Honey, not just for bears

I used to eat a lot of honey as a kid (explains why I’m so sweet! Ha!). My dad would buy a big 10 pound tub of wildflower honey every so often from the health food store. It would go on toast, in smoothies, and over yogurt. Ten pounds of honey seems like a lot (and it is) but my dad and I did our best to get through it!

While technically still a sugar, with nearly as many calories (21 cal vs 16 cal) and grams of carbs (6g vs. 4.2g) as table sugar, honey is far better for you than most any other sweetener.

From a chemical standpoint, honey is a monosaccharide, comprised of a single sugar molecule. Because of this, honey is easier to digest than sugar. Sugar is a disaccharide and starches are polysaccharides. These require additional splitting in order to be transported from the intestines into the bloodstream and can often create intestinal problems for those of us who are sensitive. Other monosaccharides are fruit, lactose free yogurt, and certain vegetables.

Even if you don’t have digestive concerns (unless you’re diabetic, battling a candida (yeast) problem, or on a low-carb diet to reduce your weight) I recommend eating more honey and less refined sugar for a number of reasons. (For sure we should all be eliminating artificial sweeteners, which are just simply poison.)

Honey is a natural product, offering enzymes and minerals that sugar cannot.  Sugar has gone through a refining process and is no longer natural. Honey is simply a more natural way to satisfy a sweet tooth.

Eating honey local to your area can benefit those with allergies. By eating honey produced by bees near where you live, you are building your immunity from local plants. A resource for finding local honey producers by state can be found here: www.honey.com. Other good sites are www.beeculture.com, and www.localharvest.org.

Certain types of honey, such as Manuka, have been shown to be more effective than antibiotics in the treatment of serious, hard-to-heal skin infections. The only types of honey you should ever attempt to use for wound care are Manuka honey or raw (unprocessed) honey. Conventional “Grade A” type honey found in most grocery stores may actually worsen infection and should never be applied to wounds. Clinical trials have found Manuka honey can effectively eradicate more than 250 clinical strains of bacteria.

Purchasing honey is also a great way to support beekeepers, who often struggle financially to make ends meet. While buying honey at your local market, Trader Joe’s or health food store is better than buying their sugar, go to your farmer’s market or neighborhood beekeeper directly and buy honey from them. They will be happy to let you taste the many varieties of honey they offer so you can decide which flavor you like best.

A few months ago I did just that. We were driving the back roads to a little mountain town northeast of San Diego called Julian for the weekend and came across a roadside shack selling local honey. They had some really interesting flavors: avocado, habanero, and cinnamon honey to name a few. I bought 2: desert sage, and cherry; cherry being particularly good over blueberries and whipped cream!

A few weekends ago we were in Ojai and our friends noticed a sign on the main street advertising a honey tasting nearby. Heavenly Honey offered samples of the 6-8 varieties they produce. I again bought the sage (it’s one of my favorites) and also this time a little darker honey variety than I usually get, Buckwheat, which was also really tasty. I tried it on my nutty pancakes I made last weekend and it was perfect.

But there are so many flavors to choose from. Another one I really love is orange blossom.

Embrace your inner bear and eat more honey, especially from beekeepers at your farmers market. You’ll be supporting our endangered bees and hard-working beekeepers by investing in Nature’s purest sweetener.

This recipe is particularly good when peaches are in season and we’ve got the grill on half the time anyway.

Grilled Peaches with Cinnamon Honey and Whipped Cream

One ripe peach per person, cut in half, seed removed
1 Tbsp. butter
1 Tbsp. honey
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
Whipped cream or vanilla ice cream*

Turn on your grill to low.

Wash, dry and cut in half one ripe peach per person.

Melt some butter in a small saucepan, to which you’ll add a little honey and a sprinkling of cinnamon. Using a pastry brush, brush the entire surface of each peach half with a little coating of this mixture. Place the peach halves face down on the grill and cook for about 5 minutes until nice grill marks are achieved. Turn over, brush with a little more honey butter and cook another 5-8 minutes until the peaches are warm.

