Fermentation Success

We've been getting a farm share all year from a different farm, and while there hasn't been the overabundance of produce as was the case with the previous farm, we do sometimes get a lot of things that we just can't eat in time. I had a bunch of napa cabbage and some watermelon radishes so I decided to try to make kimchi again. 

Previous attempts at kimchi were very watery. Somehow, this one wasn't. It was perfect, in fact. In 3 days after the fermentation started the taste was just right. I gave some to my friend, as I had about 3 quarts of it. Another quart went to this lovely dish:

Salmon with fried kimchi

This was from the New York Times Cooking app - Salmon cooked on a bed of fried kimchi.

Now, what to do with all the kale?

Farm Share Mixed Radish Pickle

The farm share always has radishes and Hakurei turnips the first few weeks and, since I'm the only one who likes radishes, even with just half the share they build up. (Note to self, they are not great on pizza.) But last week also had small Daikon radishes so I thought to mix all 3 into a quick radish pickle using rice wine vinegar and ginger. This is a recipe in Preserving by the Pint which I've made before, just not with all kinds of radish/turnip at once. They made exactly 1 pint, good for sandwiches and salads.

Another thing I had in abundance was fava beans so following another recipe in Preserving by the Pint, I made a fava-parsley-walnut pesto, using foraged black walnuts instead of regular ones. This made over 2 cups of pesto; I froze one cup, and baked chicken breasts coated with some of the rest. All of us ate it, some of us liked it. The rest were just very polite. 

Farm Season

The farm share started up last week and since it's been a cooler and rainy spring it's off to a slow start. Not that I mind. Last year was so hot and dry I'm grateful for all the rain. We were all worried when it was so hot this past February!

This year I'm splitting the share with a friend. It'll be good for both of us, I think. A full share can be so much food! So I'll likely do a little less canning from my share but it'll be less overwhelming.

Yesterday's share contained radishes, Hakurei turnips, spinach, arugula, herbs, snap peas, komatsuna greens, mustard greens and kale. My half of the share, except for the greens I'm giving to Mocha, basically made one terrific salad. I was able to snag a few ripe strawberries from my front garden, the ones the chipmunks hadn't found, and add those as well. Strawberry season should start in earnest next week!

Busted!

The other day, my husband informed me that the 10 year old had discovered my bread cookbook and came to the realization that I had a recipe for cinnamon rolls and had yet to make any. This was, as you can imagine, quite upsetting. Why had I been holding out, the 10 year old wanted to know. I promised that we would find a time to make them together. We made a date for today, after school.

While school was in, however, I had about 3 or 4 projects of my own to take care of. I started with making 14 pints of chicken stock, using all the chicken bones I found in the freezer (three chickens). I will can this tomorrow, right now the stock is being chilled so I can remove the fat. I also made a batch of pickled radishes, using the recipe in my book "Preserving by the Pint." Instead of using Daikon radishes, I used regular red ones as I was fairly inundated and I'm the only one, really, who eats them. When I went outside to take the picture of the radish pickles, there was an oriole in my garden!

One of the nurses at work had asked when I was going to bring in more treats so I made brownies - the kind with the chocolate chip cookie dough, oreos, dulce du leche, and brownie batter all layered in a pan. When they came out of the oven, I drizzled them with the last of the dulce du leche and sprinkled them with coarse finishing salt.  Also, I started marinating steak and venison in soy, garlic, ginger and sherry for this evening's stir fry.

Then I went to check on the bees. They were busily bringing in pollen and those younger bees were washboarding again. I have decided that, whatever washboarding is for, it is the scut of the bee world and the most junior are the ones who have to do it. Like interns. Eventually they will graduate to some other task. Anyway, I took a video of them while they were doing their little washboarding dance.

Speaking of bee dances, I peeked through the window and happened to catch a bee doing the "wiggle dance" they do to tell other bees of a good source of food. It was pretty cool to watch - she was on the edge of a comb and shaking so much she was blurry. Then she moved to a different spot and did it again. Sure enough, shortly after, there was a larger number of bees leaving the hive than previously. How cool!
After the 10 year old got home from school, we made the cinnamon rolls. I am pleased to say my kid did most of the work. Kneading was almost as much fun as sprinkling sugar and cinnamon (mostly) on the dough. Once those were done, my 13 year old made the stir fry for dinner. First the beef and venison was fried, then taken out of the wok so the Napa cabbage, scallions, and komatsuna greens could be sauteed. They were also removed, and the rice noodles were fried in the wok with a sauce of soy sauce, chicken stock, cornstarch, 5-spice powder and white pepper. They only needed to be cooked a few minutes and then everything else got added back to get coated in sauce. Dinner was really tasty - the venison was more tender than the beef, which was a nice surprise.

For dessert, we ate those cinnamon rolls!

Welcome Back, Farm

The farm share distribution started today - a little late due to the late start to Spring. It's so nice to be back out there! Given that it was the first week, the amount of food was more than expected: Napa cabbage, broccoli, a bunch each of radishes and Hakurei turnips, 12 garlic scapes, a pound of komatsuna greens, and 2 pints of strawberries.

For dinner we had a big salad with some of the radishes, turnips and strawberries, as well as goat cheese. I made another champagne vinaigrette for the dressing, this time I added a little fresh parsley and some cayenne pepper for a little extra kick. Tomorrow I plan to have a stir fry with the cabbage and the komatsuna greens and some beef and a little venison - I have random individual servings of various meats in the freezer that should be eaten and I've been looking for ways to use them. This seems like a good plan.

