Seasonal Produce

Our friend John pointed out this fun seasonal produce map on epicurious.com (a site I love to use to find recipes). For our region they tell us:

"The growing season is currently dormant here; opt for items from storage, such as apples, pears, and root vegetables."

Ha, no kidding!

Veggie Stock

We are overrun with parsnips. What to do with all these parsnips? And that pesky turnip I can't stand? Well, my solution is to make and freeze vegetable stock. This is the simplest of tasks and uses some of those root vegetables that get out of control at this time of year.

Step 1: Wash veggies - in this case, I have used one carrot, one parsnip, a turnip, and an onion. Cut these into large pieces and cook in about 1 tsp. of olive oil, just until the sides are brown. I have found this gives the vegetable stock more flavor.

Step 2: Fill the pot with water, add a bit of salt, some black peppercorns (or ground pepper), and a couple of bay leaves. Bring to a boil and simmer until the stock turns a rich brown color.

Step 3: Strain and cool, then freeze! I put the stock in yogurt containers, which are about 4 cups each. This is perfect for thinning soup, steaming veggies, making rice, etc., especially when my vegetarian friends come for dinner.

Why we do this...

The other night I was getting an almost-midnight snack, looked down at my plate, and realized THIS is why we embarked on this food adventure! This little snack, made of fresh Iggy's bread, Kate's butter, and homemade plum jam, is composed entirely of local ingredients. It is the perfect tartine (French for bread-and-butter) and made my mouth water. The bread is flavorful and the perfect texture, with a hearty crust and a chewy, moist interior. The butter tastes fresh and creamy, and our homemade jam tastes like the plums off the tree...and the combination is magnifique!

Oh la la!

Apple Sauce a la Grandmere

When I was a little girl and visited my elegant grandparents in New Hampshire, I could always count on a small dish of sweet, pink applesauce after lunch. Grandmother made this applesauce herself using a wonderful contraption: a food strainer! This year, as a Christmas gift, my dad gave me a food strainer, which I put to use on the apples I have been storing. While making applesauce is hardly a difficult task, this device streamlines the process and almost eliminates waste...and, for me, brings back lovely memories of the sounds and smells of making applesauce.

This strainer is composed of several parts: a large, plastic funnel, a handle, a grinder, and a chute. To make applesauce, wash and quarter the whole apples, boil them until soft (with cinnamon and nutmeg, if desired) and then grind them in the food strainer. The core, skin, and seeds are pushed out of the end of the grinder, while the smooth pulp comes through the strainer, down the chute, and in to the collecting bowl. The applesauce is sweet and delicious.

California salad...in Massachusetts!

One summer afternoon, when we lived in lovely Berkeley, Andrew and I enjoyed a goat cheese salad, based on a recipe my Mom has made many times before. But, this time, it was different: all the ingredients came from near Berkeley, including lemon zest from our own tree, Sonoma goat cheese, farmer's market asparagus, and an icy glass of Husch white wine. We dubbed this "California Salad" and imagined, with some sadness, that it would be a distant memory when we moved away.

However, tonight Susan and I recreated this salad. While the setting was different and there's snow on the ground, this salad took us to California! We used greens provided by Enterprise Farm, green beans I froze from a previous produce delivery, Vermont goat cheese, and Flying Pig Bread (from Maine, available in the store across the street!). Thanks to Geri's Christmas generosity, we have a new supply of California lemons, which we zested on top of the salad, giving it a fresh, incredible flavor.

"California Salad" - serves 2

4 oz. goat cheese, formed into rounds

Dredge these in flour, then yogurt/egg/or mayo, then bread crumbs

Saute the first side in olive oil on high heat, then turn down the heat and brown the other side slowly.

Place these rounds on a bed of lettuce with vinaigrette dressing, or on a salad of cold cooked green beans or asparagus with vinaigrette. Serve with croutons or fresh bread - we prefer French or sour dough bread brushed with olive oil and toasted in the oven.

Garnish with fresh lemon zest - preferably Meyer lemons from California! And, definitely enjoy this with a glass of cold sauvignon blanc.

Thanksgiving

Our friend Alison of Ithaca's Food Web asked us to post our Thanksgiving menu - but since we weren't home, it didn't seem that relevant. I do dream of doing a local Thanksgiving meal, but am not ready to give up being pampered by relatives who really know how to whip up the traditional fare. I have become a pie baker for our yearly festivities, though, and discovered I took some photos of my apple pie. I love pie more than any other dessert - we even had pie at our wedding, rather than the traditional wedding cake. I love the crisp, flakey, buttery crust above all else, and the filling is really secondary to me. This year I used flour milled in Vermont, Massachusetts apples, and Maine butter to make this lovely holiday pie! It was a hit and had the crisp, flakey, buttery crust I crave.

Enterprise Farm Winter Share

Who could resist?

We are delighted to be returning members of Enterprise Farm's winter share. This farm, in South Deerfield, Massachusetts, distributes produce to many members in Massachusetts throughout the winter months, when our own stores have grown thin. This year, they are proud to be distributing about 50% New England produce in these shares, with the rest coming from small, organic farms from New York to Florida. We are amazed to see how they have grown during the past year and encourage our fellow Mass residents to join! At first, we wondered how "local" this was, but after seeing the grocery store food from Mexico, California, and Chile that's available to us in the winter, we decided this was a fantastic option.

Our first distribution was joyous, since we had about a month between our last Waltham Fields pick-up and the Enterprise Farm box. It was tough to go back to the grocery store after eating farm-fresh veggies all summer. When the box arrives and we pick it up at The Dairy Bar in Davis Square, it's like opening treasure to see what we will find! The share is accompanied by an e-letter containing farm news and recipes. It's pretty amazing to think of the network of small farmers whose land provides us with our veggies each week.

Susan can't contain her glee!

Hopefully Enterprise Farm will be among those who present their CSAs at the Somerville Library on January 11. This is a meeting organized by Somerville Climate Action and Transition Somerville, and is for anyone interested in joining CSAs that deliver in Somerville! Info: Community Supported Agriculture Fair & Film: The Power of Community, Monday, January 11th, 5:30pm to 9:00pm, Somerville Public Library, 79 Highland Avenue, Somerville.

New England Cranberries

This fall we bought 5 pounds of fresh Cape Cod Cranberries, thanks to Boston Localvores, who advertised the sale on their website. Susan shared these with us, and they came from Cranberry Hill Farm in Plymouth, MA, where they are grown organically. Cranberry bogs are beautiful in the fall when they turn red before harvesting, and are a unique site on our Cape Cod landscape. These berries arrived in coolers at Boston Localvores' home, where we picked up our bags of the beautiful red jewels!

As a Christmas surprise, I took a small bag of these New England berries to California in my suitcase for Andrew's mom Geri. Geri, a splendid local eater (she has her own flock of sheep!), made us spectacular cranberry muffins using dried apricots, just enough sugar, oats, and rice flour. Mmmmm.


We are seeking good cranberry recipes - both sweet and savory - for our bounty. I call upon the bakers in my life (and you know who you are!) to send me tasty recipes!