i've got to stop the galettes!!!!!

why, oh why, did i decide, after all these years, to try to make rustic tarts??? savory, sweet, it doesn't matter. i am now obsessed and running out of butter. for heavens sake spring, get your butt here!!! i gotta get out of this house. i gotta get on a bike and explore. i gotta get in the soil and garden. i gotta stop making the galettes!!!!!!

chris knight was wrong when he said "ice is nice."

so remember the big hubbard squash from week #2's csa? it's been hiding out in the back of the frig patiently waiting for it's turn to shine and it got it's chance the other night. after the success of the apple galette, i went looking for some other rustic tarts to try and i stumbled on this recipe over at smitten kitchen. i followed the pastry recipe as written and it was the most wonderful crust i have ever made. so delicious, so flaky, it is now my go to crust for savory tarts. yippee!!! i did need to changed up the filling a bit to work with what i had in my kitchen. i used a different kind of squash, omitted the cheese (simply because i didn't have any), used ground sage since i didn't have any fresh, just used regular pepper instead of cayenne, tossed in a bit of honey in lieu of sugar, and to make things a bit easier, i roasted the onions in with the squash. i then proceed to assemble and bake the tart in a cast iron skillet pretty much as the recipe states. and now, i will most definitely state, here and now, squash i don't think i love you, i KNOW i love you!!!

and the leftovers tasted even better the following night.

well while we're having this squash love fest, let's give spaghetti squash it's due. cooking the spaghetti squash couldn't be more simple. all you have to do is wash the squash off, place the whole entire squash on a cookie sheet, and bake it in a 375 degree oven for 45 minutes to an hour. once done, cut the squash in half lengthwise, remove the seeds and stringy stuff, and then scrape out the flesh with a fork. and then do this........

make some quick, and i mean quick, meatballs in a pan.

remove the casing from your favorite sausage and roll the meat into tiny little balls and saute in olive oil and/or butter till just about cooked through.

throw in some cooked spaghetti squash. 

pour in your favorite sauce and heat till everything is good and hot.

there you go, you're done!!!

as we speak, i still have two acorn squash in the frig that i need to prepare, so if anyone has any suggestions or recipes please let me know. happy squash everyone.

an almost completely csa dinner

something strange is going on here. hubby keeps reminding me that i haven't posted this week's csa. i didn't realize that he was checking in on the blog. sweet boy!! here's something else sorta strange. being winter i fully expected a lot of repeat items in each week's csa loot, and i was cool with that. but, happily, each week has been quite different. yes we're getting a meat, bread, and squash each time, but the variety of each is really awesome. and this weeks loot is proving to be exceptionally tasty. take a look....

week #3 csa

isn't that gorgeous!!!! just gorgeous. so inspiring and yet so delicious and fresh that overworking such ingredients is not necessary. i just kept telling myself, like with anything, "keep it simple stupid." so for two nights we had an almost completely csa dinner.... lamb brats and sauteed onions on rolls with sunflower shoots. easy, easy, easy. first saute half an onion in some butter for a few minutes (the second night i was enjoying a beer while cooking and splashed the onions a couple of times with the beer and oh boy that was really good) then add two lamb brats to the pan and heat till fully cooked. when i cut the brats in half to make them fit on the roll, and to check to see if they were done, some juices ran out into the pan. can't just leave the juices in there. so cut the rolls in half and toasted them in the pan juices, yummy. finally, top the sandwich off with some lightly dressed sunflower shoots (ground mustard, a pinch of S&P, bit of honey, rice vinegar, and olive oil mixed together and you got a serious little dressing). and there you have it, dinner.

heavens, i love my cast iron skillet.

a new obsession: MICROGREENS!!!!!

on night two, i decided to fix us a dessert with apples from the week #2 csa loot. where apple pie can be a bit of a pain to deal with, an apple galette is easy as 1, 2, 3.

apple tart 1, 2, 3. 