While the peaches are grilling, get out your Kitchen Aid mixer or hand held mixer and whip some fresh cream, sweetened with a little honey or a few drops of stevia, if you like.

Remove peaches from grill and serve alongside the whipped cream for a delicious, easy, summertime dessert.

* Alternatives to whipped cream or ice cream: ricotta cheese, mascarpone, chèvre, Greek yogurt, regular yogurt, or cream cheese. Any of those would be great with a little cinnamon, ginger,  and / or nutmeg, and of course sweetened with a little honey!

Grilling Trout

In June I wrote a post about my trip to Mammoth Lakes, California, and how we had fresh trout for dinner. Though I gave some hint as to how the fish were prepared that evening, I thought I’d spend more time on it today, considering we recently enjoyed it again.

And I wanted to focus on trout, because it is really a wonderful fish and I don't hear much about it, either from friends making it, or on cooking shows. It's delicate, moist, flaky, and mildly sweet and needs very little to taste great. If you’re not able to head to your nearest lake and fish for your dinner, but you have a Costco nearby, you’re in business. In fact, as my husband pointed out, it's actually cheaper to get it at Costco. By the time you buy your fishing license, get bait, etc. you've spent more (of course there's the whole fishing experience thing, if you're into that). Costco sells a 4-pack of fresh, whole trout, which are the next best thing. Granted, I’m not the one who deals with the head and tail (I leave that to the fisherman at home), but I think I could, if I had to.

Trout is wonderfully healthy and a good source of Omega-3’s.  Omega 3’s are at critical lows in the SAD (Standard American Diet) and we should be eating more of them.  Omega 3’s cannot be manufactured by the body, so they must be obtained from food and fish is an excellent way to add this critical nutrient to a healthy diet.

Omega 3’s offer many health benefits:

• They can alleviate inflammatory diseases such as arthritis and help reduce the amount of medication taken for them.
• They prevent the blood from forming clots, which therefore reduces the risk of heart attack and stroke.
• They protect against heart and circulatory problems and are good for the healthy development of the brain and eyes.
• People who regularly consume oily fish (such as trout) are less likely to suffer dementia or Alzheimer’s.
• Making trout a part of our diet can also help reduce bad (LDL) cholesterol and lower blood pressure.
• In addition, this fish offers Vitamin B12, B6, niacin, potassium, phosphorous and selenium. Fat-soluble vitamins are plentiful in oily fish such as Vitamins A, D, E and K.

Other oily fish are salmon, sardines, swordfish, fresh tuna, anchovies, eel, kipper, mackerel, carp, smelt, and bluefish. As oily fish contain a certain amount of fat it is best to use cooking methods where additional oil is not needed. Therefore, grilling, baking, steaming, and pan-frying are ideal.

And finally, Rainbow Trout is a good choice in terms of sustainability, according to the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s annual Seafood Watch guide.

Ok, so enough about that. We were in the mood for trout again so we headed to Costco and here’s what we did with it.

Grilled Trout with Herbs

Preheat your grill.

Take each trout and rinse it well under running tap water. Pat dry with paper towels.  Place fish on cutting board. Open cavity and stuff with a few sprigs of fresh lemon thyme, lemon slices, salt and pepper. Close up cavity. My husband will use a bamboo skewer, snapped in half, and weave it in and out to sew up the cavity, if you will. This helps prevent the stuffing from falling out when he turns the fish on the grill.

Do this with the remaining fish.  Place the fish on the heated grill and grill about 8-10 minutes per side, depending on the thickness of the fish. The rule of thumb is generally about 10 minutes per inch, measuring at the thickest part of the fish, of course.

Remove from grill. Lift fish head with one hand while sticking a fork in under the gills on the underside. Gently pry the skeleton away from the meat by lifting the body up. The meat should easily pull away from the bones. Use gravity. Flip the fish over and do the same on the other side. The head, skeleton and tail will then all be attached to one another and you can throw this out. Congratulations - you've deboned the fish in one fell swoop! Remove bamboo skewers and stuffing from cavity. 

