Canada’s Food Guide- a welcome change.

The new Canada’s Food Guide is a welcome change from the highly structured and restrictive days of it’s past. The new guide no longer looks to dictate your diet in perfect portions, but actually act as a guide. The eye-catching new plate diagram is a much easier portioning system to understand, and replaces the old (highly-industry influenced) rainbow. The main recommendation is simple: eat more plants. It isn’t about cutting out meat, dairy and grains, but simply shifting our portion sizes to have the focus be on vegetables and fruits.

These positive, plant and protein focused changes are highly important to the health of Canadian’s of all ages, however our favourite parts of the new food guide are actually in the additional recommendations. They encourage Canadians to try out some revolutionary ideas: cook more often, eat with others, and enjoy your food! Okay, maybe they aren’t so revolutionary, but they are surprisingly relevant reminders in a time where we applaud being busy, and prioritize convenience over our own well-being. Here are some of our own tips and tricks to help you explore these ideas:

Cook more often: Cooking takes time, and if that is something you’re short on, try to carve out just a couple of times a week that you commit to cooking dinner- and get the whole family involved if possible! Make it fun by trying a new recipe (pro tip- head to the third floor of our new downtown Calgary Public Library and get out a cookbook to base a whole meal around), play music or listen to a podcast while you cook, or appoint one of the kids ‘head chef’ and allow them to choose the meal plan for the evening. Feeling uninspired? Come by our weekly Farmers’ Market on Wednesday to find some fresh ingredients or chat food with our awesome vendors.

Eat meals with others: Host a potluck or dinner club with your friends and neighbours! Themes help make group meals easier- choose a culture to explore, have guests bring items that align with the theme, and play music from that country to create some great atmosphere! New to the neighbourhood or looking for a way to get to know some more folks in the area? Every Thursday at the HSCA from 6-8pm everyone is welcome at our Neighbour Night program where you can share in a vegetarian meal, and a fun activity. Additionally, the second Friday of every month we host a Community Potluck- all are welcome!

Enjoy your food: It seems a bit basic, but when it comes to food- you should enjoy it! Eat what you like. But of course, try to keep the focus on plants! If you don’t like vegetables much, find at least one you do enjoy (at least a little bit!) and look up several different ways to prepare it. Cauliflower doesn’t always have to be steamed and bland… try it as a garlic mash, with chickpeas in a curry, or as cauliflower “chicken” wings. If you don’t enjoy what you’re eating, you’ll cook less, and depend more on processed and convenience foods. Eat local to improve flavour and nutritional value, and try new things! Variety is the spice of life after all.

Recipe Highlight | Potato and Leek Soup

This classic winter recipe was made recently by loyal market go-er and YYC Growers harvest box subscriber, Lindsay Mogden. Using her box bounty, with some other key local ingredients, she created a luscious soup and paired it with bread from Prairie Mill and a side salad with her own beet and cabbage sauerkraut (using more YYC produce!). We love that Lindsay was able to create a well-balanced meal featuring so much "local deliciousness"! 

original recipe from “Kylee Cooks”

INgredients

• 4 slices bacon diced (*Lindsay fried up some extra bacon for garnishing- bacon and stock came from The Honest Meat Co.)

• 1/2 large onion thinly sliced, or 1 medium

• 2 leeks chopped finely (*Lindsay used one large leek)

• 2 cloves garlic minced

• 4 large potatoes peeled and sliced thinly

• 6 cups chicken stock enough to cover the potatoes about half an inch

• pepper

• 1/2 cup half n half

INSTRUCTIONS

1. In a dutch oven, over medium-high heat, cook the bacon, then add the onion and leeks. Cook until tender (about 5 minutes).

2. Add the garlic, cook a further 30 seconds.

3. Add the potatoes and broth, and bring to a boil.

4. Reduce the heat to medium, and let simmer until the potatoes are tender (about 10-15 mins).

5. Either use a masher, an immersion blender, or a blender to roughly blend (you don't want puree it fully, chunks are good!)

6. Stir in the pepper and the half & half.

7. Devour.

Recipe Highlight | Mushroom Bruschetta

This recipe, taken from Taste of Home, uses a ton of ingredients you can get at market right now (See the notes made on the ingredient list to find out where). It is a great lazy-Sunday afternoon snack, or dinner party starter, taking classic bruschetta to the next level with meaty mushrooms. It seems complicated at first but don’t let that scare you! It is mostly some chopping, mixing and charring…

Ingredients:

AIOLI:

1/3 cup mayonnaise (or make your own with egg whites and oil!)

1 garlic clove, minced (See Shirley’s Greenhouse)

1-1/2 teaspoons lemon juice

1-1/2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar

1 teaspoon minced fresh rosemary (See The Apple Lady)

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

MARINADE:

1/4 cup packed brown sugar

1/4 cup balsamic vinegar

1/4 cup honey (See Buzzy Bee Honey)

4 teaspoons minced fresh thyme or 1 teaspoon dried thyme (try fresh from The Apple Lady)

BRUSCHETTA:

6 large portobello mushrooms, stems and gills removed (you can use any kind of mushroom- and several varieties can be found these days from The Apple Lady)

1/2 cup olive oil, divided

3 medium red onions, halved and thinly sliced

2 large sweet red peppers (See Shirley’s Greenhouse)

3 tablespoons thinly sliced green onions

3 tablespoons minced fresh basil

1 garlic clove, minced (See Shirley’s Greenhouse)

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon pepper

24 slices French bread baguette (1/4-inch thick) (Try it with pieces of sourdough from Prairie Mill!)

