Reduce your ecological footprint, eat sausage!

Three months ago I was a struggling student sleeping on a friend's couch in Toronto trying desperately to finish off a thesis that had taken the better part of my summer.  At the time I was watching way too many cooking shows (a contributing factor to the tardiness of my academic work).  I'd spend my morning reading gentrification literature, lunch with Jamie Oliver (whom, I know is easy to make fun off, but the guy still pulls off some sweet dishes), afternoons editing and revising, break with Anthony Bourdain, and the evening trying, sometimes even succeeding, in recreating what I had spent the afternoon watching.  It was a strange, and I suppose romantic last stand as a student.  

Around this time I got an email from a friend inviting me to a sausage making workshop sponsored by the Vancouver Slow food group, to be held in November.  Knowing I was moving back to Vancouver I eagerly accepted the invite and then promptly forgot about it, as it was both thousands of miles and months away.  Needless to say I was pleasantly surprised when she called me up to remind me about it a few weeks ago.

The event was put on by Sebastian and Co in North Vancouver, and Sebastian himself (a Chilean born and trained chef) walk us through the basics of Charcuterie.  Separated in groups by the animals we chose to use for our sausages we all eagerly got to work grinding, seasoning, and stuffing.  My friend Tenny, myself, and another fellow choose pork (all Sebastian's products are organic and free range) and decided to make a type of Sicilian sausage seasoned with wine, anise, chillies and plenty of salt and pepper.  It turns out making sausages is amazingly straightforward, and if you like to get your hands dirty, fun.  I suppose this shouldn't come as a huge surprise, however, considering that sausages have been around long enough to have been banned by the Roman Emperor Constantine in a particularly cruel law invoked as part of the Catholic reforms of the time.  Fortunately for us, eating sausages today is only a sin in the eyes of overly moralistic vegans and vegetarians, and not the state.

What makes sausages such an amazing food, and beyond the lengthy history and cultural dispersion of the food, is that they are products of what would otherwise be waste.  Sausages are not made from the best cuts, the most glamorous, but rather a mix of tougher cuts and tasty fats salvaged and recombined with a skill and love that nearly all other recycling programs lack.  Sausages are tasty and just good practice.  If ever we needed justification for such indulgence this seems to me as good as any. 

CB

Follow up:  Sebastian and Co run occasional sausage making workshops for the incredibly low price of $15, which includes instruction and supplies (all organic), plus you go home with a good 3 pounds of artisan, self produced sausage!  Check them out here.   

When pigs fly...

Sadly we are approaching the end of an era. If you've ever had a burger from this place you're probably going to want to slam your fist into your keyboard in anguish when I tell you that Save on meats will be closing permanently some time in the new year. Just do it, it will make you feel better. The full story, if you can bear to read the details, is here http://www.straight.com/print/170703.
I'm too bummed to write a good eulogy. I need a burger.




http://www.straight.com/print/170703

I couldn't resist posting these beautiful pictures my friend Simon took this September up in the Shuswap. The property we were staying on was bursting with premium huckleberries and even a few wild blueberries. Through bake wizardry, Cohen and Hamish transformed them into pies which I ate.
I just want to stick my face in that bowl of berries.

toys

There are some new toys on the blog!
Toys!

So the first one is a handy map with all kinds of great stuff. Awesome curry, date/pick nick spots, home brew supply, a really big rosemary bush etc. The idea is that the map acts as an evolving catalog of places, resources ideas and so forth. I want to emphasize the off beat possibilities of this branch of the project and this is also why we need your help. Know a killer dumpster that's unlocked? Have a favorite blackberry bush? Been to any good pubs? Let us know, we'll put it up. There is some community building here people, share a couple of secret gems and we could all be rich...in theory. Besides I already put all my good spots up so if no one else does i'm screwed.

Toy 2! We have an email adress now and its posted on the top of the blog, thesimmeringcrockpot@gmail.com. I would have gone for just 'thecrockpot' but of course some dingus already did, bulshit. Map aside, send us a line about anything. If you wanna be a TV internet TV star person, we can make it happen...totally. Lets make a really amazing veagan lazagne together and document the whole thing and then put crickets in the lazagne and eat it, or even eat it without the crickets, whatever!
You get the idea, the same as the map lets do something different like go on feildtrips to find out where our food comes from, or have a sandwich throw down. I want to go to the Rogers sugar plant, bad.

crickets for breakfast

So yesterday at around 11am Cohen calls me up and tells me that he has just recieved the 1000 frozen crickets he ordered and that we are going to cook and eat them...saturday is looking up already. I arrive to a box of crickets, American crickets from Washington state. 10 minutes later, glass of wine in one hand, pile of crickets in the other, I eat my first insect and it tastes like pumpkin seeds.

My name is liam w, welcome to our blog. The story I just told you is true and over the next few months more culinary tales of adventure, exploration, experimentation, humor and (probably) pain, will be posted here on the crock pot.
My colleagues and I have started this blog as an open journal of sorts, sharing our struggles and sucesses as urban dwelling 20 somethings trying to nourish body and mind in a quickly changing world. In lofty terms, this blog aims to be a place that adresses issues of nutrition, culinary technique, sustainability, urban life, ethics and hamburgers in a personal and informative manner. In reality, there will be weekly video posts of us cooking, eating, talking and drinking...alcohol from which any or none of the above may be infered. Essentially, we enjoy food, we have fun and we want to share.

Where we fail, you will laugh at us. Where we suceed, you will cheer and probably laugh at us. There is even a chance you might laugh at us...I mean learn something.
Stay tuned space kids...