Also tomorrow I might pickle some of the red radishes!

First Farm Share of the Year

Ever since I started getting a farm share I've eagerly awaited the first day of the season.  That was today.  Usually we just get a little bit, enough for one meal.  Not today!

I came away with:  1/2 pound of mustard greens (and a plan to pickle them, maybe tomorrow), a bunch of arugula, a pound of spinach, a bunch of radishes, a bunch of Hakurei turnips, a bunch of swiss chard, a head of Napa cabbage, 40 (yes, 40. Forty. Four-oh.) garlic scapes, a pint of strawberries, and a pint each of snow and shell peas.  That is a lot of food.  Mostly greens.  I'm hoping Mocha will help make a dent but he hasn't seemed so interested in the radish and turnip greens so far.

Adding to the greens:  last night our mason came to our door with a HUGE grocery bag crammed full with lettuce.  I hope we can get through it before it goes bad!

Tonight's dinner, therefore, featured a large salad.

Lettuce, arugula, spinach, turnips, radishes, strawberries, peas, tomatoes and goat cheese.  With a little balsamic vinegar.  Yum.

The Farm is Back!

Gotta love spring! Last week the farm opened and Steph got the first share. This week was my turn, and I picked up: 1 large bok choi, 1 bowl of arugula, 6 Hakurei turnips, 4 radishes, 6 garlic scapes, 1 and a half pounds of spinach, 1 quart of strawberries, 1 pint of snow peas, and a bunch of cilantro.

One and a half pounds of spinach is a LOT of spinach.

Tonight we're having a spinach-arugula-strawberry salad, lobster, corn on the cob, and the rest of the strawberry-rhubarb pie. Love, love, LOVE the farm!

Farm Share Dinner Tonight!

Today's farm share, the first one my sister-in-law and I have needed to split, consisted of: 2 heads of lettuce, 1 large bowl of tat soi, 1 head of garlic, 4 basil plants, 12 carrots, 6 really small zucchini/summer squash, 2 cucumbers, 30 fava bean pods, 1 pint each of snow peas and shell peas, 5 stems of cosmos, and herbs. I didn't pick up the herbs. So here's what I'm doing with my half:

I marinated the fava beans using this recipe and will likely eat them tomorrow. Except that instead of shallots and chives, I used garlic scapes.

Tonight's dinner is chicken nuggets, biscuits, and salad (red lettuce, cuke, shell peas, radishes from my garden, maybe some goat cheese) with an "only Mom will eat" stir fry of the squashes with garlic scapes, some carrots, and the tat soi. Right now the kids are munching on carrots and cucumber slices.

I combined the snow peas with the leftover half-pint from 2 weeks ago and will find something to do with them in the next few days.

While I was dropping of the share at my brother's house, we went outside to check out their wild blackberry and concord grape vines. The blackberries are just forming, nowhere near ripe yet, but there have to be about a thousand on the big bush. I have never seen so many in one place! And the grapes should be enough to make them some grape jelly (we haven't even made a dent in last year's batch, so I won't make more for us). This is so exciting! More gleaning! More canning!

Farm Share Cooking

Just wanted to log in what I've done with last week's farm share. On Monday night we had friends over for dinner and I wanted to use my fresh veggies. We had a big salad, which boasted lettuce from the farm and radishes from my garden (whee!), swiss chard with a lemon and olive oil dressing (from the cookbook Vegetables Every Day by Jack Bishop), and quinoa with garlic scapes and spinach tossed in. For the latter, I cooked the scapes then toasted the quinoa (black and white) at the same time, then cooked in chicken broth. When it was done, I tossed in shredded spinach leaves and let them wilt. It was that easy. A little lemon juice on top finished it nicely. All of this went very well with the grilled salmon.

All I have left is snow peas and some garlic scapes. I will likely use them tomorrow for something. My sister in law gets the share this week, and then we start splitting. Oh, and my tomato plants, even the sad ones that aren't growing well, have tomatoes on them!

Bounty in June

Another week, another farm share. More new things for us to try! This week the haul was even bigger; here's our half: 2 pattipan squashes, 1 head of lettuce, 1 large bowl of mixed greens (mustard, spinach, arugula, and mizuna), 5 scallions, 2 large radishes and a small hakurei turnip, 10 baby carrots, 5 garlic scapes, 1 joy choi, 1 bok choi, and 2 tat sois, 1 pint strawberries and 1 cup of snow peas. Wow. And it's just going to be more and more each week!

Add to that the mulberries picked from the tree around the corner (at least 1 pint! what a tree!) and we have the makings for some great salads, stir fries, and snacks. Tonight it's a salad, and I have to run to the store to get some goat cheese and some hamburgers.

Look at all this wonderful stuff (and this is only a little bit of it all)!

More From the Farm

This week the farm share consisted of lettuce, spinach, bok choi, scallions, radishes, snow peas, strawberries, and some Hakurei turnips which are edible raw. Mmm. I went up to my roof deck and harvested a few radishes of my own (red and white), some more spinach, and a few of my shelling peas (well, all that were ready) and made a salad with the shelled peas, lettuce, a little spinach, radishes and one of the turnips. I fried the spinach with a little garlic in olive oil. The strawberries were devoured for dessert. Tomorrow night I'll make a stir fry with the bok choi, scallions and snow peas. We are liking this farm share thing!