A-Z food education

It’s no wonder that certain ancient foods have been around for centuries. Dating back to Biblical times and beyond, pomegranates were, and still are, a treasured fruit native to the present-day Middle East. According to the official Pomegranate Council website, the fruit was not only …

So far in this little alphabet game of mine, I’ve blogged about fruit, vegetables, spices, cheese, legumes…. but I have yet to write about one of my favorite foods. Fish! I love seafood, especially fresh fish and whenever I dine out, I almost always order …

I know it’s not the most creative and exciting topic, but the letter N really stumped me, and nutmeg was my best choice. Besides baking, most people have no other use for nutmeg; but I am here to tell you otherwise. Nutmeg is a pungent spice …

We’re all familiar with molasses and I’m sure we’ve all baked with it before; but, most people don’t even know what it is. I mean what is molasses really? Molasses is a thick, sweet syrup that is leftover from the process of refining cane sugar. …

Did you know that lentils were one of the first cultivated foods? Thousands of years ago lentils were harvested as a food staple in central Asia, and this tradition has withstood the test of time, as these ancient beans are just as, if not even …

Kefir. It might be a name you’ve heard once or twice lately – you may have seen it in the grocery store or read about it in a magazine. Yes, all the fine print and grandiose marketing text covering the bottle look and sound intimidating, …

What is crunchy and sweet and brown all over?………. Jicama (pronounced hih-ka-mah) may not look appetizing, but what lies beneath its dirt-laden, earthy facade is what makes this root vegetable stand out. Jicama grows underground like all other root vegetables and looks very similar to a …

Okay, I admit, I struggled to come up with a creative food topic that starts with the letter I. So, given that it’s still summer and it’s prime ice cream season, I figured I should pay a tribute to one of our favorite childhood treats. …

If you’ve ever had grits, polenta, or other foods made with cornmeal, you’ve eaten the very same maize corn that is used to make hominy. Hominy is a corn product made by soaking the kernels of maize corn (not the sweet corn we nibble off …

Most people are turned off by the very thought of cold soup. Bleh! Are we just too lazy to cook food properly anymore? Hardly! Some soups are meant to be eaten chilled; in fact they would taste pretty weird if they were hot. According to …