Living Lightly and Gyros!

We were back up to speed, event-wise this weekend, at the store. It was a gorgeous weekend, but we had a nice group for both our discussion on Living Lightly and the cooking class on Gyros and Kebabs.

Maribeth Miller,the organizer behind Green Phoenix (a group dedicated to sustainable living) led the talk. She had a clever way to inspire the discussion: she brought a basket filled with physical reminders of topics--a drainpipe to represent a rain barrel, empty spray bottles to suggest "green" cleaning methods, newspaper as a weed barrier replacement. It got people talking, and sharing, and was a nice solution to the "how to not read off an outline" problem. I am bound and determined to get a rain barrel--or two--this year.

(I hear the Rock County Extension is selling reconditioned barrels sometime in April. Extension agent, Mike Maddox, is talking about compost at the store Monday nite--5:00pm, free--and I will get the details.)

An hour later, we cleared the lunch counter and set up for "Street Food Comes Inside: Gyros!." This was supposed to be our resident sheep-farmer Rich's class, but Jackie (the other resident sheep farmer) and Chad (the resident cook) took over while Rich nursed a back injury. Jackie shared her recent attempted to recreate Gas Station Nachos--but local/organically...the end-result was a delicious mess of Frito Pie (in a bag). We sample Samuel Smith's Organic Cider (alcoholic), which was a lovely pairing, albeit a bit classy for eating out of a foil bag.

Then we drained yogurt, peeled cucumbers, mixed tzatziki sauce, and threaded skewers. The theme was quick-n-easy Meditteranean, and it was. The leg of lamb roast has been started earlier, so we were ready to eat as soon as the demo model had been slipped in the oven. Lots of napkins were used, as this too was bit messy (street food equals portable, but sloppy, I guess). But it was really good, and we barely had room for the kebabs once we polished off the gyros--and I mean polished, I only barely scraped up enough meat from the pan for my pita after everyone else got theirs. Guests first!