Dropstone Farms

A struggling mall in Cleveland converts their food court to a giant greenhouse.

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For some reason I got all het up to make some sour cream this week. I followed this recipe, because I didn’t realize Mother Earth News had one too. But they are pretty much the same.

So once I had this sour cream, I froze 3/4 of it but we still needed to use up a half-pint of it that I kept fresh in the fridge. We also have a LOT of eggs (want eggs? email me!!) and Garth loves black beans almost as much as he loves ketchup. So: huevos rancheros, only mostly following the recipe (as usual).

• Black beans from Alvarez Farm (150+ miles, but just barely), simmered for a long time with pre-fried Skagit River Ranch bacon and Laughing Crow Farm onions, and a bay leaf from our farmers’ market.
• Fresh tortillas from the awesome tortilla-maker machine at Central Market! (Now that we have lard we might be making our own tortillas soon!)
• Salsa: onion from Laughing Crow, organic storebought :( tomatoes, homegrown jalapeños, Laughing Crow hot peppers that we dried at home last summer (not sure what variety, but I thought they looked a lot like Bulgarian Carrot peppers). Obviously did not use cilantro, as it is, you know, February.
• Homegrown eggs! as always. Fried in my happy cast iron pan with leftover tasty bacon fat.
• Homemade sour cream with cream from Fresh Breeze dairy, also as always. I used Nancy’s organic full-fat plain yogurt as the starter.

Verdict: YUM. Will definitely be making this again. I usually order this when out for breakfast because I don’t eat meat whose origins are not intimately known to me, and it’s often one of the only vegetarian meals on a breakfast menu. But the addition of the little bit of bacon in the beans is fantastic and adds a nice depth to the whole thing. I also cooked the salsa for a good long while, which made it caramelizey, and neutralized the acids a bit, mellowing it out — though it still had some good heat from the peppers.

Homegrown: eggs, jalapeños
Island-grown: onions, hot peppers, garlic
Local (150 miles): cream for sour cream; bacon; bay leaf
Local (Washington): beans!
Locally-made from unknown ingredients: tortillas!
Unknown, organic: tomatoes :(

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Our locally-raised pig was slaughtered a couple of weeks ago and was finally butchered and ready to pick up last Saturday. Yay! We put everything into the freezer but kept a package of 2 pork chops out for dinner that night, and grilled them up with my favorite not-very-local marinade — red wine vinegar, soy sauce, and garlic (island-grown).

There had just been a Dark Days email list thread about what to do with winter squash, and I thought the squash mac & cheese sounded fantastic, so I improvised. We don’t have a pasta extruder (?) so I made some short wide pastas from organic flour (Utah) and homegrown eggs, and mostly followed the recipe … except I used a homegrown acorn squash*, a homemade chicken stock cube, half-and-half (Fresh Breeze Farms), full-fat homemade ricotta from Fresh Breeze cream, Tillamook cheddar cheese (non-organic but non-rBST too) and an artisanal parmigiano reggiano imported by an independent cheese company in California. The recipe turned out great — more of a casserole than a cheese saucey slippery thing, but that’s OK with me; I like casseroles.

Rounded off with a fresh salad of greens grown by Butler Green Farms, this made a lovely warm homey meal. And pretty, too; I should get back into the habit of taking pictures.

Homegrown: squash; chicken stock; eggs for pasta
Homemade from local ingredients: ricotta
Homemade from organic ingredients: pasta (flour); bread crumbs for mac & cheese (ground up by me)
Island-grown: pork; garlic; salad greens
Local: half-and-half
Local-ish: Tillamook cheddar cheese
Happy: parm
Unknown: red wine vinegar; soy sauce; salt; nutmeg; cayenne; olive oil.

* After I cut its top off, I doubted my original idea, as the recipe calls for peeling and cubing it, and acorn squash are so deeply grooved on the sides that I wasn’t sure I’d be able to peel it effectively without wasting lots of squashflesh. Here is my current method, which seemed to work OK: I peeled what I could reach (the peaks) with a vegetable peeler. Then after cutting the whole squash in half, I used the big heavy knife to cut it along the valleys — that is, I made several spears with half a valley on each edge and a (naked) peak in the middle. Then I used a paring knife to trim the skin from the sides of each spear. It worked pretty well, and wasn’t even as fraught with danger of stabbing oneself in the hand as I had worried.

