FOOD ON THE FOOD

Foraging: Black Walnuts

It's almost spring foraging time!  But while I'm waiting for things to start poking out of the ground, I'm still working on the remnants of last year's fall forage—namely, black walnuts.

I've been wanting to blog about black walnuts for a good eight months—since last July.  That was when I first located some walnut trees in a variety of secret locations.  I used my powers of observation to note the very obvious presence of lime-sized, lime-colored balls high up in the trees.  See?

They were not limes, however.  This isn't Florida.  They're walnuts!

I monitored those trees all summer long and into the fall to make sure the nuts didn't drop without me, which they did anyway.  So then I had to fight the squirrels for my (un)fair share, scooping up any and all walnuts I could find on the ground as the sun set one September evening when I was supposed to be at a school PTO meeting.  I arrived to said meeting late with scratches on my arms and twigs in my hair and a pocketbook full of odd-smelling green nutballs (I'm very popular in case you haven't already guessed).

The next day, I dumped the walnuts onto the ground and stomped on them with old shoes to remove the green husks.  The oily insides of the hulls stained everything they touched dark brown, including the cement walkway and the rubber dishwashing gloves I wore. 

I scrubbed the nuts in a bucket of water to remove the remaining stainy husk material, keeping the nuts that sunk to the bottom and tossing the ones that floated (floaters indicate insect damage or otherwise shriveled-up nut meats).  I didn't compost the hulls, but rather threw them in the trash because they contain juglone, a compound that kills other plants.  I don't need any additional help in that department, as you well know.

Finally, I cured the nuts by drying them on trays indoors.  Every few months, I'd bring some outside and shell them with a hammer (eye protection recommended).  It takes quite a few whacks, and the inner nut chambers are so labyrinthine and the nutmeats so small compared to your average walnut that you end up with just a handful of fragments.   The yield was meager for the amount of time and work involved, but I was very, very excited to try them!

Here's the thing, though—I don't think I like black walnuts.  When I got it in my mind to collect them, I just assumed I would like them because I love all nuts passionately (Husband to insert joke here).  I had heard that black walnuts taste much, much stronger than your typical English walnuts, but I didn't think they'd taste THAT different.  They're stinky!  Like a super-sharp cheese aged in the musty basement of an industrial factory.  Am I selling this for you?  The best I can describe the flavor is eau de Home Depot.  I like the way hardware stores smell, but I'm not sure I like that in a nut.  They're pretty good in salads, I will say, in the same way that something powerful like blue cheese is good in a salad.  However, I find them borderline blasphemous in fudge.  My Virginia-bred grandmother has a recipe for chocolate pecan pie with a variation that includes a lesser amount of black walnuts.  I thought about attempting it, but that's a lot of man-hours for what I can only imagine would be a disgusting pie.

Still, I keep eating them.  Maybe I DO like them?  Or maybe I just like the idea of gathering my own wild nuts.  If you've ever had black walnuts, or get the chance to try them, let me know what you think. 

Support Local Farming: Sprout 2011

 

My CSA, Waltham Fields Community Farm, is having its annual fundraiser on Saturday, April 9 from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. at the Charles River Museum of Industry, and everyone's invited!  Come hang out, have some food, hear some music, and help raise money for the farm's wonderful food access work by bidding on great silent auction items donated by the local community, including a kayak from Charles River Canoe & Kayak, gift certificates to area restaurants like James Beard-nominated Craigie on Main and Henrietta's Table, meat CSA shares from Chestnut Farms and John Crow Farm, vineyard tours at local wineries like Turtle Creek and Westport Rivers, an overnight at the Red Lion Inn in the Berkshires, as well as gift baskets, pottery, knits, and more.  Even I have something up for auction—it's a secret, though. 

If you went last year, you may recall that Waltham Fields throws a pretty sweet party.  Food this year will be prepared by the Ethics of Eating class at Newbury College, and includes an assortment of local cheeses, pulled pork sliders with carrot slaw, butternut squash orecchiette, and bourbon bread pudding.  (They had me at "food," lost me at "squash," then got me back again at "bourbon.")  The open bar will serve up local beer and organic wine.  Plus, you have the full run of the museum, which is very cool in and of itself.  Vintage typewriters, steam engines, an old phone booth and operator's switchboard, and LOTS of clocks and watches.  They don't call Waltham the Watch City for nothing.  I brought the kids to the museum a month ago, and our favorite part was the steampunk exhibit—think modern technology rewrought by artists in a Victorian theme.

Community farms rely on community support to keep their educational programs and local hunger relief efforts going.  The money you spend goes directly to farm-run programs that get fresh, local food into the Waltham Public Schools as well as the hands of people who otherwise wouldn't have the means.  If you like to have a good time AND support local farming, meet us there.   Tickets can be purchased here ($45 for members, $50 for nonmembers, $30 each when you buy 3 or more tickets).   Hope to see you!

What's Up, Wakefield?

Hey, you!  Yes, you.  You live in Wakefield, right?  Well, next Wednesday, March 30 at 6:30 p.m., I'll be at Wakefield's Lucius Beebe Memorial Library giving a talk on how to cook with local ingredients for a family.  It's part of a series on eating locally in Massachusetts.  Past presenters included Claire Kozower of Waltham Fields Community Farm and Amy McCoy, author of the book and blog, Poor Girl Gourmet.  The series concludes Tuesday, April 5 with local chocolatier Valerie Conyngham of Vianne Chocolat.

During my talk, I hope to answer your burning questions about how to get delicious local farm products onto your table, especially when there are children lurking about. Questions like: How do you get your kids to eat vegetables? Answer: Bribery, threats, and relentless vegetable exposure.  How many trips to various farms does it take to get ingredients for dinner? Answer: 12.  Just joking, only 10.  No, no, I kid.  Three max.  Okay, maybe five. 

(Perhaps I should rehearse beforehand?)

I can't promise you I will have all the answers, or that they will be the best answers, but I will be there anyway with my favorite cookbooks and some homemade sour cherry preserves, moving my mouth for the allotted time and praying something coherent comes out.  So there.  Hope a few of you (but not too many of you) can make it out!

En Garde!: Knife Care 101

I got my knives sharpened recently, so don't mess with me. 

Patti Small (aka The Knife Lady) of On The Edge Knife Sharpening in Bolton has been a fixture at the Wayland Winter Farmer's Market all season.  Last month, I dropped off a box of knives and, by the following week, she had managed to convert my dull pieces of scrap metal into razor-sharp blades of death!  Now I can cut cleanly through a head of cabbage like butter and mince herbs without transforming them into a blackened mash.  Hooray!

Sharp knives really make a big difference in the kitchen, not just in terms of control and ease of use, but also in the resulting texture of the items being sliced.  You want to cut cleanly through the cell membranes, not crush them.   Sharp knives are also safer than dull ones, believe it or not.  You don't need to apply as much force (risking slippage), nor resort to a desperate sawing motion.  Just be extra careful the first week you get your knives back.  It's like going from a car with a sluggish accelerator to one that is sensitive to the slightest touch.  It takes some time to adapt and you'll want to keep all your body parts attached in the meantime.

Patti agreed to set down her knives for a minute and answer some questions: 

TD: How do you sharpen knives? 

PS: I use a machine called an Edge Pro, which is an upside-down whetstone. The stone moves on the knife instead of the knife moving on the stone.  When it can cut through a piece of paper with no resistance, the knife is done.

TD: Once you sharpen a knife, what is the best way to keep it sharp for as long as possible (besides not using it)?

PS: Store it carefully.  A knife block is good.  A magnet is good. Unsupervised in a drawer is bad.  Do not cut on glass.  Hard surfaces will cause early demise of an edge.  Bamboo is a pretty good cutting surface.

TD: I heard that the dishwasher dulls knives.  Is that true?  Because I have this irrational fear that I'm going to cut off my arm while washing my knives by hand (also goes for spoons, forks, cups, and plates).

PS: The soap used in a dishwasher is more caustic than handwashing soap.  Also, when the knives are in a dishwasher they move and tend to bump into other objects, thus accelerating dulling.  I wash my knives in the dishwasher.  No big deal for me--I can sharpen them whenever I want!

TD: Those pole things that come with knife sets, what are they called?

PS: Steels.

TD: Yeah, steels.  Is it really necessary to use them?  If so, how often?

