Put Up or Shut Up: Episode 1 - Greens

My CSA box this week contained:

Lettuce, basil, snap peas, squash, zucchini, kale, cucumbers, radishes, broccoli, spinach, bok choy, and eggs.

So many leafy greens!

Here is a riddle that I have heard:

Q: What is the only fruit or vegetable that is not frozen, dried, pickled, or preserved in any way?
A: Lettuce

This riddle is false per my kitchen this year.

I know last year I was trying to figure out what to do with additional lettuce.  I wilted some of it like a bitter green.  It was pretty bad.

But lettuce is one of those things that just keeps coming.  And it starts far before the rest of your salad ingredients are ready to pick.  And if you don't keep up with it, it turns bitter and gross.  I know that my CSA box has recently been packed with it in all it's forms, coming faster than I can use it.  And that doesn't include the lettuce that's quickly turning bitter in my garden.  Lettuce, beet greens, Swiss chard, bok choy, spinach, arugula, not to mention the mint and oregano that is quickly taking over by back yard...

So what do you do with it all?  I hate waste.

I have tried blanching and freezing spinach.  It's an option, but frankly I don't feel like it thaws out well enough that I ever really want to eat it.  It's good for stuff that frozen spinach goes in to, like a spinach  dip (and who doesn't love a good spinach dip), but that's really about it.  It's certainly not something that I would just eat as a side dish for dinner - especially when some of the vendors at the winter farmer's market have spinach growing in their greenhouses almost all year long.

I was watching the Cooking Channel, and Alton Brown was making Pistachio and Mixed Herb Pesto.  This got me thinking about spinach pesto, and arugula pesto, both of which I have eaten and which taste good.  Which was a light bulb moment for me: you can make pesto out of any leafy green.

Even lettuce.

(I talked about and provided my lettuce pesto recipe here.)

And once pesto is made, it is easily frozen and lasts up to a year.  Meaning lettuce can be frozen and saved for later!

My basic pesto recipe is:

• 2 tbsp toasted nuts
• 2 tbsp garlic
• 2 cups green stuff
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 2 tbsp shredded cheese

Process nuts, garlic, and greens in a food processor until combined into a thick paste, but not past the point where you can still see flecks of individual ingredients.  Slowly add the olive oil while continuing to process.  Add the cheese when ready to serve.

It should look kind of like this

The good thing about this recipe is that two cups of any leafy green is not really a lot.  This is basically the tops of any bunch of veggies you might pick up.  No, those tops are not garbage!  If you're paying by the pound, you paid for those tops!  So you might as well get as much as you can out of them.  If they're fresh and you're in the mood, saute them up and serve them for dinner.  But, if you don't have time, why not take 5 minutes (that's really all this recipe takes) and turn them into some pesto that you can use later.

Here are a few examples:

I thinned my carrots and turned the carrot greens into pesto.  I used walnuts instead of pine nuts because walnuts go into carrot cake.  I wish that I had planted more carrots so I had more greens to thin.  If you've never had carrot greens, they're definitely lightly carrot flavored, but also have a serious grass/clover flavor to them.  Like good grass.  Like when you're a kid and you chew on a long stalk of grass.  Combined with the walnuts which are a little sweet, I felt this was done without the cheese.  I also did not add any garlic (I know, shocking, right?!?)  I got only one serving, which I have not made into a meal yet, but I am waiting to pair it with something with a strong flavor like beef.  I'm thinking this would be a great topping to a steak sandwich.  Last summer (after scouring the internet and deciding they were not poisonous), I put  my carrot tops into my chicken stock.  In retrospect, I think that was a waste.   This is how I'm using my carrot tops from now on.

Next came beet greens.  I again used the walnuts, because I bought too many for the carrots and I didn't want to hang on to them.  I also found a fair number of beet and walnut salad recipes on the internet, so I figured they had to be a good pairing.  When I tasted it, I wanted it to be just a little sweeter.  The beets are sweet, but I didn't think this carried through in the beet green pesto.  It was confusing.  Are you sweet?  Are you not sweet?  Pick one and go with it!  So I ran to the store and picked up some maple candied macadamia nuts.  Pricy?  Yes.  Amazing?  Also yes.  These are sold in bulk at my local natural foods store and they are absolutely my favorite snack that I cannot afford.  So I used you good readers as my excuse to purchase far more than I needed which I will be taking to work to eat there.  Taste wise, the first was fair, the second amazing.  Appearance wise, both were a little lacking.  Beets bleed.  They make a mess of my hands and cutting board and counter every time I cook them.  The greens, while mostly green, contain some of the color and all of the bleeding in their stems.  When this was split in the food processor, the red color went everywhere, combined with the green leaves, and mostly looked brown.  Still delicious, but I wouldn't recommend this for your fancy food party.