(made in a 6 inch cast iron skillet)

1. make the apple filling

peel, core, and slice thin 2 apples (arkansas black)

toss with a small palm full of sugar, 1/4 tsp. cinnamon, and a pinch nutmeg. 

2. make the dough

cut 3 tbsp. butter into 1/2 cup flour and a pinch of salt. mix in 2 tbsp. chilled water till you can press the dough and it holds together in a ball. roll the dough out on floured surface until the dough circle is a good bit larger than the cast iron skillet.

3. bake the tart

set the dough in the skillet, plop in the apples (i tried to make a nice pretty circular pattern, but, in the end, i just kinda threw them in), fold over the extra dough, brush the dough with some melted butter, dot the apples with a bit more butter, and bake at 400 degrees for about 45 minutes.

if only we'd had some ice cream!!!

3G week #5 totals breakdown

maude's market csa: $35.97

(including tax and the dozen eggs)

2 acorn squash

sunflower shoots

6 lamb brats

5 rolls

pint of frozen cherries

bean soup mix

1 dozen large eggs

wholefoods/target: $22.45

org. milk x2

org. sour cream

org. yogurt

jar of org. strained tomatoes

raw pumpkin seeds

raw sunflower seeds

saluda farmers market: $4.50

1 lb. local homemade unsalted butter

total: about $63.00

($3.00 over, project bank now down to $5.00)

yeast pancakes, say what!!!

ok, these are pancakes that, due to the yeast, you kinda gotta plan ahead a bit to make. that would explain why i haven't tried to make them until now. but let me tell you, once you go yeast, you just can't go back. luckily i had some "tod" left in the frig so that cut the process down a step or two. however, that was the last of the "tod" and since we've been getting bread every week in our csa, i haven't made time to deal with making more bread starter. but after tasting these pancakes, with their delicious dinner roll flavor and super light texture, it's off to make more "tod" i go.

yeast pancakes

(makes 8 small pancakes)

1/2 cup starter

1/2 tsp. dry yeast

1/3 tsp. salt

1/3 tsp. white sugar

1/2 tablespoon butter

1/3 cup warm water

1/2 cup flour

1/8 cup brown sugar

1 egg

mix white sugar, butter, salt and yeast into warm water till dissolved. add solution to the starter and mix in the egg. mix in flour and brown sugar.  set bowl, covered, on counter until everything get nice and bubbly alive. my batter took about 2 hours or so. then i stirred it a bit and let it rest for about 30 more minutes. proceed to make pancakes as you normally would. enjoy.

bubble, bubble, toil and trouble.

add some left over fried chicken, sauteed butter carrots, maple syrup, and you got dinner.

Mmmbap, ba du ba bap!!

the other night i decided to make hamburgers from the ground bison meat that we got in our csa from week #2. and what goes better with homemade hamburgers than homemade burger buns?? so confident was i (cause why wouldn't i, i have "tod," my super fantastic bread starter) that it was gonna work on the first try, i used my very very last egg in the dough. unfortunately, that dough completely and utterly failed to rise. i mean not even a smidgen. boo whoo me. i could have given up and walked to the store for the buns, but i was determined to make something, anything, tasty in that dang kitchen. with all my kitchen failures lately, i really needed a success story. hail the floury bap. i took the recipe from linda collister's bread book and adapted it a bit to accommodate my starter. thanks goodness the dough decided to rise up for me, the hamburgers turned out tasty, and the sweet potato "fries" we're not to bad (they just needed a bit more time in the oven, but, to bad, i was hungry.) now if i could just get the auto focus on my camera to be my friend, things might start to look up a bit.

yeah, it has risen!!

before....

after.

bison burger with homemade flour bap and my canned pepper ketchup. oops, out of focus.

floury baps

(makes 6 baps)

1/2 cup starter mixed with 1/2 flour, 1/2 water, and 1/4 teaspoon yeast.

let starter hang out on counter till nice a bubbly.

mix 1/2 teaspoon yeast into 2/3 cup warm milk and 1 teaspoon salt.

cut 2 tablespoons butter into 2 cups flour till looks like crumbs. 

