Making Summer Last, 101

An inevitable truth: Tomatoes right off the vine from your own garden just can't compare to anything else. I love when August comes and tomatoes really start pouring in, and I can eat caprese salads to my heart's content and still have gorgeous toms leftover for anything I might want to create. I wish I could pick fresh tomatoes year-round, but living in New England, I have to resign myself to a 6-8 week peak season of tomato gluttony, and then get through a year of mealy imposters until next year comes around. One way that I have tried to extend the season lately: canning my own tomato sauce. Sean and I tend to eat a LOT of pasta during the year, and homemade sauce is a delicious reminder of summer--especially welcome in the long winter months.

Canning might sound scary, but it's actually very straightforward and incredibly satisfying when you see all of your jars all lined up in the pantry. To be fair, you do have to know what you're doing, and be very careful of following canning protocol very precisely to protect against spoilage or contamination, but I've been canning for several years now and have never had a problem. If you are ready to try it yourself, invest in a boiling water bath canning kit, which will include a canner (aka a big giant pot), a canning rack to keep the jars elevated inside the canner, and a jar lifter (very helpful since we are dealing with lots of boiling water/hot items here). Jars in varying sizes can be found at hardware stores and some grocery stores seasonally. There are lots of great books to help you get started with canning and learn the ropes, which also have good recipes. I like the Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving, Joy of Cooking: All About Canning and Preserving, and The Busy Person's Guide to Preserving Food. There are also good resources online to check out, including http://www.freshpreserving.com/, http://pickyourown.org/allaboutcanning.htm, and a series of YouTube videos called "Home Canning Basics."

I adapted the following recipe from The Complete Book of Year-Round Small-Batch Preserving, and it is totally amazing. I could NOT stop taste-testing it while it cooked, to the point that I was concerned there wouldn't be any left to can. For those of you who are in the Boston area, Russo's is a great place to go for large amounts of local tomatoes at a good price (and they always have fabulous produce), and they still had cases of beautiful local roma tomatoes today for only $16/box. Two other notes if you want to try out this recipe: Sterilizing jars in the dishwasher is easy and a big timesaver, so try that if your dishwasher has that option. Lastly, peeling 8 pounds of tomatoes might sound tedious, but it's not bad at all if you do it right, and I even find it pretty zen. Just score an X in the bottom of each tomato, drop them into boiling water for 1 minute (or until you see the skin start to pull away from the incision), shock them in a bowl of ice water, and the skins will slip right off. Yes, it still takes time to peel and chop them, and yes, you should dedicate several hours to this project, but it's worth every last tomato-y drop.

Tomato Basil Pasta Sauce

Note: This recipe yields 7-8 pint jars of sauce, and can be halved. I wouldn't recommend doubling it, as the recipe as written fills a 7-quart stockpot.

Ingredients:

• 16 cups (about 8 lbs) peeled, coarsely chopped roma tomatoes
• 2 cups chopped onion
• 6 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 1/3 cups red wine
• 1/2 cup 5% red wine vinegar
• 1 cup chopped fresh basil
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley
• 2 teaspoons pickling salt
• 1 teaspoon granulated sugar
• 2 6-oz cans tomato paste

Directions:

1. Combine tomatoes, onion, garlic, wine, vinegar, basil, parsley, salt, sugar, and tomato paste in a very large non-reactive pot. Bring to a boil over high heat, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer, uncovered, stirring often, for 1 hour and 20 minutes, or until mixture reaches desired consistency.
2. Meanwhile, heat water in boiling water bath canner and sterilize jars. Ladle sauce into hot pint jars, leaving 1/2 inch of head space. Remove any air bubbles in the jar, wipe down jar mouth with a damp kitchen towel, and affix lids and bands. Process pint jars for 35 minutes in a boiling water bath. Allow jars to cool for 12 hours. Remove bands from each jar to ensure the lid is properly sealed, then reattach and tighten bands, label jars, and store in a cool, dry place for up to 1 year.

