Independence Days #8

The temperatures dropped around here this week, which has made it a little easier to get into the kitchen and cook. What a nice change of pace!

I can't say I've done a whole lot, though perhaps if I go through the checklist, I might surprise myself...

1. Plant something: At the Renaissance Man's garden, golden beets, golden chard, Antares oakleaf lettuce, summer savory.


2. Harvest something: At the Renaissance Man's garden, a few lonely pods of fava beans, the last French Breakfast radishes, one white radish, lemon balm, and the first crop of Masai bush beans (don't let the photo fool you; they were about 4" long and very slender); foraged black raspberries in the park and shepherd's purse at the Lady Bountiful's farm.

3. Preserve something: Froze peas, broccoli, chopped garlic scapes; dried spinach, lambs' quarters, peas, carrots, lemon balm; made over two pints of strawberry-mulberry jam with the Renaissance Man.

4. Reduce waste: Saved more food scraps for stock; saved bread crumbs to add to zucchini-feta pancakes for texture; starting to save oil.

5. Preparation and storage: Made stock and froze it; bought lemon juice for tomato canning later this summer; gathered baskets and bucket for berry picking.

6. Build local food systems: Talked with an editor at one of the local papers about publicizing Local Roots on a regular basis; taught the Renaissance Man how to make jam; foraged with the Renaissance Man, scouting out new sources of wild edibles; talked with the local movie theatre about doing a Local Roots film series later this year; saw the July Local Roots newsletter go out; took the Southern Belle and My Adorable Nephews blueberry picking.

7. Eat the food: Steamed green beans tossed with oregano, garlic, olive oil, and balsamic vinegar; pasta with loads of fresh vegetables; snacking on kohlrabi and little carrots; zucchini-feta pancakes; broccoli-cheese soup; black raspberry tea bread.

Well, guess I did more than I thought! But next week I expect to do even more as I'll have some vacation time from work, and I plan to get a bit caught up.

Tomorrow we'll enjoy Independence Day with the usual celebrations around town, culminating in what should be a grand fireworks display. It's certainly going to be a time to appreciate what is good about our country.

For me, of course, that includes celebrating the wonderful local foods I grew up picking and appreciating -- and celebrating the family traditions for putting up those foods for winter.

And yes, that's a kind of Independence I'm willing to keep practicing.

Oh, Say, Can You CSA? 2009 Week 6

There's construction going on all over the place these days. I can hardly cross the street for my morning break at work without dodging a torn-up section of sidewalk or street, and several other streets in town are ragged, dusty ghosts of themselves.

Even heading to our CSA farm today, we had to stop for a while before we could continue through a one-lane section of the road. It's just that time of year.

It's a good thing, though, that good CSA food is worth any obstacle!


Today's offerings included:

--two Walla Walla onions (split)
--one bag mixed lettuce (mine)
--one pint summer squash (split)
--one bunch carrots (mine)
--one bunch cilantro (mine)
--one and a half pounds zucchini (yellow and green; split)
--one bunch kale (mine)
--one bunch broccoli (for my folks)
--one pint sugar snap peas (also for my folks)
--two fresh garlic bulbs (mine)
--and my usual half-dozen eggs

The summer produce is definitely starting to come in! And while it looks like I got the larger share of the produce -- I did -- I think I may save some to share at the Farm on an upcoming visit.

I also wandered around the raised beds and picked some of the shepherd's purse (a wild edible) I had noticed growing in one of the beds. The Lady Bountiful joined me in my browse, and when she pointed out the bolting spinach, I tested a leaf at her request and thought it might be fine for cooking or freezing. So, being the perpetually generous person she is, she told me to grab a bag and scissors and take whatever I wanted since she'd be pulling it soon.

See? It's always worth the trip to CSA what's growing!

Jam Artist

"I still haven't done anything with those strawberries," the Renaissance Man lamented earlier this week. "Maybe I should have you teach me how to make jam."

Say no more, dear friend -- I always stand ready to initiate others into the joys (and labors) of food preservation.

So I gathered up a handful of small canning jars, the rest of my own strawberries (a cup at best), and headed to his place to show him the ropes.