Serve "butterflied" (open) with melted lemon butter.  In my opinion, the best veggie to serve alongside this fish is green beans. Dribble a little melted lemon butter on those, too. Maybe sprinkle on both some sliced almonds for a little texture.

You can also make fish tacos with trout. Simply pan-fry a filet for 5-7 minutes and add to a corn tortilla, along with shredded green cabbage with lime juice. Sprinkle on a little green Tabasco sauce or salsa verde and some “white sauce”, made from a little mayo and sour cream mixed together with a bit of lime juice and grated lime peel.

Mammoth Trout & Forest Bathing

Last weekend was my husband’s family reunion, of sorts. Just the immediate family - mother, father, 3 brothers, their wives and a couple of dogs . The occasion was fishing and the location, a family hangout for many years, Mammoth Lakes.

We drove up from southern California along Hwy 395, through miles and miles of dry, mostly deserted, barren, hot desert. The occasional Joshua Tree dotted the landscape, adding some visual interest to an otherwise monotonous stretch of beige nothingness. Dilapidated buildings, the occasional gas station, rest stop, and home-made jerky stand were all we saw for hours. After sweating through 95 degree heat in a car with non-working air conditioning (!) the road started its ascent after Bishop. As we climbed, the car’s outside temperature gauge literally went down one degree after another every minute, eventually reaching the high 60’s. Ahhhhh, relief! Not only was the temperature change a welcome relief, but so were the sights. As the road gained elevation, the landscape also changed. Brown desert gave way to green pines, sand gave way to craggy mountains.

As we exited the highway into Mammoth Lakes, my husband and I recognized stores and restaurants we’d been to the last time we were here and we were glad to see many of them were still in business. Of course, his memories go back much farther than mine. Childhood summers and winter vacations were spent at the condo his parents had once owned here.

Mammoth in the winter

We were too early to check in to the condominium his family had rented for the weekend, so we drove past the street where we would have turned, and went a bit further up the road to Twin Lakes. Glad to get out and stretch our legs again, we were blasted with gale force winds we hadn’t expected. We took a few pictures, but the wind just about blew us over. Undeterred from enjoying this idyllic place we hadn’t seen in a long time, we got back in the car and continued up the road and crossed the bridge over the lake. You could see the waterfall best from this vantage point. We were both thinking the same thing: someday we would have to camp here. Twin Lakes Campground is small but beautiful, each campsite nestled among trees and shrubs, virtually private from its neighbors. One place I had never seen was the top of the waterfall that feeds Twin Lakes. What an amazing view! (Later I was to learn that it had appeared in a Toyota commercial).


The mountains had the last remnants of snow at their peaks – just enough to remind us that winter had passed but that summer hadn’t quite yet arrived. Despite a lackluster season, snow melt created ample water to feed these lakes. Fishermen in their little aluminum boats bobbed around on their surfaces with rods dangling in the water, hoping to catch something. I was hoping the men in this family would be successful, too. Dinner the second night depended on it!


As evening approached we realized it was time to head to the condo where the rest of the family had probably already arrived. After all the greetings and unpacking the car, dinner was quickly assembled and we tucked in. It had been a long travel day for all of us.

Lake Crowley, 15 miles from Mammoth Lakes

The following morning, as sandwiches and goodies were packed, the men were sent off to fish Lake Crowley. The women headed out to sightsee. We headed to the lakes (I didn't mind seeing them again) and drove past the Mammoth Mountain ski resort up to the summit for a panoramic view of the Minarets, as well as other mountain peaks and alpine meadows. The sky was blue, the air clear, everything breathtakingly beautiful.

Throughout the day we had been getting periodic text message updates from one of the brothers with the # of fish caught. For a while, it was looking kind of grim. I was thinking that maybe we should give them the address of the nearest supermarket to stop at along the way! At the end of the day they came home with enough to feed the 10 people we would have for dinner. Fresh trout for everyone!!

Lake trout

My brother-in-law, Steve, is a really good cook, and he was in charge of preparing them.  He left the fish whole and into the cavity placed a twig of rosemary, lemon slices, salt and pepper and sliced onion. Then he grilled the fish whole for 7 minutes per side and let them rest for a couple of minutes before cutting off the head and tail and filleting them.

