#you can't just boil dried corn!

[clove-pinks]

That time when the Petersburg Volunteers were trying to bake dough in rough field conditions during the War of 1812, only to be tragically separated from their meals:

Our culinary utensils were left behind, and we had not as yet been let into the Indian mode of twisting the dough around a stake, and setting it up before the fire to roast. After a brief consultation, we settled on the African method, and concluded that we could get our cakes through in the ash-pone style.

So covering them cleverly with ashes and embers, we were about to broil our pittance of meat, when the drum suddenly beat to arms. We buckled on our armor, hoping it was some new-fashioned morning drill, or that some general order was about to be promulged. It was in vain for the subalterns to pass down the line and say, "Dress — dress — dress by the right!" for we could not keep our eyes from glancing askance toward our smoking cakes, which we were fearful were dressing too fast for the occasion. But what was our extreme disappointment when the luckless word came, and from high authority, "Right face! forward march!" Our legs, being as practiced as stage-horses', began to beat time; but our eyes, although carried away, still had independence enough to cast many a longing, lingering look behind.

As "gentleman volunteers" who were from a higher socioeconomic status than the average soldier, the Petersburg Volunteers were at a disadvantage cooking, since so few of them had experience preparing food. Not long after the lost cakes, they attempted to make hominy from looted foraged corn with equally disastrous results.

[whentherewerebicycles]

hello dear Jes, I am all out of good meal ideas!! I’m always in awe of your drive to cook and the great-looking meals you create. Any good recs for yummy and relatively easy / quick recipes? thank u 🙏

hello!! yes here are some very easy, low effort low prep recipes i love. the bolded ones are the ones i find myself making most often when i am like wow i do NOT want to cook but if i must do so, i wish to make the easiest thing ever.

shakshuka (all recipes are basically the same! i make it with canned tomatoes to cut down on prep, add a sliced jalapeno to make it spicier, and top it with feta and cilantro. if you are not crazy about eggs my sister often makes it with chickpeas and no eggs!)

thai peanut noodles (you can make as-is but i often add roasted broccoli and air fryer tofu if i have time!)

ricotta pasta with roasted broccoli and chickpeas (i roast the broccoli rather than broiling it as i am afraid of broiling lol but it's very easy and delish)

creamy corn pasta (my beloved)

spaghetti with onion-"bacon", corn, and basil

roasted sweet potato tacos (roast sweet potatoes, warm black beans on the stove with spices, and make easy quick-pickled onions if i have time - then you can add avocado, sour cream, cilantro, and any other toppings you like!)

potato egg and cheese breakfast tacos (i roast or air-fry small-cubed potatoes, scramble eggs, melt cheese into the eggs, and top with the salsa of your choice!)

migas breakfast tacos

tortellini with pesto and roasted veggies

caprese toasts (toast bread of your choice, then add pesto, sliced mozzarella, sliced cherry tomatoes, basil if you have it, and balsamic glaze... my all-time fave easy/no-cook meal)

pesto pasta with frozen peas (another super easy one i make when i want to barely cook at all - you boil the frozen peas in the pasta pot for the last three minutes of the pasta's cook time. then add pesto, grated parmesan, a squeeze of lemon, and halved cherry tomatoes if you have them)

easy asparagus soup (thinly slice a leek and cut 1-2 bunches of asparagus into half inch pieces. melt 3 TBS of butter in your pot, then saute the leek plus 5-6 cloves of garlic for 8 min. add asparagus pieces and 4-6 cups of veggie stock, bring to a boil, salt and pepper, and simmer for 30 min. transfer it all to a blender and blend, then add 1/4th cup grated parmesan and the juice of half a lemon. serve with crusty croutons and sliced chives)

roasted sweet potato & figs dish (you can also make with dried dates if you can't find figs!)

easy chana masala

nectarine, arugula, and feta salad (best in the summer when it's nectarine season but delish all year round... you can also use peaches. i usually serve it on a bed of quinoa so it's more filling/more of a main dish. the basil dressing is to die for i could eat it with a spoon)

avocado & egg sandwich (you can make this on a bagel, english muffin, or bread... just toast your bread, mash avocado onto the bread & sprinkle with red pepper flakes, and then scramble or fry eggs to your liking and put on top)

[prommethium]

He said that he was craving Aztec soup.

