Day 22

Yesterday was hands-down the best eating day of the experiment.
For breakfast I had some Full Belly Farm wheat berries, soaked overnight, then cooked with diced apples (the Anna apples, an early ripening, mild weather apple are delicious) and stewed plums. Drizzled with honey.
Lunch was green tomatoes dredged in some flour and fried in duck fat (!) with a fried egg. Followed by a jar of stewed apricots.
Yes, I have a very regular BM these days.
For beverages, my new thing is lemonade with honey and mint.
In the afternoon, I biked over to my friend Jennifer’s house and grazed a bit in her garden. She has physalis, or Cape gooseberries (which are a great source of Vitamin C) and green beans and grapes. Then we walked around Berkeley and picked blackberries. In a two block radius of her house is a peach tree (with peaches on the GROUND), an asian pear, an enormous plum and pear tree, walnut trees, and tons of blackberry brambles.
We picked a bucket of berries and talked about how we grew up eating. Jennifer’s dad took them strawberry picking and canned or froze tons of their food. William came by and we used the car as a ladder to access a whole bag of Elephant heart plums. They’re green with red centers.
THEN we picked green walnuts to make nocino, or vin de noix, a walnut liquer. You know how green walnuts smell really good? This captures their essence, with the help of some 95 proof alcohol like vodka or everclear. I’ve only had it once, when this fella named Adam brought some to a party. It’s a digestive. We picked them a little late, in Italy, most people get the little green guys on June 24.
Finally, for dinner I made zucchini pancakes (shredded and drained then mixed with cilantro and mint and coriander and a wisp of flour) with a large green salad (which included a new ingredient: armenian cucumbers). For dessert? I got totally Little House on the Prarie and made a blackberry pie, with a crust made of duck fat mixed and chilled with Full Belly Farm wheat. Who knew? I won’t say the crust was light and flaky, but it sure was tasty.