Archives for category: In the Kitchen
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Ohio Bounty

By Joe
August 7, 2010 //
0

Last week, I ordered 25 pounds of Ohio peaches from the awesome, local Wayward Seed Farm – for only $1 a pound! I’m not quite sure why, but I didn’t realize how many peaches are in 25 pounds. These peaches are completely awesome – most store bought peaches are mealy and don’t have an aroma at all. These yield slightly to the touch  (perfectly ripe TODAY!) and have a beautiful perfume about them.

This is just half of them...

We picked them up at the North Market Farmers Market this morning, and Janna spotted some nice looking blackberries as well. In for a penny, in for a pound, we also picked up a 12-pint flat of blackberries for $25 from Rhoades Farm. Not too shabby, considering the tasteless blackberries at Whole Foods are selling for $2 a half-pint.

These blackberries are so good Janna couldn't wait until I took a photo.

So today is canning day. And probably freezing day as well. It’s harder than you think to use 25 pounds of peaches. Updates to follow soon.

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Categories In the Kitchen

Blueberry-Bay Leaf Infused Vodka

By Joe
August 2, 2010 //
0
My second attempt at an infusion was inspired by a recipe from the Hungry Southerner, which I found on Punk Domestics. If you haven’t seen this site yet, it’s great! It can be hard to find good, unique recipes for preserves that give you enough information to be able to take your own liberties. But Punk Domestics is full of them, from people with great blogs from all over.
This time, I’m trying and blueberry infusion. I cut the recipe in half, and my only addition a large Turkish bay leaf. Because blueberries and bay are both members of the laurel family, I thought there might be an interesting interplay of flavors – sweet/sour and resinous. I taste tested as I went along, and I removed the bay leaf after two days.  I decanted the mixture after two weeks through a sieve and a two coffee filters, and the result is a highly flavored, just barely sweet mixer.

Blueberry/Bay infused vodkaThe finished product! Great with some tonic and a twist of lime.

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Categories In the Kitchen

Strawberry Balsamic Conserve

By Joe
July 29, 2010 //
0
Janna’s favorite jam is strawberry, so of course, I made a batch. But I’ve done the plain strawberry jam before, and while it comes out nice, it’s a little too sweet and one-note for my taste. I adapted a recipe from the inspiring Well Preserved by Eugenia Bone.

I used a few strawberries from the back yard, but most were store bought.

This jam is surprisingly simple:

Strawberry Balsamic Conserve
1 1/2 pounds strawberries, hulled
5 cups sugar
5 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar – use the good stuff here
1 package of pectin (this isn’t part of the book’s recipe, but I wanted a firmer set.)

Most of the strawberries I used were fairly large, so I halved or quartered them – still leaving fairly large pieces. If you happen to have those tiny, sweet Alpine strawberries, this would be a perfect use for those you can’t eat right away.

Cook the strawberries over medium heat until they boil. You don’t want to mash them – you’re looking for nice large pieces of fruit in the final product. Then add the sugar, and stir until the sugar dissolves. Cook on medium low for 10 minutes (the book’s recipe calls for 40, but it leaves out pectin, so the extra cooking time is for thickening.) Add in the pectin and balsamic vinegar, bring back to a boil and cook for one minute.  

Ladle into sterile jars, leaving 1/2 inch of head room. Seal with sterile lids and rings, and process in boiling water for 10  minutes. The set on this conserve takes about two days – at first, it’s very runny inside the jars, but it firms up to a medium set.

Really delicious! The recipe yielded five half pints of conserve.

Strawberry Balsamic Jam.

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Categories In the Kitchen

Cherry/Clove Infused Vodka, with Cracked Pits

By Joe
July 26, 2010 //
2
With the abundance of beautiful local fruit and long hours at work presenting the need for a stiff drink in the evening, I decided to take my first stab at a vodka infusion. I know you can buy flavored vodkas at any old grocery store these days, but I thought I’d try my hand at a unique flavor made with fruit at the peak of its perfection.
For my first try, I chose cherries. I pitted 1/2 cup of sweet Bing cherries. No special tools are needed, just un-bend a large paper clip and scoop the pits out. I reserved the pits, and cracked them with a mallet (inside a towel of course – well, after that first one exploded across the room…) and added them to the cherries. The cracked pits impart a bitter almond flavor that I’ve been really craving lately. Of course, that bitter taste is a cyanide-precursor, but with just eight or so tiny pits, I think I’ll risk it. Last, I dropped in a half-tablespoon of sugar and four cloves. You don’t want to go overboard with spices -m the vodka is really good at extracting all the flavorful oils out of them.

