Pumpin' up the jam

      For some reason I’d always been intimidated by the idea of putting up preserves- I guess I thought it was just too much trouble, and for some reason, the thought of being around big pots of boiling water kind of scared me. What I found out was that not only is it relatively easy (it helps to be the sort of person who actually *enjoys* standing in the kitchen for several hours peeling and squishing and coaxing and boiling), it’s also really rewarding.


      It all started with that stupid fig tree out back of my apartment. After being bombarded with figs the first summer I lived there, I decided I had to do *something* with the gazillion sexy little fruits I had left over after eating them out of hand, making breads and sauces (both sweet and savory), grilling them with various meats and cheeses.. Etcetera. So this past summer, more or less on a whim, I decided to make my first batch of fig jam.

      It wasn’t too hard to do, and in the end I was rewarded with jar upon jar of beautiful jewel-toned sweetness- which I promptly ate and gave away to all my friends. The fig jam was a hit, and the fig-ginger was lovely, but when I made fig-strawberry jam with a pile of gorgeous ripe strawberries from the farmers’ market, I knew I’d hit on something special. The first two batches practically flew out of my pantry. People were devouring it faster than I thought possible and asking for more. My plan was to make at least 3 or 4 more batches before the figs went away, but unfortunately life got in the way and the last few weeks of figs went unpicked and uneaten.

*sigh*

      Fast forward to a few weeks ago when I was at my folks’ house for a visit. I noticed the fruit on my dad’s nopales was abundant and ripe, and tickling my urge to make more preserves. The wicked, spiny prickly pears (or tuna as they’re known in Spanish) were just begging to be harvested and transformed into something delicate and sweet. I researched how to process them (hopefully without getting a handful of glochids in the process), grabbed a bucket, and got to work. The result? A lovely, purply-pink jelly with an almost sagey finish. It tasted like the desert, it looked like the sunset, and I was hooked- not only on the jelly, or the process of making the jellies, but on the idea of making them from found and foraged and gifted fruit.

      Since then I’ve made several batches of tuna jelly, wiping out the fruit from my mom’s nopales, and tried my hand at pomegranate jelly using fruit from the neighbors’ tree. (The pomegranates don’t like to give up their essence so easily as the figs and prickly pears, but the result was a dark amethyst jelly with an amazingly intense flavor- totally worth the effort) Now I’ll pretty much make jelly or jam out of whatever’s growing at the moment, and I plan on hitting up neighbors, coworkers and friends for their excess fruit in exchanged for my finished product. This week it’s more pomegranates, next week maybe more tuna (anyone got some cactus fruit they want to get rid of?) and who knows what I’ll be putting up next month… I’m looking forward to loquats and kumquats from my neighborhood next summer, and I might even see if I can grow some passionfruit vines!

      In the meantime, I have local gifts for far-away friends, and goodies to trade with my favorite farmers’ market vendors. I have a sense of satisfaction that I’m using what comes natural to the area in a way that makes people happy. And after the last batch of pomegranates, I have a kitchen that looks like something out of a serial-killer movie. Yum!

The best vegetable soup EVER

Well, maybe not EVER, but it's pretty darn good.

This one came about after I found fresh lima beans at the Escondido farmers market last week. I don't know about you, but I love lima beans.. I know they're one of those things from childhood that a lot of people hate (like brussel sprouts, which I also adore) but really, if you haven't had them for a while, give them another chance. They are soo good and buttery just steamed with a little salt, or you can saute them with some corn and tomatoes for a nice succotash.. Or you can get all ambitious and spend an hour chopping up veggies for this amazing soup I discovered earlier this summer.

It's a little labor-intensive, sure, but I swear it's totally worth it.

• 2 tbs olive oil
• 2 large shallots, sliced thin
• 4 or 5 cloves of garlic, minced
• 1 cup potatoes, 1/4 inch dice
• 1 cup green beans, cut into 1-inch pieces
• 1 cup parsnips, 1/4 inch dice (you can use carrots if you like, but I think the parsnips add a certain something)
• 1 quart chicken stock*
• 2 cups tomatoes, peeled and seeded**
• kernels from an ear of corn
• 1 cup lima beans
• a couple of tablespoons fresh parsley, minced
• a few sprigs of thyme, minced
• juice from half a lemon

*I use better than bouillon fake chicken broth- just so I can share with my veggie friends. It can be a bit salty, so be sparing, although this soup can stand up to a strong salty stock better than most.
**plum tomatoes are great for this, or if you can find Japanese sweet tomatoes, even better.

