Beautiful Borscht

I first discovered that I actually love beets in my late 20s.  I had joined a food co-op and there was a weekly CSA that I signed up for.  This was the mid 90s, before the locavore 'fad' really took off and I was exposed to many foods that I had never eaten before, and some of them I had never even seen.

One of these items was beets.  Yes, beets.  Oh sure, on occasion, I'd tentatively sampled those generally awful pickled beets that are way too sweet and use the cheapest quality of white vinegar.  I had determined from those scrunched up face samples that no thank-you, like my mother, I did not like beets.

So when these first fresh beets arrived I queried my fellow CSA members and was told to roast them, skins on, for about an hour (these were generously sized beets).  Roasting them with the skins on retains more of the fresh flavour - you remove the skin after baking them.  I was also told back then that you could eat beets raw, like carrots.  At that time I felt that a whole new culinary closet had been revealed to me.  Because, you see, it turned out that I actually love beets.  Really really love them. I also have fond memories of my daughter painting her face with them - she would get so excited when I made beets because she was allowed to play with her food :)

And since then I have grown them, souped them, slawed them and still often roast them with their skins on.  I really like the candy striped variety that I grew a couple of years ago.  Another favourite variety are the bright orange (gold) ones too.  I stay away from pickling them although I might give that a go since I've tasted better quality beet pickles now too.

One recipe that I never quite got the knack of was Borscht.  And last week, while walking my dog, one of my wonderful neighbours called me over to give my dog a treat (she doesn't have a dog, she just keeps treats for dog passerbys by like me).  I joked that my dog was living the good life on that particular day since I had made chicken stock the previous day and she was enjoying all the gristle from that (bones removed, of course).  This neighbour then said that she had made borscht the previous weekend and would I like some of the rib gristle for my dog? She had been giving it to her cats but there was still plenty.  This led to an exchange by not only animal lovers but also made-from-scratch food lovers.  She told me the recipe of her Ukrainian heritage family and yesterday I finally made it after craving it since she told me about it.

Ukrainian Borscht
1 - 2 lbs pork ribs  - I used riblets
1 bunch beets peeled and chopped into bit sized pieces - use root only - I used the green tops for another soup I made
1/2 bunch fresh dill (about 12 stalks)
1/4 - 1/2 cup lemon juice
1 tsp salt
salt and pepper to taste

Put the ribs in a medium sized cast iron pot with a tight fitting lid and cover with water.  Add salt and bring to a boil.  Simmer until meat is falling off the bones, about 2 hours.  Use a colander to strain the broth.  Return the broth to the pot and remove the meat from the bones and gristle.  Add the small sized meat pieces to the stock. Add the chopped beet.  Add the stalks of dill with the thickest parts of the stalk removed,  I then 'broke' the stalks into large pieces of about 2 - 6 inches in length. Bring the mixture back to a boil and simmer for about 20 minutes in order to cook the beets. Refrigerate at least 1 day in order to let the flavours settle.  Add the lemon juice (to taste) before serving.

My soup pot and one of the freezer jars of borscht.

The politics of food and 2006 Stats Canada Census data for Toronto

The Employment Equity Act defines visible minorities as 'persons, other than Aboriginal peoples, who are non-Caucasian in race or non-white in colour.' data source

Toronto has reached a new era of multi-culturalism.

Us Torontonians are living in a city with no clear majority of race, colour, or creed.

This is a unique time and place to live on this globe.

Why post this on a food blog?

As it turns out, the politics of food in the city has become a hot topic. I attended a forum on this exact topic in the fall (audio download available here).

An eloquent farmer (wearing a bright "Farmers Feed Cities" button) got up during the question and answer period and asked us all to consider why G8 countries obey very strict laws regarding importing cheaper goods into developing countries that can't grow or produce the same goods as cheaply as wealthy developed nations YET our very own country allows cheap imported food to undercut locally grown food at alarming and growing levels (most of Toronto's food is imported from outside of province and outside of the country - this has changed drastically in the last 20 years). He mentioned strawberries from California as the perfect example.

Part of the wide scale change in Toronto's food markets has come about because of what I have displayed above using today's freshly released 2006 census data and google's funky new chart creator.

A city of immigrants wants a taste of their homeland and they have every right to demand it from the market. But what we don't have at the moment is the ability for Ontario to provide the raw food for the myriad of diets that the city of Toronto currently has. Rice is just one small example of a food that is in huge demand in our city yet Ontario is not able to grow this staple.

There are foods that Ontario could grow but Canada does not provide immigrants with support to choose farming in their new land. Our immigrant approval process actively discourages applications from foreign farmers.