As Local As It Gets

I have always loved to grow things. It's amazing to me how much can happen by simply giving plants the few things they need, and how many different beautiful shapes and colors can burst out of tiny seeds. The time I spend out in the garden (even when tedious, hot, and buggy) is some of the most peaceful and focused that I have. So, this year, after learning so much about the benefits of eating locally and seasonally, it made sense to try and grow as much of our own food as possible. We don't have a lot of space, nor a lot of time to tend a large garden, but I was intrigued by Mel Bartholomew's book Square Foot Gardening, and thought I would try the method out this year. The basic premise is to maximize your space by planning your garden in square foot increments, and optimize your soil by building raised beds and filling them with a mixture of compost, vermiculite, and peat moss (which keeps your plants healthier, reduces the need for weeding and watering, and is relatively maintenance-free). Anyone can do it, even on a rooftop or along the side of your house, and you can grow a surprising amount of food in a small space. Sean and I built three raised beds this year (with a total of 32 square feet of growing space), complete with trellises for climbing veggies, and gave it a try (to learn more about SFG, visit http://www.squarefootgardening.com/). I had a fantastic time ordering heirloom variety seeds from catalogs this winter (my favorite seed company is Seed Savers Exchange, a great organization that is dedicated to reviving and preserving heirloom plant varieties among its members), and started seedlings inside starting in early February. I decided to grow fairly standard (yet heirloom) varieties of vegetables this year, and branch out into some exotic varieties next year if the project was successful. Fast-forwarding to the present, our most successful crops so far have been our peas (Amish Snap), bush beans (Empress), cucumbers (Japanese Climbing), lettuces (Bronze Arrowhead, Buttercrunch, and Australian Yellowleaf), tomatoes (Brandywine, Sweet 100, and Viva Italia), and various herbs. A tad too optimistic, we did not put up any fencing this year, and subsequently have lost all of our kale, most of our swiss chard, our broccoli, our cilantro, and all of my lovingly tended sweet peppers to rabbits, groundhogs, and (we think?) wild turkeys. I would definitely recommend square foot gardening to anyone, even if you have a lot of space for a traditional garden, as it's easy to maintain and looks very pretty all laid out. It's SO satisfying to go outside, pick something ripe and delicious, and cook with it moments later (knowing exactly where it came from, and how it was grown). Just make sure you put up a fence of some kind so that YOU are the one who gets to eat that food, and not your fellow woodland creatures.

To celebrate the bounty you can grow easily from your very own garden (or that you can find at your very own farmer's market), here is a quick pasta sauce recipe that makes the most of the delicious cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, and herbs that are at their best right now. Enjoy!

Garden of Eden Pasta Sauce (from Cook's Country)

Makes enough to sauce 1 pound of pasta (suggested varieties: penne, campanelle, and farfalle).

Ingredients:

• 2 large tomatoes, cored and chopped
• 1 yellow or orange bell pepper, seeded and chopped
• 1 medium cucumber, peeled, seeded, and chopped
• 8 ounces fresh mozzarella cheese, cut into 1/2-inch chunks
• 2 scallions, sliced thin
• 1/2 cup chopped fresh basil
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 1 garlic clove, minced
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon ground oregano
• 1/2 cup reserved pasta cooking water

Directions:

1. Combine tomatoes, bell pepper, cucumber, cheese, scallions, basil, and salt in a large bowl. Whisk oil, vinegar, garlic, cumin, and oregano in a rsmall bowl. Pour oil mixture over tomato mixture and toss to coat. Cover and let stand at room temperature 1 hour.
2. Toss tomato mixture with cooked pasta and reserved pasta cooking water, if necessary to thin sauce. Serve.

