Vancity Grant for Burnaby Food First

Vancity, Canada�s largest community credit union, has contributed funds that will help support some exciting upcoming gardening projects in Burnaby!

Cheque presentation ceremony at Vancity North Burnaby Branch

Pictured (from left to right): Maria Michayluk (Vancity), Stephen D'Souza (Meals on Wheels),

Joyce Cameron (Burnaby Food First), and Carmela Busto (Vancity)

Credit: Jennifer Lee

They have donated a grant that will help Meals on Wheels, partnering with Burnaby Food First, to deliver free gardening workshops to the local community. Part of the funds will also go towards supporting the Sharing Backyards project, an initiative that helps increase the availability of local gardening space.




Burnaby Food First is grateful to Vancity for their generous funding of our programs.



Leona Skovgaard, chair of the Burnaby Food First Steering Committee, gives thanks for this on-going support:

�Thank you to Vancity for the grant and to Meals on Wheels for partnering with us to provide gardening workshops to the community. These workshops will help residents of Burnaby grow their own fruits and vegetables, as well as create a more engaged community through sharing backyards, community gardens, and participation in workshops.�

The first gardening workshop, to be held on April 18, will help participants plan their garden; registration has already been filled. Leanne Zmud, program coordinator, is very pleased with the overwhelming response.



She encourages anyone interested to get involved. �We will be scheduling more free workshops soon, so please keep checking our website for upcoming events.�



You can find details about all of Burnaby Food First's workshops and projects on the Burnaby Food First website. Check back for information on future workshops.

Ethically sourced veal and foie gras on CBC's Weekend Morning Show!

This morning I presented the following dishes for CBC's Weekend Morning Show with host Terry MacLeod.  I chose these as they are considered controversial but do not necessarily need to be, if sourced and handled properly.  It is important to get to know your butcher, farmer or producer to understand the products offered.

The Foie Gras comes from Brome Lake, Quebec.  It is a free range duck.  They are not penned and walk around freely.  They come to be fed.  The whole duck is used in different products.  They provide an excellent foie gras and is available at DeLuca's on Portage Ave.  

The Veal steak is also a free range product and not treated as large commercial production of milk-fed veal.  This was Halal and is available at Millad's Supermarket on Notre Dame in Winnipeg.

Photo coming soon!

1. Seared Foie Gras with fig or pear compote

Prepare crostini or toasts and top with warm compote as recipe follows;

1/2 - 1 whole sliced pear or 2-3 sliced fresh figs
1/2 tsp butter
ground hazelnuts (optional)
deglaze with Frangelico or Disorrono

Cook pear or figs in pan and cook down with liquor.

Prepare foie gras slices by slightly seasoning with sea salt.  In a hot pan, sear foie gras on both sides until brown and deglaze with liquor.  Place on prepared toasts, top with a few grains of Fleur d�sel or good sea salt and serve immediately.
Enjoy!

2. Veal TBone steak
Talk with your butcher as to wanting free range or ros� veal.  Halal veal would qualify.

Prepare steak as to your desired doneness, recommend rare, serve as desired.

Enjoy!

Evening for Burnaby Food First Volunteers

Join us on Wednesday, April 22, 2015 for an evening of

• Getting to know one another over tasty desserts (including gluten-free options)


• Learning more about Burnaby Food First's volunteer opportunities


• Making seedling pots for yourself as well as Burnaby Food First

New volunteers welcome!



Where: Tommy Douglas Library (7311 Kingsway / Burnaby - map)



When: Wednesday, April 22, 2015, 6:30 pm to 8:15 pm



To register, please email Joyce or call (604) 293-1748.

Planning Your Garden Workshop

Burnaby Food First is pleased to present our first FREE workshop of the season (funded by Vancity)!



Planning Your Garden

Saturday, April 18

10:00 am - 12:00 pm

Goodlad Community Garden, Backyard (7912 Goodlad Street / Burnaby - map)



Join Kayla Gagne to get a jump on spring! Come learn how to plan your garden and start thinking about the veggies you want to grow this season.



Please dress for the weather. We will be outside, rain or shine.



**REGISTRATION CLOSED**

----

Enjoy Burnaby Food First workshops? Want to get involved as a
volunteer?

Check out all the great ways you can get involved. All are welcome, and we'd love to have you on
board! For more information, send us an email.

Strawberry Balsamic Vanilla Sodas

I�m going to keep this pretty short and sweet.
Today is/would have been my dad�s 63rd birthday. We�re having a little family birthday-Easter celebration. I'm making a twist on his favorite spring dessert (a tart with mascarpone and fresh strawberries), we're going to play several rounds of ruthless, competitive, cross-country croquet, eat a lot of Amanda�s amazing pulled ham, and of course, we're going to hunt some Easter eggs (with which we'll make classic deviled eggs, maybe this deconstructed egg salad, and probably this sriracha-sesame egg salad).

