FOOD ON THE FOOD

Blight

It seems that I’m not the only one feeling blighted these days.  By now I’m sure you’ve heard about the proliferation of late blight, the devastating fungus that was responsible for the Irish potato famine, which has already destroyed entire tomato fields across New England (with eyes on the potato fields), including the ones in my immediate area.  Today’s guest post is by Amanda Cather, farmer and CSA manager of Waltham Fields.  She writes a beautiful weekly newsletter, from which she agreed to let me share an excerpt.  Here’s what she had to say about the loss of such a labor-intensive but cherished crop:

Tomatoes on our farm are a labor of true love.  First, we painstakingly select our favorites from the hundreds of varieties in our seed catalogs, selecting a mix of colors, flavors, ripening dates and yields that we imagine will keep us well fed all late summer and fall. We start the seeds in the greenhouse beginning in March and April, transplant them into larger pots as they grow, and begin to plant them in the field in mid-May.  The tomato field requires intensive preparation, mowing down and incorporating thick winter rye and hairy vetch, spreading compost and soybean meal, laying black plastic and putting down mulch in the pathways.  As the tomatoes grow in the field, we stake and trellis them to keep them off the ground and carry the weight of the ever-increasing fruit.  The harvest itself, in a good year, takes hours every other day.  All the while, we're dreaming of the bounty of August and September—the roasted tomato sauces, juicy tomato sandwiches, lightly sautéed Sun Gold cherries with basil and Swiss chard, a platter of lightly salted, multi-colored heirloom tomatoes to eat straight up or with fresh mozzarella.  Imagining the varied textures and flavors of our tomato meals helps us get through the work of growing tomatoes to the joyful end:  the harvest.

Not this year.

Late blight hit our farm early and hard.  We saw the first evidence of the blight a few weeks before many other growers in the area, possibly because of our location, right in the middle of an urban area, surrounded by home gardeners and the big box stores which sold them infected tomato plants.  In any case, once it arrived, the cool weather and apparently unending rain spread the disease through the first succession of tomatoes with frightening rapidity.  Heavy on the vines and almost ready to ripen, the fruit turned rotten in a matter of days.  From one Saturday to the next, the vines withered and died on their trellises.  The second succession, planted right beside the first, was hit next.  Despite spraying copper, an organically approved fungicide, we saw the blight appear in our cherry and plum tomatoes as well.  Once the disease appears, there is no organically approved method of destroying it.

Tomatoes are a hard crop for us to let go of on our farm.  They account for a large portion of our share value, and they are just one of our favorites.  They are also a valuable donation crop and a big part of our plan for hunger relief and food access work on the farm.  In the end, it is the support of the CSA that allows us to move on from what feels like a fairly significant agricultural tragedy for us.  We know that shareholders will miss their tomatoes this season as much as we do, but we're grateful for the flexibility of the CSA model, which gives us the space to make hard decisions with integrity without jeopardizing our staff or the health of our soil.

Events like this, which hopefully occur once in a generation, remind us that local food systems are both fragile—a regional disaster can impact an entire crop for an entire season—and resilient—since the commitment of participants and growers to one another can help maintain small farms through the trouble and hopefully turn eaters on to the joys of green tomato relish and other seasonal delights.  While we'd certainly rather not learn these lessons at the expense of our tomatoes—how about a crop failure in fennel or kohlrabi instead?—the power of the community you and your farmers have built together will carry us through the blight and into what we hope will be a bountiful autumn harvest.  We are grateful for your support in this challenging season.

Please support your local farms this season more than ever.

Fishing For Compliments

Before chemo started, Husband and I attempted to keep the vacation spirit alive by taking the kids fishing.  We tried out Horn Pond in Woburn.  It’s right by the electric power plant.  You can’t miss it.

Husband and the kids used their secret weapon: hot dogs.  I used a lure. 

Husband and the kids caught a whole bunch of fish.  I did not. 

Husband suggested I try some hot dog.  I refused. 

