June 2010

  • Make Your Own Gyros

    By lisala on 6/30/10 2:22pm
    1 Comment

    Once you've made tzatziki, it's pretty much a given that you're going to start thinking about making your own gyros. For those of you thus far unfamiliar with the gyros, it's a Greek "fast food" sort of dish. The name refers to the large turning spit containing a roast; (gyros is cognate with Modern English gyrate, to turn). Slices of the moist-but-crispy meat are combined with tazatziki, Greek yogurt-dill-and-cucumber sauce, on a pita. Other ingredients, like tomato, or feta, or lettuce or even pepper, salt, and paprika, are optional. In Greece gyros are common fare at small cafes and street carts.

    Read more >

  • Shrimp Pasta Salad

    By lisala on 6/29/10 7:21pm
    Add Comment

    Small, local "baby" or bay shrimp are appearing up and down the Oregon and Washington coasts. I'm seeing fresh, never frozen shrimp between $3.00 and $4.00 a pound at both local fish markets and chain grocers. Quite often they're already cooked, but these will cook in a jiffy in some boiling lightly salted water; it's pretty much a matter of dip them in the water, wait three or 4 minutes, and cool them down with running cold water. You want to watch the shrimp carefully; they'll change color when they're cooked, and you want to remove them from the water immediately, and cool them down so they don't over cook and become rubbery.

    Read more >

  • Hops

    By lisala on 6/22/10 4:30pm
    Add Comment

    Hops are largely associated with beer today but in terms of the history of brewing beer they are a modern addition, since they date to sometime in the middle ages, probably sometime around the late tenth or early eleventh century. It's hops that give beer that characteristic hint of bitterness, sometimes with a nod at citrus. Hops contribute to the aroma, as well as the taste of beer. It's generally assumed that hops were initially added to beer as a preservative, and an antibacterial. There was a long tradition of adding other herbs as preservative before hops, but the theory is that some brewer somewhere noticed his hoppy ale stayed fresh longer. One of the interesting and important qualities of hops is that while they are naturally antibacterial, they do not destroy the yeast that is so very vital in terms of fermenting the wort, the grain and water base, that all beer begins with.

    Read more >

  • Tzatziki: Greek Yogurt and Dill Condiment

    By lisala on 6/21/10 10:52am
    3 Comments

    I'm exceedingly fond of Greek food. Truth be told, I'm fond of the entire of Greek/ Lebanese/ Turkish suite; there are, for some obvious geographic and historic reasons a fair amount of cross-over in terms of the Mediterranean cuisines. Greek immigrants have carried their traditions with them, and are found all over the Pacific Northwest, especially in Washington. There are a number of Greek festivals in Washington, including Seattle, Spokane, and Tacoma, even San Jose, California.

    Read more >

  • Mediterranean Diet: Northwest Style

    By lisala on 6/19/10 9:47pm
    Add Comment

    The commercially-presented version of the "Mediterranean diet" does not, alas, mean "eat all the Mediterranean food you want," but rather, it's based on some assumptions about why people whose diets feature olive oil, yogurt, feta, fresh vegetables and fruit, whole grains, red wine in moderation, fresh fish, and low amounts of salt, processed foods and sugars, and red meat tend to have better overall health, particularly in terms of lower rates of obesity and diabetes. A lot of the positive effects are attributed to the low saturated fat percentage in terms total calories consumed, largely because of the emphasis on olive oil, and the high percentage of fruits and vegetables.

    Read more >

  • Tasty, Healthy and Easy Salmon Fillets with Lemon Relish

    By becksta on 6/10/10 11:38am
    Add Comment

    Salmon FilletsSalmon FilletsSalmon is of course a staple cuisine of the Pacific Northwest and there are literally hundreds of different ways to prepare it, most of them quite tasty. Recently, I decided to cook up some salmon a la ex-con Martha Stewart, who has become my new kitchen Guru at long last for her simple, healthy recipes despite her criminal history.

    The recipe called for lemon zest, roasted pine nuts, and raisins to be put into a bowl ad covered with boiling water. To make the lemon zest, either thinly slice one entire lemon or grate one lemon peel. In the photo of this particular recipe, the lemon zest was sliced into slivers. While I was preparing the combination, I substituted the raisins for cranraisins and added in the zest of an orange- both choices proved to be delightful.


    Read more >

  • Manny's Pale Ale Georgetown Beer, Washington

    By lisala on 6/7/10 7:29pm
    Add Comment

    Georgetown Beer is very much a local brewery, and a true micro brewery with their beer only available at the brewery in Seattle's Georgetown neighborhood, or in select bars and restaurants in Washington and Idaho. Right now, they produce three beers all year round, Chopper's Red Ale, Roger's Pilsner (named after one of the two brewery co-founders) and Manny's Pale Ale, named after the other of the brewery's two co-founders. They've been known to produce seasonal or occasional brews, as well as a few custom brews for particular restaurants.

    Read more >

  • How A First Nations People Got their Salmon Back--With Help from the Maori

    By lisala on 6/3/10 7:10pm
    Add Comment

    The Winnemem Wintu ("middle river people") are one of the nine sub-groups or bands of the Wintu tribe, whose traditional lands were along the lower McCloud River, above the Shasta Dam, and including Mount Shasta. Modern day Redding, California, is the the nearest large city. Although the Winnemem Wintu traditional language is recognized as the North Eastern dialect of the Northern Wintun, a member of the Wintuan language group, itself a member of the much larger Penuatian language family, they are not currently listed by the U. S. Federal agencies as a Federally recognized tribe. Of the original nine bands of Wintu, today only three survive, and their traditional lands and sacred places are in constant danger of more flooding from California's Shasta dam.

    Read more >