Jaime's Summer CSA Delivery #2 - June 13, 2013

This week's bounty included more swiss chard, snap peas, cucumbers, radishes, and cucumbers. Also, a head of fennel (which I braised with shallots and cardamom, following the recipe in From Asparagus to Zucchini - delicious!), a head of napa cabbage, raspberries, and the first appearance of summer squash.

It has been fruit central around here. We have been picking mulberries from the neighborhood trees and were happy to get our first little harvest of tart cherries from our new tree. We also managed to make it out to Hollin Farms for the first and only day of pick-your-own cherries for the season. And we harvested the peaches from our tree today. We filled this basket four times!

The mulberries and cherries have been frozen for now. When things settle down, I'll make some jam. I have canned 15 pints of peaches and still have a full basket left of underripe peaches that need to soften up.

"Here we go round the mulberry bush..." - May 29, 2013

The urban foraging season has begun! With the first 90+ degree day, the mulberry trees in our neighborhood just started ripening and dropping fruit today. I picked these this morning on my walk with Lily and then went back out this evening and picked about a quart from the easily reached branches.

Last year I made some preserves and experimented with a few baked goods. I also froze a few bags when I ran out of ideas and they ended up being delicious in smoothies during the winter when local and organic fruit was scarce, so I plan on doing more of that this year.

I also picked up some rhubarb at the market last weekend am thinking some kind of rhubarb-mulberry crisp might be good... Stay tuned!

Nettle-Phyllo Pie - May 13, 2013

When I was researching recipes for the stinging nettles that arrived in our CSA box last week, I came across the advice to just use nettles in place of other greens in any recipe.  This drastically broadened my cooking options, as you can imagine.  I ended up picking out this recipe from the spinach section of "Asparagus to Zucchini" and it was delicious.

Working with stinging nettles is quite tedious (as is phyllo dough).  I wore gloves to pick the leaves from the stems so I wouldn't get stung.  Once they are cooked, the sting goes away.  I did supplement with a handful of spinach leaves, as well.  For the onions it called for, I used ramps, also from our CSA box.  The only other change I made was using ricotta in place of cottage cheese.

This was a delicious way to use up our nettles, even if it's a bit labor intensive for a weeknight dinner.  It does make a large amount.  I cut the recipe in half and we'll still eat for three nights, so if you average it over three dinners, perhaps it's not such a bad investment of time.

Foraged Plums - June 20, 2012

Just as peach season wrapped up, we turned the Hartman house to plum central. A few weeks ago Richie discovered that some of the pretty flowering trees in front of some office buildings not far from our house were not just the typical ornamental cherries or ubiquitous Bradford pears but are actually fruit-bearing plum trees. He kept an eye on them and then when they turned ripe and started dropping onto the sidewalk in mass quantities late last week, we decided it was time to pounce. Early Saturday morning we threw a ladder, a basket, and a few canvas grocery bags into the car and came home with an astonishing 26+ pounds of fruit!

I then proceeded to spend the rest of Saturday working furiously to preserve as many as I could since they were ripening and splitting open in front of my eyes and I was about to leave on a three-day business trip Sunday morning.

Remembering the "Italian prunes" my mother used to can each summer for us to eat all winter, I put up 13 pints of whole plums in syrup. I also made two kinds of jam - one just plain fruit and the other plums with spices. 

Then this morning I made a small batch of this plum chutney that just happened to be posted on The Kitchn by the author of Food in Jars at the very moment I was looking for something else to do with the remainder of my plums! This was my first experience with chutney outside of the stuff you get at an Indian restaurant so I didn't know what to expect. I slathered some on a portion of the leftover smoked pork shoulder we did last week and stuck it between two slices of hearty bread and discovered it turned some ordinary leftovers into an amazing sandwich! I'm a chutney convert now!

We still have a few pounds of the least ripe ones left in the refrigerator and the remainder of a plum crisp I improvised Saturday night to eat, but the rest have been jammed and/or canned and added to my growing pantry stash! 