Because he is my dad, of course I made it!!

Now, I'm sharing just because I'm saving MY recipe here and for the ones who would like to eat some decent fucking Mexican food.

INGREDIENTS FOR THE 3 LITERS OF SOUP. 

6 big tomatoes

4 garlic cloves

1 big ass onion

2 chiles guajillo (dried mirasol)

2 chiles de guisar/ancho (dried Capsicum annuum)

120g of chile chipotle 

1 chicken leg (or just a chicken bone... any bone)

2 chicken breast

carrots to taste

potatoes to taste

Cucurbita to taste (that green veggie)

2 Avocados

Fresh cheese to taste (when I mean fresh, I mean; go and buy it from your local market, not the shit that has probably 6 months in a fridge, this needs a cheese that breaks once you slightly press it between your fingers) if you can't get it, use mozzarella.

15 tortillas (please use tortillas made of CORN, but if you don't have them... well then the dish you will prepare can't be called "Aztec," but hey, you have my permission to use bread or even those shitty nachos BUT YOU CAN'T USE DORITOS... or I'm personally chasing you over and murdering you.)  

Spices

METODOLOGY!!

1) Bring half a liter of water to boil, turn the energy down (fire or ignition WHATEVER!), and add there the dried chilis (this will help them soften.) Leave them to rest. (just look how sad they look and how happy they turn after a nice hot bath 🥺✨ if you are weak and can't tolerate spicy food take away the seeds and the little veins, Omacatl is going to curse you without friends bc of your puny palate.)

2) In a pot, add 2 liters of water, add salt to taste, and put there the chicken; (as it cooks, take away all the foam.) Cook medium-high heat for 35 min.  

3) Cut the tomatoes and the onion into big chunks, and peel the garlic cloves (do it with your fingers pretend they are the eyes of your enemies and release some anger.) 

4) in a very hot comal (or if you are basic, in a nonstick pan,) put your tomatoes and onion to cook, DO NOT USE OIL!! just let them cook on a hot surface.

k: omg!! they look burnt!! are you sure is that the right way???

c: STFU YOU WEAK HUMAN, THEY NEED TO LOOK LIKE THIS if they don't look like this you are doing it wrong; if you don't do it like this the nearest Mexican human corpse is going to haunt you down.

5) Take away the chicken from the broth, and put it in a bowl.

6) Take away from the jacuzzi those dried chilis and put them on the mixer, add the cloves of garlic, tomatoes, and onion you just cooked, the 120g of chipotle chilis, and now my fellas, dear colonizers reading this, pay attention, this is crutial THIS IS WHAT MAKES IT TASTE GOOD:

add a pinch of: 

salt, black pepper, cinnamon, powder of cilantro seeds, brown sugar, thyme, AND 3 PINCHES OF DELICIOUS GLORIOUS CARAWAY. Add a liter of water and mix it well, once looks as homogeneous as it can be, pour it into the chicken broth.

Just look at how pretty that looks!!! That looks like decent food, that looks like something my ancestors would be proud of!!! *honestly I got some tears after tasting this, ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS!!!*

7) Use any method you like to make eatable those chunks of meat, I like to separate the meat with my hands.

8) Add the meat again to the chili-spicy/broth and add the minced veggies 

9) cook for 40 min, low heat.

10) Mince the coriander

11) If you are a cool decent human cut the tortillas into small rectangles and fry them until they are hard 🔥😏 2 to 3 tortillas per serving. If you are not cool use your shameful nachos. 