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Yesterday we spent the day preparing to have mushrooms in the fall. Friends Joanna (who interned at a farm out here last summer) and Jacob came out for the day, bearing safety gear and two giant bags of plugs (basically dowels) inoculated with shiitake mushroom spores from Fungi Perfecti.

The first step (after eating delicious cinnamon rolls) was to find and cut down suitable hardwood trees and/or branches of 3-6 inches in diameter. I stayed out of the way for that, so no dramatic photos of timber falling (also no photos of Garth in his silly-looking hardhat with attached ear protection). But there were no chainsaw-related casualties, so that’s good.

The process is simple, if somewhat time-consuming, but once you get a rhythm down it goes pretty smoothly, assembly-line style … though we learned it would work better with a corded drill; the battery life on our 3 drills was our limiting factor.

You take your 5/16″ drill bit and put a bunch of holes in your logs, about 4 inches apart, in a diamond pattern. After you drill up a log, hand it over to the hammering section, where the next person puts one little plug into each hole and hammers it in. This was my favorite job.

After it’s all full of plugs, the next person uses a little plastic syringe to suck up cheese wax from the dedicated wax-melting crockpot, and puts a little puddle of wax on top of each plug. This helps protect the log from being colonized by other, non-delicious spores.

And now, we wait, and keep them from getting too dry (water them or cover with burlap or shade cloth). And in the fall, we harvest (we hope) lots and lots of organic local shiitake mushrooms! I’m already planning lots of beef stew …

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Local food friends Anne & Ryan hosted a potluck for the Olympics opening ceremony this week, and the assignment was to bring an international dish (because it’s the Olympics, you know). I have an affinity with Belgium, having spent a year there on exchange in high school, so I violated the rules of going to parties and chose to make something I’d never made before: Gentse waterzooi. Waterzooi is a recipe from Gent (Ghent), a beautiful and ancient town in Flanders, the Flemish-speaking part of Belgium. Belgium’s climate is very similar to the Pacific Northwest, and the food tends to be rustic and homey, not as fancy as French cuisine, but hearty and delicious. So part of the appeal of this recipe is that it’s extremely easy to make with local ingredients.

I found Julia Child’s recipe (login probably required, sorry) from a 1987 issue of the New York Times, and since Julia has never steered me wrong, I went with it, with some modifications, as noted below.

Julia’s ingredient list

2 large carrots
2 medium onions
2 tender ribs of celery (I omitted this as I do not have any growing currently)
2 medium-sized leeks, white and tender green parts only (I used several small ones)
.5 teaspoon dried tarragon
Salt and freshly ground white pepper to taste
2.5 pounds cut-up frying chicken, legs or thighs or breasts (with bone), or a mixture of these (I deboned and chopped up the chicken into bite-size pieces — I didn’t want partygoers to have to try to remove meat from bones in plates balanced on their laps, and I didn’t want to deal with the degreasing required if using skin-on chicken parts. Also, because I use homemade chicken stock that has plenty of gelatin and flavor, I was not worried about losing that benefit of boiling the bones in the soup.)
1.5 cups dry white French vermouth (I omitted this because of a pregnant partygoer. I substituted about a third of a cup of lemon juice, for the acid, and more stock.)
1.5 to 2 cups chicken broth (I used the aforementioned homemade chicken stock, which we reduce down quite a lot and then freeze in ice cube trays.)
.5 cup heavy cream
1.5 teaspoons cornstarch
6 egg yolks
3 tablespoons minced fresh parsley. (I omitted this, because I forgot to bring the stems I’d just picked.)

The steps are simple, up until the end. Julienne the vegetables — I used a mandoline slicer for the carrots, but did the rest by hand, and actually just sliced the onion thinly rather than julienning it. Toss all veggie sticks in a bowl with some salt and pepper and the tarragon, and in your big dutch oven or stock pot, layer a third of the veggies, half the chicken, half of the remaining veggies, the other half of the chicken, and the rest of the veggies. Add your vermouth (lemon juice) and stock just to cover.

Julia says you can stop here and refrigerate for several hours to finish up later, so we packed up and took everything with us to finish at the party.

Simmer for 25-30 minutes or until chicken is done. At this point Julia says to strain it, degrease the broth, and season. I just poured most of it through a strainer into a bowl, and didn’t worry too much about the dregs left in the pot. (I could do this because I used skinned meat. If using skin-on meat, you’ll definitely want to degrease.)

