On Saturday, just hours after getting home from a two-week vacation, I headed to the garden and felt like I was suddenly greeted by teenagers when I left toddlers behind. Every plant was twice its size and blooming fruit and flowers that were just days away from ripening. Thankfully, I hadn’t missed any significant harvest,Read more »

Great piece today in Salon by Sarah Karnasiewicz, formerly of Saveur (and Salon too, actually, I think), about the resurgence of home canning, and whether we’re all deluding ourselves about homesteading being a logical response to a down economy. As an avid home canner with a serious and legendary spatial-vision problem (which is what gotRead more »

I have a real weakness for imitation Herzog in pretty much any form, but in cooking show form? Yes, please. For earlier forays into Herzogian food media (made, incidentally, by legendary filmmaker Les Blank, who himself has a food-film background), here. [via] Rupa Bhattacharya, Culinary Writer

[For previous Cheap-Ash Meals, go here or here] Summer Squash Tacos with Radish-Lime Salsa and Cotija cheese Grilled Corn with Chile-Lime Butter Pinto Beans with Garlic and Red Chiles Avocado, Radish, Onion Salad with Cumin Vinaigrette =$14.05 Click through for recipes and receipt:

In honor of the Fourth of July, here’s an infographic map of the new Presidential garden (via Good magazine) — click through to enlarge:

Comfort yourself with a bear-shaped potato, part of a series of what the Guardian delightfully calls “wonky vegetables,” released in honor of the EU’s having lifted vegetable-shape strictures. Rupa Bhattacharya, Culinary Writer

A Hare Krishna group in West Virginia (who knew?), faced with what appear to be mounting cases of dissatisfied cows, has launched the nation’s first adopt-a-cow program, allowing you to provide care for a retired cow for $108 a month — or, should that prove too pricey for you, you can feed a workaday cowRead more »

The kids are home for the summer and the rain shows no signs of ever stopping, so I have two words for all of you cooped-up parents out there: Boudin Noir. For many the dark, almost black sausage conjures up feelings of warm, comfy, home-cooked goodness. For others deep, dark, pure disgust. And for othersRead more »

How an extremely misanthropic resident of the bovine digestive system such as E. coli travels through four stomachs, 150 feet of intestines large and small, across thousands of miles, from farm to processor(s) to retailers to — at the end of a journey that makes a Yukon river salmon run look like a 5-minute commuteRead more »

Yes, it is. Photo, and garbage can over which we’re eating said mango, courtesy of Ashley. Rupa Bhattacharya, Culinary Writer