Feast of St. Patrick & a birthday cake

Celebration was the theme at our house this past weekend.  I celebrated a birthday on Saturday and baked my favorite cake to commemorate- a buttermilk cake with lemon cream cheese frosting and blueberries.   Then on Sunday, because I enjoy celebrating food traditions, I prepared a traditional St. Patrick's Day feast.  Today I will share with you the recipes for both.

St. Patrick is the patron saint of Ireland and the holiday originally known as the Feast of St. Patrick was first celebrated by the Irish in Europe in the 9th century.  In the early 1600s, it became recognized as a holy day of obligation for Roman Catholics in Ireland and in 1903, it became an official public holiday in Ireland.  St. Patrick's Day falls during the Christian season of Lent and Irish families would traditionally attend church in the morning and celebrate in the afternoon. Lenten prohibitions against the consumption of meat and alcohol were waived and people would dance, drink and feast.  The traditional meal was Irish bacon and cabbage, but around the turn of the century, Irish immigrants living in New York City's Lower East Side substituted corned beef as a less expensive and more widely available option.  Thus, the American celebration of St. Patrick's Day typically consists of corned beef, cabbage, potatoes, and, of course, a pint or two of Guiness. 

I chose to make our Feast of St. Patrick in a pressure cooker that my Uncle Tom sent to me.  The pressure cooker is great for making one-pot meals, cooks dried beans in a snap (even without pre-soaking!), and doubles as an excellent rice cooker.  It is similar to a crock pot, except that instead of slow cooking foods, it cooks them quite rapidly to juicy, tender perfection.  I get a lot of use out of mine.  The handbook that came with my pressure cooker included a recipe for corned beef & cabbage, which I used as my framework for this meal.  No pressure cooker?  No problem.  You can make this same meal in a dutch oven or in a crock pot.  You will just need to adjust the cooking times accordingly.

Corned Beef & Cabbage with Potatoes & Carrots:

3 lbs Corned Beef Brisket
12 oz Guiness
1 med onion, halved
1 shallot, halved
3 whole cloves garlic
2 cups of water or beef stock
4 medium red potatoes, halved
1 large head of cabbage, cut into 8 wedges
1 cup carrots, peeled and halved
Whole grain Dijon mustard

Trim any excess fat from the corned beef and if the seasoning packet is separate, open it and rub the brisket with the seasonings.  The brisket I selected comes from Lou's Garrett Valley Naturals and came pre-seasoned in a brine made of water, sea salt, unrefined sugar, beet powder, garlic powder, bay leaves, mustard seed, and allspice.   Place the brisket in the pot, then add the beer, onion, shallot, garlic, and the water or stock.  Then, lock the pressure cooker lid, select the meat setting, and cook for 60 minutes.  Release the pressure, open the cooker, and add the potatoes, carrots, and cabbage.  The carrots I used came from Elmer Farm in East Middlebury, VT and the cabbage is from Blackwell Roots in Cabot, VT.  Re-lock the lid, select the vegetable function, and cook 10 minutes.  Serve with a bit of Dijon mustard for the meat.

And now, for the birthday cake!  I chose this cake because it is my absolute favorite.  The buttermilk cake is super moist and the tart lemon cream cheese frosting tastes so great with some of our blueberries that we grew and froze last summer.  In addition to using our own blueberries, I also used our eggs, cream cheese from Green Mountain Farms, buttermilk from Animal Farm and flour from Nitty Gritty Grain Co.   This cake is really easy to make and can be paired with lots of other fruit toppings depending on what's in season or stocked in your freezer.

Buttermilk Cake:

1 cup sugar
1/2 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 eggs, beaten
2 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 cup buttermilk
1 1/2 cup cake flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 3/4 tsp baking powder

Preheat oven to 350 Fahrenheit.  If using frozen fruit, remove it from the freezer and set aside to defrost.  Grease and flour a 9 inch round cake pan, unless you are using a silicone pan.  In a mixer with a paddle attachment, mix the softened butter and sugar until they are creamy.  Add the eggs, then the vanilla, then the buttermilk.  Stop the mixer and scrape the sides.  In a separate bowl, combine the flour, salt, and baking powder.  If you don't have cake flour, you can use all-purpose flour and substitute 2 Tbsp of it for 2 Tbsp of cornstarch.  Sift the flour mixture once or twice.  Turn the mixer on medium and add the flour mix in several batches until combined.  Pour the batter into your cake pan and bake 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.  Transfer the cake to a rack and allow it to cool before frosting.

Lemon Cream Cheese Frosting

8 oz cream cheese, softened
1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 Tbsp lemon juice
2 tsp lemon zest
1 tsp vanilla
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar

Mix all but the sugar in a mixer with the paddle attachment.  Blend well.  Sift the confectioners sugar and then add to the mixer in two batches.  Blend until smooth.  Spread over the cooled cake.

To prepare the blueberries, I defrosted them, then squeezed a little lemon juice on them and sprinkled them with a little bit of sugar.  Stir, then put a spoon full on top of each piece of cake as you serve it. 

What is a Co-op, anyway?

If you read my posts regularly, you may have noticed a few mentions of my local co-op.  And, if you're curious like I was when I first heard mention of a co-op, you may be wondering what exactly it means to be a part of one.  The United Nations named 2012 the year of the co-op and the latest issue of Yes! Magazine features a cover story about how cooperatives are driving the new economy.  Publications like the Business Insider and Triple Pundit also feature articles on cooperatives.  So what exactly are they and why are they so important?