We each received half a fish, which was plenty, with all the other food we had. There were green beans almondine, rice salad, and Greek salad. It was a great feast and everything was so good. The fish was of course the main attraction and absolutely wonderful. Moist and juicy and incredibly fresh (like 'hours' fresh, not 'days'). 


That weekend I realized that there is something sort of primal in catching and preparing your own food - a link to times when people had to rely on themselves. Today's "hunting" at the supermarket doesn't provide that same feeling. To go out and "hunt and gather" for oneself provides a greater appreciation and respect for the food we eat, since there would also have been times one would have had to go without.  

I fished with my husband and father-in-law on that very same lake many years ago. I had caught the first fish and at the end of the day had caught the most. There was a sense of accomplishment there, I will admit. But my favorite part of being in the mountains is the time spent outdoors. I find that very primal, too. I recently read that a great way to recenter yourself is to engage in "forest bathing". I thought this was a great term to describe spending time in natural settings. I do feel "bathed" when I see the beauty of sweeping vistas, alpine lakes and meadows, and snow-capped  rugged mountains. It renews and refreshes.

Holy Smoke!

Memorial Day weekend is considered the official beginning of summer and for many of us, that means barbeques will be ablazin’. Time to take off the cover of your grill and clean it up to get it ready for the weekend’s cooking and entertaining.

If you’re like us, and especially if you live in milder climates like Southern California, you’ve probably already started grilling. It can be almost a year-round activity where we live, and we like it that way. Grilling is great for many reasons: it’s quick, clean up is easy, and you don’t have that cooking smell in the house, which is especially unwelcome when you’re making fish.  It’s also a nice alternative to baking or roasting, sautéing or pan-frying.

I’ve done some reading about smoking recently and thought it was appropriate for my post on grilling. I’ve not done much smoking myself, but found myself buying wood chips on sale somewhere not too long ago with the intent to learn how, so I am going to use them this weekend. My grill has a “fancy slot” on one side where you can slide out a narrow tray and lay in some wood chips. It is the perfect sized tray for laying down rosemary twigs. I’ve done that when grilling chicken. It’s also nice for beef. The smoke from the burning rosemary gave the chicken great flavor. Smoking food imparts a wonderful depth of flavor to foods. You can still marinade the food first, but then when grilling, the smoke adds another dimension resulting in layers of flavor that can be very interesting.

Smoker

We have a gas grill and I like it a lot better than the carcinogenic charcoal variety. I just don’t like the taste of lighter fluid, thank you very much. Whichever kind of grill you have, you can smoke. (Of course, you can just go out and buy a smoker)! But you don’t need one, a regular grill will work just fine. Depending on the type of grill you have, the prep work is a little different. Here’s how to do it.

Charcoal Grills

Arrange coals on one side of the charcoal grate and leave the other side empty to create two heat zones. The empty side is for cooking foods that require indirect heat; you can also move food there when you get flare-ups. To smoke, once coals are lit, scatter soaked and well-drained wood chips evenly over the charcoal. Wait for smoke to appear before you begin cooking.

Smoker box containing wood chips

Gas Grills

Gas grills are a little different because they require preheating to generate smoke, and wood chips need to be contained.  You can either purchase a metal smoker box or make your own placing chips in a small foil pan. Cover the top with aluminum foil, then poke holes in the foil to let the smoke out. You can even just use a piece of aluminum foil and fold it into a packet, again poking holes on top. Before you light the grill, remove cooking grates and place the aluminum pan directly on bars, preferably in a back corner. Replace cooking grates, light grill with all burners on high, and close the lid. If you are using a box, place it on top of the grate, directly over a lit burner. When smoke appears, turn one burner off completely, adjust remaining burners according to your recipe, and begin cooking.

