Gardening in July: Tomatoes Are Ripe

And here's what we've gotten: a nice big, palm-sized brandywine tomato. We sliced this one up, salted it, and topped the slices with mozzarella and basil leaves from the garden. It was a nice treat. And looking at the tomato plant, it appears that we will be enjoying this treat again and again. There are ripening brandywines all over the place.

Here's the garden's harvest for that night.

And here's what Sean did with the rest of the meal. This is a modified Whole Foods recipe. It's chicken kabobs with peaches and red onion, with a heavenly peach preserve, soy sauce, o.j., and rosemary basting sauce. The peaches were fresh from the farmer's market, the red onion from our CSA share, and the rosemary from our garden. We've eaten so well these last few weeks and I have Sean to thank for this. I really am so lucky to have a partner with whom I've found a shared love of cooking and who not only appreciates the family meal, but does, often times all, the preparation of a family meal.

Farmer's Market Bounty: Candied Squash Seeds

There have been so many squashes in our house over the last several weeks and I'm glad of it, since it means I got the excuse to try these candied pumpkin seeds. They taste delicious! However... I made some significant adjustments to the recipe since I had trouble with them being too chewy.

The first thing I did was boil the cleaned seeds in unsalted water for at least 10 minutes. Then I followed the recipe, cooking the spices together with the butter and sugar in a sauce pan and then adding the drained seeds. But for some reason the mixture was just all too runny. After letting them simmer for a long time in hopes that the candy sauce would cook down to a thicker consistency, I gave up, took them off the heat and then spread the gooey seeds onto a sheet of wax paper, in hopes that the mixture would dry out. No luck. So then I sprayed some non-stick spray onto a cookie sheet and roasted them in a 350 degree oven for about 10 minutes--after 5 minutes, I kept a very close eye. And that did the trick! They were clumped together in chip-sized bites. They were crunchy and not chewy. And they didn't last long, a sad detail considering how long it took me to get the seeds clean. If I could find an easy way to clean all the seeds we ultimately compost, I would make these all the time. Sadly, I think it will be awhile before I build up the endurance to make these again. Even if I don't make candied squash seed right away, I have to admit that my immediate response to the final product was that I wanted to candy everything in the house, in particular, I wanted to abscond with all of the nuts that Sean uses for his various healthy snacks (his homemade power bars, and his muesli cereal) and candy them all! Sadly, he didn't agree with this plan.

Farmer's Market Bounty: Broccoli Pesto

While not a terribly camera-friendly presentation here, I'm very happy with this result. Super easy, and well-timed. Last Monday was our final Farmer's Market and our favorite veggie and fruit farmer had a great deal on broccoli: buy 2 pounds and get 1 pound free. So I had tons of broccoli to use.

We're big fans of broccoli in our house. We regularly steam it up and spritz with "I Can't Believe it's not Butter" spray and salt, pepper, and garlic powder. (This is our very basic, quick and easy way of getting lots of veggies on our table.) My favorite method of cooking broccoli is Ellie Krieger's recipe for "dirty broccoli," which is basically cooked broccoli tossed with sauteed garlic and breadcrumbs. Awesome!




Anyway, for this broccoli pesto, I treated it just as I would regular pesto, just substituting broccoli for basil. I steamed up quite a bit of broccoli (about 3 small heads) and then put it in our food processor.








I put in 5 or so cloves of raw garlic, about 1/2 cup of grated parmesan cheese, about 1/4 cup of pan-toasted pine nuts (just what I had on hand), and blended away. As I blended, I slowly added about 1/4 cup or so of olive oil, after which point I added some of the reserved water that I used to steam the broccoli to give it a bit thinner texture. (Of course, I could've just added more olive oil, but I was trying to keep the fat content under control.) Then I added salt and pepper to taste. It's still a smidge on the thick side. I've since portioned it out and frozen it in 1/2 cup servings to be used to mix with a box of cooked pasta down the road. It will likely need a touch of olive oil or pasta water to thin it back out when it's mixed with the pasta.

It went really well with large batch of pasta salad, which was inspired by our friend, Kathleen's, recipe. She cooked it for us after Auric was born and it was great to have on hand for dinners or cold lunches. I added some of the broccoli pesto to cooked pasta, then added steamed broccoli, chopped oven-dried tomatoes that I store in herbed olive oil, cooked chicken breasts, salt and pepper. Very tasty and Thora-friendly!