Then arugula with pine nuts, and spinach with almonds.  Spinach/almond is my favorite, because it just feels so healthy!

Last but not least, mint pesto.  I used the traditional pine nuts, but any of the other options would work too.  This is some serious stuff, and I wouldn't recommend using it straight up in a pasta.  A better choice again would be a spread on a sandwich, or maybe an accompaniment to some fish or lamb.

For a quick dinner, I made some beef, zucchini, mushroom, and potato shish kabobs.  I boiled the potatoes first so they were almost completely cooked, seasoned everything with salt and pepper, then threw the skewers on the grill for about 3 minutes per side.  I was lucky enough to receive some tenderloin tips for kabobs along with my beef purchase, but you could really make these with any kind of beef.  Or lamb.  Or chicken.  Or shrimp...

The finished product. You can still see the individual little bits

Mint Pesto DipMakes enough to freeze for later

• 2 tablespoons pine nuts
• 2-3 large garlic cloves, roughly chopped
• 2 cups mint leaves, washed
• 1/4 cup olive oil

 Heat a large, heavy skillet over medium high heat (no oil).  Add pine nuts, and toast,stirring frequently, until pine nuts start to smell extra nutty and get just a little brown.  Be careful, when they go they go fast.  If you burn them, throw them away and start over!

Remove the toasted pine nuts from the pan immediately (if you leave them in there, they will keep cooking!), and add to the bowl of a food processor.  Add garlic cloves, and process for 4 to 5 short pulses, until the nuts and garlic are just broken up.

Add the mint, and continue to process, until you have a mixture that resembles a flecked counter top - it's consistent in it's appearance, but you can still see the individual pieces that make up the pesto.  Add the olive oil and process for two or three more short pulses to combine.

Dip your kabob meat and vegetables into the pesto.  It is also excellent as a spread on some good crusty bread.


Lettuce Pesto
(Reprinting, just to have them all together)

• 2 tbsp pine nuts
• 2 tbsp garlic scapes,
• 2 large hand-fulls of lettuce, washed and dried
• 1 tbsp finely grated Parmesan cheese 
• 1/4 to 1/2 cup olive oil

Toast the pine nuts as above.

Meanwhile, coarsely chop the garlic scapes.  Add the garlic to the pine nuts in the food processor, and process as above

Add the lettuce (I needed to add lettuce in two batches, because it didn't fit in my food processor bowl.  This is perfectly fine.) and process until the lettuce is just broken down into small pieces. should still be able to see individual bis of lettuce, nut, and garlic.  Continue to process, adding olive oil in a slow stream.  How much you use will depend on what you are using your pesto for - a spread will get less oil, while a pasta sauce will need more.

I recommend serving this on a cold pasta salad, because when warm it tastes a little like warm lettuce, which is weird.

Beet Green Pesto
(The ratios are changed up a little here to emphasize the sweet flavor of the beets)

• 2-3 tbsp maple macadamia nuts
• 1 tbsp garlic scapes
• 1/4 cup sweet Italian basil
• 2 cups beet greens, stems removed
• 1/2 cup olive oil

Combine nuts and garlic in a food processor, and process as above (no toasting this time).

Add basil and beet greens, and process as above.

Slowly add in olive oil, and continue to process until combined.

While not particularly pretty, this was a delicious, light, and sweet pesto.  I would recommend it with pasta and seafood.  I'm thinking along the lines of some angel hair pasta mixed with the pesto, topped with grilled beet slices and maple bacon wrapped scallops.

That will have to be dinner very soon!

Gardening 401: Advanced Independent Study in Farming

Happy Solstice a little late!  I hope that this summer is off to a great start for you, and that you're starting to get the best vegetables that summer can offer.  It's still a little early for tomatoes (at least in Wisconsin), but the zucchini have started to explode, and despite a rough spring the cherries are coming in.  I've also seen some farmers with broccoli, which seems a little early to me but I'm not complaining!