12) TIME TO FUCKING SERVE AND TASTE THE FRUIT OF YOUR 3 HOURS OF WORK!! 

In a bowl, serve the meat and veggies, add some chili broth, put in the center your tortillas, around the tortillas the cheese, on top the minced coriander, and decorate with slices of avocado. 

now that is decent food 😌🔥 you are very welcome.

[masterbakerdubai]

Ingredients Needed To Prepare Cakes

Cake batters are precise concoctions of several ingredients. In actuality, a cake recipe is a scientific formula that details the exact ratios that must be used to combine the ingredients to produce the cake's structure. Scratch cake recipes include one-bowl techniques, shorter cakes like pound cakes, and foam cakes like angel food and sponge cakes. Mix-mix cakes can taste just as good as homemade cakes, especially if you incorporate ingredients like sour cream or finely chopped chocolate into the batter. Look for a provider of bulk baking ingredients in Dubai.

Every type of cake follows a basic procedure meant to get the intended results. You can produce the best cakes possible if you understand the science of cakes and the rationale behind particular steps in recipes. This knowledge can help you create your own recipes or adapt existing ones for better results as your cake-baking skills develop.

Flour:

All light cakes need a weaker soft flour (low gluten content) to get a more crumbly texture. If you can't find this kind of flour easily, you can soften it with a little cornstarch added to all-purpose flour. Typically, 20% of the corn flour or cocoa flour is replaced by corn flour or cocoa powder.

Baking Powder:

This is used to aerate the cake. Make sure the cake is precisely weighed and sieved several times with the flour to guarantee that it is spread equally and is neither excessively nor insufficiently aerated. To stop the baking powder's gasses from building up and exploding out of the batter, cake mixtures must be cooked immediately.

Butter:

Butter is advised to be used. The outcome of a sponge batter is dependent on the quantity of fat supplied. For creaming, butter should be soft rather than greasy. The more fat there is, the heavier the sponge will be.

Eggs:

The eggs should be warmed up before being used in a cake. You can accomplish this by either boiling them gently with the weighed sugar or immersing them in hot water. This is done in an attempt to produce firm whipped foam that will not crumble when combined with additional ingredients.

If the foam loses the air it has already absorbed, the cake will get thicker. Warming the eggs can prevent curdling of the combinations when fat, sugar, and eggs are combined. Separate the egg yolks and whisk the whites separately to lighten the cake.

Flavouring ingredient:

A range of other materials can be added to the sponge combinations, depending on the intended function of the sponge. For example, while constructing a sponge for a chocolate cake, you can obtain a dark, rich chocolate flavour by adding 20% more cocoa powder to the flour mixture. You can flavor a cake with coffee by mixing coffee and water to make a paste; you can flavor a cake with honey and almonds by mixing flaked almonds and honey; and so on.

These are the essential ingredients that every baker needs. Almonds, coconut, sprinkles, peanut butter, rolled oats, food coloring, dried fruits, and more can be used in addition to the ones already listed. The majority of these ingredients are used in cake icing and flavor enhancers. Get the baking ingredients online in Dubai at Master Baker Studio.

[renas-recipes]

I'm going to toss my hat in the ring, here, as another (former) small cattle operation manager. (We had 30 to 40 head of heifers and cows, and one bull.)

Unless you leave cows in a field long enough that they begin pulling the grass up by the roots out of desperation because they've eaten everything else down, grazing and even making hay are closer to giving you a haircut than it is to killing the plants. The plant itself remains alive; the part that dries and gets bailed to be fed later is just the hair that was clipped off.

A barren field is a major sign of improper resource management and overgrazing. Also, we did feed our cows ground up corn stalks or beet greens as a treat- but these were a result of us cleaning up our own garden to get it ready for winter, or harvesting things for ourselves, as Scout said above.

