Fun Custom Cereal Giveaway

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"Food Gal's Favorite'' -- my custom blended cereal mix.

Except for some crunchy granola scattered over my bowl of yogurt, I’m not the world’s biggest cereal eater.

But Me & Goji just might make me one.

The New Hampshire custom, artisanal cereal company lets you design your own blend of cereal. We’re not talking Rice Krispies mixed with Special K and Cocoa Puffs. Instead, you can choose from more than 60 all-natural ingredients, including 5-grain muesli, “samurai wheat” bite-sized shredded wheat cubes, barley flakes, acai powder, goji berries, chia seeds, pine nuts, dried strawberries and sesame seeds.

You can name your cereal and upload a photo to decorate the resealable, recyclable, heavy-duty tube it comes in.

The company was started a couple years ago by two active, sporty guys — Alexander Renzi and Adam Sirois — who graduated from Northwestern University, where they played soccer together and longed for healthier food options to recharge with.

Recently, they offered me a chance to design my own cereal on the house.

Your cereal arrives in a resealable, recyclable capsule.

The name I gave my cereal.

I blended a mix of the “flax and flaked” (a blend of corn flakes, amaranth seeds, flax seeds, and sesame seeds) with granola, whole almonds, walnuts, sesame seeds and mulberries. And I named it, “Food Gal’s Favorite.” But of course!

I love this cereal. It is crunchy, nutty, full of varied textures and a far cry from the almost candy-like cereals on store shelves. It tastes fresh, healthful and delightful.

According to the nutritional info on the back of the tube, my cereal mix weighs in at 161 calories per half cup (a lot less than most granolas I eat), with 7.5g total fat, 75mg potassium, 4.8g protein, 3.5g sugar, and 9 percent of the daily requirement of iron.

My mix would have cost $13.90, plus $3.99 for shipping and 99 cents for the tube, which contains about 10 cups of cereal.

There’s also a handy “recipe ID” number printed on the back of the tube, so if I want to re-order the same blend, I just enter that number on the Web site and it’s automatically added to my cart for check-out.

Contest: I’m thrilled to be able to give one lucky Food Gal reader a chance to try their own custom cereal blend for free.

Entries, limited to those in the continental United States, will be accepted through midnight PST March 26. Winner will be announced March 28.

How to win?

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Jack & Jason Went to the Kitchen to Make Pancakes

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Fluffy, hearty pancakes from Jack & Jason mixes.

I’m not sure the world needs another pancake/waffle mix. But San Francisco entrepreneurs Jack Harper and Jason Jervis are betting you’ll find theirs irresistible.

Their Jack & Jason’s Pancake & Waffle Mixes, which come in five flavors, are made with unenriched whole wheat flour, oatmeal and real fruit. Choose from: Original, Blueberry, Double Chocolate, Banana-Walnut and Pumpkin-Spice.

I had a chance to try the Banana-Walnut. You still have to add your own butter, egg and milk to the mix. A nice option is the directions included for making a low-cholesterol version with canola oil, egg whites and skim milk.

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All Spice Is All Charm

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Ahi tuna atop pickled watermelon at All Spice.

In a seemingly incongruous locale tucked back from busy El Camino Real in San Mateo sits a quaint 1906 Victorian house, where dynamic, modern Indian fare is now being created.

All Spice, which opened in November, is the latest venture by Chef Sachin Chopra, formerly of Sakoon in Mountain View, Mantra in Palo Alto, Amber India in San Jose, and Daniel in New York. It’s also the first time Chopra has partnered with his wife, Shoshana Wolff, in a restaurant venture.

Recently, I was invited to be a guest of the restaurant, which is a warren of small rooms that lend a feeling of warmth and intimacy.

Wolff greets you at the door with a cheery welcome. With a masters in Viticulture and Enology from the University of California at Davis, Wolff also is a wine-maker, growing her own grapes at her family’s vineyard in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Her Wolff & Father Wines, which she hopes to pour at the restaurant in the near future, will focus on Merlot and Zinfandel. At first thought, you might think those substantial reds jarring with Indian cuisine, but Wolff assures that they go exceedingly well with her husband’s style of cooking, which is boldly flavored but not at all searing in heat.

