soup – Sheetar.com

One Local Summer 2013 – Week 20

By Sheetar 22 October 2013 19 October 2013

Another meal by the husband. It’s the time of year that he makes at least one pot of soup per week, and there are no complaints from me! The only thing not really local is the bread – it was baked locally, but the ingredients aren’t local (but it does go very well with the soup). The soup turned out great – the cabbage was still just a little crunchy and not completely wilted down to mush. The husband has a real knack for knowing what ingredients work together in a soup, and this was no exception. The soup bone had a bunch of meat on it, more than we expected, so that was a nice surprise. The whole thing turned out great and made for a perfect lunch on a chilly day.

Cabbage Soup:
Carrots – North Star Orchard
Cabbage – North Star Orchard
Potatoes – North Star Orchard
Onions – North Star Orchard
Soup Bone – Deep Roots Valley Farm
Bread – St. Peter’s Bakery
Non Local – Salt, pepper

One Local Summer

One Local Summer 2013 – Week 18

By Sheetar 10 October 2013 31 August 2016

I had big plans for the garden this year, but somehow it never really got off the ground.. or in the ground. Either way, I did manage to get one lonely squash plant seedling planted, and it yielded a single ENORMOUS Boston Marrow Squash. Well hey, I wasn’t going to let that go to waste, so I scooped out the seeds and set out to make the largest batch of squash soup ever. It ended up working out really well for soup – the squash has lots of flavor and is pretty sweet, almost like a pumpkin on steroids. I added some local cheese to thicken up the texture, saving some for the top as well, and paired it with a mug of Asian Pear cider. A pretty simple meal, but that squash is a big winner. Maybe next year, I’ll have a few more!

Squash Soup:
Boston Marrow Squash – My Garden
Cheese – Birchrun Hills
Asian Pear Cider – North Star Orchard
Non local – salt, pepper

One Local Summer

One Local Summer 2012 – Week 26

By Sheetar 9 November 2012 4 November 2012

I’m still sometimes not sure how I manage half a year of doing this. And it might be more than half a year, but TWENTY-SIX weeks of blogging about making one meal each week using only locally grown food. The number of different things we’ve done, the amount of gas saved from not having to transport produce/meat from another part of the country, the amazing quality of the meat and produce, the neat things that we can find at our farmer’s market that we can’t find in grocery stores, the challenge of cooking (for me, it’s a challenge anyway), the rewards of the healthy food. All of it. If you’re reading this, it’s probably preaching to the choir, but I’m proud of it anyway. So, we’ll call this the last week of One Local Summer for 2012, and we’ll return the blog to genealogy and fiber arts, and some neglected posts on travel for the winter.

This meal is pumpkin soup with some toast. The pumpkin was a long necked pumpkin which I chopped up and roasted in the oven for about a half hour. I took a container of chicken stock (from boiling wings for chicken wings, also local!) and brought that to a boil on the stove. Added in the pumpkin which was now nice and tender, and let it simmer until I could get the immersion blender (BEST KITCHEN TOOL EVER) into the pot and mush things down. Then I added leeks, sage, some salt and pepper, and some curry seasoning to the mix. Ran it through another go-around with the immersion blender and let it simmer a little while longer. Finally, added some goat’s milk yogurt at the end to make it creamy, and topped the whole thing off with fresh goat cheese, a sharp chevre. I really love the blend of the tangy goat’s milk yogurt and cheese with the curry. Finally, I added a slice of toast (the ingredients aren’t local, but the bakery is!) topped with hot pepper jam made by a friend. If I remember correctly, the peppers were grown locally. The whole thing was delicious and the perfect meal for a chilly fall day.

Pumpkin Soup:
Long Necked Pumpkin: Charlestown Farm
Sage – My Garden
Goat’s Milk Yogurt – Shellbark Hollow
Chevre – Shellbark Hollow
Leeks – My Garden
Toast – St Peter’s Bakery
Hot Pepper Jam – A friend, who told me it was made with local peppers.
Non Local – Salt, Pepper, Curry

One Local Summer

One Local Summer 2011 – Week 21

By Sheetar 1 November 2011 1 November 2011

This week, the husband is back home and cooking! He made chicken wings (from our favorite local chicken vendor) the night prior which involves boiling the wings and then finishing them to crispy perfection on the grill. But that’s not what this post is about. The broth left behind from boiling the wings is perfect for soup! Add in some carrots, celery, onions, sage, garlic, cilantro, sausage, and turnips, let simmer for a while, and VOILA! SOUP! It’s gotten colder, and I just love soup season, mostly because the husband is such a fantastic soup chef.

Sausage and Vegetable Soup:
Italian Turkey Sausage – Mountain View Organics
Smoked Pork Sausage – Countrytime Farm
Carrots – North Star Orchards
Garlic – Jack’s Farm
Celery – North Star Orchards
Sage – Jack’s Farm
Cilantro – Jack’s Farm
Turnips – Jack’s Farm
Potatoes – Jack’s Farm
Onions – Hoagland Farm
Smoked Sea Salt – Pureblend Tea
Chicken Broth – Mountain View Organics (from chicken wings)
Bread – St. Peter’s Bakery
Wine – Sand Castle Winery

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