So we have white Caucasians choosing what to grow in what little farmland is to be had around Toronto (and Ontario) so the dietary needs of most new immigrants can not be supplied with locally grown food.

This imbalance has resulted in a form of food terrorism. Immigrants are forced to buy imported goods in various markets booming around the city. Any change or threat to this food supply will lead to a large scale disaster of a gastric nature.

And considering that most of us Torontonians (visible minority or not) consume foreign grown food daily...this food terrorism situation applies to us all.

That is why I belong to a food co-op. Increasing and maintaining active alliances with local farmers is something I hope to formalize at the co-op during my term on our board of directors. Food security is a real issue. For all of us. Everywhere.

Karma Food Co-operative Inc.: Toronto's only Member Owned Food Co-operative Store

I am on the board of directors for Karma, a co-op that has been running for over 35 years. In 1997-1999 I was on the board of director's for Ebytown Food Co-op in Kitchener (now a 30 year old institution). The contrast in experience is baffling to me in many ways and for many reasons but there is one way that my experience with both co-ops is exactly the same - the availability of whole foods at decent prices.

I took a number of pictures yesterday at Karma. I wanted to record some general prices of the food Karma carries with my camera.

One of Karma's idiosyncrasies is that we still do not have an electronic point of sale system. All record keeping is done basically by hand except for some, but not all aspects, of basic accounting/book-keeping. This makes analysis of any data at Karma next to impossible and is rarely done except for the financial statements.

As a board member of a co-operative, and Karma has ten people on it's board, we are elected and mandated by our 1000+ members to ensure the efficient and effective operation of our food store. Remarkably, this has worked for 35 years without many processes implemented to observe, record and analyze product movement through the store. Membership details are casually observed but again, no analysis that I know of has been done.

Karma has nearly gone bankrupt a few times in the past and is currently facing a union drive by it's staff of 10 people. Couple this union with our very weak state of finances (due to a renovation that must happen due to violation of the health code) and this might be the death knell. Might. The vibrant and tumultuous history of Karma's past tells me that we will not likely to die and certainly will not without a fight.

Members of food co-operatives tend to get nearly violent (ahem, figuratively) when loss of their food is threatened. Thus, I'm fairly positive that I will be able to take a similar series of pictures next February in our renovated store and we can compare some prices together and marvel over the increased number of local greens on Karma's shelves (we already provide a few hydroponic products from local farmers and that market is growing). I might even be able to report about the successful implementation of a point of sale system (currently being studied by a very productive committee at Karma). Or point you to a site containing events that you, a member of the Toronto public, can attend to find out more about Karma. Pollyanna-like musings? Time and a round table of 10 passionate board members will tell.

All of my visitors are tracked with google analytics. In an effort to illustrate the ease, necessity, and power of data collection in the age of blogging I have planted this post. If you found this post via a google search for Toronto food co-ops or something similar then I will find out (not who you are - just what you searched for - here is the report of key word searches to this blog for last month). Feel free to leave a comment if this is how you landed - in the interest of data collection of course ;) Comments from others are also welcome!

Frankenfood meets nanotechnology this year in a big way

This terrifying knell came straight out of my google alert for frankenfood this morning (emphasis made by moi) - it should make you run towards the closest organic food market near you (or grow your own!):

"A breed of Frankenfood is being introduced into human diet and cosmetics with potentially disastrous consequences, experts said last night.

Academics, consumer groups and Government officials are warning that the arrival of nanotechnology threatens dangerous changes to the body and the environment.

The particles it uses are so small - 80,000 times thinner than a human hair - that they can pass through membranes protecting the brain or babies in the womb.

Nano health supplements, such as antioxidants, are already on the market while the first of hundreds of new foods are expected to arrive in the next 12 months." (published 10:26am on 2nd January 2008)

There has come a time when there is a lot of food to eat but nothing good.

It is difficult to eat wisely in the middle of a 3 million person urban blotch on this planet.

And local? Don't even get me started.

My definition of local, in the city of Toronto, Canada, includes farmers in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Quebec, and New York (although it is hard to determine NY with our current packaging and produce identification laws).

I am currently a board member with Karma Food Coop and I also served on the Ebytown Food Coop board back in the mid 1990s.

This is how I have attempted to control the food I eat. Membership and involvement with local food cooperatives ensure that I know where and what I am putting as fuel into this body.

This blog intends to be part rant, part recipe digest, part nutrition info. I've had some history posting recipes on the web (see this link for a 1993 discussion group posting by moi :)

And the recipes? Gluten free/Legume free/Dairy free/Tomato free. That's how I live and I've found marvelous benefits. Getting an MS diagnosis kicked start me into this diet. No regrets - although it has been challenging after a life time of pizza....etc.