One Local Summer

One Local Summer – Week 25

By Sheetar 6 November 2010 6 November 2010

A friend pointed out, after the last post, that it’s definitely not summer anymore and perhaps I should change my title. I realized, at week 25, that we’re nearing a half year’s worth of local meals. I’ve clearly somewhat lost my mind, but there are still new and incredible local vegetables out there and I’m determined to see if I can make it a whole year. The title is going to stand, because it started with a summer, and so long as there are vegetables growing, it’ll still be summer in my kitchen. I’m just going to not pay attention to those hard frosts we’ve already had. 🙂

This week! Dear friend Abbie was out for a visit and I subjected her again to a local meal. We made a chicken pot pie from scratch, and while the broth inside didn’t come out quite as thick as I would’ve wanted, the very vegetable-heavy chicken pot pie had us both coming back for seconds.

Chicken Pot Pie:
Daikon – Maysie’s Farm
Bread Flour – Mill at Anselma
Whole Wheat Flour – Mill at Anselma
Broccoli – Smith’s Produce
Onion – Maysie’s Farm. One red, one white.
Garlic – Maysie’s Farm
Carrots – Maysie’s Farm
Trumpet Mushrooms – Oley Valey Mushrooms
Chicken – Mountain View Organics
Non-local – Butter, salt, sugar

One Local Summer

One Local Summer – Week 24

By Sheetar 29 October 2010 27 October 2010

So this is almost getting so easy that I’m thinking I just might be able to continue this all year long. This past week (yeah, still catching up) was a Spaghetti Squash Carbonara. It’s definitely the time of year for the Spaghetti Squash and I’ve REALLY come to love them since discovering them this year. The recipe came from the Food Network and I only made one change, cutting the bacon amount in half (it just didn’t seem necessary to use a half pound!). The resulting dish was incredible and pretty easy to make. I did need to use a few more non-local ingredients than normal, but the dish was still 90% or more local.

Spaghetti Squash Carbonara:
Spaghetti Squash – Smith’s Produce
Onion – Maysie’s Farm
Bacon – Countrytime Farm
Eggs – Smith’s Produce
Garlic – Maysie’s Farm
Non-Local – Salt, Pepper, Piave Cheese, Wine

One Local Summer

One Local Summer – Week 23

By Sheetar 27 October 2010 27 October 2010

Here’s where I admit that we were a few days late getting this one done, but I’m catching up! This is a local version of Shepherd’s Pie using ground beef and local vegetables. It’s a really simple comfort food to make, easy to put together, bake, and voila! Local dinner. No real recipe on this one, just brown the beef, add vegetables, top with mashed potatoes and bake in the oven at 350 for about 30 minutes.

Shepherd’s Pie:
Ground Beef – Bethany Farm
Radish – Maysie’s Farm
Onion – Maysie’s Farm
Carrots – Maysie’s Farm
Potatoes – Smith’s Produce
Non-Local – Olive Oil, Spices.

One Local Summer, recipes

One Local Summer – Week 22

By Sheetar 11 October 2010 7 February 2012

The husband decided that we ought to use up some ground bison and make his own special on-the-fly version of Italian Wedding Soup. This was a collaborative effort, and what we came up with is absolutely incredible. It’s far from traditional, but it was incredibly delicious and definitely something that will be made again. We had made chicken wings the night prior (boil wings, then throw on grill to crisp) so we had the chicken stock on hand already. Other than that, the recipe is below, feel free to print, use, and enjoy!

Italian Wedding Soup:
Bison – Backyard Bison
Red Onions – Maysie’s Farm
Garlic – Maysie’s Farm
Egg – Mt View Organics
Bread – LeBoon’s Homemade
Cilantro, Sage, Basil – My Garden
Carrots – Maysie’s Farm
Potatoes – Smith’s Produce
Chicken Broth – Boiled down from Mt View Organics wings (Tuesday Night’s dinner!)
Non-Local – Salt

Italian Wedding Soup	Print

Ingredients – Meatballs	Ingredients – Soup
1 lb ground bison	10 cups Chicken Broth (from 2lbs chicken, boiled)
2 cloves garlic, minced	2 Small Red Onions, Diced
1 egg	2 Carrots, sliced
1 slice Italian Bread, crumbled	8 Small Potatoes, cubed
Cilantro, Sage, Basil to taste	1 tsp Salt
	12 large leaves of Spinach, chopped

Instructions:
Preheat oven to 350F. Break egg into bowl, add bison, garlic, crumbled bread, and spices, mix together well with hands. Roll into 1″ round meatballs, place on greased cookie tray and bake in oven for 20 minutes. Heat broth on medium-high in large stock pot. add onions, carrots, potatoes, and salt and simmer while meatballs are cooking. Add meatballs to pot and simmer for 15 minutes. Add spinach and simmer until wilted. Top with your favorite grated cheese and enjoy! Makes approximately 14 1-cup servings

One Local Summer

One Local Summer – Week 21

By Sheetar 6 October 2010 6 October 2010

The husband has returned home and planted himself in the kitchen. I can’t say I mind, when the result is an amazing crock pot meal. He took a Bison chuck roast out of the freezer and threw in all manner of vegetables and fruit that I had from the farmer’s markets and came up with something AMAZING. The bison was SO tender after cooking for five hours and the way the flavors blended together was really a work of art. I think I’m still in a food coma over this one! It was all served over some home made noodles using Whole Wheat Pastry flour and Buckwheat flour from the Mill at Anselma.