Vodka, infusing with cherries, cracked cherry pits and cloves

I poured vodka over the cherry mixture to cover, inside a tightly sealed jar (about two cups total.) I used Svedka because it’s inexpensive (about $12 for a 750 ml bottle,) really smooth and has no flavor of its own. After two days, I removed the cloves, and the cherries’ color had already been leached out. Every other day, I stir the infusion, and in two weeks to a month, it will be ready to drink. After it’s ready, I’ll strain the mixture through a sieve and cheesecloth, and add it to cocktails – I think this would be great with limeade or even some light ginger ale. After a week, the infusion is a beautiful, uniform red in color.

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Categories In the Kitchen

Rummy Rainier Cherries

By Joe
July 21, 2010 //
0
When cherries are in season, life is good. And when Rainier cherries are in season, it’s even better. And when you find them for $1.99 a pound? Some produce manager must have made a mistake. When I saw big bags of flawless Rainier cherries, I bought a whole lot – so many that we could never eat them before they went bad. Rainier cherries are really perishable – they bruise easily, and have yellow flesh.
My cherry tree is doing really well – it’s twice the height it was when I planted it – but it won’t be producing cherries for several years.

Rainier cherries are sweeter than Bing cherries and much more delicate.

 This recipe is really easy. The quantity of cherries doesn’t matter, as long as you have enough syrup to cover them in the jar.

Rummy Rainier Cherries
A pound or so – of Rainier cherries, pits reserved. (You can use Bing or even sour cherries)
Half strength simple syrup (For every cup of sugar, add two cups of water)
Dark rum (one tablespoon for each half-pint jar you end up filling)

Pit the cherries – I used an unbent paperclip – just push it into the stem end and scoop around the pit to pull it out. Do this over the pot you’ll be cooking in, and just drop the pits into the pot along with the cherries. The pits will give the cherries a slight amaretto flavor. Add in the sugar and water, and bring to a boil for five minutes. Remove the pits, and scoop the cherries into sterilized jars. Add one tablespoon of dark rum directly to each half-pint jar, then ladle in enough syrup to cover the cherries, leaving 1/2 inch of headroom. Seal the jars with sterilized lids and rings, then process in boiling water for 10 minutes.

We picked up these bottles of Cruzan rum in St. Croix last fall. I used the dark rum in these cherries.

Rummy Rainier Cherries

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Categories In the Kitchen

Apricot-Noyaux-Bourbon Jam

By Joe
July 19, 2010 //
4

Another day, another jam! Well, techincally, I made all of the preserves and infusions you’ll see here over the next few weeks in two days last weekend. Preserving doesn’t really take all the time you think it might, and once you’ve prepped for one batch, it’s not a lot of trouble to make up a second batch. In all, I ended up with something like five pint jars, 10 half-pint jars and 5 half-cup jars of preserves, and about a liter of fruit infused vodka. Definitely more than Janna I can eat in a year, but they were a lot of fun to make, and will be fun to give away, as well.

Because I’ve already made a batch of peach jam, I thought my next batch should be apricot. My apricot tree is doing pretty well – it had a bit of heat/water stress earlier, but it recovering nicely with the added attention I’m giving it. I won’t have fruit from it for another two years, and even then, probably not enough to preserve for about five. And apricot season in Central Ohio has already come and gone. But I ended up finding some very nice, barely underripe apricots at the grocery store two blocks away. I also found a few really beautiful black apricots, which are a fuzzy skinned cross between plums and apricots. The flavor is incredible!

Black Apricots.

For this batch, I used this recipe from Hedonia. I replaced half of the apricots called for with black apricots, and didn’t add cardamom. While I love cardamom, it can be overpowering, and some people just don’t like the flavor. I also used a box of pectin , and I pulled out the lemons before I poured the jam into the jars.

I was intrigued by the recipe because of its use of noyaux, which are the seeds inside the pits of stone fruit, like apricots. I enjoyed the strong, bitter almond flavor when cracking my neighborhood apricots pits for germination a while back. But the noyaux of the store bought apricots were completely bland and tasteless. The pits of the black apricots were tiny, like plum pits, and not worth cracking. I raided my apricot seeds in the fridge and added any that were cracked or looked like I handled them too roughly. I still have about eight apricots seeds left chilling.

Bourbon = good. Fruit = good. Bourbon + Fruit = Good Jam.

I’ve never tried a jam with alcohol in it, but this worked really well, flavor-wise. Fruit and bourbon go really well together, and the alcohol helps bring out the flavorful oils in the spices. Even if you’re a teetotaler, I’d recommend trying at least one jam using alcohol – this batch used 1/4 cup of bourbon (I used Woodford Reserve) and yielded 6 1/2 cups of jam. When it’s added at the end, most (but not all) of it boiled off within seconds.

