Food Friday: Strawberry Pie

(Photo by Sara Owens, Virginia Farm Bureau)

I’m not a huge fan of cake, so when my parents asked me what I wanted for my birthday dessert when I was growing up, most years I requested a strawberry pie from Shoney’s.

As an adult, I tend to make my own birthday dessert and invite my parents over, but a giant piece of pie full of plump strawberries is still one of my favorites—birthday or no birthday.

My husband and I went strawberry picking a couple of weeks ago at Chesterfield Berry Farm. We try to go each year, and we always end up picking way too many strawberries (Doesn’t everyone?).

This year I purposely picked too many berries, because I wanted to make my own version of Shoney’s pie. I wanted mine to be a little healthier, but also very simple.

This recipe ended up being so simple that I’m almost embarrassed to post it. But it was too tasty not to share. I fooled my family into thinking I had some awesome culinary skills. Go impress your friends and family too. After all, you can always make it more complicated by making your own whipped topping, glaze and pie crust. But I like simple. And I like this pie.

Simple Strawberry Pie

(Based off this blueberry pie recipe I posted a few weeks ago.)

1 quart fresh strawberries, de-stemmed, washed and halved

half a packet of strawberry glaze (in your grocer’s produce department) OR a 10-ounce jar of strawberry jelly

1 pie crust of your choice

8 ounces non-dairy whipped topping

Place strawberry halves in a large bowl. Pour glaze or jelly on top of the strawberries, and mix thoroughly. Once strawberries are well-coated, place mixture in the pie crust, and top with whipped topping until the pie is completely covered. Refrigerate immediately for at least 1 hour before serving.

Note: I used a graham cracker crust, strawberry glaze and fat-free Cool Whip.

Farm families pleased new youth labor regs were withdrawn

Farm families across the country were pleased with the recent announcement that the U.S. Department of Labor had decided to withdraw its proposed restrictions on underage farm employees.

Last winter the DOL’s proposed new restrictions on youth farm labor ignited a firestorm of protest from the U.S. agricultural community. Thousands of farm families wrote in opposition, and a bill was introduced in Congress to reverse the regulations if they went into effect. The DOL withdrew the regulations on April 27 and said it will instead intensify education and safety programs for minors working in a farm environment

Jonathan Cavin, a Lee County beef, produce and tobacco farmer who helped his father plow fields when he was a pre-teen, was pleased with this decision, because in his mind, “agriculture is something that is learned” at the side of an older farmer.

To hear more on the issue directly from Cavin, watch the video below.

Food Friday: Salsa and strawberries make fruity combination

(Photo by Pam Wiley, Virginia Farm Bureau)

How often do you have two food holidays that can be easily combined? May is both National Salsa Month and National Strawberry Month.

So I say let’s make it National Strawberry Salsa Month!

The first time I had a fruit salsa, it was on grilled salmon. And it was delicious. Since then, I’ve experimented with different fruit salsa recipes, and this one with strawberries is hands-down my favorite.

Its sweet and sour combination makes it good with both chips and with grilled fish or pork. You also could serve it over cream cheese with ginger snaps. This recipe is adapted from one on tasteofhome.com.

Try it; you’ll like it!

Strawberry Salsa

Ingredients

1½ cups diced fresh strawberries

1½ cups chopped red pepper

1 cup chopped green pepper

1 cup seeded, chopped tomato

1 seeded, chopped jalapeno pepper

2 tablespoons minced fresh cilantro

1 teaspoon sea salt

½ teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

¼ teaspoon pepper

2 tablespoons honey

2 tablespoons lime juice

1 tablespoon lemon juice

Directions

In a large bowl, combine the first nine ingredients. In a small bowl, combine honey and lemon and lime juices, then gently honey mixture into the strawberry mixture. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours. Stir just before serving.

Domino’s ditches HSUS request to restrict pork supplies

(Photo courtesy of Domino’s)

Hallelujah. There is finally someone out there with something intelligent to say when it comes to the production of meat.

“We rely on animal experts to determine what is the best way to raise an animal that’s being used for food,” Domino’s spokesman Tim McIntyre said recently after the company’s shareholders unanimously rejected a request from the Humane Society of the United States for the company to stop using pork from suppliers who confine breeding pigs in gestation crates.

If only other companies had as much common sense. Unfortunately, HSUS has convinced McDonald’s, Wendy’s and the world’s largest food service provider, Compass Group, to remove gestation crates from their supply chains.

Gestation crates do many helpful things. They confine pregnant sows and protect them and their newborn piglets from other aggressive sows. They also ensure individual feeding and veterinary care of each animal instead of letting them fend for themselves.

HSUS asked Domino’s to ensure that its pepperoni and ham come from producers that don’t use gestation crates because they prevent pregnant sows from turning around.

