Eggplant

Anne of So Many Veggies blogged about eggplant, so I thought I would add what I have been up to. Our farm offers many kinds of eggplant, including the standard large eggplant, long eggplant, and fairy eggplant. (Say it a few more times and the word "eggplant" will lose all meaning...)

Fairy Eggplant

I have made baba ghanoush and ratatouille from these, and they were both amazing. My recipes are adapted from The Joy of Cooking. The tahini is not from New England, obviously, but I was able to buy a jar at one of the amazing Middle Eastern markets in Watertown - and it comes from Lebanon!

Baba Ghanoush:

I peeled and sauteed about 3 eggplants until they were very soft (roasting just takes too long).

I blended these with 2 T of tahini, 2 chopped garlic cloves, the juice of one large lemon (Andrew's mom brings these from CA), and 1/2 t. salt (all this can be altered to taste, depending on the amount of eggplant). I topped the bowl of baba ghanoush with olive oil and chopped parsley.

Homemade baba ghanoush, pita chips, and falafel.

Ratatouille:

This is one of my all-time favorite summer meals, and it takes full advantage of our farm veggie supply. I use my Le Creuset cast-iron, enameled pot for this because it's heavy and prevents burning. In olive oil and a bit of water, I sautee a chopped onion and 3 minced garlic cloves. When these are soft, I add more olive oil (up to 1/4 c.), and enough cubed eggplant, zucchini, and bell peppers to fill the pot. To this, I add fresh thyme, a bay leaf, salt, pepper, and a bit of water to help the veggies steam. When these vegetables have softened, I add ~1.5 cups or more of chopped fresh tomatoes and let it all simmer until the veggies are beginning to fall apart (peeling and seeding the tomatoes is nice, but not necessary). It's wonderful on polenta, with fresh bread, on pasta, or added to tomato soup.

Long-cooked ratatouille.

Picnic at Walden Pond

My sister Susan and I have had a long tradition of running around Walden Pond in Concord, Mass. and then jumping in the water for a refreshing swim. Walden Pond was made famous by Henry David Thoreau, who lived and wrote there in the 19th century. He was the only resident in those days, and while it is now a frenzy of people swimming, canoeing, and hiking, we are always able to find a little corner of peace at one of the private access points. Recently, we took Andrew on one of these runs and packed a picnic for a post-swim feast. We all agreed it was one of the best picnics we'd ever had, especially since Andrew ate his in the water! Andrew and I repeated this adventure this week (minus the run) and enjoyed a very local picnic. He loves to swim, so I set out the food while he took a long swim across the pond.

Our menu:

Local tomatoes with garden basil and mozzarella made in Everett, Mass.

Russo's bread (ok, so I don't know where the ingredients are from, but I know where it was baked!)

Goat and cheddar-style cheeses from Vermont and Lancaster Co., PA

Local berry crisp made with Kate's butter and Vermont King Arthur Flour

(and maybe we snuck in a little white wine, too...)

Salsa!

Our CSA is now offering tomatillos, hot peppers, and husk cherries, so Andrew was inspired to make salsa! Using our favorite Mexican cookbook by Rick Bayless, Andrew made two different salsas:

1) Roasted Tomatillo Salsa (with husk cherries!):

Following Bayless' instructions, Andrew packed 6 halved tomatillos, several halved garlic cloves, a handful of husk cherries, and a jalapeno into a cast-iron skillet and roasted them on the stove top. When they were nicely roasted, he blended them with some salt and chopped white onion (he left this out of my portion, given my aversion to raw onions), and we ate this with rice, beans, and homemade tortilla chips. The husk cherries added a nice sweetness to the salsa, but did not overpower the tomatillo flavor.

2) Roasted Fresh Chile Salsa:

We have picked a variety of chiles on our farm and they are all pretty mild. For this salsa, Andrew halved the chiles (left in the seeds) and 4 garlic cloves, roasted them under the broiler until the skin began to blacken, and then blended this with 2 tablespoons of lime juice. Yum! The smell of roasting chiles in the kitchen was warm and delicious.

The two salsas mixed together were wonderful, as well, and everything tasted fresh and authentic...and brought back happy memories of home in Berkeley and our favorite restaurant in Chicago, the Frontera Grill.

New England Summer Fruit

We have had a difficult summer with too much rain and cool temperatures. The fruit has been less than abundant, but when the weather turned, I decided to go in search of local fruits. Several weeks ago, I visited Russo's with Anne and Susan, where we found an amazing bounty!

These peaches, strawberries, apples, and blueberries were all grown in New England and have provided many meals. We have eaten them plain, mixed with a little maple sugar, baked in crisps, and in oven-baked french toast. The apples are part of our apple share through our CSA and I am planning on freezing lots of apple sauce in the next few weeks (see my post on apple picking for my apple sauce recipe).

New England blueberries are *very* different from the large, high-bush blueberries that come from New Jersey and California. These grow close to the ground and they are very tiny. They are also a bit more sour, but have a huge blueberry flavor. Picking them yourself is work-intensive, but worth it! Their harvesting window is short, but they can be found on the slopes of New Hampshire's and Maine's mountains...if any of you have read Blueberries for Sal by Robert McCloskey (of Make Way for Ducklings fame), you will know how special these berries are in New England.

Family Food History

Richard Foster with the results of his foraging!

Eating locally, learning to can with the Bassetts, and broadening my food horizons has me thinking about my own “food education” - and I have my Mom to thank for that. Food and eating are central to our family life. My Mom, Margaret, has a degree from the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts, and she is synonymous with cooking and creativity. When she and my Dad were first married in the 1970s, they established a little antique store in Cochituate, Massachusetts, where I grew up. This store specialized in antique kitchen equipment, and they spent many weekends exploring New England and upstate New York for things to sell in their own shop.

The Kitchen Cabinet - Mom's shop on Main Street in Cochituate, Mass.

She has always had fabulous taste!

Later, after we had lived in France and she was inspired by the culinary delights of the Dordogne Valley, Mom went to cooking school and established her own catering business out of our home. She has some painfully funny stories from those days, but I mostly remember the incredible desserts she brought home and that cool outfit she got to wear! We had a beautiful garden behind the house at 12 Shawmut Ave, where we could pick asparagus, beans, tomatoes, strawberries, peppers, lettuce, tons of raspberries, corn, sour cherries, and other home-grown veggies. Mom kept us in vegetables during the summer, and sometimes surprised us with frozen raspberries in the deep of New England winter. My Dad, Richard, was the forager and often came home with mushrooms he gathered himself. He would sit at the dining room table with the mushroom guides, and I would wait for someone to keel over dead at the dinner table. Homemade bread was - and still is - a staple in our house, and both Mom and Dad have perfected their own baking styles. The smell of baking bread always makes me feel at home.

Mom at cooking school at the Cambridge School of Culinary Arts.

Now that she lives on Cape Cod and has a smaller garden, Mom spends more time exploring the locally available vegetable and fruit options. The Cape is home to tomato farms and strawberry fields, and the corn stands are always packed at the end of the summer. She has also joined the local Coonamessett Farm, where she can pick her own hydroponic lettuce (grown in water!), gather eggs from the chicken coop, and pick the fruits and vegetables in season. It has been so fun to get to know her local growers - though the winters are bleak. Of course the freshest fish catch is always available at the Falmouth Fish Market or from the Clam Man, and it’s guaranteed to be local year-round.

As an adult, I can see how this incredible focus on food and home has helped make me who I am. Andrew and I have that in common, and our lives continue to revolve around the kitchen.

To see the Coonamessett Farm, see my upcoming post or visit: http://www.coonamessettfarm.com/