How Does YOUR garden grow?

Blueberry cake with streusel topping

2011-07-24T11:46:00.002-04:00

I love blueberry season. My kids love to go blueberry picking. I love to go blueberry picking. We pick TONS, and freeze them to use all year long.

While we were recently out of town, my mother-in-law stopped in to check our mail for us. While she was here, she left a section she'd pulled out of the Boston Globe about blueberry cakes. Hmm, I'm game! I tried their winning recipe for a blueberry cake with streusel topping. It sure was a winner--absolutely delicious, and it will certainly be something I make each blueberry season.

I followed the recipe exactly, so I'll just include a link here. Well worth a try!

Far Away Flavors, Local Food

2011-07-05T14:03:00.000-04:00

One of my favorite things about eating locally and gardening is that it forces you to experiment with your cooking. I'm sure that a few years ago, I never would have dreamed of making ratatouille considering the fact that I had never eaten it before. Maybe for kids in France this is a normal part of summer. For me, its hot dogs, ice cream and slush puppies. But with a CSA box overflowing and a tiny garden doing the same, you have to branch out from the hots dogs and find some new foods to associate with each season.

Branching out for me often means incorporating spices and flavors not traditionally found in "local" food. It took me a long time to embrace new foods (I had never even tried hummus until I was in college!) but now it's my favorite part of cooking. For the most part, recipes are easily adapted to local produce. There are obvious exceptions - I'm sure I will never find local avocado. But most vegetables and meats can be grown right here just as they are grown far across the world. Or, many recipes from far off lands do fine when you swap in your own favorite, local vegetables.

The first "foreign" dish that I tried this year was a Thai curry, based on one that I LOVE from our local Thai restaurant. Now, to be fair, this was largely NOT local when I cooked it (a few weeks ago). However by now, most of the veggies I used are in season, maybe with the help of a greenhouse or some other clever farming techniques. I had this dish in mind when I chose my peas - I love the snap peas in the pod that they use in their mango curry. Add other seasonable vegetables like summer squash, cherry or grape tomatoes, zucchini, and bell pepper and you've got yourself a fairly local meal. The coconut curry sauce, mango and the rice will never be local, of course, but that's a small price to pay, in my opinion.

And one last disclaimer: I totally cheated and used the canned curry paste. I know I could make my own but I'm still new to this cooking from scratch thing so one step at a time.

"Local" Thai Curry

Small can of curry paste (I prefer the yellow)
2 cups Coconut milk
1 mango, diced (optional - but DELICIOUS!)
1/2 cup snap peas
1 red bell pepper, cut into strips
1 yellow summer squash, cut into strips
10-12 cherry or grape tomatoes
1/2 - 1lb meat/chicken (cut in pieces) or shrimp (optional)

Add curry paste, coconut milk and mango (if using it) to deep pan, bring to a boil and then simmer.
Add meat/chicken (if using it) and veggies. If using shrimp, add later as shrimp cooks faster than veggies.
Simmer until vegetables are tender and meat/chicken/shrimp is cooked through. Serve over brown jasmine rice.

For those of you who also love Thai curry, what are you favorite veggies to add?

Fresh pea soup

2011-07-03T14:26:00.004-04:00

My CSA has been giving us a bag of shelling peas each week--a lot of work, but yummy!

I wanted to try to find a use for pea shells, so I decided to try this recipe that uses the pea shells to make a broth for pea soup. Well, I started with that recipe, and then took out all the "fancy" and made it "homey".

I'm also going to try my hand at making this recipe universal for any starting quantity of peas. I hate when recipes call for x amount of something and I get either more or less in my CSA share. So this is all approximate quantities--use what ya got!

Ingredients:

Whole peas in pods, washed well
Water
Onion
Butter
Salt
Pepper
A few sprigs fresh thyme
Heavy cream
Sour cream

Directions:

Shell the peas, reserving the shells in a separate bowl. Remove any very dirty/icky parts of the shells.

Place the pea shells in a large pot. Add water to cover the shells. Bring to a boil, then simmer for 20 or so minutes. Use a slotted spoon to remove and discard the pea shells.

Continue simmering for about 20-30 minutes, until the broth has reduced by half.

Meanwhile, slice an onion and saute in butter until browned and softened. I used one small onion--I started with about one pound of shelling peas and it ultimately made 2 bowls of soup. If you like onion, use a lot. If you're not a huge onion fan, just use half a small onion.

After the pea shell broth has reduced, add the peas, sauteed onions, and the leaves off a few sprigs of thyme. Let simmer for about 5 minutes, until the peas have cooked.

Remove from the heat and hit it with a stick blender (or put it in a regular blender). Be careful here--let the soup cool a bit so it doesn't splash and hurt you. Also, if your soup is too low in the pot and the stick blender is splashing a lot, either transfer it to a smaller pot or add some vegetable stock until the liquid level is high enough for the stick blender.

Blend until chunky. You don't need to get it totally smooth.

Stir in one tablespoon heavy cream and one tablespoon sour cream. Taste, and add more cream and sour cream if you'd like. I found one tablespoon of each was perfect for my 2 servings of soup. Season with salt and pepper.

Serve warm or cold. Yum!

_______________

Part of why I've been lax about posting recipes here is that I got a job writing for a local Patch site. Every week I post a recipe, often featuring local ingredients. How lucky am I--to have a job writing, cooking, and sharing my love of eating locally? Feel free to visit me and say hi! I have a new recipe published each Tuesday morning.

End of asparagus season

2011-07-02T14:39:00.000-04:00

Our farm announced at the farmer's market today that this week is the end of their asparagus season. It's bittersweet for me because I love asparagus but it does mark the beginning of summer/end of spring in these parts. And summer brings so many sorely missed veggies and fruits of its own that we all get over it pretty quickly.

When it comes to asparagus (fresh and in season, at least) I am a purist. Toss'em with olive oil, salt, and pepper, throw them on the grill and call it delicious. However, I have two problems with this way of preparing asparagus. One, I don't know how to use our new grill. I'm sure it's simple but if I learn then I will have to use it and my husband will stop and we don't want that, now do we? As much as I enjoy it, it's nice to have a break from cooking! The second problem is the children. Only one of them will dare try grilled asparagus and even then, there's a 50/50 chance of her actually eating it. So, I needed another, indoor, kid-friendly recipe for my asparagus.

It didn't take me long to find this quiche recipe and declare it a winner. Since we are also doing an egg CSA this season, this would kill two birds with one stone. Enter some local cheese (calls for Swiss but I often use cheddar in my quiches), cherry tomatoes and bacon from the farmer's market, and High Lawn Farm cream easily found at Whole Foods, and this recipe is a perfect locavore meal.

Ingredients

1 pound fresh asparagus
1 teaspoon salt
1 (10 inch) unbaked pastry shell
1 egg white, lightly beaten
2 cups shredded Swiss cheese
10 bacon strips, cooked and crumbled
4 eggs
1 1/2 cups light cream
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 pinch pepper
cherry tomatoes, halved

Directions

Cut eight asparagus spears 4-in. long for garnish. Cut remaining asparagus into 1/2-in. pieces, using only tender parts of stalks. Steam asparagus until tender but firm.
Brush bottom of pastry shell with egg white, In a bowl combine asparagus, Swiss cheese and bacon; mix gently. Place in bottom of pastry shell. In another bowl, beat eggs, cream, nutmeg, salt and pepper until smooth. Pour into shell. Bake, uncovered, at 400 degrees F for 30-35 minutes or until a knife inserted near the center comes out clean.
Arrange the asparagus spears, spoke fashion, on top of quiche; place cherry tomato halves between spokes.

Welcome Spring!

2011-04-14T14:27:00.011-04:00

Hello World! Most (all?) of New England is finally out of hibernation and Spring has never been more welcome. After 2 straight months buried under snow, it's amazing to finally see plants and trees coming to life yet again. Kind of magical, if you ask me.

I'm not sure what inspired me, but I decided I wanted a piece of that magic for myself and built a raised bed square foot garden. OK - my husband built it and helped me fill it but I did all the rest! This is my first ever gardening attempt so I'm keeping it small but still ambitious. I hope you'll cheer me on as I post my little garden's progress here. And of course I'll share my culinary creations born of it.

We did our first plantings and sowing on April 3rd, right after the snow melted from that lovely April Fool's Day storm. We chose cinder blocks as our building material because both Hubby and I are terrible with tools. Plus, we have the added bonus of planting inside the blocks which I think is pretty cool. Here is a shot of the raised bed just after filling it:

And here it is after our first plantings:

In the blocks, we put ever-bearing strawberries and in the bed, there are shallots (left) and leeks (right). As for seeds, we sowed arugula, spinach, bunching onions and snap peas (also in the blocks, all the way to the right where there are no strawberries).

On Monday (April 11th) we had our first sprouts - Arugula!

The next day, up came the spinach:

Then today, the peas, just barely:

The strawberry crowns are also looking healthy:

Here is everything else I'm planning to plant/sow:

carrots
cilantro
basil
tomatoes
jalapeno
bell pepper
parsley
swiss chard

The arugula will be my first harvest (if I don't kill it) and I'm thinking about an arugula-Parmigiano-prosciutto pizza...YUM! Anyone know if they make prosciutto locally??

-Nicole

Savory Summer Salsa

2010-09-02T10:52:00.005-04:00

As I mentioned below, from a 'farm to table' perspective, this is my favorite time of year. And there's no better way to enjoy the bounty of the season than in a fresh summer salsa. So when I saw the recipe of the week in our CSA newsletter from Holiday Brook Farm was for none other than Summer Salsa I knew I had to try it.

My husband, who doesn't normally like fresh tomatoes (I know, it's sinful) can't get enough of this stuff! This one's a keeper; I'll be putting some up for winter consumption so we can enjoy this savory salsa throughout the depths of winter here in the northeast.

So without further adieu, here is the recipe - courtesy of Eden Glen Farm by way of Ed & Ellen Bond, shareholders.

Ingredients -

1/2 red sweet bell pepper

1/2 purple sweet pepper

1 green bell pepper

2 jalapeno peppers

1 Hungarian Hot Wax pepper

5 large tomatoes (many varieties)

2 large cloves of garlic

2-4 Tablespoons each of fresh cilantro and basil

1 ear of corn, cut off cob

1 large onion, any kind

4 Tablespoons cider vinegar

4 Tablespoons olive oil

1/2 - 1 can black beans

2-4 Tablespoons tomato paste to sweeten and thicken (if needed)

Ground Cayenne to taste (optional)

Directions: Dice all vegetables and mix with the vinegar and olive oil. Add beans, optional tomato paste and cayenne.

I highly recommend a top shelf margarita on the side.

Bon Appetit!

Loving Local

2010-08-28T11:37:00.007-04:00

Today may be the official end of Massachusetts Farmers' Market Week, however, it's certainly not the end of Farmers' Market season here in the Berkshires. In fact, late August/early September is one of my favorite times of year as the variety of local fruits and vegetables available is at a peak. (This favorite time of year thing may also have to do with the fact that football season is knocking at the door and night temperatures begin to plunge, but I digress.)

My friend Tinky over at In Our Grandmothers' Kitchen hosted a Loving Local blogathon this past week in an effort to increase awareness of the bounty all around us and celebrate the flavors of the Bay State.

I'm a bit late to the party, but would be remiss if I didn't join in with a shout out to the local farm that provides a large amount of the food on our table. Our dinner last night was simple - grilled pork tenderloin, with a lemon pepper rub, mashed new potato "patties" (made from leftover mashed potatoes) and a medley of green, yellow and purple beans sauteed in a bit of sesame oil (YUM). Aside from the seasonings and oil, everything on our plate came from our friends at Holiday Brook Farm.

Whatever YOUR fancy - succulent peach crumble, or a slice of fresh blueberry pie, corn on the cob, an heirloom tomato salad, roasted new potatoes or farm fresh eggs - your local farm(er) is your freshest source. Buying local is not only better for you, it's better for your local economy too and you'll be doing your part to help preserve open space as well as our cultural heritage.

If you would like to spread some love to local farmers by donating to the Mass Farmers' Market, you can do so here.

Bon Appetit!

Coriander and Cilantro Flatbread

2010-06-28T19:35:00.000-04:00

I don't know what it is about the summer, but I've got a bumper crop of cilantro. Tons and tons and tons of it. I use some, and the next day it seems like I've already got twice as much as I had the day before!

I pulled this recipe out of Bon Appetit magazine a few years back, and decided now was the time to make it to use up some of this delicious cilantro. I've made some very minor adjustments/clarifications, noted here.

Coriander and Cilantro Flatbreads
(pictured with Slow cooker Lentils, Rice, and Eggplant)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour, plus additional for dusting
3 teaspoons ground coriander (or more!)
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/3 cup chopped fresh cilantro (packed, measured after chopping. Better with lots of cilantro, if you ask me!)
3/4 cup plain whole-milk yogurt
olive oil for frying

Directions:

Add the first 5 ingredients to a medium bowl, and mix well with a whisk (alternately, sift the ingredients together). Stir in the cilantro. Add yogurt and stir with a fork until slightly mixed, then knead until dough holds together. Don't over-knead! Add more flour or yogurt if necessary to make a soft, slightly sticky dough. Use a large knife to divide the dough into 8 pieces, and roll into balls. On a floured surface, roll each ball out into a flat circle. Make the bread pretty thin (1/4" or so thick)--it'll puff when cooking.

Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium heat. Brush with olive oil until the bottom of the pan is well-coated. Place two or three breads into the skillet (depends on how many can fit...don't crowd!). Cook until dough is golden brown and slightly puffed, then flip. It takes only 2 or 3 minutes per side. Keep warm in a 200 degree oven until ready to serve.

Slow Cooker Lentils, Rice, and Eggplant

2010-06-28T19:30:00.001-04:00

Besides the lentils (Baer's Best--yum!), not much of this is local. Yet. But I'm posting this recipe now because later in the summer, most of the veggies will be available locally. And because it's so good :)

This recipe is based on a recipe I found at www.justslowcooking.com. The first time I made this, I followed the recipe exactly and wasn't pleased with the results. But it had promise, so I made it again with significant adjustments to the quantities, and it was perfect!

Slow Cooker Lentils, Rice, and Eggplant
(pictured with Coriander and Cilantro Flatbread)

Ingredients:

3 Tbs sherry (or just veggie stock is fine)
1 large or 2 medium onions, diced
3 cloves garlic, minced
8 oz chopped mushrooms
3 medium carrots, diced
1 eggplant, peeled and cubed into bite-sized pieces
1/2 cup lentils (any kind. The second time I made it, I used French Green lentils, and I liked how they held up in the slow cooker.)
1/2 cup brown rice
1/2 cup tomato sauce
1 cup veggie stock
1 cup water
1 tsp dried basil
1 tsp dried oregano
1 Tbs chopped fresh parsley (or more)
Olive oil for sauteeing

Directions:

Saute the vegetables until lightly browned and slightly softened. Add everything except the parsley to the slow cooker. Cook on low for 6 to 8 hours, or high for 3 to 4 hours. Serve with parsley on top for garnish.

_________________

It's a little more work in the morning than I'm used to with slow cooker recipes since there's a lot of peeling, dicing, and sauteeing. But it really is delightful, even if you have to save it for a weekend to make. Leftovers are also yummy!

This is fabulous with the Coriander and Cilantro Flatbread recipe I'm also posting. Delightful combination!

Strawberry Daze

2010-06-23T11:04:00.005-04:00

Whew, it's been a long winter. But I find that some of the first things to grow and mature and announce the arrival of spring and early summer are cheery pink, especially rhubarb and strawberries. What better color to wake up our winter-tired eyes and our root-weary tastebuds?

The Boy and The Girl were still in school last week, so I was able to go to my local PYO strawberry farm and power-pick some fruit (read: no visits to feed the animals, no begging for ice cream). The farmer says that strawberry season, due to a confluence of weather-related factors, is running about 10-14 days ahead of schedule this year, so it's already nearly at an end. And blueberries are coming up fast behind them, perhaps as soon as next week. I was able to pick more than 8 pounds of berries quickly, and then it was back home to decide how to dole out the juicy prizes.

I made a batch of jam with most of them (see my jam post from June of last year), and decided to make dessert with the rest. My family loves clafoutis (read Bea's funny treatise on clafoutis at http://www.latartinegourmande.com/) with any kind of fruit, from blueberry to pear, but most recipes I read always say, "Use any kind of fruit EXCEPT strawberries, since they are too wet."

Well, strawberries was what I had, and that's what was going to get clafoutis-ed. I decided to adapt a recipe for pear and chocolate clafoutis that I learned last year at a cooking class in Paris (long story, excellent class!), and I knew that I'd be making six personal-sized desserts in the small, shallow white ramekins I bought just for this purpose.

The oven preheated to 375 while the ramekins got buttered and dusted with sugar. I beat 2 eggs for a minute or two, then added a pinch of salt, 2 tablespoons of sugar, a teaspoon of vanilla, a half-cup of flour, and a cup of thick Greek yogurt (you can also use creme fraiche, like we did in Paris, or even sour cream). I added a half-cup of milk and beat the whole thing till it was smooth. Also into the bowl went a small slug of creme de cassis, which my cooking instructor added to all three courses we cooked with her! (Had to carry a bottle of that good stuff back with me, I'm nearly down to the dregs now, gotta make another trip!) I sliced the berries lengthwise and placed about 10 slices in the bottom of the ramekins, poured the egg-milk-yogurt mix carefully over the berries, and then--with the edge of a paring knife--shaved some bittersweet chocolate shreds over each portion. A little sprinkle of sugar on top and they were ready for 20-30 minutes in the oven. You know they're done when the edges are brown but the center is just set.

Yes, I made a little strawberry fan on top like they do in nice restaurants. Yes, my kids were surprised that I actually "decorated" their food. But they got over it mighty quick when they got to have warm strawberry clafoutis for snack after school.

Raving About Rhubarb

2010-06-13T08:15:00.006-04:00

Rhubarb is another rite of spring that takes me back to the days of my youth. I'm not sure whether that has more to do with the fact that it was a pretty regular attendee at family gatherings throughout the spring or because we were continually being yelled at for battering mom's abundant crop. You see, as I was growing up our rhubarb was planted right along our basketball court in the back yard. As a result, it often took quite a beating from errant basketballs. (What's a kid or two to do?)

And as kids, we could never understand what the big deal was over breaking a stalk (or ten). There was still PLENTY of rhubarb to go around. Mom would preserve rhubarb by making and canning numerous jars of rhubarb sauce, we'd also have rhubarb crisp and thus yummy, artery clogging dish called rhubarb fruit pie. But my FAVORITE way to eat it was (and still is) in a regular ole rhubarb pie - well regular to the Nuttall family and those who knew them.

Many people add strawberries to their rhubarb pie to balance the tart taste of this vegetable, which is more commonly considered a fruit. This recipe uses a custard-type filling to achieve what I consider to be a perfect balance of sweet and sour.

I use this recipe for my crust. Once your crust has been rolled out and the bottom crust placed into your pie pan, combine the following ingredients:

1 1/2 cups sugar

2 eggs, slightly beaten (if they are small, use 3)

2 Tablespoons flour

Combine above with 3 to 4 cups of rhubarb cut into one inch pieces and pour into unbaked pie crust. Dot with butter and add top crust. Brush top crust with milk and sprinkle with raw, unrefined sugar.

Bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes then lower temperature to 375 for 40-50 minutes. I like to serve this slightly warm or at room temperature with a scoop of local vanilla ice cream on top!

Bon Appetit!

Ramping Up for Our Vegetable CSA

2010-06-12T14:50:00.008-04:00

I had (the best) intentions of blogging this post quite some time ago - you know, when ramps were actually in season and it was considered fashionable to spend the afternoon foraging for them.

However, technical difficulties (read: my beloved husband permanently damaged the monitor on our laptop, rendering it useless). I toyed with the idea of passing this one by (or saving it until next spring), but by then I will have forgotten this "recipe". Since this blog exists not only as a means of sharing our passion for local foods but also as an archive of recipes we may want to return to - I've decided to forge ahead (or should I say forage ahead).

Some of my earliest childhood memories involve ramps. My mom would send my sister and I off with our buckets and trowels to forage for ramps so she could make potato leek soup. I loved those foraging adventures....I still do. I can't think of a better way to welcome spring and bid farewell, for the time being, to a diet laden with winter root vegetables.

One of my favorite ways to eat ramps is to coat them with olive oil, sprinkle them with a dash of sea salt then toss them on the grille. They also make a FANTASTIC pesto sauce. Combine a healthy handful of greens (I highly recommend using the bulbs too) in your food precessor with 1/3 of a cup of pine nuts and a couple tablespoons of butter. Blend as you drizzle in olive oil until you obtain the desired consistency, then blend with 1/4 cup of imported, grated parmesan cheese and add salt to taste.

My favorite way to eat ramp pesto is mixed with some fresh (cooked) cheese tortellini and grilled chicken breast.

Freeze any pesto you're not going to consume within the next few days - you'll appreciate it down the road when ramp season becomes a distant memory.

Bon appetit!

How my garden grows

2010-06-05T07:46:00.010-04:00

In the past, I've halfheartedly thrown a few vegetable seedlings in our gardens, hoping for the best. Unsurprisingly, my "survival of the fittest" theory of gardening usually resulted in weeds, bugs, and animals proving they were the fittest. So I've never actually had any vegetables to harvest.

This year, I decided to make more of a concerted effort. I read a few basic gardening books. We decided to try out a square foot garden. While our new house has a beautiful yard, it's very wooded and our best sun comes in the front yard. Rather than digging out the yard to plant a traditional garden, we just added a 4' x 4' box. It was a fun project. The kids had a lot of fun with it. For the dividers, we bought a bunch of wood paints at the craft store and let them go wild.

Cute, huh?

So what have we got going here? Onions, lettuce, rainbow chard, fairy tale eggplant, grape tomatoes, sungold tomatoes, a carrot mix (yellow, purple, and orange--N-man's pick), lima beans (B-man's pick). I had transplanted some arugula as well that I'd started indoor from seeds, but it didn't make it. The transplanted lettuce didn't work out, either, so I bought some at the nursery that's growing much better.

I also wanted an herb garden. I had a small herb garden at my last house that I loved, though it was fairly inconveniently located from the kitchen. We decided this year to put the herbs in planters on the back porch. Some of the smaller planters I'm planning to bring inside in the winter--fresh herbs all year, if it works out! Our porch is very near the kitchen, and already I find myself just popping out with a pair of scissors to harvest a few sprigs while I'm cooking. Wonderfully convenient!

This one is parsley, garlic chives, and amethyst basil (a favorite with N-man and B-man, not to mention TK and me!).

Next, we've got rosemary, chocolate mint, and chives. These are the planters I'm sure to bring in this winter.

In a big planter, I have sage, cilantro, basil, and lemon thyme. I'm worried this might be over-full, but if so, I'm sure I can use vast quantities of cilantro and basil if I need to thin this fast.

I had another planter so I threw in an extra fairy-tale eggplant and two lettuce plants. I'm going to harvest the lettuce very soon, before they grow much larger and start to crowd the eggplant. Yum, fresh baby lettuce, maybe this weekend!

My inlaws gave us a strawberry pot, so using my vast imagination, I planted it with...strawberries. We've gotten 5 yummy strawberries from it already, but mostly the strawberries are getting eaten by animals (chipmunks, I think. Do they eat strawberries?) I don't have much hope for this. I think we'll do flowers instead of strawberries next time.

