As we all know around here, I love beans. (They are the magical fruit, right?)

When I met Zak, he told me he didn’t like beans. I was like, “What?” But then, I quickly understood–he had never had them except out of a can, and if there is something that might well make someone dislike beans, it’s those mushy, flavorless critters that come out of cans masquerading as beans. It doesn’t matter what kind of bean they say they are, or what color they are, most of them taste the same–blah. Kinda mealy, kinda mushy, very yucky.

So, I proceeded to cook him a pot of proper pinto beans, made the old hillbilly way with a ham hock (I can feel the vegetarians wincing, but well, beans taste mighty good that way and I wanted to make sure to hook him before I went all vegetarian on him) a bay leaf, an onion and a garlic clove and lots of water which turns into a delicious bean broth that was always my favorite part of beans when I was a kid. Mother thought I was weird, but I liked to drink a cup of it right out of the pot, I liked it so well. (I did the same with the liquid kale is simmered in, too–she told my doctor about it and he said, “Let her do it! That’s where most of the vitamins have escaped to!)

Well, needless to say, Zak was converted, and we’ve had lots of beans in our pantry ever since.

Recently, I’ve been keeping Athens very own Shagbark Seed & Mill Company’s black turtle beans in my pantry and have been using them for all sorts of purposes–as a plain old pot of beans, drained and used to top nachos, in salsas, in tacos and in enchiladas. And they are mighty good, no, not just good, but delicious, with a nice chew to the skins with creamy, sweet interiors. And they make fine broth.

And I’ve heard tell that Michelle and Brandon are offering pinto beans this fall after they get harvested–glory hallelujah, and praise be! I’m waiting impatiently to taste those, because when I was growing up, pinto beans and cornbread were a big favorite, especially in the late fall or winter. I never tired of them, even when we ate them a whole lot when Dad was laid off for a year and we went from “somewhat impoverished” to “downright poor.” Even eating them several times a week didn’t dampen my enthusiasm for them. Pintos are just that good, and I cannot wait to taste ones fresh from the field, because I know they’ll be better than the ones from the store which could have been hanging around for who knows how long.

BUT, you know, a reader named Laughingrat commented when I wrote about Shagbark’s black beans and clued me into a company that grows and sells heirloom varieties of dried beans out in California, called Rancho Gordo.

And you know how I am. I looked at their website, and saw all the beautiful beans in all their glorious colors: yellow, red, purple, black, piebald black and white or brown and white, streaked, spotted and speckled, pink, and celedon green–and of course, I was smitten. I’m a sucker for colors, and even though I knew darned good and well that when you cook dried beans most of those luscious pigments melt away and you end up with beans in some shade of creamy beige or brown, I couldn’t help it–I had to know if these beans were indeed any more special than the ones that came from the grocery store.

Steve Sando, the owner of Rancho Gordo and the Guru of Legumes, writes eloquent descriptions of the flavors and textures of the different legumes he offers in his online catalog and at his retail outlet in Napa, as well as in San Francisco, and his words haunted me. Because, I just had to know if his beans were just as good as the beans grown here in Athens.

So, I ordered a couple of pound packages for myself and a full dozen packages as a Father’s Day gift for Zak’s dad, Karl. (Karl is a bean aficionado, just like me.)

And, I finally got around to testing out three of the varieties from Rancho Gordo: “Pebbles,” which is a fascinating bean in that from the same plant come beans of all different shades of brown, pinkish beige, black and yellow, “Yellow Indian Woman,” which is widely grown among the Native American tribes in the northern plains (though it was originally brought to Montana by a Swedish family) and “Eye of the Goat,” which looks like a very fat, rounded, glossy pinto bean.

And here’s what I found out–Sando’s beans from Rancho Gordo have the same qualities of freshness that I found in Shagbark’s beans. They cook slightly faster than grocery store dried beans, probably because they’ve not been sitting in a warehouse for years on end. They also have more flavor–a LOT more flavor–and each type has a different character. And, finally–their textures are more varied than most grocery store beans–each type of bean has a distinctive texture–just as the black beans from Shagbark had tougher skins, but very creamy interiors, which led to them being paradoxically both slightly chewy and yet melting in the mouth.

