By Sidonie Maroon, Culinary Educator for the Food Co-op

My inner Spring cleaning happens while at the sink with soapy hands, hanging up a pot, or grabbing the milk bottle from the fridge. In all these unspectacular, yet contemplative moments of just being, I come to terms with realities and the necessities of change. 

Our need to declutter, decide, and revitalize is natural during transitions. Sometimes at the turn of season and sometimes in a new season of life. Recognizing when to switch gears, remain consistent, or both is a type of deep clean.

My cooking plays a significant role in how I show up for others. It’s where I express care, gratitude and connection. I’ve used it to teach, explore, earn a living and write recipes. As the cook, I’m the gatekeeper for my family’s health, and provide the social structure of mealtimes for us to gather around. It is the creative way for me to get the necessary done. Cooking is a good fit for my talents, or so I thought.

I’ve come through a successful parathyroidectomy, and while grateful to be alive, on the other side and eager to regain my health and energy — hyperparathyroidism has left me with osteoporosis. I’m putting myself through intensive self study on how to rebuild and keep my bones healthy, and while we already eat lots of fresh produce, good protein sources and little processed foods — I still need to make shifts that disrupt our usual ways of eating.

Instead of cooking farmhouse breakfasts every morning, my husband now cooks his own big breakfast for his high caloric needs. (He’s thin and works physically hard all day.) I, for the first time, am drinking homemade smoothies packed with bone happy ingredients. My eating patterns and hunger signals have also changed, and so it takes more to motivate everyday cooking.

Surprisingly, it’s ok. My partner leaped forward as I stepped back. He didn’t love me just because I’m a good cook, although I know he’s grateful. Over the past five years of coping with an unknown illness, I’ve had to get smart about my kitchen systems—I’ve pared back, paced my energy, asked for help and let others take on some of my duties.

I still make Instant Pot yogurt and sourdough bread every week, because they’re easy and take little effort. I haven’t had to change my cooking from scratch commitment because our systems were already in place. It’s helped that my skills are second nature, so there is something important about building competencies for all circumstances.  

As Spring begins and I continue to reassess my cooking life, I’m making more conscious decisions about what to keep and let go.

Let Go

● Making multicourse complicated meals every day.

● Feeling guilty and obligated about anything, ever.

● Trying to make others happy at my expense.  

Keep and Begin

● I’d like to restart my worm composting system that I had to let go.

● Commitment to growing more brassicas like kale, collards, cabbage and broccoli. I have an easy go-to way to make daily salads with them. I use the Italian boiling method I learned last summer.

● My delicious easy homemade no-knead, gluten-free sourdough made with quinoa, buckwheat, amaranth, lentils, chickpeas, flax, psyllium and sunflower seeds is a necessary, daily and much appreciated part of my diet. I can have toast with my tea! 

Sidonie’s Gluten Free Sourdough

Makes one large loaf

An easy gluten-free no knead sourdough with whole seeds and legumes with no separate starter!

It tastes like a quality whole grain sourdough and makes excellent toast.

Special equipment needed: 11-cup capacity food processor or smaller if you grind in two batches. 

​​Notes: You can substitute other grains or legumes, but keep the same water to solids ratio. Weigh both your water and solids to figure this out. Use filtered water and don’t rinse the ingredients. The beneficial yeasts and bacterias good live on their skins. That’s why you won’t need a separate starter! You don’t need to knead this bread because there isn’t any gluten to develop. It’s held together with the flax and psyllium. Be sure to add the flax and psyllium AFTER you’ve ground the soaked materials in the food processor, otherwise it’ll gum up.   

For Soaking

3 cups filtered water

½ cup each dry organic bulk of the following

Quinoa, pre-washed

Amaranth seeds

Buckwheat groats

Hulled sunflower seeds

Lentils, any type

Chickpeas

Add to the batter

½ cup ground flax seeds

¼ cup psyllium seed husk powder

Final Ingredients

2 teaspoons sea salt

2 tablespoons molasses

First day: Add soaking ingredients to a large mixing bowl, with the water and soak 8 hours (overnight), or up to 12 hours. The quinoa should be pre-washed, so it doesn’t make the rest of the batch soapy tasting, but don’t pre-rinse the other ingredients because the inert yeasts and good bacteria are on the plant skins. I make up and store 12 separate baggies of dry soaking ingredients at a time, so I only need to grab one when I’m ready to make my next loaf.

Second day: After soaking, add the soaked ingredients and soaking water to a large food processor and grind into a batter. I allow the processor to run for the time it takes to grind the flaxseed in a coffee grinder and get out the psyllium seed husk powder, about 3 minutes.

Put the batter back into the rinsed soaking bowl. Add the ground flaxseed and psyllium husk powder to the batter and stir it in. Cover the bowl with a plate or towel and allow it to ferment at room temperature 65 to 70 F for 8 to12 hours. The fermentation and soaking times are flexible as long as you don’t go over 6 hours of the recommended times. The batter should taste slightly sour when it’s fully fermented. It needs to be sour, but too sour and the yeasts have a hard time surviving, and they are the ones who make the bread rise.

