Dharma Feast Cookbook (48 page)

If something calls for ¼ cup, don’t divide the liter equivalent—multiply the tablespoon equivalent. Example: ¼ cup = 4 tablespoons. 1 tablespoon = 15 ml, so ¼ cup = 4 tablespoons x 15 ml each = 60 ml

Choose A Juicer

There is no “best” juicer. Just like we would dress differently for different occasions, each juicer type matches a different need. All that really matters is that you get one that fits your needs. If all you want is fresh orange or grapefruit juice in the morning, then all you need is a manual press juicer.

The Norwalk brand is well-reviewed. Or consider an old-fashioned glass juicer, the kind where youpress half an orange down on it and voila—juice.

If you decide you’d like to add more and different fresh juices to your diet, there are three types of juicers—centrifugal, masticating, and twin-gear.

In a centrifugal juicer, fruit pieces are pushed against a spinning mesh basket, which shreds them into a pulp. The spinning motion also separates the juice. The pulp either stays in the basket or is expelled depending on the model. If it isn’t expelled it has to be removed from time to time during juicing.

These juicers make juice quickly because of their large intake tubes—foods do not need to be cut up as much, and more can be added at once. They work well with most fruits and vegetables and are cheaper than the other two types. They are easy to clean but the mesh basket must be cleaned

immediately or it can become very difficult to get the dried pulp out.

However, they don’t do so well with leafy greens and smaller pieces of produce, which just fall into the mesh basket, leading to wasted food. The fast spinning of the basket also adds heat and air, which oxidizes the juice, resulting in faster nutritional loss than juice produced by the other two kinds. Some work at lower speeds but this means less juice is produced. Centrifugal juicers are the loudest of the three because of the motor power required to spin the basket.

The Omega Big-Mouth Juicer and the Breville Juice Fountain Elite 800 JEXL both get consistently good reviews.

Masticating, or single-gear, juicers grind food into a pulp and squeeze it against a mesh strainer. This results in more juice from the same amount of produce than a centrifugal juicer. The pulp is continuously ejected so it is not necessary to stop juice production to remove it. They run at a much lower speed than a centrifugal so there is less oxidation. Most brands do well with a wide variety of fruits and vegetables and some can even make nut butters and baby foods, but they don’t work as well with leafy greens. They have big feed tubes but, unlike with centrifugal juicers, smaller pieces of food are fully processed.

The best-reviewed ones are from the Omega brand, with the J8006 slightly beating out the J804 and J8005 models. The Champion brand is also well-reviewed and is easy to clean.

Twin-gear (sometimes called triturating) juicers have two interlocking gears that grind food to a pulp to extract the juice. They get the most juice from foods and run at the lowest speeds—juice can be stored for up to two days without significant nutrient loss. They are also the only juicers that work with leafy greens.

Because of their low speeds, though, they do take longer. They also have more parts to clean. They can be less efficient with soft fruits like oranges, although some now have soft-fruit attachments.

The best twin-gears are the Green Star Elite and the Green Power, by Tribest.

Have the following considerations in mind when shopping for a juicer:

Power
—The more power, the faster the juicer works. But the faster the juicer, the more oxidation occurs.

Produce used
—If you want to juice only fruits and vegetables, either a centrifugal or masticating is fine. But if you also want to juice greens then you need a twin-gear.

Feeder tube size
—The smaller the tube the more
produce must be chopped and the longer it takes to make juice.

Simplicity
—The less parts, the easier it is to clean.

Noise
—Centrifugals are the loudest but that doesn’t mean the others are quiet. Still, this is one place where the adage “you get what you pay for” applies—the more expensive juicers are quieter.

Warranty and parts
—All juicers break eventually. A good warranty can mean your juicer gets fixed for free. If you don’t want a warranty, make sure parts are easily available. Buying a bargain discontinued model or an older used model may not be worth it if the manufacturer no longer makes parts for it.

We are the arbiters of our destiny.

– I
RINA
T
WEEDIE

Farmers Markets

The
supermarché,
or supermarket, is a relatively new phenomenon in France. Just like Walmart and other large chain stores have put small retail stores out of business, the
supermarché
has to a large degree done the same to traditional open-air markets. These traditional markets are places where people get vegetables and cheese from
producteurs
(farmers), choose cuts of meat, and buy fresh what they will cook for dinner. The
boulangerie
and
charcuterie,
or bread and meat shops, are also dwindling in numbers. Much to their credit, some French people refuse to shop at the supermarket because they view them as the death of their food culture.

In the U.S. we no longer have a culture of food that is connected to the earth. We have lost relationship with the people who grow our food. What we have lost is the relationships that stretch from the soil of the farm to the plate on our table, and this is partly responsible for our lack of appreciation and connection to what we eat.

