What was on the front porch today?
The cooler had a great surprise in it. A chicken. From the Zahradka farm. Free range. No hormones or antibiotics. It has been squeezed into the out of control freezer destined for the crockpot sometime next week.
This week I asked for and received:
1 large yellow onion
kale
spinach
sweet potatoes
leeks
radishes
Everything looks good, and has been cleaned for storage. Menu planning is in full swing.
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… on the table by 6.
Micro-greens from Sharp’s at Waterford Farm. A wonderful place in southwest HoCo. Denise Sharp gives talks about farming and takes visitors on a tour with a history lesson. Worth the time to do, if you get the chance. I was there helping a friend set up lunch for the Howard Legacy Leadership Institute of the Environment (HoLLIE).
I buy plants from the farm. My chrysanthemums came from there. In the fall, we go there to get pumpkins. They sell plants commercially and at the greenhouses in the spring and fall. The greens are from their new high tunnel, and since it never stayed cold long enough, they never died back. She encouraged us to take some home since they would be dug up soon to put in the spring seeds. I certainly enjoyed these for dinner that night with honey mustard dressing.
Also at the farm, the Howard Bird Club gets permission to hike there on a Sunday to find waterfowl, eagles, migrating birds, and owls. Last year we found two northern bob whites walking down the dirt road next to the tall grasses. It had been years since anyone saw them wild in this area.
Kevin Heffernan took this picture which is now featured on the Howard Bird Club photo pages. His three bob white pictures featured there are the only recorded pictures the club has published in their photos taken on field trips by members.
This week the group with Denise walked back one of the old dirt roads and learned some of the history of the farm. The lovely old house on the hill, which is one of those farmhouses around here that just kept growing and adapting to the family’s needs is the sort of place that brings back memories to me, memories of my great grandparents farm beyond the Liberty Reservoir, where they farmed from the end of the 19th century until they had to sell and move in with my great aunt and her family.
When the greenhouses open in April I will be there looking for some heirloom tomato plants. For those who live in Howard County, this farm is one of the really interesting places to visit. If not in the spring, the corn maze and pumpkin patches in the fall are worth the trip down Route 97 to Jennings Chapel Road.
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Valentine’s Day is an interesting holiday. The cynical side of me considers it a Hallmark holiday, where much money is spent on cards. We don’t do cards. Just like the advent of digital cameras impacted film, and the progression to ebooks is affecting book stores, and newspapers and magazines fall one after another, it is only a matter of time until cards in the mail disappear as well.
But the point of this post is “What did we do for Valentine’s Day?”
Wine and chocolate.
More of the first and less of the last. I try to limit the amount of chocolate in the house, so just a taste is what I want. Not a box full of empty calories.
This fit the bill. Just enough to enjoy, and the wine lasted two nights. 15.9% alcohol will make it last more than one sitting. I have to thank Les Amis du Vin, the predecessor of Taster’s Guild, for introducing us to Biale Zins. Big Zins. With interesting names like Black Chicken. For a trip down memory lane, we reminisced about Yogi Barrett and the wine tastings at the old Chez Fernand, where we first tasted Biale wines. A piece of HoCo loco trivia. The names of the restaurants where Fernand worked. Where was Papillon? Chez Fernand? It also had us to trying to remember the name of the restaurant when he was in Baltimore after the fire in Ellicott City. Then returning to Ellicott City with Tersiquels.
This wine is from 2002. It is a Lodi appellation, from Spenker Vineyard. High in alcohol yet not with that burn that high alcohol wines sometimes contain. Perfect with a chili infused dark chocolate.
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We are back to a Friday delivery. I did have the cooler out, thankfully, for the eggs and the beef. This week I got the makings of soups, greens and stews, and some oranges from the Florida partner farms.
The carrots are huge, and like all winter carrots that we have found, they have a sweetness due to the starch to sugar conversion associated with cold weather growing. Something new I learned in my earliest forays into gardening in spring and fall.
This week’s celery is the largest we have received so far, and the best texture. These veggies are getting into their stride, so to speak. Destined for a soup next week with some beef from Boarman’s and the carrots and huge white onions from a Baugher’s visit a few weeks back.
Since the weather turned cold, and it snowed last night, more soups are coming on the menu. The cauliflower will go into soup, same with potatoes. I love soup and bread for dinner when it is cold.
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Here we are, I believe on Week Eleven of the “Dark Days Challenge“, where over 100 of us from across the US, with one or two from Canada and the UK, are trying to see if we can make one meal a week using ingredients sourced from 150 miles or less from where we live. We have exceptions like spices, oils, chocolate and coffee. Plus, whatever we declared before we started. I will use locally produced items that may contain ingredients like flour or baking powder that aren’t local. Atwater’s bread is one of those sources.
So far, every week I have been able to source and use local items to make at least one meal. I finally reached the repetitive stage in this week, the eleventh one. I did an omelet for dinner, not much different than my frittata of a few weeks ago.