Then in the last planter, I'm trying to start some herbs from seeds. There are lots of little sprouts, but I planted over a month ago and it's growing very slowly. It's a fun experiment, but I don't have hugely high hopes for this. It'll be neat to see what, if anything really comes up here.

So that's it. I tried not to go overboard since 1) we have a CSA subscription, and there are only so many vegetables even I can eat, and 2) I've never had much luck in the past with gardens, and there are ZILLIONS of wild animals around our house so I fear I'm just gardening for them :)

Do you have a garden? What are you growing this year?

Strawberry Ice Cream

2010-05-30T09:22:00.005-04:00

In honor of my favorite you-pick farm, Parlee Farm, opening for strawberry picking this week, I'm posting a delightful strawberry ice cream recipe. This is egg-free, so it tastes a little lighter than regular ice cream. Not that it's light. At all. But it sure is delicious! Quick, easy, no cooking required--yum!

Ingredients:

1 pint strawberries
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 cup heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
1 pinch salt
extra strawberries and mint leaves for garnish (optional)

Directions:

Hull strawberries and place in a large bowl. Using a potato masher, mash well. (Hint: mash very well. Big chunks of strawberries become hard frozen blobs).

Mix remaining ingredients into the juicy strawberry mash. Pour into ice cream maker and freeze according to your ice cream maker instructions.

Once it's frozen solid (or kind of solid, like I did, if your kids can't possibly wait any longer), scoop into dishes and garnish with strawberries and mint if desired. This year I'm trying chocolate mint in a container on my porch. I ended up tearing up the leaves and mixing into my ice cream. Soooo good! Next time I might add some chopped mint leaves directly into the ice cream!

Kale, Sweet Potato, and Bean Soup

2010-02-07T07:03:00.003-05:00

I'm not sure what to call this soup. Sure, it has kale, sweet potato, and beans in it, but it's the squash-flavored broth that really makes it outstanding. It looks like a lot of extra work, and it kind of is (though really, it's not too bad). But believe me, this makes the most AWESOME tasting broth ever...kind of sweet and rich and delicious.

This soup is also easily adaptable to a vegan recipe. I'll include notes if anyone wants to make it vegan.

This is also just the basic recipe--feel free to add other vegetables. I usually throw in whatever other root veggies are in the house, like carrots or parsnips. You could play around with what type of greens you use instead of kale. You can swap out different types of beans. Basically, this is an easily-customizable recipe. I'm just giving you my favorite version :)

This will make a big pot of soup. I like to make a big batch, and then just freeze the leftovers. But if you're unsure about this recipe, or don't like leftovers, you'll probably want to half this recipe.

Ingredients:

Approximately 3 lbs winter squash (any kind is okay--I've made it with delicata squash, and a combo of butternut, delicata, and dumpling squash. Feel free to experiment! Also, you're just going to puree this into the broth for flavor, so it's fine to use more or less squash. Just use what you've got!)
1 large apple, peeled and coarsely diced
1 large onion, peeled and coarsely diced
3 cloves garlic, crushed
Olive oil for drizzling (I don't know, maybe 2 tablespoons approximately)
Honey for drizzling (again, about 2 tablespoons) (Omit honey if you're making a vegan recipe. I've made this without the honey--the resulting soup still has that sweetness from the squash and sweet potatoes. I just like the faint smoky-depth you get from honey!)
12 cups stock (I like turkey stock for this, though clearly use veggie stock if you want to make vegan soup :)
1 large or 2 medium sweet potatoes
2 cans of cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
1 bunch kale, stems removed and leaves torn into bite sized pieces
1 teaspoon sage
Pepper to taste

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Cut the squash in half and discard seeds. Place the squash cut side up on a baking tray. Place the diced apples, onions and crushed garlic into the cups in the squash where the seeds were. Drizzle with olive oil and honey. Roast until squash is fork-tender, about 45 minutes (it will really depend on how thick your squash is, so just keep checking). Remove from oven and let cool.

Once the squash is cool enough to touch, scoop the onions, apples, garlic, and squash flesh into a large pot. Add 4 cups of stock. Simmer for 30 or 45 minutes, until everything is pretty soft.

Turn off the heat and let cool for 15 minutes or so. This is important--danger, danger! The next step is to blend this up and the soup can splash and burn you. If you make this often, I know one day you'll say "oh, I won't burn myself. I'm not going to wait." Then it'll splash and hit you and burn. I know, I speak from experience! Okay, warning over, back to the recipe. Using an immersion (stick) blender, blend the soup until it's smooth. Feel free to add more broth if the liquid level isn't high enough and you're getting splashing from the stick blender. You could also process in batches in a regular blender as well.

Turn the stove back on to medium. Add the remaining broth (you may not need the full 12 cups--it's up to you how soupy you like your soup to be. I usually keep adding as time goes on so it maintains the soupiness I like :). Add the diced sweet potatoes. Bring the soup to a boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for about 30 minutes.

Add the sage, beans, and kale. (Depending on the size of your bunch of kale, you may not need to add it all. Just keep adding kale until it looks like enough kale to you. I usually make Jules' kale chips with the leftover kale!) Simmer for approximate 30-45 minutes until the kale and potatoes are tender. Season with pepper.

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This has quickly become my favorite soup. I first "invented" it when I was getting all these vegetables in our fall CSA share. I made it for Thanksgiving dinner. I've been making it all winter, with fewer and fewer local ingredients. I just made it yesterday, and the only local ingredients I could find were apples, garlic, and winter squash, but at least this time I finally remembered to write down the quantities as I was cooking so I could post the recipe. But I think it's about time to retire this for the year--I'll be looking forward to next fall when I can find all these ingredients again!

Wayland Winter Farmers' Market review

2010-01-25T14:41:00.004-05:00

I love New England, but the dark days of winter seem so long by the end of January. A few weeks ago, I was sitting around lamenting the lack of fresh produce, considering just how crazy it would be to make a 2+ hour drive to the winter farmers' markets I'd heard about in Rhode Island or Connecticut.

Imagine my surprise when I found there's not one, but TWO winter farmers' markets in the area! How do I miss these things? Anyway, after lots of squealing and jumping for joy, I told my husband and we planned our trips. Both markets are still about 45 minutes away, but that's a little less extreme than leaving the state :)

This past Saturday, we checked out the Wayland Winter Farmers' Market. It runs Saturdays 10-1 through February 27.

It was awesome! Just what I needed!

Okay, now for a more useful review. We arrived shortly after the market opened, about 10:30. The parking lot was crowded and exceedingly slippery. We wound our way through the store to the area where farmers' market was set up. It was ridiculously crowded! I mean, stacks of people crowded around stalls, queued up to buy, blocking aisles.

I figure this is a good and bad thing. Good, because it certainly proves there's a demand, and I can hope next winter there will be more farmers' markets. Good, because I like to see the farmers' work supported and valued. Bad for me who was trying to shop with two kids and a baby in a stroller! It certainly wasn't the relaxing experience of most summer farmers' markets where you can spend a minute or two talking to vendors.

As to be expected in the winter, the market was heavier on prepared foods than produce. A lot of the prepared foods are produced locally, but not necessarily with local ingredients. That doesn't bother me, but my issue is that many of the prepared foods aren't nut-safe, so we can't get them due to nut allergies. Ah well. We got some anyway and just won't let our son eat any! We ended up with a container of maple syrup and a container of Thai Maple Peanut Sauce from The Warren Farm, a jar of delicious cranberry-lime sauce from Appalachian Naturals, and a very exciting container of Baba Ganoush from Samira's Homemade, not to mention their Ful Medammes and some pita bread. We got some gnocchi and mozzarella from Fior D'Italia and some stew beef from Springdell Farm.

I embarrassingly can't remember which farm the veggies came from...hey, as I said, I was wrangling twins, an infant, and braving huge crowds. The veggie stand was so swamped when we arrived that we passed them by at first. We stopped back as we were ready to leave at about 11:15, and the stand was less crowded but looking a little picked over. I wonder what it was like closer to 1 when the market closed! For example, I really wanted kale, and by the time we got there, there were only 3 scraggly looking bundles left. I snapped one of them up...made it into yummy soup last night :) We also got some onions, potatoes, sweet potatoes, and garlic. Plus just enough baby spinach and arugula to make a salad for my husband and I. At $14 a lb, we didn't buy much, but it sure was a delightful mid-winter treat and worth the splurge!

Overall, I'd give this one a positive review. I'm glad it was so crowded, even if it did make it a little bit difficult for me to maneuver through. Just go expecting the crowds...the products there were all high-quality, delicious, and worth the trip!

Next week, we're off to try the Natick Winter Farmers' Market! I'll let you know what I think.

Smitten and Spoiled

2010-01-24T07:47:00.006-05:00

Those of you who have been following this blog since the beginning are quite aware of how smitten I am with our CSA Farm. I love everything about belonging to a CSA - farm to table food (some of which we get to pick ourselves!), the opportunity to show my young son EXACTLY where his food comes from, developing a real relationship with the farmers that in essence are present at our table every day (I could go on and on).

Yes, indeed, we become a wee bit spoiled during the traditional growing season here in Western, MA when fresh, local produce (and a large variety of it) is readily available. But, all good things must come to an end, and eventually even the storage crops begin to dwindle. I knew this was going to be a tough transition for me (and my family).

To their credit, our local Big Y is committed to supporting local farms and food producers and labels these selections accordingly, making it relatively easy to continue purchasing local staples, but it's the fresh, local produce I really missed. Enter Berkshire Organics. Once again, I am smitten. My only regret is that this business wasn't my brainchild (though I'm eternally grateful to Aleisha for conceiving and ultimately giving birth to this convenient and affordable service).

For the past couple of months, we've been the proud (and happy) recipients of the Berkshire Basket. Since Berkshire Organics is "right down the road" from my daycare provider, I've opted to pick our basket up (vs. having it delivered) and we manage to stretch our basket out over the course of two weeks (with supplements from our freezer, root cellar and I'll be honest...the grocer). I LOVE the fact that Berkshire Organics' goal is to help reduce the distance from the farm to our table (sound familiar). They work with a number of farms within a 50-mile radius as well as an organic supplier who shares their vision by purchasing produce as close to New England as possible. The produce is fantastic and the variety (and flexibility) is great too! They let you know ahead of time what's in that weeks' basket and if there's something you don't like you can email them to request a substitution from a list of items that are available.

As we move into February and each day brings us a little closer to spring, the distance our food travels will begin to diminish. Before you know it we'll once again be basking in the warmth that Holiday Brook Farm brings to us.....in so many ways.

I am extremely grateful for the local food options available to us here in the Berkshires. For those of you who try to eat locally when you can, what do YOU do during the "off season"?

Bon Appetit!

Note: New England Bloggers are celebrating their one-year anniversary this week. To celebrate, Elizabeth - host(ess) of NEB has organized a carnival of posts that relate to our wonderful region. Please stop by to see the celebratory blog posts - and don't forget to say "hi"!

Pure Comfort

2010-01-17T07:58:00.005-05:00

The last time we "spoke", I was waxing poetic about the collection of various local squash adorning our dining room table. I've certainly come to see these delectable treats in a new light over the past couple of months - for they are one of the last remaining vegetables we have left from our CSA Farm. I've come to cherish this connection with Mother Earth and thoroughly enjoy preparing and eating each and every one.

I stumbled upon Amy Cotler's recipe for Tropical Butternut Squash Bisque in a recent edition of Rural Intelligence. I knew I had one lone butternut squash stocked away* and just happened to have a can of coconut milk in the pantry, so it all seemed meant to be...

For those of you who aren't local and may not be familiar with Amy, she's been a BIG farm to table advocate for years. She is the founding director of Berkshire Grown, which became an early model for local food and farm advocacy in my neck of the woods.

I followed the recipe exactly, except for the garnish - I was making this for my brown bag lunches, which don't lend themselves to garnishes as well as a home-cooked lunch or dinner might, but it was fabulous nonetheless! I love the way the earthy, sweet flavor of the squash melds with the tropical hint from the coconut and the mild spice of cayenne. YUM! This one's a keeper. And a BIG thank you to Amy for teaching me you don't have to wrestle with butternut squash in an attempt to peel it! Just pierce it and toss it in the oven - once it's roasted, the skin will peel right off (who knew)?

Bon Appetit!

*This particular squash was locally sourced, but was not a part of our actual CSA distribution.

Bean Soup

2010-01-07T15:54:00.006-05:00

I was reading the winter issue of Edible Boston, and there was an article about Baer's Best, a local grower of dried beans. And even better, it mentioned they're sold at Idylwilde Farm, a place I frequently shop! So I headed out and bought myself some beans. There were plenty of varieties to chose from, and I decided on the mixed bag of Heirloom Bean Soup.

Isn't it pretty? How could I resist?

There was a recipe on the back of the bag that I used for a jumping off point. I added some ingredients based on what was in my fridge. Here's my version of the recipe:

Heirloom Bean Soup

Ingredients:
1 lb mixed dried beans
Lots of water (see recipe)
1 Tbsp salt
1 ham hock or 1/4 lb finely diced ham
1 large onion, diced
1 or 2 15 oz cans of diced tomatoes (I used two cans, but thought it turned out a little too tomato-y, so you might just want to start with one can)
1 parsnip, peeled and sliced
3 large carrots, peeled and sliced
Juice of one lemon
Pepper to taste

Directions:
Wash the beans, then place in a pot with 4 cups of water and 1 Tbsp salt. Let stand overnight.

The next day, drain the beans. Return beans to the pot and add 8 cups water. Add the diced onion and ham hock or diced ham. Simmer for 2 1/2 to 3 hours, adding more water as necessary if the water level starts getting low. Over the entire course of cooking, I added about 5 more cups of water, so you might need to add quite a bit more than the initial 8 cups.

If you used a ham hock, take the bone out of the soup, pick off any meat, and return the meat to the soup. Discard the bone.

Add remaining ingredients and simmer until carrots and parsnips are tender, about 45 minutes, adding more water if the soup is too thick for you.

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The end result was outstanding! Bean soups take a lot of time, but my husband and I both love them so every once in a while, it's worth the effort. One of my kids even ate quite a bit of this soup, and since neither of them ever eat anything new, it was pretty exciting!

And I went back to the store and bought 3 more bags of beans: one bag of black beans, one bag of split peas, and of course another bag of the Heirloom Soup beans. Delightful! Plenty more soups in our future!

With Everything There is a Season

2009-11-13T07:33:00.010-05:00

One of the last remaining signs of our vegetable CSA bounty is the wonderful variety of squash currently serving as a centerpiece on our dining room table.

In all of my 29 years, I never knew that some varieties of winter squash, such as butternut, really shouldn't be opened until after the Winter Holidays. Other varieties, such as spaghetti, delicata and other acorn types, while fine during the early fall months, will be better at Thanksgiving! (Thank you to Desiree for sharing that info in the Holiday Brook Farm CSA Newsletter.)

Even knowing this, I couldn't stop myself from cutting into one of the golden yellow spaghetti squash to mix with some local ricotta to make this recipe for - Spaghetti Squash with Ricotta, Sage and Pine Nuts adapted from the Kitchn.

I agree - using fresh ricotta is key to the success of this recipe (that and toasting the pine nuts vs. roasting them until they're on the verge of burning, as I have done below). I found some local ricotta from Calabro, a family owned and operated Italian cheese company. It was out of this world (and I had just enough leftover cheese to make a ricotta pie).

I followed the recipe for this one exactly, so follow the link and give it a try. It's a warm, cheesy, comforting dish for the season and so easy to make with all local ingredients!

Bon Appetit!

Braised Brussels Sprouts

2009-11-03T15:45:00.005-05:00

It's pretty hard to beat plain old roasted brussels sprouts, with a sprinkle of salt (or Borsari!). They're easy...just pop 'em in the oven at 400 degrees for about 30-45 minutes, and they come out so creamy on the inside and completely delicious.

But, this year I'm hosting Thanksgiving for the very first time. I'm pretty excited and am starting to test out some recipes for side dishes. So when I came across this recipe for brussels sprouts braised in heavy cream, with a splash of lemon, I knew I had to try it out. And believe me, it's a winner.

I didn't make any changes, so just follow the link over to Orangette. She waxes poetic about brussels sprouts for far longer than even I could manage...the actual recipe is quite a ways down the post. Oh, and not a big surprise, but her picture is way better than mine.

This may very well be even more delicious than roasted brussels sprouts, but I'm going to force myself not to make it very often as I absolutely couldn't control myself. I'm embarrassed to admit that I ate about 3/4 of this by myself. I was actually glad my kids didn't like it so I could eat theirs. I made this less than a week ago and I can't even remember what else I served for dinner that night; I pretty much just ate tons of brussels sprouts! So good, and on special occasions like Thanksgiving, I'm totally willing to go there and eat sprouts swimming in a whole cup of heavy cream!

_____________

If anyone has any recipe suggestions for Thanksgiving side dishes, I'd love to hear it (bonus points if they use ingredients I can find locally!)

Back to the Basics

2009-11-02T06:03:00.009-05:00

Belonging to a CSA doesn't always mean searching for new recipes in which to incorporate unfamiliar ingredients. Sometimes it's a simple as recreating old favorites with local, very fresh ingredients. Try it sometime; I guarantee you'll be pleasantly surprised by the end result! We recently made shepherd's pie with local corn, potatoes and ground pork from Holiday Brook Farm. It was outstanding (and I assure you, it didn't look like this for long).

More recently, I purchased a pork butt roast from Holiday Brook Farm. We've been grilling pork butt steaks throughout the summer and are quite addicted to the wonderful flavor of pastured pork (as well as the health benefits of all that omega 3 and conjugated linoleic acid). This little beauty spent some quality time in my crock pot before landing on a roll in the form of pulled pork. It was outstanding (and that's an understatement). This is the recipe I used, Adapted from Williams-Sonoma's "Food Made Fast: Slow Cooker".

Ingredients:

3 T EVOO
3-4 pound pork butt roast (they call for a boneless pork shoulder)
1 yellow onion, finely chopped
1 cup cider vinegar
3/4 cup ketchup
1/2 cup dark molasses
1/3 cup firmly packed brown sugar
2 tsp. red pepper flakes
1 T Worcestershire sauce
1 tsp. each dry mustard, salt and pepper (I used white pepper)
1/2 tsp. paprika
Sandwich rolls, toasted

Heat the oil in a large skillet and brown pork roast evenly on all sides (about 10 minutes); then transfer to crock pot.

Pour off all but 1 T oil in the skillet (I skipped this part); add onion and cook until golden brown (about 5 minutes). Add vinegar; cook stirring to scrape up the browned bits, 2 minutes. Stir in ketchup, molasses, brown sugar and red pepper flakes, Worcestershire sauce, dry mustard, salt, pepper and paprika. Cook, stirring occasionally, until mixture starts to bubble, 1 minute. Pour over pork.

Cover crock pot and cook on high for 4-5 hours (may be cooked on low for 8-10). Transfer pork to cutting board and using forks (or your fingers) shred, discarding fat. Return pork to crock pot and stir to mix in sauce (I let it cook another 30-45 minutes). Serve on toasted buns!

I'm a little bit lost without our vegetable CSA. I've got a serious stash of winter squash, some brussel sprouts in the freezer, potatoes and onions in the pantry and carrots in the crisper, but I miss my fresh weekly greens and the camaraderie! Our farm has decided to offer a meat CSA throughout the winter. We have already enrolled and will be picking up our 10-pound share of pork on the first Saturday of each month, so we won't be losing touch with our farm and farmers completely throughout the winter months. I'll also continue to get farm fresh eggs and local yogurt from them.

I have some thoughts on what we'll do for produce in the coming months - I'll share that information with you in a separate post in the coming week as I'd love to hear what you are doing now that CSA and farmers' market season is coming to an end. Until then.....Bon Appetit!

Sage-Roasted Fall Vegetable Salad

2009-10-27T20:51:00.008-04:00

This past Saturday was our last CSA vegetable pick-up of the season. Breaking up's been hard to do (and I'm still not over it). I've loved every minute of our relationship with Holiday Brook Farm. Our family was blessed with many of our seasonal favorites and I've tried things I haven't had since my mother MADE me eat them as a child and have been pleasantly surprised to find I like them, I really like them! Many of the root vegetables in the recipe I'm about to share fall into the latter category.

This recipe, adapted from Serving up the Harvest, was included in our CSA newsletter this week and since we received turnips, rutabagas, onions and celeriac in our pick-up this week and I had some local butternut squash posing as a centerpiece on our table, some beets from the farm in the crisper and some sage hanging in there in our herb garden, I immediately began dicing.

Ingredients:

1 cup wild rice, cooked according to directions (I used chicken bouillon instead of water)

12 cups of peeled (optional) and diced fall veggies such as winter squash, carrots, beets, rutabagas, turnips, parsnips and/or celeriac
1 onion, diced
1 Tab fresh sage, chopped
3 Tab EVOO
Fresh ground pepper

Cranberry Vinaigrette
2 shallots, chopped
1 cup cranberry sauce/jam
2 Tab fruited vinegar or red wine vinegar
2 Tab fresh orange juice
3/4 cup walnut or olive oil
Salt and fresh ground pepper to taste.

Directions:
Cook wild rice according to instructions. Let cool.
Meanwhile, preheat the oven to 450. Lightly grease a shallow roasting pan with oil (I just tossed the veggies in it and called it a day). Combine the diced fall veggies, onion and sage in a large bowl. Add the oil and toss gently to coat. Transfer to the roasting pan and arrange in a single layer.

Roast for 30-40 minutes stirring occasionally, until the veggies are tender and lightly browned.

To make the vinaigrette, finely chop the shallots in a blender. Add the cranberry sauce, vinegar, orange juice and oil and process until smooth. Season with salt and pepper.

Combine the roasted veggies and vinaigrette in a large bowl. Add rice and toss gently to mix. Taste and add salt and pepper if desired. Serve warm or at room temperature.

This dish was really out of this world - from the sweet roasted vegetables to the savory rice perfectly married with just a touch of fruity goodness. This one's a keeper and I'll definitely be adding this vinaigrette to some baby spinach with toasted walnuts and dried cranberries to make a scrumptious salad this holiday season!
As you can see, I served it alongside our roasted free range chicken from EarthFire Farm.
Bon Appetit!

The great pumpkin

2009-10-24T21:24:00.005-04:00

I love pumpkins. I love the way they look on the front steps, I adore drawing them with my kids, and I especially love the way they make the house smell when I roast them for their gorgeous orange-russet flesh. Yesterday, I updated my Facebook status to say "I'm roasting pumpkins for their flesh. Yes, they're food. And my house smells like Thanksgiving!" (Yes, I post on Facebook. Don't judge me.)
When I first read Barbara Kingsolver's "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle," the passage that made me laugh out loud was the one about the pumpkins. She swears that nobody knows that the decorations in their yard and on their stoop are actually edible. You can read that passage here.
I bought a couple of medium-sized sugar pumpkins, scrubbed them free of dirt, poked them with a sharp knife a few times, put them on a baking sheet, and stuck them in a 375 degree oven for about an hour. I think roasting pumpkins and squash this way is MUCH easier than risking fingers and countertops while wielding a cleaver and mallet.

