Flavorstitch

Foodspotting Savory Scavenger Hunt - BlogHer Food

Me, Laura (my partner for the Savory Scavenger Hunt) and Heather in the HP Photo booth.

Saturday afternoon was the day of the Foodspotting Scavenger Hunt at the Ferry Building Marketplace in San Francisco. My partner Laura of Hey What's For Dinner Mom and I wanted to win this. Badly.

We chose the Foodspotting Savory Scavenger Hunt since we had our sights set on the $500 gift e-card to spend at Cooking.com. Laura and I agreed to work as a team with plans to split the prize money if we won.

We had our list of items to spot at the Ferry Building Marketplace. We jumped off the bus and hurried to Sur La Table to begin the Scavenger Hunt.

Something French at Sur La Table

Although speed wasn't necessary for the Scavenger Hunt, we still raced around snapping our photos every time we spotted something on the list.

Something Meaty at Prather Ranch Meat. We got more than we bargained for when asked about something meaty.

Something with Citrus at Stonehouse California Olive Oil.

Something Fishy at San Francisco Fish Company.

Something Caffeinated at Blue Bottle Coffee. How we didn't stop for coffee, I'll never know.

Something from the Oven at Acme Bread Company.

Something Salty at Boccalone Salumeria.

At the closing session of the BlogHer Food Conference they announced the winners. I really didn't believe it when they pulled my Flavorstitch card out of a bowl and announced me as the winner. I gave an embarrassing shriek and ran up to the front feeling lightheaded and giddy praying that I wouldn't do a face dive into the stage. When I arrived back at our table in one piece, Laura and I barely took a breath before we were on the Cooking.com site to start our wishlist.

 Our $500 gift e-card courtesy of BlogHer and Cooking.com.

Top of my list is a Panini Maker. I eat gluten-free so I can only experience a Panini sandwich in the safety of my own home. I'm thinking this Kiwi Le Creuset Grill Pan with Panini Press just might do the trick for my panini withdrawals. I'm thinking vintage cheese, bacon and avocado.

Thank you BlogHer and Cooking.com for this fabulous gift!

food on the mind

Food on the mind.

The last four days have been centered around the discussion of food, the consumption of food and the celebration of food. I left Sonoma County on Thursday afternoon and drove to San Francisco to the InterContiential Hotel for the 2010 BlogHer Food Conference.

While I've been blogging for nearly 4 1/2 years, Flavorstitch is relatively new. I'm not new to writing about food as I've blogged about it on my other blog Apron Thrift Girl here and there. I just never focused on food.

Yet standing in my hotel room and looking out across the buildings of San Francisco on the 14th floor, I felt a ball of anxiety and fear in my stomach. I asked myself what I was doing there. Why did I think that I could write about food? Who was I kidding? This discomfort stayed with me all through the afternoon and evening, even when we went to dinner at the incredible Zare Flytrap Restaurant. For some reason as I sat around the table with nine other food bloggers, I felt that I didn't quite belong.

I love food, I crave food and my thoughts are consumed by food. But I felt like a fake. Have you ever had the feeling as an adult that you are just a kid wearing someone else's clothes and doing someone else's job? It felt oddly like that as if I was fraudulently walking in some stranger's shoes.

The next day amidst 300 food bloggers I began to feel a sensation of familiarity. It wasn't until Saturday afternoon while listening to Penny De Los Santos and her session on Photography that I not only felt that I should be there, but I wondered why I hadn't been writing about food for the last four years.

I felt as if I had found my community of passionate, authentic writers. There have been many times that I couldn't quite find my place in the blog world. I wrote about thrifting, a bit about crafting, some of my experiences about Waldorf Education, conversations about natural living but nothing that I could exactly pin down in a quick elevator speech when asked about my blog. I know that I do write my posts from my heart, sometimes reaching so far into myself that the words appeared on the screen in front of me before I realize what I am writing. But how does that describe me as a blogger?

Penny stood there before us in a dark room with only a hint of light from the screen shining on her. It was her voice and it was her photos that penetrated our hearts as she spoke. She reminded me that food is about community and family. Food is about the art of sharing. And food is my life and it's what I want to write about.

Penny shared with us that the perfect picture arrives when she is grounded and she is connected to those around her. She feels the energy and takes the photo.

I want to do that with my writing and my food photography. Some of my favorite posts were the ones where I can sense a feeling in my chest, right around the heart. It's hard to describe in exact words but it's where I can truly feel my soul as I type the words into my Mac. I wasn't sure what my voice would be with this new adventure when I began. Should it be journalistic? Not personable? Should I avoid including my children? Or should I be true to myself? In the end Penny gave me that answer.

