Rhubarb

I have a confession. I am a fruitaholic. I can live on fruit. Any kind, doesn't matter. "Five a Day", not a problem. I am a particular sucker for the summer fruits - the berries, peaches, plums, melons, etc. Seldom, however, do I eat these fruits out of season. In my opinion the quality is terrible and they just aren't worth the price when you buy summer fruits in the middle of winter. So when they show up at the farmers' markets, I go nuts. Strawberries are just coming into abundance and the first of the cherries have shown up at our local farmers' market, but we are still waiting on the rest. Fortunately, there is rhubarb. Just when I think I can't wait any longer for something other than apples and pears, rhubarb comes into season.

We can still find a bit of rhubarb at our local market, so I've been loading up and canning away. The first batch of jam had to be thrown away after I discovered my candy thermometer broke in the pot - devastating! But today I managed to preserve seven lovely jars of the most delicious rhubarb-ginger jam. Jam is so easy to make, its a great introduction to canning. Canning is intimidating, but not at all difficult. I recommend the following book....



"Ball Complete Book of Home Preserving" edited by Kingry and Devin

Along with a ton of interesting recipes it provides very easy to follow instruction on home preserving. I also find the USDA's website useful. Canning is relatively straight forward, but you'll want to do your reading before starting and follow reliable recipes, as this affects the ultimate safety of your preserves. As a side note, this is not a kid-friendly activity. There is just too much boiling hot, spattering liquid around. Plus it is a process that requires your undivided attention. I always can when my daughter is asleep.

Anyways, rhubarb jam, you've got to make some. Fabulous! Without much effort we'll be able to make more than enough jam for the year along with some to share with friends.

I had a bit of extra rhubarb left over from the jam, so this morning I stewed it for a little less than 10 minutes with some sugar and lemon juice, then added it to our oatmeal. Delicious! I think I'll try this again with some fruit juice or honey instead of sugar.



More on these fabulous berries later...

A Few Deliciously Simple Meals

I generally am not one to take shortcuts in the kitchen - I just enjoy cooking from scratch too much. But some shortcuts are just too good not to use. I had discovered a great shortcut for making ravioli a few years back, but had forgotten about it until recently. The Asian rice paper wrappers you can find at just about any grocery store are great for making ravioli and dumplings. The fillings are limited only by your imagination. We made a deliciously sweet filling of butternut squash. Just roast a butternut squash, mash it, and season to taste with cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, Parmesan cheese, and salt and pepper. Moisten a wrapper with water, place about a tsp of filling in the center, fold and press the edges, and set aside on a lightly floured plate. Gently boil a few ravioli at a time in a large pot of salted water for a few minutes (they float when done) and enjoy immediately with a sauce of your choice. We melted some butter with garlic and fresh rosemary from the garden. Fabulous!

With all the greens, scallions, and mushrooms available at the Farmers' Markets, I plan on making some more Asian flavored dumplings soon.

Although easy to make, the preparation can be a bit time consuming. But you can make enough for several meals and simply freeze the extras. Just place them on a lightly floured sheet pan and freeze until solid. We now have several easy meals ready to go in the freezer. This is definitely going to be one of my new favorite ways to set aside some of our summer garden excess for those rainy winter days.



Here's a great recipe using the lovely spring greens, carrots, and mushrooms now available at the Farmers' Markets. This was super easy and a really light, warming spring meal. Its from one of my new favorite cookbooks....

"Bob's Red Mill Cookbook"

This book is full of really easy, nutritious meals. I highly recommend it.

Mushroom and Barley Soup with Spring Greens

Ingredients:

• 6 cups of stock
• 2 cups of mushroom stock
• 1 large onion, finely diced (or a handful of green onions)
• 2 large carrots, finely diced
• 4 cloves of garlic, chopped
• 2 bay leaves
• 1 lb mushrooms (any combination)
• 2 cups of cooked barley or bulgur
• 2 large bunches of spring greens (bok choy, chard, spinach, or mustard greens), sliced into thin ribbons or bite-size pieces

Directions:

• Bring the stock to a simmer in a large soup pot. Add the onions, carrots, garlic, and bay leaves. Allow to simmer until the carrots start to become tender.
  
• Add the mushrooms and continue to simmer until the vegetables have reached the desired consistency, about 5-15 minutes.
  
• For the last few minutes add the greens, just cooking lightly.
• Spoon the cooked grains into warmed soup bowls and ladle the soup over the top.
  

Return of the Farmers' Markets

One of my favorite things about Portland is the abundance of Farmers' Markets. There are a few that go year round, but this week marked the beginning of most. It seems that almost every neighborhood has one, making it easy to find a nearby market 7 days a week. I absolutely love Farmers' Markets. To me they represent what food shopping should be all about. You support local businesses, connect with the producers of your food, and generally enjoy the experience rather than dreading the chore of going to the store. So I celebrate the return of Farmers' Markets by saying good-bye to the grocery store.

This evening was the opening day of our little neighborhood market. My daughter and I spent over three hours there! Our shopping was done within 20 minutes, but it was such a lovely evening that we just didn't want to leave. So I bought a basket of strawberries, some fresh bread and local cheese, and set up camp on the grass near the calypso band. Within seconds my daughter had her shoes off and had joined the large group of children partly dancing, partly running through all the picnickers, stopping by just long enough to grab another handful of berries - which she seemed to do from every family she passed by. I feel fairly confident that she prefers these shopping experiences to being tied down in a shopping cart. Next time you are at your Farmers' Market, stop and people watch for awhile. As people buy their food for the week, they are strolling, not rushing, conversing with the vendors rather than simply answering, "credit or debit?", their children are happy, they run into friends, and the whole atmosphere is festive rather than stressful. I plan on making this my normal shopping experience rather than the exception.