PS: Whatever steel you use, it should be really smooth.  Over 1000 grit.  The purpose of a steel is to realign the edge, not to sharpen.  If you use one every time you use your knife it should help the edge hold.

TD: How often should people get their knives professionally sharpened in a perfect world?

PS: It depends on how many knives you have and how much they are used.  When they can't slice a tomato there is a problem.

TD: What about in an imperfect world?

PS: When you can't slit your wrist there is a big problem.

TD: Touché! Why don't electric knife-sharpeners get my knives as sharp as you do?

PS: Electric sharpeners take more metal off than I do.  The machine itself doesn't have eyes to look at the edge.  I have one that I used once about ten years ago and ruined a knife.  

TD: How much does it cost to sharpen a regular-sized chef's knife?  What about a small paring knife?

PS: A small knife is $5 and large is $10.

TD: We just brought the kids to the Higgins Armory in Worcester.  Do people ever bring you swords to sharpen?  Knights or ninjas, say?

PS: Yes, someone called me with a sword.  I sent him away.  It takes way too long and I do not have the equipment.  It was a samurai sword.  I do know someone who will sharpen them though.

TD: What's your favorite kind of knife?

PS: Right now my choice of knife for chopping are two eight-inch Wusthof chefs knives that I hold together and use at the same time.  I think that Adam Simha, a knifemaker in Cambridge, is going to make me a knife that will be two blades with one handle to achieve the same effect.

TD: Wow, that's cool!  Thanks, Knife Lady! 

The Wayland Winter Farmer's Market has closed for the season, but Patti travels often to other farmer's markets in the area.  She can also be found some Sundays at Formaggio's Kitchen in Cambridge and some Thursday evenings at City Feed in Jamaica Plain.  Her calendar is here, but always check ahead of time to make sure she'll be there.  If you're not local, seek out a professional knife-sharpener in your area.  I'm telling you, you'll fall in love with your knives all over again!

Wayland Winter Farmer's Market 2011

If you haven't visited the Wayland Winter Farmer's Market since last year, do come back.  Russell's Garden Center is hosting the market again and most, if not all, of the vendors have returned, plus there seem to be some new additions. 

Both Red Fire Farm of Granby and Winter Moon Organic Farm of Hadley have impressive vegetable stands and, if you're lucky, fresh eggs.  There's lots of cheese on offer, including superb marinated feta, cheddar, blue cheese, and a lovely goat tomme from award-winning West River Creamery in Vermont.  Lawton Family Farm from nearby Foxborough is selling asiago and fromage blanc.  The asiago is very meltable and I enjoyed it on several Tuscan ham sandwiches with local dill pickles and a touch of mayo.  The fromage blanc was lovely on garlic-rubbed toasts with smoked bluefish from Dave's Cape Cod Smokehouse, sliced red onion, and capers.

This Saturday (2/12) is Wool Day, so they'll have all kinds of yarn and knitting stuff for sale as well as the usual bagels, apples, meat, fish, gelato, bread, pastries, maple and honey products, coffee, root beer, salsa, and granola.  I also heard a rumor that a knife-sharpener sets up shop at the market, though I have yet to actually locate him. Yooooohoooooo!!  (It's amazing, though, how people get right out of your way when you're waving your dull knives around.) 

Side note: Russell's has a small but cute kids section at the top of the big stairs that I often use for last-minute gifts for birthday parties (puzzles, Thomas trains, science kits).  They also have a free, self-serve gift-wrapping station that I take full advantage of, though I do stop short of gift-wrapping my produce for myself!

The market runs on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. through March 12 at Russell's Garden Center, 397 Boston Post Road (Rt. 20), Wayland, MA, 508-358-2283.

Crispy Hash Browns

Wow, you guys.  Never have I gotten so many desperate pleas for a recipe as I have in the past few days after the mere mention of hash browns.  It's nice to know that I have such a discerning/obsessed readership.  Now that we've had a chance to dig ourselves out of the foot and a half of snow that fell yesterday, I'm happy to share my technique.  It produces a well-seasoned potato patty that's crisp on the outside and soft on the inside.  In short: perfect.

 

Crispy Hash Browns

3 medium Yukon gold potatoes (or other starchy potato)
Kosher salt and black pepper
Olive oil

Peel and grate potatoes using the large holes on a box grater (watch your knuckles!).  Line a colander with cheesecloth or non-linty dishtowel.  Set grated potato on towel in colander and sprinkle with several pinches of kosher salt, tossing to distribute.  Let sit 5 minutes. 

Heat a large skillet (I like cast iron) with 2 Tbsp. olive oil on medium heat.  (If you're making the hash browns to go with sausage and vegetable hash, you may have some fat left over in the skillet so you can use less oil).  While the pan is heating, gather up the sides of the towel, twist, and squeeze the potatoes hard over the sink so all of the moisture drips out.  Repeat several times.  You want the potatoes dry, dry, dry before they hit the pan.  You should be left with a wad of potato pulp about the size of a baseball.

When the pan is good and hot, take 1/3 of grated potatoes, pull apart, and spread out into a potato pancake no more than 1/2-inch thick.  You want the potato loosely packed with lacy edges.  Sprinkle with black pepper, press down with a spatula, then leave it alone for about 10 minutes.  Time will vary depending on your pan and the flame.  When you see the edges start to brown significantly, carefully loosen with the spatula and lift up an edge.  If the hash brown is merely golden on the bottom and kind of sags, let it cook more time.  What you want is a crust on the bottom that can withstand the weight of the hash brown itself.  It's called hash brown for a reason (just take care not to make it a hash black).  Flip and repeat on the second side.  When nice and crispy brown, let drain on paper towels and season with salt.  Repeat with two more batches of potatoes, squeezing any additional moisture that may have been drawn out by the salt, and adding more oil to the pan as necessary.  Serves 2 adults and 2 kids (who split the third).

A few other notes: You could probably use a food processor fitted with the grater disk, though it takes less time to grate three potatoes by hand than it would for me to locate and later wash all of the parts of the food processor.  Don't let your peeled/grated potatoes sit out too long before cooking or they will turn brown.  Also, be sure to rinse out the squeezing towel with water soon afterwards so it doesn't stain brown.  If you need to speed up the frying process, use two skillets simultaneously.  Finally, if your kids turn up their noses at your beautiful hash browns, just say they're like hamburgers made out of French fries and suddenly at least one of them is chowing down.

Local Ingredients:
Potatoes: Waltham Fields, Waltham, MA/Picadilly Farm, Winchester, NH

Sausage and Root Vegetable Skillet Supper

Don't you just love breakfast for dinner?  Or "brinner" as my oldest calls it. 

To me, brinner usually means that Husband is making his amazing blueberry pancakes and I'm off duty, a double score for me.  Sometimes it means I'm frying up bacon and eggs.  More recently, though, I've been whittling down my root vegetable stash by making sausage and vegetable hash.  It makes fine cold- weather fare for breakfast, brunch, or brinner.  It is best served with hash- browned potatoes on the side or, as Husband easily convinced me, broken up so the crispy, lacy bits mingle with the rest of the vegetables.  My super-simple hash brown technique is here.  In the meantime, go find yourself some squash.


Sausage and Root Vegetable Skillet Supper (with Crispy Hash Browns)

If you don't have access to these particularly delicious breakfast sausages, you can substitute high-quality ground pork mixed with a healthy dose of salt, ground sage, and black pepper, as well as a touch of cayenne and ground coriander.  You could also use bacon.  Feel free to omit the root vegetables you don't like and replace them with others that you do, like carrots, sweet potatoes, and rutabagas.

1/2-1 lb. farm-fresh, breakfast sausage patties
1-2 Tbsp. bacon fat (or oil, if you prefer)
1/2 butternut squash, peeled, 1/2-inch dice
1 medium turnip, peeled, 1/2-inch dice
1 medium celery root, peeled, 1/2-inch dice
2 parsnips, peeled, sides sliced off the woody core, 1/2-inch dice
1 red onion, 1/2-inch dice
2 Tbsp. olive oil
1 Tbsp. chopped fresh rosemary
1 Tbsp. chopped fresh thyme
Salt and pepper to taste

Preheat the oven to 350°F. 

In a large skillet, preferably cast iron, melt the fat and brown the sausage meat, breaking the patties into bite-sized pieces as you go.  You want the pieces fully cooked and golden-brown on several sides.  When done, remove meat and set aside.  Reserve skillet (unwashed) for hash browns.

