Wine and cheese tastings, every Saturday in June at Mount Nittany Vineyard and Winery

To celebrate June as “National Dairy Month,” Mount Nittany Vineyard and Winery will host free wine and cheese tastings every Saturday in June from 12 noon until 5pm. 

On Saturday, June 7, local cheese artisan Stone Meadow Farm will be available in the winery tasting room to provide samples and sales of their products. Stone Meadow raises milking and beef cattle in the beautiful pastures of Centre County, Pennsylvania. Their cheeses are made directly on the farm from fresh, whole unpasteurized milk which is dense with nutrients due to their farming practices and breed of cows. Stone Meadow makes a variety of hard cheeses: Cheddar, Swiss, Colby and Jalapeno Jack. In addition, seasonally they offer soft cheeses such as Camembert and Taleggio, as well as smoked cheeses.

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Tags: wine | cheese | events |

Recipe: BBQ ribs, a summer classic

I love BBQ. I can’t deny it. People will tell you Kansas is best, others will tell you Memphis is best, others will say Carolina is best. You know what? They are all right. Each type of BBQ has its own particular something special to offer. So don’t be afraid to try a type you haven’t before. You may be surprised. I’ve cooked over wood fire, used smokers, gas grills, charcoal grills, you name it. Now I am not going to sit here and tell you one is better than the other. We each have what we have and use what we are used to. The only thing I have to say is don’t be afraid to try something different if you have the chance.

Food should be an adventure. Trying new foods and types of cooking is like a culinary journey. Taking you to faraway lands and experiencing new cultures through their foods and cooking styles. Food is one of the few things I can think of that crosses racial and ethnic boundaries. So go, try, experiment, and enjoy.

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Tags: recipe | summer | ribs |

Five very good reasons to buy pastured eggs at farmers markets

Eggs are cheap and plentiful in the grocery store, so one might wonder why you’d venture out to a local farmer’s market to buy pastured eggs. An egg is an egg, right? Well, as it turns out, there are vast differences that all go back to how the chicken is raised.

I raise laying hens on pasture just outside of State College, and I just love selling that first pastured dozen to someone who tells me they’ve only bought eggs at the grocery before. I know exactly how much of a surprise they are in for! (I should note that “free-range” at the grocery store means that the hens are not caged and have access to the outdoors at least part of the day. How much space they have outdoors or what the surface is made of is not specified. “Cage-free” hens are raised entirely indoors, but are not confined to cages.) Here are a few surprises you might encounter if you’ve never tried a pastured egg before.

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Tags: ChaseFamilyFarm | chickens | eggs | cage-free |

I’m Fed Up With Industrial Food

I am really fed up. And it isn’t just because I am an increasingly irascible, old curmudgeon.

I’m fed up with the behavior of government agencies like the FDA, the USDA, and the EPA, dancing like puppets in the hands of Monsanto, ConAgra, Dow, Big Pharma and their ilk. The FDA dilly-dallies by continuing to allow antibiotics in animal feed to promote “efficiency” and profits, when it is clear that the practice promotes the proliferation of antibiotic-resistant bacteria that threaten our health.

I’m fed up with the EPA constantly approving new pesticides that are known to kill pollinators. (Who needs insects anyway?)

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Tags: supermarket | corn | opinion | factoryfarming |