Learning to shop the Farmers' Markets (and I mean really shop, not just pick up a few things for fun) takes practice. We have become so accustomed to having whatever produce we want year round. This is a skill I'm still working on. It can be particularly difficult in the spring, when there isn't much available beyond the early spring greens like kale and chard. Today's finds included swiss chard, kale, bok choy, sugar peas, butter lettuce, and radishes. I was pleasantly surprised to find some early zucchini.


I am always super happy when I make it to the market early enough to get some eggs - these go fast! Just look how beautiful these are!




This is a great book for the Farmers' Market shopper as well as the backyard gardener...

"The Victory Garden Cookbook" by Marian Morash

This lovely book is organized by fruit / vegetable. So lets say you happen to find an abundance of chard and kale at the Farmers' Market but have no idea what to do with it. This book outlines the basics of storage and preparation as well as providing more than a few simple, flexible recipes using each particular vegetable. It even gives tips on growing your own if you are so inclined.

My eventual goal is to purchase a small share of a CSA to supplement our garden for all our produce needs. But until then, you'll find me at least once a week at a local Farmers' Market.

Expectations

One of my current cooking goals is to make all my family's "convenience food". The snacks, the frozen dinners, the stuff you grab when you need something quick and easy. Making them myself is healthier, cheaper, and one more way for us to stop supporting the industrial food system that makes me cringe.

I figured I'd start with the easy stuff, like crackers and granola bars. Today I made multi-seed crackers from one of my favorite baking books.....

King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking

Finding the time and energy to make these delicious snacks has not been the hard part. Its surprising how much of the week's baking you can get done in one short afternoon. What has surprised me is how much my expectations of what food should look and taste like has been shaped by the boxed foods available at the market. I feel like if all my crackers are not a perfectly uniform shape, size, and color, I must have done something wrong.

This is not what crackers from a box look like....


Granted, appearances, taste, and texture will improve with more practice. But really, these crackers are delicious. More and more I am realizing that making your own food from scratch requires a rethinking of what exactly real food is.

PS. My new favorite thing to eat on crackers, toast, sandwiches, right out of the container, is homemade yogurt cheese. Its like a very tangy cream cheese. This is fool-proof.

Yogurt Cheese

1. Start with plain yogurt, either full or low fat works. I haven't tried non-fat, but it probably would work to.
   
2. Scoop the desired amount into a piece of butter muslin or very-fine weave cheese cloth. About 2 cups is usually enough for the week for my family.
3. Tie up the corners and hang the bag with the yogurt over the sink or a bowl for 12-24 hrs.
   
4. Remove from the cheese cloth and enjoy! Refrigerate.
5. Be creative, add any herb combination that strikes your fancy.
   

Fresh Bread - Quick and Easy

My husband and I are passionate about food. The kitchen is without question the center of our home. I also firmly believe that one of the greatest tragedies of our modern American culture is the general lack of importance we place on our food and food production. It is no secret that in general American's have horrible diets, with poor health, rapidly deteriorating natural resources, increasing food costs, and ever growing concern over food security and safety a direct result.

Long ago we gave up the highly processed, "quick-and-convenient" diet that has become the norm and replaced it with a vegetarian, cooked-from scratch menu. We don't count calories, worry about our cholesterol or fat-intake, stress over whether or not we are getting enough fiber and whole-grains, or need to supplement with endless bottles of vitamins and fortified foods. A plant-based, diverse diet takes care of all that for us.

However, very little of our food comes from local or organic sources. This does not sit well with me. I love farmer's markets and 100% believe that buying local, organic food makes a measurable impact on both our family's and community's health. But we just can't afford it. I want to change that.

I figured one of the easiest ways for me to start was by baking our own bread. We easily consume a loaf / week of your standard sandwich bread. I've aspired to baking all our bread for sometime. Our shelves are filled with lovely, quality books on artisan and whole-grain baking. But it was always so much work! And then, I found this....

The breads in this book are all based on the slow-rise method. Which means they are really easy and I haven't failed at one yet. It's like making muffins. I throw all the ingredients in a bowl (takes all of 10 minutes) and let them rise overnight.


Just give it a quick stir and toss them in some bread pans - no fancy shaping, no need to worry about deflating the dough....

Let rise for a few more hours, bake while you and the kids are eating lunch, and bingo! Fresh bread for the week. It takes the same amount of time to make one loaf as two, so I make two and throw one in the freezer. So easy!

Just to make sure this was worth it, I did a little rough math at the store today. At my local big-box discount market, a loaf of whole-grain organic bread costs $3.70 / loaf. I can bake the same bread with local, organic flour for roughly $1.75 / loaf. The price drops even further if I just buy some bulk flour from the same discount market. Yes, it's true, you can buy a loaf of bread for less. But it is most likely full of preservatives and additives, has no redeeming nutritional value, and in my opinion doesn't taste nearly as good.


But here's the secret to truly great bread. Store it in your Grandmother's bread box, so every time you need a few slices, you are reminded of your Grandma's kitchen and then your Mom's kitchen, and you can look forward to the day your daughter is reminded of your kitchen when she is baking bread for her future family.