I cooked all three types the same–in a pot with a bay leaf, a small amount of smoked pork (a small hunk of ham hock), a small whole onion and a whole clove of garlic. Then, I used each one in several ways to see how versatile they were in the context of different recipes.

The first one I cooked was “Pebbles.” You know I had to see what they were like, because they really do look like a bunch of river-polished stones. If you drilled holes in these beans and strung them up, they’d look like a necklace of agate beads–they really are that pretty, as you can see from the photo. (Maybe I should attempt to string some of them into a bracelet, if not a necklace.)

I used the cooked, drained beans to top nachos made with Shagbark’s amazing corn tortilla chips and some really lovely aged cheddar, and Kat and Zak and I loved them. Kat proclaimed them the “bestest bean nachos ever,” and Zak said that the beans had a slightly sweet flavor that was interesting.

Also, I noticed that while the differences between the colors of the cooked beans was not as startling as with the raw beans, they still showed subtle variations that made them look pretty neat on the plate.

I also ended up using these in a taco filling and as the filling to some vegetarian enchiladas that included grilled corn cut from the cobs and summer squash, and even in those contexts, the beans retained their sweet flavor and textural character.

The next beans I cooked were the “Yellow Indian Woman” beans, but I neglected to take photographs of them, either before or after they were cooked. They start out as ovoid brownish yellow beans and cook up to a pale pinkish brown. Their skins are somewhat tough so they retain their shape very well, even when cooked in a pressure cooker. Their flavor is distinctly earthy and sweet, and when I made them into refried beans, they had a silky, creamy texture that Kat and I adored.

Zak liked them, too, but he prefers the beans I cooked today to use in a refried bean dip to go with my salsa for a potluck at Kat’s preschool.

These beauties are known as “Ojo de Cabra,” or, “Eye of the Goat,” and at first glance they don’t look all that special. I mean, yeah, they’re pretty, but really they look like really pinto beans that went on an eating binge and are about to burst their skins, they’ve gained so much weight from all their gobbling.

But they don’t taste like pintos. They have a very fresh, sweet flavor with a hint of mushroomy depth. Steve Sando says likes to cook them simply and then serve them with some grated raw onion and a squeeze of lime juice and a bit of salt. You can see my version pictured in the blue bowl near the top of this post–I diced the onions finely instead of grating them, added minced cilantro along with the salt and a sprinkle of Aleppo pepper flakes just before the lime juice squeeze.

And you know what–that makes a fine bowl of beans. And it showcases the very meaty texture of the Goat Beans as I’ve come to call them. That’s what I ate for lunch today.

But for the potluck tonight, I mashed the beans and fried them with fresh onion and garlic in a bit of bacon fat melted with olive oil, and Zak said he absolutely loved the fuller, deeper texture of these beans to the creaminess of the “Yellow Indian Woman” beans. He said that the texture was firmer and a bit drier, but it made the beans taste somehow nutty in addition to just plain good.

So now we have a new favorite refried bean bean.

That is, until Shagbark’s pintos come in.

Then, we’ll see whose beans come out on top.

Until then, let it be known that I highly approve of the heirloom beans Sando is offering through Rancho Gordo–and while I’m at it–his two books, The Rancho Gordo Heirloom Bean Grower’s Guide: Steve Sando’s 50 Favorite Varieties and Heirloom Beans: Great Recipes for Dips and Spreads, Soups and Stews, Salads and Salsas, and Much More from Rancho Gordo are downright awesome, too.

Both are filled, cover to cover, with bean lore, cultivation information, recipes, and description of the individual characteristics and flavors of a whole array of heirloom beans, and are equally filled to the brim with Sando’s very infectious leguminous enthusiasm. Both books are well worth checking out, though the second book is more a cookbook that is geared toward foodies, while the first has essential bean cultivation information, as well as descriptions of the beans, their histories and a few recipes featuring them that aren’t included in the first second book.

