South Bronx-Schoharie County Linked Up

An article in the New York Times was recently brought to my attention.  Seventy year-old professor Dennis Derryck has taken the popular CSA model and modified it to give the members more say in the food being grown.  More importantly, he has managed to incorporate a flexible pay-scale dependent on income.  I could go on, but you might as well read the article for yourself - it's short and has a video as well, don't be apathetic. 

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/06/23/dining/23bronx.html?th&emc=th

A Week of Meals

I think I can finally say it - I have come as close as I ever will to perfecting the texture of my breads.  This past week I put to rest some angst ridden emotions associated with my failure to achieve an airy, soft and light bread, with a crispy crust to match.  In the time since I have tried again and succeeded much to my delight - the bread was no aberration.

Yet, with all the hustle and bustle of summer - work on the farm, at the market, and at the coffee shop, occasional leisure activity, etc. - I failed to photo-document my accomplishment.  So, I decided this would be a good opportunity to simply upload some pictures of recent meals we have enjoyed, talk only briefly about them, and get back to the kitchen.

Tamara made Rosemary-Rhubarb Jam with some of the pounds upon pounds of Rhubarb filling up our valuable freezer space.  The flavor is strong, but delicious and suits pork really well.  I used it as a glaze on some pork chops (freeing up even more freezer space). 

To go with the rosemary-rhubarb glazed pork chops I sauteed a bunch of beet greens along with their attached baby beets and some garlic scapes.  I also made a little salad with goat cheese from Sweet Spring Farm, baby cucumbers (some of the first of the season), strawberries (some of the last of the season), and garnished it with a pair of cherries.  

Later in the week I got my hands on some of the Kilpatrick's squash blossoms.  Squash blossoms, like fiddleheads and garlic scapes, are one of those 'get them while you can' types of market fare.  I usually make a batter, stuff the delicate little flowers and pan fry them, however I was feeling slightly lazy on this particular night, so I just stuffed them and roasted them in the oven until they looked crispy and oozed a bit of the sausage, apple, and apple smoked cheddar I filled them with - words cannot justify how delicious squash blossoms are when stuffed with good cheese - add some tart apple and some fennel-seeded sausage [exasperated sounds of dumbfounded wordlessness] ..there is literally nothing I can say.

At some point in the not so distant past I made this loaf of bread with olives in the top.  I saw something similar in My Bread: The Revolutionary No-Work, No-Knead Method, by bread mastermind Jim Lahey.  It turned out pretty well, but this was all before I unlocked the secrets of the often sought after airy bread texture.  I will try it again soon.  Mali, to the left eyeing the bread, is clearly not as picky as I am about bread texture.  She has a special way of begging that has a fantastic success rate, although I think some guests may find it annoying. 

Last, but certainly not least, I made a breakfast pizza with eggs, roasted fingerling potatoes (the last of the storage potatoes, so we'll be waiting patiently for the new harvest), Mesclun from New Minglewood, and homemade ricotta that I made using Willow Marsh Farm's raw milk.

Quick Breakfast

Feeling obligated to prove my continued existence to anyone following this blog, I decided to document a pretty basic, quick breakfast I made this morning. It has the charm of being almost exclusively local - the exceptions being salt, pepper, olive oil, my coffee, and whatever ingredients go into the free two day old bagels at Uncommon Grounds.

First thing, I grabbed a hand full of the Kilpatrick's fingerling potatoes out of the fridge poked a few fork holes in them and tossed them in the microwave for 3 minutes - I know, the microwave, how lame, but I'm trying to be quick.

In the meantime I got the skillet going with some olive oil. I took an everything bagel and put it in the toaster oven for a few minutes. An english muffin or any other type of bread would be equally lovely.

When the potatoes were finished I threw them in the skillet to crisp up. When the bagel was partially toasted I took it out and spread some Sweet Spring goat cheese on one side and some of Anna Mae's tomato jam on the other, and returned it to the toaster oven.

The potatoes were looking nice and crispy so, I cracked a couple of Elihu Farm's eggs into the skillet right along side them - saving on dishes and time. I went with over-easy, but any style egg would do the trick. The skillet was hot so it only took about one minute.

I put the bagel onto a plate, put the eggs on the bagel, and surround it with the crispy little potatoes. New potatoes aren't ready for harvest yet, but when the fingerlings are stored over winter a good amount of their starch converts to sugar, leaving them with an added sweetness which works great for something like this or potato salad.

We had a bag of New Minglewood's mesclun mix which has a perfect kick to it and really goes well with goat cheese - so I topped it all off with that.

I took my plate outside and joined the dog in watching the bees - about as good a morning as I could hope for. Total time: about 5 minutes (I had the coffee going already).

Tamara's ladies are in those boxes.

Mali waits patiently for her welfare check or some of my breakfast - whichever comes first.

One last look at breakfast.