Blueberry cake with streusel topping

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

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

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

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

1. 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. 
2. 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. 
3. Arrange the asparagus spears, spoke fashion, on top of quiche; place cherry tomato halves between spokes.

Welcome Spring!

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

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

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!