This is one of those recipes that works best of you peel, dice, and chop everything first, then add as you go. I usually arrange things by bowls of what goes in when- shallots and garlic in a little bowl, potatoes, green beans, and parsnips in another, and the tomatoes, corn, and limas in another... But I'm a little anal-retentive that way.

Aaaaanyway, here's how it goes: heat the oil, then saute the shallots and garlic until the shallots are soft and translucent. add the potatoes, green beans, and parsnips and continue cooking for about 5 minutes. add the stock and the tomatoes, corn, and lima beans, bring to a simmer, and cook for about half an hour. toss in the lemon juice and herbs, leave on the heat for a few more minutes, and voila! It'll take less time to cook than it did to chop the vegetables :)

This is a soup that's extra-rad the next day, after the flavors have had time to smoosh together, and it's extra-EXTRA rad if you make these magical little croutons to go with it:

• Good crusty sourdough bread, sliced thick
• thyme, basil, rosemary, whatever fresh herbs you have lying around, minced fine
• a few tablespoons of olive oil (depends on how many you're making)

Mix the herbs in with the oil, then brush onto the bread slices. Throw 'em on a baking sheet and into a 375-degree oven for about 15 minutes.  Put them together with the soup and make some serious magic...

This soup recipe makes a lot, so plan to share.. And enjoy.

(I'll write some stuff on here besides just recipes soon. I'm just too tired to rant and rave today.. But I have some good stuff to tell y'all about).

Unexpected goodness!

     OK, so since I moved away from my roommates (miss you guys!) I’ve been trying to adjust my food buying and preparation to the needs of someone living alone. For the first month in my solo apartment, I found myself discarding way too much food. Without two big hungry men to clean out the fridge every couple of days I’d find extra portions languishing in the crisper, days after their deliciousness had expired. As bad as I feel about throwing away leftovers (picture me laying a tiny little wreath on the top of a small Tupperware® container as I mentally deliver a moving and sincere eulogy for last week’s leftover quiche) I feel even worse about throwing out uncooked food. I mean, those collards had so much potential, and look how they ended up, wilting away in the prime of their life until they were nothing but shriveled stalks… And it was ALL MY FAULT! *sob*

…..I need a second, I’m feeling a little verklempt here…..

     Where was I? Oh, yeah. So after a trip to the market on Sunday, I realized I had a few things in the kitchen that needed to be used up, pronto. Some chard, a couple ears of corn, half a butternut squash, a few sprigs of thyme, one sad spotty little banana, and a pile of way too many perfectly ripe pears I had been unable to resist at the farmers market.

     The squash was easy peasy, just throw that bad boy in the oven for a while and eat. The chard and corn I figured I’d just sauté together with a lil’ onion and garlic. Simple, tasty veggie dinner, right? Little did I know that these ingredients were about come together to make one of the bestest super-simple vegetable dishes I’ve made in months…

I don’t actually know what to call this, but here’s the recipe:

• ½ butternut squash
• Pat o’ buttah (what’s that, like a tablespoon?)
• Brown sugar
• A few sprigs of fresh thyme
• ¼ tsp ground cumin
• One small red onion, sliced
• One clove garlic, minced
• 2 ears worth of corn kernels, fresh offa the cob
• Bunch of chard, whatever color you like (the red looked really pretty with the other colors in the finished dish) rinsed but not dried and chopped into manageable pieces.      

     Heat the oven to 400 degrees. Place the squash in a glass baking dish, cut side up, Dot with buttah, sprinkle with a little brown sugar, and sprinkle with thyme leaves and cumin. Roast that bad boy for around half an hour, give or take, till you can fork it.

     When the squash is just about done, heat some olive oil in a big skillet or dutch oven. Add garlic and onions and give ‘em a stir, cook just enough to flavor the oil. Add the corn and sauté for a couple of minutes, then add the chard and sauté until the water has evaporated from the pan. Scoop the squash out of its skin (make sure any of the buttery goodness dripping off of it falls into the sautéed veggies!) and chop it up into chunks, then stir into the sauté. Add a little more butter on top, if you like, and a dash of salt.