Crock Pot Bison Roast:
Bison Chuck Roast – Backyard Bison
Onion – North Star Orchard
Purple Potatoes – Unknown Vendor at Anselma
Apples – North Star Orchard
Noodles – Egg from Mt View Organics, Flour from the Mill at Anselma, Buckwheat flour from the Mill at Anselma
Peppers – My Garden
Wine – Paradocx
Beer – Homebrew Imperial Blonde
Sage – My Garden
Cilantro – My Garden
Basil – My Garden
Non-Local – Spices

One Local Summer

One Local Summer – Week 20

By Sheetar 21 September 2010 21 September 2010

Pumpkin, again. Yeah when I get on a kick, I get on a kick, but at least here there are plenty of other ingredients involved. The recipe took a lot of searching – I wanted to use both bison and this little Long Island Cheese Pumpkin I brought home last week. Finally, I came across a recipe for Potato Topped Beef and Pumpkin Casserole which ended up being the perfect recipe to use for my new little casserole dish. Naturally, there were a few modifications. I didn’t have any carrots, so I used turnips instead. Left out the beef stock cube, and used three types of potatoes. The pumpkin makes for a great base, but the sweet pumpkiny flavor is mostly lost in the recipe – I suppose this works out okay, since the flavors all run together well, but I was expecting more smack-you-in-the-face pumpkin. Still, it’s delicious, and VERY much edible.

Oh and if you’re curious, the dish comes from Karin Lorenc on etsy.

Potato Topped Beef and Pumpkin Casserole:
Bison – Backyard Bison. Sirloin
Flour – Mill at Anselma. Bread Flour
Onion – North Star Orchard
Turnip – Maysie’s Farm
Long Island Cheese Pumpkin – Smith’s Produce
Red Wine – Paradocx. Barn Red
Sweet Potatoes – Brogue Hydroponics
Purple Potatoes – Unknown Vendor at Anselma
White Potatoes – Brogue Hydroponics
Non-local – Olive Oil, spices

One Local Summer

One Local Summer – Week 19

By Sheetar 17 September 2010 15 September 2010

Well it’s feeling more like fall and there were some GREAT squash and pumpkin choices available at the Anselma Market this week. I stopped by the Smith’s Produce booth and found a funny green pumpkin that I was told was a Kabocha pumpkin. The producers even had a recipe ready for Kabocha pumpkin soup, so the inspiration belongs to them! Going back to one of my favorite food blogs, I found a recipe for Pumpkin Soup with Smoked Paprika. Sadly we didn’t have smoked paprika on hand, but we did have the regular kind. I’m sure the smoked variety would’ve added an extra kick, but this turned out just fine. I left out the cream since I couldn’t find any locally, but the one cup of goat’s milk created the texture I was looking for. Also, I’d be LOST without our immersion blender – it got a solid work-out with this recipe and did a fine job. I added on some grilled cheese to make this dinner and sprinkled some chevre and the toasted seeds from the pumpkin on top of the soup.

Pumpkin Soup with Grilled Cheese:
Kabocha Pumpkin – Smith’s Produce
Onion – North Star Orchard
Garlic – North Star Orchard
Apple – Unknown Vendor at Anselma (forgot to grab the name!)
Goat’s Milk – Shellbark Hollow Farm
Sage – My Garden
Bread – Saint Peter’s Bakery. Whole Wheat
Yogurt Cheese – Farmstead Fresh
Non-local – Butter, Paprika, Cumin, Salt

One Local Summer

One Local Summer – Week 18

By Sheetar 15 September 2010 15 September 2010

Pizza.. AGAIN?! Oh yes, pizza again. It never gets old with the wide variety of toppings and ways to make the crust. This week we have a flatbread grilled pizza topped with Chevre, Red Onion, Asian Pears, and bacon. Bacon always makes everything better and again, no exception to that rule here. Asian Pears are FINALLY in season and I’ve been gathering them up from the market like the world is going to end, so they’ve ended up in everything I’ve made recently. Gotta love a pear you can eat like an apple. I’ll admit that the pizza was an experiment in combining flavors, but I liked how it came out – a little sweet, bacony, savory, pizza. The recipe is Bobby Flay’s for the flatbread and I’ve used this one a number of times, mixing half whole wheat pastry flour and half bread flour for the dough. Just make sure you’ve got the dough coated VERY WELL with olive oil before throwing it on the grill and it’ll work perfectly.

Grilled Flatbread Pizza:
Whole Wheat Pastry Flour – Mill at Anselma
Bread Flour – Mill at Anslema
Asian Pear – North Star Orchard
Onion – North Star Orchard
Chevre – Shellbark Hollow Farm
Bacon – Countrytime Farm
Non-local – Yeast, salt, olive oil.