Dinner Tonight: Smoked Pork Chops & Cabbage-Apple "Kraut"

MMMMM! I love smoked pork chops! They were from the pig we went in on from the farm we bring our compost to. Delicious! For dinner, I sauteed some sliced red onion in olive oil, then added 1/2 a medium head of thinly sliced red cabbage and a slice Macintosh apple. I poured in some apple cider and cider vinegar as well as a big dollop of whole-grain mustard. I let that cook a bit then put in the smoked pork chops, covering them with the "kraut." When they were hot, they were done!

Dan gave it 7.8/10 stars. He doesn't like bone-in meat.

3.3.10 Pickup

This week's pickup...
1.5 lbs Red Thumb Fingerling Potatoes
2 lbs Red Beets
1 lb Celeriac
2 lbs Kohlrabi
3 lbs Green Cabbage
Frozen Braising Greens Mix
Bag of Shoots/Claytonia Mix
On the Rise Pizza Dough
Amir Hebib's Oyster and Shiitake Mushrooms
Maplebrook Fresh Mozzarella
Pete's Applesauce

It's also our first meat pickup! I'm so excited. We're getting...
a chicken
lamb loin chops
hot italian YAK sausage
ground beef

I still have carrots, some shoots, a daikon and a head of cabbage in my fridge, plus peppers in my freezer. I decided this week that I'll make a menu on Tues pm/Wed am to help use stuff in a timely manner.

Using what we have on hand and in this week's share I came up with....
smoked pork chops with quick homemade kraut and roasted potatoes

pizza with mozz, yak sausage, greens and salad

roast chicken and vegetables/potatoes

salmon with celeriac-carrot salad

chicken tacos with cabbage slaw

Dumpling Soup

This is in no way local but I have to write this down for posterity's sake.

Dan has a little sinus infection going on and wanted something spicy and brothy for dinner. This is what I made.

I was already poaching chicken, so I used the leftover poaching liquid and added more chicken broth to it, along with minced ginger, chile-garlic sauce, soy sauce and 5 spice powder. I first added sliced celery, diced carrot and diced onion. After a bit I added diced purple snow peas and shredded cabbage. Then I added Ling Ling dumplings! After the dumplings were done, I stirred in whole cilantro leaves and topped our bowls with sliced radishes.

SO GOOD!

Snowy Day Pickup 2.24.10

We almost missed our pick-up this week, like a few other folks it sounded like. Dan was crazy busy all day. I got home at 5:30 (the time our pick-up ends) and it took me a few minutes to wonder where it was. Luckily there was still someone at Shelburne Vineyard when I called and we braved the snow to get it. Yay! Here's what we got this week...

2 lbs Carrots
1 lb Daikon Radish
2 lbs Rutabagas
2 lbs Yellow Storage Onions
2-3 lbsRed Cabbagge
Frozen Winter Squash Puree
Bag of Shoots/Claytonia Mix
Elmore Mountain Pain Au Levain with Sifted Whole Wheat Flour
Champlain Orchards Cranberry Apple Cider
Pa Pa Doodles Farm Eggs
Sour Pickles

The bread is incredible--I just had an egg sammy with it for breakfast. Just sour enough. Nom. I'm looking forward to the squash puree--I've had a hankering for a soup I used to make when I worked at Smokejack's that was sweet potato with maple syrup, chipotle and cider vinegar. I have another container of it from last winter (oops!) so I'll be combing the 2. Made a spritzer with the cider and homemade seltzer last night. Also made slaw with a leftover head of cabbage, a couple of carrots, a daikon and a chopped yellow bell pepper with a dressing of mayo, yogurt, vinegar and Frank's :D

We still have some roots in the fridge from last week, but that's good as I'm planning on making root vegetable enchiladas for a party this weekend. I'm a little bummed bc I just bought a 5# bag of carrots Tuesday. I didn't think we'd get them in the share this week because they got them last week. Oh well, we eat those like they're going out of style so no worries.

Looking forward to the meat csa starting next week!!!

Mmmm... Local Potato Soup...

We're in slightly rough shape today. We were in Mass all weekend, culminating in seeing some of Dan's old college friends last night. We were up too late drinking and watching the Olympics and got very little sleep today. We had a big brunch before we headed home and when I started talking about making x when we got home, then y for dinner, Dan was like, let's just have dinner. Right-o.

