The Business Education Partnership Committee is looking for gently used or new books to help fill the Kits for Kids.  These books get distributed to households throughout New Braunfels and Comal County to help assist in getting reading materials to young readers in households where they may not otherwise be available.

We are looking for books for readers ages 3 years to 9 years old with a beginning reading level.

Books can be dropped off at the New Braunfels Chamber of Commerce, 390 S Seguin Ave, New Braunfels, TX 78130.  If you have a large amount of books that need to be picked up that can be arranged as well by calling Rusty Brockman at 800-572-2626 or Chris Snider at 830-626-1123.

by Frances Marion Platt   –   HV1

Kathleen Perry of Rosendale’s Perry’s Pickles at Picklefest 2013. (photo by Lauren Thomas)

It may seem hard to believe, if you haven’t actually been the one doing all the work, that the Rosendale International Pickle Festival has been around for two decades now. It was founded by local garden center proprietor (and now town historian) Bill Brooks, his wife Cathy and their friend Eri Yamaguchi, who missed the traditional tsukemono of her homeland. What started out as a Japanese dinner party for 200 soon turned into a celebration of all things pickled that attracted about 1,000 people the first year, and by now, 5,000 or more annually. From the beginning, it has also been a fundraiser that benefits several different community projects in and around Rosendale each year.

The Pickle Festival returns to the Rosendale Recreation Center this Sunday, November 19 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. A highlight is always the county-fair-style competition for home-fermented concoctions, but it’s also a fun gathering for those more interested in tasting pickle products than in creating them. Of the 100 vendors setting up shop both inside the Rec Center and in and around the large tent outside, about a quarter will actually be selling pickled foods of myriad descriptions, including the legendary deep-fried pickles-on-a-stick. Other prepared foods to round out your meal, in addition to crafts and packaged gourmet products, will also be available for sale.

Repeat visitors know to expect live music and dancing from many ethnic traditions — as diverse as there are types of pickled foods around the world — for most of the day. Late in the afternoon, the Pickle Triathlon gets underway. It starts with a Pickle-Eating Contest, in which contestants vie to consume the entire contents of a small jar of Mount Olive Pickle Spears in the shortest period of time. Next comes a Pickle-Juice-Drinking Contest, where contestants are tasked with downing 24 ounces of brine through a straw. The final event, the Pickle-Tossing Contest, is a team effort: The pitcher tosses a pickle chip to the catcher, who must catch it in his or her mouth, then spurt it into the counter’s jar. Gold, Silver and Bronze awards are conferred upon the top three winners in each category.

The Brookses have been trying to retire gradually from their management of this event for about three years now, with the Rosendale Chamber of Commerce now the official Festival sponsor. But they’re still the ones to contact if you want to enter some of your own specialties into competition. Eligible categories in the Home Pickling Contest include Kimchi, Dill Pickles, Sweet Pickles, Pickled Onions/Garlic, Dilly Beans, Pickled Fruit, Pickled Beets, Pickled Veggies, Pickled Brussels Sprouts, Chutneys, Fermented Liquid or Semi-Liquid Products and

Miscellaneous. A Best of Show ribbon will also be awarded.

Competitors are limited to up to three submissions in any combination of categories, and are asked to submit two jars of the same item for each entry (one for display, one for the judges to sample). Each jar should be labeled with the nature of the contents plus the entrant’s name, address, phone number (including area code) and e-mail address. You can drop them off at the Rec Center by 11 a.m. on the day of the Festival (judging begins at noon), or arrange an appointment to drop them off earlier in the week by e-mailing picklelady16@yahoo.com.

Admission to the 20th annual Rosendale International Pickle Festival costs $5 per adult; kids get in free. Pets are not permitted on-site, and the event goes on rain or shine. The Rosendale Community Center is located at 1055 Route 32, just south of its intersection with Route 213. To find out more, visit http://rosendalechamber.org/pickle-festival or www.facebook.com/events/1056620817803091.

BY IMOGEN PULLAN   –   The Japan Times

Ole G. Mouritsen is interviewed at the Royal Society in London on Oct. 17. Mouritsen and chef Klavs Styrbaek cover the history, science and aesthetics of Japanese pickles in a new book. | KYODO

LONDON – A prominent Danish gastrophysicist has made a bold claim: He believes he can get children to not only eat broccoli but enjoy it too.

Having spent the last decade researching and writing on Japanese cuisine, professor Ole G. Mouritsen has turned his attention to tsukemono (Japanese pickles), and believes they are the key to getting children (and some adults) to embrace vegetables.

Tsukemono — vegetables, fruit or flowers that have been preserved in a pickling ingredient such as soy sauce, sake or vinegar — are a mainstay of the traditional Japanese meal. There are believed to be around 4,000 varieties in Japan.

Japan has one of the lowest obesity rates in the world. Mouritsen emphasizes that while tsukemono is neither the sole reason for this nor the sole answer to obesity issues in countries like the United States or Britain, “it is one of the suggestions from Japanese cuisine to make vegetables more interesting and more accessible.”

“I always get scolded when I say this, but there’s a reason why people have problems eating vegetables and that is because they’re not tasty enough,” said Mouritsen, a physicist who works on the science of gastronomy and cooking, a field known as gastrophysics.

At a recent event hosted by the Japan Foundation in London, Mouritsen talked about the science and history of tsukemono.

According to Mouritsen, pickling infuses vegetables with umami (a savory taste) and creates mouthfeel, both of which are generally accepted to be essential to the enjoyment of food.

An added bonus is that some preservatives like shio kōji — a seasoning made from salt and rice treated with mold spores — convert carbohydrates into sugar, making the vegetables sweeter, less bitter and much more acceptable to younger palates.

Individual vegetable consumption thus increases, making people’s diets healthier, Mouritsen suggests.

Mouritsen was first introduced to Japanese food by a colleague when living and working in Vancouver, British Columbia, as a visiting professor in the early 1980s. He was immediately captivated, and he has since visited Japan many times for research.

“What really intrigued me was eating at a counter. You can see the craft and the skills; there’s a deep respect for the raw ingredients and an understanding of flavor,” he said. “What a sushi chef would do, (present a piece of sushi) in his hand, put it in front of you — I think this is something very fundamental within human food culture.”

This interest has led him to write books on sushi, seaweed, umami and mouthfeel, and he was appointed a “goodwill ambassador” of Japanese cuisine by the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries in 2016.

A keen cook himself, Mouritsen says: “I never use a recipe. What I enjoy about cooking is that if you know a few basic things you can always make something that is delicious and is a good dish.”

His top tip for making tsukemono is to dry the vegetables destined for pickling until they look tired and boring. They will then absorb water and flavor during the marinating process, resulting in a delicious, crunchy taste.

“You just take whatever vegetables you like and cut them in small pieces — broccoli, radish, cabbage — put them in a plastic bag, add a teaspoon of shio kōji, shake it, put it in the fridge, and then just after an hour it’s already changed,” he said. “Sometimes you may want to keep it there for the next day or two days later, and it gets more and more flavorful.”

Mouritsen’s latest book, co-authored with chef Klavs Styrbaek, is about the science and history of tsukemono, as well as its aesthetics and production techniques. The book, titled “Tsukemono,” is currently only available in Danish but is being translated into English for release at a later date.