Featuring winter vegetables...

Yesterday's snowstorm in the DC area felt like the start of winter, despite what the calendar says. So tonight I made dinner featuring two classic winter vegetables: sweet potatoes and brussels sprouts.

The sweet potatoes were part of a black bean chili from Eating Well. Usually I find their recipes too bland, but this is one of my winter standbys. (This might have something to do with my secret ingredient—hot lime pickle from the Indian market, instead of ground chipotle.)

I used sweet potatoes that I picked up on the last day of the Mt. Pleasant farmers market. (Unfortunately, everything else was from the grocery store.)

I also made brussels sprouts for the first time, using a Mark Bittman recipe. I had intended to roast them, but this was faster and, as a bonus, called for butter.

I actually halved the brussels sprouts, even though the recipe calls for them to be cooked whole. I thought they were better halved, but Bittman does warn they are easier to overcook that way.

The only thing I really changed about the recipe is that I threw on some shallot pepper from Penzey's. I'm not sure if it really added anything, but I forgot I had it and wanted to use it on something.

I thought the brussels sprouts turned out really well. I've never been a huge fan, but I've tried them a few times roasted and now braised, and I'm liking them more and more. This was a really easy recipe, too, that will definitely be added to the winter rotation.

Sweet potatoes and caramelized onions

Okay, I am going to come right out and admit that this is not the most appetizing picture I have ever posted. But this recipe for sweet potatoes and caramelized onions is so, so good. And, it takes full advantage of produce in ample supply at the farmers markets.

The recipe is from The Kitchn. Here are two things I did differently:

1. I used a mix of sweet potatoes, mostly because of what I had on hand. I used a Japanese sweet potato, a white sweet potato (is there a difference? The texture felt a little different when it was raw...), and a regular orange sweet potato. I couldn't tell a difference in taste or texture once they were all cooked though.

2. I used three onions (one yellow and two sweet) rather than the two onions the recipe called for because, well, I read the recipe wrong. But you know what? The more caramelized onions, the better. (I added a bit of extra oil to compensate.)

I served this with salad, but obviously it's a great side dish. Tomorrow I will be having it with brown rice for lunch.

Lunch on a day off

Wow. It has been more than a month since I last posted. While I certainly have been cooking during that time, I definitely have been slacking on all-local meals.

That's not to say I have not been using local ingredients. I've made roasted Japanese sweet potatoes (which I procured at the Crystal City farmers market) with miso-scallion butter. I've made sesame-garlic soba noodles with fried local eggs. I've made cannellini beans with local kale and garlic. But I didn't post about any of those, because I felt like they didn't really count.

As winter approaches, it is going to become even more difficult to make entire meals from local ingredients (especially since I did not try my hand at canning this summer like I had planned). So I plan to keep featuring local ingredients in my meals, but I'm going to give myself much more slack on using store-bought ingredients.

Which brings me to today's lunch. I have the day off from work, so I decided to take advantage of actually being able to cook at lunch. I had a bowl of local yellow cherry tomatoes slowly dying on my countertop, so I roasted them (halved lengthwise) with olive oil, salt, and pepper. When they were done (or rather, when I was hungry—about an hour), I added a bit more olive oil and some chopped chives (another farmers market purchase that needed to be used pronto). This became the topping for some homemade pasta from Radius, a great restaurant in Mt. Pleasant a couple of blocks from my apartment.

The results: delicious. I wish all weekday lunches could be like this.

Local farmers

Okay, this is not a post about me cooking anything local. In fact, when I recently had a chance to bring a dish to a potluck baby shower for a friend who is a farmer, what did I bring? Store-bought hummus and pita. Busy Labor Day weekend.

But I did want to mention that said farmer friend was featured on Serious Eats' "Meet Your Farmers" series. Check it out!

(By the way, much of the produce at the baby shower was from my friend's Frog Bottom Farm. And it was delicious.)