Our newsletter last week had a recipe for Winter Baked Potato Soup. I made a riff on it. Here's what I did...

Cooked 4 pieces of bacon from the pig we got in a Dutch oven. Added a chopped red onion, sauteed that in the rendered bacon fat, then added all of the nicola potatoes we got last week and a halved garlic clove. I covered it with milk and simmered the mixture until the potatoes were tender. I mashed everything until it was chunky and added grated special reserve Cabot sharp Cheddar and creme fraiche. I toasted some leftover Cyrus Pringle bread and put it on top of the soup along with the crumbled bacon. Nom nom...

To start, we had a sprout salad with grapefruit and avocado and a mustard-white wine vinaigrette.

I love that everything in the soup was grown or processed in Vermont. Two thumbs up.

1st CSA Pickup

So Dan and I decided we needed a break as CSA members. For over a year, we were members of either Pete's Greens in winter and spring and Full Moon Farm in the summer and fall. This past fall we decided we wanted to actually go grocery shopping. Dan was sick of me telling him we couldn't have pho for dinner because we had too many other vegetables in the fridge that needed eating. I was sick of having to deal with the endless number of root vegetables that needed cooking.

Boy, weren't we both wrong.

When we decided to start back up with Pete's Greens for the spring share, it was a relief. We moved to Charlotte this winter and I no longer have the luxury of walking to a terrific co-op or even Shaw's when we ran out of something. Now I had to drive 20 minutes to get to a chain grocery store, longer to get to a natural-food store. I needed the share.

Even Dan was excited. He didn't even question rejoining, which surprised me a little. We made the decision several weeks ago and ever since, each week Dan asked, "Does the CSA start this week?" It was good to see his excitement.

And here I present to you, our first pick-up...

2 lbs Nicola Potatoes; 2 lbs Celeriac; 2 lbs Parsnips; 2 lbs Red Onions; 1-2 Heads of Garlic; Frozen Sweet Mixed Peppers; Bag of Shoots/Claytonia Salad Mix; Red Hen Cyrus Pringle Bread; Champlain Orchards Empire Apples; Butterworks Whole Wheat Flour; Vt Butter and Cheese Creme Fraiche

And the first pick-up, of course, brought the same challenges.
Dan hates parnsips.
I baked 2 loaves of bread this weekend that we still have parts of.
I just bought apples.
We both dislike green peppers.
I rarely cook with creme fraiche.

BUT! As always, we will embrace it! I'm out of whole-wheat flour. And garlic. And onions. Dan loves celeriac. And potatoes!

Presently I have roasting in the oven diced apples, celeriac, parsnips, onions tossed with canola oil, salt, pepper and dried thyme. It smells heavenly. Speaking of which, I should go eat it right now.

Best Valentine's Day Ever?

Even though Valentine's Day didn't turn out exactly as I wanted it to, it definitely ranks as one of the best Valentine's Days ever.

I had high hopes for enjoying the first bacon of our pig along with homemade pumpkin-oat-bread French toast. I made the dough from the artisan bread in 5 min a day book last night, but didn't realize until I woke up this morning that the bread needed 2 hours to rise before baking for another hour. Thankfully, Martha had a pumpkin pancake recipe on her website that was quite possibly the best pancake recipe I've ever made (OK, maybe #3). The only pork we've eaten from our pig was Italian sausage, which was great. The bacon was pretty darn good, though less salty than run-of-the-mill bacon, which wasn't necessarily bad.

After refreshing Pain de Campagne part II, we headed to Montpelier for a cheese, chocolate and beer tasting at our favorite beer haunt.

And what an event it was. Lots of delicious pairings, but one of the most amazing things were these truffles from Laughing Moon chocolates which were quite literally this amazing cheese from Jasper Hill Farms (Willoughby) dipped in dark chocolate. :swoon My favorite match-up of the day was that same cheese (Willoughby) with a really nice Trappist trippel. Nom.

We were just going to stay for a glass of the cask beer (Allagash Black!) but ended up having another. And another. And another. Whoops! Luckily we stopped at a friends' house for a bit to sober up and made it home in one piece. And luckily there was leftover soup in our fridge to chow down on....

Now I just have to stay awake long enough to let the bread rise and bake...