Back to the Roots shows the joy of home farming via a small cardboard box that produces two micro-crops of mushrooms.

Two UC Berkeley students came across the idea during a class, which mentioned the potential to grow gourmet mushrooms entirely on recycled coffee grounds.

Inspired by the idea of turning waste into fresh food, they succeeded in growing oyster mushrooms on recycled coffee grounds. With some initial interest from Whole Foods and Chez Panisse, and a $5,000 grant from the UC Berkeley Chancellor for social innovation, they decided to forgo their corporate job offers and become urban mushroom farmers.

Now, everyone can enjoy freshly-harvested oyster mushrooms with a Grow-Your-Own Mushroom Garden. That which is not edible is compostible or recylcable.

A sustainable project that yields good, healthy food: This is a feel-good purchase and gift.

The kits are available at some Whole Foods Markets and online.
  

Sugar dissolves slowly in cold liquids. Photo by K.G. Toh | CSP

Superfine Sugar

Pick up some superfine sugar, or make your own.

Superfine sugar is simply table sugar that is ground into smaller grains, which dissolve quickly. You can make it in the food processor by pulsing table sugar until it’s very fine. Keep superfine sugar in a separate sugar bowl to bring out when you’re serving iced coffee and tea.

Simple Syrup

Simple syrup is typically used by bartenders to sweeten drinks. It’s a mixture of half sugar and half water, stirred over medium-low heat until it dissolves. Cooled to room temperature, it’s a quick sweetener.

You can buy it or make a batch, keep it in the fridge in a tightly-capped jar and use as needed. Here’s the simple syrup recipe.

There’s also a sugar-free simple syrup made with stevia.

Agave Nectar

The healthiest alternative is to use no sugar. Refined white sugar makes no positive contribution to our nutrition and has a downside everyone is familiar with.

A better choice than sugar is agave nectar, a low-glycemic natural sweetener from the agave plant. Agave nectar has a glycemic index (GI) of 32; half that of table sugar (GI 60-65). Honey has a GI of 58, pure maple syrup has a GI of 54. (Here’s more information on agave.)

WHY DOESN’T SUGAR DISSOLVE FASTER?

It’s simple chemistry: Substances dissolve faster in hot water. Hot water molecules have more entropy (move faster) than cold water molecules, enabling hot water to more quickly break down the sugar molecules in the solution.
How many types of sugar are there? Check out our Sugar Glossary.

MORE COLD DRINK TIPS

Don’t Dilute The Iced Coffee/Iced Tea

We’ve been to delis where iced coffee (or tea) is made by pouring the hot stuff over ice. They probably figure that with the added sugar and milk, people won’t notice how dilute the coffee is.

At home, you can:

Try Flavoring Ice Coffee & Iced Tea

MORE RECIPES

Here are more iced coffee tips and recipes.

Try this recipe for ultra-rich vanilla iced coffee with shaved chocolate.

Q Kola, an elegant mixer. Photo courtesy Q
Drinks.

The mission resulted in Q Water (Q for quinine). The company, Q Drinks, also produced a Q Ginger and a Q Club Soda.

And now, there’s Q Kola.

Like Q Tonic Water and Q Ginger Ale, Q Kola is clean, crisp, not too sweet and made in small batches with with all-natural ingredients. The whole line is more light in body than big-brand mixers. One reason is the house style, the other reason is that high fructose corn syrup, the main sweetener of big-brand mixers, adds body and mouthfeel.

If you’d like more elegance in your Rum and Coke, Long Island Iced Tea, Mad Bomber or other drinks among the more than 163 drinks made with cola, try Q Kola.

Packaged in a beautiful glass bottle, Q Kola is made with organic ingredients, including kola nuts, cinnamon, cloves, coriander, lemon, lime, orange and nutmeg (the flavorings found in cola). It’s lightly sweetened with organic agave nectar.

There’s a store locator on the company website. You can purchase Q Kola online at Amazon.com.

Find more of our favorite soft drinks.

July 26th is National Pisco Day—a day to drink Pisco, and to try Brazil’s national cocktail, the Pisco Sour (recipe below).

We’re about to introduce you to Pisco. Below you’ll find:

 
But first:
 
 
WHERE WOULD WE BE WITHOUT THESE FOOD STAPLES FROM PERU?

Here are some of our favorite foods originated in Peru, all cultivated by the Incas:

 
 
CONTEMPORARY PERUVIAN DISHES

At the end of each of the past four years, food trend analysts have predicted that Peruvian food will be the next hot cuisine in the U.S.

But it hasn’t happened yet. Although it’s on numerous menus, most people don’t realize that ceviche originated in Peru.

Peru’s national cocktail, the Pisco Sour, remains the best-known Peruvian food in the U.S.

