Tomatoes

What to do with all those tomatoes?

We had neighbors over this evening for a glass of wine and appetizers. It seemed like an opportunity to try out a few things with the our GFF tomatoes. The most important thing about these heirloom tomatoes is to let their flavor take center stage. The ones I have now are showing their age a bit, so I thought something along the bruschetta line made sense.

I used as my starting point a recipe for Cherry Tomato Crostini with Ricotta from my newest cookbook "A Platter of Figs and other recipes" by David Tanis (who could resist a cookbook entitled a platter of figs). However, I did take great liberties with it. Here is my adapted recipe using GFF heirloom tomatoes and local goat cheese:

3 large heirloom tomatoes, seeded, chopped, and drained

1 large shallot, finely minced

2 Tbs red wine vinegar

1/2 cup olive oil

2 garlic cloves, crushed, plus a couple more cloves for rubbing toast

1 loaf ciabatta

1/4 - 1/3 lb fresh goat cheese (I used the chevre from Cherry Glen, Boyds, Md)

basil leaves, chopped

Mix shallot and red wine vinegar together and allow to sit for a few minutes

Heat 1/2 cup olive oil in a small saute pan. Add 2 crushed cloves of garlic and saute for a couple minutes. Remove garlic and add the olive oil to the shallots. Add tomatoes, some salt and pepper to taste. Allow to sit for a few minutes.

Slice the ciabatta into 1/2 inch slices. Arrange on a baking sheet and toast on both sides under broiler until lightly toasted. Rub toast with with peeled garlic clove.

Spread goat cheese on toast and arrange on a platter. Use slotted spoon to put a heaping tablespoon of the tomato mixture on each toast. Sprinkle basil leaves over crostini.

Enjoy!

Send in your tomato recipes to the blog (either to Kate or to me at donb.sarahd@gmail.com and I will post them here).

More CSA E-mails: Shephard's Pie

One CSA member, Selena Rebleto e-mailed Kate a while back with several recipes that are perfect for this past week's CSA. Wondering what to do with those beautiful quail eggs? Selena sent this picture of her deviled quail eggs which, I must say, are just lovely.

She also sent a link to a Shepherd's Pie recipe. This recipe, from Rachel Ray, looks quick and easy and perfect for a week-night dinner. Here is the finished product and it looks great (better than the Rachel Ray picture!). I think that the hamburger and the potatoes from last week's CSA will make this quite something. Selena used fresh shelled peas and carrots with the ground beef for the filling and topped with the potatoes.

An aside, if you haven't tried the beef from Green Fence Farm, you are crazy (unless, of course, you don't eat meat and, then, I will not call you crazy). I made my regular enchilada recipe with the ground beef and, wow, it was fantastic.

Potatoes

My morning routine is to stumble downstairs, make lots of coffee, check my e-mail (yes, I am obsessive), and then go on-line to read the Post and the Times. Don likes to read the paper newspaper. But I like to read the newspaper on-line because I never know where it will take me.

This morning a link from Tom Sietsema's discussion on over-hyped food trends led me to Regina Schrambling's blog on Epicurious. One recent post discusses how to preserve basil (she claims to keep basil a week by putting stems/roots in a jar with water and covering with a grocery bag). Another post discusses her take on Creamy Potato Salad, Light on the Mayo.

So, what are you doing with your potatoes?

Posts from CSA Members

What a great CSA share we got today. I took one of the heirloom tomatoes, seeded, chopped it up (kind of chunky), added some salt, pepper, a little olive oil and sprinkled goat cheese and a few olives over it. It was yummy.

Now I have one less tomato but I still have a huge box of them. So, please let send in what you are doing with all of the ones you got, as well as the other wonderful produce we received today. Send them to me, donb.sarahd@gmail.com, if you want them posted before winter. Kate just sent me your great pictures and ideas from previous shares and they look great. Here are a few.

Alden O'Brien made a salade composée with bed of lettuce, beets, hard boiled eggs, herbs, all from the farm. The one pictured at the right includes some cuke dice from Cemmy Peterson’s farm.

Alden also sent a picture of swiss chard and broccolini. She blanched them and then stir fried them with a little olive oil and those scallion or "whatever flower things and some slices of that stem."

Beautiful, Alden! Thanks for sharing!