How to Make an ENORMOUS Batch of Soup

So, as planned, but later than hoped, I made a batch of the Sweet Potato and Butternut Squash Soup from the recipe that my in-laws emailed me, coincidentally on the same day that I came back from the last Farmer's Market, totally drowning in sweet potatoes and butternut squash. The verdict on the soup? ...Awesome.

So, if you want to try this soup and would like to feed a neighborhood or just your small family for a while by freezing it (what I plan to do), here are the steps.

First, you must pretend not to know how much 1 pound of diced sweet potatoes looks like. If you have a good idea, throw it out the window. If you're like me, proceed by chopping up two large sweet potatoes. You will soon realize, when you're chopping and adding the other ingredients, that you've doubled the recipe, at least. Then go back and chop more onion, since there won't be enough. And chop more butternut squash to even out the ratio of potato to squash. And forget to season while it's simmering. This all sounds really complicated, but if these basic steps are followed, you'll have a yummy, savory soup without the chaos of my cooking technique.

2 tablespoons oil (I used olive oil although the recipe calls for canola)
2 medium onions, diced
1 tablespoon minced fresh ginger (I accidentally didn't get around to doubling this part of the recipe, but would have, had I been more on the ball about what was going on. My point is, it still tastes great without doubling.)
1 large butternut squash (and if you're like me and you didn't know that there was an easy way to peel a butternut squash, check this out.)
2 large sweet potatoes
3 medium potatoes
12 cups of chicken stock

I heated the oil in a pan and sauteed the onions with a little added salt to help soften them. I then added the ginger and let that saute for a minute or so. I added the squash, sweet potatoes, regular potatoes and stock. I simmered it for over an hour, until the squash and potatoes were mushy.

Then I transferred the vegetables and onions into the food processor, being careful to keep most of the stock in the pot. I learned quickly that the soup would be way too runny if I used all the stock I'd cooked the vegetables in. I figured I could always add more liquid if the soup was to thick. So I was careful to strain it before blending. Basically, I have a ton of chicken stock left, but the end product is a golden yellow, shiny, smooth, creamy, savory soup. (The salt in the stock and the pinches of salt I used when sauteeing the onions was enough seasoning for this soup. I never seasoned it again, and don't think it needs it.)

A Long Winter Ahead

Today marks the first Monday without a Farmer's Market. No fresh produce from local farms. No fresh baked goods from local bakeries. (Sure, I can get baked goods, but Thora and I had gotten quite used to Hi-Rise Bakery's molasses cookies!) Last week, I stocked up, loading up Thora's stroller with butternut squash, sweet potatoes, fingerling potatoes, and apples. And so, tonight, in celebration of the great eating we've done all season, of the farmer's who have provided our family with fresh, safe, environmentally sound foods, I'm going to try a new recipe for Sweet Potato and Butternut Squash soup, the main ingredients for which I'm flush. My in-laws sent me the recipe from the New York Times. Here's the link if you want to try it too.

Farmer's Market Bounty: Roasted Red Peppers

This past week has been all about preserving (for days/weeks but not months) the fresh produce from the weekly Farmer's Market. In addition to making oven-dried tomatoes, I wanted to preserve the large, red peppers that I picked up this week. I've been thinking about red peppers, marinated in herbs, oil, and vinegar, and what a wonderful accompaniment they would make to salads and on pita bread with goat cheese. (Now that I've got the cheesemaking bug, I think goat cheese is my next accomplishment.) Anyway, I found this great resource for roasting peppers and keeping them. (While there are a ka-gillion recipes that call for roasted red peppers, if they don't require you to open a jar, then you are expected to use them all up as part of a larger recipe.) I wanted information on how to dress up roasted red peppers that would keep in the fridge to be added to snacks and meals over the course of a few weeks. And I found here, in a New York Times Health piece.

I started by grilling the peppers directly on the burner. I actually woudn't recommend doing two front to back like this, since I would occasionally "warm" my forearm while reaching over the front pepper to check and turn the back pepper. I moved the back pepper to the left front burner and that was a much safer way to roast two at a time. It took about 5 minutes or so to roast each pepper.

Here is a pepper almost completely roasted. Its skin is almost completely blackened.

