PNW Veg Party with the People
When my husband Russ and I were packing up our place in the “other” Washington in 2008, our friends Tai and Daphne, who run an equally groovy home design/housewares shop in D.C., had one thing to say: “You have to meet the Smershes.”
We dutifully heeded our friends’ advice and promptly tracked down these Smersh people in their first location in the Admiral district (aka “Click Classic”) .
Nine years later, Frances and John remain part of our West Seattle family. They’ve hosted me many times at the store for my first and second cookbooks – and next week, helping me to celebrate my newest book baby, PNW Veg.
The common thread among all my cookbooks is that they’re vegetarian – but I’m not. The eat-less-meat-ness train that Russ and I embarked on shortly after arriving in Seattle remains a constant. We still eat meat, but much less of it, and we buy from farmers who can tell us about how the animal was raised.
PNW Veg is my edible love letter to the Pacific Northwest. This region – which spans east to Idaho, north to Vancouver and south to the Oregon- California border – is home to many climates, which translates into an incredibly rich and diverse land of plenty. The variety of produce – and the long growing season – is second to California. In the book, you’ll get to know fiddlehead ferns, sunchokes, huckleberries, and artichokes (which grow really well along the Oregon coast), to name a few. You’ll get a chance to play with lentils, chickpeas, mayocobas and other PNW-friendly legumes.
The book is a PNW affair – it’s published by Seattle-based Sasquatch Books, and the luscious photographs shot by Seattle shutterbug Charity Burggraaf. To celebrate PNW Veg’s first week out in the world, Click and I are hosting a shindig – and you are invited! Join us Thursday, May 11, 6:30-9 p.m. – there will be signed copies for purchase and lots of nibbles from the book.
Hope to see you there!
Peace, love + lentils,
Kim O’Donnel
P.S. Can’t make it on the 11th ? Click! is selling signed copies online.
