Posts Tagged ‘farmers market’

13 Apr

Living in Interesting Times: Shortages

Posted by wooddogs3 in Books worth reading, edible landscaping, farmers market, front yard gardening, greens, herbs, home food production, Nose-to-tail vegetables, Uncategorized. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , .

When I talk with friends and neighbors about the current pandemic, I am sometimes surprised to encounter a firm fixed belief that there are no food shortages and won’t be any food shortages. Ask them if they’ve tried to buy flour or rice lately and you won’t receive a sensible reply. My own view is that in such situations there are potentially two kinds of shortages: short-term ones caused by panic-buying and hoarding, and longer-term ones caused by interruption of supply chains. Our current difficulty (at least in my area) in getting rice, flour, eggs, and toilet paper fall in the first category. Some people’s’ hoarding caused others to go without, and I’ll just add that there is a special place in hell reserved for those who hoard and price-gouge infant food, diapers, and other baby supplies. But there is lots of other stuff available and most of us will be just fine except for a little grousing.

The other kind of shortage, from interruption of production and transportation chains, is longer-term, hard to predict accurately, and potentially more worrisome. Without predicting disaster, I can only say that American agriculture depends heavily on immigrant labor, and you can review the Farm Bureau’s summary of this. I will quote only one startling fact from their statistics: “If agriculture were to lose access to all undocumented workers, agricultural output would fall by $30 to $60 billion.” Since to help contain the pandemic we are closing borders and tightening enforcement, I don’t see how the agricultural labor supply can be unaffected. This could translate to fruit unharvested and veggies decaying in the fields or not getting planted in the first place.

This is a long-winded way of saying that all food should be treated like the treasure it is. Don’t hoard it, and don’t waste it either. Look at what you have and let your imagination run wild about how you might use it. Relax your usual food restrictions unless they relate to religion or health. Taste things you might not ordinarily think about. Get a couple of good cookbooks about vegetables so that you’re ready to get the most out of available produce. Two that I highly recommend are Six Seasons and Vegetables Unleashed. Both are available in e-format and will help you make the most of any food available. Think creatively about what to make. Can’t get rice? Make lettuce wraps. We are not going to starve, not by a long shot, and we can better utilize our supply chain by being more flexible in our thinking.
The problem that I really worry about is not national and international supply chains but local ones. Huge ag corporations won’t be allowed to go under, but your area small farmers and stock raisers just might, or may be disheartened enough by plowing good vegetables back into the dirt that they don’t continue. So find out where they are and how you can buy their produce. In my area the growers’ markets will open in May but  will be limited to food only, and since it’s in the open air, this is probably safer than going to a grocery store. Use all recommended precautions, but support those growers.

Plant something of your own. This morning I was thinking about what I would grow if I only had one small garden bed to work with. Given a tiny little space four feet on a side, I would double-dig it, enrich the hell out of the soil, and plant Fordhook Swiss chard and tuck some thyme plants in at the edges. Chard produces heavily all summer regardless of heat if kept watered, and few things will do more for your health than eating more leafy greens. The taste is mild and acceptable to nearly everyone. The old reliable Fordhook is more productive and resilient than the newer fancier colors, and the stems offer a second vegetable with a different texture, great in stir-fries. It can be harvested all summer and then left in place to produce some early greens the following year. Chickens adore any leaves that you don’t get around to eating, and if you know any goats, they love the tough ends of the stalks, or just compost them. One packet of seed produces all the greens a small family can eat. I don’t know of a more nutritious and efficient vegetable. As for how to use it, click on the “greens” category in the sidebar on the right side of this page  for a dozen or more ideas, and that’s just the beginning.

 

 

 

 

4 Jul

Independence

Posted by wooddogs3 in cooking, edible landscaping, farmers market, home food production, Ketogenic diet. Tagged: , , , , , , , .

On this July 4th, I am sitting after dinner contemplating the hardly-revolutionary idea that all independence is local as well as national, and neither can exist without the other. I have wonderful irreplaceable freedoms under the Constitution. I also have a little plot of land on which to grow food like the garlic shown above, a splendid local system of farmer’s markets where I can buy what I can’t grow like the  pork belly that I roasted, and a system of national forests that preserve nearby wilderness areas where I found the oyster mushrooms. Without the national systems that protect our local freedoms, none of this could be maintained.

So be conscientiously local. Grow what you can, and buy what you have to. Waste as little as you can manage. Connect with other local people. Compost and reuse as well as recycling. Support your area farmers, not just by buying their products, but by realizing that your votes can support politicians who are sympathetic to local farms. Keep it always in mind that “All politics is local.” Connect with your neighbors, even if (especially if) their political views are different from yours, because both you and your neighbors might end up with something new to think about. And love and relish this country and support its national freedoms and national programs, and refuse to consider abridgment of its freedoms or demonization of people who don’t look or sound or worship exactly like its founders. We are bigger than that.

 

 

 

21 May

The Season of Scapes

Posted by wooddogs3 in cooking, edible landscaping, farmers market, front yard gardening, greens, herbs, Nose-to-tail vegetables, passing pleasures, urban homesteading, vegetable gardening. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , .

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Back in 2009 I wrote a post on onion and garlic scapes that you can find here, and all I can say is that if I had known that hundreds of people were going to look at it and it would still be going strong in 2016, I would’ve been more thorough. But then, when I think about it, I think my advice to get young tender garlic scapes, chop them in about 1 inch lengths, and pan fry them in hot olive oil is still my favorite way to use them. These days I usually cut the whole bud off before cutting them up to cook. It has a slightly starchy quality that does not, in my current opinion, go well with the greenness of the rest of the scape. Try it both ways and see what you think.
I also still enjoy putting them under roasting meat and poultry to stew in the juices, and in fact tonight I will be having roast chicken thighs on a bed of garlic scapes, almost exactly as I described in that post seven years ago. Make sure that they get 20 minutes or more to cook. If necessary, you can take the meat out to rest and continue roasting the scapes until done. Make sure the pan doesn’t get dry, which will cause them to burn. Add a little water or broth if needed to keep things a little juicy but not soupy.
I can also add that allicin, the antioxidant in garlic and other alliums that is thought to have many health benefits, is present in much higher levels in the green part of the garlic plant than in the cloves that you typically cook with, so eating the plant bits is good for you as well as tasty.
I am also experimenting with dehydrating scapes and grinding them into powder. I am not doing this with garlic scapes because I prefer to eat them as is, but I have been dehydrating onion and shallot scapes so that they can be ground into an attractive green powder that, I hope, will be useful for seasoning. So far, I have sprinkled some over salad with good effect. I am thinking about using it to coat chicken thighs, along with salt, and then searing them in olive oil and finishing them in the oven. I’m not sure how the green color will play out in this context, but I think it will brown enough that it will not be particularly startling.
The best advice that I can give to vegetable gardeners is: grow green garlic. Grow a lot of it. Use the greens, and ignore any rigid advice to use the white parts only, because you would be missing the best part of the garlic. Remember to slice crosswise in 1/4″ slices when using the whole stalk and leaves, since they are not as tender as the scape, and once the scape appears, the stalk and leaves are too tough to use. Try it every which way, because you are probably going to love at least some cooking methods. Click the tag for “green garlic” at the head of this post to look at all my various experiments with it.  If your space is limited and you can’t grow enough for your yearly needs, you can eat all your garlic as green garlic and then buy heads of garlic at your farmers’ market, grocery, or food co-op for winter use. If you are limited to a small space, there is no point in using it on storage vegetables.
Be aware that you can create a very long season by choosing a number of different varieties. My green garlic season starts in mid-March with the very early Chinese Pink, and right now in late May the late Mount Hood and elephant garlic are still providing wonderful green garlic. I buy all my garlic from Territorial Seeds, and I strongly recommend getting your order in by June because the most interesting varieties sell out quickly. It will be delivered in fall in time for planting. This year I have finally planted enough that I think I will be able to replant from my own stock; in previous years, I’m afraid I have gluttonously eaten it all.

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5 Apr

Kitchen Staples: Pasta and Eggs, and notes on what makes a good egg.

Posted by wooddogs3 in cooking, farmers market, fish and seafood, home food production, kitchen staples, recipe, sustainable, urban homesteading. Tagged: , , , , , , , , , , , , .

If you’re a lover of pasta carbonara, you know the rich and lovely taste of egg yolks on pasta. This time of year, if you don’t have chickens yourself (I don’t yet), the farmers markets are full of beautiful eggs with deep orange yolks, and wonderful impromptu meals can be made from them. This one is warm and comforting, but has a little zing to it. You can have it on the table in 30 minutes or less. If you always have pasta, high-quality olive oil, good Parmesan, and anchovies around, you’re never more than 30 minutes (tops) from a good meal. Good eggs in season send the combination over the top.


You will need a small, heavy skillet or clay dish (my preference) with a cover. Clay needs to be heated slowly, so if you’re using it, start heating it over low heat about 15 minutes before you want to start cooking the eggs.

Ingredients: for 2 very generous servings, start with 4 very good eggs, about 6 oz. of spaghetti or linguini, 2 small anchovy fillets (very necessary for the bold flavor of the dish), 3 tablespoons of good olive , 2 cloves of garlic chopped, a few tablespoons of chopped parsley (plus more for garnish if you like,) an ounce or two of the best Parmesan you can find, and half a teaspoon of red pepper flakes (more if they’re mild.)

Start cooking the garlic slowly in the olive oil, over medium heat, while the salted water for the pasta is coming to a boil. Meanwhile, chop the anchovy fillets very finely or pound them in a mortar until they’re paste-like. Stir them into the saute’ing garlic and cook the mixture until the garlic is soft through but not browned. Lower the heat under the skillet and stir in the red pepper. Break the eggs into the skillet a few minutes after you add the pasta to the boiling salted water. Splash a couple of teaspoons of water into the skillet (this makes a little steam to lightly cook the top of the eggs,) cover the skillet tightly, and let it sit over low heat until the eggs are done to your liking. Make sure the yolks stay soft. When done to taste, take the skillet off the heat. Heavy iron or clay will keep them hot. Open the cover so that they don’t overcook.
When the pasta is ready, drain it, toss it very quickly with the cheese, another tablespoon or so of olive oil, and the chopped parsley. Put in warmed bowls and top each with two of the eggs. Pour the garlic/anchovy/red pepper mixture left in the skillet over the top.
At the table, break the yolks, stir them into the pasta a little, and revel in simplicity and ease.
This dish accomodates whole wheat spaghetti if you like it.

Regarding those eggs, I advise buying at the farmers market whenever possible. To have a good life and make good eggs, chickens should run around outside and have access to plants and bugs, not run around a giant stinking building with a tiny outdoor yard, mostly unused by the chickens, that allows the manufacturer (and I use that term advisedly) to call its product “free range.” Don’t support a CAFO with the misimpression that you are getting truly good eggs. Really good eggs come from small producers and backyard growers and are not found at the grocery store. Be sure to bring the cartons back when you empty them, because the small growers pay too much for them and are usually eager to reuse them.

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