Morel and Ramp Pasta - May 1, 2012

I saw the basket of morel mushrooms at the co-op last week and could not resist purchasing a small quantity for a special dinner.  At the co-op, morels are $50 a pound, so when I say "special" and "small quantity," I'm not kidding around.  Learning how to find these things in the wild has just risen to the top of my to-do list.    



The occasion was Nick's return home from a week-long trip to Hong Kong and the Philippines for work.  Such a homecoming called for a fancier than average weeknight meal.  To prepare the pasta, I cleaned and sliced the morels in half length-wise.  I plan to always slice the morels this way in the future because I found about 25 small ants living inside each of two of the hollow mushrooms and a little slug inside a third, none of which I would have known about if I'd decided to cook the mushrooms whole.  Easily removed and a clear sign of organic, foraged fungi, I didn't let the bugs bother me too much after my first initial gasp of surprise. 

I diced the bulbs and stems of a small bunch of ramps I'd been keeping in the refrigerator, reserving the green leaves to add later.  I sauteed the ramp bulbs in a generous pat of butter over medium heat for about five minutes and then added my morels with a pinch of salt.  This mix cooked happily for another five minutes or so, and then I added a splash of cream and some freshly ground pepper.  While this simmered gently, I grated in some fresh Pecorino-Romano and then added my partially cooked pasta right into the pan, along with some of the pasta water to help make a light sauce.  Right at the end I added the chopped ramp greens.

The end result was light and creamy, with balanced flavors of rich and earthy morels and bright, acidic ramps.  A reflexion of time and place, this meal is one way to define home. 

Pickled Ramps - April 1, 2012

Ramp season is upon us, a good month earlier than usual here in Minnesota!  I picked up a couple bunches at the co-op last week and pickled them over the weekend.  I used a variation of this recipe, adapting it to what I had on hand.  I added a bit of fresh orange zest and grated fresh ginger to season.  These are just refrigerator pickles, and so have to be consumed within the week or so.  That shouldn't be a problem.

Just a note about the greens: I chose not to pickle the green parts of the ramps, choosing instead to use them fresh, chopped into salads and the like.  Fresh ramps are incredibly delicious, and so I find splitting the greens from the bulbs to be a nice way to enjoy both flavors.

Dandelion and Burdock Root Soda - May 24, 2011

Has anyone else seen this soda flavor at the store?  I found it by the fancy soda/drink mixers at my co-op and made a mental note to attempt a home-made version the next time dandelions were in season, which is pretty much anytime we don't have snow here at our house.  Since we got burdock root in our last CSA delivery, I thought I'd give it a try.  I did a quick internet search and found that this flavor originates from across the pond and is categorized with other 'root' beverages, such as root beer and sarsaparilla. 

I decided to use my standard simple syrup infusion method and I chopped up our three small burdock roots into thin coins.  Next I picked and thoroughly washed a good handful of dandelion flowers, removing as much of the stems, and as many ants as I could. I tossed both of these into my sugar and water mixture.  I boiled for five minutes and then let everything steep, covered and off the heat for about an hour.  Then, I strained out the roots and flowers.  Now, try not to be alarmed that the syrup looks like a jar full of urine.  I know it's a bit startling, but keep calm and carry on (this is a British soft drink, after all). 

To make the soda, I added a quarter cup of the flavored syrup to a glass and topped it off with charged water (that's my Dad's charmingly retro term for carbonated water that I'm trying to adopt because I love the sound of it).  The verdict?  Well, it's subtle and slightly vegetal, but certainly refreshing.  Reading the ingredients from the mass produced versions, I found that ginger and anise are sometimes mixed in, no doubt to increase the flavor profile, but this first time around I wanted to keep things unadulterated so that I could truly taste the burdock and dandelions.  I'm glad I tried it.  Maybe I'll have to purchase some from the co-op and see how mine compares.  Also, we may have to start experimenting for a new Homemade Happy Hour concoction.