Special guest: Tim Sommer from Purple Sage Farms

We had a special guest in our last class to educate us about organic farms, how and where to get real organic products and why we should spend more on buying healthier food.

The special guest is the owner of a local farm named Purple Sage Farms located in Middleton, Idaho. 

Tim brought a lot of fresh greens and herbs to show us and for tasting.

I felt like a bunny for munching that many different types of herbs. 

I don't quite remember all the names but they are definitely different 

from those we can buy on market in term of texture and freshness.

Purple Sage Farms also provides live stocks, so Tim brought some beef

for us to cook and try.

 Our instructor, Nicole did the cooking this time due to time concerns.

Cooking.....

Flipped the beef to cook the other side

Meanwhile, we also prepared a bean dish with the fresh herbs from the farms.

We might have overcooked the beef a little bit while 

letting it sit in the oven to keep the temperature.

The sauce was made by Nicole using the beef juice, homemade raspberry juice, seasonings

and melted the butter in it to create the consistency.

We decorated the beef with some scallions and 

chive blossoms (the tiny purple flower and petals). 

Now it's ready to be served! 

 Of course, the taste was great! I loved the sauce a lot! 

We all learned that chive blossoms can be used and 

it is a great decoration for dishes.

Thank you, Tim for sharing your knowledge and 

your amazing fresh herbs and greens with us.

(Tim is the second from the right on the picture below)

More information on Purple Sage Farms:

http://www.purplesagefarms.com/

Tim: "You pay the price for what you eat"

Spend a little bit more to eat healthier so you don't have 

a huge medical bill to pay ahead of your life. 

The pictures below sum up everything:

Class Field Trip to Boise CO-OP

On March 18 (Fri), our cooking class had a field trip to visit Boise CO-OP.

Boise CO-OP has been around since 1973 and it is a community-owned food marketplace that supplies high-quality, natural and organic food products. In short, a place where you can find healthy stuff. As I was fascinated by a lot of different departments' presentations and was focusing on all the delicious food tasting, I didn't take a lot of pictures.

I really loved the sunflower spouts. It is surprisingly fresh and delicious. 

(I did feel like a bunny for munching on that many spouts)

Besides the delicious food tasting, 

people who work at the CO-OP explained to us about their missions, 

philosophy and goals.

In addition, what they do at each different areas in the CO-OP and 

how they handle the food. 

They don't just serve food to customers, 

they serve the best and healthy food to customers. 

Also, since this is a community owned marketplace, 

they are always willing to take in feedback and listen to demands or suggestions.  

We were showed how they made one of the best selling sausages: Chorizo

A lot of workers have been working there for a long long time

One guy provided his family recipe to make chorizo, 

they tried it and established the recipe since then. 

Preparing to stuff the sausage into the intestine 

Inserting the stuffing

Lastly, spin the sausage to create separations. 

The taste of the chorizo was amazing. I mean it is their best selling sausage after all. I ate like 5 or 6 cups of samples (shh...secret). No guilt because there were still a lot of left over samples. 

Anyway, we learned a lot that day after the visit. 

If you have never been to the Boise CO-OP before, you should stop by sometimes and check it out. Maybe you will like it and become a regular of this marketplace.

To learn more about Boise CO-OP:   http://www.boise.coop

My cooking instructor's blog about this visit:

http://nicolepeyrafitte.com/blog/bsu-class-friday-class-basque-home-cooking-w-argia/