A simple local meal

Okay, it's been a busy couple of weeks for me, and I haven't had much time to cook, much less post.

But I was inspired by my friend Brianne. She just traveled all over the U.S. and Europe and blogged about what she did and, most importantly, what she ate.

Some of the meals she ate in Europe were so simple yet sounded so delicious, featuring local produce, cheeses, breads, etc. Very Alice Waters—local ingredients at their peak prepared simply.

So I made a very simple lunch of Russian banana potatoes (which I had to buy just based on the name), a freshly hard-boiled egg (still warm!), a sliced heirloom tomato with salt and pepper, some blackberries, and a few pieces of cheese. The potatoes were boiled and then tossed with some local butter, salt, pepper, and garlic chives.

The meal was delicious. If only I had eaten it in Paris.

Two-day refried beans

Okay, the refried beans don't really take two days to make. But as usual, I under-estimated the amount of time it would take to cook the beans from dried, so by the time they were ready I had long since cooked and eaten some spaghetti for dinner. I was hungry.

But I finished the refried beans tonight, and they were delicious. A little dry, to be sure—I think I didn't use enough oil. But good.

I used Mark Bittman's recipe from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian. I'm feeling a little lazy, so I won't post the full recipe here. But essentially I sauteed some chopped onions in a neutral oil (I used sunflower), added a tablespoon of cumin, added three cups of cooked kidney beans, plus some diced pickled jalapenos and crushed garlic, and mashed them until my back hurt. Since it has been hurting since Friday, I think I probably quit a little too soon. Mark (yes, we are on a first-name basis) says some lumps are okay, but as you can see in the picture, my refried beans are quite chunky. But still, it was a very tasty dinner, seasoned with salt, pepper, and cayenne pepper; topped with a fried egg (look at that nice runny yolk!); and served with a large salad.

As I mentioned yesterday, although many of the ingredients were local (lettuce, cherry tomatoes, egg, onions, garlic...) enough were from afar that I am not considering this a One Local Summer entry. But still, I think it shows how often you can use local ingredients in recipes every day without much thought or effort.

A healthy local salad for lunch

On Saturday I had plans to go to a Korean barbecue for dinner. Though I wouldn't be partaking in the giant piles of pork and beef that are sliced thin and cooked on a tabletop grill, I still knew I would be eating a ton of food. So, I decided to have a light, easy lunch.

My salad was composed of baby lettuces from Truck Patch Farms topped by halved cherry tomatoes and sliced apricots. And sunflower seeds (my salad weakness) from Connecticut, so not too far away. I also used a seasoning blend called Salad Elegant from Penzey's—it includes paprika, parmesan cheese, poppy seeds, sesame seeds, etc.

On the side I had the last two slices of focaccia with some chipotle goat cheese from Cherry Glen. Unfortunately the focaccia was a bit too far past its prime—a little too dried out for my taste. So I ended up sort of working the goat cheese into the salad.

This was such a boring (though tasty) lunch that I hope it will not become my One Local Summer entry this week, but I am going to the beach this weekend, so my cooking opportunities will be limited.

Today I am "wasting" a potential cooking day by making some beans for Mark Bittman's vegetarian refried beans recipe (from his excellent book, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian. Making beans from scratch takes a while but it doesn't involve much hands-on work, and the payoff is great.

Plus, dried beans are so cheap. I am using about half a bag of kidney beans that cost me $2 from the Indian market. That and some chopped onion, a little bit of oil, salt and pepper, cayenne and cumin, and some diced jalapeno, and I have my refried beans. Top that with a fried egg and some cheddar cheese, with a salad on the side, and I have dinner. And actually everything I am using is local except for the beans themselves (and the oil and spices, of course). Not bad.

Eggplant caponata... sort of

This week at the Crystal City farmers market, I could not resist picking up a few small light purple globe eggplants. Last summer one of my favorite meals was grilled eggplant with caponata salsa, a la smitten kitchen. So I decided to put my adorable eggplants to use in a modified version of that recipe that does not include so many non-local items (olives, capers, etc).