Corn, The Way It Was Meant To Be

If you have read Michael Pollan's The Omnivore's Dilemma, or have seen the thought-provoking documentary King Corn, then you know that Corn is generally seen as the enemy. And it's true: "Corn" (notice the big C), as grown in monoculture by huge agribusinesses has had a devastating effect on the nutrition of many things that we eat (in the form of high fructose corn syrup in large part), and is slowly (and not so slowly) killing off the small, diversified family farm as we know it. Growing anything in large monocultures year after year, be it corn, soybeans, or wheat, wreaks havoc on an ecosystem, and by slowly depriving the soil of its nutrients, requires more and more fertilizer and pesticides to keep growing in high yields over time. These fertilizers and pesticides are both harmful to the planet (in their carbon footprint) and to our health (in their toxicity). A diversified farm, on the other hand, rotates crops in different locations over time in order to preserve the nutrients within the soil, and can practice "companion planting" (planting certain crops close together for a mutual benefit) as a natural, organic method of pest control.

And yet, here I am, ready to post about corn. As much as Big Corn has upset the balance of agriculture in this country, corn itself (little c) is a wonderful summertime crop with a rich history and hundreds of heirloom varieties that are delicious and incredibly varied. That first bite of corn on the cob that was just picked that day is emblematic of summer, and I would be hard pressed to live without it. We don't need to live without corn, we just need to eat it when it's seasonal, local, responsibly grown, and actually, well, corn (and not processed into HFCS, maltodextrin, lecithin, or any other additive). The way it was meant to be . I chose to celebrate corn with the recipe below--make the most of it while it's deliciously in season, and keep it out of where it doesn't belong.

Corn Chowder (adapted from Cook's Country)

Ingredients:

• 6 ears corn
• 2 (15 ounce) cans whole kernel corn (Libby's Organic recommended)
• 5 cups low-sodium chicken broth
• 3 slices bacon
• 1 onion, chopped
• salt and pepper
• 1 pound red potatoes, scrubbed and cut into 1/2-inch dice
• 1 cup heavy cream
• 4 scallions, sliced thin

Directions:

1. Prep Corn - Cut corn cobs in half crosswise, then stand each half on its cut end. Using a sharp chef's knife, cut the kernels off the ear, one side at a time. Reserve the kernels and cobs separately. Puree canned corn and 2 cups broth in a blender (or in 2 batches in a food processor) until smooth.
2. Saute Vegetables - Cook bacon in Dutch oven over medium heat until crisp, about 8 minutes. Remove bacon and transfer to paper-towel-lined plate. Crumble when cool. Cook onion, corn kernels, 1/2 teaspoon salt, and 1/4 teaspoon pepper in bacon fat until vegetables are softened and golden brown, 6-8 minutes.
3. Finish Soup - Add potatoes, corn puree, remaining broth, and reserved corn cobs to Dutch oven and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer until potatoes are tender, about 15 minutes. Discard cobs and stir in cream, scallions, and crumbled bacon. Season with salt and pepper. Serve. (Soup can be refrigerated in an airtight container for up to 3 days).

Potato, Potato

Potatoes always strike me as a winter vegetable, but that's probably because that's all I've got in my sad, mostly empty vegetable bin during the cold months of the year. New potatoes, harvested in their first stages of growth in spring and early summer, however, are hard to beat in taste compared to their compatriots who grow to maturity (and are destined for dinners throughout the cold months). Land's Sake had a nice crop of beautiful red potatoes at their stand last week, so I decided to buy a couple of pounds and make something good--and that won't take much! Red potatoes on their own are incredibly good for you as an excellent source of Potassium, Vitamin C, fiber, and even protein, as it turns out (read a bit more here or here). There are thousands of heirloom varieties of potatoes that have been cultivated all around the world for centuries (with great names like "Cleopatra," "Durango Red," and "Inca Dawn" [you can see more varieties for yourself here]), and they are becoming easier than ever to grow thanks to mail-order heirloom seed companies like Seeds Savers Exchange and Seeds of Change.