At long, long last, I got a bite.  I could tell it was a big one.  It fought mightily, but I dug in my heels, hauling and reeling, hauling and reeling, the rod bending under the strain of my amateur technique.  This was no ordinary sunfish.  Not even a catfish or a bass.  It was a trout, for sure.  No, a cod!  A SALMON!!!  It didn’t matter that I was just going to throw it back.  I had to catch that fish.  I had to.  I would have dove in there to get it if need be.  After an epic struggle that drew at least one curious spectator, this is what I dragged to shore:

A bouquet of plastic flowers.  Never underestimate a fish’s sense of humor.

OPF (Other People’s Food)

Since things have been sucking pretty bad around here lately, I thought we’d turn things over to Boston’s own Calamity Shazaam in the Kitchen, since she can always put a smile on your face whether you really want one there or not.  Back when I was on vacation (sweet, sweet vacation), she had graciously offered to take custody of my precious (non-bean) farmshare.  Let’s see how things went:

So last week me and my neighbor Even Steve went out to Waltham to pick up the harvest. Firstly let me say right now: there is nothing farmer about me. Out I went in my skinny jeans, gold flip-flops, bright red purse, and Hollywood sunglasses. Hahah!

They saw ME coming for sure! Tammy had explained the pick up system, so I was prepared enough to bring my own bags. And everyone there was really nice, even if I had to keep guessing at Tammy's last name like a total fraud. Which was absurd anyway, because what fancy pants chick is going to be randomly driving around in Waltham looking for a farm share to defraud by randomly guessing that someone there by the name of Tammy happened to have a share.... Thankfully the farmer lady was able to help me out with that, although I am still sure the clipboard person was convinced of my fraudular inclinations.

First I picked out my eight items:

The white things are little sweet turnips (eerrr I think), the red balls are beets, carrots, chard, fava beans in the pod, purple scallions in there, and a couple of yellow squash and zukes in there too. And a head of lettuce.

The veg pick up at the shed was easy enough - you put the veg in the bag and done. However, I wasn't totally prepared for the pick your own herbs and stuff. Did you know that herbs, outside of containers, grow really low to the ground?

We tramped over to the herb & bean plots. Face it, I looked like a city slicker with my giant red bag and gold flips. This is why my Little House dream has remained a dream. I would last about a day on the prairie.

I clipped a few herbs - basil and parsley, and then we hit the bean bushes.

Ok, seriously, what the f*ck is a fava bean anyway? And how the f*ck are you supposed to eat them? Anyone?

Fava beans come in a thick woody pod and I could not figure out if I was meant to pick the little ones, or the big ginormous ones. In the end though it didn't really matter. I sent the beans flying around the kitchen trying to shell them and then the ones that did make it in to the pot turned grey when I cooked them.

Blech.

But everything else I ate. And fast because it turns out that farm fresh produce has a shelf life of oh, about a day before it all goes flabby. Which is a good thing and a bad thing. I totally panicked because the next day the carrots had all gone flabby, and so I hurried to cook and eat everything by Sunday night. But a good thing because pretty much by Monday morning I was pooping straight compost. I could literally feel the cholesterol leaving my body. It was great to eat such yummy vegetables.

The chard was particularly delicious. I sautéed it with a little olive oil, some garlic, and red pepper, a culinary cliché I know. But really it was a completely different taste than chard that is a little older. I even ate the stems.

So this week I was a little more prepared. I picked up some more carrots, chard, onions (purple and shaped like a torpedo) and two bulbs of fennel, which I gave to my Mom who likes those sorts of things. Because even though I feel like I ought to like fennel, and endives, and radicchio, I really cannot learn to like that particular bitter green taste, nor the weird licorice taste of fennel.

The carrots I turned into a soup, along with a head of cauliflower, onions, garlic, and curry. The chard is for dinner tomorrow night - probably sautéed again with a poached egg on top.

All in all, not a bad way to start the week, especially when the food is a gift. And also on a side note, I got a replacement copy of Jilly Coopers Polo finally in the mail. I love Jilly Cooper. Her writing is both excellent and florid and it is like a literary crack hit for me. So with soup, an egg, and a great read for a hot night, life is pretty terrific.