While the chicken simmers, you whisk the cornstarch and cream together, and in a large bowl whisk the egg yolks. Add the cream mixture to the large bowl and stir. Gradually add the hot broth to the egg & cream mixture, whisking the whole time. I used a ladleful at a time, or if you have a helper or a container that’s easy to pour, you could just pour in a slow steady stream. Be careful not to dump it all in at once, lest you accidentally cook the eggs suddenly. When it’s all mixed, return it all to the pot with the chicken and veggies, and bring it up to heat, but do not let it simmer, or the eggs will curdle. Not that it’s a big deal if they do — but it spoils the perfection of the beautiful creamy rich broth (which is really more like a sauce at this point).

Serve with crusty bread, or over noodles or boiled potatoes. Garnish with the chopped parsley.

I wish I’d gotten pictures, as it was quite pretty as soups go. I will definitely be making it again, though, so I’ll try to remember to update then. It seemed to be a success overall, which is always a relief when cooking a recipe for the first time, for others.

Homegrown: chicken, chicken stock, leeks, carrots, forgotten parsley, eggs
Bainbridge Island: onions (Laughing Crow Farm)
Washington: Fresh Breeze cream as usual
Unknown: salt, pepper, tarragon, lemon juice, cornstarch (but it’s advertised as non-genetically modified!).

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We’ve been reviewing our successes and not-so-much-successes from last year, and our resources for this year (including personal levels of energy and time available, as well as space), and making some decisions about when and what and how.

One thing we know: we’re not going to grow produce for sale this year. We’ll grow to feed ourselves, as usual, but not worry about selling. This turns out to be very liberating! We can choose the varieties we want, rather than trying to make decisions based on what might be interesting and do well at market.

One thing we are pretty sure about (dependent on some decisions about pastures): we’ll be raising several batches of chickens and one batch of turkeys for sale. Keep an eye out here to hear more when we are ready to take orders.

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Or maybe this is the point of the challenge: we’re tired, we’re hungry, there are a bunch of leeks and cabbages in the fridge but we don’t have energy to think up what to cook, much less to actually cook it. So we end up making sausage and sauerkraut again, replicating that meal exactly — cabbage from Laughing Crow on Bainbridge, sausage from Skagit, buns homemade by me with organic flour from Utah.

Lazy? Sure. But still delicious.

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While working from home this afternoon, I realized that since it’s dark when I get home on weeknights, today was my last chance to go meet our pig — they are scheduled to meet Farmer George, the butcher, sometime on Saturday. So we called up Rolling Bay Farm, got directions and went on by to scritch their backs. (I wanted to pat their heads but she said that was not a very good idea.)

They seemed happy and came up to the gate to say hi. We got a stick and scritched backs while they all jostled for places by the fence (including one or more who seemed to be trying to eat the fence). They wiggled their noses through the fence at us and I was surprised to note it was hard to restrain myself from touching them! I kept looking at their soft-looking pink noses and wanting to poke them, just a tiny bit, but then remembering how much I like having fingertips.

Next time I see these pigs they will be all cut and wrapped and ready for the freezer or smoker. Thanks, pigs! Thanks, farmers Adrienne and Mark!

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Oh no, I just found this post that I wrote last Tuesday (so, still late for week 9) and thought I published, but apparently didn’t! It was late already so I guess a week and two days late isn’t any different from just two days late.

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We were out of town this weekend, in Reno to visit family. Reno’s always a bit hard for me as I have apparently-arbitrary criteria for the meat I’ll eat, and it’s always seemed to be not a terribly diverse town, food-wise. But this time, formerly-vegetarian friend Phoebe came over from Davis to hang out, and took us to the enjoyable Pneumatic Diner. While there, I asked the staff about the food co-op I’d heard existed. We got directions and headed over to try to figure out what to make for dinner for my dad’s household.

After wandering — pacing is more like it, really, given the store’s teensy layout — for a while, we ended up with the localest versions we could find of: potatoes; leeks; garlic; kale; carrots. I don’t know what was from Nevada and what from California, but I opted to bypass the versions with the purple big-organic plastic labels, and get the ones with no labels … somehow that makes me think that it’s more like what I’m looking for (I may be a sucker). We also snagged a nice-looking steak from a Nevada rancher, and some locally-bagged (i.e. not Earthbound) baby greens, and some little chunks of parmigiano imported by a California company, Cowgirl Creamery.

The whole grocery bag full turned into a delicious soup, except the greens and parm of course, which were a nice salad. Even the resident kid liked the “green thing” (the kale, which I had let him know he might not like, and that that was OK with me).

Anyway, I was pretty proud of with how we ended up, as well as with Reno’s apparently growing local food scene. Go, co-ops, go!

