Iowa City’s Wilson’s Orchard just added hard cider to their list of apple offerings — “Goldmine.” I found a bottle of it at the Co-Op (it’s also available at John’s Grocery) a few weeks ago and I’ve been enjoying it ever since. Wilson’s debut hard cider is named “Goldmine.” Out of the bottle, the cider […]
Tim Taranto
Tim Taranto is a writer and artist from New York. He is a graduate of Cornell University and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. He advocates taking ones bloated nothingness out of the path of the divine circuits.
Posted inFood & Drink
Black Magic: DIY walnut bitters for an adventurous cocktail
I was on a run in Northside when I tripped on what looked like a green golf ball on the sidewalk. It wasn’t a golf ball; it was an unhulled black walnut (Juglans nigra), and the sidewalk and street were littered with them. I’d heard tell of harvesting black walnuts for their distinctively rich nut […]
Posted inFood & Drink
LV Recommends: The Drunken Gardener—a vegan cocktail for the autumnal equinox
Restrictions can breed creativity. At the Trumpet Blossom Café, the challenge of producing vegan cocktails while utilizing local and sustainable ingredients has yielded some exciting results, the latest example being my new favorite fall cocktail: The Drunken Gardener. The drink features cherry tomatoes muddled with sea salt, dry gin (I asked for Tanqueray), Dolin Blanc […]
Posted inUncategorized
Sumac Tea? Yes, please!
No doubt you’ve noticed those funky bushes bearing fuzzy red tufts along the Cedar or Iowa rivers. Those botanicals are staghorn sumacs (Rhus typhina), and they can make a delicious late-summer drink that the First Peoples have been brewing for hundreds of years. (Think hibiscus-tea-meets-pink-lemonade!) A good friend taught me how to harvest and brew […]
Posted inCommunity/News, Food & Drink
Ride, eat, repeat: The culinary ride returns
5th Annual IC Culinary Ride New Pioneer Co-op — Sunday, Sep. 20 at 8 a.m. This Sunday I’ll be wearing bike shorts all day, eating honest food, drinking local brews and peddling down bucolic Iowa roads. Why? Because it’s the 5th Annual Iowa City Culinary Ride. The Iowa City Culinary ride brings together cyclists, local […]
Posted inCommunity/News
Political Cartoon: ‘Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner?’
Mere hours before the Iowa Board of Regents selected J. Bruce Harreld as the University of Iowa’s next president, a survey conducted by the UI chapter of the American Association of University Professors found that only 1.8 percent of faculty and 2.6 percent of other respondents answered in the affirmative when asked if the candidate […]
Posted inFood & Drink
Forest gold: Find chanterelles while avoiding their poisonous look-alikes
I was selling mushrooms at a farmers market in Upstate New York last summer when this happened: “Forest gold!” said a self-proclaimed “old hippy” as he grabbed a few golden chanterelles off my table. “I used to do all the purchasing for a famous restaurant in San Francisco,” he said, “I won’t tell you which […]
Posted inFood & Drink
Bramble on: Foraging for blackcaps, blackberries, and raspberries
Hundreds of species make up the genus of common shrubs known as brambles. No doubt you’ve been pricked by one of these thorny vines or bushes while ambling …
Posted inDining Recommendations, Food & Drink
Interview: David the Custard King shares his recipe for the sweet life
As Fro-Yo shops and other health-conscious confectioners pop up around the Midwest, one man is bent on producing a homestyle custard that boasts twice…
Posted inFood & Drink
New Oyster Cult: Mushroom foraging in the IC area
Early each spring, on sunny days when the oak leaves are still as small as squirrel ears, the “cult of the morel” emerges: Iowans, poking around south-facing slopes for the prized mushrooms. But morel hunting can prove frustrating. A day’s hunt may yield only a handful of undersized mushrooms, and prices for morels can exceed […]
Posted inArts & Entertainment
The godfather of Saturday morning: A conversation with cartoonist Ron Campbell
On a misty muggy day in Iowa City, Ron Campbell, creator of the Beatles Saturday Morning Cartoon series and the film Yellow Submarine, spoke with Little Village …
