I think it was the word “kale” in the title that grabbed my attention. I’d recently added 101 Cookbooks to my Google Reader and while browsing along found Pan-fried Corona Beans and Kale. And suddenly I knew what Tuesday’s dinner would be. We are, after all, still trying to eat the kale in the backyard before the seed potatoes arrive. Ok, so it wasn’t the recipe from 101 Cookbooks, but the similar one in Heidi’s book, Super Natural Cooking (which I bought on the recommendation of an old school friend and which I’ve admired regularly but hadn’t gotten around to …
Category: in the kitchen
Caitlyn and I walked from school to the Westlake Link station yesterday afternoon. We found cherry trees starting to bloom (one totally covered in buds so that it looked pink from a block away) and daffodils pushing their greens up. Caitlyn nearly burst with joy when we found a camillia in bloom; she’s been waiting to pick up faded camillia flowers for a full year now. And while I don’t mind not being frozen whenever I step outside, I worry that this past record-breaking warm January will have unpleasant side effects later: a cold snap just as the fruit trees …
While in the kitchen this afternoon to make dinner rolls and a batch of muffins, I discovered that the carrots were no longer happy with their storage method. Lacking a root cellar, I had scrubbed the carrots, popped them into bags and put them in the drawer in the bottom of the refrigerator. The previous batch of carrots hadn’t objected to this treatment, beyond sprouting little roots and trying desperately to grow new tops. This new batch was rotting. My guess is that I had not closed the bag tightly the first time, allowing the carrots to “breathe”; these newer …
When I got started on it this morning, the vision for dinner was potato soup. When the garden produces 48 pounds of potatoes, that’s a lot of potatoes to discover/invent ways to eat. Some of them are starting to show their age (perhaps the pantry is slightly warmer than the perfect potato storage temperature), but they still soup nicely. But there was half a sweet potato in the fridge that I threw into the pot with the sautéd onions and the dried bell peppers. I added one of the jars of whey from cheesemaking last month and the whey that …
Reality Intervened, after I had promised Caitlyn project time after school today, and she was all set for some no-sew fabric crafting. Instead, we made dinner. I’d been reading about Solar Oven Chef’s frittata and Hip Chick’s kale tortilla, so: She chose the potatoes from the pantry, then scrubbed them clean. I peeled and chopped. She put the water in the pot and carried the full pot to the stove, were we turned on the burner together. She watched the pot to be sure it didn’t boil over. I sautéd onions. She added the broccoli. I drained the potatoes, and …
I bought 6 potatoes, a leek and a parsnip this afternoon, all of which were grown in Washington. It’s a moment of bittersweet pride. While I’m not absolutely positive, I believe these are the first non-animal (ie, dairy or meat), first non-treat (ie, Christmas oranges) produce items purchased since our local Farmers’ Market closed at the end of last October. We’ve been merrily munching along all winter on produce acquired at said market: dried peppers and carrots, canned tomatoes, frozen zucchini, stored butternut squash. I didn’t buy any potatoes at the end of the market since we had the ones …