make a well in the center and add the warm milk mixture and the starter.

mix till dough looks feels a bit sticky and starts to pull away from the bowl. 

turn out and knead on lightly floured surface for ten minutes. (i did it for 5 minutes)

rise for 1-2 hours in oil bowl covered with damp towel.

once doubled, turn out and divided into 6 pieces. 

shape into slightly thick circle, brush with milk, sprinkle with flour.

let rise for about 1/2 - 1 hour.

press down center of each bap with your thumb 

bake in pre-heated 425 degree oven for 15 minutes.

oops, over budget

week #2 csa loot

oopsy daisy, i'm over budget this week. i blame the hubby, a serious craving of nachos, and a need to stock up on our muslix supply. however, we now have a serious stash of some important staples, so hopefully in the next few weeks we can get back on track and save cash for the project bank. btw, i added a "3G weekly totals" page for a quick view of the weekly totals and how much money is in the project bank. this week i decided to subtract the ten dollars (rounding up a bit for tax) i'm over budget from the project bank. as much as it hurts me, it's the fair thing to do. so here is this week's breakdown......

maude's market csa week #2: $30

(pictured above)

4 heads of garlic

apples

sweet potatoes

loaf of sourdough bread

honey

1 lb. beef stew meat

1 nice size squash (a hubbard squash, i think)

1 dozen eggs ($3.15 extra) 

wholefoods: $21

(for the morning muslix)

org. milk

2 lbs. org. rolled oats

1/4 lb. org. raw pumpkin seeds

1 15 oz. box org. raisins

1/4 lb. org. raw sunflower seed

1 3lb. bag organic onions

org. yogurt

Schnucks and Target: $14

(the nacho cravings were strong folks)

2 jars of org. salsa

2 cans of org. refried black beans

sharp cheddar cheese

sour cream

1 bag org. blue corn tortilla chips

muslix, muslix, muslix

the morning muslix recipe

about 1 lb. thick rolled organic oats

1/4 lb. raw org. pumpkin seeds

1/4 lb. raw org. sunflower seeds

7.5 oz org. raisins

1/3 lb. pecan pieces 

combine all ingredients in a big jar and shake it, shake it, show me what your working with!
hubby has his with yogurt, i take mine with milk. yummy!!

back to the basics...... bread

today is sunday. i am tired, i have a headache, and i plan on being as lazy as lazy can be. so lazy in fact that even though we were both thinking a sandwich from the deli sounded really good, neither of us wanted to get bundled up and go out in the cold, so we were forced to eat pb&j for lunch. now that is just sad. but while the hubby enjoys a day of watching football and playing with the wii at halftime, i figure it's a good time to get caught up with the blog. so for this post we're going back to the basics, making homemade bread. some of you may argue that bread is not good for you, but i say, shut your pie hole. i love bread. bread with butter, bread with butter and jam, garlic bread, french toast, toast with butter and honey, stuffing, dressing, banana bread, cornbread, rye bread, bagels, pretzels, pizza, pancakes, sourdough!!!!!!.... well you get the point. so in honor of the 3G project and my love love love of the flour, water, salt, and yeast combo, i have gone back to making my own homemade bread. to make things a little easier on myself as i delve back into bread making, i am gonna start with recipes that mainly use white flour. i hope to eventually move into more whole grain flours with the ultimate goal of getting a grain/flour mill and milling my own flour at home on an as needed basis. now there are many many ways to go about making your own bread and many many website to guide you in doing so. but what i am gonna do is make a starter. i'll feed it for a few days, give it a name, and then have it live in the frig. i tried doing this a couple of months ago around thanksgiving, but i ended up neglecting the starter and it kinda died. this go round is fairing a bit better. i've name the starter "tod" and so far he seems pretty happy. i'll give you a general run down of his creation and feedings and i'll keep you posted on what we're baking together, but if you're looking for a more detailed account on creating a starter from scratch and the whole exact science behind the madness of baking bread, let me know and i can point you to some websites that have far more detail than i could ever dream of posting. cause let's face it, i have a "gonna wing it" mentality that's been working for me for the last 38 years and i'm just to lazy to change now. that said, let's make a starter.

