I waited until the last minute to throw together the menu and was afraid I would not be able to acquire my choice ingredients. I got up early on Saturday to visit the University District Farmers Market in search of a local ham to be the centerpiece of the meal. One vendor politely told me they had already ran out, and another looked at me like I had two heads. I felt defeated and a bit intimidated through the process, but I did manage to pick up a sack of potatoes from Alden Farms, some chives from an unmarked flower stand, and a tub of Fromage from Mt. Townsend Creamery.

I found my local ham at the Metropolitan Market, made by Hempler’s in Ferndale, WA. I also picked up milk from Twin Brook Creamery, some green beans (a staple at Lybecker family gatherings), and parmesan cheese. A few more items were contributed by my amazing mom-in-law and here is how the menu came together:

Mt. Townsend Creamery Fromage with Oregon Hazelnuts and Orange Zest
served with Eat Local camelina crackers

Mom’s Whole Wheat Bread
made with Twin Brook Creamery milk and Bluebird Grains cracked emmer

Bok Choy Salad
with green onions, chow mein noodles, slivered almonds, and soy sauce vinaigrette

Alden Farms Mashed Potatoes
with locally grown chives

Sautéed Green Beans
with fresh lemon juice, slivered almonds, and parmesan cheese

Hempler’s Slow Cooked Ham
with Rockridge Orchards spiced apple cider, stone ground mustard, and honey

Grand Central Bakery Coconut Cake
with vanilla bean ice cream

I felt the pressure to please everyone with dinner, but I relaxed the day of and had fun with it.  The meal received plenty of thumbs up and my husband’s mom even called me the Rockstar of Easter! I call that a glowing success.

Upon arrival, we took the shell-covered and daffodil-lined pathway up to the longhouse where we were given a cupful of steaming clams in nectar. We tossed the shells onto the ground and crushed them with our toes, participating in the village’s sustainable landscaping.

Inside the longhouse, we watched a whole salmon being cooked over an alder-wood fire on cedar stakes in the traditional Northwest Coast Indian style. We were then escorted into an auditorium where we feasted on the salmon and accompanying side dishes like wild rice and mixed greens with blue cheese and dried cranberries.

As we finished the meal, the lights dimmed and we watched a stage show featuring the spirit of the Pacific Northwest’s coastal tribe. While interesting and captivating, being the foodie I am, I was most interested in learning how to prepare the salmon. We were given a demonstration following the show.

The native chef fit the cedar stake over the center of the whole fileted king salmon.

Then laced smaller stakes through the flesh to hold the salmon open and give it the most surface to catch the heat of the alder flames.

This is a technique, if feeling ambitious, my husband and I might be able to handle on a camping trip. Regardless of whether or not we use the preparation, I enjoyed learning a traditional method for cooking salmon.

After the demonstration and a short stroll around the grounds, the four of us headed back to the boat, gliding through the Puget Sound and Elliott Bay returning the Seattle waterfront. All of us truly enjoyed the holiday gift.

I perused the web for a good recipe and landed on a Spiced Autumn Pot Roast from SouthernFood.About.com.

I woke up early on Tuesday morning, sliced onions and celery, and layered them on the bottom of my slow cooker. Then I peeled and cubed the sweet potatoes before adding to the dish. I roped my husband into the meal and made him sear the roast while I prepared the veggies. The roast fit snuggly atop the produce in the slow cooker and I poured in a concoction of beef stock, cinnamon, salt, and pepper.

We set the slow cooker on low and ran out the door for the day. The sweet smell of sweet potatoes, cinnamon, and roasted beef greeted us when we got home. We couldn’t wait to dig in.

