Growing fruits and vegetables in your Sacramento garden? Here’s where you can find free recipes
Growing fruit and vegetables isn’t always easy. Figuring out what to do with them should be.
Local blog Sacramento Digs Gardening just published the first in a series of free digital cookbooks designed to help area residents cook what they (or their neighbors) grow.
“Taste Spring!” features more than 60 recipes tested by Sacramento Digs Gardening co-owners Debbie Arrington and Kathy Morrison, from appetizers and sauces to drinks and desserts. The e-cookbook is available here.
Arrington and Morrison founded Sacramento Digs Gardening on June 1, 2018, and haven’t missed a day of posting articles with advice, events and recipes in the nearly five years since. The site publishes a new recipe each Sunday, some of which were compiled into “Taste Spring!”
Each recipe is based on what’s currently growing in Arrington’ and Morrison’s home gardens, or what they find at local farmers markets that week. When a wet winter delays the start of Northern California’s cherry season, as is currently happening, the authors instead come up with recipes for strawberry-walnut bread or roasted radishes.
“We have fun with food, and food should be fun,” Arrington said. “A lot of people get into gardening because they want to grow their own food, but when you have a bountiful harvest, you’re faced with ‘well, what do I do now?’ ”
Most recipes are created by Arrington, a former gardening and food writer and editor at The Sacramento Bee, and Morrison, who was once a copy editor at the newspaper. She’s also a Master Gardener, while Arrington co-founded Les Dammes D’Escoffier’s Sacramento chapter.
A few other recipes are pilfered from outside sources. Take “baked asparagus à la Sacramento,” originally printed in Sunset Magazine in 1935. Steamed stalks are layered with hard-boiled eggs, a cream sauce, breadcrumbs and Parmesan cheese, then baked together to form a sort of asparagus au gratin.
Sacramento Digs Gardening plans to publish free digital cookbooks for each season, and eventually charge for annual compilations of that year’s Sunday recipes. Donations are also accepted for the free e-books.
What I’m Eating
Sacramento had a short cold spell last weekend before ramping up to the 90-degree (and beyond) temperatures of summer. It felt like a vanishing opportunity to find cozy comfort in Vietnamese noodle soups.
That usually means heading down Stockton Boulevard, and Tây Giang Restaurant is technically on that main thoroughfare. But Dai Chi Luu’s eatery is by Cosumnes River College near the Elk Grove border, far south of the phở shops lining Sacramento’s Little Saigon neighborhood.
Bún nước lèo ($14), a rice vermicelli soup with melt-in-your-mouth catfish and crispy roast pork belly (thịt heo quay) pieces, satisfied my cravings. Don’t be scared off by the anchovy-lemongrass broth: The fishy paste adds umami rather than compromising the lemongrass flavor.
I’ll be back for a refreshing tofu salad called gỏi đậu hũ ($13) when the summer heat hits. Cabbage, carrots and onions in a lime-based dressing formed the backdrop for crispy garlic slivers, surprisingly flavorful grape tomatoes and fluffy tofu chunks hidden beneath a fried exterior.
I blanked on ordering Tây Giang’s famous bánh hỏi cá bông lau nướng ($50-$60 depending on size), an entire grilled and butterflied catfish served with rice papers, veggies and noodles to create DIY spring rolls. But five-spice chicken rolls called bánh hỏi gà nướng ($15) were nearly as tasty, and so aromatic that even my pescatarian friend cheated on her diet.
Tây Giang Restaurant
Address: 7321 W. Stockton Blvd., Suite 100, Sacramento.
Hours: 5-9 p.m. Wednesday-Monday, closed Tuesday.
Phone number: (916) 688-8223
Website: https://www.instagram.com/taygiangrestaurant
Drinks: Bottles and cans of beer, wine and soda.
Animal-free options: Several, with a vegetarian menu section. Make sure your dish doesn’t include fish sauce.
Noise level: Pretty quiet.
Openings & Closings
The Nook Wine Bar & Bistro debuted on May 3 at 3610 McKinley Blvd., formerly home to Célestin’s Restaurant in East Sacramento. Joe Holmberg’s restaurant and bar specializes in Spanish wines, with tapas such as papas bravas or tinned wild cod in olive oil to accompany them.
Carter Gray opened Granite Bay Brewing on April 30 at 8601 Auburn Folsom Road in Granite Bay Village shopping center. There’s no kitchen, but outside food is welcome and outside food trucks typically bring other options.
Out of Bounds Brewing shut down its Rocklin brewery and taproom on May 6, with Zach Frasher (formerly of Slice Beer Co. in Lincoln) and Amy Heller (Arrow Lodge Brewing in the San Gabriel Valley) planning to eventually open Shred Beer Co. in its place. Out of Bounds’ restaurant and bar in Folsom remains open.