While sausage is browning, wash, peel, and chop the squash, turnip, celery root, parsnips, and onion.  Combine on a large rimmed baking sheet with olive oil, rosemary, thyme, salt, and pepper.  Toss with your hands until well-coated.  Roast for 40 minutes, flipping once, or until the vegetables are tender and golden. 

Meanwhile, make the hash browns.  Combine the vegetables, sausage, and hash browns in the skillet and brinner is served.

Source: Inspired by an adaptation of the Red Lion Inn recipe in The Boston Globe.

Local Ingredient Sources
Sausage: Chestnut Farms, Hardwick, MA
Bacon fat: From bacon from Codman Farm, Lincoln, MA
Squash, turnip, red onion, potatoes: Waltham Fields, Waltham, MA
Parsnips: Sugar Mountain Farm, Whately, MA (via Russo's)
Rosemary: My half-dead plant

Autumn Harvest Salad

We spent the long weekend in New Hampshire and, yup, it’s definitely fall.  As if you couldn’t tell by: a) the calendar; b) the leaves; and c) the mounting winter squash situation.  Gourd after gourd after gourd after gourd…

I know you’re sick of hearing me complain about squash every fall, but, the truth is, I’ve developed a bit of a soft spot for squash.  Call me sentimental.  The secret, of course, is to find some recipes you really like.  I’m partial to my super-simple butternut squash bisque I contributed to Yankee Magazine some years back.  But in case you’re not willing to give in to soup season quite so soon, here’s a nice salad that eases the transition between summer and winter.  Not only does it use the last of your local lettuce and the beginnings of your winter squash, but it also features nuts, cranberries, blue cheese, bacon, and a tangy honey-sweetened dressing, making it possible to source most of the ingredients locally around here.

More about the fabulous cookbook from whence this recipe came in my next post.  But I’ll give you a hint: the local author writes a great food blog called Poor Girl Gourmet!

Harvest Salad with Honey-Balsamic Dressing

I substituted local blue cheese for the Gorgonzola and locally foraged black walnuts for the hazelnuts (more on the black walnuts later).

Squash
2-lb. acorn squash
¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
3 Tbsp. packed brown sugar
Kosher salt
Black pepper

Dressing
¼ cup honey
2 Tbsp. Dijon mustard
2 Tbsp. balsamic vinegar
¼ cup plus 2 Tbsp. extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt
Black pepper

Salad
3 cups (5 oz.) mixed baby greens, lettuce, or arugula
½ cup hazelnuts
¼ cup dried cranberries
4 slices of bacon
¼ cup Gorgonzola, crumbled

Preheat the oven to 375°F.  Cut the acorn squash in half lengthwise, pole to pole.  Remove and discard the seeds, and then cut each half crosswise into ½-inch-wide slices such that you have a lovely ripple effect from the ridges of the squash.  In a large bowl, mix together ¼ cup olive oil and brown sugar.  Add the squash and toss to coat, seasoning with salt and pepper. Transfer squash to 9 by 13-inch rimmed baking sheet, and bake, turning halfway through cooking time, about 30 minutes or until easily pierced with a fork.  Let cool 5-10 minutes.

Meanwhile, in a small bowl, whisk together honey, mustard, and balsamic vinegar.  Whisk in ¼ cup plus 2 tablespoons olive oil until well blended.  Season with salt and pepper and set aside.  Fry bacon until crispy, let cool on paper towels, and crumble.  Toast hazelnuts in dry frying pan 5-10 minutes, tossing frequently to prevent scorching, until lightly golden and fragrant.  Remove to plate to cool.

To arrange salad, place one quarter of the mixed greens on each of four plates.  Divide up the squash, nuts, cranberries, bacon, and cheese among the four salads, and drizzle a tablespoon or two of the dressing on top.  Serves 4.

Source: Adapted from Poor Girl Gourmet by Amy McCoy

Local Businesses Supported:
Squash, lettuce, arugula: Waltham Fields Community Farm, Waltham, MA
Honey: Reseska Apiaries, Holliston, MA
Dijon mustard: Raye’s Mustard, Eastport, ME
Bacon, black walnuts: Codman Farm, Lincoln, MA
Cheese: Jasper Hill Farm, Greensboro, VT

Pickling and Self-Preservation

Just had my last cancer treatment today.  Only one more surgical procedure next week to remove the IV port, and my bionic status will be revoked, happily and (fingers crossed) permanently.

While we’re on the subject, I have an article up on Culinate about pickling.  I talk a bit about my summer on chemo, and how I found the process of preserving my CSA produce to be both therapeutic and unsettling in its parallels.  Let me know what you think.

Urban Foraging: Peaches

My blogger friend over at Calamity Shazaam in the Kitchen has a friend in Dorchester with a peach tree.  A friend who was out of town when the peaches were at their peak, and who wouldn’t be back until after Hurricane Earl was projected to hit.  What would happen to all those ripe peaches? 

Well, Earl didn’t amount to much (up here anyway), but that shouldn’t detract from the heroic arrival of four concerned citizens right in the nick of time. And, by heroic, I mean purely self-serving.  Or maybe I should speak for myself.

We arrived to a sizeable tree so laden with fruit that some of the branches required propping up.  There was a hand-written sign on the tree instructing hungry passersby to twist—not pull—the fruit from the branches.  Most of the peaches were out of arm’s reach, so we used a telescoping peach-picker: a long pole with metal fingers at the end attached to a small metal cage to catch the peaches when they drop.  Like a super-long, potentially deadly lacrosse net.  The twisting was tricky to accomplish with a clawed pole aimed ten feet over our heads, but at least one of us got the hang of it.  Unfortunately, the twisty maneuvering would inevitably result in a major shakedown of the branches, sending nearby peaches plummeting to the ground and breaking open.  I assigned myself the task of trying to catch those peaches before they hit the pavement.  You can imagine the spectacle, I’m sure.  I almost had to add myself to the number of casualties.

Still, we managed to pick quite a few usable peaches.  Maybe 20 or 30 pounds?  They looked pretty gnarly, but they tasted GREAT.  Totally sweet and juicy, not mealy and flat-flavored like what you often find in the produce aisle of your well-intentioned supermarket.  Most of the black dots were only surface blemishes and came off with the skin. 

With my share of the loot, I made brandied peaches and peach jam.  Sadly, some portion of the stone fruits met their untimely demise over Labor Day weekend when I returned home to find a long, grayish-black hairy mold overtaking them like a Chia Pet growing actual human hair.  It was disgusting.  But I still have the jam!  And maybe next year we’ll have our own peach tree growing out of the compost bin!

Savin Hill Peach Jam

Adjust the recipe however you like: half the amount of sugar as peaches and some lemon juice for acidity.  I also added a little pectin just to make sure it would gel. 

4 lbs. peaches, skins on, pits removed, gnarly parts cut away
2 lbs. sugar
Juice of 2 lemons
1 Tbsp. pectin

Chop peaches coarsely and add to a large pot along with sugar.  Let sit, covered, at room temperature for several hours or overnight in the fridge. 

Dissolve pectin in lemon juice and add to peach mixture.  Simmer over medium-low heat for about an hour, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon at the beginning and increasing the frequency as it thickens to prevent the bottom from scorching.  Skim off any foam that rises to the top as it will cloud your jam.  It’s quite delicious for snacking, though.

When the mixture starts to look thick and jammy, hold your wooden spoon above the pot parallel to the floor, edges of the spoon up and down.  Tip the top of the spoon toward you slightly and watch the peach juice drip down into the pot.  If the drips come down in single, watery drips, you need to cook it some more.  If the drips start out singly, but then two drips join up to form one thick drip, this is sheeting.  I’m learning that I like to take the pot off the heat when it just reaches this point, sometimes a tiny bit sooner for a slightly looser jam.  (Alternatively, spoon a small amount onto a plate and put it in the freezer.  If it gels and wrinkles when touched, it’s good.) 

Ladle into clean jars.  Cool, cover, label, and refrigerate for up to a month.  Or, for longer lasting storage, can them using the boiling water method for 10 minutes.  Makes 6 pint jars.

Source: Adapted from Tea and Cookies.

