FoodFash

FoodFash is a food and travel blog based in Austin, TX.

Patio Gardening With Harvest Organics

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This patio gardening post is sponsored by Harvest Organics in an effort to reduce waste and replenish the earth by creating gardening products that are better for plants, pets, people, and the planet!

When we moved into a new apartment with a patio last summer, I was determined to be a plant lady. I bought a couple planters, a couple plants, and learned a couple dozen lessons along the way. Fast forward to today and I have a bustling patio garden filled with herbs, vegetables, and flowers. Listed below are my six biggest tips for starting and maintaining a patio garden of your own.

  1. Shopping – Stick to the areas of the store that are most similar to where you’re going to be keeping your plants. Is your patio fairly shaded? Look for the section in the outdoor gardening department that has similar shade conditions. Does your patio get pounded with direct light? Look at the plants that the store keeps outside with no cover {typically by the entrance}.

2. Water – Watch your plants and understand the surface of your patio as well as the material of the planter. I couldn’t understand why my plant leaves looked so sad. After all, I was watering them per the instructions. What I failed to figure was that concrete reflects a lot of heat and clay planters leak a lot of water. If your plants look dry or wilted, listen to them and water more frequently.

3. Sun – Too much sun can be a bad thing {even for plants that require “full sun”}. If you’re watering your plants enough and they’re still getting crispy, get creative about ways to provide plants with relief. I keep my herbs behind a stone wall most of the time and let them hang out on the top of the wall on weekends when I can closely monitor. You can also place sensitive plants next to or behind a larger, leafier plant.

 

4. Soil – Use a good quality soil. You know that saying, “you are what you eat.”? Well that applies to plants, too {especially edible plants}! A good quality soil like Harvest Organics Potting Mix  provides your plants with a ton of nutrients to keep your plants thriving, Harvest is also the largest processor of yard and food waste in North America, Harvest manages to keep nearly 2,000,000 tons of waste from ending up in landfills.

 

5. Food – It’s so rewarding to grow your own food, especially your own organic food. I suggest starting with herbs {like basil, mint, and cilantro} and tomatoes as they’re super easy to keep alive. This year, I’ve added four varieties of peppers, okra, and eggplant. Even if the food plants don’t take off, they’re still a beautiful addition to your patio. In addition to being rewarding, growing your own food cuts down on direct waste {plastic tags, ties, stickers, and bags} and indirect waste {fuel for transporting food to the grocery store and for transporting you to the grocery store}.

#TheHarvestEffect is the idea that the food that you throw away today could become the dirt that you produce tomorrow; or can help power your community and by fueling your family with an everlasting cycle of goodness and renewal.

6. Design – With plants, it’s true that more is more. Flowers and plants look so stunning in a cluster. But it’s easy to spend a fortune on planters. I highly recommend spending money on a couple planters that you love and supplementing with terracotta planters. The non-terracotta planters below range from $12 to $40, while the terracotta planters range from $2 to $4. Terracotta planters are also safer for growing food since they are made from natural materials.

By using Harvest Organics products, consumers become part of the Harvest Effect TM, a movement to reduce waste and replenish the earth. Grow something amazing with Harvest Organics potting mix! Harvest provides educational tips/tools to encourage their consumers to live a cleaner and greener lives.

Don’t just garden – Harvest!

This patio gardening post is sponsored by Harvest Organics in an effort to reduce waste and replenish the earth.

Creating Quality Instagram Content – A Letter of Encouragement

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Let me be the millionth person to shout off the virtual rooftops about how much Instagram sucks right now! Reach and engagement are both down 90% of the time and the other 10% of time, when a post is successful, it’s unexplainable and unrepeatable. Posting a new picture on your gallery causes the most useless and preventable anxiety on the planet. Thoughts race: “Did I post at the right time?”, “Have I changed up my hashtags enough?”, “I should have posted another burger pic.”, “How is my burger pic not doing well?”. I can’t tell you how many times in the past few weeks I’ve said “I’ve never seen engagement this low before.”.  I don’t even love burgers that much.

