INGREDIENTS:
1½ pounds button mushrooms, cleaned with a towel or paper towel, sliced 1/8th inch
1-2 cups Balsamic Vinaigrette
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This is a simple dish with big flavor. The mushrooms can be done days ahead, and I always seem to have some balsamic vinaigrette in the refrigerator. The mushrooms can be used for many other things besides the salad. Use as an antipasti with roasted beets and salumi, put in sandwiches, or heat up and use as a topping or garnish for grilled lamb, beef, or sausages. This dish can be made with regular arugula, but the “wild” arugula has more crunch and a nuttier flavor.
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Although the strawberries started late this year, the plants are healthy and the white flowers that are abundant in the field mean a steady supply of fruit for the foreseeable future. Last week we released another round of persimilis mites for what will probably be the last time. Persimilis feed on only one host, the two spotted spider mite—among the worst pests that organic strawberry growers face.
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A variation on a Quickle, this uses a hot brine to soften up the carrots a little. The pickled jalapenos and carrots found in many taquerias is part of the inspiration for these, as is the pickled vegetables found as antipasti in Italian restaurants. These can be part of a salad, tossed into sandwiches, or just eaten as is. A great addition to a lunch box if you want more vegetables in your diet but plain carrot sticks do not inspire.
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This is a combination that proves the old adage of the sum being greater than the parts. Although the combination may seem unlikely, it really tastes great. Cook the squash so it still has some crunch, and cook the collards so they no longer have a raw greens taste and texture, but not so much that they are really soft. The onions should be wilted, but try to not color them. You could forgo the breadcrumbs, but they soften up and form almost a sauce, and really help to amalgamate all the flavors. If you do not have pistachios, use almonds.
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This treatment of favas is especially good when you have more mature beans which can have a more assertive taste and are starchier. This recipe works fine with young favas, and the taste is really bright and makes a great sauce for fish like halibut or other firm white fish. Depending on how much you mash the beans and how much oil or stock you use, this recipe can be used as a topping or dip for crostini or as a sauce for fish or vegetables or pasta.
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When we began to farm our new land in 2000 (our Harkins Slough home and farm), we soon realized that our 40 horsepower wheel tractor wasn’t up to pulling the disc through our heavy soil or up our steep slopes.
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The inspiration for this is in the classic fruit sauces for game, and is me playing in the savory kitchen with things normally found in the sweet side. Use this sauce on duck, pork, chicken, buffalo, or even beef. It will work great for any game as well. This recipe is the more refined version where the sauce is pureed and strained, with notes for a simpler, quicker, more rustic/casual version in the Chef’s Notes at the end.
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While researching blueberry vinegar I realized that there are pretty much two schools of thought. One school always cooks the berries and then strains it soon after, and the vinegar is almost always sweetened. Then there are those who don’t mind waiting, and are kind of purists. These are the ones that just mix berries and vinegar and proceed to wait a few days. One recipe even did both! Either way, it is really easy to make your own blueberry vinegar.
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This dressing requires blueberry vinegar, which can be bought or is easy to make and has many uses. To make it yourself, just check the recipe on the site. Although this recipe says “creamy”, it’s not very. There is just enough to give it that texture, and whipping it keeps the dressing light. This dressing is good on salads, in a slaw, and could be used to top chicken or a pork chop.
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I really like salads with oak leaf lettuces. I love the shape of the leaves and enjoy the flavor/texture combination. This salad has lots of color to it, and the beets, carrots, and creamy blueberry dressing all have earthy notes as well as bright top notes to contrast and compliment each other. Although I usually dress the lettuces in my salads in a bowl before serving, I like the colors of the lettuces, so drizzle the dressing over the leaves once they are on the plate for this salad. If you prefer more dressing, just put the leaves into a bowl with some dressing and toss to coat, then plate the lettuces and top with the rest of the ingredients.
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Kohlrabi is unfamiliar to many people except as a very Seuss-ian looking vegetable at the store or Farmers Markets. The flavor ranges from very mild to a little sweet, with faint tones of turnip or daikon in the background. It crisp and sometimes almost succulent, and it can be chameleon-like in taking on the flavors of the surrounding seasonings. Here it acts as a foil to horseradish, with the crunch contrasting with the creamy dressing which plays up the inherent sweetness in the vegetable.
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Here, the zucchini is cut into thin strands resembling spaghetti. For this dish you will need a fixed blade slicer (a.k.a. mandolin) of some sort such as a Ben-Riner. Use the comb that gets you closest to spaghetti. If you have fava beans, sauté them up and add just before service. They become “sauce” to the “pasta” that is the squash.
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Favas and mint are a classic combination, and you will find the two in many recipes. Here is another. The prosciutto is optional, but provides a nice bit of savory saltiness that goes well. This role could be filled by shavings of Pecorino cheese or fricco*, which is a sort of cracker or tuile made of melted cheese. This is the sort of salad that could be served as a course on its own or could be used as an accompaniment to a main course item such as grilled salmon or chicken.
