Category Archives: Food

Dinner Out … In

Posted on March 12, 2013 by AnnieRie

And, no, I am not talking about In N Out Burger. Perish the thought. I am talking about replacing an evening out with a killer dinner at home. Better food. Less money.

We did that today.

Courtesy of Wegmans, my freezer, the Breezy Willow CSA, and my favorite Virginia winery, Linden.

It all started with a coupon for $5 from Wegmans, and a trip to Safelite because my windshield finally turned a ding into an eighteen inch long crack. A new windshield this morning and a visit to Wegmans looking for coffee.

Wegmans sells an 80 pack of this French roast for $35. Cheaper than Costco for an 80 pack. Add a $5 coupon to it, and it is a real deal for coffee snobs. A big, rich, bold coffee in environmentally friendly packaging. What’s not to love?

We had other coupons too. Yogurt, deli, sushi and cheese. I could do serious damage.

Today is Tuesday. Half price wine night at Bistro Blanc, right down the road. We considered dinner out. Until I saw the U-10 scallops in the seafood section at Wegmans. This is why I still love the place.

Buying a dinner out with scallops this huge would set you back a large amount of cash in a restaurant. Pan searing them in butter at home. A fraction of the cost. Trust me. Scallops are easy. So are fingerlings. I put the fingerlings in a pot with water for 15 minutes while looking for everything else. Finished them in that browned butter in the searing pan.

Made a salad with microgreens and the beets from the CSA. I roast the beets and use them in salads. I finished the potatoes with the last of that container of garlic scape pesto from my freezer.

Opened a bottle of chardonnay. Without the chardonnay, this dinner cost me $30 in ingredients. The scallops, $18. You could pay way more than $15 a person for much less at any chain restaurant for an entree.

Really easy here. Two pots, one for potatoes and one for scallops. Greens on the plate. Goat cheese from Cherry Glen. Kumatoes, I wanted to try. Not bad, a little mushy but a good taste. I did homemade dressing. You could buy yours.

Dinner in a half hour. Way better than Applebees, or any of those other chains. No beepers. No really overpriced beers and wines, the real cash cows at restaurants. What is stopping you from cooking great stuff at home?

Really. Don’t “Get out there”. Get in your kitchen.

hocofood@@@

1 Comment

Posted in CSA, Food, Real Food, Restaurants, Wine and tagged cooking, Food, foodie, Linden Vineyards, Locavore, real food, wine. Bookmark the permalink.

Improv

Posted on March 11, 2013 by AnnieRie

You know what they say about the best laid plans. Sometimes you find less than perfect execution after all your planning. Today is one of those days. Thankfully after all these years of reading recipes and learning to trust my taste (plus a little help from the internet) I recovered from what could have been a cooking failure.

I signed up to take pumpkin hummus to the volunteer pot luck luncheon at the Howard County Conservancy this week. Something new I learned to make using CSA veggies. I had a butternut squash from the market two weeks ago sitting on the counter, some garlic still in the coldest area where I store root veggies, half a jar of tahini and I had just stocked up on chickpeas, as I use them in couscous salad and lots of other recipes. The squash was from the Olney market.

Should have been easy. But no, the squash was pretty hollow down the middle. Skin still looked good. It was firm, not mushy, but was obviously dried out, or somewhat hollow down the center, at least the top half of it was. It smelled OK, so I did a little triage and salvaged the parts that weren’t drying out. It only gave me half what I needed.

Enter the internet and the CSA to the rescue. I got sweet potatoes last week from my Breezy Willow CSA.

I found a recipe that called for half “pumpkin pie filling” aka butternut squash for those of us who know that fact, and half sweet potato. Thank you, small bites blog. I did not use cumin and paprika, but used garam masala in their place.

My next problem came from my garlic. Yep, the last two heads of garlic in the storage area had gone moldy. I am now officially out of all that lovely organic garlic from Love Dove and the CSA. Thankfully, I had granulated garlic powder picked up at Costco. I had to do this by taste instead of measuring and I do like garlicky hummus.

The hummus came out really creamy, tasty and it is aging in the fridge now, ready to take Thursday to the luncheon. I am hoping to get an interesting bread this week from the CSA to use for dunking the hummus. Another improv, why go get pita for dipping when you can make your own toasty dippers from thinly sliced breads, toasted.

hocofood@@@

3 Comments

Posted in CSA, Farmer's Markets, Food, Local Businesses, Locavore, Real Food and tagged cooking, CSA, farmer's markets, Food, foodie, howard county conservancy, local businesses, Locavore, real food. Bookmark the permalink.