CSA member, Lynne Becker, sent an e-mail to Kate on "CSA: This is how I used our beans last night." She linked to a recipe from Gourmet, August 2004, Poached Chicken with Tomatoes, Olives, and Green Beans. This looks ideal for what we got in today's basket. Lynne's comments on the recipe: "I can't imagine liking many recipes without onions and garlic, so I added diced red onion to the tomato mixture and subbed basil for oregano since that's what we've got in the garden."

Ed Zakreski sent some links to Kate for red cabbage and for duck!

"I’m going to use a little bit of my red cabbage to create a sourdough starter. Here’s the link from Michael Ruhlman – one of my favorite food writers - that inspired me: http://blog.ruhlman.com/ruhlmancom/2009/07/simple-sourdough-starter.html

"I’m also sending along the “How To Roast A Duck” link from Amateur Gourmet in case you can use it to inspire more duck purchases. It does show that roasting a duck is not as intimidating as it sounds. http://www.amateurgourmet.com/2009/05/how_to_roast_a.html

Ed also shared a picture of his dinner from GFF produce. Wow! Looks fabulous.

More tomorrow. Remember to send your ideas, recipes, and pictures.

What to Do with This Week's CSA?

Just in time for our CSA delivery this week, chow.com has chosen its August Cookbook of the Month and it is seems perfect for what we are getting this week. "Ottolenghi: The Cookbook," has caused a lot of chatter on the chow website and, from what I can see, the book looks terrific with some very creative recipes. In particular, there appear to be some pretty terrific recipes for this week's CSA.

The book appears a bit hard to get (not available on amazon). But discussion group has provided many, many links to on-line recipes. These include:

Peaches and speck with orange blossom (This looks awesome, pictured above. Speck is a dry-cured smoked Italian ham--if you find it tell me!)

Marinated aubergine with tahini and oregano

Roasted aubergine with saffron yoghurt

French beans and mangetout with hazelnuts and orange (mangetout are snow peas)

There are also some terrific chicken and duck recipes discussed on the site, including roast chicken with sumac, za'atar, and lemon, seared duck breast with blood orange and star anise, and barbecued quail with mograbiah salad.

I can't wait for my Monday delivery!

Week-end on the Farm... continued

Some day, Mike Davis will part with his guidance on the wonderful things to do with the GFF birds (I heard that he was pretty busy in Maine, roasting a pig and grilling a paella over an open fire). When he is back from his culinary adventures and sends me his notes, I will post them right here. Until then, I can only tempt you with pictures of the main courses and the menus from our week-end at Green Fence Farm.

Menu for Friday Night's Dinner

Pan-Roasted Quail with Port Reduction Sauce

Mahogany Rice

Sauteed Haricots Vert with Shallots

Green Salad with Peaches, Blackberries, and Roasted Walnuts

Plum Tarte Tatin

Menu for Saturday's Dinner:

Roast Duck with Plums

Pan-Roasted Partridge with Bacon

Grilled Quail and Chicken

Roasted Beet Salad with Fried Chickpeas and Goat Cheese

Corn on the Cob

Cornmeal Shortcakes with Peaches, Blackberries, and Mint

Plum Sorbet

On Friday, Mike prepared Pan-Roasted Quail in a Port Reduction Sauce. On the side, he served Mahogany Rice, which is a black, flavorful rice (it is unmilled so cooks for 45 to 50 minutes and is very good for you). I did a quick saute of shallots and Kate's thin green beans. I made a green salad, using GFF lettuce, peaches from the nearby orchard, blackberries that we had picked that day, toasted walnuts, and a balsamic vinaigrette.

If you are nervous about the port-reduction sauce, you can try simply grilling the quail, which is what we did on Saturday night, along with grilled chicken. It was a mystery to me what we seasoned the chicken and the quail with--I think that I saw Mike walk out to the herbs and take his pick. He was particularly enamored with the lemon thyme. Here is the thing with the GFF poultry--because it is so good, you don't really need to do much with it. Salt and pepper and grilling works just fine. Add a few herbs of your choice (rosemary under the skin is always good or thyme or whatever you have that is fresh). Just remember for the quail, Because of their size, grilling does not take very long.