Chemo, Part I

You may be wondering how Husband was able to drag me to my first chemo appointment yesterday.  Because it’s hard to psyche yourself up for a good poisoning.  It’s the polar opposite of the Eat Local Challenge.  Well, except for the local part.  And the challenge.  Perhaps I’ll rename it the Eat Local Poison Challenge.  Tasty, tasty poisons.  Naturally, Husband had his work cut out for him, so he pulled out the big guns:

Him: Put on something nice.  I’m taking you out to dinner.

Me: Shut up, you are not.

Him: Yes, I am.  Now hurry up and get ready.  Our reservation’s in less than an hour.

Me: But it’s 2 o’clock in the afternoon.

Him: The chef makes his own hours.

Me: Really?  Is it like an underground supper club or something?

Him: …Yes.  Yes it is. 

Me: Oooooooo.  But there’s booze, right?  No BYO?

Him: He definitely mentioned something about special cocktails. 

Me: Weeeeeeeeeeee.  Really?  Crap, what am I going to wear.

Him: Find something fast.  You have five minutes.

After 20 minutes of yelling and swearing at the contents of my closet, I’m looking stupid in the stupid outfit I picked out and we’re finally in the car heading towards the city. 

Me: So what kind of food is it?  Are we talking French or Indian or something with weird foams and shit?

Him: Interesting you should ask.  He’s doing this innovative thing where you inject the food directly into your bloodstream.  Ruth Reichl was raving about it on NPR.

Me: Ruth Reichl?  Are you sure?

Him: Yeah, she said it’s all the rage in certain New York circles.

Me: What circles?  Junky circles?  Where’s the fun in that?  How do you taste anything?

Him: She said that instead of the flavors expressing themselves on your taste buds, you feel the sensations…other places. 

Me: Other places?  Like where?  Like (leaning in, whispering) down there?

Him: Maybe there.  Wherever.  The chef personalizes the meal for each diner so everyone gets a unique experience.

Me: (fanning myself)

We get off the Pike at the Pru and I assume we’re going to the South End, but then he keeps missing all the turns, I’m noticing.  Probably because he’s so used to driving me all the way to Longwood for my goddamned appointments.  Wait a minute.

Me: Where are we going again?

Him: I said it’s a surprise.

And that’s when we pulled up to the Dana-Farber building and Husband was exposed as the traitorous traitor he really is.  Needless to say, I didn’t get the chemorgasm I was promised.  (I faked it so the chef wouldn't feel bad, though.)  Next time, I’ll wear a better outfit.

I’m Baaa-aaaaack

We really were on vacation, by the way.  That wasn’t just code for chemo.  Chemo starts tomorrow.  Hip hip horraaaaaaaayyhackhackhhhhuuuuurrrrllll.  I hope you liked the guest posters because there may be a few more of those coming up (if anyone would like to write something, just let me know).

Our trip, during which we rent a cottage on Cape Cod for a week each summer, had been planned since February and there was no way I was going to let cancer fuck it up.  Because I think you can guess when chemo was scheduled to start.  Vacation week.  Of course it was.  Until I told them I’d rather die of cancer than spoil our family vacation with chemo.  They didn’t find that as funny as I thought they would, but they did agree to change it, so that’s what counts. 

Last week was a much-needed eye in the proverbial storm.  The weather, in case you didn’t notice, was amazing.  Could it have been more perfect? No, I think not.  We waded in tidal pools and built sandcastles and fished. 

We collected and freed polliwogs. 

We saw seals in the waters off beautiful Nauset, where it pours bean green over blue.  (Which Husband refused to harpoon.) 

We mini-golfed and majorly gorged on ice cream.  We barbecued and went out to eat at the Brewster Fish House and got fried fish at Arnold’s and lobster rolls from Maurice’s. 

I took 45 outdoor showers.  I read books and decoded many a quote from Einstein and Descartes out of the cryptogram book Husband gave me.  Because I’m a cryptogram addict.  Forget sudoku.  Sure, there’s logic to sudoku, but there’s no art.  If Scrabble is the apple pie of word games then cryptograms are pot brownie sundaes with hot heroin sauce, whipped amphetamines, sprinkled with crack-nuts, and topped with a bourbon-soaked cherry.  I love them so.  Decode this: DYV UEDIORYP PDQQRGO UD RYWDYV ZED CGAYLO HV UEAO OIYPRV PIGAYL MEVHD.

