Voracious Tasting & Food Awards

UPDATE: We have a winner! Stinging Nettle Spanikopita. This is a recipe I've been meaning to try for a while and the author provided a detailed, if slightly improvised, recipe. I'll post it in the future. Lots of other great ideas, including Nettle Raita, Nettle Larb, and Korean-style Nettle Salad. Thanks everyone for playing!


The Seattle Weekly's 6th annual Voracious Tasting & Food Awards will be held on April 23 at the Paramount Theatre in downtown Seattle. I've been to a few of these in the past and can say without reservation it's a chowhound's night.

Presented by the Washington State Beef Commission, doors open at 7:30 p.m. (6 p.m. for VIP ticket holders) with bites and booze from scores of Seattle's favorite chefs and mixologists.

The nice folks at Voracious food blog have given me a pair of tickets to give away. Since this event has become a regular spring fling, let's celebrate the season. Comment below with your favorite recipe for stinging nettles. I'll choose a winner based on my own very subjective taste (bonus points for a nettles recipe I want to make myself).

Wild Greens Workshop

It's that time again for those of us on the West Coast. The woods and meadows are waking up. Wild greens—tasty, nutritious, free—decorate the woods and forest fringes.

To ring in the spring harvest, I'll be teaching a foraging and cooking workshop at Heyday Farm on Bainbridge Island on March 27, with a focus on wild spring greens, especially stinging nettles. As I've said here before, nettles are the backbone of my spring foraging. I use nettles in soups, pastas, and sauces, and I put up large quantities of nettle pesto to have on hand year-round.

At Heyday, we'll spend the morning foraging in the woods around the farm, learning about and harvesting what’s in season. Back at the historic Heyday Farm kitchen and farmhouse, we'll learn several ways to pair and prepare our catch. The class will include a satisfying lunch. Cost is $110. Please sign up through Bainbridge Island Parks and Recreation, or by calling (206) 842-2306.