For my little red beauties, I decided to make a dish that reminded me of some time that my family spent in Greece when I was a kid. I remember visiting open air markets in Athens on Saturdays with my mom, with farmers from all over Greece showing off their best fruits, vegetables, meats, and cheeses. Many of my memories of the time that I spent there revolve around the wonderful food that we ate--particularly the tzatziki and roasted lemon potatoes that you could get at any good taverna. So, to honor the humble (but powerful!) potato, below is a recipe for Greek-inspired lemon potatoes that you can use throughout the year.

Greek-Style Lemon Potatoes (from Cook's Country)

Ingredients:

• 2 pounds red potatoes, scrubbed and halved (quartered if large)
• 2 garlic cloves, peeled and smashed, plus 2 cloves, minced
• 1 1/2 teaspoons grated zest and 2 tablespoons juice from 1 lemon
• 1 cup low-sodium chicken broth
• salt and pepper
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped parsley

Directions:

1. Rinse potatoes - Place potatoes in colander set over large bowl. Rinse under running water, tossing with hands until water runs clear. Drain potatoes well.
2. Cook potatoes - Bring potatoes, smashed garlic, lemon juice, chicken broth, and 1/2 teaspoon salt to boil in large nonstick skillet. Reduce heat to medium-low and cook, covered, until potatoes are just tender, 12-15 minutes. Remove lid and increase heat to medium. Cook, stirring occasionally, until liquid evaporates, about 5 minutes.
3. Crisp potatoes - Discard garlic cloves and add oil to pan. Turn all potatoes cut-side down and continue to cook until deep golden brown, about 6 minutes. Off heat, stir in parsley, lemon zest, and minced garlic. Season with salt and pepper. Serve.

The Return of Summer...and The Blog

Well, I suppose that one out of two isn't bad. I did eat more kale this winter, but alas, had little time to blog. But now that summer has returned, I am determined to take advantage of some free time and the longer days to return to writing about my local and seasonal eating adventures.

And what better way to start than with garlic scapes? (Never heard of them? Check out a cool video here.) I visited Land's Sake Farm today (a fantastic organic farm with a wonderful educational mission in Weston, MA), and there they were--green, curvy, and unbelievably strange. I had never cooked with them before, but I knew they are only available for a short time in early summer, and are fast becoming the latest culinary craze, so I went for it. Garlic scapes are the tops and flowers of a garlic plant, and they are harvested at this time of year to send more energy down into the bulb of the garlic plant. The scapes used to be tossed onto the compost pile at this point, but lately have become prized on their own for their mellow, garlicky flavor and culinary versatility. Using scapes at this time of year is a perfect way to celebrate some of the first fresh veggies of the season (besides lettuce and leafy greens of course) and to make use of something that could otherwise go to waste. I decided to put mine into a quiche, and have a feeling that these are soon to become an addiction. Hope you give them a try as well!

Garlic Scape Quiche with Bacon, Swiss, and Feta (my own recipe!)

Ingredients:

• 1 unbaked 9" deep dish pie shell
• 6 slices bacon
• 1 bunch (about 12) garlic scapes
• 1 cup shredded Swiss cheese
• 1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese
• 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon pepper
• 4 eggs
• 2/3 cup half and half

Directions:

1. Pre-heat oven to 400 degrees. Cut stem and flower ends from garlic scapes, and cut each scape into 1-inch pieces.
2. In a nonstick skillet, cook bacon strips over medium-low heat until crisp. Remove and drain on paper towel lined plate. Crumble when cool. Discard all but 1 tablespoon bacon fat. Return pan to medium heat, and add garlic scapes. Cook until tender and starting to caramelize, 5-7 minutes. Remove scapes with slotted spoon and drain on paper towels until cool.
3. In a medium mixing bowl, add crumbled bacon, cooled garlic scapes, Swiss cheese, feta, flour, salt, and pepper and mix until well combined. In another small bowl, whisk eggs and half and half. Add bacon-garlic scape mixture to pie shell; pour egg mixture over to fill. Cover edges of pie crust with aluminum foil to prevent over-browning. Place quiche on foil-lined baking sheet.
4. Bake quiche at 400 degrees for 15 minutes. Remove aluminum foil around edges of crust and bake for another 15-20 minutes until crust is browned and center of quiche is set. Allow quiche to cool for 5-10 minutes before slicing.