How did I get here?  

Matcha ice cream waffle cone sandwiches from @asahiimports. 📸 @foodfash. Tag #eateratx for regrams.

A post shared by Eater Austin (@eateraustin) on

I’m in a constant state of reeling in out of control, social media-induced emotions. There’s a cool down period that’s followed by asking myself, “Why did I start FoodFash in the first place?”. And the answer to that is so simple. Before page views and new followers and email subscribers and likes were a thing…

 

I started a blog to CREATE.

I started a blog to get comfortable hanging out with my bad, bad self. I started a blog to pick up a camera and re-familiarize myself with the world of apertures and shutter speeds. I started a blog to document the life I wanted to live. I started a blog to become more comfortable in the kitchen and better able to nourish my body, a body that felt worn out and sick in my mid-20s.

I started a blog with the intention of giving, not getting. 

I haven’t yet come to terms with low engagement, but I assure you that coming to terms is in progress. For one, I’m posting less. I used to post on Instagram every day before 8am, which turned out to be a really sh*tty way to start the day. Lately, I post 3-ish times per week at whatever time of day I can afford an hour of comment moderation and engaging with other accounts.

In addition to posting less, I’m switching the focus back from getting to giving. I will…

Continue the commitment to create quality content.

There was a brief time when creating quality content was incentivized by the hopes of getting reposted by an account with a massive following. And while reposts by large accounts yield little to no new followers in 2017, they still serve a purpose for an account like mine, an account that currently has a large focus on highlighting local food businesses.

My account’s reach may be the type of low that gets me down these days, but creating repost worthy content gives businesses I love a greater chance at exponential exposure. For Austin locals, Eater Austin posts a ton of community generated content and they are rockstars at providing visible photo credit. And nationally, I’ve had luck with FoodBeast and food-specific Infatuation accounts (@icecream, @burger, @tacos, @pizza). The reposts embedded within this post have literally provided nothing other than a virtual pat on the back. But when I switch the focus back from getting to giving, reposts fulfill my original intention.

What was your original social media intention?

And because not all of my content is repost-able {I still have some home-cooked meals and sponsored content sprinkled about}, I’ve come up with a list to skim down when I’m frustrated. Because when I’m frustrated, it’s likely that I’ve lost sight of my original intention.

  • Use creating content as an opportunity to hone your skills. The more content you create, the better you’ll be at composition, styling, editing, etc. If you’re avoiding a certain style or technique, research tutorials or sign up for a class.
  • Engage with your local Instagram community in real life. There’s comfort and joy in surrounding yourself with like-minded creators.
  • Use low engagement as an excuse to explore content outside of your niche. If engagement is low regardless of what you post, the pressure of posting that burger pic is greatly reduced.
  • Don’t be a slave to content. If creating content or posting content results in more negative feelings than positive, take a break.
  • Create more blog content. You own your blog and you own your subscriber list. Also, remember how it felt to write this post, a post not intended for Instagram.
  • Avoid comparing yourself to others. People display the best parts of their lives on social media, but rarely show the sacrifices and struggles that made the best parts possible.

Find a way back to your original intention. 

Family Of Two – Make The Most of Costco Membership

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I grew up thinking that Costco memberships were for families with a gazillion kids. I’d tag along with friends on occasion to stock up on frozen fruit and coconut oil. I’d Venmo money to friends that made trips without me. After years of wheeling and dealing and for affordable, organic bulk fruit, I still couldn’t justify the $60/year membership cost {seems silly now}. What finally tipped me over the edge was moving in with my boyfriend and going through double the amount of frozen fruit. I needed the ability to purchase on my own time.

