Sunny days mean that it's time for a little solar food drying. Add an overabundance of kale and you've got a formula for a tasty snack: Kale Chips
We pulled out the solar food dryer that we built last year and started warming it in the
sun. Before long it was up to 110º inside and ready for a batch of kale chip. Here's the recipe we used:
Crispy Kale Chips
There are some years that I don't plant zucchini because I'm still sick of it from the year before. This was not one of those years. Admittedly, summer squash doesn't hold my interest as long as
winter squash is around, but I wanted to try a new variety of summer squash. But wait...
First let's clarify something. Summer squash grows in the summer. Winter squash... grows in the summer. The difference is in the storage. Summer squash has to be consumed during the summer,
but winter squash stores through the winter (think pumpkins, ...
There's an old adage that advises corn growers to have the water boiling before you pick the corn. So as I write this there is a pot of water coming to a boil on the stove. It's harvest time
for sweet corn here in our test garden, and here's the blow-by-blow:
We grew Stowell's Sweet Corn, an heirloom variety, for the first time this year. We planted 20 plants in a 4x4 square foot bed (using Grow BioIntensive hexagonal spacing. Confession: the bed should
only have fit 16 plants, but we ...
The latest post on Mar Vista Patch.com is available - learn the truth about that bottle of olive oil in your pantry:
Mar Vista's Liquid Gold
...
There's a point at which every garden hits autopilot. With a little planning and adequate irrigation it can happen while you're on vacation. During my trip to Italy my garden took off, and when I got
back it was time to harvest the first fruits of the season. (My apologies to those still covered in snow out there. Your time is coming 
)
Some may recall that our community garden plot was going through some hard times last year - excessive zinc in the soil, nematodes - things were just ...
It happens every once in a while, probably every few months. Some people go on a bender. I go on a cooking jag.
The latest cooking jag involved making bread from a new book (more on this later), finding new ways to use a mountain of freshly harvested kale, and making the seemingly simple recipe for home made
yogurt in a Thermos. It seems like every newsletter and magazine I opened in May featured home made yogurt, so the time had come to try it out.
...
This week Mar Vista's Bounty Hunter found apricots and fava beans to delight customers at the Mar Vista Farmer's Market. Find out what you can do with both of these in your kitchen:
Do Me a Fava and Eat an Apricot This Memorial Day
...
In the last few years, Los Angeles has seen an abundance of Farmers' Markets popping up all over town. People are longing to get back to the way things used to be, by buying fresh local produce
straight from the farmer. Well, in Italy it still is the way it used to be, and nothing proves it more than a visit to a Farmers' Market.
There are many towns, even cities, in Italy where supermarkets do not exist. Instead the locals get their food needs met by stopping at the baker on the ...
Don't you love it when new fruits pop up at the Farmers' Market? This week's Mar Vista Bounty Hunter is all about cherries and what to do with them:
It's a Cherry Jubilee at the Farmers' Market
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I've just returned from 12 days in Italy filled with gelato, pasta, cheese and beautiful countryside. May is a wonderful time to be there - just before the stifling heat, but just after
gardens have been planted. If there's one thing you see a lot of in Italy, it's front yard gardens. They are not obsessed with the idea of a grassy front lawn like we Americans. They use their land
to grow food - lots of food.
Driving through the green rolling hills of Umbria, we saw small Medieval towns dotting the ...