Basically, my point is that unless theres mismanagement going on to the point that cows are forced to overgraze their field, theres no actual plant death involved in cattle care for the sake of the cattle, its all byproducts.

Now, re: trees, I think an argument can be made for *selective* harvesting, at least insofar on an individuals farm or ranch that doesnt utilize protected or endangered areas like national parks, federal land, or places like the Amazon.

Theres a number of reasons for this; some people still use wood as their main source of heat in the winter, for instance. (I was one of them, at one point.) The alternative where I lived (and in many other rural areas) was natural gas. I preferred wood, since I could plant another native tree but I can't create more natural gas.

But.. again. All of this boils down to responsible stewardship in order to avoid stripping or killing the land and everything that comes from it.

Regarding underpaid and 3xploitative labor- unfortunately, unless you're growing your own vegetables or buying nothing but local, by buying vegan food you are potentially supporting such labor practices, both in major agriculture AND in the factories and plants that make the more processed foods like vegan cheeses, etcetera. (No Evil foods and their anti-union tactics, as well as the reasons their workers wanted a union to begin with, for one example.)

IMO, in both cases of veganism and non, the best thing one can do in order to mitigate both human and animal suffering is to fully support local farmers, and to put pressure on big ag re: their less than stellar practices.

Iunno, just my (scattered) thoughts on the matter.

One of the things that struck me about Robin Wall Kimmerer's perspective when I was reading Braiding Sweetgrass was the way the ethical obligation to life she discussed contrasted with the colonizer's culture.

It is increasingly popular to find it inherently unethical and exploitative to kill animals for food or to farm them for animal products, and instead eat and wear "plant-based" things. This is an impulse toward ethical treatment of non-human living things.

But this way of seeing animals as "lives" and behaving accordingly, depends on seeing plants as non-lives. Asking whether we have ethical obligations toward plants is so absurd, it's dismissed as trolling.

I've known many people who farmed or hunted animals who had a great reverence for their lives. Some people would think that this is not genuine and that it is never morally acceptable to take a life for your own use.

Kimmerer discusses Indigenous use of animals. But when a tree needs to be cut down or a plant uprooted, there is the same vivid awareness that a life is being taken, that the plant's life is A Life.

Now I'm troubled by the dismissal of plants as providing total freedom from guilt and moral responsibility among many people and organizations who see animal life as deeply sacred. Plant based products are cruelty-free alternatives to animal products and plant-based diets mean nothing had to die for your meal.

I understand not wanting to support cruel industries or being uncomfortable with eating animals, but the more I learn about plants, the less I believe that all animals have something all plants lack, that means we have moral obligations toward animals and not toward plants.

Plants are incredibly unlike us, but they respond to their environments, they communicate with other plants, and they engage in behaviors. Objection to potential plant intelligence and sentience (ability to feel) is more cultural than scientific; we are just only beginning to scratch the surface of the inner world of plants. What if we have to respect plants as life? What does respect mean then, if we have to explore the idea that it doesn't necessarily contradict taking life?

[pterribledinosaurdrawings]

Could you please share the recipe for the soup you made with the bug noodles? That looks amazing and I want it in my tummy.

Sure!

The ingredients always include onions, garlic, and carrots. Usually potatoes too. It depends on what I have in the fridge, but it can also include celery, parsnip, grated turnip, cabbage, green beans, mushrooms, cauliflower, broccoli, or zucchini.

I suppose corn would also be soup compatible, or perhaps bell pepper, though I can't recall ever putting those things in this kind of soup. All vegetables are friends when you boil them up together so it's probably hard to go wrong here.

I can't really give specific amounts because it will depend on the size of your pot, and I don't measure soup ingredients.

I chop up my vegetables and garlic and put them in a big pot with a little olive oil, and cook them on medium heat until the onions have gone clear and things are starting to look a tiny bit brownish on the edges. Or maybe not quite that long if there's a lot of stuff in the pot and it's taking a while and I'm feeling impatient.