We�ll also sip on something fizzy, like these springy strawberry-balsamic-vanilla sodas! They�re sweet, but also a little tart, with tons of warm vanilla flavor. Super for a spring brunch or Easter lunch.

hbd, jfk. <3



Strawberry Balsamic Vanilla Sodas
Makes about 6 sodas

You can use regular vanilla extract, but I like the vanilla paste, because it adds little flecks of vanilla bean!

A little more than 1 cup fresh strawberries, diced
1/4 Cup balsamic vinegar
1/4 Cup honey
1 Teaspoon vanilla paste (or regular vanilla extract)
1 Pinch sea salt
1 Pinch fresh ground black pepper
Ice & soda water to serve

To a saucepan, add all ingredients except ice and soda water. Stir together, and heat over medium-low heat until honey is dissolved and the berries start to break down, about 10 minutes. Cool to room temperature, the blend until smooth. You can strain through a fine mesh sieve or cheese cloth if you desire, but I like the berry seeds.

To serve, add about 1.5 tablespoons of syrup to a glass, fill with ice, then fill with soda water. Stir, and add more syrup as desired.

My Buddy and Me

Warning -- Satire -- April Fools Post

I have a sheepish confession to make: until recently, I had a tapeworm, and that's why I'm lean.

In 2006, I took a trip to Mexico with a few friends. We often traveled through rural areas, and of course sampled the local cuisine wherever we went. In many parts of Mexico, pork is an important food. Some of it may have been a bit undercooked.

At the time, my interest in food and health was growing, and I was making many changes to my diet. I was glad to see the chubbiness around my neck and waist begin to disappear. The diet was working! Or so I thought...

Read more �

Mochiko Chicken Musubi + Surprise Baby Shower!

Emily, the hilarious gal behind The Pig & Quill, is making a human baby, and I'm making little baby sized chicken bites on a fluffy bed of rice, swaddled up all tight in a toasty seaweed blanket. Aww!!! It's practically the same! Right? No? Oh.


To help Emily welcome a new baby girl into world, we�re throwing a surprise virtual baby shower! A bunch of food bloggers got together to make some seriously delicious baby shower treats for our girl, Em.  And her baby girl, lil' piglet. And her husband. I guess he helped... so...he can come too.

As a regular visitor to Emily�s blog, I�ve always loved her quick wit and, more importantly, her taste in food. Her favorites are tacos and Asian. And also, girlfriend loves spam, and isn�t afraid to say it. Here�s the thing: spam is kind of weird and scary. Here�s the other thing: spam is effing good. If you haven�t had spam musubi�tangy sweetly sauced spam sandwiched between rice and wrapped up in nori�you haven�t lived. Or you just haven�t been to Hawaii. Either way, you�re missing out.

It�s a major bummer that Emily can�t eat spam while she�s all knocked up (that�s the official term, right?), so I wanted to give her all the musubi goodness without all the nitrate badness. Enter: fried chicken! On our Kauai honeymoon, Evan and I saw musubi filled with fried chicken (!) instead of spam, and then the planets aligned, a stork visited, someone planted a head of cabbage, and Emily got pregnant (that�s...how it works�?).

I considered oven-frying the chicken (otherwise known as baking it), but I figured Emily is putting in the hard work of, you know, child birth, so the least I could do is fry some damn chicken. But not just any chicken! Lil' nuggets of sweet, salty, garlicky, soy-sauce marinated goodness: mochiko chicken! So, here's to tasty snackies, surprise baby showers, and of course, Em's real life human baby!!

Congrats, girl! Recipe below, and the rest of #EmsPigletParty posts below that!

Fried Chicken Musubi
2 cups cooked sushi rice, mixed together with 1 tablespoon rice vinegar, cooled
Sesame oil
Furikake (or just sesame seeds)
24 pieces of mochiko-style fried chicken (recipe below)
3-4 sheets nori, cut into 24 thin strips
Sriracha if desired

Dip fingers in a little bit of sesame oil to stop rice from sticking to your hands, and roll out 24 tablespoon sized balls. Dip each ball in furikake or sesame seeds, and flaten into an oblong shape. Top each with a piece of chicken, and wrap with a thin strip of nori. Seal with a few grains of sticky rice. Top with sriracha if desired.

Mochiko-style Fried chicken
Recipe adapted from Foodland

4 Tablespoons mochiko flour
4 Tablespoons cornstarch
2 Tablespoons sugar
4 Tablespoons soy sauce
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 Teaspoon salt
2 Eggs, beaten
6 Boneless, skinless chicken thighs, cut into 24 total pieces
peanut oil for frying
 
In a large bowl, whisk together flour through eggs, until combined.

Add chicken to batter, and marinate at least an hour, but overnight in the fridge if possible.

Heat about 2-3 inches of oil in a large dutch oven or cast iron pan, to 350 degrees. Add a few pieces of chicken at a time and fry until golden brown on the outside and cooked through on the inside. Let drain on a paper towel, then cool before making musubi.

Wait! There's more...
See the tasty treats everyone else made for the baby shower!

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