Third Day: After the batter, which is now a dough, ferments, add the salt and molasses. I work it in with my hands until I can’t see any streaks of molasses. I keep my hands wet with water when working with this dough, as opposed to oil or flour.

Shape, proof and bake: With wet hands, pick up the dough and slap and turn it, working out all the cracks on its surface. Set it down on a parchment lined baking sheet, and press into a 9-inch round. Other shapes are possible, but start with the round so you’ll get a feel for how thick the dough should be. Score the top and allow it to proof at 90 F or in a warm place for 3 hours. I use my oven. It works to turn your oven on at 250 F for 10 minutes and then turn it off and allow the residual heat to proof the bread, but make sure it isn’t hotter than 90F! Anywhere warm will work, like the top of the fridge. You’ll know it’s ready to bake because the score lines will widen and it’ll look larger. Don’t expect white bread results!

Bake in a preheated oven at 350 F for 50-60 minutes. Take it out, and off the baking sheet and allow it to cool before slicing. It’s great fresh, but I love it toasted. To store, I keep it wrapped in a towel on the counter or in a covered casserole. This bread freezes well, and can be dried for croutons or breadcrumbs.

Broccoli and Black Olive Salad

Serves 2-4

A delightful way to eat your broccoli! Try this recipe and method for anything in the broccoli family — cabbage, kale, collards, mustard greens etc. Boiling salads is a traditional Italian technique, and makes lots of sense to use the same water for pasta.

1 bunch broccoli, about 3 ½ to 4 cups, using florets and peeled stems, chopped

½ cup kalamata olives, sliced

Dressing

2 cloves garlic, minced

2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, plus zest of 1 lemon

2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

¼ teaspoon sea salt

¼ teaspoon red pepper flakes

Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the broccoli florets and peeled stems. After the water comes back to the boil, set a timer for 2 to 3 minutes or until the broccoli is just tender. Scoop it out with a strainer, and run it under cold water. Shake the strainer to release any water. Chop the broccoli into smaller pieces.

Puree the dressing ingredients together in a small food processor. Toss the dressing and sliced olives with the broccoli in a serving bowl.

Serve at room temperature. 

Tuscan Kale Pesto

Makes 1 ½ cups

Condiment
This cavolo nero, black Italian kale pesto is handy to have in the refrigerator to dress pasta, white beans, or to spread on toast. It’s a delightful dark green and sumptuous. Remember to save your blanching water to boil pasta, or as a base for broth making. This technique will also work with cabbage, and other sturdy greens with variations in the blanching times. It’s a must have recipe for kale raab and its cousins.

4 cups black Italian kale, chopped with tender stems included

2  cups parsley including stems, chopped

1 teaspoon fresh sage, chopped

1 tablespoon sea salt, for blanching water

1 teaspoon anchovy fish sauce

2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar

¼ teaspoon red chili flakes

2 large cloves garlic, chopped

½ cup extra virgin olive oil

Sea salt to taste

Before preparing the ingredients, fill a pasta pot with water and bring to a boil. Add the salt once it’s boiling.

Once the water is boiling, add the kale, parsley and sage and bring it back to a boil before timing 3 minutes. After 3 minutes, or when the kale is tender, use a skimmer/strainer to remove the greens from the water. Save the water for pasta or broth.

Shake the excess water off of the greens and add to a blender or food processor with the other ingredients. Blend until smooth. Taste and add salt if needed. I use a Vitamix to make it ultra smooth, but it’s not needed.

Serve or refrigerate and use within a few days.

Spicy Vietnamese Cabbage and Carrot Slaw

Serves 6

This delicious spicy slaw traditionally includes shredded chicken (ga xe phai). It’s an excellent main dish salad, but I think it also deserves attention as a vegetable side.

You may wonder what’s with the maple syrup in the dressing? I often use maple syrup to balance flavors, because I prefer its mild flavor where sugar is too assertive. Besides, Andrea Nguyen uses it, to the same end, in her recipes, and she’s Vietnamese, so I feel vindicated.   

Ingredients

Salad

1 small green cabbage, shredded

3 medium carrots, scrubbed and shredded

½ cup scallions, thinly sliced

½ cup fresh mint, shredded

Cilantro for garnish

Optional salad additions

2 cups shredded chicken, or baked tofu thinly sliced 

½ cup roasted peanuts, chopped

Dressing

1 clove garlic, minced

1 tablespoon maple syrup

2 tablespoons rice vinegar

2 tablespoons fresh lime juice

2 tablespoons fish sauce

3 tablespoons salad oil, I used avocado

¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

In a salad bowl, toss the cabbage, carrots, scallions and mint together. I use a food processor to shred my cored cabbage and carrots.

Using a mini food processor, or by hand, blend the dressing ingredients together until smooth. If you’ll eat the entire salad for one meal, then dress it right before eating. If not, then only dress the portions you’ll eat. The oil in the dressing will otherwise make it soggy.

Garnish the individual salad bowls with cilantro and peanuts if using.