A Fig Carton

I wish I'd come up with this idea. But I didn't. It's someone else's. Someone more creative than me. Someone who has perhaps eaten more figs, more smashed figs than me; and I've eaten my fair share.

This someone, I'd never seen her before, wouldn't recognize her if I saw her again, had an egg carton in hand. She was choosing her figs one by one, perfectly ripe, soft, pliable figs, placing them in the egg carton until there were a dozen. A full purple dozen. Brilliant, I thought. And I did it too, put my figs in a carton.

Another day I cradled a dozen apricots in another egg carton, because they too are tender, so easily bruised. The fruit a precise fit. And for a moment, only a moment, I thought myself creative too.

But really, it was someone else's idea.

I wish I'd stopped to thank her.

Local on our Table - July

Farmers' Market
Apricots
Arugula
Beets
Black Mission Figs
Blueberries
Broccoli
Butter Lettuce
Cabbage
Carrots
Cauliflower
Cherries
Cucumbers
Garlic
Jalapenos
Lemon
Little Gem Lettuce
McIntosh Apples
Nectarines
New Potatoes
Onions
Peaches
Plums
Pluots
Radishes
Tomatoes
Zucchini

Back Deck Harvest
Mint
Parsley
Rose Geranium
Thai Basil

From The Freezer/Pantry

To the Pantry
Apricot Jam
Blenheim Apricots in Rose Geranium Syrup
Blueberries w/Bay
Cherries in Syrup Syrah
Fig Jam
Pickled Beets
Sugared Blackberries
Sugared Raspberries

Gleaned and Gifted
(From Someone Else's Yard)
Bay Leaves
Plums
and more Plums

Planted
Tomatillas
White Nasturtiums

Specialties
Lavendar

I Love Beets

My husband doesn't like beets. He doesn't like them to the point that he has to tell me he doesn't like them each time I bring them into the house. And then he tells me every day they are in the house that he doesn't like them. He disassembles dinner asking, "are there beets in here?"

I love beets.

I loved beets when the only kind I knew came from a can. I don't even know how old I was when I first saw a real beet. I was older still when I first cooked one. All the scrubbing and peeling to cook them has quite frankly made beets in a can seem like not a bad idea. I know they taste better fresh but they've been such a stubborn root to prepare. Until now.

I've learned to simply cook the whole beet in a pot of boiling water. I know, where have I been? It feels like I'm getting away with something it's so easy. With a little coaxing the peels slide off leaving the pure beet jewel. I happily stop right there and eat it. Maybe a dash of salt but it's not required.

Then I saw that Doughgirl was canning beets and I wanted to can pickled beets too. So I did.

And I served them for dinner last night making noises of deliciousness.

"Do you want to taste the brine," I asked my husband.

He dipped his spoon, tasted. Went back for a quarter teaspoon. A little more. I was silent.

"Okay," he said. "I'll taste one."

I hadn't said a word. I was holding my breath. I wanted him to like them but I didn't want him to like them too; I'd only canned three jars.

He put a beet in his mouth. Chewed. No spitting. He didn't exclaim. But before he'd finished swallowing, he was reaching for another.

I found the recipe at Saving the Season. Cider vinegar, brown sugar, star anise, cinnamon, cloves. It's a keeper!

What Makes A Farmers' Market Good?

 

It's wildflower season in the far reaches of Northern California, which is where we found ourselves last weekend. Rhododendrons the size of old redwood trees, well, not really, but they were huge. And blooming. Brilliant, each of them.

As much as I was charmed by the endless swaths of sweet peas, the foxglove, yellow lupine, buttercups, a single trillium, it was the Arcata farmers' market that was my favorite stop of the trip. It's had me wondering what makes a good market. Because all farmers' markets are not created equal. I recently left one hungry and empty handed.

One of my favorite things about a farmers' market, which was true in Arcata, were the small farmers. They drove pick up trucks, had hand lettered signs, where there were signs at all and each vendor was its own canopy of creativity. This was not a cookie cutter market but a morning gathering on the square, commerce, friends, food. This was art. There was music, benches, green grass. There were women selling raffle tickets to benefit the local breast cancer clinic. Top prize, a trip to Nova Scotia.