Farmers markets are making a comeback in America—they are the fastest-growing segment of agricultural business. It may not be possible to buy everything we need at a farmers market, but by buying as much there as possible we are rebuilding food culture by meeting the person growing our food and having them be a part of the experience.

We have found that if we go to a market in France and buy wine from the person who makes it, there is something subtly different in the experience of drinking that wine. For those of us who work at offices, retail businesses, and all those places where we are far from the natural world, going to a market on a Saturday or Sunday takes us out of the technological influences that we exist in all week long. We can meet a whole variety of people, handle real food, and have an expanded experience of community.

When we buy food directly from the person who grew it we are holding them accountable. They aren’t going to be able to sell us the kind of bruised or unripe tomatoes we may see in a grocery store if the table down the row is selling juicy red tomatoes plucked from the vine that morning. We can take a stand for healthy food in many ways, even engaging in political action. And, we can start in our own hometowns by supporting people of like mind.

It can be difficult to step away from the convenience and comfort of the supermarket, but there is power in the money we work for and spend on food. We are giving our support, consciously or unconsciously, for the way the food we buy is grown. Once we’ve tasted a “real"—local, organically grown—tomato, we are spoiled, in a way, and less inclined to buy chemicalized varieties.

To find a farmers market in the United States go to ams.usda.gov/farmersmarkets and type in a state. This will provide a list of all the farmers markets registered with the USDA. Local Harvest, localharvest.org, also lists local farmers markets. There are lots of farmers markets that are not registered—check local papers. To find a farmers market internationally, check in travel guide books or search for “farmers markets” for the city or region you are in on the internet. You can also check city websites—they often provide a list.

When we do shop in a grocery store or supermarket, often we can still buy food that is grown locally and in season. Food grown far away from us was picked before it was ripe and this forces it to ripen without the life-support system of the plant and the earth. Also, the longer it takes to get food from its source to our table, the more nutrients are lost. People who work in the produce section of your supermarket can be good resources, as they often know what’s in season and where the food comes from if we’re not sure.

Gardens

Gardening gives us a connection to our food and where it comes from that nothing else can. My husband and I (Theresa) live near San Francisco. We have a tiny back yard, but we dug up a strip next to the fence and planted zucchini, onions, cucumbers, basil, Swiss chard, and red bell peppers. As our little garden began to produce we were shocked at how good our produce tasted. It was like the difference between hearing a symphony through laptop speakers and hearing it live. Greens as soft as butter melted on our tongues. Onions were sweet and alive in our mouths.

Our next garden was a salad garden. We picked lettuce, arugula, chard and basil and made a salad that went from the garden to being eaten in thirty minutes. Our young son routinely asked if we could have a salad for dinner, he loved the flavor of living greens so much. I reduced my salad dressing to just a bit of olive oil.

You can have a garden planted in pots even if you don’t have some land. Since greens are important, try to grow at least a salad garden.
Salad Gardens: Gourmet Greens and Beyond
by the Brooklyn Botanic Garden has a section on container gardens for salad greens as well as other vegetables.

In creating your garden, rotate crops year to year so the soil isn’t exhausted, and use good fertilizer, like Fertrell (
www.fertrell.com).
This brand is made with seaweed, which puts the trace minerals we need in the food.
Four-Season Harvest: Organic Vegetables from Your Garden All Year Long
by Eliot Coleman and Barbara Damrosch and
The New Organic Grower: A Master’s Manual of Tools and Techniques for the Home and Market Gardner
by Eliot Coleman are two good resources.

I also get a “farm box,” which is delivered every two weeks and which I share with another family. Our box brings us a variety of picked-that-morning, seasonal produce from a CSA farm (Community Supported Agriculture—a farm that brings its produce directly to a home or drop-off point). It’s a wonderful thing to go to that box, pick out two or three fresh vegetables, and build a meal around them. Go to csacenter.org and click on “Locate a CSA Farm near you” or go to localharvest.org. For international CSAs, again, search the web for your country or region.

If this aspect of food and diet intrigues you, please read
In Defense of Food
by Michael Pollan and
Animal, Vegetable, Miracle
by Barbara Kingsolver. Mr. Pollan uses humor and hard facts to discuss the state of our food culture and explains how we went from eating good, nutritious food to, in his words, “edible foodlike substances.” Ms. Kingsolver and her family lived only on what they could produce on their land or buy in local farmers markets for a year. They ate with the seasons. Then they wrote about it.

Kitchen Tools

The culture of food extends to our kitchen. A well-equipped kitchen helps support an intentional diet. That doesn’t mean that we need every gadget and tool that’s available in all the fancy catalogues that sell expensive stainless steel and wooden utensils. In general, simply get what you need and have it be functional.

Several things to keep in mind: