The Food Desert Project - Lowfat Orange Fig Scones - and an announcement!

Before I get cooking, I'd like to invite readers of this blog to an event that has me pretty excited: I've been asked to join a discussion panel following a free screening of the documentary Lunch Line. Please join me at the Evanston (Illinois) Public Library this Saturday, April 30 at 2pm! (If you prefer an even more star-studded panel that includes the filmmakers and the Chicago Tribune's Monica Eng - see the showing at Northwestern University's Block Cinema on Thursday at 6pm. I'm hoping to be in the audience.)

I was able to screen the film in advance, and was excited to see people I've conversed or corresponded with in the process of creating this blog - in particular, Maureen George of the Organic School Project - who worked with us during the sMACkdown, and whose students created Sparky's trophy shown here; Margo Wootan of the Center for Science in the Public Interest who helped me advocate for better lunches and offered me information about added sugars, and Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, who took time from her busy schedule to listen to our little community's concerns about school lunch, and then visited one of our schools to see lunch in action.  I'd like to thank them, and all the other activists involved in the film, for giving this important issue the attention it deserves.

But, lest I forget - this is primarily a cooking blog. I love making baked goods for breakfast, but so many of them are no better than the "Brunch for Lunch" that I despise so much. I keep my eye out for better versions of traditional breakfast fare. Scones, in particular, are really difficult to make without a lot of added fat and sugar -I found this recipe, posted on Chow.com, and decided to try it out. My first attempt went so well that I decided to see if I could make a food-desert version, and here it is:

Lowfat Orange Fig Scones (makes 8)

1/4 cup dried figs, diced

1/4 cup orange juice

1 cup AP flour (If your food desert offers whole wheat, you can use that)
1 cup plain oats (either quick or old-fashioned*)
2 Tbsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 Tbsp. baking powder 

1/4 cup walnuts
1 Tbsp. maple syrup
2-1/2 Tbsp. butter, cut into small chunks
1 large egg, beaten
1/2 cup skim milk
1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

Combine the orange juice and figs, and microwave in 30-second increments until warm.  Set aside for 5-10 minutes until the figs are soft.  Strain thoroughly and discard the juice (for extra orange flavor, you could add a bit of Triple Sec to the soaking liquid.)

Put your oatmeal in the blender and blend until you have a fine flour.  (*Note: if using old-fashioned oats, pour into a bowl and combine with the skim milk; add with the wet ingredients.)  Add the oatmeal to a bowl with the flour, baking powder, and salt, sugar and walnuts and whisk well.  Add the butter and toss to combine, rubbing it between your fingers until you have something that looks like oatmeal (lumps of butter are OK, even desirable) Add the milk (or milk and oats,) drained figs, egg and vanilla and mix with your hands until you have a soft dough.

Form the dough into a loose ball, and put it on a parchment or silpat-lined baking sheet.  Press into a circle about an inch and a half thick, and about 7 inches in diameter.  With a knife, score it in eight wedges.  Drizzle the top with maple syrup.  Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes, until the top is golden brown and the center is firm.

Allow to cool slightly, break into wedges and serve.  Nutritional information.

Sundays with Sparky - Easter Bunny Eggs

A few years ago, Gourmet Magazine (RIP – sniff!)  posted a recipe for chocolate-filled “blown” chicken eggs – which sounded like a really good idea, except that the volume of a chicken egg is about ¼ cup – and that’s a LOT of chocolate.  Of course, we are blessed to live in an area where there are many, many ethnic markets and all kinds of eggs available, so I decided we’d do the same project, but with quail eggs instead – which are not only smaller, but as a bonus are covered with chocolate-colored spots, making mistakes much easier to hide.  Quail eggs are often available in natural food stores, or places where you buy sushi-grade fish…but you’ll pay a LOT less if you go to your local Asian market.

Sparky’s buddies, Orville and Wilbur, came over to help us with our egg-stravaganza, which included vegetable-dyed, marbled eggs along with our “Easter bunny eggs.”  Using a sturdy pin, I poked a hole in the top and bottom of each quail egg, and widened it out to about the size of a mustard seed – keep in mind, although quail eggs are not discernibly different from chicken eggs on the inside, the shells and membrane are much tougher – one year I had to resort to scissors.  Don’t worry if you crush one – unless it’s completely squashed, the membrane will hold it together.

Orville helped me blow the contents of the eggs into a ramekin. Then I carefully rinsed the eggshells and put them in a pot of water with a saucer to weight them down (be careful not to crush them) and heated the water to boiling.  (This step is strictly for sanitation; no raw eggs in your chocolate!)  After the water came to a boil, I lined the case with paper towels and removed and drained them carefully.

After lunching on scrambled eggs, Wilbur helped tape off the bottom of the dry quail eggs (while Orville did his best coyote-in-the-henhouse impression.)

The original recipe called for straight melted chocolate, but we found this made it tough to crack and remove the eggshells.  I decided to fill the eggs with truffle filling (ganache,) so I heated 1 cup of whipping cream in the microwave until the edges were bubbling but before it began to boil – about a minute.

