Worth it?

With so many different foods available today - not just at the grocery, but at the farmers markets, warehouse stores, specialty food stores and on-line - one of the difficulties when selecting from our enormous marketplace is figuring out when something is worth a high price. This week, I'd like to share three of foods that I believe are actually worth the extra cost and time it takes to procure them.

I've been hungry for fresh raspberries for weeks, but have been too frugal to actually put them in my cart. So imagine my surprise when I found a 9 ounce container of organic raspberries for $5.99 while shopping today! I haven't bought organic raspberries before, but there must have been a late-season crop or I stumbled on a really good sale, so I quickly snapped them up. I was even more surprised an hour later to find the same size carton of conventional (not organic) raspberries for sale at another store for a mere $3.99, and at this very moment, I have over 1-1/2 pounds of raspberries in my refrigerator. Given the short life of a raspberry, it's a good thing that my daughter and I are both crazy for them - but the bounty also presented the opportunity for a taste-test. When we ate them side-by-side, we found that the organic was sweeter, more tender and had a much more intense and complex flavor although of course both were very good. Note that organic raspberries, like many organics, have a shorter shelf-life than their conventional counterparts - usually only a day or two. Raspberries are best served without much preparation; two of my favorite ways to have them are with greek yogurt, homemade granola and jam (granola recipe here) or with my simple-to-prepare chocolate mousse (recipe here). My third favorite way to eat them is from the box on the way home from the farmstand or grocery store. 

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Several years ago, while shopping for 9 pumpkins the day after Halloween (don't ask...), I stumbled on an end-of-season farmstand sale on butternut squash and bought 10 of them. They keep very well in a cool dry place, so I tucked them under my heating oil tank for the winter, cooking them over a period of 6 months. Although I always enjoy butternut squash from the grocery, I was shocked at how much better these special squash tasted than their grocery-store counterparts. When I got down to the last three, I determined that they must be hoarded for special occasions. I would not cook them for just anyone, a guest or event had to be "squash worthy" for me to put my special squash on the menu. If you happen on farmstand butternut squash while shopping for your Halloween pumpkins, buy one and try my butternut sage squash soup recipe here.

About 5 years ago, a friend had a terrible accident (from which she has now thankfully recovered), and I took dinner over one night during her recovery. I knew that the family typically ate organic chicken, so I bought some and prepared the organic and conventional chicken with the same recipe and taste-tested both. I found that while the organic costs about twice as much, it is at least twice as flavorful and tender. Bell and Evans is a nationally-distributed brand of organic chicken and it comes tightly sealed with a shelf life of at least three weeks so you don't have to freeze it (which degrades the flavor). I love grilled chicken with peanut sauce both as an appetizer and for a family meal served over pasta. My recipe for grilled chicken is here, and the recipe for the peanut sauce - which is a little more involved than the typical You Can Cook recipe, but extremely delicious - is here.

Life is short and we are busy..but if you do find yourself near a farmstand or in the organic section of your local grocery, pick up some special raspberries, squash or chicken. No matter how you prepare them, you will not regret your purchase!

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