Here is what I know of co-ops so far:  They can be small like the Middlebury Natural Foods Co-op where I work and shop.   Or they can be Fortune 500 companies, like Land O Lakes and Sunkist.  They can be credit unions, art galleries, insurance agencies, even sports teams (did you know that the Green Bay Packers are a co-op?!).  All together the 30,000 cooperatives in the United States make up a $500 billion dollar industry, employ more than 2 million people, and have around 130 million members.  More Americans have membership in a co-op than hold shares in the stock market.  Globally, there are a billion co-op members with more than $2 trillion in revenue.  If these enterprises were a nation, their economy would be the ninth largest on earth.   What they all have in common is the fundamental idea that co-ops, just like people, can get more done together than anyone can do alone.

Here are a handful of other things that all co-ops have in common:  they are owned by their members in equal shares; their ownership is democratic, meaning that the members elect a board of directors to shape the priorities and direction of the co-op and the members vote on issues pertinent to achieving those priorities; they build healthy local economies; and they exist to meet the needs of their members.  Yes! magazine cites some fascinating statistics from a study titled Healthy Foods, Healthy Communities which point out that for every $1000 spent at a local food co-op, $1606 in economic activity is generated in their local food economy.  That means that 17% more money stays in the community than if that same $1000 was spent at a conventional grocery store.  There are also more jobs created for every million in sales with food co-ops adding jobs at a rate of 9.3% per million and conventional grocers at 5.8%.  Food co-ops on average source 20% of their products from local vendors compared with 6% for conventional grocers.  This means more money going directly to small, local family farms who are then able to stay afloat in the sea of Big Ag and continue to nourish their communities.

The local farmers who supply food to the MNFC are featured in photos in the produce, cheese & dairy departments.

Original building of the Rochedale Society of Equitable Pioneers

The cooperative business model is not new.  The first modern, consumer-owned co-op began in the 1840's when a group of cotton and wool workers in the depressed industrial town of Rochdale, England, decided that they were tired of being cheated by dishonest shopkeepers who would use rigged scales to sell flour mixed with plaster, used tea leaves that were dried and passed off as new, and rancid butter disguised under a thin layer of fresh butter.  They banded together to form the Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers and sold quality foods at fair prices with any profits distributed back to the members based on their use of the store.  This is where cooperatives really stand out among their big-business peers:  they are profit-making, but not profit-driven.  They are driven, instead, by a desire to meet the needs of their members and the needs of their communities first and foremost.  And not just in the sense of economic health, but also in the areas of education and civic engagement.


The Middlebury Natural Foods Co-op was founded in the early 1970's by a group of families who wanted access to healthy, natural foods at reasonable prices.  They operated first as a buying club, purchasing items at wholesale price and in bulk scale, then meeting at a different members home each time to split up the order among the group.  The buying club grew, and began having surpluses after dividing the items.  They also needed more space for storage and packaging, so they purchased a small store front in the Middlebury train depot and scheduled volunteers to run the store.  The store continued to grow with pre-ordering and retail store functioning side-by-side, and eventually elected a board of directors in 1976.  Fast forward to 2013, and the store is now in a beautiful new building with 3600 members and 60 employees.  The focus remains on providing healthy, natural foods to members of the community (based on a voted-upon buying criteria); stimulating a vibrant local economy; operating under democratic, cooperative ownership; and operating with environmentally sustainable and energy efficient practices.

Additionally, the MNFC puts strong emphasis on community education by sponsoring classes on budget shopping, food preservation, cooking basics, and other topics in partnership with the Hannaford Career Center.  Last week, we co-hosted a GMO labeling forum with the Northeast Organic Farming Association at the local American Legion. We often give tours to middle and high school groups, senior groups, and  college students who are studying local food systems.  In a few weeks, I will give a tour to a group of young parents who are interested in learning how to shop for healthy foods on a tight budget.  I'm particularly enthusiastic about that upcoming tour because I love debunking the myth that shopping for healthy, whole foods needs to be expensive.  I also like to let community members know that you don't have to be a member of the co-op to shop there, but membership does come with a discount at the store and at other local business in town.  Plus, membership brings monthly member coupons, an informative and educational monthly member newsletter, and the opportunity to vote and have a voice on issues that matter to me as a co-op member.  Board meetings are open to all members and members are encouraged to attend and participate. 

Another thing I find really interesting and appealing about my co-op is their strong emphasis on local products.  Many of the small farmers and food producers still deliver their goods themselves, and it gives members and customers a chance to meet them and ask about their products, processes, challenges, and experiences as a small food producer.  There is something special about meeting the people who grow and make your food, and you begin to feel a distinct connection between their success as a farmer/producer and your role as a consumer.  You begin rooting for them to succeed because you see how hard they work and you like what they bring to your dinner table.

I also love the fact that my co-op donated over 7000 pounds of food to our local food shelf last year, we compost much of the food waste that can't be donated to the food shelf, and many of our farmers and producers reuse the cardboard boxes and other containers they ship and package food in.  Things like maple syrup buckets, honey buckets, nut butter buckets, egg cartons, and glass milk containers are reused over and over again.  Food co-ops in general recycle 81% of their plastics, compared with only 29% at conventional food stores.  Reusing and recycling means a lot less food and materials are going to waste.

Vermont Cheeses

The MNFC represents just one example of a co-op and how it can impact a community.  You may not have a food co-op in your area, but you may have a credit union, an artists cooperative, a farmers cooperative, or an insurance co-op.  You may also have the opportunity to purchase items from cooperatives at conventional stores.  Cabot Cheese, Florida's Natural Orange Juice, Blue Diamond nuts, Bob's Red Mill flours, Ocean Spray, and REI Outfitters are all cooperatives.  I hope that we can all embrace the idea of a business model that puts people before profits.  I hope after reading more about what makes a cooperative tick and what it means to the community to have a healthy, thriving co-op, that you might seek them out in your area and give their products and services a try.  They are the future of our economy, after all!