Sparky and Wilbur mixed in an entire bag of chocolate chips (if you only have 1 case of quail eggs, you may want to halve this recipe…but we’re going to make bunny poo* with the leftovers.)  When this mixture was absolutely silky-smooth, we transferred it to a freezer ziploc bag; pushed out the air and zipped it tightly.  I then cut a tiny (this is critical) corner off the bag.

Sparky used the cut corner to pipe chocolate into the top of the now-empty eggshells.  (It’s important that the hole be large enough to accommodate both the tip of the bag, and to allow the air to escape.)  About half-way through, we stopped to tap the bottom of the eggshell lightly on the table to make sure the chocolate settled in the bottom and get rid of as much air as possible.  It may be necessary to microwave your ganache (10-second increments) to make it pour easily.

The eggs were placed in the refrigerator until they were solid, and then all the chocolate was wiped off…see, it doesn’t matter if you’re messy, any spilled chocolate just looks like another speckle! (Caution: since these contain egg, they should be chilled.  Also be aware that they are unsafe for people with egg allergies.)

I took some remaining chocolate, melted it, and poured it into a ziploc bag as above, and then filled a sheet of parchment with random squiggles which I tossed on a plate for our bunny “nest.” 

Any project that leaves its participants covered in chocolate is a good project, right?

* Sparky and I made “bunny poo” – tiny cocoa truffles – with the remaining ganache.  It’s as simple as rolling little balls of the ganache and covering them with cocoa powder.

Our next post is coming up on Wednesday the 27th, but join us in two weeks on May 8 for another Sundays with Sparky...

Policy Point Wednesday - How Bats affect your Food Supply

Sparky is a big fan of both flying mammals and of caving.  Last year, he was disturbed to find out that the hibernating bat population is succumbing to a disease known as white-nose syndrome.  This disease, which causes bats to awaken during hibernation, and starve as a result, is not well understood - but it is thought that cave tourism may play a part.

Little did we know that white-nose syndrome was more than just a threat to Sparky's favorite cuddly flying creatures: bats are critical to agriculture and the food supply.  The U.S. Geological Survey recently released a report estimating the financial impact of bats on American food crops at between $3 and $57 billion dollars.  This figure estimates the cost of the increased need for pesticides, but does not include the costs of the impact increased pesticide use may have on the environment, or on the food supply.  Of course, any cost to farmers eventually gets translated into costs to the consumer...so a decrease in the bat population might forecast higher food prices.

Despite good evidence to suggest that healthy bats are linked to reduced use of pesticides, only $2.4 million dollars (plus a later addition of 1.9 million dollars) has been earmarked for study of this disease.  The virulent disease was first discovered in 2006, and estimates suggest that, at the current rate of mortality, all North American hibernating bat species could be extinct in 20 years.  The Department of the Interior has requested $5 million to continue study of white-nose syndrome - but in the current economic climate, funding is not guaranteed.

The Food Desert Project - @BronxZoosCobra Cake

I don't know if you followed the escape of the Bronx Zoo Cobra and its subsequent capture...but Sparky and I followed the cobra's alleged Twitter Stream closely.

We all have our favorite cobra tweets - Sparky's is

@BronxZoosCobra "Indiana Jones, why did it have to be Indiana Jones?"

Mine is

@BronxZoosCobra Enjoying a cupcake @magnoliabakery. This is going straight to my hips. Oh, wait. I don't have hips. Yesss!#snakeonthetown

And Dad's is

@BronxZoosCobra Just FYI, I've had it with Samuel L. Jackson too.

But of course, the post-capture tweet that really caught my eye read:

@BronxZoosCobra A great cake recipe: 2 cups sugar, 4 eggs, 1 cup milk, 2 cups self-rising flour, 1 saw, 1 stick butter. And mix. Bring it by the zoo...

Sparky and I couldn't resist the challenge, which is not only a recipe from a native desert dweller...it fits the requirements for the food desert project.

First of all, bronxzooscobra,  Mia, Mrs. Justin Bieber, or whatever your name is these days - you need to read up on your Ruhlman.  Your recipe as stated is extremely wet and eggy* - somewhere closer to souffle than cake.  However, fair is fair - we decided to stick with the ingredients as written...except, since I wasn't convinced of the food-desert availability of self-rising flour, we made our own using 2 cups of flour, 1 tablespoon of baking powder, and 1/2 tsp salt.  (If your food desert or Egyptian desert happens to have self-rising flour, use the recipe as stated.)

Since the cake was unflavored except for the saw, I also opted to add 1/2 tsp of almond extract, just a hint...as I figured the almond smell (so often associated with poison) might confuse anyone looking for signs of venom (after all, if it isn't drool-worthy, why make a cake at all?)  If you're not trying to liberate a famous reptile, you can flavor yours any way you want to.