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This is pretty much the standard dipping sauce for the rice paper wrapped spring-rolls and sauce you pour on Bun (rice noodle dishes). Add a little neutral flavored oil to give it a more western texture and you have a very versatile dressing, useful for things like a kohlrabi salad or light coleslaw.
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I’m going to keep this short this week, because we’re going through our first renewal period with our new sign-up system and it’s been a busy few days!
If you are on the quarterly schedule and haven’t yet signed up for Session 2, you need to do it by noon today (for Wednesday deliveries) or noon tomorrow (for Thursday deliveries) or you won’t be on the list for this week. Go to Manage Your Account, log in with your e-mail address and password (have it send you a temporary password if you don’t know your password), then navigate to Add Share and choose “Session 2: Early Summer.”
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INGREDIENTS:
1 bunch of green onions, greens and whites separated, whites sliced ¼ inch, greens sliced 1/8th inch or finer
3 green garlic stalks, white only, split lengthwise, rinsed, and sliced finely
¼ cup cilantro stems, sliced finely and well washed
1 bunch chard, ribs and leaves separated, ribs washed and cut into
¼ inch bits, leaves stacked, rolled and cut ½ inch and washed
1 bunch of green onions, greens and whites separated, whites sliced ¼ inch, greens sliced 1/8th inch or finer
3 green garlic stalks, white only, split lengthwise, rinsed, and sliced finely
¼ cup cilantro stems, sliced finely and well washed
1 bunch chard, ribs and leaves separated, ribs washed and cut into
¼ inch bits, leaves stacked, rolled and cut ½ inch and washed
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All those bright green things in the box just look like Spring, don’t they? The “ground bean paste” in the recipe is a Chinese iteration of a dark miso that is finer than most standard miso pastes, and is more liquid, so it mixes into the dish more readily. Miso can be used as well, just thin it with some water until it is slightly pourable. The shrimp are an option of course, but they look pretty against all the greens, and the flavors go well together. To omit them simply start the recipe right after the shrimp get removed from the pan.
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When my rosemary plant flowers, I like to collect the flowers and infuse honey with them. I use this fragrant honey to glaze vegetables and pork, for lacquering poultry, and on yogurt. I love the floral notes this infusion gives up. See recipe below for making rosemary flower infused honey.
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This week we are mowing down and incorporating the last few blocks of over-wintered cover crop that we still have standing. I’m always a little ambivalent about this because it officially marks the transition from the lush, green, and more quiet time of winter and early spring to the dry, dusty, and bustling time of late spring and summer. Most of these late blocks will be planted to winter squash and pumpkins.
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We enjoyed meeting some of you at our spring farm tour last Saturday. It was a beautiful day for walking around the farm and seeing what’s growing. Here in this picture, Steve is showing off one of our new hoophouses. He talked about the mechanics of using the hoophouses to extend the season and improve the growing conditions for heat-loving crops like tomatoes, peppers, and eggplants. We could see the stark difference in the size of the plants that were growing right outside the hoophouse compared to those on the inside.
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Although this recipe calls for fresh red bell peppers, feel free to substitute the ones that come on a jar. They keep it simple, and allow you to enjoy this wonderful sauce now. You can use whole canned tomatoes, although I have gone ahead and made the recipe without tomatoes. Instead I put in a dollop of tomato paste and added more oil. It tastes different, but still excellent.
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This is a traditional Catalonian dish made with an onion similar to spring onions. There are festivals dedicated to eating calçots, and these are called a calçotada. The usual accompaniment to calçots is a romesco sauce, made with red peppers and tomatoes. Although these are not in season, I have made a perfectly fine version of this with jarred peppers and canned tomatoes, and so I will include the recipe.
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This is something that was inspired by a bag of frozen black-eyed peas I bought on an impulse one time. I have since made it using dried beans and canned beans as well. I have varied it using various beans and different pork products, changing the seasonings as well. I have even substituted mushrooms for the meat. This version goes great with cornbread. Pass the Tabasco, please.
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This dish is based on something from, I think, a Pierre Franey book a roomie had 30 or more years ago. I am not a huge fan of mayo on sandwiches, but I do love to use it as part of other things like dressing or this lovely golden glaze for fish. Really, there is only a little mayo per person, so it is not such a bad thing, and it glazes beautifully under the broiler. This dish can be prepped and cooked in the amount of time it takes to cook a pot of rice, and is a great way to show off the unique flavor of dill.
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Not quite a stir-fry, this is a dish where a small amount of liquid is introduced to steam the vegetables and form a bit of sauce. In traditional Chinese cooking this is viewed as a braise. This sort of braising is used on vegetables with a more delicate texture or flavor. For this dish you will need a 10 inch pan or wok that has a tight fitting lid.
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