I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to head out to the Rhine Center Vegetable Club two weeks ago, to spend a day working on their farm.  Some people, I recognize, may not consider this an "opportunity."  They might consider it in fact hard work, and me a sucker for doing it.  I disagree.

The farm.

As you might have noticed, I consider myself somewhat of an avid gardener.  I would say my garden plot is bigger than the average city dwellers, and it's supplemented with containers throughout my yard and house.  That being said, I was shocked at the amount of time that it takes to work a true farm when you're not using big machines, pesticides, and migrant labor.  I spent about the first five hours of my seven hour day thinning and weeding the beets.  Jess and Sam (the real farmers) were planting a new field that they hadn't used in the past, and they weren't sure how fertile it was, so they triple seeded the beets.  Unnecessary, because the beets came in just fine.  However, if the plants were just left as is, it would have meant that the beet roots would be too crowded, and the beets would not grow in as big round bulbs.  Instead, they'd just be roots.  So, we had to go down the lines, find patches of overcrowded beets, carefully select the plant that appeared to have the smallest root (which of course you couldn't really see), pull it up, snip off the root, and save the greens to go out in boxes to the CSA members.

Beets

Rows and rows and rows and rows (actually four rows) of beets

It was hot.  I actually picked far more beet greens than this, but they got snatched away faster than I could take a picture to keep them from wilting.

The rest of my time was spent harvesting and trimming kohlrabi, and picking kale.  The kale was actually my favorite, because the wilty and otherwise less than pretty leaves went over to the pigs for a snack.  I enjoy pigs, both in person and in my belly, and these guys were especially friendly.  They did, occasionally, appear to want to eat my feet, and I had to remind them that this was backwards - I eat them not the other way around.

Kohlrabi and Kale

Nom nom nom...

This is a pig who appreciates his veggies!

I'm sure that some of you are finding this disturbing.  These are happy, living creatures, snorting around eating their kale, and I'm thinking about eating them.  Cruel.  On the other hand, though, they do have a happy life.  And that happy life is paid for by my future consumption of them.  These pigs have, in my opinion, a much happier and healthier life than than their Wild Boar counterparts.  They have land to roam free, all the kale (and plenty of other goodies) that they can eat, fresh water, and medical care if needed.  And, they're not at risk of being hunted by tigers (wild boar are the main and preferred food source for tigers in the regions where they co-exist, and tigers have been known to chase boars for longer distances than other prey), wolves (a single wolf pack can consume an average of 50-80 wild boars annually, and in Italy wild boars have become so defensive against wolves that they have been known to attack domesticated dogs), and hyenas.  Baby boars are food for pythons, large birds of prey, large cats, dingos (dingos ate my boar baby!), large bears, and crocodiles. (Source: Wikipedia, of course!)

So if I don't eat them, someone will.

Like this guy.  He will eat the pig if I don't get to it first!

Seriously, though.  I'm not going to become a vegetarian.  I respect the views of people who are vegetarians, just as I respect the views of anyone who is making a conscious effort to think about what they eat - whether it be for their own health, environmental reasons, or moral reasons.  Thinking about what you eat is good.  I personally believe that meat is an important part of the human diet.  We are, omnivores by nature.  No, it is true that we do not need to be, but our digestive system is set up to process meat and vegetables.  Looking at people who eat the "Paleolithic Diet" or "Caveman Diet," they are mimicking the eating habits of our hunter-gatherer ancestors, who were just that: HUNTER-gatherers.  (Please do not read this as my advocating for the Paleo diet.  While it's interesting, and again a good way to be paying attention to what you eat, I think it's a little bit silly to take in calories like early humans when we are not expending calories like them.  Every time you get in your car, don't hunt your own food, don't forage for your own veggies, etc. you are taking a step further away from what early humans did, so your caloric needs are going to be different.  Plus, the Paleo diet forbids alcohol, which is just inconceivable in my mind.)  What is important to me is knowing that the animal that sustains me was likewise sustained.  I have heard some of my more passionate vegan friends say that eating meat is slavery for the animals.  While I can see where they are coming from, I see it more as a symbiotic relationship.  I am as dependent on that animal for survival as they are to me.  I feed them, care for them, and water them, and in return they sustain me.  The quality of sustenance I receive from them is equal to the care that they receive.  Happy food just tastes better.