One of the days during vacation, I managed to work bacon into every meal.  Bacon and eggs for breakfast, BLTs for lunch, grilled bluefish for dinner with a tomato and bacon vinaigrette as seen in the Boston Globe Sunday Magazine.  Yes, that’s right, we even bought a newspaper.  There was no Internet connection, you see.  Not that I didn’t try to hijack one, as I wandered around the perimeter of the yard with my laptop, holding it over the fence into the surrounding properties.  Whatever.  The point is: it was a fabulous vacation.  I forgot my troubles and my troubles forgot me.  Now I feel as though I’m ready for absolutely anything, though I would never dare say such a thing.  That would be stupid.

Red Pesto

Here’s another guest post, this time from Jill over at North Shore Dish.  Be sure to hop over and check out the gorgeous photography and all the delicious happenings to the north of the City.  Thanks, Jill!

I love how recipes evolve. One of my family’s favorite pasta dishes was given to me years ago by a friend. She found it in a newspaper or magazine, photocopied it, and wrote her changes on it. My copy has the original article, plus her changes, plus mine.

I keep the original rather than typing out the recipe I actually use because the article tells the story of how the recipe originated with Luciano Pavarotti, who says you must first sing the tenor part of an opera, preferably Verdi, before making the dish.

I’ve never followed that instruction and the pasta still tastes terrific. It’s easy to make, feeds a crowd, and it’s a nice change from regular tomato sauce or pesto.

Red Pesto

1 lb frozen ricotta cavatelli
½ cup minced fresh basil
½ cup minced fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 small can tomato paste
½ cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese (I’ve used Kraft in a pinch, and the sauce is still delicious)
2 garlic cloves, minced
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil

Boil a large pot of water while you make the sauce.

I use my Cuisinart to chop the herbs, then transfer them to a bowl and add the tomato paste, cheese, garlic, and oil. Mix thoroughly.

Cook the pasta according to the directions, return to the hot pot, add the sauce, and stir. Serve with additional grated cheese, crusty bread or garlic bread, and a green salad.

Note: I don’t recommend using another pasta. It will taste fine, but there’s something magical in the combination of the cavatelli with this sauce. The sauce will keep fine in the fridge for a day, just stir before using as the oil will have separated.

Bean Season

Hello? Hello? Is this thing on? Hello?

My name is Barry. I shouldn’t actually be here. I don’t mean I haven’t got permission. I mean it’s not actually my thing. It’s Tammy Donroe’s thing. “Food on the Food,” whatever the hell that’s supposed to mean. It’s a “blog.”

I’m Tammy’s neighbor. Not her neighbor, exactly: I live six blocks away, where the houses aren’t quite as fancy. I wouldn’t even say I know her, really. We’ve never talked, for example. Our main connection is, she was in my ex-wife’s yoga class for a few years.

Don’t get me started about my ex-wife.

So it came as a surprise to find a note from Tammy on my porch yesterday morning, asking me if I’d take care of her children and her “blog” while she and her husband were on vacation. Apparently they had already left. She promised to bring me some cheese curds.

How in the world did she find out about me and cheese curds?

I don’t have kids myself, and I had never done a “blog” before (in fact, I had to look up the word “blog”), but I thought, come on, how hard can it be? Also, Tammy’s kind of cute, in her own way, with that, what would you call it, hillbilly-Italian kind of thing going on. And then the cheese curds. So I thought what the heck.

I went over to her house. The kids were there, sitting quietly at the dinner table, like the note said they would be. Before I could open my mouth, the smaller one introduced himself. “I’m The Three-Year-Old,” he said. Then his brother chimed in: “I’m The Kindergartner.” Very cute boys, very polite. And talk about excellent diction—when The Three-Year-Old asked for permission to go to the bathroom, I made him repeat it several times, just because he said it in such an adorable way!

All in all, the place was pretty tidy, which is a little surprising, considering. The only real housecleaning I had to do was clear the Snickers wrappers off the kitchen table. There must have been two dozen of them, but at least the boys weren’t hungry.

But enough about babysitting. Tammy’s instructions say I’m supposed to write about food, so I’d better get to it. I’ve decided to use my brief moment in the spotlight to introduce all you Food on the Foodies to a fantastic CSA farm I recently subscribed to. If you live anywhere near Waltham, MA, you owe it to yourself to join.