mix 1 cup warm filtered water, 1 cup organic white flour, 1/2 tsp. organic yeast, and 1 tbsp. sugar

cover with a clean towel and sit it on the counter overnight

after about 24 hours or so it should have nice bubbles on the surface

if, after your starter has been sitting out overnight, it separates and forms a liquid either above or below it, just stir it back together and continue as long as it doesn't smell rank. now find a bread recipe you would like to try and get baking. at this point you don't really have a sourdough starter for a couple of reasons. 1. it's not "sour" yet (that takes a few more days and a few more feedings) and 2. most "traditional" sour dough starters don't contain packaged yeast. this summer once the weather is warmer i think i'll try making a sourdough starter from scratch by "collecting" wild yeast. but until then i'll just continue on with other recipes from a little bread book that i got awhile ago but have yet to use.

f.y.i. i also found this fun "toy camera" filter in the new photo program i got that's supper fun!!!

i hadn't used this book yet, cause all the recipes call for compressed cake yeast. but then i found a website that said you could take any bread recipe, and by decreasing the amount of liquid and flour by 1/2 cup for every cup of started used, you should be good to go. so that's what i did for my first basic loaf for 2011.

"basic loaf"

4 cups flour

(i did 2 cups white and 2 cups white wheat)

1 1/2 tsp. salt

1 1/4 cup filter water

1 cup starter

combine ingredients in bowl and stir till flour starts to come away from the side of the bowl. knead on a floured surface for about 5-10 minutes still dough is smooth. form into a ball and let rise in a oiled bowl till doubled. i let this dough rise for about 3 hours. (it's really really cool in my kitchen right now, and rising bread needs a bit of warmth, so i boiled a kettle of water and placed both the kettle and bowl of dough in the oven. don't turn on the oven. i just needed a draft free place for the dough and the hot kettle of water provided both moisture and heat.) once risen, remove dough from bowl, gently knead for a second, form into another ball, and place the dough back in the bowl, but this time line the bowl with a slightly floured towel. let rise again, this time for only about 45 minutes to an hour. with the dutch oven inside the oven, preheat to 425 degrees. once ready, lift and quickly transfer the dough to the dutch oven, close the lid, and place back into the oven and bake covered for about 25 minutes. remove the lid and continue to bake for about 10-15 more minutes till done. to test the loaf, tap on the underside, and it should sound like a hollow like a drum. if not return to oven, bake for 5 minutes and test again. 

the towel makes it easier to lift and transport the bread since i'm baking it in the dutchie.

hello old friend, you smell marvelous

after using a cup of the starter for this loaf, i was left with about 1/4 cup of starter in my bowl. instead of pitching it, i added a 1/2 cup filtered water and a 1/2 cup flour, stirred till combined, and left it covered out on the counter again overnight. the next day i stirred it again, re-covered, and left out for another night. the following day i feed it another 1/2 cup water and flour and then covered it loosely with plastic wrap and put it in the frig. i think i can leave it like that for about a week before we get into the danger zone. in a few days i'll take out some starter, feed it, and see if we get some bubbles to let us know if tod is still alive. untill then take a look at some of the recipes from the bread book that i want to try.

getting all mixed up

my dinners are starting to run together in my head and i'm having a hard time remembering when and what we are eating for dinner. you'd think it would be easy to write it down and keep track, but that would require me to actually remember to write it down. i can tell you that within the last week we had homemade "irish" stew two times, buttercup ravioli and salad twice, and scrambled eggs with homemade bread topped with goat cheese and honey. i just can't remember which night we had which. we also went out for ribs on friday night and had bbq pizza at schlafly's yesterday. anywho, let's back track and talk about the irish stew. i had some local lamb stew meat in the freezer (which is officially the last of the meat in the house, well it was till i went to pick up this week's CSA on friday) and some schlafly's irish stout beer, so deciding to make some stew was kinda a no brainer, especially since the weather has been darn right colder than cold here lately. now a lot of irish stew recipes call for a base of beef broth, which i didn't have any of, so i decided to improvise with the turkey stock from the freezer and the dark beer. and wouldn't you know it, after all was said and done, to me the result was really similar to the taste of beef broth. so next time i decide to make a stroganoff, i'll try the chicken/turkey stock stout beer combo and see how that works there as well.