Smoking Success

1. Start raw. Meats should be raw. The smoke won’t permeate cooked meat as well.
2. Don’t overdo it. Don’t add too much wood else the end result might be bitter. Better to start out with a small amount and add more next time.
3. White smoke is good, black is bad. White smoke layers food with the intoxicating scents of smoldering wood. If your grill however lacks proper ventilation, or your food is directly over the fire and its juices are burning, a black smoke will taint your food and give it a burned taste.
4. Don’t peek. Every time you open the grill, you lose heat and smoke – two of the most important elements to a great meal. Open the lid only when you have to tend to the fire or flip the food.
5. Keep the air moving. Open the vents on your charcoal grill and position the coals on the side opposite the lid vent. The open vents will draw smoke from the charcoal and wood below so that it swirls over the food and out the top properly, giving you the cleanest smoke.

Wood chips

The type of wood chips you buy will determine the final flavor. Here’s a guide to wood flavors:

Mild

Alder – Delicate smoke flavor. Good with fish (salmon and sturgeon), chicken and pork.

Apple – Slightly sweet but also dense. Good with beef, poultry, pork - especially ham.

Cherry – Slightly sweet and fruity. Good with poultry, game birds, pork.

Moderate

Maple – Nicely smoky, somewhat sweet flavor. Good with poultry, vegetables, ham.

Oak – Assertive, but pleasing. Good with beef (particularly brisket), poultry, pork.

Hickory – Pungent, smoky, baconlike flavor. Good with pork, chicken, beef, wild game, cheeses.

Pecan – Rich and more subtle than hickory but similar in taste; burns cool, so ideal for very low-heat smoking. Good with pork, chicken, lamb, fish, and cheeses.

Strong

Mesquite – In a class by itself - a big bold smoke with a little bitterness. Good with beef and lamb.

I’ve included a simple grill / smoke recipe using the herb rosemary for you to try.

Grilled Lemon Rosemary Chicken

Rosemary, cut into 1-2” pieces, can also be used as a smoking medium. The thicker, woodier stems located near the base of the plant are especially well suited for this. Use the top of these stems for the more delicate “leaves” that end up getting chopped.

Ingredients:

Chicken pieces: breast, thighs, drumsticks, whatever you like.

A pinch each of sea salt and freshly ground black pepper

Freshly pressed lemon juice

Olive oil

1 tsp. finely chopped fresh rosemary leaves

Rosemary stems, cut into 1-2” pieces, placed in your smoking contraption

Mix together the salt, pepper, olive oil, lemon juice and chopped rosemary. Marinade chicken in this for as long as possible, ideally 12-24 hours. I like to place my marinade and meat in a large Ziplok bag and put it in the fridge the evening before I plan to cook it. The next morning, I’ll give the bag a turn, so that the other side of the chicken now rests in the marinade. When ready to grill, remove chicken from bag and discard both marinade and bag.

Follow directions above for placing your wood chips on your type of grill and grill away! Chicken takes about 8-10 minutes per side, over medium heat, depending on thickness. Better to cook it more slowly, on a lower flame for longer, than too quickly.

Delicious with roasted potatoes and other roasted veggies, or a big salad, and of course, a nice white wine, like a California Chardonnay or Pinot Grigio.

Wishing you a glorious summer of happy grilling.

Source: Better Homes and Gardens Magazine, May 2012

Summer is for Grilling

Memorial Day is approaching and that traditionally signals the beginning of summer. Grilling is such a great way to impart flavor to foods, and since this blog is all about flavor, I would be amiss to not cover this universally-embraced cooking technique.

Did you know that grilling food is the single most important reason for the successful development of the human race? Amazon carries a book called Catching Fire - How cooking made us human. Looks like an interesting read. The review says, "Contrary to the dogmas of raw-foods enthusiasts, cooked cuisine was central to the biological and social evolution of humanity, argues this fascinating study. Harvard biological anthropologist Wrangham dates the breakthrough in human evolution to a moment 1.8 million years ago, when, he conjectures, our forebears tamed fire and began cooking. Starting with Homo erectus, these innovations drove anatomical and physiological changes that make us adapted to eating cooked food the way cows are adapted to eating grass. By making food more digestible and easier to extract energy from, Wrangham reasons, cooking enabled hominids' jaws, teeth and guts to shrink, freeing up calories to fuel their expanding brains. It also gave rise to pair bonding and table manners, and liberated mankind from the drudgery of chewing (while chaining womankind to the stove). Wrangham's lucid, accessible treatise ranges across nutritional science, paleontology and studies of ape behavior and hunter-gatherer societies; the result is a tour de force of natural history and a profound analysis of cooking's role in daily life. More than that, Wrangham offers a provocative take on evolution—suggesting that, rather than humans creating civilized technology, civilized technology created us."