It’s called Toot Hollow Farm, and get this: They only grow one thing, and that one thing is beans. What that means for members is that every Friday for the entire length of bean season (which the brochure says lasts from late June till about mid-February), you can expect a Toot Hollow truck to deliver a box of their freshest beans directly to your house. FYI, here are some of the contents of the latest box:

You can’t imagine what a luxury it is to find this incredible bounty on my doorstep each week. And the fact that it comes from a local grower means everything’s been picked at a stage of perfect ripeness—none of your thousand-mile journeys in refrigerated trucks. That’s good news in the carbon-footprint department. And delicious? Well, I think the photo says it all.

I signed up with Toot Hollow only a few weeks ago, and I have yet to actually visit the farm. I confess I tried to find it once or twice, but the directions in the brochure are a little vague. They must be way the hell out in the boondocks someplace: I picture rolling hills and trees full of songbirds, and of course row on row of delicious beans. No question I’ll make it out at some point, but in the meantime, just keep those boxes coming, Toot Hollow! It’s like having Christmas every week!

Luckily, if there’s one thing kids can’t get enough of, it’s beans, so you can bet that The Three-Year-Old and The Kindergartner will be enjoying the Toot Hollow cornucopia along with Uncle Barry this week, while Mom and Dad are away. I’ve been brainstorming on some fun lunchbox ideas for The Kindergartner to take to day camp. Here’s what I’ll be putting in his little backpack tomorrow:

If that doesn’t make you wish you were a kid again, nothing will!

And that’s about all I have to say on the subject of Toot Hollow Farm. Thank you for letting me post today. And if anyone’s in touch with Tammy and her husband, would you mind asking them where they keep the Band-Aids?   

Barry Foy is the author of the wildly popular Devil’s Food Dictionary: A Pioneering Culinary Reference Work Consisting Entirely of Lies.  It’s funny. 

Two More Things and Then I’ll Be Done With Black Raspberries, I Swear

First of all, just LOOK at what I found in my backyard:

Black raspberries!  No shit.  Not a lot of them.  Just one vine growing out of a rock wall right next to another thorny stem that appeared to have been hacked off by somebody at some point in the past.  And I bet that somebody was me.  Oh, foolish girl.  If only we had half a sense of what we were doing 50% of the time.

So, Smart-People-Who-Know-About-Black-Raspberries, I ask you.  How do you propagate these wild things?  Can I just chew up the berries and spit them out all over my yard?  Or do I have to more closely mimic what birds do?  Speak slowly and use very small words. 

As for the black raspberries I picked before, those that didn’t end up in the buckle were combined with some strawberries that were past their prime to make preserves.  You’ll be glad to note that I didn’t use gelatin this time.  I didn’t even use pectin.  I just relied on the fruits’ natural gelling properties using my great grandmother's basic technique.  And how did it come out?  It tastes divine.  Truly.  I’m not a huge fan of strawberry jam (too sweet), but the raspberries added such a pleasing tartness and improved the color greatly.  Just look at its garnet hue:

Actually, it was more purplish in real life.  For once the camera improved its subject.  The jam still came out too thick for my taste, though.  Twenty minutes of boiling was too long in this case.  But you can still get it on toast with some muscle, and it’ll make a kick-ass filling for thumbprint cookies.

So that’s it.  If you want to hear more about black raspberries, you’ll have to go elsewhere.

Buckle Up

Turns out I’m addicted to black raspberries.  I picked a bunch more a few days ago because it was raining, and when I got back, Looky Daddy had tweeted about this, which was adapted from this.  Suddenly, there was cake in the oven, its jammy scent wafting upstairs, interfering with my ability to fold laundry properly.  (I’m still finding mismatched socks in odd places.)

I managed to hold off for most of the day, but then I ate a quarter of this cake while making dinner.  What, I’m just fattening myself up for chemo. 

Black Raspberry Buckle

I know buckles usually have a crumbly topping, but that would ruin this.  It’s perfect the way it is.  I just like the name.