Then I add water, or perhaps meat or vegetable stock, just until they're covered, leaving some room for the tomatoes. Sometimes when I boil parsnips and carrots together in the same pot (which is very good and better than having either vegetable individually) I save the water to use for soup because it's so dang flavourful and sweet.

At this point the salt and pepper also go in, and some Herbes de Provence, or something similar. I'm currently out of the blended H de P so for this soup I think I added thyme, basil, parsley, and dried chives. Might have put some ground coriander seed too?

The little noodles also go in now, or sometimes I do barley, or sometimes neither. I got these bug shaped noodles at the Bulk Barn, but that's only in Canada so I have no idea where people in other countries should look for bug noodles.

Then I bring it to a boil, and after it has boiled I turn it down and add a can of diced tomatoes and let it simmer for a while. If it has noodles or barley or something like that then it simmers until they're cooked.

Very shortly before it's done simmering I add some frozen peas, because they really don't need boiling, just to be heated up. If they boil then the colour and texture won't be as nice.

Then I eat soup for 2 or 3 days and it's nice! I like to have it with some buttered bread or rolls.

Usually I end up with so much vegetable stuff in the pot that there isn't much room for liquid, but that's ok, I like it when there's lots of soup in my soup.

I wish you a very good soup!

[rnaeborowski]

food i try to always have at home:

bases

pasta

rice

chickpeas (pre-cooked or dried)

black beans (pre-cooked or dried)

red lentils (dried)

cooking oil of some kind

olive oil

pantry

canned chopped tomatoes

tomato paste

vegetable stock cubes

sugar

honey

flour

corn starch

spices

salt

black pepper

cummin

curry powder

chili powder

dried oregano

thyme

gochugaru

herb salt

white pepper

ground coriander

garlic powder

onion powder

smoked paprika

veggies

garlic

onion

frozen veggies (for example: broccoli, cauliflower, mixed veggies, peas)

canned corn

carrots

condiments

soy sauce

hot sauce (rn we have sriracha, tabasco and sweet chili)

ketchup

mustard

mayo

gochujang

maggi sauce

sesame oil

fridge and freezer

milk

butter

shredded cheese (we put it in the freezer so it lasts longer)

greek yoghurt

eggs

frozen herbs (cilantro, dill, basil, parsley)

frozen minced red chili peppers

frozen fruit and berries

other things i just like having at home if i can

sesame seeds

oats

cocoa powder

salted peanuts

instant mashed potatoes

instant ramen

raisins

tea

coffee

vanilla sugar / extract

syrup

shredded coconut

pumpkin and sunflower seeds

my tip if you just moved out or want to fill up on basics is to get just 1-3 things at a time and prioritize getting dried/canned things and spices first as they last for like forever.

always have rice or pasta at home.

i also always have dried lentils at home. you cook them like this: 1 part lentils and 2 parts water + salt. add to a pot. bring to a boil. lower to a simmer and let simmer under a lid for 15-20 minutes.

i prefer to buy pre-cooked beans and chickpeas as cooking dried ones takes a long time but dried ones are very budget friendly so go for whatever works for you.

frozen herbs are amazing bc it tastes pretty much as good as fresh but is cheaper and lasts so much longer than buying fresh. ofc the optimal thing is to grow your own herbs but i can't bc i don't have space or energy.

if you eat meat, keeping it in the freezer will make it last so much longer (just don't forget to take it out to thaw several hours before cooking)

if you're vegan, just exchange the milk products to vegan alternatives like oat milk or soy yoghurt for example.

i want to add that building up a pantry takes time if you're like me and don't have a lot of money and don't have a car to transport heavy groceries. be patient and look out for sales and coupons :)

i hope this can help someone! if not, it's okay because i had fun making this post! love y'all!

[mabelpodcast]

Hagging out: jamaica tea eggs with Becca

(For those of you who do not know: Hagging Out is the brainchild of @graveyarddirt, and is a food/witchcraft/creation event where participants over thirty years old build something to a theme: a recipe, a meal, a spell, a rite.)