My little orange friends roasted for about an hour; I tested for doneness by sticking a paring knife in. When the knife slid in with no resistance, I knew the flesh was cooked through and ready to puree. After taking them out and letting them cool for a few minutes, I basically just ripped into them, scooped out the seeds and stringy, goopy insides, and lifted the pieces of roasted flesh out of the skin and directly into the food processor. I pureed the pumpkin in the processor till it was smooth, but decided that the puree was a little watery and would benefit from some draining. I didn't want to lose half of my puree through the holes of my colander, so I made a makeshift filter of sorts, with coffee filters. That did the trick, as the water drained right through but the pumpkin stayed inside.

My two pumpkins yielded about 3 cups of smooth, aromatic puree. Now, what to make? I made the "Easy Pumpkin Cake" recipe from one of my favorite cookbooks, "Serving Up the Harvest" by Andrea Chesman. It's a great cookbook and all-around reading book, trust me. It came out terrific. There are any number of pumpkin cake recipes out there, just Google it and it'll come up. One of my friends adds chocolate chips to her pumpkin muffins and cakes. I think I'll do that next time!

I still have about a cup of pumpkin puree in my fridge. I haven't decided on its final destination. Because I've (uncharacteristically) been baking a lot this week, we have a lot of sweets. So definitely, something savory is in order. Another one of my friends uses her pumpkin puree in lasagna. She uses the pumpkin as another layer in between the cheese and the tomato. It adds a bit of sweetness, and of course nutrition, to her hearty lasagna. I might try a pumpkin lasagna without the tomato, instead using a bechamel sauce with a touch of nutmeg. Maybe some sausage--I think the sausage's fatty savoriness would be a good foil for the sweetish pumpkin. And wow, wouldn't it be striking-looking, with the creamy noodles and sauce against the bright pumpkin flesh? Hmm, am I onto something? I'll try this on Monday and report back.

Stuffed Delicata Squash

2009-10-15T11:09:00.004-04:00

We have a plethora of delicata squash sitting on our counter. It's delicious, but I wanted to try to make it into a main dish. I peeked around at what I had on hand, and this is what I came up with.

Ingredients:

2 delicata squash, halved and seeded
3 cloves garlic, minced
1 bunch swiss chard
1 can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
1/2 cup chicken stock (or veggie stock, or even water I'd imagine would be fine)
Panko breadcrumbs
1 Tablespoon butter, melted
Olive Oil

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Place squash cut side down in oven-safe baking dish. Add approximately 1/2 inch of water. Bake for 15 minutes. Flip squash so they are cut side up, and bake until fork-tender (varies widely depending on the size of the squash...let's say 30 minutes). Check occasionally and add more water to the baking dish if too much of the water evaporates.

Meanwhile, prepare the filling. Cut the thick stems out of the chard leaves, and roughly chop the leaves. Set aside.

In a large skillet, saute the minced garlic in olive oil until lightly browned. Add the chopped swiss chard leaves. Toss until lightly wilted, about 2 minutes. Add the beans and chicken stock and cook for approx. 10 minutes until chard is tender, stirring occasionally.

Stuff the squash "boats" with the filling, then sprinkle panko breadcrumbs on top and drizzle with some melted butter. Return to the oven and bake until the breadcrumbs are lightly browned, about 5 minutes.

__________________

My husband and I both really enjoyed the mixture of the sweet squash with the more savory filling. I would have preferred a larger squash-to-filling ratio, so I think I might try this again with a thicker-fleshed winter squash, like acorn squash.

Carrot Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

2009-10-15T10:55:00.003-04:00

Mmm, sneaky, sneaky carrots! We've been getting tons of carrots at the CSA, so I had to make something sweet with some. This recipe is originally from Taste of Home, with a few minor changes of my own. Plus, I've halved the recipe here so it doesn't make ridiculously huge quantities, as the first time I made it we had approximately 1 zillion cookies. If you have to feed a roving band of teenagers or something, feel free to double it back up.

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup shortening
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
2 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup shredded carrots
2 cups quick cooking oats (I used old-fashioned oats with no problem)
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 cup chocolate chips

Directions:

In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter, shortening, sugar, and brown sugar. Beat the eggs and vanilla. Add the carrots; mix well.

Combine the oats, whole wheat flour, all-purpose flour, baking soda, and salt. Add to creamed mixture and mix well. Stir in the chocolate chips. Cover and refrigerate for at least 4 hours.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Drop by rounded tablespoonfuls 3 inches apart onto baking sheets coated with cooking spray. Bake for 10-13 minutes or until lightly browned. Cool for 2 minutes before removing to wire racks.

Z - Always The Closer

2009-10-12T08:59:00.007-04:00

I grew up thinking Zucchini were supposed to be the size of baseball bats. Really. And not only were they BIG, but they were PLENTIFUL! One of my favorite childhood memories (no mom, it's not shelling bottomless baskets of peas on the front porch) is the endless supply of zucchini bread that was available in our house as a result of this bountiful summer squash.

A couple weeks ago, my other half came home with a fine specimen, which immediately took me back to my youth. So I did what any respectable girl from the Grove would have done. I broke out my recipe book and searched for the letter Z; you know the one that's always bringing up the rear.

As we put the summer of 2009 behind us (according to both the calendar, the end of the Red Sox season and my thermometer on this frosty morning) I felt it appropriate to share this recipe with you. So here it is. May it generate as many happy memories for your children as it has for me.

Mom's Zucchini Bread

4 eggs (farm fresh, if possible - mine came from Holiday Brook Farm)
2 cups sugar
Beat until creamy.
Then add:
3 cups zucchini (grated)
1 cup vegetable oil
2 tsp. vanilla (I highly recommend Baldwin's)
Mix and add:
3 cups flour (King Arthur)
1 tsp. salt
1 tsp. cinnamon (I use more like a Tablespoon)
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. cloves
1 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. allspice
1 1/2 cups coconut

Makes 2 large or 7 small loaves. Bake for 1 hour @ 350*. I like to sprinkle a little cinnamon & sugar on top before baking.

The perfect accompaniment to your morning coffee or afternoon tea! Try kicking it up a notch by toasting or grilling a slice - YUM!

Bon Appetit!

Perfect Pork Tenderloin

2009-10-08T20:15:00.005-04:00

Those of you who check in regularly have heard me wax poetic about the pastured pork we've been buying from Holiday Brook Farm. We've tried a number of cuts and have loved them all. So when I stumbled upon this recipe for Peach Chipotle Pork Tenderloin over at In Our Grandmothers' Kitchen, I knew I had to try that recipe with their tenderloin.

As I suspected, it was outstanding! I actually made a couple batches of the peach chipotle sauce. The first I made according to the directions (that batch is in the freezer). The second time I used a generous Tablespoon of dark brown sugar and 1/4 cup or so of grade B maple syrup (also from Holiday Brook Farm). That's the batch I used to make the pork tenderloin.

As you can see, I let it carmelize into delectable treat for the senses (okay, maybe not sight, but my sense of smell, taste and touch more than made up for that). This one's a keeper for sure!

I served this with a side of fresh brussel sprouts from our CSA, which were roasted in a touch of extra virgin olive oil and Borsari seasoning. Last, but not least, one of the last, fresh, local ears of corn of the season.

Bon Appetit!

Sometimes Less IS More

2009-10-06T20:57:00.006-04:00

I'd been staring at a half head of green cabbage in my fridge for nearly a week, trying to decide what I was going to do with it. This was no average cabbage you see - it was the ginormous variety from our CSA....grown with TLC, it was destined for something special.

I spent some time on one of my favorite recipe sites and stumbled upon this recipe for Frizzled Cabbage. A half hour later, I was eating one of the most delicious side dishes I've ever had. Four ingredients - it doesn't get much easier. Okay, maybe I'm over simplifying things. I took creative liberties with the recipe and added a sliced onion to the mix. I also used Borsari in place of salt (with LOTS of black pepper).

This is what my recipe looked like at what would be the finishing point for most people.

I kicked it up another notch and carmelized those veggies just a wee bit more.

This will be a regular dish in our household during cabbage season from now on.

Bon Appetit!

Roasted Turnips

2009-10-05T09:47:00.005-04:00

We got some of those little hakurei salad turnips last week in our share, but I wasn't making salad so I decided to try something a little different. I love root vegetables roasted, so I tossed these in the oven. Pretty good, though my husband was a far bigger fan than I was.

Ingredients:

5 fairly good sized hakurei turnips (about 1 1/2 cups diced), diced
1 tablespoon butter, melted
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
salt and pepper to taste
garlic powder to taste (I think in the future I'd just throw some peeled garlic cloves right on the pan with the turnips!)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees
Place diced turnips in a large oven safe dish or jelly roll pan
Stir together remaining ingredients
Drizzle butter mixture over turnips, stir to coat.

Cook until fork-tender and browned, stirring occasionally. I'm not going to give you a time as it depends on how small you diced the turnips, but I'd start checking after 20 minutes, though it took me 40 minutes to cook mine.

They come out a nice blend of sweet with a touch of sour from the vinegar. A nice side dish, and something a little different then the way I usually eat them, raw in a salad.

Yogurt--it's not just for hippies anymore

2009-10-03T14:15:00.006-04:00

It's cooking season again, as my husband says. I made yogurt yesterday; I made it regularly for a while, but took the summer off. I guess I wasn't looking for rich dairy products in the hot weather.

Dusted off the yogurt maker--yup, I do it the easy way with the little glass jars instead of the way my doctor makes it, in a chipped earthenware bowl, on the counter, wrapped in a sweater that gives it just the right amount of warmth. When I told her I had a yogurt maker, she basically called me a wimp. Whatever--I wasn't gonna argue with her--she knows my darkest secrets!

I guess the biggest issue with making yogurt is the milk. It's got to be processed by the dairy at lower temperatures than the supermarket milk--can't be "ultra-pasteurized." The higher-temp flash pasteurization kills all the good microbes and your yogurt will never set up. Luckily, we can get just that kind of milk locally at Shaw Farm in Dracut. They do the lower-temp pasteurization, not the flash kind, and it makes lovely, tangy yogurt. I'd love to get my hands on some raw milk, but the germ-phobes around here won't let anyone sell it. Julie, I know your neck of the woods has some places you can procure it, sometimes surreptitiously if you say it's for your cats!

I also use a powdered yogurt culture, as in the past I've used already-made yogurt for my culture, and it's hit and miss whether the new batch'll set up.

The Girl helped me with the yogurt-making, and she was surprised that it mainly consists of boiling the milk, cooling it a bit, mixing the culture, and pouring it into the jars. Then it's into the yogurt-maker for 12 hours. If you do this in the morning, you can put the jars in the fridge overnight and have fresh yogurt for breakfast. That's what we all did this morning.

Let me tell you, it's tangy. Definitely not like the candy-flavored yogurt my kids used to clamor for (bubble gum? Are you KIDDING me?) but so good with honey or jam mixed in. Plus it's healthy for your, ...um, ...how do I say, your innards. Eat a jar of this stuff every morning and you'll be talking about your happy colon on national TV just like Jamie Lee Curtis. :)

Butternut Squash Soup

2009-10-03T11:04:00.003-04:00

One of my favorite fall/winter dishes is butternut squash soup. I don't have a picture yet as we haven't gotten any butternut squash from our CSA this year, but I'm posting this recipe for my sister-in-law.

I originally got this recipe from my other sister-in-law, who made it for Thanksgiving a few years back. I've been making it ever since!

Ingredients:
2 Tablespoons honey
3 Tablespoons vegetable oil
Approx. 3 lbs butternut squash, halved lengthwise and seeded
2 yellow onions, peeled and quartered
1 or 2 Granny Smith apples, peeled, quartered, and cored (okay to use other varieties of apples, though tart, firm apples are best)
5 cups chicken broth
salt and pepper
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 cup half and half
1/3 cup coarsely chopped pistachios (I put them in a ziplock, squeeze the air out and seal, then pound them with a mallet) OPTIONAL
Balsamic vinegar OPTIONAL

Preheat oven to 450.

In a small bowl, stir together honey and oil. Arrange squash, onion, and apples on a rimmed cookie sheet. Brush the cut side of the squash and all the onion and apples with the honey mixture. Bake, until tender and well browned, approx 1 hour. Remove from oven, let cool.

Scoop out squash and add the squash, onion, and apple to a large soup pot over medium heat. Add stock, salt, pepper, and nutmeg. Bring to a simmer over medium heat. Partially cover and cook until very tender, approx. 20 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.

****NOTE: you can stop here and put it in the refrigerator for a day if you'd like*****

In a blender or food processor, puree soup in batches until smooth. Return to pot and place over medium heat. Stir in half and half and bring to a simmer.

Serve with pistachios sprinkled on top. Or, if you're dealing with nut allergies (or just want to try something a little different), it's also good with a drizzle of balsamic vinegar swirled on top of each bowl. Though quite honestly, the pistachios are better, says the mom of the kid with a severe pistachio allergy! So it's balsamic vinegar in our house...

New CSA

2009-09-30T07:41:00.003-04:00

First, an apology: whoa, I haven't posted in a while! For those of you who don't read my personal blog, I have a pretty good excuse--we welcomed our 3rd child five weeks ago. As I'm sure none of you are shocked to hear, not much imaginative cooking is getting done in our house. We've been eating a lot of salads (and sandwiches and bowls of cereal!). Don't worry, I have been doing some cooking, relying on tried-and-true recipes, like Jules' sausage kale soup, roasted garbanzo beans with swiss chard, and of course chocolate zucchini cake!

The other big exciting change in our lives is that we moved (4 days before lil' Z-man was born, but that's a whole 'nother story!). It's been great, except one thing: we're really too far away from our CSA at our new house. We've belonged to Waltham Fields Community Farm for the past two years, and I can't even tell you how awesome it's been. I absolutely love, love, love them! But now it takes nearly an hour to get there, sometimes more like an hour and a half if I'm fighting rush hour traffic. They've pushed up their renewals from January to October (now!!), so I was forced to make a decision with heavy heart not to renew our share.

So now I have to decide what to do for next summer. I'm looking into CSAs in the Nashoba Valley area (basically, anywhere kind of near 495 between Rte 3 and Rte 2, or even southern New Hampshire in the general vicinity of Nashua). I've been looking at Bear Hill Farm (Lisa, I hope you'll chime in!), and Dragonfly Farm, plus a few others I saw on Local Harvest. Anyone have any recommendations for me?

Alternately, I could just plan to shop the farmers' markets next summer. That supports local farms as well and may work better with the little man's nap schedule (whatever that ends up being!) than a shorter pickup window with a CSA. Plus, there's generally a wider selection at farmers' markets...things like bread, cheese, eggs, meat, fish, and fruit. I don't know, though; I really like the set up of a CSA.

It might be moot. I might pick a CSA and end up waitlisted for next summer anyway. But now's the time to start thinking.

Anyway, any opinions would be welcome, and I should be back with recipes soon!

Colorful Corn Salad

2009-09-26T15:24:00.004-04:00

I grew up in a family where the parental units believed that the only way to eat corn is to put a pot of water on to boil just prior to racing out to the garden to harvest what you need. You then race back to the house, shuck it and drop it into the pot! Fortunately, we live right around the corner from a sweet little farm stand (which operates by the honor system - I just love that), so I'm able to eat my sweet corn pretty close to the fashion in which I'm accustomed. During August and September, corn is pretty much a staple in our household.

This recipe was passed on to me by my friend, Megan, who was raving about it as we were talking about our respective picnic menus for the James Taylor concerts at Tanglewood.

I picked up some corn at Bittersweet Farm, grabbed some cherry tomatoes and honey from The Bradley Farm at our local farmers' market and snipped some cilantro as part of our CSA share at Holiday Brook Farm and followed these instructions exactly.

Grill 4 or 5 ears of corn brushed with olive oil until they are nice and charred. Slice corn off the cob and combine it with one pint of cherry tomatoes, sliced in half and 4-5 avocados cubed.

Whisk together 1/4 cup rice wine vinegar, 1 Tablespoon of honey, the juice of two lines and 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil. Add a handful of chopped cilantro and pour over veggies. Chill and serve.

I felt a couple slices of toasted pepperoni bread from Blossoming Acres (one of my favorite vendors at the aforementioned farmer's market)was the ideal accompaniment; I was right.

Bon Appetit!

Perfect Peach Pound Cake

2009-09-20T19:55:00.004-04:00

I knew the moment I "met" Tinky that ours was a most special relationship. Her wit, her style, her love and support of local farmers/producers......her recipes!

Yesterday I went to our local farmers' market specifically to pick up some peaches so I could make her summer peach pound cake. I followed her recipe exactly and man, oh man. The combination of buttery goodness and succulent peaches....let's just say it's no coincidence it's called pound cake. You could easily pack on the pounds with this one!

If you have never visited Tinky's blog, do yourself a favor and stop on by.

Bon Appetit!

All American Apple Pie

2009-09-16T05:00:00.001-04:00

Apple picking is one of my favorite fall activities and we are fortunate to live near Barlett's orchard which features fantastic views, a large variety of apples (within H-man's reach) and world famous cider donuts. Okay, that may be a slight exaggeration, but I dare you to stop by for a warm batch some morning and argue the fact with me.

We've actually been known to go apple picking three, four, even five times a season as different varieties ripen and become available for picking.

Labor Day the H-man and I headed out for some Paula Reds and Jonamacs (and some pick your own raspberries).

As soon as we got home, I selected a few tasty looking morsels and settled in to make a pie. But oh, which recipe to follow? Should I go with (what was) my favorite pie recipe, handed down to me by my BFF's mother? Or should I venture out on a limb and try something new? I opted for the latter and dug out my wrinkled copy of this apple pie recipe from King Arthur. The exception being the crust. My mom makes a mean crust and if it ain't broke, why fix it...so this is how I make my crust.

Pie Crust (Recipe courtesy of Betty aka Julie's mom)

2 cups flour

2 tsp. salt

1 cup crisco

Mix together and add:

1 T vinegar (I like to use cider vinegar)

1 egg

3 T. cold water

Fold the dough over and over to bring it all together. Once it's completely mixed, divide it in half. Pat into two disks of equal size (I like to do this on parchment paper).

Roll each disc on its edge, like a wheel, to smooth out the edges (this is a King Arthur trick). This will ensure your dough will roll out evenly, without a lot of cracks and splits at the edges.

Roll out one disc to circle that's large enough to overlap the rim of your pie pan by an inch all the way around (if you're not sure how to judge that, place your pie pan upside down on your rolled out crust to get an idea of whether you're finished rolling.....or not). Repeat for top crust.

This recipe turned out FANTABULOUS (just ask my waistline) and will be my new "go to" apple pie recipe. Be sure to check out King Arthur's boiled cider . I'm convinced it takes and "okay pie" and pushes it over the top to the best. pie. ever. Try it! I bet you'll never make another pie without it.

I've got another apple recipe all dusted off and ready to go. Cortlands will be ready this weekend too. Coincidence? I think not.

What is YOUR favorite apple recipe and how did it find it's way into your recipe box?

Bon Appetit!

Harvest Soup

2009-09-14T19:06:00.004-04:00

As I commented on Lisa's post below, the cool, crisp days of autumn move me to cook. Okay, okay, before someone points out to me that the official start of autumn is still a week away, let me go on record as saying I know it's not here yet, but it feels like it is and that's the only excuse I need.

Last weekend I found our fridge/pantry loaded with kale, sweet link sausage, garlic, tender young leeks, fresh potatoes and free range chicken stock. If you've never had free range chicken, I have to say - "what ever are you waiting for?" Once you discover what chicken is really supposed to taste like, you will be hard pressed to buy chicken from your local grocer, but I digress.

I decided these ingredients were begging (yes, the food in our household often speaks to me) to be combined into a soup for the soul that would be greater than the sum of it's parts. Who was I to begrudge them their final wish? And so I began....

I tossed a few cloves (3-4) of chopped garlic, 4 tender, young leeks (again, chopped) and sliced sausage (casing removed) into a stock pot. In the meantime, I quickly chopped a few potatoes (probably 1 1/2 cups worth) into bite-size chunks and tossed them into the pot. The sausage (from pastured pork raised at Holiday Brook Farm alongside the veggies in this soup) was pretty lean so I actually had to add a bit of butter to the mixture to get the potatoes to brown. Then I added a healthy dose of kale (probably 3-4 cups loosely packed) torn into bite-sized pieces with stems removed, along with a cup or so of chicken stock. Once the kale began to wilt, I added another 3 cups or so of chicken stock. I let this simmer for a while...maybe 30 minutes or so, then tossed in a can of white beans. I really debated on whether to do that, since everything else was sourced locally, but it just needed the beans.

This honestly was one of THE best soups I've ever made. Much of that was, I'm sure, due to fabulous, fresh ingredients. But I'm also going to take a little credit for the recipe. The photo below doesn't even begin to do it justice, but here it is. This one's for you, Meg!

Bon Appetit!

Zucchini overflow

2009-09-13T09:41:00.005-04:00

Seriously, what to do with more zucchini?! It's an every-summer problem that has plagued mankind for decades...OK, it has plagued me, at least, for 5 years. I ran across a couple of recipes the other day for zucchini relish. Like sweet pickle relish, but with, well, you know. Wow, good way to "get rid of" some of those green goblins sitting on my counter and in the crisper.

Again, as is my habit, I took a survey of the recipes out in the web-o-sphere and then took the best parts of the ones I liked to make my own.

It was very easy--chop, mix, heat, stir. I also added the extra "preserve" step, but you don't really have to do that, if you're going to eat most of it soon, or keep one jar for yourself and give the rest away with the priviso that the recipients keep it in the fridge and eat it within a month.

The amounts listed here make about four half-pint jars, but as always you can scale it up with no problems. I wouldn't double or triple the hot pepper flakes, though.

I roughly chopped about 3 medium zucchini, a medium onion, and one bell pepper (I used red for color), and then ran it through the food processor. The initial rough chop helps to keep the processor chop uniform. Put the mixture in a colander over a bowl and sprinkle with 2 tablespoons salt to draw out the water in the vegetables. Let them stand about an hour or so. Drain the water off and then rinse the chopped vegs. and drain well again. Combine about a cup and a half of sugar, 1 to 2 teaspoons celery seed, 1 teaspoon mustard seed, and a cup of cider vinegar in a saucepan. Add a pinch of hot red pepper flakes, or however much heat you want. I bet you could also add one small, finely minced jalapeno pepper to your vegetable mixture if you like it really hot and really sweet. Bring this mixture to a boil. Add the chopped, drained vegetables, stir, and simmer about 10 minutes.

If you are going to simply refrigerate the relish, cool it off a bit before putting it in your containers, some to keep, and some to give away. If you are going to can it, pack your hot relish into your hot prepared half-pint jars, leaving about a quarter-inch of headspace, and put on your lids and rings. Process 10 minutes in your boiling-water canner. Let sit overnight without jostling and make sure your lids have the concave-vacuum seal.

I haven't tried the relish on my hot dogs yet, but we did make tartar sauce (mix w/mayo) for our fish sticks the other night and it was excellent--tasted just like real sweet pickle relish! So...another solution for those green monstrosities on our counters.

What moves you to cook?

2009-09-06T17:14:00.004-04:00

I know, I'm hardly the first to blog about this subject, but we saw the movie "Julie and Julia" recently and it really got me thinking. I'd read both of the books on which the movie is based; loved them both, lent them to friends, etc. I really enjoyed the movie, and so did my husband. We came out of the movie inspired to cook even more.