     Honestly, it’s sublime. I suppose a smart person would make some kind of grain to go with this, or it would go nicely with a nice hunk of rare beef. I just ate it by itself, seeing as I was home alone and had no one to impress.

    Now what to do with the pears and banana? I’m a bit baking challenged- all that measuring, and doing things in order, and patience… I’m way too much of a spaz for that. Seriously, I have to force myself to concentrate and FOLLOW THE DIRECTIONS every time I try to bake anything more complicated than a pie or a quick bread… And given that I didn’t have any pre-made pie crusts around (something else I'm not very good at. I can never roll it out right one the first or second try, and by then it’s too warm, but I don’t have the patience to get it cool enough to work with… You get the picture) I figured I’d have to go with a quick bread.

     The gorgeous thing about quick breads is that you can pretty much throw in whatever fruit you like, so long as you keep the proportions the same. This was originally going to be just pear bread, until I spotted the spots on the banana and thought “why not?”

Here’s how it goes:

• 3 cups flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• ¼ tsp baking powder
• 1tsp salt 
• Cinnamon- I think I tossed in about ½ a tablespoon 
• Dash of nutmeg 
• 1 cup walnuts, chopped as fine or as coarse as you like ‘em 
• ¾ cup vegetable oil (if you’re feeling decadent you can use softened buttah) 
• 3 eggs 
• 2 cups sugar 
• 2 cups fruit (I mashed the banana, then added the peeled and finely chopped pears to equal 2 cups) 
• Splash o’ vanilla  

     Combine the flour, soda, powder, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Add nuts and toss around till they’re coated with the stuff. Combine the rest of the ingredients, then stir into the flour mixture- just enough so everything’s incorporated. Dump it into a couple of greased loaf pans and bake at 350 for about an hour.

 Good stuff!

Let's go shopping.

     Goodness gracious, it’s been a long time since I’ve posted anything here. Which isn’t to say I haven’t been obsessing over food… it’s just that I’m lazy.

     Things have changed a bit since I last updated. I moved into my own little tiny bachelorette pad at the beginning of July. Oddly enough, I’ve been cooking at home more than ever now that I’m living on my own. As much as I loved cooking for the boys, I was experiencing a bit of frustration due to the sheer magnitude of their appetites. (Carlos, honey, if you’re reading this, I am NOT complaining. Honestly. It is what it is.) Now that I’m on my own, a batch of fresh salsa lasts me days- whereas before it would be demolished in the course of an hour. If I roast a chicken the leftovers last me a week… You get the picture.
     This in turn has made me more likely to indulge my love of fresh local goodness by shopping almost exclusively at the farmers markets- I’m spending less on groceries every week, even though per pound stuff tends to be more expensive than at Henry’s. Now I’m free to roam the produce vendors, grab whatever is looking amazing that week, and build a meal around whatever I bring home.

     Which brings me (in my usual roundabout, overly wordy way) to today’s topic: a brief review of local farmer’s markets. This isn’t a comprehensive survey by any stretch of the imagination, just a survey of the ones in my ‘hood (with the exception of Escondido- I work 2 block away from that one) but I’d like to tell you about the places I frequent on a weekly basis and the ones that I’ve made a point to check out.

     First off, the Hillcrest farmers market (Normal street, in front of the DMV. 10am-2pm Sundays). This is my favorite, and in my opinion, the best in town. The produce vendors are numerous and varied, with a few very specialized sellers- the lady who sells like 10 varieties of potatoes, for instance, or the mushroom lady (mmmmm, criminis), or the folks that sell almost exclusively fresh herbs and greens (sorrel! Watercress! Homemade sauerkraut!) as well as the usual seasonal fruits and veggies. You can also find local artisan cheeses and butter, cured meats, eggs, honey, etcetera. There’s plenty of folks selling prepared foods, of course. The Thai coconut pancakes are a staple for me, and the tamale lady at the Northwest end of the food row is one of Rob’s favorite stops. The Turkish coffee is a good bet, as well.
     I don’t usually pay a lot of attention to the non-food folks at the markets, as most of them are the exact same stuff you see at every single street fair around town, but Hillcrest has some standouts. The ladies that sell vintage shoes/clothing are a perfect example. Can you say gorgeous vintage cowboy boots for *cheap*? Yeah. There’s also the booth that sells shopping bags/backpacks/travel bags- check out the ‘envirosax’ (an awesome product with an unfortunate name).
     Parking can be a pain in the butt, although I’ve found that if you go later (after noon) you can generally park pretty close. Otherwise expect to walk a bit.