CSA Inspiration

Posted on March 10, 2013 by AnnieRie

It’s always fun to get inspiration from something in the CSA delivery and make it a highlight of a meal. This week the inspiration so far is from the citrus. I love really fresh citrus. This week we got oranges and ruby red grapefruit. We scarfed down a grapefruit while I was attempting to segment one of them. It never made it to the salad bowl. Eventually one grapefruit and two oranges, supremed, became the base for this salad.

Well, let’s say most of the fruit made it into the bowl. When I didn’t cut it well, I ate it. What can I say? I really do love fresh juicy sweet citrus, and these do not disappoint.

The recipe:
two or three citrus fruits, navel oranges, juice oranges, sweet red grapefruit, what you have
about two or three ounces of fennel, pulled from the bulb
an ounce or so of red onion
salt, pepper
really good olive oil

Supreme the citrus, by cuting off the peel, save it, cut out wedges avoiding the pith and membrane. You will use the peel to make the vinaigrette. Julienne the fennel and the red onion. I make both really thin and usually an inch to two inches long. Mix it all together. Just before serving, drizzle extra virgin olive oil and squeeze as much juice as you can from the fruit left attached to the peels you reserved. I also squeeze all the juice out of that center of the fruit after you have cut out the wedges. Salt and pepper to taste. Refreshing and for us, the way to end the meal.

If we have a rich dish for dinner, this citrus salad really is a light finish to the meal.

The rest of our mostly local meal last night was a simple pasta with pesto, and steamed Brussels sprouts with butter. The pesto is my garlic scape pesto defrosted from the freezer.

The recipe for the pesto is here. What is really funny about looking for that post, I saw I made strawberry cubes. They must be in the very bottom of the freezer, so I need to go “freezer diving” and find them.

I boiled up some egg noodles, picked up at the market a while back. You can find these many places. Egg noodles with pesto.

Served with a 2007 Linden Hardscrabble Chardonnay. Big, rich, buttery. Cuts through the richness of the pesto. I took this picture while I was cooling it in the freezer. I didn’t have any chardonnay in the back fridge, so pulled this one up from the cellar.

Before this light dinner, we shared some spring rolls picked up at Roots, alongside one of our favorites, that Meyer lemon basil fizz, made with Aranciata, also from Roots. Lovely evening, sitting on the porch and watching the sunset before dinner.

Today I considered grilling something, but had nothing defrosted and a crock pot full of tomato, basil and Boarman’s sausage sauce. Tonight there will be pasta with sauce, some bread and greens with goat cheese. I made that sauce to serve a few times this week, once it will be served over steamed kale from the CSA. Looking forward to what we will get Wednesday, and eating mostly locally sourced items. Loving the coming of spring. In other words, running out of garlic scapes and wanting to make more pesto.

hocofood@@@

2 Comments

Posted in CSA, Food, Gardening, Local Businesses, Locavore, Real Food, Weather, Wine, Winter Eat Local and tagged cooking, crock pot cooking, CSA, Food, gardening, Linden Vineyards, local businesses, Locavore, real food, wine. Bookmark the permalink.

Chayote!

Posted on March 8, 2013 by AnnieRie

A new vegetable. Part of my Sixty@sixty challenge. That is, the six new fruits and veggies part of the challenge. I already have three done. This is the fourth. Where did I find chayote and what is it?

I stopped at Weis the other day on the way home from the Conservancy. I needed a few items and wanted to see how their renovations turned out. They completely redid the store. They need to be competitive now that Harris Teeter is coming to Waverly. Harris Teeter opens in April.

The new Weis is pretty different. I was looking for fresh basil, to use in my Meyer lemon basil fizz, and to use in a tomato sauce. I like the living basil plants.

The basil has nothing to do with the recipe, but was the reason I stopped at the store. Weis has some fairly interesting veggies in their produce section. They have yacon which I blogged about after getting it in my CSA basket.

Lots of good Latin and Mexican veggies there. Reasonable prices too.

So, what could I do that was interesting with chayote. It is in the squash family. Not really flavorful. It seems to be one of those veggies that takes on the flavors of your seasonings and broths. I found a “posole” recipe on epicurious. Not real posole with pork and hominy, but a vegetarian take on it.

Traditionalists don’t like it much. But, it was pretty decent. I did alter the recipe a bit to use what I could find, and what I have here.

I used canned hominy, aka posole. This gave me another check off on my 60@60 list. A childhood memory. My dad used to make hominy for breakfast, with sausage.