So there we are–check out Rancho Gordo and see what you think of their heirloom beans–because they really are just that good.

Now, I’m going to stop writing and wait impatiently for Shagbark’s pinto beans to be ready to harvest…..

As a landscape architect and city planner, Darrin Nordahl is in a unique position in regards to understanding and articulating the feasibility of urban agriculture in modern US cities. Unlike many authors, such as Micheal Pollan, Nordahl has first-hand experience with designing public landscapes in urban environments, and so he can see the viewpoints of those who favor of adding edible plants to urban landscapes and those who oppose the idea.

All of these facts work in Nordahl’s favor as he wrote Public Produce: The New Urban Agriculture. In it, he outlines the hows and whys of changing our public policies regarding food in the urban landscape. He makes a cogent argument that municipalities can and should take the lead in feeding the public through other means than the usual community garden. He suggests that cities can plant fruit and nut trees in public venues such as parks or city plazas. He tells stories of unused parking lots being turned into community gardens staffed by public employees where the food is available to everyone and anyone. He suggests, again, with straight reasoning behind his thoughts, that the traditional community garden plan is not sufficient to feed those in need, and that it is not only up to individuals or private charities to take up the slack, but that governments can and should step up and lead the way into a new way of integrating food into our daily lives in the 21st century and beyond.

I loved the ways in which Nordahl suggests to incorporate food into many different types of public venues, and I loved his arguments against the usual naysayers who declare that food plants have no business in the public view because they are unattractive and messy.

What I found lacking in the book, though, was a certain eloquence–while it is obvious to me that Nordahl is passionate about the subject and is more than knowledgeable, his writing style is a bit dry and lackluster. The stories he tells are factually interesting, but are told in such a way that they are bloodless and cold. There is a lack of human warmth in the book that made it very hard for me to read–which is odd because I can usually devour books of this type in days.

This book, though it is a mere 149 pages, took me over two weeks to read.

Compare that to the 450 pages in Michael Pollan’s The Omnivore’s Dilemma, which I read in less than a week.

But be that as it may, while the book is not an entertaining read that is easy to tear through, it has a worthy message and is filled with useful informatin, especially for people who are interested in helping alleviate the food inequity in our country.

And for that, it is quite worth slogging through the less than sparkling prose.

Well, it reads like a detective novel filled with geneticists, biochemists and endocrinologists, folks who seldom appear as characters in your standard mystery story.

But it is a mystery story, one which is partially unraveled in the course of the book, but which has, as yet, no real ending. it seems that every time scientists think they have found the gene, hormone or neurotransmitter that is the root cause of obesity, it turns out that they are only partially correct. The biological processes which controls appetite, hunger, satiety and fat storage are immensely complex, and attempts to control these processes by pharmaceutical means have all failed. I believe that this is in large part because our bodies are programmed to get fat in times of plenty, which is what we have been living in for the past several generations in the US. This programming is meant to protect humans from the stresses of an eventual famine, but since we have lacked one of those for more generations than I can count back, our evolutionary programming has led us into a serious health problem.

This makes the book sound like it is unremittingly depressing, and for some folks, I suppose it would be. But as for me–I found the narrative to be so fascinating that I could overlook the fact that much of the book is pointing out how seemingly inevitable it is that humanity will just continue to get fatter and fatter over the next twenty years, Genetics and biochemical bodily processes fascinate me, so I can get absorbed in the relatively few success stories in the book, and let the positive feelings they generate help me get past the depressing news contained in the rest of the narrative.

On the other hand–I have to say that it is somewhat comforting to me to know that some of my assumptions that body weight is in large part controlled by genetics. I have family members who have suffered and struggled with their weight over years, and not surprisingly, they are all directly related to one very obese individual–they are here children and grandchildren. Growing up seeing these kids start out at normal sizes and weights, then over time, in adulthood, gaining more and more weight, I always assumed that it was a familial trait. Especially since most of them didn’t eat that much more than the rest of us did, and some of them ate less.