1 cup all-purpose flour
½ tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. baking soda
¼ tsp. salt
4 Tbsp. unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup sugar, plus 1 Tbsp., divided (I liked Pinch My Salt’s idea of using demerara sugar on top.  I would have done it if I'd had some.)
½ tsp. pure vanilla extract
1 large egg
½ cup buttermilk, well shaken
1 cup fresh black (or red) raspberries

Preheat oven to 400°F with rack towards the top.  Butter and flour a 9-inch round cake pan.  Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.  Cream butter and 2/3 cup sugar with an electric mixer at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes.  Beat in vanilla. Add egg and mix well.

At low speed, add flour mixture in 3 batches, alternating with buttermilk, and mixing until just combined.  Spoon batter into cake pan, smoothing top.  Scatter raspberries evenly over top and sprinkle with remaining 1 Tbsp sugar.

Bake until cake is golden and a toothpick inserted into center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Let cool.  Serve.

Source: Adapted from Gourmet’s recipe by Melissa Roberts.

Our 4th

Who would have thought that only three weeks after my mastectomy, I’d be up and about, doing all my usual things, almost as good as new?  (Almost.)  The human body is as amazing as it is disgusting. 

I’m very grateful for this stretch of time after recovering from surgery and before chemo starts where things feel normal again.  Where we can have a barbecue with our neighbors on the porch just like old times and the ribs taste just as sweet, if not sweeter, thanks to Neighbor Husband’s secret recipe and his way with a grill.

And I managed to fry up the hush puppies only five minutes late, and even though I broke the corn and cayenne mayonnaise twice, it did finally come together with a third yolk and a whisk.

And the coleslaw didn’t suck.

And the neighbors brought the best grilled beans on the planet.

And there was blueberry cobbler left over from the night before, so nobody had to worry about making dessert.

It felt good to be cooking again.  Really good.  Worthy of fireworks, even.

In Which I Lose My Already Tenuous Credibility

Yesterday, we took advantage of the rain to go blackberry-picking among the canes growing wild at a nearby park.  The bees, I had heard, have been particularly agitated lately, sending several neighborhood children home in tears on one of the few sunny afternoons we’ve had.  I attributed this to the bees’ formidable to do list combined with a weather-restricted work schedule.  Don’t we all get that way from time to time?

I figured that the pouring rain might work in our favor.  With the bees on siesta, maybe our non-stealthy approach to foraging might go unnoticed.  And it did, allowing us (me, mostly) to pick a scant pint.  The rain did not, however, save me from being stung by angry three-year-olds.  Soggy, angry three-year-olds:

Him: Mommy, I want a raspberry.

Me: These are blackberries.  Here, have one.

Him: No, I want a raspberry.

Me: There aren’t any raspberries here.  Only blackberries.

Him: But Mommy, I see a raspberry RIGHT THERE.

Me: Ohhhh.   Those red berries aren’t raspberries, they’re unripe blackberries.

Him: Yes, they ARE raspberries.  I see them RIGHT THERE.

Sheesh, the kid grows up in a CSA and suddenly he’s a berry expert.  (To be fair, they do look exactly like raspberries.)

Me: No, those don’t taste good.  Try one of these.

Him: Nooooooo, Mommy, nooooo…RASPBERRIIIIIEEEEESSSSS…

Me: Okay, fine.  Here.  (handing him a red one)

He tastes it, shivers.  I go back to picking.

Him: …Can I have a blackberry, please?

Me: Exactly.

Meanwhile, the angry six-year-old stayed behind in the car.  Something about it raining really hard.  Yeah, kid, what else is new?  Mommy needs to get the hell outside before she hangs herself with her computer cord.

Author's Note: What makes this post hilarious is that, come to find out, those berries aren’t blackberries at all, but black raspberries.  Because I can never pass up an opportunity to be a moron.  You can read all about the berry differences in the comment section, but how I found out was at dinner tonight when we had some friends over and I threw the remaining “blackberries” into a blueberry cobbler I was making and my friend said, those aren’t blackberries, they’re black raspberries, and I had to smile about what I wrote, knowing how smug I was to think I could win a battle of wits with a preschooler.  WRONG.  So, yes, the 3YO was right about the plant classification.  As for me, well, at least I know my colors!