The following day I decided to go get some delicious late-summer strawberries that my local farm grows and make a strawberry tart from Julia's original "Mastering the Art of French Cooking." I've had both volumes for years and have cooked a number of French recipes from them, but I'd never made any desserts. I'm just not the dessert person. Eating it, yes; making it, no. The tart came out pretty good, I think. It wasn't picture-perfect, but my family didn't mind--they gobbled it nonetheless.

Now, I won't reprint the "Tarte aux Fraises" recipe here--anybody with a search engine can find that. I'm not trying to show off my mad cooking skills (OK, Deb, stop laughing, maybe just a little). And I'm not saying that everybody has to run to the kitchen and make a difficult pastry. I've made tarts I've liked just as much from bought pie crust, pudding, and fruit. I'm just saying that I was inspired to cook something out of my comfort zone by someone who wrote something long before I was born.

My point: What are you inspired to cook? What moves you to cook--maybe a change of seasons, a book, a movie, a cooking show on TV? I'd be really interested to hear...

Family Friendly Food

2009-09-05T20:47:00.006-04:00

I can't believe it's been (gulp) weeks since I've posted. A constant stream of company (yes, mom and dad, I'm blaming this partially on you - ha, ha) and an uncooperative USB port on our laptop has put a damper on my usual banter.

Now that things have settled down a bit ('though I still need to address the USB issue), I hope to be back to our regularly scheduled programming!
With the fabulous variety of local fruits and vegetables that are available right now, I've been cooking up a storm and have a lot to share!

We're fortunate (knock wood) that the H-man is a pretty decent vegetable eater. At least when it comes to the usual suspects such as cucumbers, peas, green beans, broccoli, asparagus and corn. I love the fact that he's exposed to new and unusual veggies through our CSA (as well as new and unusual varieties of his favorites).

He's not a huge meat eater, although he is getting better, but I'm told that's pretty normal for a four year old. Pasta on the other hand......he would live on it if I let him! One of our favorite family meals is pasta with garlic, broccoli (sometimes chicken) doused in olive oil, a dash of salt and lots of fresh ground pepper. I was recently able to make this dish with local garlic, broccoli and leftover meat from our first roasted free range chicken (which was beyond delicious). Here's what I do. Note: it's not exactly gourmet cuisine, but I know from talking to friends with toddler to pre-school aged children, finding new and nutritional items to add to your repertoire can sometimes seem daunting.

Prepare enough of your favorite pasta for one family meal, plus some extra for leftovers. During the homestretch of the boiling phase (the last 3-5 minutes or so), toss in broccoli, which has been cut into florets (I add 1-2 cups of broccoli for 1/2 pound or so of pasta).

In the meantime, saute several sliced cloves of garlic in a couple Tablespoons of EVOO. Toss in chicken (I've used raw chicken tenderloins or breast as well as leftovers from a roasted chicken here - both work, you just need to adjust your cooking time accordingly).

Once you drain the pasta/broccoli combo, toss it into the chicken, garlic, EVOO mixture and cook until the flavors meld (we like our pasta to saute a bit too).

Serve it up and watch it disappear!
Bon appetit.

Channeling Provence: A New England Ratatouille

2009-08-09T11:57:00.002-04:00

As the weeks go by and summer becomes late summer (and soon to be fall - yikes!), our CSA shares change with the harvest. For the first time this past week, we got eggplant in our shares. Naturally, being raised in a suburban wonderland where all pizza places bread, fry and dump marinara sauce on their eggplant, I thought of eggplant parmigiana.

I pulled out Joy of Cooking, found the eggplant section and flipped to the page for eggplant parmigiana. And right next to that recipe was the recipe for ratatouille provencale. I must admit that I did not know that ratatouille had eggplant in it. I've seen the movie but I guess I wasn't paying very close attention. I decided I should try something new and give the recipe a try. Sorry, eggplant parm.

Looking it over, it's easy to see why this is such a classic French summer dish. In addition to the eggplant, it incorporates zucchini, bell pepper, tomatoes, garlic, onions and herbs. New England seems to have this in common with Provence because I was able to find almost all the ingredients I needed at the farmer's market. This dish may be French in conception but can be wonderfully local here in Massachusetts.

There are so many versions of this recipe and as long as you respect the basic concept (layering of the summer garden flavors), you will be pleased with the results. I broke with tradition and added some soft, creamy, crumbled chevre on top. Again, more French inspiration, locally sourced!

Bon Apetit!

-Nicole

Lamenting

2009-08-08T14:43:00.003-04:00

Call me pollyanna, but I'm still refusing to believe "the farm" is going to lose it's entire tomato and potato crop. Even though, "some of the potato varieties are dying and the tomatoes don't look that good" (Desiree's words). And all of the surrounding farms have lost their crops to Late Blight. Sigh.

Tomatoes with a Twist

2009-08-04T18:36:00.006-04:00

Amanda Cather's newsletter on late blight literally brought goosebumps to my arms and tears to my eyes. This small glimpse into what many of our ancestors were up against as they settled this great land overwhelms me. At that time, a regional disaster such as this could mean the difference between life or death for members of a family, which made their living off of the land. It's really scary when you think about that.

I'd like to think we've come a long way in some regards. While I cringe at the devastation late blight has caused (and will continue to cause) in the surrounding region this year, I hope that by participating in a CSA (and/or supporting local farmers at farm stands or farmers' markets) we are ensuring that said farms (and future generations of those who run them) are here tomorrow.
Having said all that....I've been harboring this post since WhataCard posted about her disappointment at the total loss of her CSA's tomato crop. I kind of felt like I was sitting her (safely 2.25 hours away from WaC) saying nonny, nonny, boo, boo as I dined on these delectable treats. I've given it a lot of thought since then and finally came to the conclusion that if ever there were a time to rejoice in the glorious bounty we receive from this great earth, this is one of those times. So without further adieu.....

Tomatoes with Mint

This is a bit of a twist on the usual tomato, basil and mozzarella salad. My parents were visiting last week and brought us a large bag of cherry tomatoes from their garden. After eating them in salads for a few days, I sliced the remaining red morsels in half, tossed them with some fresh mint from the garden and sprinkled a little sugar on top. This is VERY refreshing (especially on a hot, humid summer day).

One of my other favorite combinations is sliced tomatoes and chunks of Great Hill Blue Cheese, a local favorite, drizzled with A.O.C. Extra Virgin Olive Oil from the Valle des Baux in Provence sourced from Bizalions in Great Barrington, MA and sprinkled with fresh ground salt and pepper. Add a loaf of your favorite bread and a bottle of wine......

Bon Appetit!

Summer Squash in Coconut Milk, plus, the risk side of the CSA

2009-07-31T09:18:00.003-04:00

I didn't take a picture last night, but here's YASSR (Yet Another Summer Squash Recipe...with all the squash, can we ever have too many recipes??) I found this recipe written on the board at the CSA pick up this week, and decided to try it when I got home. Quick, easy, yummy!

Ingredients:

3 or 4 medium sized summer squash (any varieties)
8 or so leaves of fresh Thai (purple) basil
A few sprigs of fresh parsley
A small handful of fresh cilantro
About half a can of coconut milk
Pinch of salt

Directions:

Cut the squash into bite-sized pieces.

Chop up all the herbs. Chiffonade, anyone? I just jammed all the other herbs inside the basil, rolled it up, and chopped!

Add the squash and herbs to a frying pan, and pour enough coconut milk to cover the bottom of the pan completely.

Cook over medium heat until done to your liking. Season with a little salt.

Quite tasty, easy, and a little different from the normal ways I prepare squash!

_____________________

And on the flip side, I wanted to talk for a minute or two about the inherent risk of a CSA. Part of what I like about a CSA is that it's a *SHARE* of a harvest. If there's a good harvest, presumably you'll get a good share size. But if it's a bad harvest, well, you might not get such a big share.

This year, our CSA is taking a huge hit: tomatoes. We probably won't get any. They were hit by late blight. It's not just our CSA, it's throughout the northeast, so I'm guessing many of you reading are in the same situation, with tomatoes and/or potatoes affected.

I won't lie...it's a disappointment. But I'm glad I belong to a CSA, where the loss of a huge crop like tomatoes means just that: disappointment. Presumably not something that leads to the demise of a farm.

Our latest CSA newsletter had a great article about losing the tomatoes. Tammy at Food on the Food has reprinted it on her blog. Worth a read (not to mention sticking around and peeking at the rest of her blog...it's wonderful, and the first blog I started reading way back when I first got interested in eating locally.)

Buckets o'blues

2009-07-28T08:00:00.000-04:00

Blueberries are my favorite fruit, not only to eat, but especially to cook. You don't have to peel them, like apples; you don't have to pit them AND peel them, like peaches; and you don't have to wait for the eeexxaaccttt right moment of ripeness to use them, like pears. Blueberries are happy to wait for you in the fridge, content to hang out till you're ready to use them.
My family picked pounds--like, 12 of 'em--of blueberries the other day at a pick-your-own in the next town over. We met just about everybody we knew there, doing the same thing we were: Greedily stocking up on an incredible taste that would be around for just a few weeks. My kids have heard this so often in the last couple of years that they finish the sentence for me now: "Now that we've preserved these, we can get them out in the middle of winter and..." And the kids chime in: "We'll have a taste of summer!"
What did we do with these pounds of berries? Pie, of course (blueberry pie's the fave for breakfast around here), berries and cream, some nice cobbler, and just a bowl of the sweet things on the table at breakfast, lunch, and dinner.
Oh, and the blueberry jam I was threatening to make. Double batch, reduced-sugar recipe, lids and rings, real canned jam. Absolutely delicious--even my jam-shy husband has been eating it by the spoonful. I used a special type of pectin that my friend Deb researched and ordered (www.pomonapectin.com). Instead of the supermarket-pectin recipe, which uses 6 cups of fruit and 7 cups of sugar, the reduced-sugar kind calls for 8 cups of fruit and anywhere from 1 to 4 cups of sugar. I split the difference and used about 3 of sugar. Now, I'm not the sugar police, not even close (just look in my cabinets), but when I eat jam I want to taste fruit!

The good and the bad

2009-07-20T14:00:00.000-04:00

You want to hear something really neat? My CSA featured my recipe for zucchini pancakes in their newsletter! How cool and awesome are they? It is a really yummy way to have zucchini! I mean, almost as good as zucchini brownies!

Now the bad: they linked in the recipe incorrectly, so the blog is getting tons of hits to "page not found".

So, I figured I'd post the link here, in case anyone makes it from the CSA newsletter to our main blog page. Enjoy, and feel free to poke around the other recipes...there's a list of ingredients you can choose on the right side of the page. If anyone's visiting here from Waltham Fields Community Farm, welcome!

Lotsa lettuce

2009-07-20T07:40:00.002-04:00

(Whoops, sorry about previous post. I was trying to "paste" and did the keyboard command for "post" instead.)

Seems like we're swimming in lettuce these days. We got some from our CSA, our friend brought us some from her garden, and I can't seem to resist the lovely furled heads at the Farmers' Market. The Husband and I can only eat so much salad, and The Boy and The Girl aren't much for the lettuce. All the other crunchy vegetables you'd put on a salad--tomatoes, cukes, peppers, pea pods--they gobble up, but they haven't yet gotten a taste for lettuce. I was looking for a way to use my surplus and ran a good one: It's all over the web, under such various names as "Asian Lettuce Wraps" and "Meat Rolls." My lovely non-PC children call it "Chinese Tacos." Actually, I think it's more akin to meals I've had in Korean restaurants, what with the dolloping, the garnishing, the wrapping.
All I know is that it's a good thing I bought extra lettuce at the Farmers' Market, because my kids, under the guise of Chinese Tacos, snarfed an ENTIRE head of lettuce, forcing me to hop up and wash/spin another head! It wasn't just an aberration, either; we've had this three times in the last month and each time they eat themselves silly.
The recipe I'm using is kind of cobbled together from a couple I saw, plus a few extra touches of my own. Whatever you call it, it's terrific!
Here's how I've been doing it: Rinse and spin dry a whole head of Bibb or other butter-type lettuce, being careful not to tear them. Brown a pound of ground turkey or pork in a large skillet. When the meat is nearly cooked, add about half a chopped onion and a clove of minced garlic and saute. When onion is cooked, add 1-2 Tbsp. soy sauce, 1/4 cup hoisin sauce, 1-2 tsp. grated ginger root, 1 Tbsp. rice wine vinegar, and a dash or two of hot sauce (optional). Stir constantly for a few minutes until all is combined and cooked through. Add 2-3 chopped scallions and a scant teaspoon of toasted sesame oil; stir. Arrange your whole lettuce leaves around the outer edge of a large serving platter and pile meat mixture in the center.

Each diner takes a lettuce leaf and spoons a portion of meat into the middle. Garnish with finely julienned carrot and cucumber plus some bean sprouts if you like them. Wrap the lettuce around the filling like a burrito. It's messy, but delicious!

Scallops and Chard

2009-07-19T10:08:00.005-04:00

Those who know me are well aware that I am New Englander, through and through. My palate is evidence enough of that. My father loves to tell people the story of when, at three years of age, I requested lobster for lunch at a carnival instead of a hot dog or hamburger. And my love of shellfish and many other New England staples only seems to grow with time. So, joining a CSA and trying to eat more locally (and get more creative with recipes) has been a lot of fun.

Unfortunately, I don't cook often because my husband is not home much but he was in between projects and I had him for 2 weeks straight! Needless to say, the pots and pans got a lot of use! And he shares my love of shellfish so pretty much any recipe I attempt in that area is gobbled right up.

Last weekend, I tried a scallop recipe that was somewhat created in my mind and somewhat ripped off of various internet sources. My culinary skills are still in their infancy so I almost always look to other recipes for guidance. We had picked up a pound of scallops at the farmer's market and for some reason, I really wanted to eat them with sauteed spinach. I figured I could sub in some CSA chard for the spinach and it would be just as good. Here's what I did:

Marinate 1 lb. scallops in dressing - I chose Drew's Soy Ginger dressing. Added crushed red pepper for some heat. Let it marinate for at least one hour in the fridge.

Saute +8 torn chard leaves (or another green, if you like) in olive oil, salt, garlic and more crushed red pepper.

Saute scallops (I used a separate pan but you could probably use the same one as the greens) until cooked through.

Toss greens and scallops together over heat to let flavors come together, salt to taste and serve!

We will definitely be making this again as we never seem to tire of seafood. It's just the New England in me!

-Nicole

A Day in the Life of a CSA

2009-07-18T13:32:00.010-04:00

By now you've heard us wax poetic about our respective CSA's and the beautiful and tasty bounty we receive from them each week. But what exactly does a CSA "pickup" or "share" look like?

Our goods this week were so striking, I decided I had to take a picture of them before I started cooking, so that's what part of this post is all about. The photo above consists of: Red Russian Kale (that is what's in the plastic storage bag), Beets, Scallions (hiding under the Carrots), Red Cabbage, New Potatoes, Carrots and Shell Peas. Additional options included Broccoli (we've been on the run a lot this week and have a bunch from last week, so we passed on that) and Senposai Collards.

Our CSA operates in a "market style" fashion, which means you pick and choose from the week's offerings until you fill your "share". The farm has generously provided us with customized canvas bags (small bags for small shares, which equal approximately 1/4 bushel of produce a week and large bags for large shares, which equal approximately 1/2 bushel of produce a week - we have a small share for our small family). One of the things I love most about this style of distribution is we get the most bang for our buck - taking advantage of the things we love (and new things we want to try), while leaving others that we don't. Or in the case of this week's broccoli - opting out because we still have some at home.

Up until this week I had passed on the Kale. Even though our CSA offers a few different varieties, I've never found a recipe for Kale that rendered it palatable to me. That is until now....

Some of the members of our CSA have been making Kale Chips. This concept intrigued me. I love chips. If I can find a way to justify eating them regularly....well, that would be almost like winning the lottery! (Hey, I said almost.) I didn't have a particular recipe to go by - this was passed along from Desiree at Holiday Brook Farm by word of mouth. I baked them in a convection oven, which worked perfectly, if that option is open to you! Without further adieu, this is what I did...

Tear Kale into bite sized pieces (I was not too particular about this, some of my pieces were small; others were quite large). Toss with a little olive oil and your favorite sea salt or seasoned salt (I used Borsari). Spread out flat on a large cookie sheet. Bake in a preheated 400 degree oven, keeping close watch on them. Remove from oven when Kale is crispy (and before they are completely toast colored).

I don't know that this recipe has convinced me to to out and search for Kale on a regular basis, but I do enjoy these and will be making this recipe from time to time. Bon Appetit!

Shrimp Boil - A One Pot Meal

2009-07-14T20:52:00.006-04:00

This is one of my favorite summertime recipes. It's quick and simple, full of local flavors and good for you too! Top it off with an ice cold beer and it's pretty much the perfect meal on a steamy summer evening (or a cool one too)!

My sister is visiting from VA (by way of New London, CT) and brought some shrimp from Captain Scotts Lobster Dock. The corn is "local" from the grocer (which means it's probably from Hadley, MA) and the new potatoes are from the farm stand on Tamarack Road - just around the corner.

Ingredients:
1 lemon, quartered
5 T Cajun seasoning
2 1/2 tsps. cayenne
2 bay leaves
4 garlic cloves
8 small boiling potatoes (about 2")
4 ears of corn, shucked and halved
1 1/2 pounds large shrimp in the shell (but deveined)
1/3 cup ketchup
1/3 cup mayonnaise
1 1/2 T horseradish

Preparation:
Squeeze lemon juice into 4 qt. water in a 6-8 quart pot, then stir in lemon quarters, cajun seasoning, 2 tsp. cayenne, bay leaves, garlic, potatoes, and 2 T salt (omit salt if it is the first ingreident in seasoning).

Bring to a boil, then simmer, partially covered, until potatoes are almost tender, 10-12 minutes.

Increase heat to high, then add corn and simmer, partially covered, 4 minutes.

Stir shrimp and cook until just cooked through, 2-3 minutes.

Meanwhile, stir together ketchup, mayonnaise, horseradish and remaining 1/2 teaspoon cayenne. Drain shrimp, potatoes and corn and serve with sauce.

This recipe from epicurious came to me by way of Cate Robichaud McLean. As you can see, I served this up with a side of snap peas sauteed in a bit of olive oil with a pinch of Borsari seasoning.

Bon Appetit!

Ruby orbs of tastiness

2009-07-12T23:00:00.003-04:00

Beets are a funny thing. I spent most of my childhood avoiding them; my father grew them every year in his very large Italian-immigrant-guy garden. They appeared on our table constantly, in all guises: steamed, boiled, roasted, pickled, shredded. I tasted them a few times, probably all times before the age of 10. My verdict: "They taste like red dirt." So I didn't eat them again for almost 30 years.

We started getting them, of course, with our CSA share. And, predictably, I had palmed them off every time on my friends. My neighbor has Russian relatives, so she knew just what to do with a bunch of beets. And my friend Deb used them to make borscht, which reminded her of her late mom. But then The Boy, then about 5 or 6, asked me why I kept giving our vegetables away. I promised him I'd cook them for him, silently reminding myself to "model good behavior" and not make yukky faces while I served him the beets. Surprise! He loved them. And so did I. Now we look forward to getting beets every year at the farm and sometimes even break down and buy those pretty golden ones once in a while if we go to Idlywilde Farms.

One day about two years ago, when we had a pretty good haul from the farm, The Boy decided he'd make up a salad recipe to use the things we'd gotten in our farm share. The salad consisted of roasted beets, steamed carrots, and shredded lettuce, all topped with a dollop of mayonnaise. Gulp. Well, we tried it, and he liked it, and he was eating all these vegetables, so I wasn't going to put the kibosh on THAT.

For a poolside dinner party we attended the other night, I made a slightly altered version of The Boy's salad, with the roasted beets (quartered), steamed carrot coins (cut with the crinkly carrot cutter I inherited from my late mom-in-law), and lovely butter lettuce cups. I made some lemon mayo (no, not from scratch! I doctored some Hellmann's with fresh lemon juice and zest) and served it on the side for drizzling. It made a delicious sauce to dip the beets into, and pretty much rendered the carrots and lettuce irrelevant. Sorry I couldn't take a picture of the entire composed salad, but I brought the elements of it to the party-giver's house separately so we wouldn't have blood-red lettuce, carrots, and dressing. So I just took a pic of the beets. But they're pretty enough to stand alone, don't you think?

There Are Salads and Then There Are Salads!

2009-07-11T17:11:00.005-04:00

One of the things I love about this time of year is the neverendinggoodness of fresh made salads. It doesn't matter to me whether they consist of healthy green vegetables or succulent fruits or in this case a combination of both.

We've been receiving fresh mesclun greens on a weekly basis from our CSA. I've been asking myself, "what exactly ARE those tender greens I'm enjoying"and last week's newsletter answered my question. Our mixture is a combination of arugula, mizuna, green wave, ruby streaks and red giant mustards, tat-soi and red russion kale (and sometimes spinach and/or chard). I've been adding some red or green leaf lettuce (or butter lettuce from our small garden) to the mix once I get it home.

A quick, easy and delicious lunch consists of tossing a heaping handful of the aforementioned greens with some crumbles of goat cheese, fresh sliced strawberries, which we picked ourselves at mountain view farm and candied walnuts. Drizzle a bit of really good olive oil and balsamic vinegar on top and you have a salad that's really hard to beat, at least in my book.

Bon Appetit!

Stuffed Swiss Chard

2009-07-10T08:34:00.005-04:00

I was inspired by this recipe that was posted on the cooking blog I wrote for last summer. But I didn't even click over to the real recipe, since the post mentions two fatal flaws: risotto (not my favorite), and a picky, time-consuming recipe. No thanks! So I just looked at the picture, and made my own quickie version!

Ingredients (to generously serve two people):

6 good-sized leaves swiss chard with no rips or holes
1 cup quinoa (or similar grain...I was out of quinoa so used Trader Joe's Harvest Blend, a mix of quinoa, garbanzo beans, orzo, and couscous. I've used quinoa in the past, though)
2 cups broth (veggie or chicken)
6 slices from a block of cheese (whatever variety you like...I used cheddar today, and I've used havarti in the past). The cheese should be about 1/8"-1/4" thick, and slightly less long than the size of the finished roll.
Additional broth, approximately 1 cup

Directions:

Cook quinoa according to the package directions, except use the 2 cups of broth in place of plain water. (If you do decide to use the Trader Joe's Harvest Blend, their package directions are all wrong and drive me crazy. Just use 1 cup of the grains with 2 cups of liquid. Cook for 20 minutes. If you follow the package directions, you end up with a dry, crunchy partially cooked mess!)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cut part of the thick stem out of the center of the swiss chard leaves, about 1" to 2" into the leaf section. You can see in the picture that it's okay to leave the center stem in the main section of the leaf, just get rid of the really thick part near the bottom of the leaf. Make sure you DON'T cut all of the center stem out...then your leaf will be broken in half and you won't be able to make a roll!

Place one slice of cheese in the center of each leaf. Top with a scoop of quinoa. I use a wooden spoon to scoop the quinoa...about 1 good sized wooden spoon scoop.

Fold the end of the leaf that's divided where the portion of the stem was cut out on top of the quinoa. Fold the opposite end over. Then fold in the two sides, making a roll. Place seam side down in a baking dish.

Continue until all leaves have been rolled.

Add the extra broth to the baking dish, so it come about 1/2 way up the side of the rolls. Cover the dish and bake for about 15 to 20 minutes.