Most local farmers - at least the local farmers I know in Wisconsin - appreciate having people out to their farm.  This is their job, but it is also their passion and their art.  They are proud of it.  Farming is a dying skill, which is terrifying because without farmers there is no food.  But, really, how many of your friends wanted to be a farmer when they grew up?

These people might have wanted to be farmers when they grew up.  They're kick ass farmers now, regardless.

So, I highly recommend spending a day on a farm.  It's hard work, but I promise you will leave feeling satisfied.  If you get a CSA, often times the farmer will allow you to pay some of your share cost in labor.  Some even offer "Worker's Shares," in which your CSA share is paid for or supplemented by your commitment to put in a certain amount of time at the farm each week or month.  I took away from my visit a sense of accomplishment, a renewed energy for my passion in local food, a sunburned knee (just one...), and the knowledge that I was going to get a hell of a good sleep that night!  I also had the opportunity for a truly amazing lunch with my hosts, and got to learn more about the people who are kind enough to feed me every week. It's nice to realize your food comes from somewhere other than the shelves of a grocery store, or a truck before that, or a distribution center before that.  And it's also nice to think about the amount of work that goes into creating your food.  I know for me, it renewed my commitment to waste as little food as possible.  Those beet tops, the carrot greens, the green shoots the garlic sent up, those chicken livers and those pigs feet, they all took time and love and energy to create.  We should not be considering them garbage and tossing them away.

And, who knows, maybe you'll change your mind and want to be a farmer when you grow up!

Extra bonus recipe:

Early Summer Beet Green Risotto

• 6 cups chicken stock
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 large green onion, thinly sliced including tender green parts
• 1 garlic scape, thinly sliced
• 2 cups Arborio rice
• 1/4 cup white wine
• salt and pepper
• 3 cups thinly sliced beet greens

Bring the chicken stock to a gentle simmer.

In a large frying pan with high sides, heat the olive oil over medium high heat.  Add the onions and garlic, and saute just a few minutes until fragrant.  Add the rice and continue to cook, stirring constantly, for about five minutes.  The rice should be translucent with just a small white dot in the center.  Add the white wine, and cook, stirring constantly, until the wine has evaporated.  Reduce the heat to low.  Add the chicken stock about 1 cup at a time, stirring vigorously after each addition, and adding another cup when the rice is almost dry on top.  Season with salt and pepper.  Around the 4th cup you want to start tasting to see where your rice is in terms of doneness.  The rice should be just barely firm, and creamy (you may not use all 6 cups of stock).  Add the beet greens with the last addition of stock.

Now enjoy some pictures of happy chickens, pigs, and beets.  For the rest of my pictures (no, this is not all of them!), visit my Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/HomeGrownHomemade.  Consider giving us a like while you're there!:

 

 

 

 

 

A Giant Steak Can be Good for You!

Red meat is, okay, not the healthiest choice.  It's high in fat, high in cholesterol, and has been linked to colon cancer, breast cancer and Alzheimer.  What the hell?

On the other hand, it's high in iron (and I'm anemic, so that's a plus), zinc (which is good for the immune system), and protein.

I'm not a doctor.  (Oh, gosh, had you not realized that yet?  Seriously, I'm not.  From a medical perspective this website is even less helpful than WebMD - the Wikipedia of Medicine!), but here's my problem with studies on the negatives of red meat.  All the studies I've seen compare the "Western Diet" (burgers, french fries, fried chicken), to the "Mediterranean Diet" (fish, grains, olive oil).  Yeah, the Mediterranean Diet is going to win!  But, what if the problem isn't the red meat?  What if the problem is the fact that our meat is being fed crazy antibiotics and ground up animal byproducts and god knows what else.  What if the problem is that it's being cooked in pure trans fat?  There's too much to separate.

In the end, everything is bad for you.  Yeah, I'm probably going to die of cancer.  But I'm also going to die of cancer because I like to garden in a tank top without putting on sunscreen.  Or because there was asbestos in my high school.    Or because of the aluminum in my deodorant, or in my aluminum cans.  There's too much to worry about.  If we don't all die of cancer, it's probably only because the terrorists won.  I can try to be healthy, but that's the best I can do.