Plus, I wanted to add cheese. I found this recipe for grilled eggplant with tomato goat cheese relish that got me closer to what I was envisioning. In the end, I just improvised.

I've never actually tried to write out a recipe, but here is basically what I did, with guesses at the measurements. This is enough for about three people, assuming you are serving other dishes as well.

Ingredients:

3 small globe eggplants (or you could use the long slim Japanese eggplants, which is what I usually do because I find them less bitter)
Olive oil (to brush on the eggplant)
Salt and pepper to taste

1 pint of cherry tomatoes (preferably a mix of colors—I used red and yellow), halved lengthwise (I cut some of the larger tomatoes in quarters)
1 large clove of garlic, crushed
1 jalapeno, diced
1/2 red onion, chopped fairly finely
Olive oil
Vinegar (I used the ramp vinegar I am so excited by, but I think red wine or balsamic would also work. Or even just lemon juice.)
Basil (I used a little bit of dried but fresh would be better)
Salt and pepper to taste
Goat cheese or another soft-ish cheese (maybe two ounces)

I would make the salsa first to allow for some flavor-mingling time. Combine all of the vegetables and mix well. If the proportions don't look quite right, feel free to add more tomatoes, more onion, etc. Add two parts olive oil to one part vinegar. I just guessed at this and ended up adding too much. Don't forget, like I did, that the tomatoes will give off a lot of juice. Start small—you can always add more if you need it.

Then add the basil (or other herbs—smitten kitchen uses fresh oregano but I am not a big fan) and the salt and pepper to taste. I'm sure there are many other things you could add to this salsa—some chopped bell pepper, maybe? Or you could go in a fruity direction and add peaches, which go well with tomatoes.

Set that aside and slice the eggplant evenly into half-inch slices. Brush with olive oil and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Grill the eggplant on a grill pan (or, I suppose, an actual grill), or just pan fry if you don't have a grill pan, as I do not right now.

Divide the slices evenly among the number of people you are serving (in my case, it was three people, three slices of eggplant each) and top with salsa and some crumbled goat cheese (or chopped cheese if you couldn't find goat cheese, as was the case for me. I used a really delicious cave-aged cheese called Chappelle from Chapel's Country Creamery in Maryland.

To round out the meal, I served focaccia from Quail Creek Farm with butter from Blue Ridge Dairy, and some totally non-local whole-wheat spaghetti with a light tomato sauce. I did make the sauce myself but the only local ingredient in it was the garlic. So we'll pretend that wasn't part of the meal for the purposes of this challenge. :)

Dinner tonight: Eggs in the 10th Circle of Hell

Tonight I had a (mostly) local dinner. My salad featured greens from Tree and Leaf Farm in Virginia, along with cherry tomatoes from Richfield Farm in Maryland, currants from Quaker Valley Farm in—you guessed it—Pennsylvania, and sunflower seeds from, well, Giant. What can I say—I really love sunflower seeds in salads. And hey, I just checked, and turns out they are from Connecticut!

I also made Eggs in Purgatory for the second time in a couple of weeks. Last time I was very lazy and used bottled sauce (Rao's Homemade Arrabiata, which I think is quite good) and a Thomas' English muffin. This time I made the sauce from scratch using this really simple recipe from smitten kitchen.

Everything I used was local, except for the crushed tomatoes themselves and the glug of red wine I poured in, which was accidentally quite generous. And, of course, the spices and oil. I used leftover Atwater's bread from brunch on Saturday, eggs from Groff's Content Farm, and garlic from Tree and Leaf. I am so glad garlic is back at the farmers markets. All winter I was so distressed by the sad state of garlic at both Harris Teeter and Whole Foods, and I could not wait until the summer when I could purchase decent garlic.

