We’ve eaten summer salads for days. . . . → Read More: Cucurbit Risotto]]> Did you know there’s a name for the veggies overflowing your crisper/garden/CSA box right now? Cucurbitaceae! Zucchini, summer squash, cucumbers, melons…we’re kind of drowning in them over here. Well, not melons, so much, and our little muffin (9 months tomorrow!) devours zucchini and summer squash, so we don’t really have a problem with that, but all the cucumbers are in our refrigerator right now. ALL! So. Many. Cucumbers.

We’ve eaten summer salads for days. I’ve blended them into smoothies. I’ve even baked them into pancakes with questionable success. Pickles? Done. And I don’t even love pickles.

What do I love? Warm smooshy things in bowls that don’t take forever to make. Bonus points if The Muffin likes it. Extra bonus points if he can feed it to himself. Super extra bonus points if leftovers are still tasty. What fits the bill? Cucumber risotto. “EWWWWWWWWWWWWW!”, you say? “Delicious!”, I counter. “EWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW!”, you still say. Well, everyone’s entitled to her opinion, but this risotto is sweet and subtle and creamy and lavender/green. If you still don’t trust me, substitute zucchini – I have and it’s great.

Apologies (once again) for the phone photos. We’ll figure out this technology thing, I promise!

Cucurbit Risotto

Adapted from Greene on Greens

Serves 4-6 as a main

Directions

1. Heat the chicken stock (on the stove or in the microwave). Prep your veggies. You don’t have to be too fussy with seeding and peeling the cucumbers. I think it’s easiest to seed cucumbers by cutting them in half the long way and scooping out the seedy middle with a spoon. (See picture above)
2. In a heavy skillet, melt half the butter (1 TBsp) over medium-low heat. Add the red onion and sweat (cook slowly without browning) for 2 minutes; add the garlic and cook for another minute.
3. Thoroughly stir the rice into the onion mixture, so that each grain is coated with butter.
4. Add the cucumbers and crushed red pepper flakes. Stir well, then use your spoon to smooth and level the rice mixture in the pan.
5. Gently pour a generous 1 cup of hot stock evenly over the rice mixture. Don’t stir. Just let the rice absorb the liquid, which should take about 15 minutes.
6. When all the liquid has been absorbed, stir and repeat with another generous cup of stock. Reduce the heat if the last batch was absorbed in less than 15 minutes.
7. Stir in the last 1/2 cup or so of stock. Keep your eye on the risotto this time. It’s done when the rice is tender, but not mushy. If it’s the right consistency, but there’s still liquid in the pan, raise the heat to boil it off. If the rice isn’t ready when all the liquid is gone, add a little hot water and keep cooking.
8. When the rice is perfect, stir in the remaining butter (1 TBsp) and salt, pepper, and herbs to taste.

First, we no longer let it “yoge” in the oven. After forgetting that it’s in there and baking it once too often, we’ve started culturing it in the microwave. This works great!

Second, we’ve been whisking in the culture once the milk cools to 130 degrees, rather than 120 degrees. This seems to result in a creamier . . . → Read More: Yogurt Update]]> Since we first posted our yogurt recipe (really more of a method), we’ve made a few changes.

First, we no longer let it “yoge” in the oven. After forgetting that it’s in there and baking it once too often, we’ve started culturing it in the microwave. This works great!

Second, we’ve been whisking in the culture once the milk cools to 130 degrees, rather than 120 degrees. This seems to result in a creamier yogurt. I’m not sure why, but it might be because the temperature is kept slightly higher while culturing.

Third, after we melted the lid of our regular yogurt container (see comment number one), we switched to using a quart jar. It works really well, except that you have to start with 3-3/4 cups of milk, rather than an even 4, so that the jar doesn’t overflow.

I hope you’ve at least given the yogurt thing a try. If you need an extra push in that direction, read this short NPR article, which includes a couple of yummy sounding recipes in addition to the author’s own yogurt method. Happy culturing!

We’re leaving for Florida early this week and received a shocking amount of food from our CSA, considering it’s still the winter season and it was the second-to-last pickup. Four pounds of onions, four pounds of beets and radishes, five pounds of apples… you get the picture. We’ve certainly gotten our . . . → Read More: A Busy Day Working with and Against Microbes]]> Lindsay and I had a busy day. But we had a lot of help in the form of pressurized steam, yeast, and lactobacillus bacteria.