Though I washed and sliced my contributions to the pot, I made him do the work on the rest (and told him to consider it physical therapy for his healed arm). Once all the berries had been thrown into the pot, I mashed them until juicy and still a little chunky.


Meanwhile, he decided that the remaining foraged mulberries might be a good addition to the jam, so he added those as well as the necessary sugar.

I set him to stirring the pot as the jam heated up, while I set up his Dutch oven with jars and rings to be sterilized and let it start bubbling away.

I'll not bore you with the tedious details (stir, stir, stir; use tongs and strong language to remove boiling-hot glass jars from the makeshift canner; ladle hot jam cautiously into jars). We opened the back door for a good breeze, kept ourselves hydrated, and did the necessary.


But at the end of it all, he had one pint jar, one half-pint, and three half-cup jars of darkly glistening and not-too-sweet berry jam awaiting his pleasure.

Well, we didn't really have to wait too long: one small jar was opened in time for dessert so that we could top vanilla ice cream with this new berry "sauce." (An excellent decision!)

"That's all there is to it?" he asked as we stood back to admire his handiwork. And when I confirmed it, he started pondering other similar projects for later this summer.

Maybe this year, he'll make all the jam for me!

Market Report: 6/27/09

I haven't done much with my abundance of fresh produce over the past few days, so I knew I shouldn't let myself get too carried away in buying produce at this morning's farmers' market.

But it's so easy to be tempted:


--two quarts of shelling peas, a long cucumber, and cookies from the Cheerful Lady
--broccoli and purple kohlrabi from the Fiddlin' Farmer, and a bunch of colorful zinnias from his son
--tiny new potatoes from the Amish Farmer
--whole wheat bread and pasta from the Herb Lady
--carrots from the Spelt Baker
--a jar of honey from the Bee Man
--basil and thyme pots from the Lady Bountiful
--a dozen gingersnaps from the Gluten-Free Baker

Yes, compared to my usual farmers' market shopping spree, that was restraint on my part!

I lingered downtown to enjoy an outdoor Local Roots marketing meeting over iced coffee, and then I ran a few errands before heading home and tackling the first preservation projects of the day: blanching and drying one bundle of carrots and all of the shelling peas.

Maybe I'll actually be able to take it easy this weekend?

Nahhhh...

Independence Days #7

Another busy week! I'm glad I got a lot of this done last weekend as this week has really gotten away from me...

1. Plant something: Added bush beans, Soldier dry beans, and carrots to the Southern Belle's garden.

2. Harvest something: From the Renaissance Man's garden, radishes, lettuce, sage, borage, plantain; lettuce, spinach, pac choi, chard, beets, radishes, snap peas, garlic scapes, and dill from the Southern Belle's garden.


3. Preserve something: Vinegars and tinctures with herbs (comfrey, sage, basil, comfrey and plantain); started kim chi; borage honey; radishes "pickled" in vinegar; dried carrots, spinach, savory, sweet cherries, fennel fronds; froze pac choi; started strawberry and mulberry shrubs.

4. Reduce waste: Used kohlrabi and radish leaves in kim chi (instead of cabbage); saving more prep scraps for stock.

5. Preparation and storage: stocked up on olive oil and vodka for herbal preparations; made a list of herbal tinctures, syrups, and oils I'd like to try to make.

6. Build local food systems: Talked to more new vendors at the farmers' market and handed out brochures about Local Roots; gave a handful of brochures to the Chef Mother to spread around (since she's become one of our "ambassadors"); started reading A Nation of Farmers; finished articles for the July Local Roots newsletter; talked with friends about a potential connection between Local Roots and the local Grange.


7. Eat the food: Salads; linguine with stir-fry asparagus, snow peas, pac choi; a confetti-colored roasted mix of vegetables (asparagus, Chioggia and golden beets, carrots, cauliflower, broccoli, onion, garlic, and fennel); broccoli and greens egg puff; broccoli walnut pasta.

I still have a good deal of food in the refrigerator, so I think I'd better go easy at the farmers' market tomorrow and then get some work done!

The season's picking up!