Cooking tip of the day: When you crack the eggs into your nicely reduced sauce, don't wander away and start catching up on blogs. You will overcook your eggs, which is exactly what I did last time I made Eggs in Purgatory too. This is why I have upgraded them to the 10th Circle of Hell, better known as the hell of hard, chalky yolks instead of nice, runny yolks. Still, it was a good meal, and very quick to throw together on a weeknight.

One local brunch

This weekend I invited two good friends over for a (mostly) local brunch. On the menu:

Mexican-style scrambled eggs. The recipe was from the Cherry Glen Goat Cheese Company, and is intended to use their chipotle goat cheese. However, they weren't at the Mt. Pleasant market this week (according to the weekly market email they are moving into a new ripening room), so I substituted Dragon's Breath cheese from Keswick Creamery—an equally spicy, though not as melty, cheese. All the ingredients I used in this were local except the tortilla chips and, of course, the salt and pepper. No red bell peppers at the market this week, so I used purple.

Home fries. Continuing the purple theme, I made home fries with purple potatoes, onion, garlic, cayenne pepper, smoked paprika, and canola oil. Colorful and delicious, even if they did take forever to cook. The spices are from Penzey's, a great source for fresh, inexpensive spices. (If you are in the DC area, there are locations in Falls Church and Rockville.)

Salad, with red currants from Quaker Valley Farm and sunflower seeds (not local). Despite my earlier taste test, I have decided I prefer the red currants to the pink. The flavor of the pink currants is too subtle (and they get soft and mushy sooner than a procrastinator like me would like). Speaking of currants, here is a recent article from the New York Times about the resurgence of these berries, particularly the black ones, which I have yet to see at the market. (Thanks, Marianne!)

Slow-roasted red and yellow cherry tomatoes from Richfield Farm with olive oil, salt, and pepper.

Melon. I wish I could remember what it was called. It had a yellow, smooth skin and a light green flesh. Anyone know? I believe it was also from Quaker Valley Farm.

Peasant wheat toast from Atwater's Bakery served with raspberry jam from Country Pleasures Farm, and butter (sadly, not local—I wasn't able to stop by Penn Quarter on Thursday to replenish my butter supply from Blue Ridge Dairy).

Mimosas. Well, it was brunch...

Pasta with broccoli and garlic

Today I stopped by the Foggy Bottom farmers market and was ecstatic when the first table I came to was selling fresh pasta. I was so in the mood for noodles, and Cavanna Pasta delivered. I bought a pound of whole-wheat fettuccine (and some anise biscotti as a birthday present for my former boss).

I also picked up about a pound of broccoli and, most exciting, some red and pink currants (there were also white currants, but the deal was two for $7). I asked the nice woman taking my money if there was a difference in the taste. "Yes," she said, then turned to help someone else. Hmmm.

So I brought the currants home and gave them a try. Based on a very small sampling, I think I like the pink ones better. They have a more subtle, fresh fruity taste. The red currants taste more tart, which normally I love, but the taste verged on bitterness. I'll have to give both another try in my yogurt tomorrow morning.

For dinner tonight, I decided to be a bit lazy. I chopped the broccoli into florets, threw it into boiling salted water, then added a half-pound of the pasta. Two minutes later (after I fished an errant piece of broccoli out from under the burner), I drained everything and started sauteing the garlic and some red pepper flakes in olive oil, then added the pasta and a bit of butter. (I would have used Blue Ridge Dairy butter, but apparently that has started getting moldy...) Finally, I added some salt and pepper and crumbled Cherry Glen goat cheese—which had also begun to get moldy, but I just cut that off.

I was a little nervous the broccoli was going to overcook since normally I dump it in an ice bath after blanching it, but it turned out perfectly (which means my leftovers will probably be mushy). All in all, it was a delicious and fast local meal.

Semi-local meals this week

My sister is visiting from Charleston, SC, this week. We have had a great time visiting the local farmers markets (Mt. Pleasant, U Street, Dupont), trying gooseberries, and cooking some semi-local food. In fact, she took the reins in the kitchen this week.

