Actually cooking organ meats week after week
Dinner prep: a quick summertime visit to my community garden
Why do I feed these offal foods to my children? How could my husband agree to such treatment? What does this look like in practice, via our dinner schedule!? Ahhh, I thought you’d never ask….
The
Classic French Pork Liver Pate stands on it’s own, but also makes a beautiful accompaniment to many meals. This traditional dish may be vilified for the high vitamin A levels or cholesterol in liver. However, it’s longevity in traditional cuisine runs counter to concerns. Perhaps everything in moderation still applies!…
I was craving the savory flavors of puttanesca… but what to do on a Monday night? Add liver! Any night is a good night for liver, but I find that if I always start the week off well, everything is easier. I created a weekly meal schedule for our family many years ago… to be sure we would have a steady relationship with the most nutrient-dense foods. Chicken Liver Puttanesca was a great Monday night meal and is sure to have a repeat appearance in our home….
Pate with Italian Sausage Seasonings is the second pâté with sausage seasonings inspired by Alice Waters. Summer chicken livers are easy to find and perfect for this pâté. And they boast the sacred combination of fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, and K2) that must work together. The media can be so fickle: D getting all the love, A sometimes vilified, and K2 often absent… But the reality is that one without the others may be harmful; these three go hand-in-hand. …
Another day in the life; Sweetbreads with Zucchini and Mushrooms for dinner. Yep, among all the changes this past year, we are still eating organs every week. These meals tend to be mashups of meat, veg and spices that we have on hand. They have been plain and simple, quick and easy, accessible and no-fuss. …
Pork Kidney Stir-Fry with Tomatoes and Bell Pepper was adapted from my trusty copy of Innards and Variety Meats. This recipe surprised me and we liked it more than I expected. Which is great, because I’m always happy to take what my farmer has on hand. Or what is handed to me in life. Sometimes in excess, if that’s what’s available! In the meantime, we keep eating offal week after week because it feels so grounding and nourishing….
Kidney Meatloaf with Shitakes was so popular last weekend, I’m selfishly posting so I can find it later. Surprise, surprise, we’re not eating tons of liver right now. In fact, we’re enjoying other organs still available from our local farmers during this collective exhale. After diving into Chris Masterjohn’s well-researched Food and Supplement Guide to Coronavirus last week, I wanted to share why we’re skipping extra liver right now and how we’re incorporating zinc and copper into our diet these days….
Chicken and Gizzard Meatballs with Dill have been a simple and familiar part of our everyday this winter.
This past week I met a friend at the Art Institute and she guided me to the Noda Tetsuya exhibit. I found such an inspired and beautiful set of prints. An original expression of social media, in layered print. Reflecting his day to day, life and family. Deliberately.
Tetsuya shares his day to day experiences in his work. Some of his most celebrated pieces reflect exceptional days, such as his engagement announcement to his family and future in-laws. However, he makes his everyday beautiful at the same time, with prints of his wife or growing children – a stamp in time. Or as a commentary on a moment or place where he found himself over the years….
What to do with all those odd bits? Make Stuffing with Giblets and share them with the people that you love!
And count your blessings while you do… That you have a turkey that comes with giblets. That you have the resources for using them. And that you will be able to savor the nutrient density of these goodies, all the while enjoying a delicious meal.
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Happy Halloween! Scrambled Brains with Beets are so beautiful, but also worthy of a Halloween scare. In honor of Halloween, I digress from my usual nutrition soapbox or nudge toward self-care. I am finishing Permanent Record by Edward Snowden, and want to comment on something truly scary to me: our collective loss of privacy and civil liberties at the hands of the US government.
I have no idea how this could play out in the long term. Like everyone else, I am reluctant to completely fall off the grid because I appreciate the connections and joy that I stumble upon using technology. This blog. Social media accounts. Twenty plus years of email. I’m writing this post to create more awareness. The thought of all this truly scrambles my own brain and I’m asking you to take a moment, over Scrambled Brains perhaps, to think about how complicated this is….