Sunday 7 June 2009

Heart of the Matter #27 - The Best of June's Produce


It's time to announce the new Heart of the Matter theme for this month, I have chosen one that works for both hemispheres so there's no excuse not to participate! The theme is ... The Best of June's Produce. So be it spring summer autumn, take the food/ingredient you like the best and that you can get this month and cook up something heart healthy, you can choose to make it savoury or sweet, solid or liquid, for dinners or lunches or cocktail parties - you choose, you cook, you blog and you send me the link before midnight on Monday the 29 June at luculliandelights AT gmail DOT com.
Remember that your entry should be low in saturated fats (lean meats and fish), be low in salt (sodium), and that you can be abundant with vegetables or fruit. If you want to get more information, check out our useful links in the right hand marginal. Please only use your entry for this event so that we can keep things centered on heart-healthy recipes.


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Friday 5 June 2009

Heart of the Matter 26: The Locavore (Round-Up)

The theme for Heart of the Matter 26 was "The Locavore" or using local foods - using an ingredient, or several ingredients, from near your home. I hope it encouraged at least some people out there to seek out some kind of local food or be inspired to start growing something of your own! I'm sad to say though that only two of you out there were able to join us for this round-up and I hope it's only because May and June, that transition from Spring into Summer is always a busy one. I know I was crazy busy and waited until the last minute to make my dish and try and take pictures, only to find out my camera wouldn't work! So my actual post is in this round-up because I have just now gotten my camera back to working. I know my co-host Ilva also ran into some computer issues and was unable to participate this time as well.

Hopefully we'll see some of our regulars - and maybe a few new bloggers? - back here for June's theme next month!

So without further adieu, here are our three entries - the two ladies who stuck it out and sent in their entry, and myself with my late entry!

Our first entry came from Soma, at eCurry. She used some beautiful little greens that were right outside in her backyard to make her Stir Fried "Pui" with Poppy Seeds - which is, as she describes it "a very simple recipe that my mom & my grandmom would make. It is a stir fry with a lot of flavor of garlic, almost caramelized onions and a sprinkle of poppy seeds." Sounds lovely, doesn't it? And it's so inspiring to me that she grew it herself!

Our second entry came from Zabeena, who writes the blog, A Lot On My Plate. It has a very simple name, Pink Green, but you'll see while its name is simple, there are some incredible and interesting flavor combinations going on in this single dish - consisting of asparagus with three pink dipping sauces (and thus, the name!). She's also got a lot of interesting info about the food, the place she lives and how this dish came about - go check it out!

Lastly, my own dish is super simple, but made with all local ingredients...a Sweet Corn, Mint and Feta Salad. Well, that's not exactly true. It is all local except for one ingredient...which could well have been local too but when I sent my husband to the grocery store for me he came home with the non-local version of the feta. Oh well! Kahuku sweet corn is available for most of the year here and is in full swing right now, so I simply paired it with feta, fresh mint, a bit of lime juice and some olive oil, salt and pepper. It turned out a wonderful, simple dish that I'm sure we'll be eating again this summer with various types of grilled fish and maybe even bring to a potluck or two!

A big thanks to Soma and Zabeena for participating! Hope to see you next month too!

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