Spiced Autumn Pot Roast

3 to 4 pounds boneless beef chuck pot roast
2 tbsp. cooking oil
1 medium onion, thinly sliced
2 ribs celery, sliced
3 to 4 medium sweet potatoes, peeled and quartered
2/3 cup beef broth
1 teaspoon seasoned salt
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. pepper
1 tbsp. cornstarch
2 tbsp. cold water

Trim fat from roast; brown in skillet on all sides in hot oil. Drain well. In 4 to 5-quart slow cooker place sliced onion, celery, then sweet potatoes. Place roast in top of vegetables, cut if necessary to fit. Combine beef broth, celery salt, salt, and cinnamon. Pour over all. Cover. Cook on low 10 to 12 hours or high 4-5 hours. To serve, transfer roast and vegetables to platter. Reserve juices. Measure 1 cup; make gravy by stirring cornstarch in cold water; add juices. Cook and stir for 2 minutes, until thickened and bubbly. Makes 6 to 8 servings.

Credit: SouthernFood.About.com

I made it through the market with a ten-dollar bill and a crisp twenty, picking up an acorn squash and sweet carrots from Stoney Plains Organic Farm and a round of Seastack cheese from Mt. Townsend Creamery.

I found sweet potatoes and Braeburn apples.

The big splurge was a 3-pound grass-fed chuck roast from Stokesberry Sustainable Farm.  The vendor gave me a bit of a deal of the beef so long as I promised to cook it slowly.

My meal plan for the week? With items in my pantry and freezer, this is what I hope to create in my kitchen this week:

•    Roasted chicken thighs with carrots, apples, and red onion
•    Pot roast with sweet potatoes and onion (seasoned with cinnamon)
•    Pot roast, round two, with roasted acorn squash
•    Fruit and cheese plate featuring Seastack

I can’t wait to share with you the results.

When I launched A Greener Kitchen, I searched endlessly for the perfect “green” apron. The price was always too high and the chic was nowhere to be found. Discouraged, yet determined, I partnered up with my mom’s sewing company and designed my own aprons, sourcing bright and bold organic cotton from Harmony Art.

I recently invited my good friend over for a lunch date to test out the new organic cotton aprons. I donned a full apron with the Garden print and she chose the half apron with the lime green Eyes of the World pattern.

We cubed sweet potatoes for mashing, turned day old bread into croutons for a salad, and rubbed chicken breasts with a dry spice rub. The chicken recipe is a favorite of mine from Cooking Light – Spicy Honey-Brushed Chicken.

The finished meal was a winter comfort, hearty and warm.

And our clothes? Clean and ready to wear for the afternoon.

I live in my kitchen, and now in my aprons.

In year’s past I have made bread rolls from scratch using my Mom’s Whole Wheat Bread recipe and I was asked to contribute the same this year. Knowing I could not source all of the ingredients from the state, I felt I had to make one more dish.

I wandered the West Seattle Farmer’s Market with my husband contemplating what to make. “Does your family like swiss chard? What if we do a fruit and cheese plate? How about glazed carrots?” The answers I got were, “Nope. Nah. Uh uh.”

We finally settled on a salmon spread served with locally made crackers. The ingredients – Fromage cheese from Mt. Townsend Creamery, rosemary from Stoney Plains Organic Farm, and salmon from the Loki Fish Company. After we made the purchases, my doubt began to take back over. The salmon wasn’t technically from Washington State; it was caught in Alaska. I was beginning to think I failed the challenge.

Discouraged, but determined to complete the dish that was decided, I moved on to the bread. Surprisingly, instead of dwelling on the fact that it was not a local dish, I saw this recipe as an opportunity to incorporate local ingredients. I added Bluebird Grains’ cracked emmer to the recipe and the liquid mixture contained milk from Twin Brook Creamery. I was feeling positive… until I killed the yeast.

I was working way too quickly and not measuring temperatures diligently. I poured the liquid into the bowl with the whole wheat flour and yeast when it was twice as warm as it should have been. Steam rose up from the mixture, but I was hopeful. I kneaded the dough and left it on the counter to rise.

But it didn’t. I formed the un-risen dough into small round balls and crossed my fingers they would miraculously rise up for the second round. They didn’t. The bread had failed.

We showed up at grandparents’ doorstep with unleavened bread and the salmon spread.

My mother-in-law thought they were both delicious, the brother-in-law went back for seconds, and our family friend raved over the round little bread balls. I wanted to share my accomplishments of incorporating local ingredients. I wanted to wave from my boat saying, “Look at me, look at me. I may have failed, but I certainly tried.” But I didn’t have time to take pride; there were turkey, mashed potatoes, and grandma’s dressing to be devoured.