I want food to be soulful. I want it to be authentic. It deserves to be.

avocados

When I moved to California a year ago I was looking forward to living in the sunshine, being close to the ocean and the ability to eat a large variety of local food. What I had no idea about was this benefit:

When I lived on Bainbridge Island, near Seattle the sale price of organic avocados was 2 for $5.00. Perhaps on the rarest occasions I would find them for $2.00 each. But never, ever would I find them for a mere 79¢. They are up there in my top five favorite foods and at this price I can practically eat them every other day. If someone would come up to me now and ask why I moved to California I might have to say "it was the avocados."

What's the best price that you have paid for an organic avocado?

Pluots and Ice Cream

A couple years ago my friend Jacki and I were pouring over the latest edition of Marie Claire Idees magazine. It's French, it's crafty and it's inspiring. There was a recipe for plum sauce on the very last page that intrigued us both. Jacki is gifted in the kitchen and can make anything that she puts her mind to. She created her own recipe guessing what was in the recipe since neither of us read or speak French. Jacki's sauce was delicious.

When I saw that organic Pluots were on sale at our local grocery store Oliver's last week, I bought 8 of them with Jacki's plum sauce as my inspiration.

Pluot Sauce

8 Pluots

3/4 Cup Brown Sugar

1/2 Tsp Anise Seed

4 Star Anise Pods

*I use organic ingredients as much as possible 

Slice Pluots in half around the pit (stone). Place the pluot halves in large pot. I used my enamel Martha Stewart Dutch Oven. Add the sugar and bring to a low boil cooking over medium heat. Add the star anise pods and anise seed. Stir often.

Cooking time may vary depending on how well you want to cook the pluots. I wanted them to keep their form but still be quite soft. I cooked them for around 12 minutes. If you want the pluots to be firmer, cook them for around 8 minutes, for softer pluots cook for 15 minutes or longer.

Pluot Sauce is ideal over vanilla ice cream. I wanted to try something organic and local. Straus Family Creamery did not disappoint and they also weren't kidding when they named this flavor vanilla bean. It sang loud chords of vanilla with every single bite. I'd even go so far as to say it was the best vanilla ice cream that I've ever tasted.

Pluot Sauce & Straus Vanilla Bean Ice Cream.

A perfect marriage of flavors. The pluot sauce is slightly tart with a soft sweetness and a hint of anise.

8 Pluots boiled down to fit in 5 small canning jars. I didn't properly can them in boiling water since they are meant to be consumed right away. Three of them were given away as gifts (with a note to refrigerate the jars) and the other two went in our fridge and were enjoyed within the week.

What is your favorite fruit to indulge in over ice cream?

Conte's Pizza - a Review - part 1

Mushroom Florentine Pizza by Conte's Pasta

This last Wednesday instead of having to cook from scratch I had the delight of opening the freezer and baking not one, but two Conte's frozen pizzas. Conte's Pizzas are all natural and they are gluten-free and wheat-free. These days I rarely eat pizza yet still have the fond memory of walking into our local Round Table Pizza as a child and being greeted by the delicious scent of pizza. I miss it. With a gluten allergy I avoid nearly all pizza parlors so it was a special treat to fill my kitchen with the smell of pizza once again.

Margherita Pizza

I'm really excited to have a freezer with a variety of Conte's gluten-free products which I will be tasting and reviewing for a three part series. It was so exciting to receive a box from Conte's Pasta that arrived frozen at my door. Check out my disclosure statement for more details about Reviews here at Flavorstitch.

 

I wanted to try both pizzas at the same time. Why not, right?

My favorite one hands down is the Margherita Pizza with roasted garlic and olive oil. It tasted like pizza straight from a restaurant. It was the pizza sauce with garlic that won me over completely. Garlic always wins me over. It was also extremely cheesy and delicious. Visually I loved the look of the crust. It was uneven and you could imagine the dough being thrown in the air by the artisan pizza baker. The crust was thin but even when I was eating regular pizza I'd prefer my crust thin with a slight crunch to thick and doughy.

The Mushroom Florentine Pizza was also packed full of flavor. You could really taste each individual piece of mushroom and tomato. It did have less sauce than the Margherita Pizza but the flavors of the toppings did the trick for adding a lot of flavor to the pizza.  The crust had lots of good texture and the taste of it really stood out. A strong plus in my opinion. I crave food packed with flavor.

The Pizzas baked for around 15 minutes in our vintage 1960's not-so-accurate oven at 450 degrees. The box suggested 10-12 minutes.

I found my first Conte's Pizza at our local Whole Foods Market. You can contact Conte's to find out where to locate your nearest Conte's products. You can also follow Conte's on Twitter.

Seriously if you haven't had pizza in years run out and find some Conte's Pizza. Right now. You won't be disappointed.