somewhat irish stew

(here's a rough recipe)

1 lb lamb stew meat

3 carrots

5 small potatoes

1 onion

1 - 1 1/2 cup frozen peas

salt and pepper to taste

bay leaves

10 oz. irish stout beer

1 jar turkey stock 

couple of tablespoons butter and flour

rinse, pat dry, season, and brown stew meat in a dutch oven, remove and set aside. saute onions and carrots till onions are a bit soft. pour in some beer and scrape up all the brown bits in the bottom of pan. add turkey stock, potatoes, stew meat, and a couple of bay leaves and simmer till veggies are soft. toss in some frozen peas and salt and pepper to taste. make a quick roux out of butter and flour and add to stew and simmer till the stew thickens a bit. serve with yummy cheese biscuits.

healthy?? tasty?? banana bread??

so i'm not sure exactly sure how "healthy" this bread is (it's got honey in it, and sugar is sugar) and you might not like the taste of the bread (kinda depends on what your sweet index is), but i'm gonna post the recipe anyway cause over the last week i've grown to actually really like this bread as my afternoon snack. oddly enough, as much as i like deserts, i'm not really game for things that are overly sweet on a daily basis. so if your looking for something a bit naughty that you can fool yourself into thinking that is really really good for you, try this bread. not to mention that is does have chocolate in it and that makes everything good. unless of course you are one of those folks who don't like chocolate, then i have nothing for you, you alien freak of nature.

banana bread with nuts and chocolate

(based off a recipe i found in "yogurt cookery" by kay shaw nelson)

1 cup white flour

1 cup white wheat flour

1/4 cup honey

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 large mashed bananas

2/3 cup yogurt

2 oz. melted butter

1 egg

2 oz. chopped nuts (i had walnuts and pecans)

2 oz. chopped chocolate (i used left over ghirardelli chocolate squares from the frig)

put the flours, BP, BS, and salt in a bowl and mix well. combine the bananas, yogurt, honey, melted butter, and egg in another bowl and mix well. add the dry and wet ingredients together and mix to blend. stir in the nuts and chocolate then pour batter into buttered loaf pan and bake at 375 degrees till done. i think mine took about and hour. you can generally tell when it's ready buy one or all of the following.

1. you can smell the bread from the living room

2. the sides of the loaf start to pull away from the pan (i used a cast iron one) 

3. the top looks nice and brown and feels firm to the touch

4. you insert a knife or cake tester into the center and it comes out clean

now i have yet to make a banana bread that really and truly taste like bananas, not to mention that i am all out of bananas, so i think for the next loaf i am going to try the peanut butter bread recipe from the same book with the addition of chocolate bits of course. because chocolate is what's its all about. 

squash, i think i love you.

buttercup squash i love you.

ah, first week of the 3G project is done and i'm starting to have a really good time in the kitchen. i don't think i've eaten this many fall veggies in awhile. let me tell you, i'm becoming a little obsessed with squash, which is really weird cause i never classified myself as a squash person. i don't like zucchini or that icky yellow crookneck squash (well unless you make it into a casserole with a ton of butter, cheese, and breadcrumbs or of course deep fry it) so i just thought, "i don't like squash." but these winter squash varieties are a whole nother ball game. after the successful dinner i made with some spaghetti squash the other night (see that post here), when maude over at maude's market suggested some buttercup squash she had, i though, well why not. holy crap is that squash good. i cut that sucker in half and immediately caught a whiff of a delicate sweet smell and saw a supper bright orange flesh that i was not at all expecting. hubby and i agreed that it smelled like a honey due melon. i decided that i would use one half for some soup and save the other half for later. i cut the first half up into slices and then used a vegetable peeler to remove the skin which was lot easier than i though it was going to be. then i cut the flesh into cubes and coated them with a little olive oil and salt, plopped it in a cast iron skillet, and roasted it in the oven at 375 degrees till soft. after the squash cooled, i ran the flesh through a food mill along with a jar of my home canned tomatoes from the garden in greenville. i added that mixture to some sauteed onions, a bit of chopped rosemary and sage, along with a jar of turkey stock from the freezer, and let it all simmer for just a bit and done. soup!!