Finding a CSA that delivers all winter, and having numerous markets open year round, has made this fairly simple. Silver Spring, Tacoma Park and Dupont Circle all stay open year round. Zahradka farm provides home delivered veggies, fruit, meat, eggs, bread, and specially ordered items using an online weekly form. After picking which options you want for the 18 weeks, and pay in advance, we just sit back and take delivery weekly.
For this meal, the inspiration was a package of bacon from TLV Tree Farm in Glenelg, bought from Jamie this past year at the Fall Fest at the Howard County Conservancy in October and put away in my freezer with other goodies like a brisket and sausages. I defrosted it to use for Tuesday’s omelet and for Southern greens I will be making this weekend when my CSA arrives with collard greens. I admit, belonging to a CSA means you have to plan meals.
The baby Swiss cheese from a recent visit to South Mountain Creamery along with their milk and unsalted butter is going to be used for this 5 egg omelet. I am getting my biweekly delivery of eggs this coming weekend from Zahradka Farm CSA so I needed to use up some of the ones from last month. The spinach is from the CSA as well. The mushrooms I picked up at Boarman’s. They are labeled as from our favorite local source, Kennett Square PA. I get these mushrooms most of the spring and fall from the Sandy Spring CSA that delivers to Columbia and to the Conservancy.
Come this May will mark our second year with the cooperative of 70-80 organic farmers around Lancaster, including Mother Earth mushrooms. Until then, though, I am eating lots of greens, onions, potatoes, leeks, chard, cauliflower and broccoli. Eating seasonally is something many of us stopped doing when year round veggies from all over the world came into our chain supermarkets.
Taking this challenge has brought me back to simple cooking, fresh foods and decreased allergies. I am glad I did it.
On to the omelet, I cut up some bacon, browned it in the pan, added the veggies and mushrooms, then poured in the egg and milk mixture.
The finished product fell in pieces when I was trying to serve it so there are no dinner pictures.
We poured a glass of Linden Chardonnay from VA and buttered some some Atwater’s Bread, making this a completely local meal except for the salt and pepper.
A source that I have relied upon to tell me where to find local foods is the book Dishing Up Maryland by Lucie Snodgrass. I bought mine at Black Ankle vineyards last year, and I have seen it at Baugher’s Market. Besides the great recipes, there are pages of local resources in the back, a great place to find farms, artisans and markets in the state.
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This week I attempted to reduce the clutter in my fridge by cooking as many local dinners as possible, and using small business or organic items if I didn’t have local ones. For the most part, I made it.
Sunday Dinner
Followed by:
Three days including a grilling day
I am happy to say I made it through the rest of the week as well. Thursday night we finished up the leftovers from the Sunday night pasta meal, augmented with an organic roasted red pepper sauce made from Pacific soup, thickened with a touch of local flour and some red wine. Forgot to take pics.
Friday and Saturday the weather changed and I fell back on using the crockpot.
Friday I made greens with chorizo bought at Dupont Circle Market in December from Cedarbrook Farm in WV, and a huge sweet potato from Baugher’s farm stand. The collard greens were from the CSA, and the carrots and chard from the Silver Spring market. My teeny little dried peppers. Onion – CSA
The chorizo was browned on the stove before placing it on top the veggies in the crockpot. It came out really nice, spicy but not overwhelming.
Finally, Dark Days Dinner with Sweet Ending — a mini-challenge to make something sweet for Valentine’s Day, even though we aren’t there yet. Not a huge sweets fan, me, but my husband is. I decided to make a sort of peanut “brittle” using Virginia peanuts bought at the Common Market. I roasted them with a coating of walnut oil and salt, then added them to a pan of local honey with pepper. Poured them out on a plate and put them in the freezer. Enjoyed them last night while watching a movie.
As for the dinner, it was homemade chicken soup in the crockpot. All local except for the egg noodles. They are from the Amish Market in Shrewsbury, bulk, made in PA but not guaranteeing the source of the flour. Chicken from South Mountain Creamery. Turkey stock from my freezer, made with my Thanksgiving turkey. Carrots, onion, celery all from Zahradka Farm CSA.
I forgot to take pics again, but here are the leftovers ready for the fridge.
It was served with Atwater’s rosemary bread and Blue Ridge Dairy butter, and a Linden Chardonnay.
Now, this week I need to work on getting the fridge under control. No buying of anything but milk and bread.
And, I need to get rid of my husband’s water pitcher. Boy, is that puppy in sad shape with dings and marks. Wonder how old it is?
All in all, a good week of eating locally and cooking from scratch. Of course, being retired helps.
Today we had one of those days where we just went where we wanted and sampled local goodies, and found new places to visit. We had some errands to run in Columbia, and then I wanted to get to Atwater’s to buy bread.