Of course, being a lover of food, I had to serve some bites to go along with the drinks. I assembled a cheese plate with Rogue Creamery’s Smokey Blue, aged Gouda, and Mt. Townsend Creamery’s Fromage. They were accompanied by some La Panzanella crackers, dried cherries, and walnuts.

I made some pizza dough from scratch, topping one pie with home made tomato sauce (using my canned tomatoes), slices of fresh mozzarella, and basil, and the second pie with a combination that is quickly becoming a favorite of my hubby and friends. I brushed the dough with olive oil and baked on the lowest rack in the oven for eight minutes. Then I layered on mozzarella, red onion, sliced apples, grilled chicken, smoked blue cheese, and chopped walnuts.

For dessert we had to have cake for Chris and Renee to slice into, but I couldn’t stop there. I also baked up some mini cupcakes and dressed them in Bella Cupcake Couture.

The table was complete when Chris and Renee arrived with a chocolate loaf and their infamous cheese ball made with Old English, blue cheese, and walnuts. The food didn’t last for long.

The food was delicious, the drinks were flowing, and bride- and groom-to-be were glowing.

(Give this part your best Minnesotan accent. C’mon, give a whirl!) Have you ever heard of Ole and Lena? Vell, they live up north in Minnesota loving life and bumblin’ around.

Vell, don’tcha know, old Ole got sick and vus dyin’ in his bed. And vhile vaitin’ for her old husband to kick duh bucket, Lena started in to cookin’. She vus makin’ lefsa and a nice zucchini hotdish. Well, Old Ole, he loved nuttin’ better than Lena’s hotdish, and ven he smelled it from da deathbed, up he went to da kitchen. Vhen Lena saw dat he vas eatin’ a plate of hotdish and lefsa she took it from him and said, “Ole, vat are ya doin’? Dat hotdish is for duh funeral don’tcha know!”

Minnesotans love their hotdish – the home-style cousin of the casserole – and I would know, generations of my family, including me have called the state, and the dish, home.

Hotdish first got its start when budget-minded farm wives needed to feed their families, as well as congregations in the basements of the first Minnesota churches. It was a simple solution for stretching ingredients, especially pricey cuts of meat, while still being able to dazzle family, friends, and neighbors with something tasty and satisfying.

Also imagine Minnesota winters when the temp could drop to 40 below – a warm hotdish was a comfort food that was filling and foolproof – even in a wood-burning oven. Farm cooks everywhere embraced these hotdishes, and every family had a favorite. And they still do. Including mine.

When I was growing up, my aunt Connie and uncle Keith prepared wild rice hotdish every Sunday for our post-Mass get togethers. My mom often made tuna noodle hotdish with saltine crackers crumbled on top. For deer hunting season, my grandma whipped up her concoction of ground beef, shell pasta, corn, and cream of mushroom soup. Cream of anything soup is an essential base for any Minnesota hotdish.

Like Lena, my family also had a funeral hotdish – we didn’t use zucchini, but we saved our best combination of tomatoes, corn, hamburger, and elbow macaroni to mourn the loss of our elderly relatives and fellow church members.

Hotdish can literally be any combination of ingredients – if you asked 150 Minnesotans for their favorite hotdish recipe, you would get 150 recipes in return.

The word hotdish is so ingrained in me, that it wasn’t until I moved away from Minnesota that it dawned on me – other people might not know the meaning of the word. The first year I was in Seattle, my fellow co-workers and I threw together a potluck Thanksgiving dinner. We were discussing what to bring – pumpkin pie, mashed potatoes, dressing – and I uttered the phrase in every Minnesotan’s repertoire, “I’ll just bring a hotdish.” The confused stares I got back threw me off my game. “You know what a hotdish is, right?” My brave co-worker Evelyn, said, “oh yah, oh yah, it’s a plate and it gets hot, helps keep the food warm.” “Not exactly, it’s essentially a casserole.” It’s a funny comparison to me because the word “casserole” doesn’t hold the same feeling and tradition as the word “hotdish.”

