Tomasz Baranski, the head chef at Andina and its sister restaurant Ceviche, was kind enough to show me a couple of the great dishes they are preparing with Quinola. They have an affordable and mixed selection of ceviches, street food starters and mains, all inspired Peruvian gastronomy. They even do a filling quinoa based porridge for breakfast. First up where some delightfully succulent and crispy quinoa croquettes. These are deep fried balls of pearl quinoa and parmesan cheese with eggs used to bind the lot. These were served with rocoto chilli jam, that added exactly the right balance of sweetness...

It is well known that sugar pervades almost all pre-processed foods these days. Free sugars, or sugar that is not a natural part of an ingredient such as fruit, contain significant amounts of energy but have almost no nutritional value. The body’s feedback mechanism, developed for a world of food scarcity, is not well adapted to letting us know that we are consuming too much sugar- instead sugar gives our body a very strong ‘this is a good thing’ message. This is why industrial processed food is laced with sugar, from bread to pasta sauces. A simple trick of the...

Ok, this is not about a farmer. But thought you might be interested in the many uses that cow pats are put to, other than a natural fertilizer. Here you see a  stock of cow pats to use as fuel in the kitchen when cooking. They burn well and it avoids having to buy wood. They are left to dry out in sun before being used as fuel. Handy for baking potatoes in makeshifts ovens by the sides of fields, for a hearty lunch break that avoids heading back home. Potatoes and cheese go down a treat after a long...

Being fundamentally convinced about the organic movement, and the insanity of much in modern agriculture (do you remember those butter mountains and wine lakes of the 1980s?), I found an article written on http://www.theletterfromamerica.org/ fascinating. This highlights to me that despite the potential for GM crops to improve drought resistance etc all the efforts have been focused on resistance to massively toxic chemical and the sale of hectolitres of pesticides and herbicides that are working their way into our food web. For those without the time to read the entire article here are the salient points: Since GM crops were introduced into...