     My next favorite is the Escondido farmers market (Grand Ave, between Kalmia & Juniper. Tuesdays from 2:30-6pm (winter hours)). Although smaller than the Hillcrest market, there is still a good variety of produce vendors. The strawberry lady at the corner of Kalmia & Grand always has the best fruit, and there’s a woman further down the block who always has amazing herbs and gorgeous arugula.
     There’s a gentleman from Da-Lee Ranch selling local, pasture-raised meat products which are phenomenal (ask him about the pork jerky) and you can buy bread from Belen artisan bakery, in my opinion the best local bakery in town. The food vendors have been multiplying over the past year, from a single taco stand to include crepes, Thai food, and soul food (which I have yet to try, maybe today!). There are also several live plant vendors where you can buy herbs, berry bushes, and even avocado trees for planting.

     On Thursday there’s the North Park farmers market (In the CVS parking lot, corner of 32nd & North Park Way, 2pm-dark). This one has been a source of frustration for me. It’s the closest one to home, and I would *love* to buy more of my stuff there, but I just can’t seem to get what I need. There are only a few produce vendors, and most of them are selling the same varieties of produce, although the last time I went (a couple of weeks ago) there were several new vendors with a bit more variety. Let’s hope they stick.
     It’s a good one for prepared food, though, and you can always pick up the basics (fruit, lettuce, a few seasonal crops) and that’s a good enough reason to stop by. Besides, the more people start shopping there, the more appealing it will be to farms & vendors to start selling!

     The brand-new Mission Valley farmers market (east end of the mall parking lot, 3-7pm Fridays) has only been open a month, but it shows some promise. As you might expect (being at the mall and all) the ratio of food to non-food vendors is about 1 to 4. When I went by there a couple of weeks ago there was a decent variety for how few produce vendors were present, but there’s still not a lot there.
     This one is just getting started, so I’ll be keeping an eye on it in weeks to come.

     The City Heights farmers market (Saturdays 9am-1pm, on Wightman between Fairmount and 43rd) is an interesting one. It’s small, and there aren’t a lot of produce vendors, but you can find some pretty obscure Asian veggies that I haven’t seen at any of the other markets. There are also people set up swap-meet style at one end, selling old clothes and such, which is something I’m not accustomed to seeing at the markets.
     There’s a couple of good reasons to go to this one, even if it’s just for a couple of things. It’s very neighborhood- oriented, supporting the City Heights community garden project, and it’s the only farmers market in the county that accepts WIC vouchers (with a dollar matching program for up to $5 of fresh produce). Oh, yeah, and there’s Bikes del pueblo, “a volunteer run cooperative learning space and a do-it-yourself bike repair shop.”
     The whole idea behind this market is community involvement and improving the quality of life for the neighborhood, as well as promoting healthier eating habits for lower-income folks- and I think that’s a damn good reason to support it, if you ask me.

     There’s like 40 farmers markets all over the county, every day of the week except Monday (stupid Monday). Here’s a lowdown on where else you’ll find ‘em. Go out, get some good food, and be a part of your community. It's good stuff.

Enjoy!

The great turkey adventure, part two.

My folks were properly aghast when presented with the monster bird. After we ooh’ed and aah’ed over it for a bit, the refrigerator was reconfigured and the turkey was introduced to its new temporary home. We adjourned to the living room with beers in hand, where I outlined my doubts about the practicality of brining it. My dad, sensing a challenge, overruled my objections, and a couple of hours later, the turkey was resting comfortably wrapped in a giant plastic bag filled with water, salt, and sugars, and nestled into a Coleman cooler surrounded by ice. I bade farewell to the bird and my family, and headed back to civilization to worry some more.


Brine. I think we used 12 gallons or so.


Who knew giant prehistoric turkeys could swim?