Some Things Never Change

Lest you think that all this mushroom-growing and involvement in the school garden has miraculously turned my black thumbs green, I’m here to tell you that it’s business as usual on the plant-killing front.  My sage plant died almost instantly upon transfer of ownership.  My two heirloom tomato plants were dead by August.  The oregano isn’t far behind.  And while the rest of the herbs are hanging on, they’re clearly not thriving.  Even the mint has no intention of trying to outgrow its tiny pot. 

I know you’re going to ask me if I’ve been watering my plants and the answer is no.  Of course I haven’t.  I can barely keep my own self hydrated on a daily basis.  I count on a little rain falling once in a while, but so far this summer I think it’s only rained twice in two months.  Not a good situation when your so-called caretaker will only drag the hose out once a week to soak her mushroom logs.

Luckily, there are eight other families involved in the school garden, so the plants over there have been getting plenty of water and good care.  The proof is in the sungold tomatoes, which did not disappoint again this year.  So sweet and so many!  Everyone was buzzing about the bright orange sun-candy.  I have a feeling there won’t be any trouble getting garden volunteers next year.  I just hope none of them ever bear witness to the secret shame that is my own garden!

Tart Cherry Preserves

In the cookbook Put ‘Em Up that I raffled off last month, there is a recipe for preserved cherries, the intro to which says, “Cherry preserves are to strawberry jam what a red satin gown is to a puffy pink prom dress.”  That’s for sure.  Only the author forgot to mention the red lipstick.  Lipstick and cleavage.  This, my friends, is the Christina Hendricks of jams. 

If you’ve never cooked with sour cherries (and I hadn’t until this year), let’s just say that there’s a reason why everybody swoons over them.  Under no circumstances should you EVER pass them up.  And I know it’s cruel to mention sour cherries when their season is past, but now you have a whole year to nail down a local source and mark your calendars for late June/early July so you don’t miss their fleeting window.  Then you should set some of them aside to make this:

Classic Cherry Preserves

Original recipe was doubled.  I should have stuck with the original recipe.

1½ lbs. sour cherries (sometimes labeled tart cherries)
½ cup sugar
2 Tbsp. lemon juice

Stem and pit the cherries (they're so juicy you can just cut them in half and flick out the pit with the tip of a paring knife, no pitter required).  Combine the cherries with a splash of water in a medium nonreactive saucepan.  Bring to a boil, mashing with a potato masher to release the juice.  Add the sugar and lemon juice and stir to dissolve.  Continue to cook, stirring frequently, until the preserves reach the desired thickness, 15 to 20 minutes (stick a jam-coated spoon in the freezer for a minute to see if it gels).  Remove from heat and let rest for 5 minutes, stirring occasionally.  Ladle into clean jars.  Cool, cover, label, and refrigerate for up to a month.  (Or, for longer lasting storage, can them using the boiling water method for 10 minutes).  Now just try to keep your hands off them!

Source: Adapted from Put ‘Em Up by Sherri Brooks Vinton.

Fish Tacos

Why has it taken me so long to embrace the fish taco?  It is nothing short of genius, especially when you’re a member of a local fishermen’s coop.  Basically how it works is this: whatever leftover fish you have, throw it into a taco with whatever vegetables you have.  Seriously.  Not only that, but it tastes fresh and healthy and not even a little bit lazy.  Here’s how we’ve been doing fish tacos lately, though I'd imagine there are about as many variations as there are fish in the sea.

 

Fish Tacos

1 package corn tortillas
½ lb. leftover fish or pieces for frying
¼ head of cabbage, finely shredded
¼ red onion, thinly sliced
Whole cilantro leaves
½ cup mayo
Juice of ½ lime
½ shallot, chopped
½ jalapeño, minced, seeds removed
1 Tbsp. fresh herbs like dill, oregano, parsley
¼ tsp. dried cumin
Dash cayenne
Salt and pepper to taste

First, I get my vegetables ready—in this case, shredded cabbage, thinly sliced red onion, and cilantro leaves.  I keep the cilantro leaves separate from the herbs in the dressing because people either love cilantro or hate it.  This way, you can either pile it on (yes, yes, yes!) or leave it out at your own discretion.  Then I make the sauce, which is similar to that creamy salad dressing recipe I gave you earlier this summer.  In fact, I’ll often just doctor that if I have some around.  If not, just whisk the mayo with lime juice and add the chopped shallot, jalapeño, herbs, spices, salt, and pepper.  I like it heavy on the dill.  Taste it and once you get the flavor you like, you can thin it with milk or buttermilk, thicken it with more mayo, or just leave it alone.  If you should find yourself with too much sauce, it also makes a great dressing for coleslaw.

Next, the fish.  We really like pollock in our tacos, though we’ve also enjoyed haddock and hake (aka merluza).  Sometimes we use leftover fish and other times I’ll deep fry some for the occasion and let the children have homemade fish sticks while the adults flake theirs into tacos.  (The children have yet to take to the taco, but I’ll break them down eventually.)  For batter, I either coat the fish pieces in buttermilk or plain yogurt thinned with milk and dredge them in cornmeal, or make a beer batter with ¾ cup flour, ¼ cup cornstarch, and enough beer to make a batter of a reasonable consistency.  Then I drink the remaining ¾ bottle of beer to make the frying go faster.  You want the oil hot (375°F) so the fish comes out light and crispy, not sodden.  Drain on paper towels and sprinkle with salt. 

When you’re on your last batch of fish, wrap a stack of corn tortillas in a damp paper towel and heat the whole thing in the microwave on medium-low for a minute.  Flake the fish into bite-sized pieces.  Assembly, to be done individually at the table, is just a matter of taking two tortillas, making a small pile of cabbage, onion, cilantro, and fish down the center, and applying sauce.  Don’t be too stingy with the sauce—you’ll want at least a tablespoon on there.  It’s a pretty healthy meal overall.

By the way, Cape Ann Fresh Catch is accepting new members, so if you’ve been eager to try out local delivery of fresh Gloucester-caught fish, now’s your chance.  They have a fillet option now so you don’t have to lug home a whole fish and fillet it yourself if you don’t want to.  I’ve opted for the pre-filleted share myself since I already have enough fish bones in my freezer to keep us in chowder for five years straight. 

Local Sources:
Cabbage, red onion, cilantro: Waltham Fields Community Farm, Waltham, MA
Dill, parsley, oregano: Neighbor’s garden, Waltham, MA
Fish: Cape Ann Fresh Catch, Gloucester, MA
Buttermilk: Kate’s Homemade Butter, Old Orchard Beach, ME
Corn tortillas: Cinco de Mayo, Lynn, MA (via Russo’s)

Deliciduous Trees

Ever since I successfully identified a black walnut tree in the wild all by myself (which isn’t hard, it turns out, but this suburban girl demands kudos anyway), I’ve been studying up on nut trees in a crazed fashion.  Just ask Husband about my reading material during our Cape vacation: all nut-, berry-, and mushroom-related.  He fears for his life.

Anyway, I’ve been wondering about all these trees we have in our backyard and whether or not they’re anything good.  I mean, they’re trees so they’re automatically good regardless of whether or not they provide me with delicious nuts.  Calm down, Trees.  But what I mean to say is: in addition to oxygenating the air, furnishing a pleasant canopy of shade, and blocking out unattractive urban eyesores, wouldn’t they be even better if they provided me with delicious nuts? 

That’s where you come in.  Yes, you.  You get to help me identify my trees!  Won’t that be fun?  No?  Well, tough crap because I have all these tree pictures and nothing else prepared for today, so dig out your thinking caps and help me figure out what the hell these goddamned trees are.  There are only two for today.

Specimen #1:

Notice the unusual pattern of the bark.  So geometric.  The tree is so tall and shoulder-to-shoulder with maples and oaks competing for sunlight that I literally can’t even see the leaves.  I got out some binoculars to get a better (but still crappy) look, and I did find some fallen leaves that I think belong to the tree in question, so I’ve recreated the leaf pattern as best I could see it:

Alternate, pinnately compound, toothed leaflets, I believe.  The leaves still on the tree are green, by the way, not yellow.  Other potential clues: not a lot of vegetation growing around the trunk unlike the other nearby trees.  Also, high up on the trunk is this ominous-looking thing:

Any guesses as to what type of tree this could be?