The theme of this month's Hagging Out was tea. If you do not want to see pictures of the beautiful and divinitory jamaica tea eggs I made on the full moon, please do not ~

Jamaica (also known as hibiscus) is a popular ingredient in Mexico, most often used to make an agua fresca: sweet and tart and bloody pink-red, it is delicious, and vivid, and absurdly high in vitamin C. Served with ice, jamaica agua fresca is the most refreshing thing you have ever tasted. Jamaica is magic: a flower with a story to tell.

Here is how to make jamaica tea eggs. First: throw many handfuls of dried red flowers into your wife's green enamel pot. They will smell like rosehips, like tart berries, and a little bit like rain.

Add to the flowers some crushed garlic, several bay leaves, some peeled and sliced ginger, a few constellations of star anise. No need to measure; you will know when it's right.

Haphazardly tip a likely amount of organic black tea into the tiny mug with a small corvid friend painted on it.

Scatter the tea onto the flowers and the aromatics. Add just the right amount of boiling water to your wife's enamel pot. The concoction will look like a swamp, like the very first swamp; it will smell like heaven.

Put the lid on the enamel pot and let the tea steep while you go out into the garden. Can't you hear the birds sing? Forget about the tea entirely; pick flowers and follow bumblebees from daisy to daisy. If you are kind and gentle, they will let you pet their soft bellies. If you are neither, they will not. Remember your tea, and go inside again, strain it out. Without the black tea, what you're left with would have been perfect to make jamaica tacos: the flowers, soaked and then cooked in spices, take the place of taco meat. Only to be eaten with the freshest of corn tortillas, the kind of tortillas that smell like your abuelita.

Fetch the eggs from the little duck who guards them. Thank her for doing her duty well.

Boil the eggs however you do such things. When the eggs are hard-boiled, roll them along your counter to smash their shells. Tell them, as you do, who you are: make sure they know your name.

Set the eggs to steep in the cold tea. Leave them in the fridge, to ruminate, for many hours. Six, or eight, or overnight. You will try to capture the red-black beauty of them, and you will fail, but that's all right. You have other important things to do.

Prepare for the ritual. You know the one.

The full moon is an egg, too. Something ever hatching. When dark falls, when you have greeted her, her attendant darkness, the spider drowsing on the window, the moth who flew too close to the spider's web, the fire, the falling petals, the milk-light over the horizon -

- afterwards, your eggs will be black. So will the tea. They will look like bobbing sea-stones. Peel them to transcribe the futures their cobwebbed and marbled black veins tell.

Eat them with the moon gazing over your shoulder.

[bumblebeeappletree]

Learn how to make an incredible spicy vegan Mexican soup in just literally minutes!

LAY HO MA!! This recipe is going to be a lifesaver for the days where you just can't be bothered. This spicy Mexican soup is fast, simple, and absolutely packed with flavour. Join me in this episode and learn how to make my version of a spicy vegan Mexican soup.

Ingredients:

1/2 red onion

2 pieces garlic

1 scotch bonnet (optional! very spicy!)

2-3 tbsp olive oil

1/2 tbsp cumin

1 1/2 tbsp smoked paprika

1/2 tbsp chili powder

2 tbsp dried oregano

1 800ml can peeled tomatoes

1 can black beans

2 cups corn

6 cups water or vegetable stock (plus 1 tbsp pink salt if using water)

3 tbsp tomato paste

2 tbsp cane sugar

1 avocado

1 small bunch cilantro

few tortilla chips

Directions:

