There are many reasons to love maple. Nikolas thinks so, because asked what he wants to be when he grows up (someone asked him this for the first time at the dentist’s office last week, and every parent can relate to my waiting with bated breath), he replied: I want to work in a sugar house and make maple syrup! (There are some sketchy details that then involve knocking our house and his cousin’s house down so we can go and live with him on the farm, but hey, the kid sees a future for himself, AND he’s going to hook us up with maple syrup!).

Back from the 28th annual NOFA winter conference, “Celebrating the Heart of Organic.” The people were numerous, the mood was festive, and the food was delicious! City Market had a table with local food recipes, a raffle of local products, and an information sheet on “local food gaps” – those items we would like to source more of locally, because of a growing demand for them (grains, of course, which are still a challenge to grow, but also things like local eggs, which simply fly off of our shelves).

Nikolas munched on big, orange disks of carrots from Arethusa Farm Thursday night from his first ever school lunch tray. It was a proud parental moment. Later, I used local carrots to make a delicious side dish with roasted local carrots, oranges, and scallions. 
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We have beautiful ginger from Biker Dude in the store right now. For those of you who don’t know Biker Dude, he’s an organic farmer in Hawaii who cultivates a somewhat unconventional image, and he supplies us with fresh ginger with funny names during the growing season. Our Produce Buyer, Mary Manghis, even went out and visited his farm two years ago and cemented our connection.

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One of my favorite things to make to go along with soup is muffins. I find that oatmeal muffins are ideal, because the oats give them a little boost of protein compared to other grains, and the currants in this version complement the savory flavors of soup nicely. (In other words, they're really yummy!)

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I’ve never had much luck with the alchemy of what happens in the oven like a lot of people who consider themselves bakers. I consider myself more of a cook, and a constant experimenter, tweaking things here and there as I stir and taste. But I do like bread, and the process of making dough, and kneading, and the smell of flour as it changes from something pasty to something puffy and mouth-watering.

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After all those soup recipes, I’m feeling like we need some sides to go along with them. Through the end of February, I’m doing cooking demos of beans, grains, and flours in our Bulk section (every Sunday, 2-3:30 p.m.). I’ll be blogging about some of those recipes here. 
 
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Nine intrepid participants showed up to our first ever local soup-making class as part of our Souperbowl Challenge, where we cooked three soups featuring local ingredients selected from several dozen entries.

They chopped, they sautéed, they stirred and they seasoned. And they came up with a winner. “Kale and Kielbasa Soup,” a recipe submitted by Linda Glenn of Burlington!
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Tonight we’re hosting the local soup making class (booked to capacity!), where we will make 3 soups from the dozens that were submitted for the Souperbowl contest! We’ve narrowed down the entries to 3 finalists. Is yours among them? Butternut Squash & White Bean Soup, Curried Roasted Butternut Squash Soup (hm…. I detect a popular theme!), and Kale & Kielbasa Soup (we’ll be making 2 versions, with and without kielbasa).

 
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So the Souperbowl Challenge is in full swing, and I got to prepare a hearty bean and vegetable soup on Sunday for piles of shoppers braving the snowy day on foot, sled, cross-country skis, and snowshoes. I don’t know if it was the day of record snow and festive mood or this particular soup, but I couldn’t ladle it out fast enough. It uses our glorious local yellow-eye beans from Island View Farm,

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