Specimen #2:

This tree is still young and small, but, I think, promising.  Look at the leaf distribution.  Also alternate, toothed, and pinnately compound.  Leaflets are arranged in groups of five like fingers on a hand, except the larger trio of top leaves are joined together in the same spot and the two smaller leaves are joined lower on the stem in a separate spot, as if the leaf version of a thumb and pinky finger were growing out of its wrist.  (I would have made an awesome scientist, I just know it!)  Here’s the tiny trunk:

So, nature-loving people, what’s the verdict?  Will Husband be up to his nuts in nuts this fall?  If Specimen 1 is what I think it is, the good news will probably be flanked by bad news.  Perhaps the only thing I should count on come October is the usual ton of raking.

Serving 1 to Life

I know I pissed some of you off with the tomato theft story.  With so many garden-oriented readers, I can’t help but think I half-hoped to stir up a little controversy with my presentation.  And you have a valid point.  Stealing is wrong, regardless of the scale, regardless of the circumstance. But let me give you the rest of the story, not to excuse it, but to put it in a larger context. 

The garden in question turned out to be in back of my older son’s elementary school.  That there was a garden back there was news to me.  No one had ever mentioned anything about a school garden before.  My son had never laid eyes on it.  The woman who had told me about the tomatoes was affiliated with the community farm through which we have a CSA share, but I didn’t know much more than that.  All I knew was there were unblighted tomatoes behind the school, possibly the only local tomatoes I would see all year, and I needed to figure out a way to get some.  And, yes, I realize that stealing from children only worsens my case for clemency, but let me finish.  Sheesh!

When I showed up at the building, boldly holding two pint containers in my hands, it was a week or so before school was starting.  Teachers were preparing for the new school year and so there was some activity inside the building.  I headed for the office to ask the school secretary about the garden.  She said, what garden?  I said, the garden in back of the school.  She said, we have a garden in back of the school?  I said, don’t you?  Nobody else in the office seemed to know.  This is when I started to doubt the veracity of the woman at the farm.  Where did she get this information?  I asked if I could go out back and look.  The secretary said, go ahead.  I asked if she wanted me to pick her a pint of tomatoes while I was back there.  She didn’t seem to care.

If you missed the tomato story, what happened next is here.  The plants were big and beautiful and yielded tons of ripe little sungolds.  Tons.  I took two pints and change, and barely made a dent.  It was clear that somebody was taking good care of that garden, but who?  Then, when the janitors started banging trashcans against the windows, I figured it was probably them.  I resolved to get to the bottom of this mystery as soon as possible.  As soon as possible after I got those tomatoes into a salad.

Once school began, I started volunteering at the school library.  The library has a long bank of sunny windows in the back that happen to overlook the garden and its woody surroundings.  I asked the librarian about the garden and, as it happened, she knew the e-mail addresses of the two people who planted it.  I contacted them and one of them wrote back to say that the garden was part of a pilot program at the public schools designed to teach kids about where their food comes from and the growing cycle.  One of the grades had planted pumpkin seeds before summer vacation and would be harvesting them that fall.  She said they were looking to expand the garden and get more kids, and perhaps the parents, involved.  Can you guess who the person in charge of the garden was? 

The woman who told me about the tomatoes in the first place! 

Damnit!  I hadn’t been stealing after all!  She had practically given me her blessing. (sigh)

Well, that garden left such an indelible impression on me that I immediately volunteered to be the parent liaison.  Now I help Healthy Waltham, a city-run organization that aims to improve health and quality of life, in organizing parent volunteers to help maintain the garden over the summer (weeding, watering, and, yes, harvesting) so it’s in good shape for lessons in the fall.  They’re hoping that, with more parent involvement, the garden can grow, become more integrated in the curriculum, and serve as an example for other schools around the country. 

Nine families signed up to take care of the garden for a week this summer.  During our week, the kids and I watered the plants, weeded, and mulched the pumpkin patch with straw.  And by “the kids and I,” I mean me.  They sat under a shady tree and read books.  That’s fine, too.

I’m not sure the end always justifies the means, but, in this case, it didn’t turn out too badly.

Pickling Cookbook Winners

Wow, I learned so much about you guys (and pickles in general) from your comments on the last post.  For example, there seem to be a lot of us in love with pickled beets. I dare say we have good taste.  Calamity Jane of Apron Strings writes of the pickled fiddleheads and wild cucumber she made in her Alaskan kitchen.  Gillis raves about the Grillo’s Pickles cart on Boston Common (2 spears for $1 all summer at the Park St. T stop).  Bobbie fondly remembers the giant pickles on a stick at the Wisconsin State Fair.  Pengwenhsd once had a man propose to her upon tasting her homemade bread and butter pickles.  And the favorite jarred brand seems to be Claussen dills (a recipe for a homemade version is here).

But where people got downright poetic was talking about Jewish deli pickles. Fellow blogger Aimee of New To Farm Life writes:

“I'm a pickle fanatic and it is hard to pick just one. But as I was thinking about it, a pure and perfect memory came back to me. I'm about seven years old, and we've gone to New York to visit my grandparents. Mom has dragged us kids around museums all day and we are ravenously hungry. We go into a real old-fashioned New York delicatessen to pick up food to eat on the train home. I've never been in a place like this (West Coast child) and am stone cold fascinated by the deli case with its bright salads, slabs of fish, a hundred kinds of cheese. Up on top of the counter, above my head, is a gigantic glass crock full of equally gigantic pickles. I point it out to brother and sister and we set up a ruckus, clamoring for pickles. The pickles, when we get them, are so big we can't close our fists around them, and they are so briny and crisp and delicious my mouth fills up with water. I can remember everything about those pickles - the snap they made when we bit into them, the warty cool skin of them, the cloudy brine in the jar swirling with garlic and spices. Most of all I remember the feeling of being small and curious, wide-eyed in a new place, with my mother beside me, teaching me, showing me, interpreting the world for me.”

What a fabulous pickle story! 

Reader Ashley writes of her grandmother’s pickles:

“My grandma made the best dill pickles. They were left in their brine on the porch of her bungalow in the Catskills, the center of summer life for Jewish New Yorkers escaping the city heat. The pickles had much of the old country in them, with a garlicky bite and ultra-satisfying crunch. The perfect refreshing summer snack, though I often ignored my mom's warnings, gorged on the salty treats, and woke up in the middle of the night parched.”

Mmmmmm.  Can anybody else use a drink right now?

There were even some requests for other readers’ pickle recipes (some of these requests are my own):

1. Millie’s carrot and daikon radish recipe;
2. The refrigerator half-sour recipe from Pickledbeets; and
3. The pickled shiitake recipe from the Momofuku cookbook that Louisa mentioned (though I just helped myself to that recipe from this fine blog).

So good work, people.  I wish I had 30 cookbooks to give out.  Do we have 30 cookbooks to give out, Storey?  Just kidding.  (Unless we do.) 

In order to be fair, and instead of writing names on pieces of paper and making Husband pull them out of a box like I’ve done in the past, I used a random number generator to pick the number of the winning commenters.  And the winners of a copy of Put 'Em Up by Sherri Brooks Vinton are:

16. Pickledbeets

26. Kate

Winners, I will be in touch.  For the rest of you, don’t worry, there will be other raffles in the future.  I won’t rest until everybody’s won something good.

Get Your Pickles On!

Okay, people, I’m feeling generous again.  Now that school is out and it’s officially summertime, I have pickling on my mind.  Even more so since I started flipping through the new book Put ‘Em Up by Sherri Brooks Vinton, a charming ode to canning, pickling, and other methods of putting food by.  An excerpt:

“…Home food preservation is a natural progression of the Real Food Revival—our increasing demand for food that is grown the way it should and used to be.  We want food that’s good for the farmer, the environment, and ourselves.  Putting up food is part of this passion.  It’s part of coveting the harvest so much that you can’t let it slip through your fingers so fleetingly.  It’s part of cherishing the work of local growers or your own toil in the backyard and wanting to hold on to some aspect of that even when fields lie fallow.”

Well, not so much my own toil.  I prefer to cherish other people’s toil, but I get her point.  Plus pickling is like tasty time travel.  Not only does it yield a healthful, homemade snack, but it also allows you to return to a moment, a place, a memory—whether it’s the sunny spot where you picked your own summer beans or the rainy morning when you finally decided to bite the bullet and boil some jars.  You get to remember those simple pleasures many months down the road while eating something delicious that you thoughtfully put aside for yourself.