I have never eaten in a “Triple D” dive. Now, I can say I have and it was awesome. R&R Taqueria in Jessup (why they call it Elkridge is beyond me, it is in Jessup) serves the most amazing tacos al pastor. Even worth eating them in the car before continuing our errands. They are just like what we found in Mexico, and Rodrigo the owner is really a great person. They originally gave our tacos to someone else, the place was mobbed at 1130 on a Friday morning, and made it up quickly. I love the corn tortillas. The spices were done right. We have to go back and try the posole to see if it passes my test, a coworker who lived in Albuquerque makes the best posole I have tasted outside of Mexico.
We then popped down to Catonsville to get bread, before heading up to H Mart. What a place! Heaven if you want international flavors, or fish like you have never seen. We will be back, including a visit to try the Korean fried chicken recommended by HowChow.
We haven’t been on the side roads in Howard County and Catonsville in ages. We found The Breadery in Oella. And Treuth Butchers right down the road. Both are locally owned and are worth the trip.
It is easy around here to find locally made goodies. Ignore the big box stores and chain restaurants and keep locals in business, that is our goal.
Here is an earlier picture of Atwater’s bread and cake. Today we picked up rosemary bread and a sourdough loaf to freeze for later.
Really. Today it hit 67 degrees. Yesterday 64 degrees. Where is winter? But, I am not complaining. We fired up the grill yesterday.
In the spirit of Dark Days, the potatoes were CSA. The merquez lamb sausage was from Whitmore Farm in Emmitsburg MD, bought at The Common Market. I did deviate a bit with naan from Wegman’s and olive bar Mediterranean salad. Still main part of the meal was local.
Monday night I did an omelet. All local with the exception of the parmesan sprinkled on top at the end and a few Nicoise olives from Wegman’s. CSA eggs, PA mushrooms, chard, collard and beet greens, CSA and Silver Spring Market. Onion from CSA. South Mountain Creamery baby Swiss cheese. A splash of South Mountain whole milk in the egg mixture.
As for tonight, Wednesday, heated up leftovers from Sunday night’s Dark Days meal. Three days down, most dinners local.
This week is the week we are supposed to focus on creating a sweet dish, but I don’t bake or make candies like I did before my metabolism slowed down. Keeping temptation away from me is a good thing. But, I still buy some goodies for my husband who likes ice cream and coffee after dinner. So, his local dessert was seasonal ice cream from South Mountain Creamery.
My challenge this week is to see how many dinners I can make that are almost completely local, and when not local are organic or small family-owned business produced. I will allow myself to add one or two non-challenge items if I need to, but make the vast majority of the meal be local.
Sunday night I started off with only a few exceptions, but most of the meal was local.
The base of the meal was a sprouted whole wheat pasta, made in PA, with Angus beef sausage from MD that was baked using Breezy Willow Farm spaghetti sauce, baby bellos from Kennett Square PA and baby turnips from the Silver Spring market. Italian dried herbs, non-local, seasoned the sauce.
The star of the meal, though, was the salad. Mock’s Greenhouse Bibb lettuce with red onion, Firefly Farms mountain blue cheese, and non-local olives. A homemade vinaigrette from the St. Helena oil and vinegar, with ramp mustard, yogurt and honey.
The dinner was rounded out with a Naked Mountain Vineyard Raptor Red from 1995, the last one in the cellar. Still hanging in there with lots of fruit even though it was 17 years old. Virginia can make excellent wines. You just have to search around and have patience.
Overall, the pasta was a little different. Chewier, even when cooked for the maximum recommended ten minutes. Let’s just say it was an acquired taste. The sausage is so sweet, beef sausage freshly made, is definitely not the same Italian sausage taste that you would get from pork. Breezy Willow’s spaghetti sauce was very tasty, made in a slightly more watery style than commercial sauces bulked up with who knows what.
And the salad was awesome. Mountain Blue is an intense cheese. Red onions and olives added a kick. I also love this homemade vinaigrette, made in a jam jar. I use a 2 to 1 ration of oil to vinegar when adding mustard and yogurt. A tiny squirt of honey takes off the edge. Experimentation in making dressings is easy. Just add a little more of what is missing to your taste preferences and shake again.
I will keep notes and make a few posts this week to see how successful I can be in making more dinners with local ingredients.
Friday came and went quickly. The delivery was placed on the porch about 4 PM. Egg week, and beef sausage again. Hopefully, now that we have made up for the huge turkey the first week, we will get something larger next week. The meat share averages $10 a week, but the half turkey at Christmas was close to 15 pounds of free range turkey. Hence, the smaller deliveries these past weeks. I am hoping to see pork or chicken soon.
Here is what we got:
four sweet winter carrots
a bag of Yukon gold potatoes
a large red onion
two large “heads” of collard greens
a bag of spinach
four tangelos from the FL farmer
Getting vegetables that are picked the day before you eat them is what makes being a CSA member so satisfying. The broccoli from last week was so much better than what you see in the stores. This week’s spinach went directly into a salad Friday night, and two of the potatoes were used in dinner as well.
AnnieRie Unplugged 