The picture above is from before I baked it. Here's a picture after it came out of the oven:

You can kind of see in the back of the green leaf that some of the cheese started leaking out where I'd cut the center stem. That's the danger...you have to balance between removing the thick stem and having the filling leak! It's a fine line to walk :)

You also have to be careful removing this from the baking dish. I use two forks to support the bottoms. Get too wild, and the leaf will just come unrolled on the way to your plate and dump out all the filling! (Yes, that happened to me once, the first time I made these. As long as you're careful, though, they don't fall apart too easily.)

These are very yummy and easy to make. They do take almost an hour to prepare, but it's mostly sitting around waiting...the 20 minutes to make the quinoa and the 20 minutes to bake the rolls. The actual prep work is really quick, so I still think of this as an easy meal.

Zucchini Pancakes

2009-07-07T11:05:00.004-04:00

Growing up, my parents would sometimes grow zucchini in the backyard. And my very favorite thing about growing zucchini would be when my mom would make "zucchini blobs". So when we got our first zucchini of the year from the CSA this past week, I decided to make my kids some zucchini blobs. Though for the sake of not turning people off, I've decided to call these "zucchini pancakes"...that's really what they are, made quite similarly to potato pancakes. But if you have kids, or a weird sense of humor, feel free to call them zucchini blobs. That's what they'll always be to me!

As with all informal family recipes, these quantities are a bit footloose and fancy-free. Feel free to swap and sub and add as you see fit! For example, I keep meaning to experiment with different herbs (feeling adventurous? I was wondering what this would be like with some fresh mint added! Or maybe some basil, or rosemary, or just plain ol' parsley. If you do try adding something, I'd love to hear how it turns out for you!) But here's the basic recipe.

Ingredients:

1 medium/large zucchini, about 2 cups roughly grated
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1/4 cup bread crumbs (or more, if things seem really soupy after you mix it up)
Scant 1/4 cup Parmesan cheese
1/4 teaspoon salt
Garlic powder, onion powder to taste (or real finely diced onion and garlic if you're feeling fancy!)
Oil for frying

Directions:

Coat the bottom of a large frying pan with oil (about 1/8" deep...not too deep, but more than just a splash!) Heat over medium high heat.

Mix together all the other ingredients.

Once the oil is hot, add a spoonful of the zucchini mixture to the oil. Use the back of the spoon to flatten it into a pancake shape. Repeat, leaving a small amount of room between pancakes. Flip after about 1 minute, when the bottom is browned. Fry the other side until brown (about 1 minute), then transfer to a paper towel to drain.

That's it! You can serve these plain, or with some sour cream, or with an extra sprinkle of Parmesan cheese, or some marinara sauce. However you'd like!

Rhubarb's last gasp

2009-07-03T18:33:00.000-04:00

I know, rhubarb is a spring thing. And it's finally summer here. But I can't give up on rhubarb just yet: My two friends have been giving me parts of their rhubarb harvest for the last month or so, and I've been having a rhubarb fest. When I was a kid, we had a giant rhubarb plant that sprawled all over our garden. We'd eat what we could and preserve all the rest until the plant was exhausted. So I had a good bit of rhubarb when I was young. My father and I used to sit in the garden and chew the stringy stalks, seeing who could wait the longest to make a sour face. I always won. Come to think of it, I guess he let me win.

My friend brought me another batch of the good stuff the other day and I decided to make the rhubarb cake from the local Beyond Salmon blog (http://beyondsalmon.blogspot.com/) because the accompanying photo looked so appetizing. I kind of hated to chop it up, since it looked so nice, sitting there all preppy-pink-green on my counter. But The Girl and I chopped it up and made the cake (a very easy recipe). It was delicious; even my husband, an avowed rhubarb pooh-pooher, liked it a lot. My picture isn't as nice as the other blog's, but the cake rocked.

My rhubarb connection even told me that since her plant is getting too big for her garden, she's going to split it and give me half so I can grow my own stash. Being a black thumb, I resisted, but she prevailed and next year at this time I'll be havesting my own stalks. Who knows--now that I'm a master of jam (ha!) perhaps I'll try strawberry-rhubarb preserves. How about blue-barb? Yum.

Tzatziki with Marinated Souvlaki

2009-07-03T13:23:00.008-04:00

When I got the email from our farmer this week telling us what to expect at our pick up, I was a bit disappointed. For the first time, something I really don't like was on the list: cucumbers. I know I'm not the only one who doesn't like them but unfortunately, I also hate pickles. I considered giving them to my neighbor but thought I should at least try to find something to do with them first.

After googling a bit, I came across a recipe for tzatziki, a Greek yogurt and cucumber dip. Duh!! I'm Greek and I can't believe I didn't think of it on my own. Well, this got me all excited, mouth-watering and the menu started coming together in my mind. I had some steak tips in the freezer - I can make steak gyros! Got some tomatoes in my CSA pick up so I can throw those in gyro. And since I'll be grilling the steak tips (aka souvlaki), I may as well grill the garlic scapes I got this week. And no good meal is complete without a side salad, so I could make use of all the lettuce and strawberries I got, too. Yum! All this inspired by the lowly cucumber - this is one of the things I love about eating locally. Seasonal inspiration!

Here is the recipe for the tzatziki, and yogurt marinade:

Tzatziki (from The Joy of Cooking)

1 cup yogurt (I used non-fat Greek yogurt)
1 cucumber, peeled, seeded and finely chopped
1 tbsp dill, finely chopped
1 tbsp mint, finely chopped (I didn't have any so I doubled up on the dill)
1 tbsp olive oil
1 tbsp lemon juice
1 clove minced garlic
1/2 tsp salt

Blend all ingredients together - I used a simple blender. Leave in fridge over night to let flavors settle. Serve cold.

Cilantro Cumin Yogurt Marinade (from here) - with some of my changes

1/2 medium onion, grated
1 cup Greek yogurt
2 tbsp cilantro, finely chopped
1 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp ground black pepper

Mix all ingredients together in a large Tupperware. Add meat (in our case, 1.5lbs of steak tips), coat well, and cover. Leave in fridge overnight. Grill and serve hot.

Souvlaki with grilled garlic scapes

CSA lettuce and strawberries with Asian Sesame dressing

And here was our final product: Beef gyros with tzatziki and tomatoes

This was a perfect lunch for dining alfresco - finally we can enjoy some nice summer weather here in New England!

-Nicole

Sugar (Snap Peas) and Spice and Everything Nice

2009-07-02T19:15:00.010-04:00

To me, the arrival of peas represents a sort of rite of passage from spring to summer. They're one of the first veggies to arrive on the scene as one begins to wonder, "just how many greens can/should one person eat?" Yeah, I know peas are green, but they're sweet, crispy goodness is a totally different experience from the spring greens, which are the first veggies to arrive on the scene at farmers' markets and in CSA shares.

I know we were thrilled to see sugar snap peas on the "pick your own" board at our CSA last week. Since then, we've enjoyed them prepared a variety of different ways. Raw off the plant in the garden (does it get any better than that?). Then in a risotto, a very close second (and the perfect comfort food on these rainy New England evenings). My standard risotto recipe can be found here. I use this as my "base" and tweak it according to what I have on hand (or to achieve the flavor I'm aiming for).

This time I omitted the saffron, but added 1/4 pound of prosciutto sliced into 1/2" pieces when I added the onions. This allows the flavor of the prosciutto to permeate the other ingredients (can you say, YUM)! The other change I made was to add about 1 cup of sugar snapped peas (cut into thirds) with the last ladle of stock. This really was one of my best meals ever IMHO. Restaurant quality. The poor lighting doesn't even begin to show how good and gorgeous this dish really is.

The other new pea recipe I tried this past week was
Sauteed Sugar Snap Peas with Carrots and Ginger/Honey Glaze. This recipe was courtesy of Holiday Brook Farms' CSA Newsletter as taken from Farmer John’s Cookbook, The Real Dirt on Vegetables: Seasonal Recipes and Stories from a Community Farm.

Ingredients:
½-1lb sugar snap peas
2 medium carrots, peeled [I used half a package of baby carrots]
2 Tbsp butter
1 Tbsp honey
A couple pieces crystallized ginger, chopped fine (about 1-2 Tbsp, to taste) [I used grated fresh ginger]
Fresh ground pepper

Instructions:
Remove strings from both edges of the pea pods. Cut each carrot into thirds and slice lengthwise so that they are about the same size as the pea pods. Place carrots in a steamer basket and steam until just crisp-tender, 3-5 minutes. Melt the butter in a large skillet over medium heat and add the peas; cook, stirring frequently for 5 minutes. Add the carrots. Continue to cook until peas are bright green, about 3 minutes. Add the honey & ginger and cook for 1 more minute, stirring constantly, until the peas and carrots are glazed. Season with pepper to taste.

I'll be adding both these recipes to my recipe box. Hope you enjoy them too!

Bon Appetit!

My "all local" day

2009-06-30T09:15:00.008-04:00

Following up on my all-local day for Reduce Footprint's weekly challenge. Overall, it was a fun activity! I must admit, though, that my local "day" got spread out over a weekend as we're trying to sell our house and we kept having last minute showings at meal times. It's hard to prepare local meals when you're constantly being kicked out of the kitchen! But here was my local day plan, even if we ended up eating dinner on a different day!

First off, breakfast:

Scrambled eggs with green onions, chives, parsley, and cheese.

Eggs from Waltham Farmer's Market
Green onions and Cheddar cheese (Smith's Country Cheese) from Waltham Field Community Farm
Chives and Parsley from my garden
Butter for cooking was Kate's Homemade Butter.

Lunch:

I made some sauteed spinach for the main meal. Here's what I did:

Ingredients (for one serving):

2 bunching onions, finely diced (from Waltham Fields Community Farm)
Approximately 1/2 lb of spinach, stems removed, leaves roughly torn (from Waltham Fields Community Farm)
A few slices of Havarti ( Smith's Country Cheese)
About 1 teaspoon butter (Kate's Homemade Butter)

Directions:

Melt the butter in a skillet. Add the diced onion and saute until translucent. Add the spinach and toss until wilted, about one minute. Place the havarti on top and leave in the pan until slightly melted, about one minute. (The cheese will keep melting once you transfer to a plate, so you don't have to totally melt it).

So yummy!

On the side, I had a Macintosh apple. I know, an apple. In June. I found it at Winchester Farmers' Market. I was a little worried about an apple that had been stored all winter, but it was perfect...crisp, juicy, and flavorful. Plus a perfect accompaniment to the spinach.

Snack:

I was still hungry after lunch, so I made a snack as well. I'd picked up some hothouse tomatoes at the Winchester Farmers' Market, plus some Narragansett Creamery mozzarella also from the Winchester Farmers' Market. I also had some left over basil from the Lexington Farmers' Market. So I threw it all together.

I was a little disappointed in this. Clearly, I'm pushing the tomato season here in Massachusetts, and this dish paid the price with less than stellar results. The mozzarella was also very plain. I ended up "cheating" and adding some salt and a splash of vinegar, which improved it dramatically.

Finally, dinner:

The main part of our meal was halibut from Globe Fish Co at the Winchester Farmer's Market. We got to the market really late, and there was very little choice left for the fish so I'm not sure quite how local this really was, though at the very least, it was supporting a local vendor. There was no meat vendor at the market either (again, maybe because we were so late), so this was a last minute substitution. I added some diced green onions and thyme from the CSA, a drizzle of some melted butter, and TK cooked this on the grill.

On the side, we had some grilled garlic scapes (also with melted butter). And, at the Winchester Farmer's Market, I found some early summer squash. I diced three of them, and sauteed in some butter with thyme from the CSA and parsley from our herb garden.

Dinner was really outstanding!

For dessert, we just had a bunch of sliced strawberries. A hit with the whole family!

_______________

What did I learn from this? Well, eating 100% locally is A LOT of work. Given a busy schedule, 2 picky preschoolers, and a budget, it's probably not something I'm ready to commit to. Adding a loaf of bread to the dinner would have made the meal much more palatable to my kids*. Having pasta, rice, or quinoa available as a side dish also would have helped. And I miss olive oil.

I think it's important to be conscious of choices, and planning a 100% eat local day helped raise my consciousness of the choices I make. I'm happy I did this, as it reinforced my commitment to eat locally when possible, and to happily supplement with non-local choices when necessary to improve our largely local meals.

* I should note that I would be happy to buy bread from a local artisan bread maker, even though they don't use local ingredients...there are so many around and all look delicious! However, we haven't been able to find a nut-free bakery so can't buy local bread due to my son's nut allergies :( We're stuck with the major supermarket brands of bread...I'm just happy if I can find nut-safe, HFCS-free bread at this point!

Roasted Garbanzo Beans with Swiss Chard

2009-06-30T08:55:00.000-04:00

This isn't the most local recipe...really, besides the swiss chard, none of the ingredients were local. However, I'm always looking for ways to incorporate protein into my veggie-heavy meals during the summer. I have a bad habit of just making veggies with a side of veggies! Plus, TK and I agreed that this was one of the most delicious meals ever, and a great use of swiss chard. So I figured I'd share it for any of you looking for an awesome swiss chard recipe!

I kind of followed this Bon Appetit recipe, though with a number of minor changes.

Ingredients:

1 15.5 oz can garbanzo beans, drained
6 garlic cloves, peeled and partially crushed (just a quick hit with the side of the knife)
1 large onion, diced and divided in half
3 bay leaves
Approximately 6 to 8 good sized swiss chard leaves, stems removed and leaves coarsely torn
3 more garlic cloves, finely chopped
1 cup chicken or veggie broth
1/2 cup olive oil, plus a little more for the pan
Salt and Pepper

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Combine in a baking dish: drained garbanzo beans, the 6 peeled and crushed garlic cloves, half of the diced onion, and the 3 bay leaves. Sprinkle with salt and pepper, then add 1/2 cup olive oil. Roast for 45 minutes.

As you near the end of the 45 minute roasting time, start on the chard.

In a large pot, heat about 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium high heat. Saute the remaining garlic and onion until slightly translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the chard and toss until wilted, about 2 minutes. Add the broth, cover, and cook for about 10 minutes until the chard is tender.

Pour chard mixture into a strainer to remove the broth (it would probably be delicious! I let mine run down the drain without thinking about it and then was kicking myself!)

Remove the bay leaves from the garbanzo beans and discard.

Return the chard to the pot and add the garbanzo bean mixture. Use a slotted spoon to transfer the garbanzo beans if there's a lot of oil left in the pan. Mix it all together and heat through, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper if necessary.

Locavore for a Day

2009-06-29T09:45:00.010-04:00

On Wednesday, What a Card wrote about Reduce Footprint's weekly challenge which just happened to jive with we do over here: eating locally! The challenge was to eat only local for one whole day. I'm a newbie on the locavore scene so I knew taking on this challenge would be tough as my cupboards and fridge have only just started their transition to local foods. I picked Sunday as our day so that my husband could join in the fun.

This week, my CSA share included sugar snap peas, strawberries, salad mix, tomatoes and asparagus so I wanted to revolve our meals around those foods - not really hard! Here is what we came up with:

Breakfast: Tomato, basil and chevre omelet (tomato from the CSA; basil and chevre from Winchester Farmer's market; local brown eggs from Whole Foods)

Snack: Stonyfield Yogurt with strawberries

Lunch: Sugar snap peas sauteed in butter and salt, pan-seared asparagus and marinated steak tips (Peas and asparagus from CSA both cooked with local dairy butter; steak from Stillman's, Cilantro Lime Vinaigrette dressing for marinade by Appalachian Naturals)

Dinner: Toasted tomato, basil, mozzarella sandwiches with salad mix (tomato and salad mix from CSA; basil from Winchester Farmer's Market; hand-made mozzarella from Fiore di Nonna Cheese; salad dressing same as for steak marinade; bread from Mamadou Bakery in Winchester, MA)

Dessert: Crescent Ridge Dairy vanilla ice cream

We did cheat a bit by using salt and pepper on the peas, asparagus and steak. Not that you can't get local sea salt (you can!) but I just didn't plan that far ahead. Overall, I would say it was a great learning experience to see how easy and tasty it can be to plan your meals around local, in-season produce. I also realized that when you are eating the freshest produce available, you don't need a lot of other stuff to dress it up. Everything we ate was simply prepared and so good.

Try it out for a day (or more!!) and see how delicious it can be - New England in summer gives us so many wonderful choices! You can't go wrong.

Top Ten Reasons To Buy Local Food from your Neighbors

2009-06-27T15:23:00.005-04:00

Courtesy of http://www.buyfresh.org/

Freshness & Taste - Locally grown fruits and vegetables are usually harvested within hours of being purchased by the consumer. Whether you buy them at a farm stand, Farmers Market or visit a farm and pick them yourself, you will be getting food with exceptional taste.

Local farmers raise and sell wonderful unusual varieties of products that you will never find on supermarket shelves. That is because local farmers grow for taste not the ability of the product to be shipped great distances.

Nutritional value declines, often dramatically, as time passes after harvest. Because locally grown produce is fresher, it can be more nutritionally complete.

With local produce, you can visit farms or meet the farmer face to face at the market. You get to look them in the eye and ask them anything you would like to know about how they grow the products that you are buying. Farms also offer hayrides and festivals to encourage people to spend a day in the country finding the perfect pumpkin, picking the best apples, or just relaxing while munching on a warm cider donut, sweet apple pie and a cup of ice cold cider.

Local growers live in your community, spend their dollars in your community, hire local workers and their farms help make communities livable. Regional farmers paid over $9.3 million for labor and $1.3 million in real property taxes in 2002.

Local food supports a clean environment - A well-managed family farm has been handed down from one generation to the next. These farmers value their land, clean water and fertile soil. It takes 87 calories of fuel to move a single calorie of fruit from CA to NY.

Farmland benefits wildlife - residents get a thrill when they see wildlife that live in the patchwork of fields, meadows, woods, and ponds that farms provide.

Buying local food preserves open space - You have probably enjoyed driving out into the country and appreciated the lush fields of crops, the meadows full of wildflowers, and the picturesque barns. That landscape will survive only as long as farms are financially viable. When you buy locally grown food, you are doing something proactive about preserving the agricultural landscape.

Local food keeps your taxes in check - Numerous studies have shown that farms contribute more in taxes than they require in services, whereas suburban development costs more than it generates in taxes, according to several studies. On average, for every $1 in revenue raised by residential development, governments must spend $1.17 on services, thus requiring higher taxes of all taxpayers. For each dollar of revenue raised by farm, forest, or open space, governments spend 0.34 cents on services.

Local food is about the future - By supporting local farmers today, you can help ensure that there will be farms in your County tomorrow, and that future generations will have access to nourishing, flavorful, and fresh food.

Why not visit a local farm market today and taste the difference? Your taste buds will thank you.

Summer = jam

2009-06-25T12:59:00.002-04:00

I made jam today. Yup, real hot-water-bath, steam-up-the-kitchen, old-school strawberry jam. Okay, I know it's not Paris-Brest cake or some unpronounceable European concoction, but hey--it's big stuff for me. I'd been thinking about making jam or canning something for a while now. I think what put me over the edge was an article I re-read endlessly by Molly Wizenberg (you know, "Orangette") that traced her journey to jam-hood. I'd bookmarked it and put it on my counter; every so often, when I'd be standing at the stove waiting for something to simmer, I'd take it out and read it yet again. She made it sound so easy that I figured I could handle it.

Now, I'm a heavy-duty home cook: I can whoop up a pie crust without stressing; I've made different types of cheese in my kitchen; hell, if a fire started to consume my house, I'd probably grab my 25-year-old carbon-steel wok first and then go back to save my kids. So yesterday I finally put down all the obsessive research I'd been amassing, got The Girl to help me pick strawberries at the pick-your-own farm the next street over from my house (some rain, but we--OK, I--kept picking), and waded into Wal-Mart (!) for jars and pectin. Yes, I used pectin. Don't make that face. I'm not about to risk all this work for a non-jelling jelly...

I won't detail the whole process (wanna borrow all my notes?!), but probably the two jobs that took the longest were 1) preparing the berries and 2) waiting for the giant canning pot of water to boil. The rest was fairly easy. And by about 10:30 this morning, I had 8 jars of strawberry jam sitting on my dining-room table, starting their 24-hour "don't touch or I won't jell" countdown.

Now I can't wait for blueberry season. I'm totally making some blueberry jam. And in the fall I'm going to try a version of some French apple/pear/walnut conserve that my kids love but that costs six bucks at Whole Foods.

Can I confess something about me and hobbies? I tried my hand at furniture refinishing. I didn't really see the point. Gardening made me want to jam a tomato stake in my eye. My dear departed mother-in-law, who tried to teach me to needlepoint, found me so uncoordinated that she asked me if my brain was "all there." But this jam thing--now that's a hobby I can really get behind.

An Eat Local Challenge

2009-06-24T16:29:00.002-04:00

I'm cross-posting this from my personal blog, since this sounds like it may be of interest to some of you over here!

Every Wednesday, Small Footprints has a new weekly challenge. I missed the first two, and boy, I'm glad I didn't miss this one! Check out this week's challenge:

For one full day this week, eat only local foods. No tropical fruits from across the world ... no veggies that traveled hundreds of miles to get to your table ... only locally grown foods (this includes meats, dairy products, etc., if you eat them).

Cool, huh? Right up my alley! I wonder, though, how much fudging is fair for the boys. I don't think their morning Cheerios are local. I also haven't found good local sources of cooking oil (though I could just plan to use local bacon on my 100% local day and cook in the grease, or use butter, or, gasp, plan meals that don't need any sauteing), salt, or grains. I can probably do without those for a day, though it's the staples like these that keep me from ever attempting a more extensive local food challenge.

Anyone else want to play along? Head over to Reduce Footprints!

The Great (E)Scape Part Deux

2009-06-23T20:13:00.005-04:00

Okay, not one, but both of my parental units are master gardeners. My entire life up to this point has involved gardening to some degree (herbs, vegetables, fruits and flowers too). But somehow, I've managed to avoid this delectable treat.

We were blessed with an abundance of garlic scapes in our CSA basket of goodies this week. I had already been eyeing this recipe and couldn't wait to hunker down in the kitchen for some quality time with my food processor. I pretty much followed the recipe with a few slight changes - I used white pepper instead of black, added the juice from half a lemon and totally bagged the drizzle of olive oil with salt on top when it was finished.

I consulted with my professional team of taste analysts (aka my colleagues) and it was unanimous. This recipe is finger-licking good (don't ask me how I know). This will definitely be on my list of favorites come garlic scape season each June. Oh, and I've already called the parental units to tell them how they've deprived me all these years.

Next - I can't wait to try WhataCard's recipe below for caramelized goodness!

Bon Appetit!

The Great Garlic Scapes!

2009-06-23T08:00:00.001-04:00

Here's some CSA advice for you: when in doubt, ask the farmer!

Last year, I was never overly pleased with my garlic scape adventures. I mean, some turned out pretty good, but nothing I was super excited about getting to eat again this year. So at the pick up this past week, I mentioned to one of the farmers that I wasn't sure what to do with the garlic scapes. He gave me the PERFECT advice, so here it is for you!

Garlic Scapes, a la Waltham Fields Community Farm Farmer
AKA Grilled Garlic Scapes

Ingredients:

Garlic Scapes (I think I used about 15 scapes)
A tablespoon or so of olive oil
A pinch of salt (I splurged and used some fleur de sel)

Directions:

Trim the very thin, skinny end of the garlic scape off. It'll just get burned, and the farmer told me it wasn't the tasty part anyway.