This book is a great introduction to the art of freezing, drying, brining, canning, and otherwise storing your bountiful summer produce for later enjoyment.  Included are recipes for quick and fermented pickles, like dilly beans, pickled beets, and sauerkraut.  Other recipes that had me daydreaming: cherry and black pepper preserves, spicy peach salsa, sweet pepper marmalade, charred chili barbecue sauce, fennel and onion jam, rhubarb jelly, roasted pepper ketchup, and watermelon granita.  Plus it has such cute pictures of hand-labeled jars.  Adorable!

So here’s the deal.  Storey Publishing, a nice little publisher out in western Mass., will give away two cookbooks, one to each of two lucky readers.  And all you have to do is regale me with a story about the best pickle you ever had in the comment section.  That’s right, one more homework assignment before you’re off for the summer.  But if you win, you have to promise you’ll actually make something out of the book.  No entering yourself in the lottery and then letting the book sit on a shelf.  I’ll walk over there and take it back.

Okay, enough with the empty threats.  You have until sometime on Sunday.  Ready, set, go!

Are Those Mulberries on My Salad?

Why, yes.  Yes, they are.  I found some new mulberry trees in a secret location where the branches are low and the competing wildlife less voracious.  (Also, I noticed that the black raspberries are starting to come into their own, so keep your eye out for those, too.)

I love turning salad into dessert.  Because do you know how much salad I eat when it tastes like dessert?  Four times as much.  So much that having “a little salad” before my evening jog turns into “a lot of salad” before my evening jog such that I practically throw up halfway through my evening jog.  Add this to the list of totally preventable circumstances if only I could have helped myself.

The responsible salad was farmshare greens (lettuce, spinach, arugula, endive) with foraged mulberries, sliced red onion, goat cheese, and walnuts with a balsamic vinaigrette.  It was delicious next to rosemary and fennel-crusted pork chops.  (I might have eaten a little of those, too.)  (And a hunk of defrosted baguette.)

Anyway, I don’t need any lectures, Husband.  I’ve already learned my lesson about stuffing myself a half-hour before physical exertion.  And the lesson is that jogging is dumb!

Local Ingredient Sources:
Lettuce, spinach, arugula, endive: Waltham Fields, Waltham, MA
Mulberries: Waltham, MA
Goat cheese: Westfield Farm, Hubbardston, MA
Pork chops: Chestnut Farms, Hardwick, MA

Back to the Farm

Our first CSA pickup of the season was this weekend, and so the summer cooking frenzy begins.  How exciting!  On Sunday, I defrosted some shrimp from my winter fish share from Cape Ann Fresh Catch and made a quick stir-fry with garlic scapes, bok choy, tatsoi, scallions, and snow peas, the latter of which we picked ourselves at Waltham Fields.  The simple sauce contained no soy.  Just two parts fish sauce to one part sugar.  Fabulous over rice. 

Then last night, I grilled chicken from Chestnut Farms and served it over salad with a lemony spinach pesto dressing (yes, the same one you made for me, Red—thanks for the inspiration).  My BFF provided the orzo pasta salad with feta and herbs.  Then came strawberry shortcake assembly.  When was the last time you had real strawberry shortcake?  Not the kind over those circular store-bought sponge cakes.  The kind over real buttermilk biscuits sliced in half so the berry juices soak in.  The kind with sweet, local strawberries not soaked in methyl iodide.  The kind with real whipped cream on top, lightly sweetened with a touch of vanilla.  If you’re not going to make my rhubarb pie, at least make my strawberry shortcake, for god’s sake.  Have you no soul? 

Sorry.  Didn’t mean to get so worked up.  It’s just that if you’re going to be eating all those delicious vegetables, I think it’s okay if you have a little dessert.

 

Spinach and Pine Nut Dressing

For those extra heads of lettuce you find yourself with at this time of year.  It's also a good use for your lemon verbena.

2 cups lightly packed baby spinach leaves (about 2 oz.)
¼ cup pine nuts
Juice from 1 lemon (about 2 Tbsp.)
Zest from 1 lemon (about 1 tsp.)
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
Salt and pepper to taste

In a small frying pan with no oil, toast the pine nuts over medium-low heat for about 5 minutes, stirring occasionally, until fragrant and starting to get golden-brown in spots.  Let cool.  Combine the spinach, pine nuts, lemon juice, and lemon zest in a food processor.  Pulse until well-chopped.  With the machine running, gradually add the oil, blending until the mixture reaches a creamy dressing consistency.  Add salt and pepper to taste.  Great with a grilled chicken salad.

Source: Adapted from Everyday Italian by Giada De Laurentiis.

Here We Go ‘Round the Mulberry Bush

I’m on deadline today, so this post is going to be of the 10-minute variety.  But pay attention because this may be the only time I give you more than a week’s notice about anything.  My important announcement is this: the mulberries are almost ready.  In the Boston area, that is.  Don’t miss them!

On a jog earlier this week along the Charles with my friend K, I noticed a few mulberry-looking trees.  The berries looked like elongated black raspberries on bramble-less branches that had slightly shiny, heart-shaped leaves with serrated edges.  Some leaves had a notch out of one side that made them look like children’s mittens.  Since there wasn’t any oxygen getting to my brain, I shoved a few leaves into my pocket for later identification.  Turns out, they were indeed mulberry trees. 

So today I went back for another run.  Lacking anything more appropriate, I grabbed one of the kids’ Easter baskets from the top of a closet as I left.  I know I said I would never eat anything out of the disgusting Charles River, but these trees were only near the Charles.  On the other side of the path that runs along the Charles.  Also, finders-keepers.  I jogged along with my Easter basket in hand, tailing some goldfinches, and, holy crap, there are a shit-ton of mulberry bushes along the river.  I noticed at least 10 on my little bridge-to-bridge loop.  Some of them were giant.  Unfortunately, the berries were not ripe, yet.  Most of them were still white or pinkish-red.  There were some blackish ones, but when I got up close, I realized that they were just dark purple tinged with red and not quite ready.  And the really, really black ones were just bird poop.  You only make that mistake once.

Long story short, I had to jog back empty-handed.  Well, except for the basket.  Now if you’re jogging with a big basket full of ripe, juicy berries, you might be considered a hero by a select few, like the old Russian ladies with babushkas who nod knowingly as you pass or some young person with wildish hair, but, let me tell you something.  If you’re tripping down the path with a brightly colored, plastic Easter basket that’s completely empty, accidentally humming nursery rhymes, you just look like an all-purpose moron.

Rhubarb Pie

Oh, my god, you guys, I am obsessed with rhubarb pie.  Obsessed!  Do you know how many rhubarb pies I’ve made in the past two weeks?  Three.  Three pies and nary a strawberry to be found in any of them.  Strawberries have their time and place, don’t get me wrong, but that time is when they’re raw and right out of the garden, and that place is far away from my rhubarb pies. 

This recipe comes from my friend, Cathy, whom I stalked until she gave it to me.  Yes, I’m back to my stalking ways.  Get it?  Rhubarb?  Stalks?  Shut up.  Her recipe is tart, the way I like my rhubarb, with a touch of cream, which is how I like pretty much everything.  I had to add a little more sugar to appease Husband, and double the flour because my particular rhubarb seemed to have a high water content.  I also added a lattice crust so you wouldn’t be subjected to a photo of a pie that looked like someone just vomited into a pie shell.  Now it looks like someone vomited into a pie shell and I added a decorative lattice crust!  But you know I never discriminate against ugly food on this blog.  Ugly food is the best food.

Make this pie.  Make it early and often.  And I know one of you is going to ask me if you can leave out the cream, and my answer, as always, is that you could, but why would you want to do a silly thing like that?

 

Rhubarb Pie

Yes, you can use a premade crust, but I won’t stop nagging you to make your own at least once.  Below is a recipe for a homemade butter crust.  Using half butter, half shortening will give you extra flakiness (the tradeoff is transfats).  Or you could make a lard crust.