Saturday night's dinner was a display of the GFF bounty. In addition to the grilled quail and chicken, Mike prepared a Roast Duck with plums (pictured below) and Pan-Roasted Partridge with Bacon. I can only post the pictures and attest to how wonderful they both were. The Roasted Duck was so delicious that it made Nick admit that they were almost worth all the work that goes into raising them.

I made two vegetable side dishes on Saturday, both of which were based on the Sunday Suppers at Lucques (which I discussed below). One for lunch, first of the season succotash salad, I will post separately. Below is the beet salad.

Roasted Beet Salad with Fried Chickpeas and Goat Cheese

First, if you are ever wondering what to do with the beautiful beets that you get in your CSA, just roast them. They are so sweet and delicious all by themselves. Cut off the tops, clean well, and toss with olive oil and salt (Suzanne Goin uses 2T of extra virgin olive oil and 1 tsp salt for 3 bunches of beets). Place in roasting pan with a bit of water and roast at 400 degrees until tender (around 40 minutes, depending on the size). After cooling, remove the skins and quarter. Look at those beets--aren't they beautiful. We should just stop here.

I loosely followed the rest of the recipe. First of all, the fried chickpeas were okay--I don't think that I cooked them long enough and I don't think that they were completely necessary here since everything else was so great. Just remember, if you are doing this recipe to start the chickpeas first, since they have to cook for quite a while (originally this was going to be a side dish for Thursday, but I didn't start the chickpeas until late).

Using what we had, I made a vinaigrette of 2+ T red wine vinegar, 1 T lemon juice, pinch of cumin, salt, pepper, and 1/2 c (maybe less) of extra virgin olive oil. I used some of the GFF lettuce, tossing it in a bit of vinaigrette, and using it to line the plate. I tossed the beets and 1/4 c thinly sliced shallots in some of the vinaigrette. Added to the plate.

Then, crumbled goat cheese, the fried chickpeas, and flat leaf parsley over the salad to finish it up. As you can see, it was quite a beautiful display and a wonderful tasting salad. The goat cheese combination with the beets was terrific. The recipe calls for roasted cumin seeds and I can see that it would add an additional depth to the salad. Using what we had in the pantry seemed to go well here.

Plum Tarte Tatin with Creme Fraiche

Friday night dessert: Another creation from Suzanne Goin, Plum Tarte Tatin. I did not improvise on this and worked straight from her recipe with a couple of unintentional deviations.

In looking around the internet, I saw that some people had trouble with this dessert. Maybe it was beginner's luck, but I found this very simple. I also think that the plums were just right for this recipe. They were ripe but still firm enough to keep their shape.

Since I have linked the recipe, I won't go into every single detail. Most of the work was halving and pitting 3 pounds of plums. After adding sugar (1/4 c) and letting them sit for 30 minutes, it was time to make the caramel coating. Kate has a great big cast iron skillet which was perfect for making the tarte. Heated the pan over medium heat and added 1 stick of butter. When it foamed, I added 3/4 cup sugar and cooked for 6 minutes until it was a brown caramel color.

While it cooled, I drained the plums. I think that this step is critical, because too much juice result in a pretty soggy tarte. Goin suggests making a cocktail from the sugared-plum juice, but I am not imaginative to think what would go well with it. I am open to suggestions.

When the caramel had cooled for about 20 minutes, I placed the plums, skin side up in the skillet, in lovely, concentric circles.

I put the skillet in the fridge here and missed the step of cooking the plums and caramel on the stove. After refrigerating for a couple hours, I realized my mistake and put the skillet on the stove, cooking the plums--without touching--for 20 minutes over medium-low heat. Then, after cooling the plums and caramel again for about an hour or so, I topped it with store-bought puff pastery (sorry purests, but I like pepperidge farm for this). Brushed with beaten egg (from GFF, of course) and sprinkled with sugar. Baked at 375 degrees for 45 to 55 minutes.

After cooling for 30 minutes, it was time to flip the tarte. This is time when it is nice to have someone strong around, since flipping a cast iron skillet with plate on it is a little challenging. Cutting around the edges helps, but flipping it in one motion seems to be important too. Then, letting it just drop out of the skillet from its own weight.

Served with creme fraiche on the side, we ate this all up and left none for Don who arrived late from DC on Friday night.