When I visited, the restaurant was still awaiting its wine and beer license, but offering a small, but well-crafted list of non-alcoholic beverages. I enjoyed a rosemary-infused pink grapefruit punch so much that I can’t wait to try making it at home.

Lentil-battered potato fritters show up as an amuse bouche.

After we were seated, our convivial server brought an amuse of lentil-battered potatoes with Indian-style aioli. The potato fritters were crisp on the outside, creamy within, and with bits of salty, porky bacon hidden inside.

Indian-style chicken wings with fall-off-the-bone tenderness.

My husband started with the star anise and fennel confit chicken wings ($9), a generous portion that is probably best shared. Fragrant with lemongrass and yuzu, as well as a red chili sauce, the wings weren’t crisp-fried like the Buffalo-version. Instead, the wings were braised until the meat was pull-away tender. It’s a messy dish, but one you’ll be happy to dig into.

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Lemon Lasagna

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Sausage, Swiss chard and slivers of lemon make this lasagna unforgettable.

Can you stand just one more lemon recipe?

After all, you know your friends are still foisting their backyard lemons on you or you’re still picking ripe ones off your own tree.

So, dedicate one of those lemons to this fabulous dish: “Sausage, Chard and Lemon Lasagna.” It’s from the March 2011 issue of Martha Stewart Living magazine.

It’s a very rich dish. I won’t kid you about that, what with the creamy, cheesy white sauce made with full-fat milk that binds everything together. The lemon gets sliced very thin. As you layer the no-bake lasagna noodles, sausage, and Swiss chard-white sauce mixture, you also add a layer of lemon slices, which have been blanched ahead of time to remove some of their bitterness.

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Healthful Pizza, Ruth Reichl Visit, Chef Demo & More

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The Mexican pizza at ZPizza in San Francisco. (Photo courtesy of the restaurant)

Organic Wheat Flour Pizzas in San Francisco

Laguna Beach, Calif.-based ZPizza, which has more than 90 locations nationwide, now has a locale in San Francisco at 833 Mission St., Suite C (at Fourth Street).

The pizza dough is made from certified organic wheat flour, the sauces are prepared fresh daily, and the cheese is part-skim, rBGH-free mozzarella from grass-fed cows. Gluten-free crust and vegan cheese also are offered. Gourmet ingredients include cremini and shiitake mushrooms, as well as truffle oil and the African hot sauce known as pili pili. For delivery, the pizzas are ferried via bicycles to reduce carbon emissions. Gourmet salads, pastas and sandwiches round out the menu.

Pizza choices include the Thai, with peanut sauce, mozzarella, spicy chicken, cilantro, bean sprouts and serranos; the Mexican with housemade salsa, mozzarella, spicy lime chicken, green onions, avocado, sour cream and cilantro; and the Casablanca, with roasted garlic sauce, mozzarella, ricotta, mushrooms, artichoke hearts and parmesan. Pizzas are $10.95 for a small, $19.95 for a large, and $24.94 for an extra-large.

The one and only Ruth Reichl. (Photo by Fiona Aboud)

Ruth Reichl at Stanford University

Join former Gourmet magazine Editor-in-Chief Ruth Reichl at a free event at the Cubberley Auditorium on the Stanford University Campus in Palo Alto at 6 p.m. March 29.

Reichl, now an editor and author at Random House, will be speaking on “The Intersection of Food, Culture and History.”

A Different Look at Vanilla, Saffron and Chocolate

Sure, they taste good. But did you know all three of those ingredients are rife with politics?

Learn all about the intrigue in getting these three ingredients from harvest to plate at “Politics of the Plate — What’s Behind the Silky Sexiness of Vanilla, Saffron and Chocolate,” 6:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. March 16 at the Unitarian Universalist Church of San Francisco (Starr King room), 1187 Franklin St. at Geary Street.

Experts Patricia Rain (vanilla), Juan San Mames (saffron) and Mark Magers (chocolate) will be on the panel with moderator Janet Fletcher, a San Francisco Chronicle food writer.

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