I just had to share these - credit goes to Nashville Scene Bites blog for pointing them out. I could spend hours just reading the comments (and dying of laughter the whole time). I give you the genius that is a Food Network chef
Late Night Bacon - Rachel Ray
Dark Chocolate as a Snack - Ellie Kreiger
English Peas - Paula Dean
Enjoy!
Today was a total weather tease in Nashville, 65 degrees, sunny and beautiful - just 3 days after snow (and likely, 3 days before it snows again, knowing our luck this year). It was wildly refreshing to get outside today and actually enjoy it. But man does it make me antsy for spring to really come. It has also become time for me to start researching our Summer CSA options. Bountiful Blessings only does the winter thing - so I have been on the hunt for another farm. I think that I have finally settled on Delvin Farms in College Grove TN, just about 40 minutes south of our house. Certified organic (which is a tough thing to accomplish) and they know our folks at Peaceful Pastures quite well (and we will definitely be signing up for the meat CSA again - and we have recruited some other friends to join as well. woohoo!)
Anyways, on the subject of spring time - the future fair weather has gotten me thinking through my game plan for this summer. What items do I want to focus on stocking up on for next winter, what do I want to try canning, etc. So for a little help with that - I give you the Seasonality Calendar. Obviously your seasonality might be a bit different than mine (especially if you are lucky enough to life in CA… jealous) so below is a link to a website which lists seasonality calendars by state. So find yours, start to learn when your favorite items are in their peak season, and get ready for spring!
http://www.fieldtoplate.com/guide.php
(If you are in Nashville - the Nashville Farmers Market also has a good one here, which the above website doesnt give you a link to)
What fruit or veggie are you most excited about this spring??
I dont know if I have ever been so excited for veggies in my life. Its been a month and a half…. plus….. since we have gotten fresh veggies. Again, cant exxaaccttllyy blame the farmer, have to blame this whacko winter we are having, but either way I am glad the veg is back.
I must admit, this weeks delivery is a little…well… weak. I imagine it is due to all the snow we have had, but while I am glad for finally having a delivery, I am a little disappointed with the quantity. Hopefully quality will make up for it! This weeks delivery included
Butternut squash
Carrots.. lots and lots of Carrots
Baby Lettuce
Spinach
Brussel sprouts (they told me they went to harvest them and they werent quite ideal - i brought some home anyways but i have a feeling they wont quite be edible)
Rosemary
Red & green cabage
Orange beets
Tatsoi (another form of greens, in the same family as spinach)
Here is to a weekend of fresh veg!
Month 3!
2 whole chickens
2 packages ground beef
2 packages ground pork
1 beef chuck roast
1 beef sirloin steak
1 package beef soup bones (YUM! cant wait for this)
1 package beef stew meat
1 beef shoulder roast
Delicious meals ahead!
I feel as if I have been MIA for too long, and for that I apologize. It has been an interesting last month or so for us, not necessarily in a life perspective but in a food perspective so I thought I’d share a bit what I have learned recently.
THE RISK OF CSA’S
Given the holiday season, we did not get our usual veggie delivery the week between Christmas and New Years. That was to be expected and didnt put too much of a damper on things as we still had a few items left from the previous delivery to tide us over. However, when the time for the next delivery came around mid January - something happened in Nashville that no one quite knew how to handle. SNOW. Thats right, snow. No matter how often it happens, the city always reacts the same. Total shutdown. In Nashville’s defense - this year has been a bit much snow-wise here - in fact its snowing again as I type. It has probably snowed 6 times so far? Im pretty sure thats more than the first 6 years I lived in Nashville combined.
As much as I would love to go on about the inability of our city to properly handle snow - I will give our farmers some credit. There really isn’t much they could do to get us veggies. The ground was frozen, the veggies were frozen, if they weren’t frozen they would have froze in the truck on the way to us. So aside from the fact that the roads were rough, the veggies would have been no good.
Ultimately it is a lesson in the risk you take by participating in a CSA. CSA membership is essentially an investment in the farm, so you live the risks and reap the rewards right along with them. According to the Dysingers this is the first delivery they have ever missed since they started doing CSA’s. In an effort to make it up to us they are toying with the ideas of either a credit to their a-la-cart market or adding an extra delivery on at the end of the season. This gesture is greatly appreciated, although unexpected and I highly doubt the norm with other CSA’s.