We’re leaving for Florida early this week and received a shocking amount of food from our CSA, considering it’s still the winter season and it was the second-to-last pickup. Four pounds of onions, four pounds of beets and radishes, five pounds of apples… you get the picture. We’ve certainly gotten our money’s worth this year! But with all this food on top of what we already had, we needed to prep some for storage.

To deal with the four pounds of fingerling potatoes (which we already had a bunch of), Lindsay used our pressure canner for the first time:

Regular water-bath canning limits you to recipes that are acidic or briny enough to kill off botulism. 212-degree boiling water will kill off everything else, but botulism can survive (see our rules of canning, which we will need to update to include a guide to pressure canning). Pressure canning uses pressure to get the temperature high enough to kill absolutely everything, which means that you can do absolutely anything you wants.

And it’s a two-fee: it cooks at the same time it preserves. In six months, if we want to make potato salad, we can just reach for one of these jars. Lindsay will have to write-up the process of pressure canning. Even though it was perfectly easy and safe, the first time is still scary and intimidating, even for someone comfortable with canning. Just look at this steampunk contraption:

Second, to deal with the two heads of cabbage we weren’t going to eat, Lindsay made (actually, is still in the process of making) sauerkraut. Our CSA this year has given us a lot of cabbage (both red and green), and we’ve found that we waste a lot less of it by taking an hour to make one large batch of kraut which will supply 5-10 quick dinners down the line. We even decided to invest in a ceramic fermenting crock that has a water moat to allow it to “burp” while fermenting while still enduring that no nasty microbes can get in:

Finally, speaking of fermenting, I made a batch of beer this weekend. I plan to take more photos down the line and do a real post once I get the hang of the process, but for now, here’s a preview:

It is an all-grain (from malted barley) recipe and we decided to save the “spent grain” that is left over. This grain has been crushed and steeped in hot water to convert and extract all the sugar from the starches, but what’s left over still has flavor. We used our dehydrator to dry it out so that we can store it. It goes great as an added crunch to granola (reminds me of grape nuts) and we also plan to crush it into flour and make some spent-grain baked goods:

Guideline 1: Commit. Get a . . . → Read More: Cooking for One: Inappropriately Large Salad]]> Here’s another attempt at avoiding delivery while Erik is out of town – a salad that is nearly the same size as my laptop. I’m a hungry girl, so normal salads don’t really do it for me. I need a thoughtfully composed bowl of tasty things or I don’t feel satisfied. Instead of giving a recipe, I’ll give you my little guiding principles for making a GIGANTIC, super-filling salad.

Guideline 1: Commit. Get a big bowl. Much bigger than you think you’ll need. Better to look silly and keep your salad together, than use a small bowl piled precariously high. The second part of committing is to use your hands to toss everything together. Maybe I’m not very coordinated, but I’ve never had good luck with salad tossing utensils. I either toss more on the floor than in the bowl or don’t adequately mix everything. My (clean) hands work great though!

Guideline 2: Only use things you like. I don’t like celery, so you won’t see it in any of my salads. I prefer dark leafy greens (kale, spinach, etc.) to lighter ones (romaine or iceberg). I also like some sweetness from fruit and a mixture of crisp and soft things. I don’t like a huge bowl of crunchy veggies, because I get bored of chewing them. You get the picture. It also helps to have some prepped stuff in the refrigerator. If you like beets on your salad, as I do, roast a few right away, so that they’re ready for a quick salad later in the week.

Guideline 3: Know a few good dressing recipes. I love the standard oil and vinegar, but it doesn’t always make the cut. We have found that raw food cookbooks and websites (like Choosing Raw) have great recipes for interesting dressings that can turn a pile of produce into a meal.

Guideline 4: Mega salads aren’t diet food! It’s a meal, so treat it like one and pay attention to what you’re putting in it. Like any meal, it should be substantial enough to keep you full, but not overloaded with calorie-rich ingredients. The salad I made today had a riff on this avocado-mustard dressing with a small avocado (about 200 calories) and a tablespoon of olive oil (120 calories). I also added about a tablespoon of toasted pine nuts (50 calories or so). As a meal, this is fine for me. It’s filling and delicious, but not a reason to reward myself with ice cream this afternoon. Even though it’s definitely ice cream weather…

Check out our salad posts for some ideas. As the weather warms up, it’s nice to have an arsenal of dinner ideas that don’t require the oven or stove.