We also had a field trip to a farm, on which more to come later.

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Still no pictures, as my small camera is full and I am still too scared of the new big fancy camera.

We have been talking for years about making meat loaf, which Garth remembers fondly from his childhood. But his mom used the recipe from the back of the Quaker Oats box, and I wanted to do something a bit closer to home. I looked around a bit for recommendations, then mostly made it up as I went along, using what was on hand. I did have to compromise a bit though as he was not willing to give up the ketchup on top.

The mostly-local part: the loaf.

I caramelized some onions for a long time in butter (organic, co-op, non-local). When they were nice and brown I put a bottle of Pike Pale Ale, brewed at Pike Brewing, and let it sit on low heat for a while, just barely simmering, then dumped in the remains of a freezer bag of home-ground bread crumbs so they could get moist before mixing, to keep them from drying out the meat loaf.
While that was happening, I grated a giant carrot from the garden in the food processor, as well as a few cloves of garlic. I removed two Skagit River Ranch sausages from their casing and put them in a bowl with two pounds of ground beef from our cow. The beef is pretty lean so I also melted a spoonful of home-rendered lard from a local pig.
I carefully mixed everything together in a big bowl, stirring with a spatula instead of kneading with my hands, as I read that kneading dries it out also. I also added two little eggs from our hens as a binder.

Onion, garlic: Laughing Crow Farm, Bainbridge Island
Beer: Pike Brewing, Seattle
Eggs, carrot, thyme: the yard
Ground beef: from our quarter cow, raised by On the Lamb Farm in Arlington
Pork Italian sausage: Skagit River Ranch
Lard: home-rendered from a pig grown on Bainbridge Island
Bread crumbs: the last of several months’ worth of home-ground crumbs from both home-grown and store-bought bread, kept in the freezer

On a silpat-lined sheet pan (with edges!) I shaped it into one small loaf of about 1/3 of the meat, for dinner, and one large loaf, composed of the rest of the meat, for future sandwiches. Following Alton’s instructions, I put it all in the oven at 325° and set the timer for 10 minutes.

The not-local-at-all part: the glaze.
In my favorite tiny cast iron pan, I mixed the following:
Ketchup, Worcestershire sauce, sriracha, and I don’t even remember what other things, all from jars of indeterminate origin. Oh, and a little bit of local honey from Pike Place Market.

Alton said to brush the glaze on after it had been cooking for ten minutes, so I did. I did it again a little while later when I checked on the temperature. The little loaf hit temp first, of course, so we took it out and served it up while we waited for the big one to finish.

My verdict: Yum! Not dry at all — plenty soft and flavorful.
Garth’s verdict: “Not much like my childhood meatloaf. It was better. It tasted like food.”

I don’t think I’ll ever be able to come between him and his ketchup, though.

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I missed a Dark Days meal this week — not because we weren’t eating delicious local food, just that there was no one big meal, and we were out of town for the weekend. We’re out this weekend too (and the next, ack) but I may write up a generic soup (”Piles part 2″) if I get a chance.

By the end of the month we’ll have a half a pig! I look forward to tasty pork recipes coming up.

(like posole!)

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The fridge was full and I was overwhelmed with options … How to divide up one serving of fried chicken, one serving of pot roast, four leftover egg whites, and 2+ servings of potato parsnip gratin? I was just starting to try to figure out how to decide who gets the pot roast sandwich and who gets the fried chicken sandwich, when Garth reminded me we could just split it all up and have a Very Trendy Small Plates meal instead of just leftovers. Hooray!

Fried chicken:
homegrown chicken fried à la Alton Brown, with Organic Valley buttermilk and organic, non-local flour and miscellaneous spices

Pot roast:
Made by Anne at Small Potatoes with a roast from the cow we shared; some carrots from our garden and some from the Bainbridge Island farmers’ market; mushrooms from BC; herbs grown and dried by Anne’s mom.

Scrambled eggs and cheese:
Four homegrown egg whites reserved from Ruhlman’s cooked egg nog, combined with two more whole homegrown eggs and a mess of grated (non-local, non-organic, but rBST-free at least) Tillamook cheddar.

Potato parsnip gratin:
Made-up recipe inspired by a meal at Agate Pass Café, with potatoes from Soup Garden Farm, parsnips and garlic from Laughing Crow Farm, leeks from Persephone Farm — all from the Bainbridge Island farmers’ market; homegrown parsley; and Fresh Breeze Organic milk as usual.

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