The result was a soft-set jam that has a perceptible bourbon flavor, with the freshness of the apricots coming through. It’s a little less firm that I would have liked, but still great drizzled on blue cheese. I’ll also save some jars to use as the apricot fillings of Christmas cookies.

Apricot-Noyaux-Bourbon Jam.

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Categories In the Kitchen

Blueberry-Lavender Jam

By Joe
July 18, 2010 //
6

When I saw beautiful, local (and affordable!) blueberries at the Farmers Market, I knew I’d have to make some blueberry jam. My first thoughts for accompaniment went toward red wine – a nice Grand River Valley Pinot Noir would have been great. But without a car for the weekend, I wasn’t able to run to a wine shop to buy some.

Instead, I looked closer – to the back yard – for some inspiration, and found that our lavender had sent up some fresh, soft shoots. Lavender is one of those flavors many people don’t equate with food. It’s not just for potpourri in your great-aunt’s sock drawer - you can cook with it the way you cook with other herbs, and it has a great affinity for berries. When cooking jam, you have to use a lot of lavender for its flavor to make an appearance alongside those tart berries and sweet sugar.

Blueberries and Lavender are a classic combination.

Most of the jams I’ve made lately have had a soft set. This is great for drizzling on top of yogurt with some hazelnuts or walnuts (my breakfast lately) or adding to a cheese plate. But I decided to aim for a firm set with this jam – to eat on a cream cheese and jam sandwich without it all spilling out the sides. I used the standard recipe that came with the SureJell pectin, but modified it in a couple of ways. The box will tell you to stick firmly to the measurements it lists, but jam is more of an art than a science. As long as you have enough sugar and acid to preserve your fruit, the other proportions are up to you.

Blueberry Lavender Jam: (makes seven cups)
3 pints of blueberries, washed and shaken dry
1/2 cup lavender young lavender branches, bruised and packed firm
2Two boxes of SureJell pectin (double the amount called for in the standard recipe)
Juice of 1 large or 1 1/2 small lemons
1 tsp. sea salt
4 cups of sugar

Crush the blueberries in a large pot with a potato masher. It’s easiest to mash one pint before you add the next. Add the lavender. I used large shoots that were easy to fish out later – but if you have smaller pieces, or even dried food-grade lavender, it might be easiest to tie them in a cheesecloth pouch. Meanwhile, sterilize your jars in a bath of boiling water. Stir the mixture continuously over high heat until it comes to a full boil, then cook for one more minute. 

Add the pectin, lemon juice and salt, and incorporate it well. Add the sugar and stir until you no longer see crystals. Turn heat down to medium, and bring back to a full boil for one more minute. This extra time gives the lavender more time to infuse into the jam.

The jam should be starting to thicken at this point. Fill dry, sterilized jars with the jam using a canning funnel (invest in one if you don’t have one already – it saves so much from being wasted, and on cleanup and jam burns, too.) Put on sterilized lids and bands, tighten well, then process in boiling water that comes at least an inch over the top of the tallest jar for 10 minutes.

The completed Blueberry-Lavender Jam

The end result is a beautiful, firm, blue-black jam that’s not too sweet. The addition of salt and extra acid from the lemon juice cut down the sticky-sweetness of most jams. This blueberry-lavender jam would be equally at home in sweet preparations and savory ones. In fact, it would be an excellent glaze for grilled chicken thighs or pork tenderloin. I’m glad there’s a lot of it! And even though there is, I might go back to that blueberry pinot jam idea if I can get my hands on a nice local bottle.

Of course, it's good on toast, too.

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Categories In the Kitchen

It’s a St. Swithin’s Day Miracle! (Or how we rescued our tomato plants.)

By Joe
July 15, 2010 //
0
The tomato plants are almost back to normal!

 Our tomato plants are recovering! Last week, we put a few bags more soil on top of the tomato’s roots, and removed the dead and dying branches of leaves. Since then, they’ve been perking up really well! All but one plant looks relatively healthy, and even the worst off plant looks much better than before.

The first tomatoes!

Yesterday, we were delighted to find the first two tomatoes ripening! These are black Brandywine, and they have green shoulders. They’re low on the plant, so it’s no wonder we missed them this long.

Today's harvest: a black Brandywine tomato, an Ichiban eggplant, some kale, purslane, a jalapeno and some oregano.

 It’s getting to be peak season in the garden, and every day supplies almost a whole meal’s worth of vegetables. Today, I picked a small handful of purslane, some oregano, a ripened jalapeno, some kale, an eggplant, and the first tomato of the year! I had some ground lamb and some taco shells, so tacos seemed like a great idea. 

Spicy lamb tacos with the first garden tomato of the summer.