Toss the scapes in olive oil and sprinkle with salt.

Transfer to a grill basket and grill until they begin to caramelize. Don't go too long...they're not that good if they start to char!

These were SO good. I mean, so, so, so, so good. Mildly garlic-y, a slight reminiscence of asparagus, and a singular deliciousness that made me wish I had a zillion more garlic scapes.

These were great eaten straight off the grill, and I think this is also the way to go to prepare garlic scapes for use in other recipes. Mincing the grilled scapes and adding to garlic bread would be excellent. Or adding to stuffed squash, or a salad, or quinoa, or just about anything. Yum!!!

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You can see in the picture that we also had some grilled pork chops we'd picked up at the Waltham Farmer's Market. Also delightful! My favorite part of the meal wasn't in the picture, though: the salad. It didn't seem worth taking a picture, as it was just a standard salad of the stuff from our CSA distribution: arugula, red leaf lettuce, baby carrots, and sugar snap peas, plus some hot house tomato we'd gotten at the farmer's market. Drizzled with some Cindy's Kitchen Wild Maine Blueberry Dressing. It was just a simple salad, but every part of it was perfection. It's really greens season now. If you don't belong to a CSA, run out to a farmer's market and get some lettuce and other greens. It's amazing how much more delicious it is at this time of year!

2009-06-22T13:48:00.002-04:00

Guess I'll start off like my fellow posters below and give a little intro: My name is Lisa and I live in the 'burbs of Boston, near the NH border. I've been interested in local foods for a few years now, more in an "it tastes good and I can actually meet the farmer" way than a "I'm saving the planet and I want to get back to the land" way. I know we all have different ways of coming at this, so if that's your angle, that's cool with me. It's also good for The Boy (age 9) and The Girl (age 5) to see animals and realize they're not pets (!), know that they can live on food grown and produced very close to home, and see the sweat on the farmers' brow so that they can thank them for what they produce.
I find that people are so surprised when I tell them I belong to a CSA (Bear Hill Farm in Tyngsboro, MA). Of course, first I have to tell them what the heck a CSA is, but after that, they have a few specific reactions: "Why in the world would you drive anywhere else but Market Basket for vegetables?" "How much more expensive is it?" and "Geez, you don't strike me as the crunchy granola type." I like that last one the best.
Guess I do a lot of thinking about what people eat, what constitutes "cooking" these days, and where exactly the food comes from. I've read all the books--the Pollan, the Bittman, the Kingsolver, the Kurlansky. I also have to admit that I HATE gardening, a fact I learned only after planting a large garden after moving into a suburban house with a big backyard. Sadly, I didn't inherit either my dad's green thumb or his ability to spend literally all day outside with his "crops." But I've been staying at home for almost 8 years now, so I've had the time to cruise around and see our local offerings.
My two closest friends out here in the country have gotten into vegetable gardening in a very big way in the past few years, canning and pickling and the whole nine yards. It's really been a big part of their free time (yes, I'm doing air quotes in my head as I type those last 2 words). At least I was able to teach the two of them how to make cheese recently--that way I got to enter their world of food preservation...
Anyway, I'm looking forward to actually reporting on my "field trips," getting interesting tips, and generally gabbing about my favorite subject. Thanks to WhatACard and Julie for the invite.

Strawberry Rhubarb Crisp

2009-06-21T18:18:00.006-04:00

Before I get to this delicious recipe, allow me introduce myself. My name is Nicole and I was cordially invited by What A Card to share this (and hopefully other!) recipes with everyone. I am new to the whole "local-vore" thing and am so excited to start eating local foods that I haven't yet tried, or even heard of, as the case may be.

Last week was my first CSA pick from Warner Farm and we got strawberries, salad mix, radishes, garlic scapes, and rhubarb. The salad mix was so yummy - I never thought greens could taste so good. As for the rest, I wasn't really sure what to do with it. I know what radishes are but I have never eaten them. I've never heard of garlic scapes and I love strawberry rhubarb pie but I'm a terrible baker. Fortunately, this farm saw me coming and they gave us all some recipes to use with this pick-up. The first one I tried was the strawberry rhubarb crisp. Easy and so delicious! Here is the recipe:

Ingredients:

4 c. rhubarb pieces (about 1 lb.)

2 c. sliced strawberries

1 c. sugar

1 1/3 c. flour, divided

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1 c. brown sugar

1 c. old fashioned rolled oats

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

1/2 c. butter, melted and cooled

In a large bowl, combine rhubarb, strawberries, sugar, 1/3 cup flour and cinnamon. Transfer to greased 9 x 13 in baking dish.

In another bowl, combine remaining 1 cup of flour with brown sugar, oats and nutmeg. Add butter and blend well to create the streusel. Sprinkle streusel over rhubarb mixture and bake at 350 degrees for 35-40 minutes.

The things I liked best about this recipe is that the ingredients are simple and the recipe itself is very forgiving. I don't have the best stocked pantry, so I love it when I get a recipe and I can just make it without running to the store to get some odd ingredient. Also, I realized I had only half as much rhubarb as it called for but I decided to go for it anyway. And let me tell you, no one missed it! It still tasted great and had the tartness of rhubarb.

I will be getting another batch of strawberries and rhubarb tomorrow and I'd love some other ideas for them. My husband loved this but doesn't love what it could do to his waist line if I keep making it!

Smith's Country Cheeses

2009-06-21T07:52:00.003-04:00

Okay, may as well get this out of the way early in the blog: I'm a cheese addict. Yes, it's true. If it's cheese, I'm on board. Everything is better with cheese, and I'm sure you'll see many, many recipes with cheese and cheese reviews from me in the future. I'm hoping to use this blog as an excuse to sample as many local cheeses as I can find! Today I thought I'd share with you one of my favorites: Smith's Country Cheese.

First, they have cheddar...the only local cheddar I can find. The sharp cheddar is so outrageously good. It's a little crumbly: cut a thin slice for a cracker and it may break in half. I love that! Cheddar shouldn't be a waxy mess the consistency of Velveeta! This cheddar is a little dry and so tasty. It's great with fruit or crackers, on nachos or quesadillas, or just eaten alone.

They really seem to be known for their gouda, though. Yesterday we tried a Garlic Gouda spread. Once again, amazing! The boys ate a TON, and for those of you familiar with my boys, having them eat any of anything is something of a miracle. My husband TK and I even got them saying "It's so GOOD-A!" (Yes, I'm not above cheesy jokes!)

Smith's cheeses are relatively easy to find in the Boston area. I usually get them at Roche Bros supermarket (though they don't carry any Smith's cheddar unfortunately, at least at my Roche Bros), Verrill Farm, or now making my summer exceptional, they sell it at the Waltham Fields CSA pick up. How convenient is that? Fresh veggies AND a cheese fix! We also got some at the Waltham Farmer's Market yesterday. Basically, if I see it somewhere, I'm buying it! Check their website for other locations where you can buy their cheese.

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So what are your favorite New England cheeses? As I said, I'm looking to try as many different cheeses as I can!

Introducing myself (What A Card)

2009-06-20T14:36:00.002-04:00

I figured before I really get going, I'd do a brief introduction of myself. I live in the suburbs of Boston with my husband and two (soon to be three!) boys.

Why the interest in local foods? Well, for a number of reasons. I think it's better for us, better for the environment, and better for the local farms. Oh yeah, and it generally tastes better to have the freshest ingredients. It's fun and expands our diets beyond the normal stuff you get at the grocery store.

I'm far from "perfect", though. I have budget constraints, and sometimes even more importantly, time constraints. But I do my best and have fun doing it. I'm a big believer in making small changes, and eating locally, at least on a small scale, is part of my small changes. I may not eat 100% local, but I try to make local choices when I can.

So you're not going to get any judgments here. If you only replace one ingredient a week with something local, that's a great start. One of the problems I had when I was first getting started was that I didn't know where to find local ingredients. Another problem was that when I did find local ingredients, they were sometimes things with which I was unfamiliar. Hopefully this blog will help answer some of those questions for those of you just getting started. And I'm excited to learn new things from the other writers here!

If there's anything you're interested in hearing more about, or any questions you have, leave us a comment. Looking forward to getting to know all you readers and writers!

Borsari.....How Do I Love You?

2009-06-18T20:53:00.004-04:00

Let me count the ways....

I love you on grilled, roasted and stir fried veggies. I love you in my homemade sauce. I love you in salads. I love to use you as a rub on pork, chicken and beef. (I imagine you would add the perfect touch to fish.)

This combination of spices is a "must have". If you don't have a jar of Borsari in your spice cabinet (mine never makes it that far, it's on the counter at all times) then run, don't walk to your nearest grocer. It's the ideal spice. Enhancing, without overwhelming, the earthy goodness of all of the locally grown produce and meat you'll be eating.

I'll be honest, I've never ventured from the original flavor - it's kind of a "why mess with perfection" sort of thing. However, a colleague brought me some samples of the citrus and ginger flavors today. Oh yeah, if you're at all skeptical about making this investment, ask your local grocer if they have samples (you'll likely find them in the meat or fish department).

As an added perk to my love affair with Borsari....I discovered last night that it is produced by a former "neighbor" (I use the term loosely. He lived on the other end of the road I grew up on.) You can read all about it here.

Bon Appetit!

Our First CSA Meal of the Season

2009-06-16T18:43:00.002-04:00

If you or anyone you know is on the fence with regard to joining a CSA I have three words for you...just do it! We have a small share (to supplement our small garden) at Holiday Brook Farm. Our first pick-up was last Saturday. As we pulled into the farm I was giddy with excitement (yeah, it doesn't take much). Upon filling our 1/4 bushel basket with fresh produce (with a side of pastured pork chops that my husband just couldn't resist) we were on our way and I was mentally preparing meals.

It has been very cool and wet in Western MA so far this growing season, but even so we ended up with -

Four spring turnips
Five radishes
A head of baby bok choy
A head of red leaf lettuce
Braising Greens
Spinach

I passed on the Kale (not my favorite) and Mesclun Mix, since I had some mixed salad greens in the fridge at home.

Our CSA provides a weekly newsletter and this week the featured recipe was Stir-Fried Bok Choy with Garlic. It was the perfect accompaniment to the grilled chops. With eight cloves of garlic, how could you go wrong? I'd highly recommend this simple recipe if you're looking for a delicious way to fix this veggie.

Ingredients:

1/3 c. chicken or vegetable broth

1 T soy sauce

1 1/2 tsp. cornstarch

3 T vegetable oil

8 garlic cloves, thinly sliced

2 pounds (about 1 full sized) bok choy, chopped, leaves and stems separate

2 tsp. toasted sesame oil

1/2 tsp. salt (I omitted this)

Directions: Stir together broth, soy sauce, cornstarch and salt until cornstarch has dissolved; set aside. Heat a 14" wok (or heavy bottomed pan) over high heat until a drop of water evaporates instantly. Pour the oil down the side of wok and swirl to coat the sides. Add garlic and stir-fry, 5-10 seconds until pale golden. Add bok choy stems and stir fry until bright green and tender (a few minutes) and then add the leaves and stir-fry for 2 minutes longer until limp. Stir the broth mixture, then pour into the wok and cook for another 15 seconds. Turn the ehat down a bit, cover and cook, stirring occasionally, until veggies are crisp tender (2-4 minutes). Stir in sesame oil and gransfer to a serving dish.

Bon Appetit!

How and Why This Blog Came to Be

2009-06-15T18:03:00.000-04:00

What a Card and I have talked about beginning a blog to share our love of food, particularly local food, for some time now. I think it's actually her way of "forcing" me to join the blogger world, but I digress.

Anywho...the real motivating factor behind this endeavor (besides my desire to create a central location in which to store my thoughts/recipes/experiences related to eating and cooking local ingredients) is to create a resource, which is useful to others of similar mind. And hey, if our sharp wit provides an ounce of entertainment along the way, well, that's just a BONUS!

I'll be the first to admit, my level of commitment to eating locally varies, depending on the season (or my craving(s) at any particular moment). For instance, I love bananas and last time I checked, there weren't too many New England farms growing those delectable, yellow fruits. (I have tried to grow my own, but have not yet met with success. Sigh.) I think what's important, is that each individual establishes their own, personal comfort level with regard to eating locally. To some that may be a year -round commitment. For others that may mean choosing ingredients produced as close to home as possible (and perhaps during the growing months only).

So no matter what level you're at, I hope you'll visit us frequently, taking a little something away each time, while sharing your own thoughts and experiences.

Bon Appetit!

A blog about eating locally in New England

2009-06-14T17:10:00.001-04:00

Welcome! Here we are, starting a new blog to share our love of local foods in New England. We'll be posting in season recipes, as well as reviews and information about local food.

We look forward to meeting you!

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I thought I better include a brief explanation of the older posts. Yes, this is really the first post on this blog, but I decided to pull some related content I'd written on other blogs, so that it would all be collected in one spot. I had recipes on my own blog, plus on a vegetarian blog I wrote for last summer. So I'm trying to move them all here!

Extras from the CSA

2009-06-09T09:51:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, Ms. Sotorrific Twins asked a question about what you should do with stuff you get from a CSA that you don't want. I was going to just email her, but then I decided this could be part two of my CSA decision making series. Whoa, don't get me going, I might just post once every 6 months about CSAs!

The fact of the matter is, with many CSAs, you end up with vegetables you don't want. Some CSAs are structured where you get to choose what you want, but many just give you a box of whatever is ripe on the farm that week. So what do you do with the vegetables you don't like?

The first thing I'd suggest is TRY THEM! Search around for a different recipe that uses the vegetable in a way you've never tried. You're getting the most fresh of the vegetables...it hasn't been trucked across the country or sat in a warehouse for a week. You might be pleasantly surprised by a vegetable you thought you didn't like.

But, there's probably no way you're going to like everything. Kohlrabi is my veggie I don't want anywhere near me...I tried it a few times last year, and never liked it. I'm not sure yet if I'll even bother taking it at this year's CSA pickups. Icky! So here some ideas of what to do with those extras:

Talk to your CSA about setting up a "trade table", where people leave things they don't want and take something they do want. I mean, you're probably never going to find the popular veggies on the trade table, but you may be able to swap out your kale for kohlrabi or something. The CSA I belonged to tried this one week last year, and unfortunately, at least when I was there, the "trade table" just became filled with kohlrabi. I guess I'm not the only one who isn't a fan! But in theory this might work.
Talk to your CSA about the possibility of organizing a donation to a local food pantry or hunger relief agency (if any can use fresh veggies). People can just leave whatever they get too much of, or don't want, and then a volunteer (probably you, if it's your idea!) can deliver it to the charity. Our CSA donates to hunger relief agencies, and I absolutely LOVE this about them, and it was one of the main reasons I chose them. If there's stuff in our pickup I don't want or know I won't be able to use, most times I just don't take it and know it'll go to good use.
Offer the vegetable(s) you don't want to someone else who is there picking up at the same time. One week last summer, a family with a child with soy allergies offered us their edamame. I love edamame, so was quite excited! That vegetable you hate may be a favorite of the person standing next to you.
Bring the vegetables home and offer them to friends/neighbors/coworkers/family. Someone will probably want it.
Use the veggies to make stock, which can be frozen or used to make some yummy soup (thanks to the suggestion from Small Footprints. I've always been scared from some unknown reason of making stock, but I think I'll give it a try this summer!)
If all else fails, start composting. I mean, I would never take veggies with the intent of just throwing them on the compost pile, but if all else fails, and despite your best efforts you can't get rid of them and just can't eat them before they go bad, well at least with a compost bin/pile, it's not a complete and total waste.

One of the things I love about a CSA is getting to try all different veggies and getting a big variety. I think a traditional CSA works best for people who aren't overly picky about their vegetables. If you and your family are exceedingly picky, then a CSA that offers you choices of what to take would probably be the best bet for you. Or shopping the farmers' markets, where you have total control of selection and quantity.

What other suggestions do you have for using up those unwanted veggies?

So who else is CSA'ing this summer? Or farmers' market'ing? Yay, I love summer!

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I'm going to be moving some of my posts from last year over to this site, to try to get related content all in one area, instead of spread out between different blogs :) This is my first try!

Dandelion greens

2009-04-30T12:32:00.000-04:00

So, I decided to make a foray into backyard foraging. We're growing quite a crop of dandelions in our yard, and I knew TK was going to mow 'em all down last night. So, the boys and I headed out to pick dandelion leaves.

I researched a little online and saw the young, small leaves are generally less bitter, so that's what we picked. We got about half a colander full before we all lost interest.

I popped 'em in some salted boiling water for about 8 minutes while frying some bacon. Then I drained the dandelion greens and transferred them to the pan with the bacon grease, along with some minced garlic. Snipped in a few chives from the garden, sauteed it all for a few minutes, then topped it with crumbled bacon.

My overall assessment: kind of bitter, but certainly edible. And kind of fun that it's just a weed growing in the yard!

CSA decision making

2009-01-05T10:04:00.000-05:00

It's hard to believe, but it's that time of year to make a decision about joining a CSA for the summer season. At least in this area, the CSA shares sell out FAST...you can't put off deciding until April.

We plan on rejoining our CSA again this year. For you faithful readers from last summer, I'm sure you're not surprised as my blog devolved into "local produce, all the time" for a month or so there as I got so overly excited about the whole thing. I'll try to have more balance this summer, though no promises!

Anyway, I thought I'd share my "pros and cons" list for anyone on the CSA fence. These are *my* pros and cons...some of you may think my pros are actually cons, or vice versa :) So take it for what it's worth.

Pros of a CSA:

Supporting local farming (and all that goes with it, such as more sustainable agriculture, green space in the area, ability of farmers to grow a diversity of vegetables, training new farmers, etc.)
Getting a lot of veggies, especially varieties I haven't tried before.
Potential environmental benefit (I'm not convinced about fuel savings for shipping, and on a totally personal level, we drive A LOT further to go to the CSA than to the supermarket. I know that's not the same as a truck driving from California to MA, or a plane flying from South America, but I do kind of feel like my own personal contribution to fuel savings is at least partially offset by the long distance we have to drive to the CSA).
Okay, here's a true environmental benefit: little to no packaging materials. Sometimes we'd pick things into a reusable pint container, or use a plastic veggie bag, but most of it goes directly into a reusable grocery bag with absolutely no packaging at all. There's also no food refrigeration storage costs as it goes right from the field to us!
Giving my kids a better understanding of where food comes from and how it is grown.
Getting organic (or in our case, organically grown but not certified organic) vegetables.
This is personal to our specific CSA, but I love that our CSA is big into hunger relief efforts on a local level.
Eating healthier. We ate a lot more veggies and vegetarian meals during the summer.
The fun of the you-pick component. I mean, there's one local farm that charges $8 a person just to get on their farm to pick strawberries (you have to pay for the strawberries on top of it!) We got to do the picking for free each week, which was the boys' favorite part. B-man especially loved picking basil (I think because he was totally entranced with the fact that there was PURPLE basil!), and N-man would sometimes be willing to try a bite of something in the field (husk cherries were a hit!). Going to the CSA pick up was an event each week...a fun activity for the boys that I felt really good about. We'd also sometime pack a picnic dinner, or bump into some friends with their twins. It wasn't just an errand to go to pickup, but something fun for the family each week.

Neutral facts about a CSA:

Expense: I was suprised to find there was little, if no, difference in cost. I thought we'd save money, and we certainly did on vegetables. But we made up for it in other weird ingredients I bought to try new recipes. I also became focused on sourcing many other local (or local-ish) ingredients, which became especially spendy for meat (which we cut way back on, so I probably didn't spend any extra on meat than before), and cheese (which I bought a TON of, and is probably responsible for a large portion of the additional food expenses ;)
Getting the boys to eat more vegetables/try new foods: Yeah, this didn't work at all. They loved to pick things like fava beans, or green beans, or edamame, but they still didn't want to eat it! Oh well, they were no worse off than before!

Cons of a CSA:

The long drive to the pick up
Having little control over what, how much, and when you'll get things. For example, I think over the whole summer, we got THREE zucchinis. Three, that's it! How is that possible, when zucchinis are the poster child for summer plenty? And we got pretty sick of the endless non-zucchini summer squash (though I'm missing it now!) Sometimes we got too much of something, sometimes not enough.
Food acquisition and preparation took a huge portion of my time during the CSA...there was little "convenience" food. By the time the CSA was over, I was a bit desperate for a frozen pizza. During the CSA, I never wanted to waste any of our food by using up a meal on something that didn't require me to use any CSA ingredients.
The inherent risk of a CSA, in that you pay a flat fee and then get a share of the harvest, which may be small if it's not a good year (this past year wasn't great here due to the excessive rain, though I still felt like we got a fair amount for the price).
Having to pay a lump sum up front before the growing season begins. Sure, it's nice in July, August, and September when you've already paid, but you still need to have the cash upfront.
Being tied to specific pick-up times. The CSA we joined is one of the more convenient in that you don't have to pick a specific pick up date/time...you can show up during any of the pick up times available during the week. But even with that allowance, it's still far less convenient than a supermarket where you can pop in at pretty much any time of the day or night! For example, morning pickups would have worked best for us, but our CSA only offered late afternoon/early evening pickups so I always had to fight the afternoon rush hour.
You pay for the whole season, even if you're going to be away on vacation and miss a week or two. Last year we were able to plan our travel around our CSA, but I doubt we'll be able to again this year (it's funny, since we don't even "vacation" officially, but we do take advantage of the summer to visit family).
Did I mention the phenomenal amount of cooking and prep work? I even had to spend a lot of time looking for recipes for vegetables I'd never tried before, or new ways of preparing familiar veggies.
The weather doesn't always cooperate...we picked up in extreme heat and extreme wet (including one insane day where we got COMPLETELY soaked just walking for the car to the pick up stand, so we decided to pick green beans despite the torrential downpour. We were, without exaggeration, as wet as we would have been if we had just jumped in a swimming pool!)
Sometimes, especially the weeks when TK didn't come with me, it was hard to corral the boys. I mean, the farm was safe and there were always kids running around, but some weeks I spent more time trying to keep the kids entertained/away from trampling the plants/in eyesight than I did picking up the veggies!

As I said at the beginning of this (LONG) post, I loved our CSA and we're almost sure to do it again this year (I have nightmares about getting shutout...in fact, I have to call tomorrow if our sign up info isn't in today's mail). But I don't think a CSA is for everyone.

Who do I think would enjoy a CSA?

People who would view large (or small) amounts of different vegetables, which you may never have used before, as a fun challenge rather than a terrible burden.
People who are excited at the possibility of new and unusual varieties of vegetables. It's not just heirloom tomatoes you'll get, but odd varieties of squash, and different colored cauliflower, unusual cabbage, etc.
People who have the time and inclination to commit to a weekly supply of fresh veggies. It gets a bit overwhelming, let me tell you, when you're barely finishing up last week's pick up and it's already time to go get some new stuff!
People who don't have extensive vacations planned over the summer. If you're going to be away every other week, it's not worth it!

Going to farmers' markets are a great option, either as an alternative to a CSA, or in addition to the CSA. I still shopped at farmers' markets plenty this summer, though often for things like eggs and cheese, or to supplement our veggie pick ups (like if we only got one small eggplant, and I wanted to try a recipe that needed more eggplant). For people who don't want the commitment of time, money, or quantity that a CSA entails, shopping the farmers' markets is probably the better choice.

And for those of you still relying on the supermarket for veggies in the summer, I encourage you to check out your local farmers' markets...you'll be surprised at how much more delicious fresh vegetables can be!

