Menu Planning for March 2014

Plan for March:

Plan Ahead for April:

Mardi Gras in March – When planning for colors for Mardi Gras, Rex, the King of Carnival, selected the Mardi Gras colors in 1892 and assigned meaning to them: Purple for justice, green for faith, and gold for power.

To start the month, Mardi Gras foods are a wonderful part of the culture and no Mardi Gras celebration is complete without a King Cake, also known as Twelfth Night Cake. This cake is actually sweetened yeast bread baked in a ring shape. The cake is frosted with gold, green, and purple icing. Although this cake is colorful and tasty, the real fun hides within the cake as the baker of each King Cake has hidden a special token inside. The token is a dried red bean or a figurine of a baby, representing the Christ child. When the cake is cut and shared, the finder of the hidden treasure is said to enjoy good luck for the coming year. The lucky recipient may also be expected to bake the King Cake or throw the Mardi Gras party for the following year!

Full-flavored field rhubarb and artichokes are beginning to arrive – fresh California asparagus becomes abundant, fiddlehead ferns start as the snow melts (I prefer the Eastern fiddleheads that are about a month behind in harvest – April) and miner’s lettuce pokes through in areas with high moisture and some sunshine. The first peas and baby carrots with a little butter and mint, the first of the torpedo onions, ramps and morels begin to creep into the marketplace. You can count on the following ingredients to fuel a strong spring menu: Carrots, Celeriac, most of the Chicories, Kales, Kohlrabi, Leeks, Nettles, Sweet Onions, Sugar Snap Peas, Radishes, Bloomsdale Spinach and Turnips Grapefruit, Kiwi, Kumquat, Meyer Lemons, Blood Oranges, Star Fruit and Strawberries.

Start phasing out Bergamot and Seville oranges, cocktail grapefruit, Buddha’s hand and Chanterelles as this is usually their last month. Other items that start waning this month are Brussels sprouts, Puntarelle, Cardone and Salsify.

Remember that the items in BOLD will prove to usually be better values as they are in their peak harvest or storage period.