Lately, I’ve been cooking much less meat. I just don’t have an apetite for it when it’s so hot. When I do cook it, it’s more as a flavoring than the main attraction. These tacos started with a layer of blanched kale, some onion slices marinated in lemon juice, the 1/4 pound lamb browned with onions, garlic, jalapeno, chili powder, cumin and salt, some purslane leaves, chopped tomato, cheddar cheese, and Greek yogurt. That first tomato was so flavorful and delicious!

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Categories In the Ground, In the Kitchen

Verjuice and Stuffed Grape Leaves from Dad’s Yard

By Joe
July 13, 2010 //
1
While I was at my dad’s this weekend, I did a little foraging before I left on Sunday. I scoped out some sassafrass seedlings I might try to transplant into my sideyard later this fall (or dig the roots of for some homemade rootbeer…) But most obvious right now were the grape vines bordering between the grass and the woods. Before my parents built the house, my dad’s land was almost all vineyard, in Northeast Ohios’ Grand River Valley. Over the decades, a lot of those grape vines have gone feral, and still are producing pretty good tasting grapes on their own. The vines are probably a re-wilded Concord-type.
Of course, right now, the fruit isn’t anywhere near ripe, but there’s still a lot you can do with the plant. If you’ve never made stuffed grape leaves with fresh leaves – you’re really missing out! The brined, canned leaves are pretty foul and delicate things – but fresh ones make a big difference!

Fresh grape leaves, from my dad's backyard.

 Janna is a big fan of stuffed grape leaves, and the recipe I used was pretty close to the savory/sweet dolmades she loves from Columbus’ Cafe Shish Kebab. The only changes from the recipe were that I used almonds rather than pine nuts, and I added lemon juice-marinated onions on top while baking. 

The finished stuffed grape leaves (which turned out fantastic!)

 Next, even though the grapes weren’t close to ripe yet, they were getting to be close to full sized. On some vines, therer were so many clusters of grapes that, had this been a vineyard, some would have been thinned out. So, with that in mind, I picked some bunches, and thought I’d take a stab at verjuice, which how people would have gotten use out of unripe grapes. Verjuice is just the juice of unripe grapes – and it was commonly used in the olden days as a substitute for lemon juice, in climates where lemons couldn’t grow. It has a sour flavor that’s less intense and a little more floral than vinegar. 

About a pound and a half of wild grapes.

 Making verjuice couldn’t be easier. I stemmed the grapes, threw them in a blender, and pushed the pulp through a sieve. I tried to filter it through coffee filters, but it took forever to percolate through – so I just poured half into a Mason jar to use from the fridge, and the other half went into the freezer in smaller containers. I’m not sure exactly how I’ll use it, but I’ve read it’s nice in salad dressings. I’d imagine it would be nice in a seafood marinade too.

The finished verjuice - kind of an upapetizing shade of green, but it has an appealing sweet/sour/bitter flavor.

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Categories In the Kitchen, On the Road

A Bounty of Kale

By Joe
July 9, 2010 //
0

Of all the crops in the garden, I think the most abundant right now is the kale. Back in February, I tried starting a few seeds at the time I started the tomatoes and peppers. That was a pretty big failure: I ended up with thin, leggy seedlings that amounted to nothing. I April, I direct sowed a four-foot row of kale, and wow, has it ever grown up!

A healthy row of curly kale!

 Kale would make a pretty perfect crop for folks with even the most limited outdoor space. The plants don’t mind being crowded close together (I thinned them only to an inch apart,) and with just a 14-inch pot on a patio, with even just partial sunlight, you’ll harvest about eight meals worth of kale in a growing season.

The plants are also beautiful and can add subtle color in an ornamental bed in the same way hostas do. My variety, Blue Curled Scotch Kale, has (naturally) a blue-green tinge. Black kale (also called dino kale or lacinato) has a deep, dark green tint, and there are purple and even reddish varieties as well. They’ll last well past the first frost, and the flavor of the leaves even improves as fall turns into winter. My favorite seed company, Baker Creek, has a good selection – it’s not too late to enjoy kale this year!

So lush!

With such a great amount of kale to use, I’ve been able to get three meals out of this row already. I even gave away a healthy bundle. I love kale – I’ll probably plant another row later this month to take us through the fall and early winter, when I’ll hopefully have some great root vegetables and potatoes to make soup with. I’d also like to try this marinated kale salad from Hounds in the Kitchen. During these 90+ degree days of summer, though, we’ve been eating it raw quite a bit, and I’m always a fan of baked kale chips:

Spread washed and dried leaves in a single layer on a baking sheet, drizzle with olive oil, sprinke with salt and pepper, and maybe some sweet paprika, then bake in a 400 degree oven until just crisp and not yet brown.

Here’s to many more months of delicious, nutritious harvest from this dusting of tiny seeds.

Categories In the Ground, In the Kitchen
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