1 giant-ass T-bone.  My husband and I shared this for dinner.

And that's what this post is about.  It's about the fact that I have recently found that I really like steak.  It is about my desire, with that realization, to eat steak.  And it is about the fact that, when eating steak, my husband seems to think that bigger = better.

My realization about my love for steak was slow to come about.  I've said before that real meat - that is to say, local food from a local farm - tastes different than meat from a grocery store.  I didn't think I liked beef, unless it had been slow cooked to the point of melting in your mouth.  I didn't understand when people said that a steak melted in their mouth.  Steaks don't melt - they're chewy.  Like chewing on people, I have said in the past.  Too fleshy.

And then I realized, bad meat = bad.  Cheap meat = bad.  Processed meat with fillers and added solutions = bad.  Happy cow, killed humanely, processed properly and minimally, and prepared well = amazing.

I'm not worried about eating too much red meat.  Red meat is expensive.  If it's not, you probably shouldn't be buying it.  Try the real thing... or don't.  Once you do, you may never be able to go back.

I justify the cost of red meat, and the possible health consequences, by making sure the rest of the meal is full of healthy, inexpensive, vegetably choices. 

A good steak has it's own flavor.  The best recipe is this:

Take steak (L).  Season generously with salt and pepper, and maybe a little minced garlic (L).  Sear on a grill over high heat, until medium rare.  Cook it any more than that, and I will find you and punch you in the neck.

A good steak meal, in my mind, is about the side dishes.  They should complement the steak and fill you up.  I was very happy with both of these.  The salad was especially good, and even my husband - who I think tends to see salad mostly as a filler item - was really happy with it.  The greens were a last minute addition to the potatoes, but they were a little peppery and I really enjoyed them.  You can't tell so much from the pictures, but I used a combination of red, Yukon gold, and purple potatoes.

Still a lot of steak...

Grilled Beet Salad with Goat Cheese and Honey Vinaigrette

For the Vinaigrette:

• 3 tbsp minced shallots (L)
• 1/4 cup champagne vinigar
• 1/2 cup raw honey (L)
• 1 tsp mustard seeds
• 1 tsp fresh thyme (L*), minced
• 1 clove garlic (L), minced
• 3/4 cups extra virgin olive oil
• Salt and Pepper

For the salad:

• 2 lbs whole beets (L)
• 1/4 cup water (L)
• 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
• 4 sage leaves (L*), minced
• 3 sprigs time (L*), minced
• 1 sprig rosemary (L*), minced
• 1 bayleaf
• salt and pepper
• mixed greens (L)
• Cherry tomatoes, sliced in half or quartered (L*)
• Crumbled goat cheese (L)

Combine dressing ingredients and shake vigorously.  


Wash well and chop beets into 1/2 inch pieces (I learned there is no need to peel them).  Place into the center of a large piece of aluminum foil and fold up the edges to make a "boat."

The first piece of foil I used was too small :(

 Pour in water, olive oil, sage, thyme, rosemary, bay leaf, and salt and pepper.  Fold up to create a "packet."  Grill packet over medium high heat, until beets are cooked through and soft, about 30 minutes.  Top mixed greens with beets, tomatoes, and goat cheese, and dress with honey vinaigrette.  The dressing saves well, but you will need to pull it out of the fridge at least 30 minutes before serving, because the olive oil will congeal.

Beets in their packet

Finished salad.  So pretty!

Pan Fried Potatoes with Beet Greens

• 1 lb potatoes (L) - I used a mix of Yukon, red, and purple, but you could use anything you wanted.  Unpeeled and cut into 1 inch pieces
• 2 tbsp butter (L)
• 2 cloves garlic, minced (L)
• Greens from 2 lbs beets, sliced into 1 inch strips (L)
• Salt and freshly ground pepper.

Place potatoes into a large pot, and just cover with cold water.  Salt water, and bring to a boil, cooking at a gentle boil until potatoes just start to be tender.  Drain.

Meanwhile, add butter to a large skillet and melt over medium high heat.  Add garlic, and saute for about two minutes.  Add potatoes and greens, and cook until greens are well wilted, and potatoes are cooked through and golden brown.  Season with salt and pepper to taste.