Potato Pancakes, Apple Compote, and Zucchini Brownies

2008-10-12T15:14:00.001-04:00

While summer's bounty is at an end, I completely love the flavors of fall. Here are a couple of recipes to keep you cooking local through October:

Potato Pancakes

This recipe is based on the recipe for potato pancakes in The Joy of Cooking. I've made some slight changes.

Ingredients:

5 medium potatoes, peeled, washed, and coarsely grated (about 2.5 cups coarsely grated)
2 large eggs, lightly beaten (may need 3 eggs)
1 tablespoon finely grated onion (I almost always use about 1/2 teaspoon onion powder instead. A cheat, I know.)
2 tablespoons flour
3/4 teaspoon salt
Vegetable oil for frying

Directions:

Peel, wash, and coarsely grate the potatoes. Then place handfuls into a dish towel and wring out excess water. Place the potatoes into a large bowl. Mix with the remaining ingredients (except the vegetable oil).

The resulting mixture should be kind of liquid-y: mostly potatoes, but definitely some liquid that settles to the bottom of the bowl. If the mixture seems dry, add a third egg. This is a very forgiving recipe. Sometimes I only use 2 cups of potatoes, sometimes I use more like 3 cups. Sometimes it's pretty liquidy, sometimes it's more dry. It always turns out yummy, though!

Cover the bottom of a large skillet with approx 1/4 inch of vegetable oil. Heat over medium high heat until hot. (As a tip, you can use a wooden chopstick to test the oil. When the oil is hot enough, bubbles should form around the tip of the wooden chopstick when you dip it in the oil. You can then use the chopstick along with a spatula to help flip the pancakes).

Drop spoonfuls of potato mixture into the hot oil. Use the back of the spoon to spread the mixture out thinly. The thinner your pancakes, the crispier they will become so flatten them according to your preference (very thin if you like crispy pancakes, thicker if you like them less crispy). Stir the potato mixture in the bowl between each spoonful you add to the pan so that the liquid doesn't just settle to the bottom of the bowl.

Fry until browned on the bottom, flip, and fry until the other side is browned. Remove to paper towels to drain.

These are delicious served with sour cream, applesauce, or the apple "compote" I'll include below.

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Apple Compote

This isn't really a compote, but I'm not sure what to call it. Maybe a warm, extremely chunky applesauce?

Ingredients:

5-8 apples
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
3 tablespoons water (or more)

Directions:

Peel the apples, and then shave chunks off directly into a large saucepan. Add a couple tablespoons of water, and place over medium low heat. Add the cinnamon and sugar and heat until warm and softened, about 15 minutes. This is another forgiving recipe. Cook it longer over a lower heat, though you will probably have to add more water if it starts to dry out. Cook it a really long time, and it'll keep getting more and more like applesauce.

The flavor and consistency of this is dependent on the apples used. I like to use a variety of apples. In the picture above, I used Macs, Jonagolds, and Mutsus, the varieties I picked earlier this week.

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Okay, and dessert is really a summer dessert, that I've been meaning to post for a few months. But keep it in mind for next summer when those zucchinis are once again overflowing the crisper drawers!

Chocolate Zucchini Brownie Cake

I follow the linked recipe exactly and it turns out so amazingly. One of my friends has also make it subbing applesauce for the oil, and said it was still very good. My only complaint about the recipe is that they call it brownies. It's really more like a cake in my opinion. Whatever it is, it's delightful!

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Last note: I made this meal for my Pass the Plate meal. You can see the part of the plate, which I put the potato pancakes on. KitchenAid is selling platters to raise money for breast cancer research. The idea is that you buy a plate, register it online, then cook something for a friend or family member. Then they cook something and pass it along to someone else, who passes it to someone else, etc. Everyone registers the plate online as they pass it, and every time it gets passed, KitchenAid donates $5.

It was really fun to do, and such an easy way to help raise money for breast cancer research!

Apple Peach Blueberry Pie

2008-09-17T15:16:00.000-04:00

Quick, it's that magic time of year when you can get fresh, local apples, peaches, and blueberries. And there's nothing better than Apple Peach Blueberry Pie.

I created the recipe for Pi Day this past year, expanding upon my mom's delicious apple pie recipe. And let me tell you, while I loved this pie in March, it's a million times better with ingredients fresh off the tree!

Here's my recipe for Apple Peach Blueberry Pie:

Ingredients:
6 to 8 apples (I like to use a variety of types, larger sized apples. If you use small apples, peel more like 10 to 12)
2 or 3 peaches
2/3 cup of blueberries
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
2 tablespoons of butter (optional...I almost always forget it!)
2 pie crusts (make your own or buy from the refrigerator section...I won't tell!)

Directions:

Peel apples and peaches and thinly slice into a large bowl. Add blueberries, sugar, flour, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Stir gently to coat and let sit for at least ten minutes.

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Place bottom pie crust into pie plate. Add all of the filling. Cut up the butter and dot around on top of the filling. Top with second pie crust. Cut vents in top.

Place aluminum foil around the edges of the pie to prevent burning. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove aluminum foil and continue baking an additional 10 to 20 minutes until the pie is nicely browned.

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For all you locals, we went to Parlee Farms to pick fruit. They are reasonably priced (we spent $39 for a peck of stone fruit and a 1/2 bushel of apples...over 30 lbs of apples, peaches, nectarine, and plums!) And, it's a lot of fun for kids with a hay ride out to the orchards, a small farm animal area, and a hay maze. They also have a nut-free bakery. It was such a joy to be able to buy a cookie for my son with nut allergies. And if that's not enough, they even had local fall strawberries in their farm stand. Local strawberries! In September! Yum.

Figured I'd pass along the recommendation since we had such a great time!

Pickles and Baba Ghanoush

2008-08-19T15:18:00.000-04:00

True confessions time: I don't like cucumbers. At all. I mean, I don't even like them to touch my real food. Their icky flavor invades everything it touches. Yuck. But I love pickles. Oh, the hidden depths of me. So, when I saw the post on Boston Dish about making pickles, I figured I'd give it a go. I used the recipe she linked as my starting point, and made just a few changes.

Ingredients:

4 medium sized cucumbers (I only had regular cukes, no pickling cukes)
1 Tablespoon pickling salt
1 cup white sugar
1/4 cup packed brown sugar
1 cup white vinegar
1/2 cup apple cider vinegar
3/4 teaspoon celery seed
1/4 teaspoon tumeric
2 or 3 sprigs of fresh dill
2 cloves garlic
1 serrano pepper

Directions:

Thinly slice cucumbers and place in a large bowl. Add salt, mix, and place in the refrigerator for 90 minutes to 3 hours (no need to be exact...I forgot about mine!).

Place cucumbers in a colander and rinse under cold water, then return to the bowl.

Peel and crush garlic cloves. Cut the serrano pepper in half and remove seeds.

In a medium saucepan, place all remaining ingredients (except the cucumbers). Bring to a boil over medium heat and stir until all the sugar dissolves. Take my advice and do not put your face over the boiling vinegar. And if you do, certainly don't take a big breath. Just my two cents, based on hard-learned experience!

Pour the boiling vinegar mixture over the cucumbers. Cover, refrigerate, and wait around 24 hours. Then voila! Magic occurs, and those cucumbers have become pickles! Keep refrigerated and eat within 2 weeks. Or 5 days, if you're us.

These pickles were surprisingly good. I took them to a picnic, and overheard a couple of elementary school kids talking about how good they were. And how sweet they were. These pickles are pretty sweet, which isn't a big surprise given the huge quantity of sugar in the recipe. The longer the pickles sat in the fridge, the more sour they became. So if you don't like very sweet pickles, you may want to give it a few days before you try them.

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On an unrelated note, one of my favorite eggplant dishes is Baba Ghanoush. However, I've never been able to find a recipe that is anywhere near as good as our favorite, which sadly is from a restaurant in Atlanta. Not exactly some place we can just pop in when the urge takes us. So in my ongoing quest to find a great Baba Ganoush recipe, I tried one from The Figs Table by Todd English and Sally Sampson. I was intrigued by this recipe as it included mint, an ingredient I never thought to try in Baba Ganoush. I made a few minor changes to the recipe:

Ingredients:

4 Chinese Eggplants
Olive oil
2 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons tahini
Juice of one lemon
8 mint leaves
Salt and pepper to taste
minced scallions, lemon zest, and additional olive oil for garnishing
Pita bread

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Prick egglants all over with a fork, then rub with olive oil. Place on a cookie sheet, and roast in the oven, turning once, for approximately 30 minutes (until soft...depends on the size of your eggplant). Remove from oven and allow to cool for about 10 mintues.

Peel the garlic cloves and throw into a blender (or large food processor if you're lucky enough to have one. My mini just didn't seem up to the challenge of four eggplants!). Cut then ends off each eggplant, cut a slit down the side of each eggplant, and peel the skin off with your fingers. Add the flesh of the eggplant to the blender. Add the tahini and blend until smooth. You'll have to stop and use a rubber spatula to mix the ingredients around from time to time.

Add the lemon juice, mint leaves, salt, and pepper, and continue blending (and stirring when necessary) until the mint leaves have been completely incorporated.

Chill covered in the refrigerator for at least one hour.

Remove to a plate, drizzle with a small amount of olive oil, and garnish with scallions and lemon zest. Serve with pita bread for dipping.

We enjoyed this recipe, although it still didn't quite live up to our restaurant favorite. The mint was a very interesting addition, and this worked just fine with Chinese Eggplant (the original recipe called for one regular eggplant). While this was good, though, I'll probably keep searching for the elusive "perfect" Baba Ghanoush.

Minty Lamb Meatballs

2008-08-15T13:04:00.000-04:00

We picked up some ground lamb from Stillman Farm, and some mint at the CSA. Hmm, mint, lamb, let me look around for a recipe. And boy, did I find a good one: Lamb Meatballs. I followed the recipe pretty closely, just skipping the food processing step as that seemed too fussy for me. Oh, and I omitted the olive oil. Do you know how fatty ground lamb is? I certainly didn't need to add extra fat to fry it!

It's not a huge surprise, but the flavor of the lamb and the mint went together perfectly. And the sauce was a perfect accompaniment. It was really outstanding. TK ate a phenomenal quantity. If we're being honest, so did I :) Even N-man enjoyed them.

Corn and Tomato Salad, Zucchini Cookies

2008-08-13T15:20:00.000-04:00

It's hard to believe, but I think I'm finally getting sick of corn on the cob. We've been eating it nearly every day for almost a month, and I'm just starting to look for recipes besides shuck-heat-eat. One of my girlfriends had mentioned she made a corn and tomato salad, but couldn't remember the recipe. So I just winged it. I mean, corn, tomatoes, what else does it need?

I guess I thought of a few more ingredients!

Ingredients:
3 ears corn
20 or so cherry tomatoes
10 leaves of basil
Splash of olive oil
Slightly larger splash of balsamic vinegar
Salt and Pepper to taste

Directions:

Shuck corn, removing all corn silk. Boil the corn for about 2 minutes. Place in a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking and cool them down. When they are cool, cut off the kernels (be careful, the corn may be hotter near the cob). Put the corn kernels into a bowl.

Cut cherry tomatoes in half and add to the bowl with the corn.

Mince the fresh basil, and add to the bowl. Splash in some olive oil and balsamic vinegar, add a few cracks of pepper and salt, give it a stir, and you're done. If you have time, let it sit in the refrigerator for at least an hour to let the flavors develop. Or just eat it right away.

We all enjoyed this, although I wasn't that happy with the visual appeal of the dish. Our corn from the CSA was very light this week, nearly white without any sprinklings of yellow. And we had picked mostly golden cherry tomatoes at the farm (I rooted through the salad to get some of the few red cherry tomatoes in the picture above). The balsamic vinegar almost made the light colors look muddy. I don't know, this is all aesthetics...it tasted just fine. But if I was making it again, I'd look for yellower corn and redder tomatoes. Or I'd try a red wine vinegar instead of balsamic. It needs something to brighten up the colors of the dish to match the bright, fresh flavor. Let me know if you figure it out!

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This week I also made the chocolate chip zucchini cookies mentioned in Barbara Kingsolver's book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. I followed the recipe exactly, so I won't reprint it here, and I have to say while they were okay, I was a bit disappointed. The cookies were very soft and cakey, no crunch at all, no matter how long I cooked them (well, within reason. The recipe called for 10-15 minutes cooking, I went as long as 20 minutes with one batch. Still very soft).

They were okay, but nothing special. If I was going to make baked goods from zucchini in the future, I'd probably stick with zucchini bread. And if I felt like adding vegetables to my cookies, I'd probably stick with oatmeal carrot chocolate chip cookies.

But I include this here in case you want to give it a go for the novelty of the recipe, or because you're making all the Animal, Vegetable, Miracle recipes, or just to steer you away if you were on the fence. But as I said, they weren't bad. I mean, it used a whole bag of chocolate chips. How bad could they be? And at the very least, my boys are eating them as fast as I'll let them. Hey, it counts as a vegetable, right?

Black Bean and Corn Salad, Zucchini Grinders

2008-08-06T15:22:00.000-04:00

I love corn on the cob. I mostly just eat it lightly steamed, or occasionally grilled. But, I've been trying to branch out a little and try some new recipes. One thing I decided to throw together was a corn and black bean salsa. Or salad. I'm not sure which I'd call it, but it was yummy.

Ingredients:

1 can (15 oz.) of black beans
4 ears of corn
3 green onions
1 tablespoon fresh minced cilantro (or more to taste)
Ground cumin to taste
1 Tablespoon olive oil
Salt to taste

Directions:

Husk corn and cut the kernels off the cobs. Everyone has a favorite way to do it, but if you're a newbie, here's what I do:
1) When you husk the corn, leave the stems intact (don't break off!)
2) Cut a small amount of the bottom (tip end) of the corn off so you have a flat surface (and it gets rid of the kernels that are generally too small or a little yucky at the tip).
3) Get out a big roasting pan. Holding the corn upright in the pan, use a sharp knife to cut rows of corn off. Keep turning the corn until you've cut off all the kernels. The roasting pan will catch all the kernels as they fall from the cob.

In a medium pot, boil water, then add the corn. Boil for about 2 minutes, then drain and rinse in cold water. (You could also cook the corn on the cob before you cut the kernels off. I just didn't have time to let the corn on the cob cool before cutting it, so I cut it first). Place corn into a large bowl.

Drain and rinse black beans until the water runs clear. Place into the bowl with the corn.

Thinly slice the whites and greens of the green onions and add to the bowl.

Add the olive oil, minced cilantro, ground cumin, and salt. Stir gently and well.

Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours.

That's it. You can eat it as a salad, but I especially liked it as a salsa with pita chips.

For once, this was something my three year old boys would actually eat. They especially loved picking out their black beans, and loved to spoon it onto pita chips (although it would mostly fall off the chips before it reached their mouths).

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And here's a quickie bonus recipe: Zucchini Grinders. It's a vegetarian sandwich inspired by a meatball sub. Except you use zucchini instead of meatballs. It's a favorite in our house that I make a few times each summer. When I made them last night, I threw in 4 small diced tomatoes while I sauteed the zucchini. I didn't even bother to peel or seed the tomatoes. You could also add in some eggplant or mushrooms or onions or peppers or really, whatever you happen to have around. Or just follow the recipe as written as it is quite yummy.

Roasted Beets with Goat Cheese

2008-07-30T15:24:00.000-04:00

I must admit that beets aren't my favorite, and I'm trying not to let my kids catch on. I mean, they're sweet. They're such a bold, pretty color. Shouldn't kids be attracted to beets? Shouldn't I? But I keep persisting, thanks to our CSA, in trying to make delicious beet recipes. I doubt I'd go out and buy beets, but when they show up in our share, I figure I'm obliged to try to enjoy them.

This time I decided on Roasted Beets with Goat Cheese, borrowing quite heavily from this recipe. Not my favorite food picture ever, but my kids were pretty amused that I'd used the flowered dessert plates to make the beets look like a flower.

Here is the recipe with my changes:

Ingredients:

2 bunches of small-ish beets (about 8-10 beets)
4 small eating onions from the CSA (about 1/3 cup minced) (you could substitute regular onion or shallots)
3 tablespoons minced fresh parsley
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
salt and pepper to taste
plenty of crumbled goat cheese (for those eating local in MA, I'm in love with Capri goat cheese from Westfield Farm)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Remove any beet greens, leaving a small amount of stem. Wash the beets and place in a baking dish. Toss with some olive oil until lightly coated. Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil (or a lid) and bake about 45 minutes to an hour, until beets are easily pierced by a fork.

While the beets are roasting, mix together all the other ingredients besides the goat cheese. Set aside.

After beets have cooled slightly, cut off the top and bottom and use your fingers to remove the skin. Slice thinly into rounds.

Place the beets onto a serving dish and top with the vinaigrette and crumbled goat cheese.

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These were the most delicious beets I've ever eaten. They got rave reviews from everyone who tried them, which unfortunately did not include our children, who are persisting in their vegetable ban.

Stuffed Squash Blossoms with Cilantro Serrano Cream Sauce

2008-07-28T15:26:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I got the urge to go to a Farmers' Market. I checked a handy-dandy Massachusetts Farmers' Market list, and saw the only Sunday market was in Charles Square in Cambridge. So it was an easy decision where to go! There were only about 5 or 6 vendors there, and I couldn't find any eggplant, which was the original reason for making the trip, but it was still fun and we got plenty of stuff.

One of the neat things we got was a bunch of squash blossoms. Let's be honest: squash blossoms are one of those ingredients that are a big pain in the patootie. They're a lot of work, they have to be used nearly immediately, and they are relatively expensive (we paid $4 for a bunch of about 12 blossoms). But I just can't resist, at least once a year.

I went with a fairly traditional stuffed squash blossom recipe I came up with based on what I had on hand. Then I battered them and deep fried. My husband made cilantro serrano cream sauce, that was a perfect accompaniment. Here are the recipes:

Stuffed Squash Blossoms:

Ingredients:
Approximately 12 squash blossoms
12 oz. ricotta cheese
2 cloves garlic
2 tablespoons finely diced onion (or shallots)
1 teaspoon butter
Freshly cracked black pepper

Directions:

Gently wash the squash blossoms, then reach in and remove the inside stuff (the stamen, I think it's called). It's fine if the blossom rips down one side.

Melt the butter in a small pan over medium heat. Finely dice the garlic and onion, and add to the pan. Saute until slightly softened. You can skip this step if you like the crunch/bite of raw onion and garlic.

In a medium bowl, mix together the ricotta, onions and garlic, and black pepper to taste.

Place the cheese mixture in a pastry bag with no tip. Believe me, I used a tip and learned my lesson. Even though I had very finely minced the garlic and onion, about halfway through stuffing the blossoms, a piece that was slightly too large got stuck in the tip and I had to take the whole thing apart to get the tip out. After that, I used the bag with no tip and it was fine. Anyway, load up the pastry bag and fill each squash blossom until about 1/2" from the top. Don't overfill, especially if you ripped the blossoms along one side, as it will just all leak out. Twist the top slightly to seal the blossom. Repeat until all blossoms are stuffed.

For the batter, I used this recipe as a starting point, but had to make some changes. It made far more batter than I needed, so you might want to have some other veggies on hand as well to batter and fry.

Batter ingredients:
1 1/2 cups flour
3/4 cup cornstarch
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1/2 tablespoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup ice cubes
1 1/2 cups cold water (or less...add slowly)
additional flour for dredging

Vegetable oil for frying

Directions:
Mix the dry ingredients together, then add the egg, ice cubes, and about 1/2 of the cold water. Stir them together (a single chopstick is the best thing to use...you definitely don't want to over mix). Keep adding water until you've reached a thin pancake batter consistency. Don't make this early...you need to use it pretty soon after you've mixed it.

Place enough vegetable oil in a wok or heavy bottomed pan to fry the squash blossoms. Heat over high heat. I only put enough oil to cover about 1/2 the blossom and then just flip the blossom halfway through cooking.

Roll the squash blossoms in flour to coat, then hold the stem and dip the blossom in the batter until coated. If the batter doesn't cling to the blossoms, it's too thick. Add a little more cold water to thin it.

Place the blossom in the hot oil. Repeat until all blossoms are in the oil. It'll probably be time then to start flipping the first blossoms you added to the oil. The batter should be golden brown when finished, about 2 minutes per side.

Remove to paper towels to drain.

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You can eat the squash blossoms plain if you'd like. We served ours with a cilantro serrano cream sauce, following the linked recipe. It's a perfect recipe for all you Waltham Fields members as we're getting Serrano peppers now as well as garlic. Our garden is also full of cilantro, so it's really the ideal time for this recipe.

We thought the recipe as written was slightly too mayonaisse-y. If we make it again (and we will), we'll probably replace some mayo with milk or cream. Oh, and we only used one serrano pepper to make it less spicy for our kids, and more importantly, because we only had one serrano pepper. It was just slightly spicy. If your kids will eat spicy foods, I'd probably use at least two peppers. Or make it with one, take some out for your kids, then add an extra pepper or two to the rest of the sauce for the adults.

The cream sauce was delicious over chicken as well. Probably not of interest to all you vegetarians, but I figured I'd mention it for any other omnivores who pop by.

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I should add why I thought this was a kid-friendly meal. I figured: flowers, neat. Cheese, always a hit. And deep-fried, that's a home run! The flavor of the stuffed blossoms is fairly plain. Good, but not overwhelmingly flavorful for young palates.

Of course, my kids would have needed to taste these to realize they would have liked them. Ah well...maybe people with more adventurous kids will have more luck! The adults in our house loved these, and one of my sons really loved to help prepare them even if he didn't try it. So it wasn't a total loss.

Berry Berry Cherry Bleu Burgers

2008-07-26T13:22:00.000-04:00

While we were in Buffalo, we visited what was quite possibly the very best fruit picking farm in the whole country. Okay, fine, I haven't been to very many fruit picking farms, but the one we went to was really great. If anyone is ever in Western New York, check out Brown's Berry Farm. While there we picked vast quantities of sweet cherries, blueberries, and raspberries.

We ate them plain, I threw them in breakfasts, desserts, you name it. But in the back of my head, I'm still pretty intrigued by the meat/fruit combo I mentioned the other day. So as I was searching around for berry recipes, I was immediately captured by a few recipes that mentioned adding blueberries to burgers.

Okay, I'm game. But I wanted to use all the fruit we picked. And there was some bleu cheese left in the cheese drawer. I love bleu cheese and fruit. I love bleu cheese on burgers. Hmmmm...

I think it's time to create Berry Berry Cherry Bleu Burgers!

Here's what I did:

Ingredients:

1 lb ground beef (I think I had more like 1.25 lbs)
1/3 cup blueberries
1/3 cup raspberries
1/3 cup pitted cherries
Crumbled bleu cheese

Directions:

In a large bowl, use a potato masher to coarsely mash the blueberries and raspberries. Finely chop the pitted cherries and add to the bowl.

Add the ground beef to the bowl and mix. I used my hands to really get it mixed up.

Form a very thin, flat patty. Add a generous amount of blue cheese in the center. Top with another thin, flat patty and mush the sides together until it's sealed.

I made 3 regular sized burgers and 2 mini-burgers for my kids. Your mileage my vary depending on how large you like your burgers to be.

Grill to taste, then top with additional cheese if desired.

Here's what it looked like before we cooked them. You can really see the berries mixed in!

