It seems as if my cookie strike inadvertently translated into a blog strike. And a kitchen strike actually too. The past month I’ve spent a dismally low amount of time cooking meals for myself and I was probably too ashamed to post the hodge-podge dinners I’d been assembling on the blog. No matter how hard I tried, there were only so many half-decent alterations I could make to my staple nutritional yeast sauce. So there my blog laid, silent and forlorn. I hope some of you kept it company in my absence.

To be entirely honest, I have to admit that I have been feeling rather uninspired in the kitchen lately. Between a dwindling selection of local foods, a slightly pathetic start to a rooftop food garden (starting from seeds is harder than you think!), and a vow to replace my morning bake-a-thons with run-a-thons, I was kind of left not wanting to bother. Plus, a strong reaction to all sweet foods recently has made it impossible to cheat on my cookie strike…say, in favour of muffins.

On the bright side, however, my break from writing about food hasn’t meant a break from thinking about it. I’ve been busy this past month attending conferences and thinking a lot about the big picture of food systems – from how much energy goes into our food (7-10 calories of energy per 1 calorie of food…read more here & here) to how to create a functional community of food activists in order to bring about real change in my foodshed.  I’m also developing a series of posts about innovative food projects happening in my community that I’d like to feature here. Stay tuned for my play-day with ChocoSol, a chocolate trading company that puts ethical and environmental philosophy into action. (I let the no-sugar thing slide for that day in case you’re wondering.)

Now that farmers’ markets are starting up, there’s a spring vigour in the air, and my friend Ian has helped me get over my gardening slump, I’m already getting back into a kitchen groove. He and I celebrated all of these things this past weekend with a butternut squash risotto (mostly him) and a batch of gluten-free, sugar-free, vegan biscuits (mostly me).  Hey, looks like I found a recipe to post!

my seemingly stunted chard & basil...could they be dwarf varieties perhaps?