1 cup fresh arugula (Fresh greens available from Shirley’s Greenhouse/Deepwater Farms)

Steps:

1. In a small bowl, mix the aioli ingredients and refrigerate.

2. Preheat oven to 375°. In a small bowl, whisk marinade ingredients until blended. Place mushrooms in a 13x9-in. baking dish; drizzle with 1/4 cup marinade. Bake, covered, 35-40 minutes or until tender. Remove from baking dish; cool slightly. Cut into 1/2-in. strips.

3. In a large skillet, heat 2 tablespoons oil over medium heat. Add red onions; cook and stir 8-10 minutes or until softened. Reduce heat to medium-low; cook 30-40 minutes or until deep golden brown, stirring occasionally. Add remaining marinade; cook 4-6 minutes or until onions are glazed, stirring occasionally.

4. Place red peppers on a foil-lined baking sheet. Broil 4 in. from heat until skins blister, about 5 minutes. With tongs, rotate peppers a quarter turn. Broil and rotate until all sides are blistered and blackened. Immediately place peppers in a bowl; let stand, covered, 20 minutes.

5. Peel off and discard charred skin from peppers. Remove stems and seeds. Chop peppers; return to bowl. Add green onions, basil, garlic, salt, pepper and 1 tablespoon oil. Toss to combine.

6. Place baguette slices on ungreased baking sheets; brush with remaining oil. Bake at 375° for 4-6 minutes on each side or until golden brown.

7. To serve, top toasts with mushrooms, arugula, onions and pepper mixture. Bake 5-8 minutes longer or until heated through. Drizzle with aioli.

Recipe from:
https://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/portobello-bruschetta-with-rosemary-aioli/

Hillhurst Sunnyside Farmers' Market | Nominated for the BEST FARMERS MARKET IN YYC!

We are SO honoured and excited to have been nominated for Best Farmers' Market in Calgary for the 2019 "Best of Calgary" awards. We are just a small community market, but we have HUGE spirit- all thanks to the vendors, customers and good food friends that make up our market family. As a true, Alberta Approved Farmers' Market, we are proud to prioritize Alberta products and keep things as local as possible. For this competition, we are going up against some of the biggest players in Calgary; help us make our dreams come true and show YYC that a little market with a big heart can take this one home!

Why vote for us??

1. We're building a 'Good Food Community': Our Farmers' Market really is, as one vendor says, "the tip of the iceberg". This market is just one piece of the greater good food puzzle that we host here at the Hillhurst Sunnyside Community Association. All our fundraising efforts, and any extra profit we are able to make, allows us to support our weekly food access program for those in our community struggling to access good food. We also host many special events throughout the season to help you connect with your food, your producers, and have fun doing it!

2. We are Alberta Approved: This provincial standard requires that we operate as a non-profit, and maintain at least 80% Alberta made, baked, and grown products. We blow this percentage out of the water each year! In 2017 we hit an 87% average year-round. When you come to our market, you know that everything you buy has been handpicked by our team with this standard in mind- however we do still encourage you to ask questions and get to know your grower!

3. We do it all for the love of good food: We provide our customers with a genuine market experience. We do our best to provide lots of variety and high-quality goods in a relaxed setting. Our producers are some of the best in Alberta and they're all genuine about their love for their industry. These vendors truly love what they do, and are so proud to be a part of your weekly shop. You can feel the local love from the second you walk in the doors, and with each bite when you chow down on your fresh, local purchases.

Thank you SO MUCH to anyone who nominated us for this honour! Please take a few minutes and let your voice be heard for the Best of Calgary awards. Share with your friends, family, and neighbours and celebrate small business in our beautiful city!

Feature Guest Post | Future City Builders Calgary- an opportunity for impact and innovation

Calgary. Food. What comes to mind when you hear those words?
Do you think about gathering at the table around the holidays, cooking up your favourite soup in the cold of winter, going out to Red’s for brunch with friends, or going to the Calgary Farmers market? Or, perhaps you think of what Lord Cameron of Dillington calls “nine meals from anarchy” due to the fragility of our global food supply, and line-ups at the Calgary Food Bank where the 1 in every 10 Calgarians living in poverty may be supporting themselves? Everyone has their own thoughts and experiences with food since we need food to survive, but we want to challenge you to come together to help contribute to a food system that goes beyond surviving to thriving.

Future City Builders Calgary is an innovative, collaborative, 5-session program that will bring together 30 under or unemployed youth (18-29 years old) to build work ready skills through sharing, learning, and creating ideas around sustainable food.

Everyone has their own relationship to food from growing, cooking, preserving, food waste, connecting with people through food, food skills programs, and more. It’s rare to be able to gather, share our experience as youth, and empower ourselves to come up with solutions. Our goal is to bring together the diverse voices of youth in Calgary so we can create projects that reflect the diversity of experiences of young people around food.

Throughout a dynamic 5-session innovation workshop we will share our experiences and challenges with food, build skills for project planning and development through learning sessions and mentors, and create innovative ideas for taking action on food here in Calgary.

It’s time for us, as youth, to come together and build the city we want. We are the future of Calgary, we can work towards a better, more equal and exciting food system, and together we can we can work to be one meal closer to peace!

Head to our website for details and Apply Now:
https://www.youthfulcities.com/fcb-calgary