Cook the homily in a quart of veggie broth. You need more for dried hominy, but the canned is already cooked so less evaporation. Meanwhile, in a large pot, cook one diced onion and a couple of cloves of minced garlic in olive oil, until browned. Add one pound of washed cut up greens. I used broccoli rabe. The recipe calls for collards. Didn’t have any. Add two julienned pitted chayote. A cup of the broth from the hominy pot. Simmer for twenty minutes, covered. Toast a half cup of pecans, chopped. Add the pecans, a half cup of dried cherries, an ounce of cider vinegar and the hominy with the rest of the broth and cook uncovered at a low heat for twenty more minutes. Just before serving, add a teaspoon or so of salt, and three tablespoons of butter.

I have to admit. This is really, really good. Not real posole, but a very satisfying vegetarian stew.

hocofood@@@

4 Comments

Posted in Food, Real Food, Sixty@Sixty and tagged cooking, Food, foodie, real food. Bookmark the permalink.

Early Bird CSA Week One

Posted on March 7, 2013 by AnnieRie

Our first trip out to Breezy Willow for the spring CSA pick up. Definitely different than our other two forays into CSAs. Last year the winter one delivered to your house and you picked what you wanted online. We took a break from winter CSA this year.

Our summer one is the box type. What’s in the box is what you get. This is the first one where you go inside and pick your veggies and count out or weigh them. It also includes value added items like Florida citrus, bread and eggs. A nice haul. Mostly organic, except for the fruit from Florida, I think. I did forget to ask about the farm practices for the grapefruit and oranges.

Here is what we got.

Four ruby red grapefruit, five oranges, four york apples and four red delicious apples, eight carrots, three pounds of sweet potatoes, one pound of beets, 1/2 pound button mushrooms, one pound of Tuscan kale. We chose a cinnamon raisin bread, and we got our first dozen eggs.

Those breads are very large. This could become interesting, depending on what is there. I may be freezing bread to use later in the summer. I do know French toast will be on the menu because the bread tastes wonderful. Give it a few days as older bread makes good French toast. I am making a dish using the kale, a new one for me (the dish, not the kale). I need to find a few more ingredients before I decide if I make it.

I may try grapefruit granita, since there may be a number of weeks with grapefruit, and we aren’t huge citrus for breakfast people.

The other thing I picked up today was a bag of Michele’s granola. I heard about it, but never tried it. We had it for dessert tonight with some of the blueberry yogurt left from my last visit to England Acres. I see Breezy Willow also carries it. This yogurt is really rich. The granola is great.

This CSA costs $38.50 a week. The free range eggs would be $4.50 to buy. Great Harvest breads $5 or $6 each. Grapefruit, $1.75 each in the store the other day. Oranges $1 each. $21.50 before counting the veggies and apples. Getting these really fresh organic veggies, fruit, eggs and bread is a bargain.

A good base for a week’s cooking. Lots of people there today when they opened. I need to time it so we aren’t there in the first rush. It did get to be a little crazy trying to maneuver the driveway with over a dozen cars coming and going. Nice to see that they are successful. Convenient, too. A good beginning.

hocofood@@@

4 Comments

Posted in CSA, Food, Howard County, Local Businesses, Locavore, Real Food, West HoCo and tagged cooking, CSA, Food, Howard County, local businesses, Locavore, value of CSA, West HoCo. Bookmark the permalink.

A Sunny Window

Posted on March 4, 2013 by AnnieRie

All that is needed to start seeds for spring greens. Thursday I blogged about planting arugula, kale and mesclun mix in a box in my kitchen. Nothing fancy just a shallow box picked up at Kendalls. Five days ago. Of course, I stupidly titled it Where Did Winter Go? just to make sure we get hit with snow this week. Winter hasn’t gone yet, but even the prospect of one messy day this Wednesday doesn’t dampen my enthusiasm for the coming of spring. Why?

I already have sprouts from the seeds. The middle row, I believe is the Tuscan kale, a very fast growing leafy green. The reason I say “I believe” is because I forgot to mark the kale and arugula rows. The mesclun on the left was the first row I planted. Senior moments like these are the frustration of the retired who get phone calls while planting seeds.

Last year I put in a large amount of mesclun mix, which took quite a bit of thinning before I moved it outside. It did do well though in the planter boxes that I kept raised above bunny reach on the deck.

The other location where I will transplant greens is a small rectangle right off the mudroom door next to the patio. Very close to the house. Mostly shady, so the leaves don’t burn up from the sun. This area will get the cover over it to keep the bunnies and deer from nibbling my greens. I can harvest lots of salad right before dinner every evening by using these small planters.

I once used this area to plant spearmint thinking it wouldn’t spread beyond this enclosed concrete area. Wrong. It also comes back every year with a vengeance. The bees love it though and they buzz all around and pollinate the flowers in my garden as they visit.