And here's what it looked like after we were done cooking.

It just looks like a regular burger, doesn't it? I really loved the berries mixed in. It added a little sweetness and a lot of juiciness. The burgers weren't dry at all. I thought it was a definite improvement over a plain burger. But TK wasn't quite as convinced. He didn't dislike it, but said he'd prefer a normal burger in the future. Oh well, you can't please them all. Or in this case, anyone but me as the boys didn't even try it.

Herbed Butter

2008-07-19T15:28:00.000-04:00

This is a simple recipe to use up some of the vast quantities of herbs you have in your garden, or CSA distribution, or just when you have to buy a whole bunch but just need 1 teaspoon for your recipe. Sure, you could dry them, or freeze them, but where's the fun in planning ahead? Eat 'em!

At our last CSA this week, there was you-pick basil. Well, by the time we got home the basil was already looking pretty wilted, probably due to the 95 degree weather. So my husband looked around online to see what he could make with it right away, and this is the recipe he decided to try. You don't really need a recipe...just mix a bunch of chopped basil and garlic into butter. The linked recipe calls for using a food processor. That's too much work. Just slightly soften some butter in the microwave, or in this heat, just leave the butter sitting on your counter for half an hour before making the recipe.

We've made similar recipes with other herbs in the past. My favorite is to mix garlic, rosemary, chives, and parsley together, which happen to be the herbs growing in my garden. You can try it with any herbs you have on hand, though.

Herbed butter is surprisingly versatile. You can melt it over lightly steamed vegetables to add some extra flavor. If you added garlic to your butter, you can use it to make a delicious herbed garlic bread. You can add it to mashed potatoes for some extra zip. You can put it over corn on the cob. But let's be honest: mostly, ours gets snacked on, spread on crackers or bread, until there's not enough left to do anything else with it.

And if you're feeling especially pioneer-ish, you can even make your own butter. It's surprisingly easy, and fun for kids (and adults, too. In fact, adults are usually more intrigued than the kids in my experience). I posted directions over on my blog a few months ago, so head on over there if you feel like shaking, shaking, shaking.

Mixed Squash on the Barbie

2008-07-16T15:31:00.000-04:00

Is there anything better than fresh summer squash? I love it, and have loved getting a few new varieties to try from our CSA this year. I've been experimenting with quick, simple ways to prepare delicious squash side dishes, and I've found one that has become a favorite in our house. The best part is it can be cooked outside on these hot days!

As with many recipes, quantities here are footloose and fancy-free...adjust them to your own tastes or what you happen to have on hand. That said, here's how I made it:

Ingredients:
Approx. 2 lbs of squash, I used patty pan and crookneck since that's what we'd gotten at our CSA
1 red onion
2 to 3 tablespoons olive oil
2 to 3 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon fresh lemon thyme (I'd probably use more in the future, but that's all we had)
Zest from 1/2 a lemon

Directions:
Dice squash into bite-sized pieces large enough not to fall through the holes of a grill basket. There's no need to peel them; just wash the skin well. Dice onion into similar sized pieces. In a large bowl, stir together all the ingredients. If it seems too dry, add some additional olive oil and vinegar.

Transfer squash to a grill basket. Grill over medium heat, stirring occasionally, until squash are fork-tender (but not mushy).

Alternately, you could cut large slices of big squash and grill directly on the grate. Or you could wrap all the veggies inside a double layer of grill foil and steam them directly on the grill. Or you could cook it in a pan on the stove. Or if you wanted to pay a lot of attention to it, you could even stick it under the broiler. You have a lot of options, but if you have a grill basket, that's probably the easiest.

Enjoy, and just keep repeating that you can never have too much squash!

Kale and Bean Soup

2008-07-03T10:23:00.000-04:00

I followed this recipe for Kale and Bean soup fairly closely.

We thought it wasn't quite soupy enough. I'd probably add more liquid, or less kale in the future. Even so, it was good. TK and I agreed it was a really hearty meal and very filling.

A whole bunch of recipes!

2008-07-01T11:55:00.000-04:00

I love vegetables, but I've found that I'm pretty tame in what I buy: if I'm at the store, I get what I know. Zucchini, green beans, asparagus, Brussels sprouts, tomatoes, mushrooms, onions. I love that the CSA is forcing me to branch out a bit. One of the vegetables we got that I had no idea how to prepare was kohlrabi. Honestly, I don't think I've ever even SEEN kohlrabi in the grocery store. I searched around online and found a recipe that appealed to me: kohlrabi and carrots in honey butter sauce. I figured, carrots: good. Honey: good. Butter: good.

The recipe was simple and I followed it pretty closely (although for some unknown reason, I halved the kohlrabi and carrots amounts but forgot to half everything else so it ended up a bit soupy. Operator error on that one but easily corrected as I just used a slotted spoon to remove the carrots and kohlrabi).

It was tasty, but somehow wasn't quite outstanding. The carrots were better than the kohlrabi. I'm not sure if I don't love kohlrabi, or if this just wasn't the best dish to showcase it, but I'd probably try a different recipe if we get kohlrabi again.

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Next it was time for the beets. I must admit, I'm not a beet fan. I've mainly had them at salad bars and have come to conclude they're just there to fill out the salad bar without the restaurant having to worry that anyone would actually want to eat them. But, as always, I'm game to give something a try.

I got my inspiration from this recipe to match roasted beets with goat cheese. However, I thought this was a bit fussy with cutting everything into perfect rounds and having different oils and vinaigrettes and glazes. And I didn't have two different kinds of beets...just the golden ones. And I'm probably admitting to my pedestrian tastes, but I'm just not a big fan of towers of food. That's just weird in my admittedly non-gourmet opinion to have stacked food, unless it's a club sandwich.

So I just tossed the beets in a few tablespoons of olive oil, put them in a baking dish covered with aluminum foil, and baked them at 350 degrees for about an hour (for my small beets) until a toothpick easily pierced the center. You can peel them after they've been roasted (and cooled a bit). The skin just peels off with your fingers.

I sliced the beets thinly and alternated them with slices of herb and garlic goat cheese. (As an aside, the goat cheese was local as well, from Westfield Farm. It was outstanding cheese!)

My final vote: it was pretty good. I'm not a huge beet fan, but the goat cheese/beet combination was perfect. TK thought this was incredible, but he likes beets far more than I do. Three year old twins: liked the goat cheese, wouldn't try the beets.

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As we were picking up the beets, the guy working the distribution mentioned that beet greens were delicious. Darn it, now I have no excuse for not cooking them!

I found a recipe for preparing beet greens (or kale, or collard greens) that used vinegar and bacon. Hey, that sounds good to me! As an aside, have I mentioned my theory of preparing these odd, new (to me) vegetables, or vegetables I haven't liked in the past? I try to pick a recipe that includes an ingredient I like. Goat cheese, bacon, honey...something familiar that I know I'll like.

Here's a link to the recipe I used. I made some changes, though, fairly significantly altering quantities:

Ingredients:

Green from 5 beets
1/2 large onion, finely diced
2 strips of bacon
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 cup water
1 teaspoon sugar
Sprinkle red pepper flakes
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar

Directions:

Wash beet greens, remove thick stems, and tear leaves into bite sized pieces. Set aside.

Fry bacon until crispy and set aside on paper towels to drain.

Add onions to the bacon grease and cook over medium heat until slightly translucent. Add the garlic, stir, then add the water, sugar, and red pepper flakes. Bring to a boil. Stir in the greens and reduce the heat to low. Cover and simmer for about 15 minutes (the original recipe calls for 30 minutes if you're using kale or collard greens). Add the vinegar, cook for about 1 minute, then you're done! (The original recipe is a little unclear; if you're using kale or collard greens you may have to cook for an additional 20 or so minutes....basically, if you're using kale or collard greens, you should probably just head on over to the original recipe linked above).

Place the greens on a plate and garnish with crumbled bacon.

These were interesting. It was definitely my first time eating beet greens. They were sweet and sour; a touch spicy and a hint salty. That sounds like a lot of competing flavors, and it kind of was. But somehow it worked. TK and I cleaned this up...there wasn't a bite left. At the end of dinner, we even ate the little bits we'd put on the boys plates that they had totally ignored. Well, except for picking the bacon off to eat.

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If you look closely at the picture of the beet greens, you can see in the background that we had quinoa with it. In the last 3 minutes of cooking the quinoa, I tossed in some spinach. It was a great addition and a good way to use up some of that spinach. I'm not even going to include a recipe...just cook the quinoa however you normally do (or follow the directions on the bag/box if you don't normally prepare quinoa), then toss in some chopped spinach. Yum!

Raw salsa

2008-06-30T12:01:00.000-04:00

I'm desperate for the tomato season to start. Is there anything better than fresh tomatoes? Those things they try to pass off in the supermarket as tomatoes hardly fulfill my craving for this delightful fruit. But I'll admit it: I cheat. I buy hothouse tomatoes from Maine. I get grape tomatoes from California. I'll even resort, in the dead of winter, when the cravings are too overwhelming, to those mealy faux-tomatoes at Stop and Shop.

In our last CSA pick up, we got PURPLE scallions that I was pretty excited about. And what is the best thing to make with scallions? SALSA! Yes. Shh, don't tell the tomatoes growing at the farm, but I cheated on them. I just couldn't wait. I mean, I had the scallions, I have cilantro in my herb garden that is huge and already flowering. Thank goodness for those greenhouses in Maine, getting me my tomato fix.

I make a very simple, fresh salsa. All raw, very bright, uncluttered flavor. I make it with nothing spicy so my boys will eat it. It is one of the few relatively healthy foods they'll eat, so I keep it plain and find it's still outstanding. However, if we get some hot peppers later this summer in our CSA share, I'll probably toss some in for TK and I to enjoy. Here's the recipe:

Ingredients:

Tomatoes (any kind...I've even made it with halved grape tomatoes)
Scallions
Cilantro
Salt
Diced jalepenos or other hot peppers, or tobasco sauce (optional, I usually omit so my kids will eat it).

Directions:

You may notice this recipe lacks quantities. Can I say it's all to taste? Well, I'm going to! But, I'll try to give some hints here in the directions.

Cut tomatoes in half and squeeze out seeds. You can use your finger to squish some out, or even just gently squeeze the tomato. You don't have to perfectly get all the seeds out. In fact, if I use grape tomatoes, I don't even bother seeding them. You just don't want your salsa to be drippy with seeds.

Dice the seeded tomatoes.

Finely slice the whites (or purples in my case) of the scallions. Reserve the green part for something else! I would say as a rule of thumb, if you're using medium sized tomatoes, you'll want to use one scallion for every two tomatoes. Or more or less, depending on your taste.

Chop some cilantro leaves. How much? Oh, it depends on how much you like it. I use a few sprigs for each tomato, then add more if I feel like it needs it.

Mix the tomatoes, scallions, and cilantro leaves, then start adding the salt. I use a salt cracker (actually, I let my boys add it), so I just keep tasting. It does take a bit of salt, and I don't like my food very salty. I've made it with very little salt, but I find it's the salt that really makes the flavors of the salsa pop. So be guided by your own taste buds on this one.

Eat immediately. We rarely have leftovers, but you can store it for a day or two. You'll probably have to drain off some excess water if you keep it in the fridge overnight, but it still tastes wonderful.

Lots of recipes

2008-06-23T12:07:00.000-04:00

We started out this CSA week with a big winner: Garlic Scape Pesto. I followed the recipe given there. Well, mostly. Oh, heck, you know I made a few changes:

Ingredients:

7 garlic scapes, chopped into approx. 2" pieces
Fresh parsley (I'd guess about 2 tablespoons chopped, but I didn't chop it since it was just going into the food processor, so I'm really not sure)
3/4 cup olive oil
scant 1 cup Parmesan cheese

Directions:

Put the garlic scapes, parsley, and olive oil into a food processor and process until smooth(ish...it doesn't turn out perfectly smooth).

Stir in Parmesan cheese and serve over pasta. I choose gnocchi since it's a favorite with my twins. The pesto turns out very thick, so it was a good match to a heavy pasta.

A quick note about this picture: the sauce turns out to be a delicate green, and I just couldn't get it to show up on the camera. Either the overhead lights or flash blew-out the color too much, or without extra light, it was too shadowy. I took this picture standing near the window, holding the plate at about a 45 degree angle to catch the right natural lighting. All so you could appreciate the green color! Of course, then I was so worried about my food falling off the plate I ended up not getting a great picture anyway. But the color is pretty, isn't it?

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Served with the pesto, we had Garlic Scape Bread. Basically it was garlic bread where I used minced garlic scapes in place of garlic powder.

Looks pretty, doesn't it? Well, it wasn't garlicy enough for me. I'd add some extra garlic powder in additon to the scapes if I made this again. The delicate garlic scape flavor was wasted on garlic bread. Oh well. I mean, it was slightly garlicy buttery bread, so it was still yummy, but this won't replace my normal garlic bread recipe!

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Here it is, my first big CSA failure. Garlic scape soup. The recipe is all the way at the bottom of the page listed, if anyone wants to waste their garlic scapes on this substandard meal. It was gritty and unfinished tasting. TK and I thought it was a good soup base...it might have been good with some chicken and rice or veggies added. But as it was: uninspired. It doesn't even look good:

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But no worries, things quickly turned back in a positive direction. We went strawberry picking with Snickollet (and her kids and friend), plus both moms and baby of Two Moms and Baby. Taking my inspiration from those delightful strawberries and the latest CSA haul, I threw together this salad:

The salad contained spinach, lettuce, radish, purple scallions, hard boiled eggs, and sliced strawberries. What made it really outstanding was the homemade Strawberry Vinaigrette dressing. I followed the linked recipe, except I subbed about 1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon thyme for the tarragon, and I forgot about the sugar (oops! That was an unintentional oversight, but I didn't miss it...)

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And one last recipe, Roasted Spring Turnips, Snap Peas, and Garlic Scapes.

I found a recipe at a neat blog about eating locally (on the West Coast, but hey, we've got the same stuff here on the East Coast!) and followed the recipe pretty closely. I loved the lemon zest, and I used a lemon pepper herb mix. The garlic scapes were my favorite part as they got a little crispy in some parts and slightly caramelized. Lovely!

Napa Cabbage Salad

2008-06-20T12:16:00.000-04:00

And here's a recipe that I made to take to the farm last night. We met another family of twins there and had a little picnic before picking up our share. Very fun! We still had half a head of Napa (Chinese) cabbage from the previous weeks' share, so I decided to throw together a quick Asian salad.

I followed this recipe pretty closely, so just follow the link if you're interested. I omitted the almonds due to food allergies, and didn't miss them. However, if you're not dealing with food allergies, I'd probably leave them in. I also ran short on sesame seeds, and again, it was fine with only about half the recipe amount although given the choice, I'd probably go with the original recipe quantities.

Long story short, the salad was outrageously good. Yum!

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Note from 2009: This is one of my favorite recipes from the 2008 CSA season. Mmmm! I just made it again this year with our first head of Napa Cabbage. It was just as good as I remembered!

Chicken Lettuce Wraps and Spinach Artichoke Au Gratin

2008-06-19T12:20:00.000-04:00

Chicken Lettuce Wraps:

I very, very loosely followed this recipe. I made quite a few changes and while I was extremely happy with the results, the wraps weren't exactly similar to the P.F. Chang lettuce wraps. So if that's what you're looking for, you might want to go to the original recipe. Having said that, here's my version:

Ingredients:

1 lb. ground chicken
4 oz. water chestnuts, minced
6 oz. baby bella mushrooms, minced
1/2 medium onion, finely minced
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
3 Tablespoons brown sugar
3 Tablespoons soy sauce
Splash rice wine vinegar
2 Tablespoons ketchup
1 Tablespoon lemon juice
1/4 cup water
1 Tablespoon oyster sauce
1 Tablespoon spicy brown bean sauce**
Lettuce leaves (we used about 2/3 a head of Bibb lettuce)

Directions:

In a large skillet, brown the ground chicken. When it is about 3/4 of the way done, add the water chestnuts, mushrooms, onion, and garlic. Continue cooking, stirring often, until chicken is browned.

Meanwhile, mix all remaining ingredients (except lettuce) in a small bowl. Stir well.

When the chicken is done, add the sauce you mixed in the small bowl. Stir well to coat all the chicken and let cook for about 2 or 3 minutes until slightly thickened.

Place a spoonful of filling onto a lettuce leaf, then roll the lettuce up.

**As I mentioned previously, the original recipe linked above called for red chile paste, but the only brand I could find had peanuts in it, which is a no-go due to food allergies here. So I got House of Tsang brand spicy brown bean sauce. The final recipe was not quite spicy enough. I'd say either use the red chile paste if you don't have to worry about allergies, or add some red pepper flakes in addition to the brown bean sauce.

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Next I tried Fresh Spinach and Artichoke Au Gratin. I wasn't sure how it would come out using fresh, uncooked spinach...most recipes call for the frozen stuff. I almost steamed the spinach or blanched it, but ultimately, laziness ruled the day and I just used raw spinach. Worked out fine! Again, there's a recipe I used as a jumping off point (here), but made some significant changes.
Ingredients:

1/3 pound spinach, coarsely chopped
2/3 of a 14 oz. can of artichoke hearts (non-marinated, drained), coarsely chopped
6 oz. cream cheese
2 Tablespoons butter
1/4 cup parmesan cheese

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375 degrees

Soften cream cheese and butter in the microwave for about 20 seconds until it can be stirred together.

Mix in artichoke hearts, spinach, and parmesan cheese. Transfer to a baking dish (or just make the whole recipe right in the baking dish from the get-go...that's what I did!)

Bake for about 20-25 minutes. Serve with chips, bread, and/or veggies for dipping.

Spicy Bok Choy

2008-06-17T12:23:00.000-04:00

Here I thought I was being so smart, making the dreaded bok choy on a night when I was going out for dinner. Of course I tried it, and wouldn't you know, it was incredible! That was unexpected. I was completely, though pleasantly, surprised. The only problem now is that I'm a little depressed that we got our expected CSA distribution list for the week and there's no bok choy on it. Ah well, maybe spring turnips will be my next true food love...stay tuned!

Oh, the recipe. Here it is. I didn't really make any changes, so just follow the link if you're interested.

Chive Flower Omelet

2008-06-15T12:26:00.000-04:00

I've never eaten a chive flower. Heck, I've never even seen a chive flower before. They're neat. Really chive-y, but purple and pretty. At our CSA, they suggested we just throw them into a salad. Well, it's a bit too strong for that for me. But, getting some inspiration from this blog (about the only chive flower recipe I found on google), I decided to make an omelet. I adapted a lot of the ingredients to what I had, but left the two biggies the same: eggs and chive flowers.

End result: outstanding! Here's what it looked like:

Want the recipe? Never fear! You can't stop me from reciping. I just made that word up! Ha, ha, spell checker, I don't care that you don't think it's a word!

Ingredients:

2 eggs
Splash of milk
1 tablespoon finely diced onion
1/2 clove garlic, finely diced
1 teaspoon minced fresh chives (additional for garnishing if desired)
1/2 teaspoon minced fresh parsley (additional for garnishing if desired)
Petals from one chive flower (additional chive flower for garnishing if desired)
2 tablespoons minced spinach (additional for garnishing if desired)
1/4 cup crumbled feta (additional for garnishing if desired)
2 teaspoons olive oil

Directions:

Place olive oil in skillet over medium heat. Add onions and garlic and saute about 2 minutes.

Meanwhile, whisk eggs and milk until lightly frothy. Add chives, parsley, chive flower petals, and spinach. It will be VERY herb-y.

Pour egg mixture into skillet with the onions and garlic. If the onions and garlic collect around the outside, quickly mix them in before the eggs start to set. Or just leave them along the outside.

Cook until eggs are almost set on top. Add feta cheese and cook an additional minute or two.

Slide the omelet out onto a plate, folding in half as it slides out of the pan. Garnish with additional, well, everything. If you'd like.

Shrimp Egg Rolls and Scallops over Wilted Tatsoi

2008-06-13T12:28:00.000-04:00

Shrimp Egg Rolls

Ingredients:

1 lb precooked shrimp, coarsely chopped
1/2 head Chinese cabbage, stems removed and leaves coarsely chopped (I probably should have used a whole head, especially since I have no idea what to do with the other half a head)
1/4 cup shredded carrots
1/4 cup diced water chestnuts
1 radish, cut into small papersticks (probably could have used 2 radishes...I wasn't sure how it would go but threw it in since I had it)
6 ounces baby bella mushrooms, finely diced
3 cloves garlic, finely diced
1 tsp sesame oil
2 tablespoons olive oil
Splash rice wine vinegar
2 Tablespoons soy sauce
2 Tablespoons oyster sauce
Egg Roll wrappers (I used 12 egg roll wrappers...your mileage may vary depending on how stuffed you make your egg rolls)
Vegetable oil for frying

Directions:

Heat the sesame and olive oils in a large skillet over medium high heat (oil amounts are approximate). Saute garlic and mushrooms until slightly tender, about 2 minutes. Add the carrots, water chestnuts, and radish. Saute an additional 2 minutes. Add the Chinese cabbage, rice wine vinegar, soy sauce, and oyster sauce. Stir well until cabbage begins to wilt. Add the shrimp, stir well, then remove from the heat.

Once filling has cooled slightly, fill egg roll wrappers. If you don't know how to do that, no worries. The directions are on the package of egg roll wrappers.

Add about 1/4" oil to a skillet and heat over high heat until a wooden chopstick dipped into the oil causes bubbles to appear. Carefully add egg rolls (there will be spatters unless you're a far better egg roll roller than I am). Turn once the first side has browned. I find it best to use a spatula in one hand and a chopstick in the other to turn the egg rolls. When the other side has browned, remove to paper towel lined plate to drain.

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As if that wasn't enough, I also made:

Pan Seared Scallops over Wilted Tatsoi

The wilted tatsoi was really outstanding. I very loosely followed this recipe, except that I only used tatsoi rather than assorted Asian greens. Also, I only had seasoned rice vinegar (which they say specifically not to use), so I used it and omitted the sugar. I added some garlic, because, come on. How could you not use garlic in this? And I just eyeballed all the ingredient quantities since I wasn't using anywhere near the same quantity of greens. Anyway, it was delicious. I'm so glad we decided to try the tatsoi. We had a choice at our CSA of tatsoi or arugula, and I'm really happy we decide to go with the one we'd never heard of.

For the scallops I tried something a little different from my normal bread-and-fry-in-garlic-butter method I employ for most seafood. We had some lemon thyme that I didn't have any plans for, so I used that as my inspiration. I mean, it wasn't a big stretch to pair lemony flavors with seafood, but anyway :)

Ingredients:

1 lb sea scallops
1/2 teaspoon fresh lemon thyme
1 teaspoon lemon pepper
zest from 1/2 lemon
Oil for frying

Directions:

Rinse scallops in cold water and remove that little tough piece on the side. I don't know what it's called (anyone want to help me out?) It peels right off, though. Gently pat excess water off with paper towel.

Toss scallops with thyme, lemon pepper, and lemon zest until all scallops are lightly coated.

Add enough oil to thinly coat the bottom of a skillet. Heat over high heat. Add scallops (don't overcrowd...do it in two batches if your pan is small). When the bottom of the scallop is lightly seared, turn over and cook the other side until it's seared. I'm hesitant to give cook times as it really depends on the size of your scallops, but it's quick...1 or 2 minutes per side approximately.