Saturday, February 7, 2009

The Final Farm Share

Late yesterday and early today Jen and I were all about supporting local restaurants, in a fridge-clearing preparation to receive our latest (and last) winter farm share this morning.

Last night we ate at Friend of a Farmer, a spot we've dined at several times but not recently. If they are friends of farmers then we must be farmers because the meal was delicious! We met our good friend Joe there who enjoyed his first real meal (shepherd's pie) after a bad bout of food poisoning. Jen had the chicken pot pie and I had the angel hair with vegetables and garlic oil. It was delicious but I think I've spent the last 24 hours sweating the garlic out so I think I may need a break from my little Italian friend for a few days. I also enjoyed a Coney Island Lager which was delicious but a little too plentiful in its 22 ounce bottle. Combined with the fact that I'd eaten little in the hours proceeding dinner that made me feel like a prize lightweight.



This morning we went up to Fort Tryon Park and picked up our final winter share delivery. In this pickup we got: red, orange, and white beets; a bag of pinto beans; one rather soft potato; some softish turnips; empire and ida red apples; carrots; celeriac; spinach; tatsoi; and Swiss chard.

After that we drove on down to meet a group of friends at Sarabeth's. As a rule I do not like brunch. To me, brunch is a meal best reserved for hipsters and old ladies. Hipsters and old ladies who love to wait in line for an hour before eating! However, since I've managed to weasel my way out of this meal for the past four years I was overdue. When I am cornered into a brunch I always use the opportunity to enjoy some smoked salmon. That's what we in the business call taking lemons and turning them into lemonade. Salmon lemonade.

Eww.



We had to rush back home to meet the cable guy and play some Rock Band with our good friend Heather. After getting home we were in the mood for something sweet so I ran out to Carrot Top Pastries and grabbed some carrot, raspberry, and chocolate rugelach to have while we got ready to Rock. This eventually devolved into a Wii bowling rematch to try to avenge the ass-kicking Heather gave to us last summer.



I put Heather in her place.



Then Jen continued with a solid ass-kicking!



Then Jen and Heather both made me feel like a little girl.



For salad I made some boiled beets and tossed them with some cut up apples, dijon mustard, honey, almond, lemon, and olive oil. My intention was to serve them over the delicious beet greens I had in the fridge but our horrible, horrible fridge had other plans. Our fridge loves to freeze greens solid depending on the temperature outside, the positioning on the shelf, and the overall mood of the fridge in general. Sadly I had to dispose of a solid block of destroyed beet greens. The salad may have been better served as a side for the main course but I elected to serve it on its own anyway.

Now that I've told you about the salad, it's time to tell you the next galaxy-spinning chapter of my space adventure: Space Phalanx: The Human-Zzintar Wars!

Kintaur Rosenbaum keyed in the coordinates on his navi-computer and pulled a lever which pivoted below a flashing red light on the ship's control panel. "Well, Stormbot, this is going to be a tight one."

Stormbot flashed his eye-sensors in agreement. "These insectazoids need to buzz off," he delivered in his robotic monotone.

Kintaur's ship, The Magnetar blasted ahead, six or seven smaller ships matching speed and lighting the space behind them with their thrusters.

"Alright, Stormbot. Time to squash some bugs!"

The Magnetar arced upward, twisting as it did so, and dropped a dozen space mines behind it into the narrowing gap to the pursuing ships.

There was a series of explosions that lit up Kintaur's sensors. From the light of the explosions came one lone pursuer. Suddenly there was a buzz on the control panel's communication sensor.

"Kintaur Rosenbaum here," Kintaur said. "I'm the captain of this vessel."

"I have alerted Lord Calcitron of your position! He will be sending one of his motherships in! I suggest you surrender now while you still have a chance to be taken alive."

Kintaur cursed between gritted teeth. He lifted his thumb from the communication cone. "Alright," he said, depressing the switch once again with his thumb. "I'm cutting my engines. I will go peacefully."

"Excellent," the alien captain buzzed. "Lord Calcitron may show you mercy yet!"

As the boomerang-shaped alien ship slowed down behind Kintaur's ship, suddenly The Magnetar spun around and two round portholes shot open revealing a pair of pluon torpedoes aimed directly at the enemy ship.

"What!" Came the terrified alien voice over Kintaur's commincator.

"Tell Lord Calcitron that Kintaur Rosenbaum doesn't bargain with insect scum!" Kintaur nodded and Stormbot pushed the button to launch the torpedoes. The alien ship erupted into a ball of flame that melted away into blackness just as fast.

"Great shot, Stormbot!" Kintaur pumped his fist in triumph. "Let's set a course for the Duplin system. I think there'll be a swarm of bugs here any minute!"

Will the bugs find Kintaur again? Will Kintaur escape the bugs again? If the bugs find Kintaur and Stormbot again will Kintaur address them in a condescending manner? Find the answers to all of this in the next exciting chapter of Space Phalanx: The Human-Zzintar Wars!




For dinner I roasted some garlic, onion, turnip, celeriac, white beets, apples, and carrots. I also pan seared some bone-in pork chops and then roasted them along with the vegetables. I finished it all with a drizzle of maple syrup that I let carmelize in the pan for the last few minutes of cooking.

The pork was local, from the Winkler family farm. I tried doing a search to find information about the farm but Google came up blank. They tell me it's local to New Jersey but perhaps the chops just came in frozen from China and they just made up the story. Either way, the image of Henry Winkler in a straw hat, herding hogs, was well worth the price of the meat.



For dessert we had some of the chocolate covered chocolate mousse cake from Carrot Top. Overall it was a fantastic cap to a fun-filled day.

Let's see how long we can stretch this wonderful vegetable haul this time. My guess is that we won't make it until June when the next pick up will be.

1 comment:

Lisa Marie said...

What about hipsters who are also old ladies? Do they love brunch?

Also the answer to the brunch long wait problem is to go to a less busy restaurant. Or have brunch at home where no one will judge you if you have one too many mimosas with your tofu scramble.