APRIL FOOD DAY

Do you know that...

• One in eight Americans are at risk for hunger?
• Four million Americans receive assistance from Feeding America each week?
• Children who are hungry have slower emotional, social and educational development?
• Millions of elderly Americans go to bed hungry every night?

It is so critical that those of us who are not in this position help those that are. So many people who never thought they would need food assistance are now asking for help from their local food bank. They have lost their jobs through the massive down-sizings and layoffs. They have exhausted all of their resources. Elderly people on fixed incomes are finding that costs are out-pacing their incomes.

First-time requests at food banks are at an all-time high, but the shelves are bare. Corporations and foundations have decreased their donations and individuals are so uncertain about their own finances, that their giving has slowed.

We are asking that you make a donation, even if it's just a dollar or two, or maybe take a box of canned goods to your local food bank. It will help someone who may be less fortunate than you are.

Here's the link to Feeding America, an affiliation of more than 200 food banks across the country. Chances are that your local food bank is a part of this network.

We're all in this together, and that's the way we will come through it... together.

Please help today. The need is great and the time is now. Thank you so very much.

Lotte Market Sunday

I went to Lotte Market on Route 40 and Route 29 on the advice of Plays with Needles. She'd found the funniest little tooth-picks with wee brushes on either end and I thought they would work for art projects and for cleaning my computer and mouse.

Lotte is a mainly Korean market, but they do have a selection of Latin American and other foods. The store didn't seem as clean as H-Mart, but it was huge. Like H-Mart and Fresh World Market, Lotte has a selection of china and other housewares. Here are some things I saw: Cactus leaves.Fresh Chives.Telephone brand agar-agar. It was the branding on this that made me laugh.Kung Fu Chicken Soup. I thought it was supposed to be Kung Fu Panda.

On the way home, I drove through the Ellicott City valley, just after a storm had blown through. I love Ellicott City, but always forget to go there.

Bad News

Well, for me, anyway... Chef Cat is trying out a lot of cupcake recipes and she's asked me to be one of her testers. It's a tough job, but I am trying to step up to the responsibility.

Last night, I had a lemon cupcake with gorgeous lemon icing and little curls of candied lemon, topped with a candied rose petal. YUM!

H-Mart Saturday

The chefs and I took a field trip to H-Mart on Route 40 and Rolling Road. As usual, lots of interesting and unusual foods awaited us. Chef Dawg was looking for some fermented black beans and found them straight-away. Meanwhile, Chef Cat and I took our time strolling though the produce section and checking out what we saw.

These little things, which look sort of like tiny yams, are actually fresh tumeric. Even the chefs haven't seen this before! These rhizomes are boiled and then dried and ground for use as a spice.We're all familiar with water chestnuts, but have you ever seen fresh ones?This is mamey, the fruit of an ornamental evergeen which grows in South and Central America. Wiki says that the skin is a cross between sandpaper and peach fuzz and that the inside is creamy and sweet and orange. The flavour is described as a combination of pumpkin, sweet potato and marischino cherries! This woman is whipping up batches of kimchi, the traditional Korean pickled vegetable dish. The Kimchi Field Museum in Korea has documented 187 types of kimchi.

Because English is not the primary language of the staff at H-Mart, misspellings are frequent and frequently funny.

Frozen Frog Legs

Oy Vey! Kosher Coke

Well, not really Kosher Coke technically, but Passover Coke. There are just a few short weeks during the year that you can find this Coke, which is made with sugar instead of corn syrup. There is a prohibition against corn and corn products during Passover, which will begin on April 9, 2009.

You can distinguish regular Passover Coke from Coke by the yellow top on the bottle. It usually only comes in the 2 litre bottles and several Coke products including Sprite, Dr. Pepper and Diet Coke are also available for about three to four weeks.


You can listen to a story on Passover Coke on NPR here. If you like Classic Coke, this is the closest thing you'll find! I got some today at Fresh Market at Quarry Lake on Greenspring Avenue. La'Chiam!

April Food Day - Bloggers Fighting Hunger

Everyday, the news is filled with the dire news about the current economic climate and a lot of us use the blogging community to take a break from the constant drumbeat. However, we can not ignore the fact that friends and family members, and even some blogger friends have lost their jobs because of the recession.

Former advertising executive and editor of Easy & Elegant Life, along with fundraising professional and editor of Pigtown*Design, have teamed up to create a blogger action day on April 1, 2009, which we are calling April Food Day – Bloggers Fighting Hunger. We are asking our fellow bloggers to create a post about this project and ask each of their readers to make a contribution to Feeding America (formerly Second Harvest), a national food bank with 200 member banks across the country.

People who never had a worry in the world now have to think about where their next meal is coming from. People who never would have dreamt that they would need help are now showing up at the local food banks. But when they get there, the shelves are bare. There is not enough food being donated to meet the sudden rise in demand. There is not enough money to buy the food for the food banks. There is not a general understanding that food banks need help to help fill their shelves.

Every dollar contributed provides seven meals or 10 pounds of food. A gift of $25 provides 75 meals. If we all post together and ask our readers to make a contribution on April 1, we can make a huge difference in our communities.

We would like our fellow bloggers to help in a few easy ways:

• Send this or a similar letter to your friends with blogs and ask them to do the same.
• Write a post, and we can help you with copy if you need it, and publish it on March 31 or April 1, asking your readers to make a contribution to Feeding America. We will provide you with the direct link to Feeding America’s donation page.
• Provide a link to the blog, April Food Day, on your site and to your post about April Food Day. We will link back to your blog and your post.

We hope that you will help us help others. We understand that this is a quick turn-around, but the need is great and the time is now.