So $60 later and I’m able to purchase frozen fruit whenever I want. Even if the frozen fruit didn’t cost less than my regular grocery store {which it does}, it’s so much more convenient to purchase large bags. We make a version of this smoothie every morning and Costco prevents me from making three frozen fruit runs per week. Although the types of fruit rotate, there’s always a few types of organic bags to choose from.

Frozen fruit, toilet paper, and paper towels alone make the membership cost worth it. But I’ve also found a ton of new products that have become staples in my house, too. You have to be strategic with fresh produce because, unless you’re a family with a gazillion kids, a LOT can go to waste. Every trip, I buy organic broccoli, greens, and squash. We eat about as much broccoli and greens as we can handle and then freeze the rest of the broccoli for future dinners and the rest of the greens for future smoothies. And when you spiralize the squash, it’ll be eaten up in no time. This week, I supplemented with peppers and mushrooms. I know we’ll go through the mushrooms without a problem, but the peppers may be a challenge.

Prior to Costco, I was a meat snob. I would only buy meat and seafood at Whole Foods or Central Market. And while there are still types of meat that I’ll only buy at Whole Foods or Central Market {steak, chicken drums, pork, and non-salmon seafood}, I’ve found plenty of Costco meat to stock our freezer. After my Alaska trip, I’m so excited that Costco carries a few varieties of Alaska seafood. And I always keep frozen shrimp on hand because it thaws the quickest and eliminates a lot of excuses for going out to eat.

My coolest “find” to date is the 9-pack of Daily Greens. Cold pressed juice bottles run anywhere from $6 to $9 and this case is just over $2 per bottle. Purchasing this juice is also how I learned that each Costco carries a handful of local products. The coffee pictured above is also roasted in Austin, which I find pretty awesome!

I use the avocado oils pictured above to cook all of our meat, seafood, and veggies. I also purchased the spices I use all the time {Himalayan pink salt, pepper, garlic powder, crushed red pepper flakes} from Costco, purchasing the rest in the bulk department at Whole Foods or Central Market as-needed. The spaghetti sauce pictured above is pretty much my favorite {I have mini panic whenever I think this brand has been rotated out}. And I add a tablespoon of butter and cooked ground turkey to the sauce, which makes the perfect zoodle dinner.

 

As you can see, I’m a total Costco convert. And even though we’re only a house of two most of the time, I think this membership is totally worth it. We spent about $400 on our first trip in May because we stocked up all of the new house things. But it’s four months later and we still haven’t needed to refill toilet paper, paper towels, flushable wipes, or ziplok bags. Subsequent trips have run about $200 and we go every two to three weeks.

 

Mornings With Thomas Hammer Coffee

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Thank you Thomas Hammer coffee for sponsoring this post. 

COFFEE!! #amiright

The morning is my most productive time of day and there’s no doubt that is largely due to a warm cup of Joe. Even the smell of a fresh pot is enough to jump start my day. But that feeling when I cozy up to my computer, take a few sips of piping hot coffee, and begin to conquer my day is just something else.

I recently received a package of Thomas Hammer coffee beans and was instantly blown away by the scent of their Starry Night Sumatran whole beans. I knew I was going to love this bold mix with a hint of caramel {yum!}. And it’s the perfect inspiration to have by my side as I edit blog photos.

I was also pleasantly surprised that the Starry Night Sumatran blend is certified organic and fair-trade. I make a conscious effort to support companies that are passionate about people and the environment. And while, admittedly, my pantry is not perfect – I strive to fix the ratio of responsible products on the regular.

And to further increase my energy and productivity throughout the day, I have been experimenting with changing my morning routine. I used to drink coffee the moment I popped out of bed {thank you, coffee machine timer!}, but lately I’ve been drinking eight ounces of room temperature water first thing. And then I finish my entire breakfast before enjoying coffee. I’ve found that this helps maintain my energy level throughout the day versus an extreme jolt only in the AM.

What is your favorite way to enjoy coffee?

 Although I received compensation for this post, the opinions in this post are completely my own and based on my experience.