before.

after.

so other than hubby and i agreeing that my onions were a bit too cruchy for soup, i think dinner was a success. (especially since i made some oh so yummy cheese biscuits.) the soup was not quite tomatoy, and not quite squashy, but a nice balance of both. with that said, next time to try something a bit different, i think i will make just a squash soup since the roasted squash had such a wonderful flavor by itself, and i think i will grate the onions to give them a smoother texture.

so let the squash obsession begin!!!! not only did i walk 2.5 miles to the library and 2.5 miles back just to check out a book on squashes, this new obsession also solidifies my desire to to a three sisters garden this year just so i can have a reason to plant some squash.


p.s. i really started this post to finish up "what we ate" for the first week of the 3G project, but i got off track with the squash obsession. so if your tired of reading this post please feel free to go do something else, if not, continue........

"what we ate." the end of the first week of the 3G project.

saturday: hubby had cereal for breakfast, i had an oatmeal scone from farmer's market. for lunch i made some veggie hash out of potatoes, a carrot, an onion, rosemary, sage, and the last of the cabbage. i topped it off with fried eggs and garnished it with some homemade pepper ketchup. we also successfully polished off the last of the irish soda bread. for dinner we had a bit of leftover veggie hash and then snacked on some homemade banana, nut, and chocolate chip bread. i'll post the recipe for the bread in a separate post. the recipe is from a yogurt cookery book that i got at an estate sale. it's not the greatest banana bread in the world since it's made with white/wheat flour, honey instead of sugar, and of course yogurt. but since we had some left over chocolate in the frig that needed to be use up, i added that in and it's not so bad. i like it, but i won't lie to you, it does taste "healthy."

sunday: cereal for breakfast. for lunch a snack of apple, cheese, and crackers. for dinner buttercup and tomato soup with cheese biscuits, nuff said.

gonna make some veggie hash.

purple potatoes are pretty.

my homemade pepper ketchup.

weeknight dinner review

with it being thursday already, i though i'd give you guys a run down on what we have been eating this first week of the 3G project.

saturday: new years day. of course we had to have some sort of collard greens and black eyed pea dinner. since we are also trying to reduce our recently expanding waistlines, i decided to make a really simple dinner. i braised the greens in some apple cider and onions, made a small pot of the peas, and then cooked up a some black forest bacon. i put it all in a bowl and served it up with a bit of homemade cornbread.

happy delicious new year!!!

sunday: for breakfast we had left over cornbread and happy chicken scrambled eggs. then we had a snack of left over salami, crackers, nuts, and cheese for lunch. and for dinner left over greens and cornbread.

happy happy chickens.

so nice we ate it twice.

monday: cereal for breakfast and more left over greens and cornbread for lunch. then, since i was a bit under the weather ("lady troubles"), on the way home from getting hubby from the train, we picked up and split a sandwich from mom's deli and had that for dinner with the last of the potato chips.

