[119] Pork Shoulder with Chipotle-Orange BBQ Sauce

Cover of Simply Organic by Jesse Ziff Cool

Note: this was made prior to buying the hog. It is NOT from our share of the hog.

We made this one for a party. I’m not sure if I was prompted by a Whole Foods sale on pork shoulder, a cut I am loving more and more and more. My friend Dylan tells me it’s commonly turned into sausage, do to its ratio of fat:meat. I say, “What a waste!” This is good for so many other things!

I have a slightly tilted photo there. No idea why.

Anyway, as you can see, there’s a lot of good stuff going on in that photo. Aside from a nice cut of meat, the oranges, green onions & chipotles!

I recall it being pretty simple to make as well.… Continue reading →

Where I’ve been and where I’m going.

Reading, writing and thinking about food―and cooking food!—are such a significant part of my life now that it’s hard to believe I’ve only been sharing recipes and food thoughts here at MetaCookbook for eight months. The importance of food and food issues have been a long and slowly simmering topic for me (kind of like an excellent pot of chili), and one of the sources of this interest was “the 2001 Discover article on Gary Nabhan and his quest to eat locally sourced foods to save the planet.”:http://discovermagazine.com/2001/may/feateatlocal

Nabhan’s views, as presented in the article, started the process of challenging how I thought about food and how I eat. I will come right out and say that reading the article didn’t change my food habits right away―but Nabhan’s ideas and experience lodged themselves in my brain.… Continue reading →

[79] Seared Salmon with Orange Glaze

Cover of The Healthy Kitchen, by Andrew Weil and Rosie Daley

I generally love fish. I love everything about them, from watching them swim to knowing there’s some creepy fish out there to the way many of them taste.

Fish rule, basically. That’s what I’m saying. I’m also saying I wish I had the contents of my friend Claire’s freezer after she gets back from a trip to Alaska. Her husband and her father go out fishing. And, apparently, “fishing” isn’t code for “gettin’ away from the wimmin folk & drinkin’” the way so many of those trips are, but it actually means “fishing”, because she ends up with a big ol’ pile of halibut.

Halibut that her husband’s not a big fan of, because he disagrees with me on the “fish rule” thing. Oh well. Can’t win ’em all.… Continue reading →