letting Strawberries well just be strawberries

the weekend has come and gone. The home front ate a 1/2 gallon of strawberries and a pint of blueberries (Jersey blueberries already, hmm?).

Now, I saw lovely kohlrabi but didn't buy any. I saw it made once with love and taste. Each year I buy some and proceed to make something inedible.

any ideas for this vegetable?

local vinegar

everywhere i turn (not physically, but to podcasts, blogosphere, magazines), people are stating just how easy it is to make vinegar.

if that's the case, can anyone point to a source of good, local vinegar? with the apples and grapes in our region, we should have some quality choices...

Pasta with Sugar Snap Peas

Dinner was a hit. The primi was Tagliatelle with Sugar Snap Peas. Aside from the pasta and olives, it was all locally sourced.

Recipe Info

shopping = moderate

time = significant

technique = easy

Pasta with Sugar Snap Peas

1 lb dried tagliatelle (bionature brand)

1 lb sugar snap peas

1 garlic scape

3 scallions

1 to 3 T butter

handful oil-cured olives

salt / pepper

1. wash and clean peas
2. snap each pea at the end and pull out the string
3. cut each sugar snap pea on the bias, about 1/4 inch wide (this will take a long time)
4. cut the scape into the thinnest discs you can
5. cut the scallions into thin discs
6. heat large pot of water with fistful of salt
7. heat large saute pan with 1T butter on medium-high
8. when butter stops sizzling, add scallions and pinch of salt
9. saute 2-4 minutes
10. add scape and saute 1 minute
11. add sugar snap peas all at once and toss well
12. [put pasta in boiling water]
13. saute 5-7 minutes
14. add olives
15. turn heat low
16. add pasta and 1/2 cup pasta water
17. toss and toss and toss
18. add more butter for more deliciousness
19. add salt and pepper as you see fit
20. turn out into large bowl

farmer's market log - Saturday June 11th

Yes, I liked Star Trek: The Next Generation (the TV show that is). No, I'm not writing this like Jean-Luc Picard.

Today's bounty was tremendous:

Milk Thistle just released their slow-process yogurt - we have a pint

Maxwell Farm's strawberries are too tiny and delicious not to buy, by the quart

Farmer Ray insisted I take a bag of sugar snap peas

And the fishing family had the greatest surprise - LOBSTERS that are fiery mad. We took 2 of them along with these tiny, sardine-like fish called SPEARLING (small fish = low, low mercury and better for the ecosystem).

Dinner will be DIVINE!

local food COMING bigger and tastier than before

May passed. Early June passed. And not until Friday - June 11th, did we have a nasty HOT day. Just plain hot and sticky. Which then made me turn around and think about our great produce coming in from Jersey farmlands and the Hudson Valley.

I verified this at the food co-op last night. Finally, we're way beyond kohlrabi, turnips, & hothouse lettuces.

So I promise you the vast LOCALVORE-NATION that 2009 will be a bloggy-hot summer.