Just as I was lamenting the many long months until my next summer-harvest canning spree, my dad’s lime trees start exploding with more fruit that seems reasonable. Yes! Winter canning commences. In SoCal, we get just magnificent displays on our citrus trees, so now’s the time to dive in and start preserving the lemons, limes and grapefruits, however you can. Try your hand at lemon curd–or lime curd, which is essentially lime pie in a jar–or limoncello, which might also be delicious  made with grapefruit? Try it and send me some. Or, go traditional and make enough marmalade to put Paddington on a bender. I made mine with ginger and my dad’s limes, with just enough sugar to set the gel, but it’s still tart as can be. Delicious on a crumpet, but also works well as a glaze for chicken or fish. It’s good to be canning again. Next up: pickled beets!

I don’t have a specific recipe for the marmalade, since I’m partial to the “throw it in a pot and see” school of canning. But here’s what I did: Read on… »

True story: Yesterday I’m rushing home to have lunch before an appointment, and as I approach my front door I see a nattily-attired gentleman rooting around under our lemon tree. Neighbors are constantly raiding our Meyer lemons, so I approach the man, irritated.

“Excuse me, what are you doing?”

The man jumps up, alarmed, and I see that he’s holding a big bouquet of purple and green sourgrass, both flowering wood sorrels that grow (as weeds) all over our neighborhood.

“What do you have there?” I ask.

“Just these. They’re for my restaurant!”

I look at him skeptically, “What, for the tables?”

“No,” he says, “for the plates.”

This guy knows his edible weeds.

“What’s your restaurant?” I ask.

“Mélisse!” he answers, gesturing to the celebrated, two-Michelin-starred palace of haute cuisine two doors down (and yet a world away…) Yes, indeed, this man in my flowerbed, in his Persols and cashmere scarf, was celebu-chef Josiah Citrin!

I start to chuckle, imagining our humble sourgrass adorning the oversized white plates of one of Los Angeles’s poshest restaurants. “Ok,” I say. “Just ring the doorbell next time, or you’ll freak us out.”

“I don’t want to freak anyone out!” says Citrin, scurrying quickly away, still a bit alarmed. “Thank you!”

For some reason, I didn’t demand free food in exchange for our coveted weeds. But I definitely have a new respect for the chef, for his daring, his knowledge of edible plants (though I’m 99% sure he thinks he’s picking the very edible Oxalis stricta rather than our sort-of-edible Oxalis pes-caprae) and his obvious devotion to locally sourced ingredients!

I have been waiting for some clever charlie to figure this out. Single-cup brewers have been an environmental nightmare, what with roughly 5 billion of those damned “coffee pods” ending up in landfills in 2011. The pods are neither recyclable nor compostable, but now, finally, there is a reusable option for Keurig machines. Fill the pod your own grounds, to your desired strength, and brew away one cup at a time, if that’s your thing.

Ekobrew Reusable Filter for Keurig Single Cup Brewers.

Industry publication Restaurant News offers 20 menu trends for 2012, as predicted by chefs. With the emphasis on local sourcing and healthy options, it all seems like good news for diners…but…one thing: What on earth is a “non-traditional fish”?

Chefs predict top menu trends for 2012 | Nation’s Restaurant News.