As we move forward into a brand new year, it’s a great time to take stock of the good that cooperatives like Outpost do.

One of the big things on my list? Education.

As we enter the holiday season, what does the art of giving or giving thanks mean and are they different? The golden rule has always been that it is better to give than receive and that we should always give thanks for what we have. 

One of the really cool parts of my day job at Feeding America is that I get to travel around the country to join, start, simplify, complicate, explicate, and otherwise advance some of the big conversations surrounding food, food access, hunger, and food systems. It’s really one of the favorite parts of my job.

An e-mail recently appeared in my inbox that really got me thinking about the sustainability of current conventional farming practices. The e-mail contained a link to a report by the Center for Food Safety as part of its Save Our Seeds (SOS) initiative (http://www.centerforfoodsafety.org/campaign/save-our-seeds/). The report, Seed Giants vs. U.S. Farmers, highlights the ongoing practice of seed companies suing farmers for patent infringement when their fields are discovered to contain genetically engineered (GE or trangenic) crops, even though the farmers hadn't purchased GE seeds from the companies. The seed companies allege that farmers are knowingly saving seeds from prior year GE crops, or are obtaining GE seeds from “seed cleaners,” who specialize in the practice of processing seeds from prior years to use for subsequent plantings. According to the seed companies, these practices are expressly prohibited by the technology agreements signed by farmers who use GE seeds.

On Saturday, October 6, I had the pleasure of attending Harvest Day at Walnut Way, on 17th and North Avenue.  The entire 2200 block of N. 17th Street was blocked off for the celebration, with a large sound truck on the north end, providing a stage and sound system for talk and music.

I recently had the opportunity to read a very interesting book on a possible cause of the obesity facing us today, “Wheat Belly,” by William Davis, MD. It is alleged by Dr. Davis that wheat is a primary underlying cause of much of our obesity as well as a myriad of other health issues plaguing us today. More precisely, it is a complex carbohydrate, Amylopectin A, that is the culprit that causes higher spikes in blood sugar than a candy bar, ice cream or even table sugar itself.

Many owners in the Outpost community, as well as in the general community, have given a great deal of thought to the issue of eating animal products, notably meat.  For people who care, it is a subject layered with many dimensions:  family tradition, spiritual beliefs, political/economic convictions, dietary needs, and consideration for the roles animals play in our lives

Repeat after me – I am not a quitter - I am not a quitter. Well I guess “life” happened since my last blog post, as I have blissfully ignored the fact I haven’t yet completed my list of lessons.

Ah, what was I thinking when I came up with the notion of writing about 52 lessons learned? One lesson per week of my challenge - that should be a piece of cake. Okay then maybe I just have a bad old case of writers block.

While I truly love to cook and bake and take on “never made before in my kitchen” kinda projects, prior to this I had never kept any kind of diary, especially not about my life in the kitchen.

Here’s a glimpse into my 52 weeks of inconvenience, primarily cooking or baking for just the two of us (although some food items became gifts, while others were served to our dinner guests.

There’s a routine I think I’ll miss, and other parts that I hope will stick, like the discipline I learned in planning out our food options each week. My year of inconvenience is technically over.

I’m almost at the end of week 52 as I’m writing this post, and feeling a little sad that this adventure is almost over. Or is it? I mean once you start something like this does the adventure really ever end? It is food we’re talking about, and while I learned a lot about cooking from scratch over the past 52 weeks, there is still so much more to learn. So my question is, should I keep blogging? What do you think?

The inspiration I drew upon this week was a recipe we published from local chef Jan Kelly from the restaurant Meritage. We gave Jan a challenge of one ingredient that she needed to design a meal around, and that was kimchi. Jan of course even made the kimchi from scratch, so I figured, why don’t I try?

We began our adventure in Santa Fe at the local farmer’s market, with the purchase of red chili powder, fresh goat cheese with green chili, German butter potatoes, farm fresh eggs, a giant bunch of rainbow chard and multi-grain bread. I was having a blast.

No whining, no complaining, no sniveling as the Irish say.

A bagel by definition is known as dense, chewy and rather doughy with a nicely browned and crispy crust. That’s the bagel I was in search of!

Look at me, all proud of my pasta. This from the girl who has been resenting it since the last failed batch a few meals ago.

A Year Of Inconvenience in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel