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Chicago’s Phyter Bar and Loyola’s Cinderella Run
The Loyola University of Chicago men’s basketball team is in the NCAA Tournament’s “Sweet Sixteen” for the second time since 2018, with a game against Oregon State scheduled for 1:40 p.m. central time on Saturday.
Although their dominant win over top-seeded Illinois last weekend was regarded as a big upset, the Ramblers are seen more as a legit contender than the Cinderella team they were in 2018 when they came out of nowhere to make the Final Four. Yet there is still a lot of charm around the team, from its blue-collar work ethic to the acumen of head coach Porter Moser — and especially the spiritual leadership and basketball sophistication of team chaplain Sister Jean Dolores Smith, an effervescent presence at age 101.
Rooting hard for Loyola is Gloria Athanis, owner and partner of Phyter Bars, a delicious fresh snack made from vegetables and fruit widely available in supermarket refrigerator cases. Thanks to Gloria’s generosity, Phyter got to join in Loyola’s wild 2018 Cinderella ride. She tells the tale:
I always had a soft spot for Loyola University. I was invited there annually to lecture on the topic of self-care to a group of female students… and my son went to Loyola Prep and Marquette University (you can see the Jesuit connection). My son also attended the Loyola University-run summer basketball camp when he was in grade school.
So I had lots of reasons to be excited in 2018 when the Men’s basketball team was bound for Dallas to play in the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 1985. Knowing that their budget was most likely nothing compared to other major college sports programs, I contacted Alex Sharon, Loyola’s Director of Sports Performance — that’s him in the above photo as the team prepared to head out for the tournament —and offered to donate our Phyter plant-based snack bars so the athletes (and Sister Jean!) would have a healthy road trip snack.
This was not our first acquaintance with college sports: Northwestern University, located just a few miles north of Loyola in suburban Evanston, has been stocking their athlete fueling station with our bars since 2017. Phyters are a great choice for athletes since they are packed with fresh veggies and fruit as the #1 ingredient and can be used as a quick energy boost before or after practice or a game.
We just wanted to do our part to support a team that got to the tourney through sheer grit and hard work, so we donated Phyters for all three of their trips, to Dallas, Atlanta and the Final Four city of San Antonio. We continue to stay connected to the Loyola Ramblers and we are super excited to cheer them and Sister Jean on as they make another strong bid to their 1st NCAA championship since 1963. As a local Chicago company, we felt really great about doing our part to support a locally grown Chicago college sports team like Loyola.
Due to the immense needs brought on by the COVID pandemic, our donations this year have shifted to our heroic frontline medical workers. Our mission at Phyter is to create delicious healthy plant-based foods, to impart our knowledge and passion about living a healthy lifestyle and share this passion with those in need. We’ve donated hundreds of bars in 2020 to workers at Swedish Hospital and Northwestern University Hospital, as well as to non-profits such as The Night Ministry, Above and Beyond Family Recovery, Boys Hope Girls Hope, and Top Box Foods.
What Is It and What Do You Do With It
This is an idea I’ve been kicking around for a while: take a fresh food product — whether a familiar or exotic variety — and give a little detail about what it is, what you do with it, and what its healthy eating values are. Let me know what you think as I’m apt to go wild with this once the farmers market season opens.
Parsnip
What is It? The parsnip is a root vegetable that looks something like a bleached carrot. According to FoodPrint’s Real Food Encyclopedia:
The stories are true – the parsnip does look an albino carrot, usually a shade of pale yellow, ivory or off-white. Contrary to popular belief, the parsnip is not a genetic mutation of the carrot, but the two are botanically related. The parsnip tends to have a thinner tip and typically is sold without its green tops, which can irritate the skin.
As sweet as the carrot is, the parsnip is even sweeter. In fact, a frost will intensify its sugar content and residual sweetness. Vegetable gardeners claim that the parsnip is one of the few root vegetables that happily stays underground to “winter over,” a nifty tip for those gardeners with limited indoor storage space.
The parsnips in the photo above are from Valley Farms in Michigan via Avrom Farm’s multi-producer e-commerce site. I jokingly call supersized vegetables “weaponized” (I’ve previously written about a four-and-a-half pound butternut squash I received from Imperfect Produce).
When you reach a certain age, you worry about the darnedest things, and I’ve had this concern for while that I’d get robbed and there would be a news headline that said, “Elderly Man Mugged.” So the thought has occurred that I should have a weaponized vegetable with me whenever I’m out late, because it would be awesome to turn that headline into “Elderly Man Fends Off Mugger With Giant Parsnip.”
What Do You With It? Like its carrot cousin, the parsnip is very versatile. I add chunks of them to my vegetable soups or puree them either solo or with other root vegetables. As with most vegetables (in my opinion), parsnips are delicious roasted, and they make a lovely alternative to mashed potatoes (see below). Unlike carrots, though, parsnips are pretty fibrous and most people find them challenging to eat raw.
The Good-For-You Factor: The parsnip is a great source for Vitamin C, is high in dietary fiber, has significant amounts of potassium, and non-negligible amounts of nutrients such as magnesium, Vitamin B-6, iron and calcium.
Those three parsnips made a big old pile of cubes.
Parsnips, Two Ways
One thing about recipes. I’m a mostly scratch cook these days and not very diligent about writing down instructions. If a prep needs exquisite TLC, I’ll be detailed. But when it’s a simple, season-to-taste kind of thing, like those below, I’ll provide the basics and you can let your imaginations run wild.
Roasted Parsnip “Fries”
The reference to fries is more about the shape than a simile to potato fries. Preheat your oven at 375. Slice the parsnips as you would a potato for steak fries. Give a light coating of oil (I use olive) and mix with salt, pepper and other seasonings to taste (this batch had onion powder, garlic powder and paprika). Bake for about 45 minutes, stirring and checking occasionally for doneness and to prevent burning.
Mashed Parsnips
Boil a large pot of water over high heat. Add cubed parsnips and continue boiling until the cubes soften (start checking after about 10 minutes). Drain, return to the pot, and mash vigorously until you reach the consistency you like. Add salt, pepper and whatever spices and herbs you like to taste. Add butter a couple of pats at a time and stir as it melts. I added a few splashes of buttermilk.
Normally we’d eat this as a side dish. But I had made a pretty awesome recipe for osso buco (an Italian beef shank stew) from NYT Cooking. The dish needed something substantial to sop up the gravy, and the parsnips turned out to be a perfect choice for the job.
Reminder: Logan Square’s Winter Finale is Sunday
This is it, folks: Logan Square Farmers Market is holding its last indoor market of the season this Sunday (March 28), 9 a.m.-3 p.m. at 3029 & 3031 N. Rockwell St. Logan Square is the only major farmers market operating in the immediate Chicago area this winter due to COVID social distancing restrictions.
Take a Quiz
Answer at end (no cheating):
Asparagus is the first major crop to hit the Chicago markets when they open in May. Chicagoans are spoiled by our proximity to the prolific asparagus fields in Michigan. Where does Michigan rank among the nation’s asparagus-producing states?
a) 1st
b) 4th
c) 9th
d) 13th
Answer: a) Take a bow, Michigan friends! For many years, Michigan ranked 2nd to California. But according to the Statista site, Michigan asparagus production has risen while it has declined in California (I have no idea why). As one who measures the arrival of the first asparagus as the true start of spring, I gaze across the lake and shout, “Bring it on!”
The COVID crisis delayed the opening of 2020's farmers markets until June, past peak asparagus season, but a pop-up by Michigan's Mick Klug Farm provided me with my asparagus fix.