We are anxiously anticipating our next delivery, to say the least. Just 7 more days.
VEGGIES & MEAT
The cause and effect of the lack of veggies wasn’t really one I was expecting. Having less veggies meant eating less meat. Huh? Yup. We received our 3rd meat CSA delivery today and opening up the downstairs freezer, realized we probably had about 50% of our last CSA (if not more) still there. I think ultimately it boils down to, when you have fresh veggies you feel a need to use them before they go bad, and often times (or until I expand my repertoire of vegetarian dishes) that means cooking a meat item for which the veggies can accompany. I think that since we didn’t have the fresh veggies around we leaned more on dishes like pastas and risottos. I did make a fantastic Pad Thai (more on that later) - TWICE. Mainly because it was sooooooooo good - but that right there was 2 nights of no meat (not to mention 2 nights of tofu :-))
Not really sure what the point of my rant is, really just that I found the trend interesting, and not what I expected.
Here’s to hopefully more cooking and sharing in the future - until then, stay warm!
Whole chicken. What a wonderful thing. So far with each of our meat CSA deliveries we have gotten a whole chicken. While I know it is perfectly acceptable to break down a whole chicken while raw and do other things with it, I always feel as if I need to make an event out of it and cook the chicken whole.
Chicken #1 went to Tyler Florence’s Chicken and Dumplings with Chive & Buttermilk Dumplings. Unfortunately, not as epic as I had hoped. This time was an instance of “follow the recipe to a T” syndrome - and afterwards I really wished I had followed my gut. It was delicious but the dumplings needed something, they just weren’t what I was hoping for. The plus side was lots of left over stock!
Chicken #2 had to be epic since round 1 was less than repeatable. This time I decided to go for the classic - whole roasted chicken. After scouring recipes for the best methods, I was able to create…… A TOTAL SUCCESS. Epic Whole Chicken Dinner, check.
Ingredients:
1 3-4lb whole chicken
1 whole garlic head, all cloves peeled and left whole
2 cloves of garlic, crushed
3 whole sprigs of rosemary
1 spring worth of rosemary, pulled off the stem and given a rough chop
4 Tbs butter, room temp
Salt
Pepper
Various root vegetables for roasting - as many as you wish
Onion
Parsnips
Carrots
Brussel Sprouts
Potatoes
Sweet Potatoes
Several hours before you plan on cooking the chicken (or the night before if you think about it… the longer the better), rinse the chicken off, pat dry, and rub generously with a mixture of salt and black pepper all over the skin and inside the cavity. Cover chicken and return to the fridge until you are ready to cook.
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and remove the chicken from the fridge. Drain off any liquid that may have accumulated in the chicken cavity, and pat the outside dry once again. Inside the cavity place all cloves from the head of garlic and 3 springs of rosemary. In a small bowl combine crushed garlic, chopped rosemary, butter, salt and pepper. At the bottom of the chicken breast, near the cavity, you should be able to get underneath the skin. Take 1/2 of the butter mixture and smear it underneath the skin on each breast. Take 1/4 of the mixture and spread it all over the skin of the chicken. You should have 1/4 left which will be used later. Place the chicken breast side down in a roasting pan, into the oven for 45 minutes.
While the chicken is roasting, peel and chop your roasting vegetables. Give them a quick toss with olive oil, salt and pepper. After 45 minutes pull out the chicken, lift up with tongs, and pour all your veggies in the bottom of the roasting pan. Flip the chicken over breast side up, and place back in the roasting pan. Spread the remaining 1/4 butter mixture over the top of the chicken, and place back in the oven for another 45 minutes. Once finished let the chicken rest for at least 10 minutes before cutting into it.
The skin will be beautifully crispy, meat wonderfully tender, and veggies deliciously caramelized.
It doesn’t get much better than that.
Enjoy!
(OH and dont forget to save those lovely chicken bones and cavity filling garlic cloves for an amazing stock later!)