On Wednesday, when I was off work, the preparations commenced. Rob and I went to Home Depot, turkey measurements on hand, in the hopes of finding a charcoal grill that could accommodate Tomzilla. Failing that, another plan was hatched. We would employ two Weber kettle grills, and Rob, bless his soul, would handle the pre-cooking decapitation. All seemed well. We spent the evening prepping foodstuffs, and replies to invites rolled in all day- around 20 people were expected at this point, so I was confident that the bird would be well enjoyed.

Thanksgiving morning, pouring rain, everyone’s late… And then, suddenly…. It all came together. The bird was halved, the grills were situated under umbrellas, the smoke started rising… And it was beautiful. Everything fell together, people came, they drank wine, they snacked, they laughed, and finally, they Ate.


Rob takes apart Tomzilla


And people say I have big, uh, never mind.


Solution. Beauty.


Yes. yes. YES.


So. Was it worth it? Could the experience of eating this bird possibly justify the driving, the cost, the stress, and the problem-solving needed to bring it to the table? Will the great turkey adventure bear repeating next year?

Two words: Hell. Yes. Besides all the reasoning I outlined in the initial turkey blog, that was easily by FAR the best turkey I have ever had in my life. The texture of the breast meat was unlike any I’ve had from my grocer’s freezer- somehow denser, and so incredibly moist. The flavor was amazing, and the meat literally melted on my tongue. People were swooning and crying, offering up their firstborn in exchange for a second serving, swearing to never eat again- it was like a poultry Apocalypse of deliciousness. Maybe I exaggerate here, but seriously, not by much.

If you’re curious, come by next year when we do it all again. I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

The great turkey adventure, part one

Let’s follow up on that turkey, shall we?

I drove up to Kimber’s on the Saturday before Thanksgiving with high hopes and a giant cooler. When Kimberly brought the bird out to my car, I thought it looked pretty big- but it wasn’t until it was nestled into the cooler that I realized just how big it was. It was like a relic from prehistoric times (when squirrels were big enough to take off your arm in one bite, and the cockroaches were so big they stepped on YOU*). The legs were each easily as big around as my calf; the whole bird was bigger than my torso. We looked at the tag attached to the top of the bag- 30 pounds, on the dot. I had been expecting a bird 2/3 that size, at most, and I have never seen a hunk of poultry that large that wasn’t still squawking and trying to peck out my eyes (I was very nearly killed by an ostrich once, but that’s a story for another blog on another day). I imagined, just for a second, that perhaps there had been some mistake; maybe they had butchered an emu for me instead… Hmm, I wonder what an emu would taste like on the Weber? But no, no, those were real wings, not the vestigial appendages of a giant flightless bird.


Note the tag...


My brief emu fantasy shattered, I stared at this monster for a moment, trying to take it all in, and goodness knows what my face was showing, (panic? fear? lust?) because Kimberly glanced at me for less than a second before quickly explaining (in reassuring tones) that ‘the birds didn’t cooperate this year, you actually got one of the smaller ones’. I laughed with her and handed her my check for the balance. As she walked away I commenced staring into the cooler again, trying to comprehend how on earth we were actually going to COOK this thing.

On the drive out to my personal poultry storage facility (AKA mom & dad’s giant new refrigerator) my mind brimmed with possibilities and doubts. Were we going to have enough people to eat this thing? How were we going to brine it? It was barely going to fit into the fridge already. Dry-brining was a maybe, but I was nervous about trying a new method on this precious adventure. How were we going to cook it? There was no way it would fit on the grill in its current configuration, and my oven at home has nowhere near the capacity for such a robust beast. My experience with deconstructing raw poultry is limited, and the thought of me clumsily destroying the crowning jewel of our Thanksgiving table before it had touched heat or flame was depressing at best. I was starting to wonder if I had bitten off more than I could chew. Panic set in as I thought of the vast array of possible disasters, and my eyes brimmed with tears.

By the time I pulled into the driveway at Casa de Schultz, my nerves had calmed considerably. Between the folks on hand, with our many years of Thanksgiving successes (mom & dad), mad technical cooking skills (Rob), and unquenchable optimism (me, most of the time), we would beat this thing into submission. And deliciousness. Oh, yes.


Me, a torso-sized bird, and my dad, another big turkey :)




*I am scared to death of squirrels, and I’m overly fond of Yakov Smirnoff jokes

Gobble, gobble.

