Eggplant

Pin-Up Girl Eggplant - A Savory Dish for those Purple Beauties

I don't know about you, but I find it virtually impossible to walk by an eggplant and not pick it up. They are just so beautiful. The heft, the mysterious deep purple skin, the smooth contours just speak to me. They are the plump and saucy pin-up girls of the vegetable world and I am always seduced. I had visions of creamy curries and crusty parmesans as I filled my basket with one, two, OK, three too many at the Kingfield Farmers Market on Sunday. But as much as the aubergine beauties might have been calling to me from my kitchen counter, the last honeyed days of summer were calling me even more.
Instead of hopping on the computer and hungrily searching my favorite food blogs for recipes, I went for a long and lazy late afternoon swim at Lake Harriet. My son and I swam way far out past the buoys until we could barely recognize the rest of our tiny family on shore.
Read more »

Taste a Little More Summer with an End-of-Summer Panzanella Salad

I don’t even want to say it out loud, for fear it will come true, but does any one else feel like summer is... gulp... over? These dreary days, these gusty winds, these cool temperatures speak of change, of autumn, of... double gulp... winter. Mother Nature has decided that this year, she’s going with the rip-off-the-band-aid approach to seasonal change and she’s not messing around.

Read more »

A No-Hype Guide to What's Ripe

Can you pick up a tomato and sniff it to know that it’s ripe? What about a sweet pepper? Or a cucumber? In reality, there is no such thing as a “ripe” scent. Truth be told, you need more of a knack than your nose to know what’s ripe and when to buy it, so you won’t be throwing it away tomorrow.

As I’ve written before, I used to work as a farm hand for an organic vegetable farm. So I have a pretty good idea when a vegetable is ripe and ready to bring home to your kitchen.

Summer Squash

Read more »

This Week's Farmshare: More Local Organic Food Goodness

Is it possible to miss a bag of mixed salad greens? We've been getting them from our Harmony Valley Farmshare like clockwork, but this week, we're bag-o-mixed-salad free (fortunately, we've still got a bag of spinach). I'm totally okay with that, mostly because I've been eating tomatoes like a crazy person, thickly layered on my hummus sandwich nearly every day for lunch. I've also taking to grilling just about everything that comes, including cauliflower, which is fantastic with olive oil, black pepper, and sea salt. I haven't tried my celeriac yet, but I'm hoping to this week, especially now that I know I can grate it and fry it up like a potato pancake.

Read more »

What Will I Get From My Minnesota/Wisconsin CSA?

hv-header1 My friend Jim suggested this post, and I'm glad he did. He's apprehensive about joining a CSA; he seems especially concerned that he'll end up with 200 boxes of radishes. Here's a month-by-month listing (from the Harmony Valley Farm website) that lists the vegetables (and occasional fruits) that will be coming from the Harmony Valley Farm CSA, located in Wisconsin.

Read more »
Syndicate content