Then, once I'd charred each pepper as well as I could, I put them each in a bowl and covered tightly with cling wrap. They stay in there, steaming a bit, until they cool. Once they're cooled down, after about ten minutes, I peeled off the blackened skin, which comes off very easily. It breaks apart and sticks to your hands, so I found it helpful to rinse my hands repeatedly. (I remember vaguely reading somewhere that you want to resist just putting the peppers under running water--although that is a super easy way to get the skin off--since it washes away a lot of the roasted flavor. I don't remember where I read or heard this--or maybe I've invented this. Anyway, because of this half-memory of something that might not even be true, I resisted putting them under the faucet, and instead, put my hands under the faucet.

Once they were peeled, I followed the suggestions in the recipe. I a) sliced in half over a bowl (you want to keep all the juice that is caught inside the pepper); b)seeded and cored the pepper; c) sliced the halves into strips and put those in a separate bowl with the strained juices; d) added dried basil (would've used fresh, of course, but had none on hand), sea salt, 2 tablespoons of olive oil, about 3 garlic cloves minced, and 1 teaspoon of balsamic vinegar; e) I mixed it all up to evenly distribute all the flavors and then put them into jars for the fridge--well, one pickle jar and one plastic take-out container.

After tasting a few this morning, I might add a bit more vinegar and perhaps more dried seasonings. But they're fresh and bright-tasting. The first thing I thought of when biting into one was how good they would taste on a pizza.

Farmer's Market Bounty: Oven-Dried Cherry Tomatoes

Last night was full of culinary victory in my house. In addition to successfully making homemade mozzarella cheese, I successfully, and tastily, preserved some beautiful cherry tomatoes by oven-drying--a variation on sun-dried tomatoes.

It has become more and more important to me to gather up as much of the fresh, in-season produce from local farms. But to have it sustain us beyond it's limited window of edibility is always a challenge. Either the produce sits in the fridge too long, or on the counter. Life happens. My intention for veggie-heavy meals get lost in shuffle, when nights get late before we've even started cooking, and we often forego the second side of veggies for some other leftover. (Or we fill up on tomatoes on herbed and olive-oiled baguette slices, which is becoming more and more a pre-dinner treat that we love.) Or instead of finding their way into fresh smoothies, peaches grow soft on the counter as I spend what seems like every waking minute prying non-food items from Thora's jaws, or keeping her this side of melt-down, from a log-rolling tantrum. Needless to say, all my Monday-Morning-Farmer's-Market hopes for healthy, responsible, globally-sustainable eating sometimes goes by the wayside, or specifically into the the compost bin. But because I hate that sense of failure as I drop the wilted greens or squishy fruit in with the compost that not every bite got eaten, I've been eye-ing the produce at the Farmer's Market with specific thoughts of semi-preserving. (I'm not canning, so the preserving I'm doing here extends the lifespans of the produce by several weeks in the fridge, rather than months on the shelf.)

So last night's success was oven-dried tomatoes. I cut in half about 1/2 pint of cherry tomatoes, scooped out their seeds with a grapefruit spoon, and laid them cut-side up on a foil-lined baking sheet.

(Could these look more like candy?!?)


I put them in a 200 degree oven (the lowest setting on ours) at roughly 10:30pm for what I was thinking might be over night. But at around 12:30am, when I was still up (!), I took a look at them, and they were already shriveled and some quite leathery. So I took them out and put them in a heat-safe bowl. (I will soon be pouring boiling liquid on them, so the bowl needs to be tough.)

Then I referred to the recipe in Kingsolver's book, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle, called "Antipasto Tomatoes," which can be found at their website here. I brought about a cup of plain white vinegar to a boil (just what we had on hand and a quantity that I eyeballed and assumed to be enough to cover my small amount of tomatoes). After it came to a boil, I poured it into the bowl over the dried tomatoes, tossed in a few whole cloves of garlic, and let the tomatoes and garlic steep for 10 minutes. Then, I scooped out the tomatoes and garlic from the vinegar and, by pressing them, drained as much of the vinegar off as I could. (I reserved the vinegar that is all carmel-colored and tomato- and garlic-infused now and sure to be good in some new incarnation.) Once drained, I tossed the tomatoes and garlic with dried basil, oregano, rosemary, and thyme. (I used dried since I didn't have fresh herbs on hand, but would surely use fresh if given the option.) I put them into a jar and poured olive oil over them to cover (see top photo).

I tried some this morning, and they're quite yummy. There's still a subtle vinegar hit to the taste, which I'm not sure I want there or not. The vinegar bath helps raise the acidity so as to help prevent the bacteria that causes botulism, so it's necessary. But perhaps I could've pressed harder when draining and gotten more of the vinegar out before they went into the jar. But I think they will be nice on salads, on crusty bread, or tossed with pasta. I plan to get some plum tomatoes on Monday and do this again, for one reason, that I'd like to try again and see what happens with a meatier tomato--one that has more substance to it after it's been seeded--but ultimately, I have a feeling these won't last long.

