You can't knock water, especially if you're drinking it fresh from your own artesian well, as I am. If I weren't lucky enough to have this, I would probably be using a filter on my tap. Bottled water? I try to avoid it. I object to all that plastic from an environmental standpoint, not to mention whatever it's off-gassing into my system. But drinking water seems so virtuous, doesn't it? The hydration, the lack of calories... On a hot day or after a workout, it's just the ticket. Other times, it can be a trifle dull. Come on, I know I'm not alone here. Yes, I add fresh lemon or a few slices of cucumber or sprigs of mint, but stil. Unsweetened tea works but I prefer it with a bit of sugar or honey, and then it starts to feel like something I shouldn't be drinking lots of on a regular basis. I've already ruled out fruit juice (unless significantly watered down) and soda was never in the picture so, until recently, the options for quenching my thirst had been rather limited. Until, that is, I discovered kombucha.
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My hemp sprouting bags arrived this week, so I wanted to give you a little update on the whole sprouting project. I ordered two bags, plus dried green peas, broccoli seeds and sunflower seeds, from the good people at Raw Guru. They say hemp breathes and dries even better than cotton or linen, and is naturally antibiotic, so it's the perfect environment for sprouting. That website is a real rabbit hole for me, I can get lost for way too long poring over dehydrators and sprouters and raw agave and virgin coconut oil...yet another resource from which I can obsessively stock the larder. Anyhoo, I "sterilized" the bags per the instructions by dousing them with boiling water and then, after soaking a cup of peas and a couple of tablespoons of broccoli seeds in two clean jars filled with water for about 6 hours, I poured them into the bags. And there they hang.
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Has the light appeared at the end of the tunnel? The days are definitely getting longer. Daylight savings is right around the corner. And soon, delicate shoots and buds will begin to festoon the skeletal branches of winter. But I've got the blues, baby, and I'm dancing as fast as I can to shake them from my weary bones. On mornings like this, the sun on my face is a balm, a promise of better days to come. I thank my stars for the roof over my head and the love of a good man, but there is a heaviness in my soul that, like a magnet, seems to dredge up all the pain and bitter disappointments I have ever known.

This, too, shall pass. Because everything always does. I have no child upon whose steady growth to mark the passage of time, but the ever-changing seasons tell it all. The snowdrifts out my window will give way to Queen Anne's lace and monkeyweed, Japanese beetles will streak by in a flash of iridescence, and I will crush tomato leaves between my dirty fingers and inhale the smell of summer. In the meantime, I will harness the raw energy of the sun, chewing and swallowing it in the form of life-giving sprouts.
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G and I signed up for a mozzarella-making class at Artisanal, the center for all things cheese, located on the West side in Manhattan. It was originally an offshoot of Terrance Brennan's restaurant of the same name, though I'm not sure the two are still affiliated. At any rate, they have state-of-the-art cheese caves there and a staff of knowledgeable affineurs (cheese "agers") and educators, and a fun range of classes. We took a cheese & honey pairing class there last year that put a bee on our bonnet about raising our own bees...but that's another story. Now that I'm all up on curds and whey, what with making my own fresh cheese and all, I thought the next logical step would be making my own mozzarella. Somehow I thought we would be starting from scratch—with fresh milk and some rennet. But it turns out that making curds is a rather more involved process than they want to take a classful of cheese novices through in a 2-hour course and, like many perfectly respectable cheese-makers, they start from pre-made curds. I confess, I was a little disappointed, although at least Artisanal purchases its curds from DiPalo, the venerable cheese shop on Grand Street in what used to be New York's Little Italy. If you've never been to DiPalo, you must pay them a visit right away. They import amazing cheese, salume and pasta from Italy, and they make their own delicious mozzarella fresh every day. The people at Artisanal said that DiPalo will sell you a pound of fresh mozzarella curd if you know to ask for it. Once you've got the curd, making the mozzarella is a walk in the park. Of course, you know me: I will make my own curd one of these days, and you'll be the first to know all about it. Maybe I'll even get my hands on some water buffalo milk to do it...
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Welcome to my 200th post. (Although my site didn't go live until December, I had a backlog of posts dating to last July.) Those of you who frequent other blogs may notice that I update quite often. I've really been enjoying pouring my passion out on this page, and sharing with you all my recent nutritional discoveries. It's as though the scales have fallen from my eyes and I see the world of food in a new way. I find it a little challenging to write about things like fats, raw milk, lacto-fermentation, grass-fed beef, etc. because I imagine some of you don't have access to these things—or may not be ready to incorporate them into your lives. But as I move closer to the earth and closer to the traditional way of using what nature offers us—without the tyranny and destruction of industrialized agriculture and mass processing—I am compelled to tell you about how wonderful it is! I fervently hope I can continue to pique your interest and your palate. This shot of my fridge, above, and the ones that follow, are as good an indication as any of the transformation of my kitchen. I am so much more in control of what goes into my body, because I'm making my own mayonnaise (from farm-fresh egg yolks and cold-pressed olive and peanut oils); and my own stocks and syrups and nut butters and pickles.
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