For a Peruvian feast, try some of these popular Peruvian dishes (you can find many recipes online):

 

THE HISTORY OF PISCO

Back to Pisco: The spirit was developed by Spanish settlers in the 16th century as an alternative to orujo, a pomace brandy that was imported from Spain.

Not only did they have to wait for the cargo ship to show up; but pomace is not hard to come by.

It’s distilled from what’s after from pressing wine grapes (what’s left are the grape skins and seeds).

In Europe, estate owners typically gave this residue from their grapes to their farm workers, to distill for their own consumption.

The end product, depending on the country, is brandy, grappa, pisco and other firewater*.

In the late 1550s, the Spanish settlers began to plant quality wine grapes.

Peruvian farmers did the same as their European counterparts: They distilled a clear liquid from the pressed wine residue given to them.

Pisco was discovered by sailors in the 18th century, when it became part of the growing Peruvian export trade.

It was easier to transport Pisco up the West Coast from Peru than to transport whiskey overland from the East Coast.

Thus, Pisco made its way to San Francisco, where it was enjoyed during the Gold Rush (1848–1855) through 1920, when Prohibition put the cap on alcohol.

Today there are many Pisco brands available in the U.S., including what has to be our favorite name, Macchu Pisco (get it)? Today, premium brands are distilled from the wine itself, not from the residue.

The category’s ulta-premium brand is Pisco Portón, an elegant distillate with fruit aromas and flavors; we enjoyed drinking it neat.
 
 
HOW DO YOU DRINK PISCO?

 
 
RECIPE: PISCO SOUR COCKTAIL

Peru’s national cocktail (photos #1, #2, #3) is also a favorite in the U.S.

Ingredients For One Drink

 
Preparation

1. Combine first four ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake.

2. Strain into a chilled glass. Add a dash of bitters.

[1] A Pisco Sour has an egg white top and a garnish of bitters (photo © T.78UopXx licensed under CC-BY-SA-2.0).

[2] A Pisco Sour, served glamorously at Kindred Restaurant in Davidson, North Carolina (photo © Kindred Restaurant).

[3] The Pisco Sour’s popularity has engendered flavored versions, from berry to mango. This one is flavored with rhubarb. Here’s the recipe from Le Petit Eats (photo © Le Petit Eats).

[5] El Capitán, a combination of Pisco and red vermouth, is sometimes referred to as a Pisco Manhattan. Here’s the recipe from Imbibe Magazine (photo by Nico Vera © Imbibe Magazine).

[6] Pisco Portón, an “ultrapremium” brand of Pisco (photo © Pisco Pórton).

*Firewater is actually a generic term for alcoholic beverages that contain between 30% and 60% alcohol by volume—that’s 60 to 120 prove. The Spanish word is aguardiente, which means “fiery water” or “burning water.”

Brandy originates from brandywine, the Dutch word for “burnt wine.” The spirit is named from Pisco, a town located on the coast of Peru. Often, products were named for the town from which they were shipped.

Ceviche—shellfish cured by citrus juice acid—has been popular in Latin America for many centuries. It dates some 2,000 years to an Inca dish of raw marinated fish.

The dish was discovered by Spanish conquistadors in the 1500s; they added the lime juice and onion that are integral to modern ceviche. The name “ceviche,” pronounced say-VEE-chay, is thought to come from the Spanish “escabeche,” meaning marinade.

Today, ceviche—spelled seviche or sebiche in some countries—is so popular that there are cevicherias, restaurants that specialize in ceviche.

There’s a whole menu of ceviche, from different types of fish and seafood to country-specific preparations. Each country adds its own spin based on local seafood and preference for ingredients like avocado. Some add a dressing of ketchup or a combination of ketchup and mayonnaise.

Ceviche is delicious “health food.”

 
> Try this classic shrimp ceviche recipe.

> More ceviche recipes.

> Create your own recipe, using your favorite seafood, with this guide.

> More on the the history of ceviche.
 
 
RECIPE: CEVICHE-STYLE LOBSTER WITH
WATERMELON SALAD

Executive Chef Damian Gilchrist of the Ocean Reef Club in North Key Largo, Florida serves Florida Lobster “Ceviche-Style” with Watermelon Salad. Here’s his recipe, which serves four as a main or eight as a first course.

You can substitute other crustaceans—scallops, shrimp—or fish.

Ingredients

 
For Serving

 
Preparation

1. Mix all ingredients in a mixing bowl to thoroughly combine. Refrigerate for 2 hours.

2. Serve atop watermelon planks with mache and drizzled with balsamic syrup. For balsamic syrup, reduce balsamic vinegar or buy a ready-made balsamic glaze.

[2] Ceviche with mixed shellfish (photo © Food Colors | Fotolia).

[3] Lobster is so much more delicious in ceviche than mixed with mayonnaise in a lobster roll (photo © Get Maine Lobster).

[4] Two ingredients for any ceviche: cilantro and lime (photo © Lindsay Moe | Unsplash).

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