All in all, it was a really interesting read, and is well worth the effort and time it takes for a layperson to get through all of the biomedical jargon.

Summertime is the time for reading.

Well, in truth, every season is the time for reading.

In the summer, you can lounge by the pool or loll on a blanket on the beach and devour a good book from behind movie-star sunglasses. Or, you can be like me as a kid, and climb up in a tree and park yourself against a good sturdy branch like a lioness sleeping off a gazelle feast and instead of snoozing, devour books that you hoisted up the tree with a basket-pulley system.

But winter is perfect for reading, too. Long, cold, snowy nights are perfect for curling up on the couch, with a mug of hot mulled cider, wrapped in a soft old quilt, engulfed in a book.

Spring is good, too–you can listen to the patter of gentle spring rain on the windowpane while a book takes your mind on journeys your body likely never will experience.

And then there is autumn–a nice cool crisp morning when the sky is brilliant cerulean and the leaves are a blaze of russet, gold and orange is perfect for sitting on the porch with a cup of coffee and a book to read while listening to the calls of blue jays and mockingbirds.

Of course, all of these idyllic images rely upon the reader having enough time to actually sit down and read–something that I find myself lacking a bit these days, but dammit–I really do intend to read this pile of books.

So, what is in my summer-reading pile?

The titles of interest to foodies (I admit to also having a few psychology texts, parenting tomes, quilting books and books of Fortean interest in my pile, but I am sparing my readers from having to hear about them) are as follows:

Shark’s Fin and Sichuan Pepper: A Sweet-Sour Memoir of Eating in China by Fuschia Dunlop. The truth is, I have had this book forever. Ever since it came out in hardcover, and I have tried to finish it about three times now. (That’s why it is sans dustcover in the photo–Kat long since denuded the book and destroyed the fragile paper, which is a shame because the cover image of the author drinking soup is quite fetching.) And my statement that I have tried to read it three times is really unfair, because it makes it sound like the book is boring, which it most certainly isn’t. Dunlop, the author of two of my favorite Chinese cookbooks ever, is a great writer, and her remembrances of living, working and learning cookery in China are filled with the flavors, sounds and colors of that unfamiliar, but fascinating world. The reasons I haven’t finished it have more to do with me and my lack of focus than they do with Dunlop and her storytelling ability. This time, I swear I will finish it, for real, and then write a right and proper review of it here.

My China: A Feast For All The Senses by Kylie Kwong Yeah, I’ve had this book forever, too. It is a gorgeous, oversized coffee-table tome of a cookbook, and is filled with photographs conveying the sights, sounds and flavors of China as seen through the eyes of Australian chef and restaurateur Kylie Kwong. I have drooled over the pictures and scanned the text, but have I read it or cooked from it? No. A situation I am bound and determined to remedy.

Serve The People: A Stir Fried Journey Through China by Jen Lin-Liu Yes, this is another memoir/travelogue/eatalogue of an individual who goes through China, seeing it through the eyes and stomachs of her people. Do we detect a theme in Barbara’s reading for this season? I think that we do. Right now you must be thinking that I have a one track mind, but that just is not so. As I noted before, I am also reading about child-rearing, quilting and Bigfoot, so you cannot say that I just want to read about other people traveling to China and eating their fool heads off and writing about it and am living vicariously through them. I resemble that comment, thank you very much. No, seriously, this looks like a fun read from a Chinese-American journalist, born of Taiwanese parents who spends years living and working in Beijing and Shanghai, and while there finds a love for Chinese food and culture. What’s not to like, really?

Chop Suey: A Cultural History of Chinese Food in the United States by Andrew Coe This book just came out, but it looks good to me. It is so new that there are no customer reviews for it on Amazon, so I have to admit I bought it just because I have read Coe’s writing in Gastronomica and liked his writing style. That, and I am fascinated with the subject matter, which will most likely include the development of the Chinese restaurant as a mainstay of American food culture–a story which I find endlessly fascinating, in large part because I have spent plenty of time eating and working at such establishments.