I keep telling my friends that canning doesn’t really take that much time. Well, sometimes, it totally does. It takes all day and you end up sticky and with a sink full of dishes. BUT you can avoid that very easily by being smart about the recipes you make and how you make them. I made a canner full of applesauce yesterday, but I also managed to sleep in, do laundry, bake bread, finish . . . → Read More: How to Make Applesauce and Spend the Day Biking]]>

I keep telling my friends that canning doesn’t really take that much time. Well, sometimes, it totally does. It takes all day and you end up sticky and with a sink full of dishes. BUT you can avoid that very easily by being smart about the recipes you make and how you make them. I made a canner full of applesauce yesterday, but I also managed to sleep in, do laundry, bake bread, finish a knitting project, watch a little How I Met Your Mother, and go for a 20-mile bike ride. Your day might be full of family events, work responsibilities, reading a book, watching the news, whatever, but you can still fit in canning if you want to.

This recipe relies on two appliances to make life easier – the slow cooker and food mill. We actually used two slow cookers to speed things up. If you don’t have two slow cookers or can’t borrow one from your nice friend, Ben, you can cook in two batches. Just stick the cooked apples in another container in the refrigerator, load up the slow cooker again, and then mill everything when the second (or third or fourth) batch is done. The slow cooker is brilliant, because it eliminates all the time you’d otherwise spend standing over the stove. Plug it in and go play outside.

If you don’t have a food mill, then check out our original applesauce post. We posted a little tutorial on how to set up a KitchenAid food mill attachment, because I get buffaloed every time I open the boxes, but it really is a worthwhile tool.

Easy Peasy Applesauce

1 peck of apples will yield about 4 quarts of applesauce.

1. Wash as many apples as you want, using the yield above as a guide. A peck weighs somewhere between 10 and 14 pounds.
2. Quarter the washed apples and toss them into the slow cooker(s). Don’t worry about peels and seeds, because we’ll remove these later. You might want to cut the bigger apples into sixths, just so that they nestle better into the slow cooker.
3. Cook on high for 6 hours. This part is pretty flexible as long as the apples are really really soft at the end. You could cook one batch on low overnight and then start the second batch on high in the morning. I started right before lunch, then went on a nice long bike ride. When I got home for dinner, they were ready to go.
4. When the apples are cooked, get your canning gear ready. (Steps 3 and 4)
5. Pass the cooked apples through a food mill directly into a pot. The food mill will remove the peels and seeds and smash everything into a nice consistency.
6. If you want, you can spice up your applesauce at this point. You can add any herb, spice, or sweetener you want. We did maple syrup and cinnamon last year, which was a big hit. I think brown sugar and crumbled dried chiles would be good. Maybe smoked paprika? That stuff makes everything awesomer. Do not add nuts, dried fruit, dairy, or oil, however. Those ingredients change the pH of the sauce, potentially rendering it unsafe for canning. (Read this post for more science-y stuff.)
7. Regardless of whether you add extra ingredients, put the pot of sauce on the stove and heat to boiling. If you want your sauce thicker, keep it at a simmer until it reaches the consistency you’re looking for.
8. Fill quart, pint, or half pint jars, leaving 1/2 inch headspace, and process for 20 minutes. (Steps 6 through 22)

Yep, it’s kind of gross. But . . . → Read More: Dark Days Challenge Week 4: How to Cut Up a Whole Chicken]]> Our Dark Days meal for the week was something that we have already posted, so we decided to post a strategy instead. Eating locally sometimes means having limited options and learning how to deal with what you can get. In our case, we can’t find (or afford when we find it!) user-friendly, pre-wrapped packages of local chicken breasts. So, we buy a whole chicken and do some work ourselves.

Yep, it’s kind of gross. But I think it’s important to acknowledge that you’re eating an animal, not just “meat”. I sort of feel like this is the respectful way to eat chicken. Is that overly crunchy and “we are the world”? Probably. But it’s also waaaay cheaper and not all that bad. To combat the ick factor, keep a pair of tongs and a towel nearby. When I feel the willies coming on, I just clean my hands on the towel, grab the tongs, take a deep breath, and remind myself that if I’m going to eat it, I should be able to touch it. A few minutes with the tongs and I’m back to my bare hands.