Next up: Roasted Red Peppers

Something I never thought I'd do: Home Cheesemaking?!?

So something I haven't written about, but have been meaning to, is my appreciation for Barbara Kingsolver's book Animal, Vegetable, Miracle. It spoke to me, spurring me on to do things that I've done in the past (backyard gardening) but that had lapsed while we lived in apartments in NYC. It also encouraged me to do things (namely Farmer's Market shopping) that I did before for fun, but now I do with a true sense of purpose, enjoyment, and obligation (it's very important to support local farmers since they provide bio-diversity necessary for our planet's well-being, the significantly lower fuel usage in getting the produce to me and my neighbors, the sensibility and enjoyment of eating food that's "in-season,"...)

Anyway, two direct repercussions of reading this book are:

I'm serious about growing our own vegetables and fruit next season. Sean got me this great book as a birthday present this year, called Bountiful Container, that is proving to be critical in my planning for next year. (While I have yard access, due to a shady tree in our backyard, very little of the ground gets lots of sun. So I'll be doing container gardening along one side of house which gets tons of sun but which is also completely paved over with asphalt.) I'm so excited and don't know how I will get through the long months of winter. Seriously, I'm excited. You should see the plans, dog-eared library books, my highlighted copy of Bountiful Container littering the floor along my side of the bed.

The second thing I've done, that I have to admit I never ever imagined I would ever do, (even in my most hippie-fied fantasies), is to make my own cheese. And this is a direct result of Kingsolver's book. I had some birthday money burning a hole in my pocket and as always, I was determined to use it for something out of the ordinary; something that I want, but that I can't really justify to myself to come out of our budgeted monthly money, which also has to fund things like toilet paper and food for the baby. I know, you're thinking, "Cheesemaking?!?" I said, I know. But apparently it's super easy to make soft cheeses like mozzerella, ricotta, and goat cheese. The place to go for home cheese making is cheesemaking.com, where Ricki Carroll has been teaching home cheese making for 3 decades. Just tonight, I purchased the Starter Kit, which contains their book, an instructional dvd, and the Mozzerella & Ricotta kit which contains all the equipment and ingredients I need to make mozzerella 30 times. For now, I'm kind of doing this for the novelty of always being just 30 minutes away from organic, homemade cheese made without unnecessary processing, refridgeration, storage, transportation, etc. But rest assured (or be forewarned, whichever camp you fall into), I'll write about the trials and victories, the cost and savings, the taste and elbow-grease that goes into making your own cheese at home. So stay tuned.

Farmer's Market Bounty: Puckery Pickles

This past Monday, I was compelled to pick up some cucumbers and make my own pickles. To be truthful, the compulsion was probably chiefly driven by the "3 for $1" sign above the mound of ENORMOUS cucumbers. I couldn't resist. I love pickles. And I love having my own pickles in the fridge to shamelessly munch on when the mood strikes, or even when it doesn't. (Otherwise, I'm snacking on the pickles which are meant for tuna salad and hamburgers.) I plan to do a little more tweaking to the recipe to get a punchy but a bit more subtle flavor. Right now, the vinegar hit is unrelenting. But I love it. I'm a vinegar lover, even if it often catches me unprepared most times and causes my throat to seize up and my eyes to tear. Here is the one and only recipe that I've used to make pickles over the past years. These are refrigerator pickles and so last in the fridge for a couple of weeks. (They're not preserved so they need to be eaten relatively quickly.) I found this recipe in the New York Times Food section about 5 years ago. Although I cut the recipe out of the paper, I don't have an author to attribute it to. However, this author adapted it from "Blue Hill at Stone Barns" (which is meaningless to me, but I figured I should include it). I too have made some changes/additions (see what I did in italics below) and I look forward to playing around some more. But for now, here's the recipe:

8 medium Kirby cucumbers
This Monday, I got the three for a dollar good-sized regular cucumbers and 2 were used to fill the 3 jars I used.

For the brine:
1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
I use less (slightly less than 1/4 c.) since I like a more savory pickle.
1/4 cup Kosher salt
2 cups water
I'm thinking of upping the water and reducing the vinegar ratio in the future, maybe 2.5 cups water to 1.5 cups vinegar. Just fyi.
2 cups Champagne vinegar
We didn't have any, I used what I did have on hand: 1 & 3/4 cups white wine vinegar and 1/4 cup white balsamic vinegar.