1. Dice the red onion and garlic

2. Remove the seeds from the scotch bonnet and finely chop

3. Heat up a stock pot on medium high heat and add the olive oil

4. Add in the onions, garlic, and pepper followed by the dry spices

5. Give the pot a stir and add in the canned tomatoes (carefully!)

6. Use a spatula to break up the tomatoes

7. Add the beans, corn, and the water/veggie stock

8. Add the tomato paste and the cane sugar

9. Bring the soup to a boil, then its ready to serve

10. Top the soup with avocado cubes, fresh cilantro, and some crushed tortilla chips

[the-official-account]

This works for most vegetables including Asparagus, broccoli, peppers, most root veg, eggplant (also try eggplant parm) artichoke,

Just eat sweet peas raw or roast for a shorter time

onion and garlic and beets work too. Cut off root part of garlic & beet, cover in foil with some salt and oil, roast it while still in the sleevy-part/skin.

squash and potatoes will take longer depending on how big you cut them and because the inside needs to cook, consider covering it with foil until the end. Consider boiling your potatoes in a salty-broth or with curry!

DO NOT DO ROAST CELERY.

A delicious way to make Brussel sports if you half them with salt pepper, olive oil AND garlic and add dried cranberry onto the still-hot pan for them to candy a bit before serving.

Tomatoes get wierd, cut up thick and dress with salt and balsamic vinegar to balance the sweetness or look up a more specific recipe.

For kale, cabbages, and spinach, sautee that shit with salt pepper and olive oil, high heat until wilted/ as cooked as you'd like. Try spinach with matchsticks grannysmith apples and garlic, cabbage with cumin and ginger, and kale with chopped/sliced almonds and shredded carrots. Or just plain! Its good plain too!

Shrooms depend on the exact type. Roast OR Sautee (with butter instead of olive oil) or if you wanna get extra tasty let it simmer in whatever sauce you got around. Maybe look up a recipe for that one too, there are a ton.

You can't overcook corn just boil it and melt some butter over it when it comes out. Put corn in your chili to cut the heavy flavor.

I do not know a single tasty way to mach zucchini because I just really hate it but that's another thing: if you really don't like a vegetable even after trying different ways to make it, just don't eat it!

[aurorajay]

I love this idea! I've definitely been getting more experimental with food and drink over the pandemic. For example...

WITH LILACS!! (Very proud of my recent huge batch of simple syrup!) If you just want the recipe for lilac syrup, scroll straight to the bottom.

However I'm also going answer all the questions, since I have been planning to play around more with underused local ingredients. So in this ideal world...

1. Fresh/dried pawpaw! I recently learned these fruit trees are native to my area, though wild ones are now rare. That was a huge surprise because I'm Canadian and I thought they were more subtropical, but I'm juuuust within the northern tip of it's range. I've yet to try it, but I've heard it compared to mango, which I love.

2. Creamy duck and mushroom soup. I already make this one, though I often have to settle for creminis, and would prefer a variety of local wild mushrooms. The couple times I've been able to get my hands on some it really brought it to the next level!

3. Chili with wild rice and/or corn chips. I currently use standard grocery store ingredients, but pretty much all of them can be grown locally in the summer and canned/stored dry for use in the cold seasons. I've never tried the rice that's native to where I live, but it's long been a staple of indigenous cuisine and it's on my list of things to check out.

4. Fresh baked bread ☺️ With butter and homemade raspberry jam. Or maybe blueberry. There's plenty of berries to choose from here!

5. I love making mulled wine and cider for my friends, and while grapes and apples grow here, it does require a bunch of imported spices. If I had to choose something without, maybe cedar tea with honey? While I haven't tried it myself yet, I'm a big fan of evergreeny flavours, so I suspect it would be right up my alley.

6. LILAC LEMONADE. This is already my signature drink for spring/summer parties, and it's quite easy to make. Yes I knoooow, lemons aren't native, but you can grow them in greenhouses and in pots. My mom actually has a potted one that fruits every year! I can't really say the same for the sugar, but hey, we said this was an ideal world, so let's assume it's produced ethically and sustainabily in this scenario.