I found this great quote from a fellow Minnesotan – She sums it up perfectly.

“Hotdishes are such a part of our history. They are the epitome of comfort foods and bring such satisfying memories to all Minnesotans.”      ~Linda M. Kopp, Staples, MN

From Ole and Lena with their Scandinavian accents to my grandma with her “oh you’se guys” to my mom and to me – the basics of the Minnesota hotdish remain the same whether or not the ingredients change.

At FareStart, food is the tool that empowers lives, nourishes families, and builds communities. It is an organization that empowers homeless and disadvantaged men, women, and families to achieve self-sufficiency through life skills, job training, and employment in the food industry. It is the epitome of the famous Chinese Proverb.

Every Thursday night is Guest Chef Night, where leading local chefs work with FareStart students to create a gourmet three-course meal for only $25. My friend Lisa, an avid FareStart advocate, asks me at least once a month to join her for Guest Chef Night and we finally made it a date on October 15. Chef Alvin Binuya of Ponti Seafood Grill was at the helm and the menu featured macadamia-nut crusted albacore (it could have been nut-crusted anything and I would have been there.)

We ordered a bottle of wine to start, a 2006 Eola Hills Pinot Noir from Rickreall, OR. Soon after, the starter hit the table served by a gracious volunteer from Executive Women International. It was a Walla Walla sweet onion miso soup with crispy won tons, furikake, and scallion oil.

The entrée, the macadamia crusted Hawaiian albacore that lured me in, was served with a lemongrass-mango buerre blanc, spaghetti squash with cilantro and chilies, and soy syrup.

The dessert was a Theo moelleux au chocolate with alpine huckleberry compote. The insides oozed warm chocolate and the huckleberries added the perfect amount of tartness to the dish.

It was a nourishing meal not only for the ingredients, but for the meaning behind the preparation as well. I wrote on my life list to teach someone how to cook, preferably an underprivileged individual that I could essentially “teach how to fish.” Perhaps one day they will invite me to be a guest chef. In the mean time, I’ll give in often to the repetitious request of my dear friend and support FareStart from this side of the kitchen.

The aunts and uncles politely let us impatient kids start the buffet line. There were plates, and then forks, followed by a slow cooker of Grandpa’s beans, which often prompted a rendition of “beans, beans, the more you eat, the more you…” As a shy seven-year-old, the lyrics tinted my face red.

I started as usual with the carved turkey, white meat only, and mashed potatoes with gravy made from the turkey drippings. Some of the side dishes changed with the distinct seasons of Northwestern Minnesota, like Aunt Kari’s scalloped corn and Uncle Dave’s smoked walleye. He was a fishing guide and often brought the local star of our 10,000 lakes back to the family table. The staples were my mom’s bok choy salad and Keith and Connie’s wild rice hotdish, a Minnesota-style casserole in which the rules of ingredients are endless.

The most comfortable component on my plate was my grandma’s homemade bread. There was love in those loaves and I felt it with every bite.

Our church closed its doors when I reached high school and our Sunday dinners slipped further and further apart. I went off to college, and then replanted myself on the West Coast. The comfort and familiarity of a meal with my oversized family became a memory and a rare occasion.

Although I return to the Midwest often, I long to recreate the feeling and traditions of my family’s weekly feast in my West Seattle home.

The opportunity presented itself just a few weeks ago when my grandma and parents came to visit my husband, Charlie and me. On Sunday, we invited my husband’s family and my aunt and uncle who live nearby, scrounging up enough bodies to constitute a dinner party. My husband’s eyes were wide when I told him we were going to feed eleven people; I just smiled and started putting together the menu.

I roasted a chicken from Stokesberry Sustainable Farms, mashed potatoes, made gravy from the chicken drippings, and glazed medallion-sized carrots. We ate mixed greens with goat cheese and pecans and corn bread muffins, a quick bread substitute for my grandma’s loaves. I baked an apple raspberry crisp for dessert. As I looked around the table, I saw forks moving from plate to mouth, then wide smiles. I heard conversation echo. The sensation of Sunday supper filled the room.