Resolution: Eat More Kale! (And blog more regularly...)

Well, as you can probably infer from my lack of posts, December was an incredibly busy month for me. But fear not! I have quite the backlog of cooking experiments to write about over the next few weeks, and hope to get back into a regular routine with my posts.

Tonight's topic: Winter greens. At this time of year, it gets harder and harder to find fresh produce that is also eco-friendly (and not burning fossil fuels by being shipped from South America, etc.). Winter greens like kale, collard greens, and swiss chard love cold weather and will grow well into late fall and early spring in New England, and can be grown almost throughout the entire winter in cold frames by particularly determined farmers. You can find them almost year round at farmer's markets, and they are incredibly hardy and easy to grow yourself if you're so inclined (they are almost impossible to kill and will come back in the spring if you mulch them well over the winter). These greens are also some of the healthiest things on the planet that you can eat, and are full of antioxidants, vitamins, and minerals.

Now, I used to HATE winter greens. Bitter is my least favorite taste, and often these greens can cook up slimy, mushy, and disgusting if cooked poorly (as is usually the case). But, given my newfound zeal for seasonal eating, I thought I'd give them another try. I recently tried a pasta recipe that called for collard greens or kale, and it turned out beautifully. The greens were well-seasoned, firm in texture, and complemented the other simple flavors in the dish really well. Trust Cook's Illustrated to get it right, as they so often do! So give kale a chance, and start eating better in the new year.

Whole Wheat Pasta with Greens, Beans, Bacon, and Bread Crumbs (modified from Cook's Illustrated)
Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup bread crumbs
• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 6 cloves garlic, minced
• Table salt
• 4 slices bacon (the original recipe calls for 3 oz pancetta if you have it on hand)
• 1 medium onion, diced (about 1 cup)
• 1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes
  
• 1-1 1/2 pounds kale or collard greens, thick stems removed and discarded, chopped into 1-inch pieces and rinsed
• 1 1/2 cups low-sodium chicken broth
• 1 (15 ounce) can cannellini beans, drained and rinsed
• 13 1/4 pounds whole wheat spaghetti (Ronzoni recommended)
• 4 ounces fontina cheese, grated (about 1 cup) [I used parmesan because I had it!]
• Ground black pepper

Directions

1. Heat 2 tablespoons oil in 12-inch straight sided saute pan over medium-high heat. Add bread crumbs and cook, stirring frequently, until beginning to brown, about 3 minutes. Stir in 1 tablespoon garlic; cook, stirring constantly, until garlic is fragrant and bread crumbs are dark golden brown, about 1 minute. Season bread crumbs with salt, transfer to small serving bowl, and set aside. Wipe out pan with paper towels.

2. Heat remaining tablespoon oil in now-empty pan over medium-high heat, add bacon and cook until crisp, about 8 minutes. Transfer to paper towel lined plate and let cool. Crumble when cooled.
   

3. Add onion to pan; cook until starting to brown, about 5 minutes. Add remaining tablespoon garlic and red pepper flakes; cook, stirring constantly, until garlic is fragrant, about 30 seconds.

4. Add half of greens to pan; using tongs, toss occasionally, until starting to wilt, about 2 minutes. Add remaining greens, broth, and 3/4 teaspoon salt; cover (pan will be very full); increase heat to high and bring to strong simmer. Reduce heat to medium and cook, covered, tossing occasionally, until greens are tender, about 15 minutes (mixture will be somewhat soupy). Stir in beans and crumbled bacon.