Sparky, Zuko and I dove right in:  we decided that the heavy, wet batter was going to need more lift than just self-rising flour, so first we separated the eggs and whipped the 4 egg whites until they made soft peaks.   (did you ever wonder if rattlesnakes could use those things as whisks? ) The fluffy whites went into a clean bowl, and then the butter and sugar went into the mixer and were whipped until well incorporated... then we added the egg yolks and milk and whipped it some more.  Then came the flour, added slowly with the mixer on low.

Sparky did his usual bang-up job folding the whites into the batter, and we poured the whole thing into a well-greased and floured 8" cake pan (if you don't need the depth for hiding a saw, I'd recommend a tube pan ...preferably a springform tube pan.)  This made for a quite deep single layer.

Since the cobra left us to guess about baking times, I popped the cake into a 350 degree oven for 20 minutes, then turned it down to 300 and allowed it to bake for an additional 30 minutes, until the center top set (note: the center will rise and then cave in a bit; this is typical of egg-white-leavened cakes and why you want a tube pan.  Make sure it's firm to the touch before you remove it from the oven.)

The cake was allowed to cool thoroughly, and the saw inserted into the side of the cooked cake to allow for ease of removal later....

...except we weren't sure the cobra would really like it.  After all, maybe she's getting used to captivity...after all, how different is life behind glass than life on reality TV (a life people inexplicably seem to crave!)  Plus, with all the increased airport security, I wasn't sure how we could get it to the Bronx.

So we had some...oh, well, we ate all of it...I can make another - really!

(*Considering that eggs are the only ingredient typical of a cobra's diet, I can see why this cake was so eggy - it made for a dense, moist cake with a delicious heavy crumb.  I plan to incorporate chocolate into this recipe someday, because it has the potential to be a really spectacular chocolate cake.)

Sundays with Sparky - Sunrise Juice...Of Science!

Most of you have had a version of this experiment in your lifetimes...but probably not until you were of legal drinking age.  Alcoholic beverages, even beers, come in all sorts of densities, so they're easy enough to layer into a single drink; it's a common enough cocktail technique that bartending websites offer alcohol density charts.

The usual method for creating a kid-friendly version of this experiment involves adding progressive amounts of sugar to a flavored drink mix, but since there's so much news about food dyes recently, I thought maybe I'd try it using juice concentrate.  The science behind this density column is simple:  drinks containing more sugar are more dense.

In this case, instead of adding sugar, we used orange juice concentrate and just added less water than usual (we approximated the amount for a simple two-layer column) to make our base - however, if you want to teach your child about the benefits of label-reading, have them compare the sugar content of different juices and layer them lowest to highest (you can cheat by diluting slightly with water as well.)  Make sure your labels compare the same serving size!

Then, using a spoon to reduce the force of the pour and keep the juices from mixing, we added the second juice (we used a cranberry-pomegranate blend)

Although the two mixtures were miscible, we did wind up with a nice (if slightly blurry) division between the two juices...you can keep adding layers by changing the level of dilution of juice.

The science here isn't really that hard to grasp: things that are more dense have more mass per unit of volume, meaning, basically, a more dense substance has more stuff in it. Less dense fluids float on more dense fluids if they do not mix; the key here is to keep the two miscible (mixable) liquids from mixing.

For our regular readers, Sundays with Sparky will return in two weeks on April 24...but look for a special Sundays/Food Desert Project mashup post on Wednesday the 13th!

Policy Point Wednesday - Product Placement

Grocers have long been aware that product placement in the store drives sales:   grocers go so far as to charge "slotting fees" for prime placement on shelving.  Invariably, the companies most able and willing to take advantage of preferred placement are often those who offer highly-processed fringe foods.

Recently, growing concern about public health has caused some food purveyors to make changes in their product placement - Julie Deardorff reported in the Chicago Tribune that the Hy-Vee chain of grocery stores has created "Blue Zones," or checkout lanes offering single-serve healthy foods like string cheese and unsalted sunflower seeds.  Other grocers - who have a vested interest in selling their produce before it goes bad - have attempted to engage the public with special lighting and prominent placement near the front door.  All of these methods are proven to increase sales in healthy foods as well as unhealthy ones.

I was fortunate to discover a local entry in the healthier-foods market:  in Elmhurst, IL, I happened upon a Power Mart gas station/quick service store.  I needed a quick snack, and was happily shocked to find single-serve packages of freshly cut vegetables right at the front of the store.  Immediately next to the cash register were mixed nuts, more cut vegetables, apples and oranges, and lowfat cheese sticks.  After commenting on the pleasant surprise to the cashier, I was told that this store was a pilot featuring a wide variety of foods (there is also a small liquor store, hotdog stand, and a "bakery" featuring packaged sliced pound cake and honey buns - so there are plenty of unhealthy options) but the healthy food options were more prominently placed, both front and center and nearer to the cash register.  He said that they were serving as many as 20 kids a day after school, many of whom choose wisely.

Clearly, even quickserve stores are interested in attracting a wider audience, and are responsive to pressures from the market.  In Philadelphia (home of the Healthy Corner Stores initiative,) parents have engaged the local neighborhood watch to help steer kids towards better afterschool choices.  Direct intervention on the retail level is an effective strategy to make healthier foods more accessible.