Last weekend, she made herself a lovely lunch of (store-bought) toasted English muffins topped with diced cheddar from Keswick Creamery and local green tomatoes sauteed with olive oil and salt and pepper. (I had leftover vegetarian bibimbap from a Korean restaurant in Annandale—tasty but not exactly local.)

She also made us a delicious lunch on Tuesday of shrimp pan-fried with olive oil, red pepper flakes, salt, and pepper. We ate that with a side of basmati rice (only white rice I have on hand!) and local zucchini and green tomatoes sauteed with butter, garlic, salt, and pepper. Man, those shrimp were good.

My new favorite snack

Gooseberries. Sort of a cross between grapes, raspberries, and sour candy. Delicious and addictive.

Local breakfast

Throughout the summer, my regular breakfast consists of some combination of yogurt and fruit. Starting with strawberries in the spring, moving on to blueberries (my favorite), raspberries, blackberries, apricots, peaches...

Usually I use yogurt from Blue Ridge Dairy, but they aren't at my usual markets. So yesterday I bought yogurt from Keswick Creamery from Pennsylvania. Their yogurt is thinner than Blue Ridge's but it has a great tart flavor. I'm looking forward to trying it out with the blueberries and cherries I got yesterday in Mt. Pleasant. I also got gooseberries, which I had never tried before—those I am looking forward to eating right out of the container.

Here is a patriotic version of my normal breakfast in honor of the Fourth of July—yogurt, blueberries, and the last of the season's strawberries.

Salad with ramp vinegar dressing (One Local Summer week 4)

Salads seemed like easy and natural meals that could be made with 100% local ingredients. After all, salads are flexible enough to include many different vegetables. And salad greens have been plentiful lately—I heard one farmer tell someone that all the rain we've been having lately has been very good for lettuces, though not as much for strawberries and cherries.

Where I was getting stuck was with the dressing. Oil is allowed in the challenge, but I needed a local acidic ingredient to mix with it. I'm sure I could have gotten away with using store-bought vinegar, but I managed to find ramp vinegar from a farm in West Virginia (Bigg Riggs Farm). Now, I'm sure that the vinegar they used to make this was store-bought as well, but it just seemed a little more in keeping with the challenge. Plus, I've never had ramps before. The purchase even seemed predestined since the vinegar expires on my birthday in 2011.

I started with a salad mix from my favorite produce vendor at the Mt. Pleasant farmers market, Tree and Leaf Farm in Loudon County, VA. I added some diced red onion, halved cherry tomatoes, sliced hard-boiled eggs (still warm from the pot, my favorite way to eat them), and some chopped sweet Italian peppers (which I actually thought would have a bit of a kick, despite being called "sweet," simply because they look like banana peppers, but no luck).

The dressing was very simple—three parts olive oil to one (more like 1.5) part ramp vinegar, plus salt and pepper. It was very flavorful despite the simplicity of the ingredients because of the oniony/garlicky flavor of the ramps.

You can see more pictures here, including a shot of the eggs before they were hard-boiled. One of them has a bluish-green shell! The vendor told me which kind of hens lay eggs of that color, but unfortunately I forget. Anyone know?

Local meal #3

All right, finally starting the new content! Though the meal I am about to describe was technically eaten on June 16.

I was determined to use the fava beans I bought the previous Saturday at the U Street market. Frankly, they were starting to get a little wrinkly. My plan was to make another, well, tartine, using roughly this recipe from Epicurious. However, I forgot that, for all of its convenience and charms, the Crystal City market has no dairy, therefore, no ricotta.

So, I improvised. Instead of ricotta, I used goat cheese. Instead of garlic (since there isn't really garlic at the market yet), I used diced red onion. And, I added golden beets just for fun.

What I ended up with was a colorful, messy group of open-faced sandwiches. They look lovely in this picture, but trust me, I was a mess by the time I finished. The beets were a little too bland just roasted and plopped on the sandwich, but otherwise it was a delicious meal that gave me an opportunity to use fresh fava beans for the very first time. Mission accomplished.

