand, where it’s summer and I got lots of inspiration for some great warm weather food, including a delicious and super healthy raw spinach soup, and a Thai mussel dish, so watch this space later in the year. I also bought a really clever device to make home-made sushi, so we’ve been having brown rice sushi for lunch, filled with raw salmon and avocado and wrapped in nori sheets; what a great way to get more sea vegetables into our diet!
Here, my local store still has lots of good looking organic leeks and root vegetables; parsnips, beets, carrots, potatoes and yams, as well as several different varieties of pumpkin and squash, and I seem to have recently become addicted to the beet, carrot, orange and goat cheese salad below, which is an interesting and super healthy way to use julienned raw beets.
Let me know if you particularly like any of our Seasonal Recipes, or if you have any other healthy recipes which you'd like me to try.
- Baked sweet potatoes with leeks
- Turkish lamb rub
- Beet, carrot, orange and goat cheese salad
- Slow roasted pork with apple and fennel
- Black bean chili on garnet yams
- Lemon and ginger chickpeas
- Chicken with Moroccan spice paste
- Lamb and parsnip shepherds pie
The blood orange vinegar which I used for the salad is available at Whole Foods in Reno under the Cuisine Perel label – not organic but very delicious and versatile.
For raw cream from organic, grass fed cows contact Kelly Rouse of the Organic Pastures Buying Club; 530 582 5639
For tasty humanely raised pork, visit www.grasslandbeef.com
For healthy free range chicken, I like the ones fed on coco feed sold by www.tropicaltraditions.com