Ok, so back to this weekend. If your plans call for spending time with friends and family, as ours do, especially outdoors, enjoying the great weather (it’s in the 70’s where I live – perfect!), then a grill fest is sure to be in order. Our friends Anna and Mike are hosting the fete: a Sausage and Beer Fest. Should be great.

Here are some great grilling tips to keep in mind before you light up:

1. Use the right equipment – flat, all-metal skewers are great for grilling vegetables, a small spray bottle filled with water to put out any small fires that may erupt, a silicone basting brush, a wire brush to clean the grill, and a pair of extra-long metal tongs for moving things around on the grill.

2. Start with a clean, oiled grill – A clean grill reduced sticking food and flare-ups. Scrub grill clean with a stiff wire brush, then brush the entire grate with a neutral-flavored cooking oil such as canola, grapeseed or vegetable oil. Extra virgin olive oil is too precious to use here and is also not suited for high-heat grilling.

 

3. Bring ingredients to room temperature – moving meat and vegetables straight from the fridge to the grill leads to uneven cooking. Let foods come to room temperature for about 30 minutes before putting them on the grill.

 

4. Score steaks and chops – leave ¼ to ½ inch of fat on steaks and chops for natural basting and real flavor in the cooked meat but be sure to score the fat (make small cuts in it) so the meat doesn’t curl up while on the grill.

 

5. Wrap fish in leaves – protect fish from the heat of the grill by wrapping whole fish or fillets in large leaves such as grape leaves, fig leaves, banana leaves or corn husks. They also make a great presentation as you bring them that way to the table.

 

6. Use herbs for added flavor – tie a bunch of herbs together, particularly rosemary, and use them as a basting brush, but also add sprigs of hardy herbs to the smoker tray of your grill to impart additional flavor to the food.

 

7. Prevent Flare-Ups – Flare ups burn food, add bitter char, and increase carcinogens in grilled foods. Starting with a clean grill will help, so will cooking with the lid on (completely or slightly ajar). To manager flare-ups that occur despite these precautions, keep a small spray bottle filled with water at the grill, ready to spritz rogue flare-ups.

 

8. Flip Once – limit handling items on the grill. Grill completely on one side before turning or flipping, and then cook completely on the other side. Minimizing handling helps meat hold on to its juices and everything develop attractive grill marks.

 

9. Touch your food – chefs can tell when meat is done just by poking it. With a little practice, so can you. Raw meat feels very soft, rare meat is still soft, medium rare is fairly resistant but yields a bit, medium springs back at you a bit quicker, medium well and well will be solidly firm. This is something you can only learn with practice, so start poking!

 

10. Let food rest – this tip is particularly important for all poultry and meat. Let meat rest – sit at room temperature (tented with foil to keep warm, if you like) to allow the moisture and heat inside to distribute evenly. Resting is the final step in cooking meat and should not be overlooked. Ten to fifteen minutes is good for most items.

So, let your inner caveman/woman get the better of you this weekend and fire up your grill. By the way, grilled asparagus, if you can still find any around, is wonderful and takes only minutes.

Grilled Asparagus

• a bunch of asparagus
• extra virgin olive oil
• coarse, or regular, high-quality sea salt
• freshly ground black pepper

Wash asparagus and peel, especially the tougher bottoms. Lay out evenly, so none overlap, on a foil-lined grill. Drizzle with the oil, salt and pepper. Grill for about 5-7 minutes on medium low, watching the whole time.
 
Take off grill and enjoy immediately!
 
Happy Memorial Day!