Oh, and I had a bowl of cherries for dessert--I believe they were from West Virginia. Here are a few more pictures.

Local meal #2

(This was originally posted on Facebook on June 13.)

Technically, this is local meal #3, but since I neither photographed nor wrote up a description of my last meal, I'm thinking it doesn't count. (In case you're curious, though, it was another tartine--same Atwater bread, same delicious goat cheese, but this time with sliced tomatoes and a side of strawberries.)

Today, I made a very simple potato salad with baby red potatoes, yogurt from Blue Ridge Dairy, chives, salt, and pepper. I had that with a slice of country white bread from Atwater, toasted with some butter from Blue Ridge.

And, I had a bowl of strawberries. I've learned my lesson about strawberries--eat them the day you get them, on the way home from the market if possible. They go bad so quickly...

I was able to visit two farmers markers today--Mt. Pleasant and U Street. At the U Street market I picked up some fresh fava beans, which I am so excited to use (any ideas?). I'm actually looking forward to the labor-intensive shelling, even. I just hope I got enough. I also got some kale that I am planning to saute with garlic and white beans sometime this week. That will definitely not count as a local meal, though, what with the canned beans.

Local meal #1

(This was originally posted on Facebook on May 30.)

Today was my first of (I hope) many meals made with 100% local ingredients. I am taking the One Local Summer challenge sponsored by Farm to Philly. Participants from across the country (and the world, apparently) are committing to make one meal each week that uses only local ingredients (exceptions: oil, spices, salt, and pepper). Oh, and then we write about it, and every Tuesday Farm to Philly posts regional summaries.

Though the challenge doesn't officially begin until Monday, I realized my lunch plan for today already met the criteria and so I am counting it. Perhaps I will make a bonus all-local meal later this week, but just in case I don't, I have this one in my pocket.

So for lunch today I had tartines (open-faced sandwiches) on toasted sourdough rye bread from Atwater's, goat cheese from Cherry Glen Goat Cheese Co. (which was so freaking good), thinly sliced radishes, chopped chives, purple chive blossoms, and salt and pepper. It was so pretty and colorful--I only wish my camera was working right now.

And, it was delicious. Sourdough rye was not my top choice of bread, but I got to the Mt. Pleasant farmers market too late to be choosy. I think the tartines would have been better with a milder bread like ciabatta. Between the bread and the fairly strong goat cheese, the radishes did not have the starring role I thought they would. But it was still tasty.

The goat cheese really was amazing. I chose Cherry Glen's Monocacy Silver variety, which comes with a "white mold exterior." I am not normally one to eat rinds, but this one was so good. I'm already thinking about what I will use next as a goat cheese delivery system.

Standard introductory post

Over the past couple of years, I have become a farmers market convert. I go to farmers markets not only in the summer, when they are awash with fruits and vegetables, but also all winter, when all you can get are potatoes, apples, and onions. This summer I have started going to between two and four markets a week in the DC area (it helps that I live within a block of the Mt. Pleasant farmers market and walk right by the Crystal City market on my way home from work on Tuesdays).

So, why is it that my reusable shopping bag is always full of such predictable produce? Tomatoes, berries, carrots, cucumbers, onions... I look longingly at other vegetables, from the rather exotic (fava beans, bok choy, garlic scapes) to the ordinary (cabbage, turnips, pattypan squash), but I almost never try anything new.

No more! I've started this blog in a way to publicly shame myself into trying all of the more interesting vegetables and other farmers market goodies. Also, I am participating in Farm to Philly's One Local Summer challenge, and I think I may be the only one without a blog, which is inconvenient. I had been posting on Facebook, but it's just not the same. To be honest I am also just looking for a summer project. I've never been able to handle free time very well.

By the way, I am not married to the name of this blog--any suggestions?