A few weeks ago I drove up to Kimber’s Farm Fresh Eggs in San Marcos to put down a deposit on my Thanksgiving Turkey. I’d been toying with the idea of buying a fresh local bird this year, and upon conferring with my mother (she usually supplies the butterball, but I convinced her to go halvsies on this one instead) I decided to go for it. I wanted local, fresh, range-fed, the whole shebang, and I wanted to see for myself where it came from. Of course that put a kink in things, as many people suggested Costco for a fresh organic free-range bird. That would have been easier (I suppose- but then again I’m sure I enjoyed the drive to San Marcos and spending the day with my dad, who wanted to tag along, more than I would have the parking lot at Costco) but I wanted to be as local as possible.

Anyway, I cruised up there with my dad one Friday afternoon. Nice drive, nice place, nice folks. The operation is not a big one, a ranch-style house with big pens on either side and pastureland out back (and a couple of adorable basset hounds in the front yard!). They sell eggs (obviously), chickens, and a variety of organic produce as well. I dropped off my check and told them what type of bird and what size I needed, peeked around a bit, and was on my way. Now, nothing to do but wait…

I wasn’t sure when the bird would be ready, so I called them this week. They told me they’re processing them on Saturday, and I can come get him on Sunday. Yay! When I asked if the bird would keep OK all week, I learned that ‘resting’ time for poultry between slaughter and table is ideally 5-7 days, so there won’t be any need to freeze it between Sunday and the big feast. I’m going to have to take it over to my folk’s house for safekeeping, though, as our fridge won’t accommodate a bird that big.

A couple of my friends/people I yak with on the interwebs have expressed some doubts as to whether they’d be comfortable eating a real, live bird (okay, you know what I mean). The idea of eating an animal which I *may* have already looked in the eye (I didn’t get to identify my individual bird when I was up there, but I did eyeball a couple of the toms through the fence) apparently makes some people uncomfortable. Some of these folks are vegetarians (go figure) but not all of ‘em. As one person put it (albeit more harshly than most of my friends :p) “I can't decide what's more fucked up - someone who picks up a nicely packaged product at the grocery, allowing them to remain mostly oblivious to the craptacular living conditions and untimely death of the animal they are eating, or someone who takes a visit to a farm, looks the animal in the face, and then says "I want to kill that one"

My reply: (paraphrased and much expanded for purposes of needless verbosity)

At least I know this animal is living in healthy conditions, isn’t stuffed full of corn and antibiotics, and will be killed humanely. If you're gonna look at it from a moral standpoint, I think this wins out over factory-farmed meat. Plus, cutting out many, many middlemen and hundreds of miles (if not thousands) between that bird walking around (or not, depending on how it's farmed) and being on my plate seems like a good way to do it. Not to mention that it's healthier for me, without the aforementioned drugs and such cruising around in its bloodstream and tissue.

It's better for the environment, too, both because it's not a part of the big corn machine, and because there are minimal if any fuel/transportation costs involved (I gotta drive to pick it up, but the feed that they get is locally produced). Take my gas used to drive to SM for the bird (~28 miles each way) and subtract it from the fossil fuels and other petroleum-based goodness involved in growing (fertilizing) corn feed, it, transporting it to a feedlot, then transporting the poor creatures from possibly hundreds of miles away to the local grocery-selling place… That’s something I can feel good about, as well.

I would actually like to be more involved in the process, if possible, but none of the local poultry farms are allowing tours just now because of ‘biosecurity’ reasons.. So for those of you who have asked (some snidely, some not) whether I’m actually going to kill the bird with my own two hands, the answer is no. If I had my druthers I would at least be able to observe the process, if not participate. And yeah, I will kill something I’m going to eat if given the opportunity. Because I do firmly believe this: If you can't stomach the fact that the meat you're eating actually came from an ANIMAL, and that there are certain messy realities that exist between it gobbling about happily in the pasture, and the white meat with gravy and mashed potatoes on your plate, maybe you should think twice about eating it.

I'm not trying to justify anything, just sorta laying out my reasons for going this route this year rather than letting my mom buy a frozen butterball at the store. I did actually think about it a bit, especially because it's quite a bit more expensive this way. Now for the big question… I wonder how it’s gonna taste?