Crust
2 cups flour
12 Tbsp. cold butter, cut into pieces
1 Tbsp. sugar
1 tsp. salt
8-10 Tbsp. ice water (or more)

Filling
1 lb. rhubarb, cut into 3/4-inch pieces (3½-4 cups)
¾ cup sugar
¼ cup flour
¼ tsp. salt
½ cup heavy cream
1 Tbsp. lemon juice

For the crust, mix flour, sugar, and salt in food processor.  Add cold butter and pulse in 1-second beats until butter is the size of small peas (around 20 pulses).  Dump mixture into a large bowl and add ice water, a few tablespoons at a time, fluffing with a fork until gently absorbed.  You don’t want it wet and sticky, but if there’s too much dry flour, the dough won’t come together right.  It should just hold together when you press on it.  Don’t knead or it will become too tough.  Tear off two pieces of plastic wrap.  Dump a little over half of the dough mixture in the middle of one, and the rest in the middle of the other.  Folding over the sides of the plastic wrap, flatten the mixture into disks about an inch thick, then wrap them up, and refrigerate at least an hour or until ready to use.

Preheat oven to 450°F.  Have your 9-inch pie plate at the ready.  In a large bowl, toss rhubarb with sugar, flour, and salt.  In a small bowl, whisk together cream and lemon juice and set aside.  Retrieve your pie dough from the fridge.  Flour your counter and rolling pin well.  The dough shouldn’t stick at all.  Take the larger disk and roll it out about ¼-inch thick, about a foot in diameter.  Roll from the middle out in all directions.  Don’t grind the dough down into the counter—push it out to the sides.  If the dough sticks, sprinkle more flour.  Transfer to your pie dish by lifting the edge of the dough over the top of the rolling pin.  Gently lift and push until the dough is draped over the rolling pin (a bench scraper or even a spatula under the dough really helps).  Align dough over pie plate and gently unfurl.

Dump rhubarb mixture into pie shell.  There will be a small pile of sugar and flour in the middle.  Redistribute evenly.  Pour cream mixture over the top evenly.  Roll out the second pie crust the same way as the first, only slightly smaller.  Using a pastry wheel or sharp knife, cut thin strips for a lattice topping.  Arrange strips like so.  Fold over edges of bottom crust and crimp however you like.   Place in oven on top shelf with a baking sheet on the bottom shelf to catch any drips.  Bake 20 minutes.  Reduce heat to 350°F and bake until bubbly, puffed, and crust is richly caramelized, about 45 minutes more.  Keep an eye on the crust—if it starts to brown too much, cover with foil.

Let cool.  Serve with vanilla bean ice cream.

Local Sources:
Rhubarb: Verrill Farm, Concord, MA
Butter: Cabot, Cabot, VT
Cream: High Lawn Farm, Lee, MA

Weird Heirloom Vegetables

Today, I have a special guest blogger for you: author Novella Carpenter.  She’s an urban farmer based in Oakland, CA, where she raises vegetables, fruit, chickens, honey bees, rabbits, and dairy goats in the middle of the city.  Novella will be reading from her book, Farm City (now out in paperback), at Porter Square Books in Cambridge this coming Monday, June 7 at 7 p.m., so be sure to stop by for some funny farm stories and a seed give away.  Take it away, Novella…

I can’t help it, I like weird stuff. Like boyfriends who lie in the middle of the floor at a dinner party. Like cats with white paw pads. Like weird fruits and vegetables not available in fine stores. I’ve made it a point to collect strange fruit. I have a Seville orange tree (it’s small and I’ve still yet to get a nary a sour orange off of it). I have a sour cherry tree (we got enough cherries last year for one mind-blowing pie). Every year I graft some antique apple variety to my poor overburdened apple tree (this year it was a Winter Banana).  

Vegetables are no different; I will often wander around ethnic farmers markets with my tongue hanging out. “What is this?” I’ll ask the old ladies nearby, and they will patiently explain about taro root or chayote tendrils. A friend from Los Angeles came to visit and brought seeds for the famous giant radish of Oaxaca. I was so excited, it was as if she had brought me a suitcase full of money. This spring has been a busy one, and I’ve planted some weird vegetables that I wanted to share with you. 

Crapaudine beets (Beta vulgaris)

My sister, who lives in France, was laughing her ass off about this one when she sent me some seeds. We’re into that kind of toilet humor, and she thought maybe the etymological roots signaled that these beets were a, um, stool causer. My sister is always sending me some ancient Roman vegetable information, and these beets were apparently the original beet back in those days, before they became all rounded or striped inside.

Of course, I planted a whole bed of them. After 60 days, the leaves were looking amazing and strong so I went to harvest some for my little farm stand. This is what came out.

So that’s where the name comes from: crappy. No one bought the beets at the farm stand, and so I was left to deal with them. Being thrifty, I recognized the value of those leaves. So I made some beet chips out of them. It was easy, I just tossed the leaves in olive oil, put them in an oven at 350 degrees and cooked them for 7 minutes. They get all green and flat, perfect for tossing with salt and nutritional yeast.  

Next, I had to deal with the pathetic beetroot. I just dropped them into boiling water for a few minutes. I had very low expectations. Turned out, the thin-yucky skin slipped off to reveal a gorgeous mini-carrot-like thing.

The crapaudine beets actually tasted great! Very sweet, more like a carrot than a beet. They had a velvety texture and were lovely in a green salad tossed with boiled eggs. Thanks, Sister! I’ll never grow them for market, though.  

Bleu de Solaise leeks (Allium porrum)

Someone dumped two flats of leeks on my boyfriend. He fixed her truck, and the truck had the leeks inside—and she asked, “Does Novella want them?” Yes, Novella does. She likes free things, especially when they are heirloom leeks. These leeks, true to their name, are blue. Like that violet-y blue that is almost hallucinatory next to the dark earth. Two trays of leeks is a lot of leek. I had enough to sell at my farm stand—and enough to make leek confit.   

Confit always sounds so fancy. But in the leek confit case, it just meant that I braised the leeks in butter in a low oven for an hour. The leeks just fall apart and become gooey and caramel-y sweet. I like to use them to make leek soup (just add stock) or a leek tart (make a crust). Baby! What’s great about heirlooms like the Bleu de Solaise, is you can save the seeds and you’ll get the same beautiful blue leeks year after year.

Rampicante zucchini (Cucurbita moschata)

There’s a seed company called Baker Creek that is perfect for novelty freaks like myself. The catalog did lead me astray with a couple orders—like the Southeast Chinese cucumbers or the Thai Tigger melons that are never going to grow in foggy Northern California. Still, I love Baker Creek’s line-up. So far, I have one freak that is thriving: the rampicante zucchini.

I was drawn to it because the ad copy promised that I could eat the young squash like zucchini, and if it got older, I could eat it like winter squash. This would really solve the problem of too-far-gone zucchini, right? I also liked the name, but later heard rampicante is synonymous with the more well-known tromboncino, which I think I grew four years ago. It was just okay. Fooled again.  

Alrighty, I’m off to scan the nurseries for weird heirlooms like white tomatoes, padrone peppers, and some freaky perennial spinach.

You can read more from Novella on her blog, Ghost Town Farm. 

Motherload

I recently harvested a half-pound of shiitake mushrooms from my logs!  I sautéed them with butter, shallots, garlic, basil, parsley, chives, and cream, and served them over fettuccine.  They tasted divine.  Divine, I tell you.  Like a gift from the God of Fungus, whoever he might be.  Mycelius, maybe?  

I was going to ask you to guess what my family got me for Mother’s Day since I thought you were good at guessing games.  After all, you were right about the cold cellar.  But then you failed your last test across the board.  (For the correct answer to the Cabot’s ice cream quiz, scroll to the bottom of the comments on that post.)  So maybe I’ll just come right out and tell you what I got for Mother's Day. 

I got more mushroom spawn!! 

Most mothers prefer flowers for Mother’s Day, but I can’t cook with flowers.  At least not well.  Also, did you know that many types of mushrooms have amazing cancer-fighting health benefits?  I sure didn’t know this nor care at the time I inoculated my logs last spring, but now, exactly one year after my surprise cancer diagnosis, I care very much.  That combined with the fact that a couple of trees had to come down around our house, means it just makes good sense.  The birch logs will be recycled with oyster mushrooms.  And our next-door neighbors are donating some oak logs for additional shiitakes as well as maitake (hen of the woods).  And my four existing shiitake logs, two of which have started producing, should continue to fruit for several more years.

So it’s settled.  I’m building a mushroom garden! 

Come to Sprout!