The produce was animated with color; the spinach more green than hundred dollar bills. The carrots bunched in rainbows of yellow, orange, red and white. The food was harvested but still growing. Even the eggs, one araucana green in each dozen, were romantic. The food was fresh in a way that could not be manufactured.

I like finding something new at a farmers market too; that one of a kind item that surprises me. In Arcata it was sand dune honey. It tasted of fog and salt; it tasted of wind.

I like a market with diversity, old farmers, young farmers. A market with character, that's honest; that celebrates a place. I like markets with real food, an extra handful of cherries, bright eyes and rounding that always ends in quarters.

What is it that makes a farmers' market good for you?

eaarth

I can't pronounce the name of the book, eaarth, either and I've heard the author, Bill McKibben, say it several times in interviews, "eaarth," he says, pronouncing the double a's with a gurgle. I can't explain it. Each time I can see him smile when he says it though and I held tightly to that image as I read the book. The man is optimistic and yet 50 pages in I had a post apocalyptic dream. Or maybe it was a hot flash. Either way it woke me up.

Which is the point of McKibben's eaarth; to wake his audience up to the subtitle of his book, Making a Life on a Tough New Planet.

He stacks up the effects of climate change, not thirty years from now, but changes occurring right now, one on top of the other and somehow, I don't know how, but somehow still gives the reader room to breathe. I kept picking the book up to read more. Bill McKibben's perennial optimism comes through. In one interview he sited his optimism as the result of working with young people. I loved that.

I also loved the last quarter of the book, Lightly Carefully, Gracefully. He writes about industrial farming, small farmers, farmers' markets, local food; my favorite subjects. He writes about community and being neighborly, which is good food anytime.

McKibben's good neighbor, Barbara Kingsolver, blurbs the book on the front cover.

"What I have to say about this book is very simple; Read it, please. Straight through to the end. Whatever else you were planning to do next, nothing could be more important."

I can't blurb the book better than that. It's not always an easy read but it is an important read.

Local on our Table - June

Farmers' Market
Apricots
Asparagus
Blackberries
Blueberries
Broccoli
Cabbage
Carrots
Cherries
Chioggia Beets
Garlic
Jalapenos
Kale
Leeks
Meyer Lemons
Nectarines
New Potatoes
Onions
Orange Blossom Honey
Peaches
Potatoes
Radishes
Red Beets
Rhubarb
Strawberries
White Peaches
Wild Arugula
Yellow Beets
Yellow Crookneck Summer Squash
Zucchini

Back Deck Harvest
Thyme

From The Freezer/Pantry
Tomato Sauce

To the Freezer/Pantry
Blackberry Jam
Black-Straw, Blueberry, Thyme Jam
Pickled Beets
Snow Prince Peaches in Lavendar Syrup

Gleaned and Gifted
(From Someone Else's Yard)
Arugula
Lemons
Radishes

Planted
Borage
Cayenne Pepper
Jalapeno Pepper
Lime Tree
Rosemary
Serrano Pepper
Thai Basil
Tomato
White Nasturtium

Specialties
Flower Farm Honey

Homemade Yogurt

I've been promising to do this for the last two years. People keep telling me how easy it is. Last Thanksgiving I memorized the recipe from my sister-in-law, repeating it from the mashed potatoes to the pumpkin pie. Did we have pumpkin pie? Yeah, I forgot the recipe too.

Then I found a recipe and two nights ago finally used it. Yogurt. My own crock of yogurt. And they, the people, my sister-in-law, they were right. Making yogurt is easy. I made another batch tonight.

I have the recipe, from Mark Bittman, How To Cook Everything, memorized.

Heat a quart of milk to boiling and cool it to between 110 and 115. Whisk in half a cup of yogurt and keep the mixture warm for six to twelve hours.

I didn't believe it either. The hardest part was buying a cooking thermometer. I chose the least expensive.

To keep the mixture warm I used an old crock with a lid, tied two dish towels around that and put it in the back of the oven by the light, which I kept on all night - the light, not the oven. I did turn the oven on low for a few minutes, maybe five, before putting the crock in. To make the space cozy.

It all worked. The cute guy and I ate it up. From the crock. Plain. We couldn't stop.

And there's still part of me that doesn't believe how easy it is.