The Food and Cooking of South China by Terry Tan I just got this book yesterday, and boy is it a keeper! The photographs are enticing to say the least and there are recipes for delicacies I have never heard of before–including pork and nut dumplings–how can that be bad–and steamed chicken with ginger wine. Again, how can this be bad? Look for a full review with recipe presentations later in this month or next for this book–it is definitely a keeper.

So, there is my foodie reading for the summer.

What books are in your stack of foodie reading for this season? I need to know so I can add even more books to my pile!

If you are at all a fan of Chinese American restaurant food, and if you have ever wondered about the fact that no matter how small a town you visit in the US, you are likely to find at least one Chinese restaurant there, you should pick up a copy of Jennifer 8. Lee’s book, The Fortune Cookie Chronicles: Adventures in the World of Chinese Food.

The book opens with the statistical anomaly of the 110 second-place Powerball winners from the drawing of March 30, 2005. Even though only 3.5 second place winners were likely, the lottery officials were stunned to see 110 winners listed the next day–so stunned that they wondered if somehow lottery security had been breached.

It turned out that all 110 winners had played numbers they had gotten from fortune cookies–fortune cookies that had all been made in one factory and then shipped across the nation.

It was a strange case of cross-cultural luck in action, and it makes the perfect opening for a book on the cultural ubiquity of Chinese restaurants in the United States, which outnumber all of the McDonalds, Buger Kings and KFCs combined.

Filled with fun facts, fascinating stories, mysterious tales (such as the much-disputed origin of fortune cookies) and written in a light, conversational tone, The Fortune Cookie Chronicles is a really easy, illuminating read.

But all is not sweetness and fluff.

Lee shines a light into the dark truths surrounding the difficulties, dangers and struggles of Chinese immigrants to the US, bringing into focus the harsh realities of how others make profit on the backs of other human beings who come to the United States in search of a better life. She moves from the cold facts of the statistics on how many Chinese restaurant deliverymen, many of whom can barely speak English are murdered in New York City for paltry sums of cash and a takeout meal, to focus on the intensely personal and painful problems encountered by a Chinese immigrant family who leave New York to buy a tiny restaurant in rural Georgia. The racism and discrimination faced by Chinese immigrants is highlighted, pointing to a sad reality of life in the US, where often times Asians are invisible and are treated as if they are interchangeable.

What I found most interesting about the book was that Lee explains how Chinese restaurants arise even in the smallest areas of the United States, and how workers are supplied for these restaurants through a national network of employment agencies. This is an ingenious way to both supply workers for specialized restaurants which cannot always get workers through an existing population of Chinese immigrants (how many Chinese immigrants live in rural Georgia, for example?), as well as giving opportunities for workers to settle in places they may never have otherwise known about.

Years ago, when I was a waitress in a Chinese restaurant in Huntington, West Virginia, I got to see this system in action. The China Garden was unusual in that the owners hired American servers, dishwashers and prep cooks, but the cooks were all Chinese immigrants, many of them quite recent. I knew that the owners kept an apartment or two upstairs from the restaurant for the cooks, all of whom lived together, and I remember asking once how they found them. I was told that they called an employment agency in New York City and that they would get the names of several possible cooks and they would choose one or two as needed, and then the cooks would hop on a bus and appear a day or so later. This wasn’t the only way that cooks were hired–family members were brought from China at times, and now and again, a Chinese student from the nearby University was hired, (a medical student and nursing student were among them) but many of the workers came through the exact agency Lee writes about in this book.

The Fortune Cookie Chronicles is a fascinating read, giving a well-balanced view of the history and current reality of Chinese restaurants in America. It is well worth reading, and if you want to know more about the book, or the author, you can visit the book’s official website where Lee has a blog.