Domino’s apparently realizes that those who raise animals for food use scientifically-proven practices that are in the animals’ best interests.

If only more companies would do the same.

Food Friday: Buttermilk Biscuit Day is coming up

(Photo courtesy of Home Baking Association)

Not to worry.

Even though May 14 is National Buttermilk Biscuit Day, I’m not going to get all overwrought.

Not going to tell you all about watching my grandmother bake biscuits from scratch and memory when I was little. Not going to get all poetic about eating half a home-baked biscuit while melted butter and honey runs down my arm. Not even going to mention sausage gravy.

I’m at work, folks, and trying to maintain a little decorum.

But I am going to let you in on the ground floor of a venture I’ve pondered a little, and that’s founding the National Biscuit Hall of Fame. Because there are tons of people out there who swear they know someone, or are kin to someone, who bakes the finest biscuits in the history of mankind. The finest.

So why would we not want to honor all those people? When we get all their pictures on the walls, it’ll be Mommas, Grandmas, Nanas and PopPops; school cafeteria ladies; military and firehouse cooks; church ladies; and whoever was in the kitchen that night in 2002 when I dined at The Loveless Cafe in Nashville—biscuit bakers of all ages and shapes and colors, with flour on their hands and magic in their kitchens.

And as visitors gaze at those portraits, they’ll swear they can smell a batch of biscuits coming out of the oven that very minute.

And they’ll be right.

Because the only way out will be through the diner.

If you’re a potential Biscuit Hall of Fame nominee, you don’t need a recipe. If you’re still working toward that, here’s one from the Home Baking Association.

Perfect Buttermilk Biscuits

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

¼ teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

½ cup cold butter

¾ cup cold buttermilk

1 tablespoon melted butter

Preheat oven to 450°.

Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Cut in butter until crumbly.

Stir in buttermilk until just moistened.

Turn dough onto lightly floured surface; knead about 10 times or until smooth. Roll out dough to ¾" thickness, and cut biscuits with a 2½" cutter.

Place biscuits 1" apart on an ungreased baking sheet. Brush tops with melted butter, and bake 10 to 14 minutes or until lightly browned.

Makes 8 biscuits.

Virginia woman is finalist for Farm Mom of the Year

Dee Dee Clements Darden of Isle of Wight County is the Southeast Region winner in the annual America’s Farmers Farm Mom of the Year program (Photo courtesy of America's Farmers).

Voting continues through May 12 for Monsanto’s America’s Farmers 2012 Farm Mom of the Year recognition, and there’s a Virginia farm mom among the finalists!

Nominations from farm families all over the United States were submitted earlier this spring, and Delores “Dee Dee” Clements Darden recently was named Southeast Region winner.

Darden and her husband, Tommy, raise peanuts, cotton, corn, wheat, soybeans, pumpkins and beef cattle on 600 acres near Smithfield. They also run Darden’s Country Store, a family-run business since 1952, where they cure and sell 1,000 hams a year.

In addition to her farm and store duties, she organizes educational events each fall for more than 1,500 local schoolchildren and their parents at her family’s farm.

Darden chairs the Virginia Small Grains Checkoff Board and serves on her county board of supervisors. She is a past president of the Virginia Grains Producers and a past chairman of the National Peanut Board.

America’s Farmers has a system in place to keep you from voting more than once, but don’t miss your opportunity to get that one vote in before May 12. The national winner will be announced “on or about” Mother’s Day, May 13.

Food Friday: Blueberry Pie

Blueberries are full of antioxidants, flavonoids and other vitamins that help prevent cell damage.

Tomorrow is National Blueberry Pie Day and a great time to give this recipe a try. It is from the U.S. Highbush Blueberry Council. Virginia-grown blueberries will be available starting in June.

Double Blueberry Pie

(Photo courtesy of U.S. Highbush Blueberry Council)

1 9-inch frozen or homemade pie shell

10-ounce jar blueberry jam or fruit spread

¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon

4 cups fresh blueberries

whipped cream or vanilla ice cream (optional)

Following package or recipe directions, prebake pie shell and allow to cool. In a microwaveable dish, combine blueberry jam and cinnamon. Microwave on high until mixture liquefies, or about 1 minute. Stir in fresh blueberries. Spoon mixture into prepared shell, then chill. Serve topped with whipped cream or vanilla ice cream.

More blueberry recipes also are available from the U.S. Highbush Blueberry Council.

Note: Blueberry equivalents

1 dry cup (8 ounces) of fresh or frozen blueberries is equal to:

• 90-129 large blueberries
• 130-189 medium blueberries
• 5 ounces by weight (3 cups to a pound)
• ⅔ cup pureed
• ½ cup pureed and strained
• ⅔ cup after simmering 5 minutes with 2 tablespoons water

1 cup frozen blueberries = ⅔ cup thawed blueberries