Infusing flavor in the jars:
I completely eyeball the following ingredients. I'm certain I use more of everything below, plus I added mustard seed in comparable amounts as the peppercorns this time around. Also, I never add the chiles, but I'm a baby about heat.
1/2 teaspoon black peppercorns
4 sprigs of dill
3 garlic cloves, peeled and halved
2 whole dried chiles (optional)

1. Boil a stockpot of water as deep as the shoulder of a quart jar (or of the jars your using; I use a hodge podge of saved glass jars of all different sizes, so I usually have to boil in batches and adjust the water level accordingly.)
2. Wash cucumbers and slice into 1/8- to 1/4-inch-thick rounds.
3. In a small saucepan bring sugar, salt, vinegar and 2 cups water to a boil over high heat; remove from heat and set aside.
4. Distribute peppercorns, dill, garlic, and chiles equally between 2 sterilized 1-quart jars, then pack jars with cucumber slices. (I layer pickles, then spices, then more pickles, etc., since I think it helps disseminate the flavor. However I have no research to back that up.) Fill each jar with brine to 1/2-inch from rim.
5. Partly close jars, leave gap for steam to escape, and place in boiling water for 10 minutes. Carefully remove jars with jar lifter or 2 tongs and close lids tightly. Cool to room temperature. Refrigerate for up to two weeks.

Farmer's Market Bounty: Yellow and Red Brandywines

Even though we bought tomatoes at the farm stand at Verrill Farm over the weekend, I couldn't resist splurging at our Central Square Farmer's Market on Monday with these two Brandywine (heirloom) tomatoes, a yellow and a red. I picked up a whole wheat french bagette at Trader Joe's, cut off some slices and brushed them with herbed olive oil. (Basically I just dump rosemary, thyme, sea salt, and pepper into a few tablespoons of olive oil and stir.) I put these slices under the broiler for just a couple minutes, until they're lightly browned (or not so lightly since I always forget about them) and then top with the sliced tomatoes. These Brandywines were so flavorful, they didn't need the typical basil and mozzerella that often accompany sliced tomatoes in our house. Sean and I devoured these. Honestly, I can't wait for Monday, when I will pick two new heirloom tomatoes and we'll do this all over again. This makes an easy and tasty appetizer while we're cooking dinner. Although, had I made up more, we probably wouldn't have needed whatever it was we were cooking.

Farmer's Market Bounty: Radishes & Beer

Well I want to say, who knew? But since I don't really know all that much about all the ways that various foods are used the world over, the answer to that question surely is: Lots of people. And by "lots" I think I may be talking about millions (gazillions?). So, I guess I rephrase this to say: I really wish I knew about this! All you gazillions of people that have been eating raw salted radishes paired with beer, (Germans, I'm looking at you) why didn't you tell me?

Anyway, this past Monday at our local Farmer's Market in Central Square, I was eyeing the blood-pink color of the radishes and thought that for the first time in my life, I might buy some, for salads. Sean and I are always looking for ways to spruce up the salads we have with every single dinner (except when we have pancakes or waffles for dinner). We really like crunch, so we're constantly rotating through carrot/broccoli slaw, soy nuts, croutons, red and yellow peppers and the like. As I was handing over my money (I think $2) I thought to ask how else people might use radishes besides cut up in salads. He told me that people sautee the greens. But I could tell that his heart wasn't really there, until he said, "You know how I really like them? Sliced and salted with beer."

So I wasted no time. There were a couple cold beers in the fridge. There was sea salt in our cabinet. Now there were radishes. I put the baby to bed--not in the middle of the afternoon or anything, but at her regular bedtime--and got to slicing. And the verdict: I LOVE them. They're the slightest bit hot, in the way that wasabi is hot, but only a whisper of wasabi's sinus-clearing punch. And of course, I love the satisfying crunch and savoriness of the sea salt. Sean's comment after trying one was, "Well, I don't hate them." (Since the first taste test, he's gladly had more here and there.) But he did say that he thought one could get a "burning stomach" like he is prone to get when he has raw garlic or raw onion on an empty stomach. I guess that's why you pair them with the beer.

p.s. I am submitting this post to the Farmer's Market Report over on To Every Meal There Is A Season. Check it out here.