Cooking: Pescaterian Snacks, Vegetarian Meals and Farm to Tableware

More and more I'm reducing meat consumption not just for health of the body and the planet, but also when you have a vegetable garden, a plant-based diet or meals where animal protein is a condiment rather than the center makes sense. An organic garden is so much labor albeit one of love that it's a sin to let it go to food waste. With the last of the of cauliflower harvest, I sautéed it to eat with leftover mashed potatoes and used the other half in a chicken and cauliflower tikka masala with basmati rice.

I spent this past Saturday also tilling the soil--digging and turning shovels of a product called Pay Dirt and horse manure into areas of dirt that I had just cleared of the cauliflower, kale and Swiss chard. I also trimmed down a rose bush to make this bouquet in a mason jar.

After digging dirt, I also cut down some Swiss chard.

And dug into my cupboard to finally make a sardine sandwich. I think as a kid, I was kind of grossed out by sardines but nevertheless remember my mom mixing sardines in tomato sauce with chopped fresh onion and eating it with rice.

Recently I watched a YouTube video of Sam the Cooking Guy, making and rhapsodizing over a toasted sardine sandwich and decided I was gonna try it too. And oh shit, I forgot the lemon juice, but you know what? You gotta try it because it's pretty darn tasty and nourishing even without the acid. 

Later for dinner, it was time to cook that Swiss chard. Olive oil, chopped garlic and chicken bone broth and a little salt was all that it needed for another delicious meal.

But this time I baked the red potatoes instead of mashing them.

Today is Ceramics Club, and I've got so many pots to load into the kiln like this frost porcelain vase. If I've time, I'd like to finally break into the bag of Coleman porcelain and make a plate.

I think I'll also roll out some slabs of Bmix with grog to start on a slab teapot. And hydrate some frost porcelain scraps to wedge. Really I need to remember to turn the speckled buff clay into colanders like below.

I love 'em and wonder if I can make that foot ring. Maybe roll it out separately and lay under plastic to attach later? it's such a challenge to have both slab forms similar in moistness.