Those first few sprouts always brighten my day, knowing warm weather is coming and I can start putting out herbs in the garden and flowers in the pots. Just have to make it through this snow/sleet/rain mess in the next couple of days.

Time to go prepare another planting box, and put in the beans I want to grow in the garden this summer.

2 Comments

Posted in Food, Gardening, Nature, Weather, West HoCo and tagged Food, gardening, nature, spring flowers, West HoCo. Bookmark the permalink.

Inspiration for Eating Locally

Posted on March 3, 2013 by AnnieRie

We are coming into the end of the winter, and our Eat Local Challenge will be winding down in a few weeks. Eight of the ten group members from our cyber circle in the South and East have been posting fairly regularly about their meals. A couple of recent posts have inspired me for future meals.

I always turn to Backyard Grocery to find inspiration for using the venison in the freezer. Susan is a master of cooking with venison, and I found something on her website to use the venison neck roast. Pulled venison with blueberry barbecue sauce.

Other than the strange coloring, the recipe looks to be pretty interesting. Look for it to show up around here in a week or two. I have used her recipes when I made things like black bean chili with pulled venison. The venison was a shoulder roast slow cooked for a day, shredded, then slow cooked again to make the chili.

It showed up on the table for two dinners and a lunch last week. Basic chili recipe with tomatoes, onions, green peppers, black beans, spices and the venison. Much of it was local. My tomatoes. Farmstand onions. The venison. Yes, the beans, green pepper and spices weren’t, but still in the spirit of eating locally.

As for a new inspiring menu, just in time to take advantage of the kale we are supposed to be getting this week in our early bird CSA, I turn to Jes, at Eating Appalachia. Love her blog for new recipes. I picked up a butternut squash to try out her fritters. Her recipe for kale winter slaw will be on the menu soon as well. Breezy Willow Early Bird begins Wednesday. I will be posting pictures of what we get, and next week the Eat Local Meal will feature many of the goodies.

The Early Bird CSA is an added value CSA, getting us through those last weeks until markets open, and helping us plow down through the bottom of our freezers. Besides cold storage and high tunnel veggies, we will be getting some citrus from down South. It is a welcome addition to the pantry. Can’t wait.

My freezer in the basement is down about a third, with almost half the tomatoes gone, a good dent in all that pesto, and interestingly enough, lots of fruit left. Remember all that basil last summer? Still jars and bags of pesto cubes in there.

As for fruit, it seems I didn’t really use it the way I envisioned. I am now defrosting bags every week to use in salad dressings and making fruit drinks from them. Lots of peaches left though. I do also have quite a bit of greens, jars of broth and stew starter, and will be set until I get that huge influx of veggies in the summer CSA.

The other major cooking day this last week was Thursday when I slow cooked a brisket from TLV Farms. With dry rub and cooked in beef broth defrosted from the freezer. A few onions and carrots from England Acres. A small jar of my oven dried tomatoes. Plopped in the crock pot for ten hours. Here is the container with the leftovers.

I didn’t take pictures of dinner. We had some of it again last night, and I saved the last of the brisket for sandwiches this week. As for what I did with all that extra broth? Yesterday it became the basis to cook couscous for a salad. We will get three or four lunches from that salad.

Eating locally most of the time these days. At least the main ingredients are local. Whenever someone asks me how we use a CSA share with just two people, these are the types of things that make it worth the money. But, you do need the time to do this cooking. Thankfully, time is something we have lots of, as retirees.

hocofood@@@

4 Comments

Posted in CSA, Food, Local Businesses, Locavore, Real Food, Winter Eat Local and tagged cooking, crock pot cooking, CSA, Food, foodie, local businesses, Locavore, real food, value of CSA. Bookmark the permalink.

Saturday at Tractor Supply

Posted on March 2, 2013 by AnnieRie

The baby chicks are in. We headed out to Tractor Supply today to use my 10% coupon, looking at the greenhouse, wanting some bird seed, hubby wanted a new belt and a good pair of jeans, and I wanted hiking boots. My old ones are shot. With the coupon and the sales, Tractor Supply has the best prices on basic bird seed, work clothes, Ariat boots and shoes, and they were advertising a small greenhouse at a great price.

And, yes, the chicks are in. They have five or six varieties, rock cornish, red pullet, brahma bantam, to name a few. They also had baby ducks. Minimum purchase is six. No Easter presents is the reason. These are chicks for those who want to raise egg layers or fatten up those future broilers and fryers. The rock cornish are the chickens we get from England Acres. Great birds. Really a good breed for those looking for meat production. Chicks were $1.99 or $2.99 each, and ducks were $2.99 each. They were doing a brisk business selling chicks.