tuesday: cereal for breakfast and for lunch the last of the dried pasta with red sauce, capers, and cheese (all things i had in the house prior to the start of the project). tuesday i was feeling better so for dinner i made some irish soda bread and soup with cabbage, carrots, onions, potatoes, homemade turkey stock, and some local smoked andouille sausage from the farmers' larder that i had in the freezer (no antibiotics, hormones, msg, or sodium nitrate. and instead of sugar, they used local honey). this my friends, is so simple to make. just saute the onions (in either butter or bacon grease) for a few minutes. throw in the carrots and let them go for just a bit. add in the turkey stock, cabbage, and potatoes and cook till everything is just about soft. i only thawed out one jar of stock from the freezer (i made about 6 jars with the thanksgiving turkey caucus and neck) so i had to add extra water to have enough liquid. that thinned out the taste of the stock a bit, but after cooking the veggies, that added some flavor. and then right at the end i added the andouille sausage and let that simmer just long enough to add some flavor to the broth but also keep the integrity of the sausage.

freezing the stock is much easier than water bath canning. just remember to get freezer safe jars.

soups on!!!!

 irish soda bread cooked in my little cast iron dutchy.

wednesday: cereal for breakfast and then crackers, cheese, an apple, and the last of the salami for lunch. for dinner neither hubby nor i were that hungry (back under the weather for me. darn you uterus) so we just had a buffet of various snacks for dinner.

thursday: oatmeal and almonds for breakfast. for lunch i had happy chicken scrambled eggs, irish soda bread with butter and jam, and a bit more of the farmers' larder andouille sausage. look how orange those yolks are folks!! that's how there supposed to be. not that sad pale yellow color you see in grocery store eggs. and these eggs were REALLY good cause not only did i cook them in a little of the grease from the sausage, but when i went to add milk to the eggs and little blob of cream came out and i mixed that in. oooohhhhh delicious!!!! for dinner we're gonna have left over cabbage soup and irish soda bread.

they're looking at you.

breakfast is good anytime of the day.

and there you have it. week one is going pretty good. but as time goes by i know it's gonna get harder. especially once all the chips, crackers, and such are gone and i gotta find a good subsitute for the hubby. the cereal (and nuts) is already gone so at some point tomorrow i need to make granola. and in the future is see homemade crackers and hopefully some homemade pretzels. fingers crossed!

upcoming post: i joined a CSA, weekend farmer's market loot.

herbs.... what took me so long???

okay, so i've always liked basil with my tomatoes, rosemary with my potatoes, and fresh cilantro in salsa, but still i've never really been all that into herbs. yeah, weird, right?? especially since i really do like to cook. this year i planted a few herbs around the tomatoes, but still, nothing really remarkable. but oh boy how this is about to change. you see last weekend i took a trip to asheville to hang with my cousin and her two daughters and to do some produce shopping at the tailgate markets. i was most excited to find some fresh cut naturally grown corn from ten mile farm. i love fresh raw sweet tender corn kernels cut right off the cob and mixed into a summer salad. one of my all time favorite foods. but i will get to that in just a minute, back to the herbs..... so yeah, not really into herbs. well lately i have become a little obsessed with them. cutting them, bringing them inside to look pretty, putting them in pitchers of tea, cooking with them, and who know..... propagating them. i had no idea that you could cut off part of a stem, put in it a jar of water, and in a few days have roots. i've done this before with my house plant, and we've all done the tooth picked potato in a jar of water, but i never though of doing it with my herbs. yeah, i know, i'm slow. so, herbs in a jar, not only pretty but very functional.

check it out!! roots!!

i'm sorry to get so excited, but that is just cool. 

i think i am going to plant these in little pots to put on the windowsill in the breakfast nook.  

so with this new found love of herbs, i decided to kick up the summer a notch and add basil and cilantro to my summer veggie salad. easy, raw, and delicious. 

corn cut straight off the cob and into the bowl, cucumbers, onions (all local and naturally grown), tomatoes, basil, and cilantro (all from my garden), organic olive oil, organic lemon juice, salt to taste. mix and serve. so cool and refreshing. oh, you want a close up.. okay. 

one other herb project that i got going on, is a run away cilantro plant that popped up out of nowhere and then proceeded to bolt before i had any veggies to go with it. so i left it alone in the hopes of harvesting some coriander seeds. at this point i've got seed pods on the plant, now i just gotta figure out how and when to harvest and dry them. 

next post.... tomato and pepper update.