This is probably not the “official” way to cut up a chicken, but it works for me. The model for our photo shoot was a delicious 3-and-a-half pound chicken from Stillman’s. She had a little cosmetic issue with the skin on her breasts, so imagine that it was intact. Sorry for the blurry photos…the day went something like this…

Erik: Hold still so I can take the photo.
Lindsay: I’M HOLDING A CHICKEN SPINE. IT’S GOOD ENOUGH!!

Directions

1. Get all your tools ready. Once your hands are chicken-y, you won’t want to dig around. You’ll need:
   • Cutting board
   • Sharp knife
   • Kitchen scissors
   • Plate to hold the finished pieces
   • Zip-top bag or something similar to hold the pieces that will go in the freezer for stock later
   • Tongs
   • Towel for drying your hands when things get icky or slippery

2. Take a look inside the bird. Is there a little bag? These are the giblets – the organs. Some people cook them up; some people toss ‘em. Your choice, but take them out of the cavity either way.
3. Put your chicken, breast side down, on the cutting board. Use the scissors to cut down one side of the spine and then the other to remove it. You might have to use two hands. I save the spine for chicken stock, so it goes in my zip-top bag.

   

4. If there’s anything floating around inside, get rid of it. My chicken had a couple of things that I assume were organs. That called for tongs and a deep breath. I got through it, though, and so will you.
5. Flip the chicken over. Legs are up first. This is mostly about dislocating the joint, rather than cutting through the bone. Lift up the chicken by a leg to see how it moves. This will help you figure out where the joint is. Cut through the skin and meat on all sides of the joint until you can see it. Bend the leg back and forth to try to pop it. Sometimes I’m lucky and it comes apart easily. If that doesn’t work, stick the tip of your knife in the joint and push down to break it. Repeat with the other leg.

   

6. If you want, you can also separate the drumstick from the thigh. Follow the same steps as for separating the leg from the body – find the joint, cut through the skin and meat, and pop/cut the joint.

   

7. Now for the wings. I usually stick these in my stock bag along with the spine, but you can certainly cook them if you’d like. Again, just use the same steps as for the leg to remove both wings.

   

8. Once the wings are off, you’ll have a very familiar piece of chicken staring at you. The breasts. With the neck-end facing you, stick the tip of your knife in the bone at the top-middle of the breasts. Push the blade of the knife down to the cutting board to split the bone in half. One half of the breast should come away pretty easily at this point. You’ll have to use your fingers to separate the meat from the center bone, leaving you with ribs and meat. You can leave the second breast as is or remove the wedge-shaped breastbone by working the meat away from it with your fingers and a knife. There are probably nicer ways to split the breasts, but this works for me.

   

9. There. Done. Not so bad, right? Cook however you’d like.

   

If you’ve been wanting to learn to can or just want to meet some new friends, come join Erik and me in our Manhattan kitchen for National Can-it-Forward Day on Saturday, August 13th. We’ll start around 2 pm and finish up whenever we’re done canning and chatting away (6:00 or so).

To cover materials, we’re asking for $30 a person. If that’s prohibitive for you, send me an email and we’ll work something . . . → Read More: National Can-It-Forward Day]]>

If you’ve been wanting to learn to can or just want to meet some new friends, come join Erik and me in our Manhattan kitchen for National Can-it-Forward Day on Saturday, August 13th. We’ll start around 2 pm and finish up whenever we’re done canning and chatting away (6:00 or so).

To cover materials, we’re asking for $30 a person. If that’s prohibitive for you, send me an email and we’ll work something out. You’ll go home with printed instructions, a jar of your hard work, and hopefully some motivation!

We’ll have a great selection of produce at the Union Square Greenmarket that time of year, so let me know if there’s something in particular you’ve been wanting to make. There will definitely be peaches, blueberries, cucumbers, bell peppers, and tomatoes (although, maybe not the type I like to can whole).

If you’re interested in joining us, add a comment (don’t forget your email) or send me an email at lindsay@eatlocal365.com.