I did find hiking boots. If you have never bought Ariat boots, you really should look into them. A very nicely made product that lasts forever, and is not inexpensive. Mostly leather products. Lots of riding boots. I have many of their items and this is my first hiking boot purchase.

Of course, it seems every time we visit Tractor Supply, we run into someone we know. Today the place was very busy and we ran into a friend who has a farm over in Glenwood. We talked about how their lambing, and the birthing of their goats are going.

Popular place, in Mt. Airy. While out there I did head over to England Acres to get a few things. CSA starts next week so I only needed some dairy, bread and a few apples. I did pick up some lovely carrots and onions to make a chicken soup midweek, just in case I don’t get them in my first CSA delivery.

They knew I was coming, and they saved me a package of gingersnaps. I had asked about them the last visit, and there weren’t any. These are the best gingersnaps. Chewy, spicy, great with milk. My husband loves them as a snack. One of the little pleasures of knowing the source of your food. We also put our name down to get the side of lamb in April. They are doing two offerings of fresh lamb, one this month and one next month. Only chance this year to get fresh lamb from them. A side of lamb is about 20-25 pounds, just enough to give you some special meals.

Freshly ground lamb is so good. Remembering my grilled kofta from last year. I can’t wait to be able to make it again this spring. Doesn’t this picture just scream springtime?

Link to my post and recipe is here.

hocoblogs@@@

3 Comments

Posted in Food, Howard County, Local Businesses, Locavore, West HoCo and tagged Food, foodie, Howard County, local businesses, Locavore, West HoCo. Bookmark the permalink.

Where Did Winter Go?

Posted on February 28, 2013 by AnnieRie

I must admit, typing this, that I may jinx us, and we will get a March snowstorm. But, that would be really interesting as we haven’t had one of those for quite a while. Today temps in the fifties lured me out to mix potting soil and top soil into a container to start my spring greens.

I buy a simple tray, punch some holes in the bottom. I put this tray in one of those fruit boxes from a visit to Costco, the box wrapped in plastic, and with some newspaper between it and the tray, to absorb excess water. I mix potting soil and top soil. Made three rows of indentations. One I filled with mesclun mix, one with arugula, and one with Tuscan kale. I am trying kale for the first time this year.

I will see how they do in the east window of the kitchen, and if they need more sun, I will take them up to that large south facing window in our bedroom. The largest and brightest winter spot in our house. Strange place for plantings, but it does work well. Last year I got great results with the mesclun.

As for other spring planting plans, I saw that Tractor Supply has a greenhouse for sale. A small one, build it yourself. Just enough for a few trays of plants. We may check it out and that is where I will start some of the herbs, and where I will harden the heirloom tomatoes. I have my plans in my head, now if it really is getting to be spring, the planting will begin.

Really, I don’t think we got much of a winter. A little cold. Really rainy. Snow that disappeared in a day. Not bad.

1 Comment

Posted in Food, Gardening, Hobbies, Weather and tagged Food, gardening, weather. Bookmark the permalink.

How Did That Chicken Turn Out?

Posted on February 25, 2013 by AnnieRie

For my Winter Eat Local Challenge. The other day I posted about the pastured animal calendar and the dry rub chicken recipe in it.

I had a picture of the TLV Farm chicken marinating but didn’t put up the finished product. It came out looking like this.

The chicken went into a 300 degree oven, for about an hour. I put veggies bought at England Acres under the chicken. A large onion, two large carrots and some purple potatoes. Most of the veggies came from Lancaster Farm Fresh Coop, wholesaled to England Acres.

The other star of this dinner was the salad. Greens from East Rivendell. The golden beets were from Roots Market. Goat milk feta and red onion from England Acres. The dressing. Homemade black cherry yogurt dressing. Pequea Valley Farms yogurt. This yogurt is by far the best we have ever tasted. I buy it at England Acres by the quart. It never lasts very long, but I did make dressing from it.

We split up this salad to have after the chicken and veggies. Drizzled the dressing over it. Still have a little left for later this week. Awesome dressing.

As for dinner with the local wine. A 2011 Linden Avenius Sauvignon Blanc. This sauvignon blanc is more of the fume blanc style than the style of New Zealand, which is citrusy and acidic. Lovely pairing.

Saturday night’s dinner turned out very well. Mostly local, with some spice, herb and oil exceptions as usual. That yogurt is just beckoning me. I have an unopened container of blueberry up in the fridge. I think I will make it dessert tonight, with a few of those candied walnuts from the Olney market.

If you can find the yogurt, you have to try it. I promise. You will never want grocery store yogurt again.

hocofood@@@

2 Comments