But. Back to the LILACS. They're one of my favourite flowers, the smell is heavenly, but they're a short-lived seasonal experience. Enter simple syrup! Because it turns out, like many flowering trees, lilacs are edible! You need to be sure they haven't been exposed to harmful pesticides, but other than that you're good to go. Once you have the syrup, it can be safely stored in the fridge for at least a few weeks, or frozen almost indefinitely and brought out to mix with drinks whenever you like. It's quite nice in a gin and tonic, but my go-to crowd pleaser is the lemonade.

So here's my recipe:

1 Cup white sugar

1 Cup water

2 Cups lilac blossoms (Less precise than the other measurements. I use very generous cups)

Optional: 3-4 berries or other colourant. Left alone, the syrup is usually a light brown, with a muted tint that reflects the colour of your lilacs. I've successfully used blackberries, blueberries, and plum skins in small amounts to add a rich purpley-red colour without changing taste, which then dilutes to bright pink in my lemonade.

Snip off several bunches of lilacs, then rinse thoroughly to remove bugs and dirt. Gently shake the water off and lay them on a towel to dry while you prep. (It may be hard to judge how much this will yield until you've done it a few times, but I pile mine into an 11" mixing bowl and find this works out to roughly 8 cups of individual blossoms.)

Remove the blossoms by hand or with a small pair of scissors, leaving as little stem as you can. It's tedious, but worth the effort to keep the bitter green bits out of the mix.

Add the water to a pot on high heat and bring to a strong simmer. You can go full boil just keep in mind it shouldn't stay there for the next steps.

Add the sugar and lower heat to medium. Stir continuously to avoid burning any sugar at the bottom.

Once the sugar is fully dissolved, stir in the lilac florets plus whatever you add for colour, and bring heat down to low. Cover and let simmer for 10 minutes.

Remove from heat and allow to steep (like tea) for up to 8 hours, remaining covered. This is flexible, but I suggest at the very least to let it steep until it reaches room remperature, and not to go over a full day, as it can increase bitterness beyond a certain point. I like to make mine first thing in the morning and come back to it around dinner.

Pour the syrup through a fine mesh strainer and into a clean vessel. Use a spoon to aggressively squeeze out every last drop of flavour from the remaining mush.

To store, I recommend corked/capped bottles for the fridge, and sealable plastic containers for the freezer. I find old yogurt tubs perfect for this. Remember to leave room for expansion! Filling only 3/4 of the way is generally enough.

And this is the rough ratio I use for the lemonade:

750 ml Lemon juice (equivalent to about 15 lemons)

1 L Lilac syrup

2 L Water

I tend to wing it on this part and adjust to taste, so you may want to play around a bit to find the balance you like.

And playing around is half the fun! This method can also be applied to pretty much any foraged edible flower, such as cherry blossoms, magnolias, violets, etc. Just make sure to do your research if you try a new plant so you know it's safe.

Solarpunk Food

Let's do a little thought exercise about food. Diet culture makes us isolated while the commodification of food pushes global food trends instead of regional variation. But we're solarpunks, right? So we're all about imagining a better future. Let's imagine a world where we've healed our cultural relationship with food and are sourcing things more locally.

Think about where you live right now. Think about the kinds of things that can be raised or grown in your area. Then start to think about what recipes could be made for the following social events. We're going to start small to make this more manageable, ok? Do as many or as few of these as you feel up to doing.

In this bright sustainable future full of local ingredients:

What snack are you bringing to game/movie night?

What soup do you make for a sick loved one?

What's your go-to potluck recipe?

What treat do you welcome a new neighbor with?

What hot beverage do you share in fall/winter?

What cold beverage do you share in spring/summer?

How did that feel? What did you come up with?

Maybe these recipes can be worked into solarpunk stories. Maybe they can be made into a little cookbook. Maybe locally sourced ingredients are inaccessible to you right now, but are there any recipes you could start practicing anyway?