So my farm, Waltham Fields, is having a fundraiser open to the public and you should totally come.  It’s happening on Saturday, May 8 from 5:30 to 8:30 p.m. in the very cool Charles River Museum of Industry space in Waltham.  There will be food, music, open bar, raffles, and a silent auction with all kinds of awesome stuff like shares in Waltham Fields' sold-out CSA, Red Sox tickets, a tour of the cheese cave at Formaggio Kitchen, gift certificates to restaurants like Blue Ginger and Aquitaine, vineyard tours at Westport Rivers and Turtle Creek, and weekend getaways around New England.  You might even see me there, though don’t let that be the deciding factor.  I’m a master of disguise.

Community farms rely on community support to keep their educational programs, public access work, and food pantry donations going.  So if you live nearby and you like fun, and even if you don’t like fun, it always feels good to support a good cause.  Tickets are $35 for members, $40 for nonmembers, $25 for every ticket after your second.  For more info, go here.  Hope to see you there.  (Charles River Museum of Industry, 154 Moody St., Waltham)

Salad Dressing Refresher

We haven't had a bottle of salad dressing in our refrigerator for more than 10 years.  True story.  Now, some of that time had to do with me not eating very much salad, I will confess.  I’ve always been more of a meat and potatoes and dessert kind of girl.  But, most of that time had to do with me not liking bottled salad dressing, and finding that I eat a lot more salad when I actually like the dressing. 

My younger, restaurant-going years were spent in part devouring wonderful tangles of micro-greens, tender lettuces, and pea tendrils and wondering how these little bistro salads could attain such a level of deliciousness while my own homemade lettuce piles remained so uninspired.  The thing to know about salads if you want to like them is that you need to use fresh vegetables.  Like really fresh.  Straight from the farm if you can get them.  They should talk back.

The second thing is to wash your greens and spin them dry, dry, dry if you want your dressing to cling to the leaves instead of sliding off into a puddle at the bottom of the salad bowl.  If you don’t have a salad spinner, toss them into an old pillowcase, then walk outside and whip your arm around real fast as if it were the sole windmill powering the entire Internet.  The people on the sidewalk might look at you funny.  Just aim the centrifugal stream of water at their faces and they’ll keep right on walking.  

Thirdly, you should make your own dressing.  Supermarket dressing sucks.  Most of it, anyway (if you have a favorite, you can put it in the comments).  I don’t even know what they put in those bottles half the time, but you don’t need more than five ingredients, which you probably already have.  Two, if you’re really short on time and patience.  It will only take 30 seconds to make your own and it makes everything go down so much better.

The final thing to remember about green salads is that you should never dress them ahead of time.  Do it approximately one second before you’re going to eat.  Everyone should already be sitting down and complaining about the fact that there's salad tonight.  Don't worry.  They'll shut up once they taste the dressing. 

30-Second Vinaigrette

Here’s my everyday vinaigrette technique.  There’s no recipe—just a basic ratio that you can scale up or down depending on how many people you’re feeding.  Store any extra in a jelly jar in the fridge.  The olive oil might congeal, but some time warming at room temperature and a brisk whisking will revive it.

1 part red wine vinegar, white wine vinegar, or apple cider vinegar
Touch of Dijon mustard (optional)
2-3 parts extra-virgin olive oil (I like my dressings tangy, so I use closer to 2)
Salt and pepper

Whisk together vinegar and mustard.  Add oil in a slow, steady stream until the mixture thickens and emulsifies.  Season with salt and pepper. 

To upgrade this to a 3-minute vinaigrette, juice a lemon instead of using vinegar, add the mustard along with some minced garlic or shallots and chopped herbs.  Then whisk in the oil, salt, and pepper.


Buttermilk Herb Dressing

When I get sick of vinaigrettes, here’s what I make instead.

2 parts buttermilk
2 parts mayonnaise
1 part minced shallots or onions
1 part chopped herbs like tarragon, parsley, and chives (but the seasonal variations are endless)
Salt and pepper

Whisk or shake together in a jar, adding more buttermilk if too thick, or more mayo if too thin.  Season with salt and pepper.  Store in the fridge.  Always shake before using.  This is also great for crudité platters.  Use extra mayo for a thicker consistency.

Digging Mussels

I’ve mentioned before that I’m a big fan of mussels. I think other people would be too if they knew how delicious they can be. And how easy they are to cook. Also, how cheap they are ($2-$3 per lb.). And that farmed mussels are on the Monterey Bay Aquarium’s Best Choices list, so you don’t have to be paralyzed by fear at the seafood counter trying to figure out what the hell is okay to cook for dinner.

I’m here to tell you that blue mussels are okay. More than okay. They’re sustainable and delicious. That is, if you can train your attention away from the particulars of their anatomy, just scoop the whole thing into your mouth no questions asked. That’s how I got the kids to like them. Told them to close their eyes and then I shoved a mussel into each of their mouths. Granted, it took years for them to trust me enough to go along with it, but now we have a pair of mussel-lovers on our hands and I claim full credit.

Mussels are filter-feeders, which means they strain plankton and other organic matter out of the water. Farmed mussels, mostly from Prince Edward Island in Canada but also Maine, are raised in waters that have met approved international water quality standards and the whole process is managed in an ecologically safe way. Most cultured mussels are grown on ropes raised off the bottom so there’s minimal habitat disruption when harvesting. Because mussels don’t require any additional feed and don’t produce any waste, they don’t pollute their environment the way that, say, farmed salmon can. In fact, they can actually improve water quality. (For more information about farmed mussels, go here (read text in blue).

Wild mussels, when you can get them, are also a treat, but you need to be aware of red tide, blooms of tiny algae-like microorganisms, which contain toxins that accumulate in mussels’ bodies and can make you pretty sick. A red tide warning was just announced yesterday for the Cape. By the way, blue mussels are not to be confused with the highly endangered fresh-water mussels, which have been prized for their use in pearl cultivation rather than human consumption.

But let’s go back to how easy they are to cook. Really easy. You clean them, dump them into a pot of liquid, cover, bring to a simmer, and steam them for five minutes. It’s literally as simple as that. A classic preparation is to steam them in a white wine and herb bath and serve them alongside a big basket of fries, preferably with a hearty Belgian beer nearby. I’ve also had them served in the North End in a light tomatoey broth with basil. But last week, since I had a half a can of coconut milk in the fridge, I turned to my favorite Indian cookbook (have you bought it, yet?) and we had curry instead. We served it over rice one night, and the next in a big bowl with some kale tucked in there, a baguette handy for mopping up any remaining sauce.

Mussels in a Green Curry

The other great thing about mussels (and clams) is that they trick you into thinking you’re eating more than you actually are. Your brain registers the size of the shells, but the meat is actually only half that volume. When I see the big pile of empty shells I’ve just created, I feel psychologically full.

2 lb. mussels
¼ tsp. cumin
1 small tomato, seeded, diced small
½ cup cilantro leaves
¼ cup mint leaves
1 Tbsp. minced fresh ginger
2 small green Serrano chiles, seeds removed
2 Tbsp. canola oil
1 cup onion, finely chopped
1 cup canned coconut milk
Water, if necessary
Salt

Scrub the mussels well in cold water and pull off any beards (they look like strands of steel wool hanging out of the shells). If using wild (non-farmed) mussels, check for any decoys filled with mud. They’ll be heavier than the others and should open up and expose themselves when manhandled. You’ll want to identify these and toss them out before they end up in the pot and ruin everything.

In a food processor, grind the cumin, tomato, cilantro, mint, ginger, and chiles to a smooth paste. Or finely chop and mash with the back of a spoon. Set aside. Over medium flame, heat the oil in a large, wide pot that has a lid. Sauté the onion until golden, about 5 minutes. Add the green curry paste and sauté about 5 minutes more. Add the coconut milk and salt to taste. You may also want to add some water if your coconut milk is on the thick side, as mine was. I added somewhere between ¼-½ cup of water. Bring to a boil, then add the mussels, and reduce heat to low. Toss well, cover, and cook until all the mussels are open, about 5 minutes. Discard any mussels that haven’t opened. Serve over rice or in a big bowl with some crusty bread for mopping up the sauce. Serves 4.

Source: Adapted from 5 Spices, 50 Dishes by Ruta Kahate. I’ve said it once and I’ll say it again: My quality of life has dramatically improved since I bought this book.

Like shellfish? Here's more:

Mussel and Chorizo Soup
New England Clam Chowder
Shrimp Bisque
Oyster Soup
Pasta with Clam Sauce