5. Meanwhile, bring 4 quarts water to boil in Dutch oven over high heat. Add spaghetti and 1 tablespoon salt; cook until pasta is just shy of al dente. Drain pasta and return to pot. Add greens mixture to pasta, set over medium-high heat, and toss to combine. Cook until pasta absorbs most of liquid, about 2 minutes. Add cheese; adjust seasoning with salt and pepper. Serve immediately, topping with garlic bread crumbs.
   

Turkey Day

Before:

After:

I couldn't believe it myself, but a flock of wild turkeys actually passed through our yard on Thanksgiving Day. No, in my zeal for local cuisine I did not actually run out into the yard and take one of these beautiful birds down, but I did end up cooking a delicious meal that celebrates an often forgotten animal. Now sadly, I ended up hosting Thanksgiving somewhat last-minute, and I couldn't find anywhere that still had local or heritage breeds of turkeys available, so the bird in this photo doesn't quite measure up to what I had envisioned. Now that I am reading The Omnivore's Dilemma, I am getting much more interested in finding local, grass-fed sources of meat and poultry. Eat Wild is a great resource for finding local grass-fed producers all over the U.S., and has a lot of useful information for interested readers. I found Chestnut Farms, a Massachusetts source for beef, lamb, pork, and poultry, that does a meat CSA, which will deliver a monthly allotment of meat to a variety of locations all around MA for customer pick-up. Sean and I are hoping to test-run some of their products from the farmer's market this winter, and will probably join the CSA in their next cycle, starting in June.

Still, even though my turkey was probably far from ideally raised this year, I thought I would share a delicious recipe for roast turkey and gravy, that goes amazingly well with garlic mashed potatoes on the side (because come on, what else are you going to do with all of that gravy?). Next year, I look forward to an even more home-grown Thanksgiving!

Herb-Roasted Turkey and Gravy (from Cook's Country)

Make sure to brine a natural turkey before going forward with this recipe (a frozen "self-basting" turkey injected with a salt solution does not need to be brined).

For the turkey:

• 1 (12-14 pound) turkey, thawed, giblets discarded
  
• 8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
• 2 tablespoons dried herbes de Provence
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 tablespoon grated lemon zest
• 1 1/2 teaspoons chicken boullion (Better Than Boullion recommended)
• 1 teaspoon pepper
• 2 onions, chopped
• 1 carrot, peeled and chopped
• 1 celery rib, chopped
• 4 cups low-sodium chicken broth
• 1 cup white wine

For the gravy:

• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 5 tablespoons all purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh parsley
• 1 teaspoon minced fresh thyme
• 1/2 teaspoon minced fresh rosemary
• Salt and pepper

Directions:

1. For the turkey: Adjust oven rack to lowest position and heat oven to 325 degrees. Pat turkey dry inside and out with paper towels. Using fork, beat butter, herbs, garlic, zest, boullion, and pepper until combined.
2. Using the handle of a wooden spoon gently loosen the skin from the breast meat. Spoon half of butter mixture under skin of turkey, and rub remaining butter all over the skin on the outside and inside the turkey cavity.
3. Scatter vegetables in bottom of large roasting pan, then add broth and wine. Tuck wings behind back and arrange turkey on V-rack set inside roasting pan. Roast until internal temperature of breast reaches 165 degrees and thigh registers 170-175 degrees, 2 1/2 to 3 hours. Transfer turkey to cutting board and let rest for 30 minutes.
4. For the gravy: Carefully strain contents of roasting pan into large measuring cup. Let liquid settle so that fat separates, then skim fat from surface. If necessary, add enough water to measure 4 cups. Melt butter in saucepan over medium heat. Add flour and whisk constantly until honey-colored, about 2 minutes. Gradually whisk in strained juices. Bring to boil, then reduce heat to low and simmer until slightly thickened, about 5 minutes. Off heat, stir in herbs and season with salt and pepper. Carve turkey and serve with herb gravy.