Duck Tales, Woo Hoo!

I only have two more nights to be able to cook this week so I needed to make the most out of the farm vegetables tonight and tomorrow.. Luckily (well, not actually lucky at all) the unprecedented rain and unseasonably cool weather has made our haul quite low -- so there's not that much to use up.



Tonight I started by serving up a little Capricho de Cabra on multiseed bread with a dab of that cherry preserve I made. I was not sure about the bread choice but it ended up being a great combination. Of course you could smear Capricho de Cabra on a moldy grasshopper and it would taste like heaven.



For a salad I used the tiny head of farm red leaf with a touch of Satur Farms spring mix, some sliced avocado, Connecticut grape tomatoes, some lemon, and olive oil.

I'm starting to think that I need to start my Space Phalanx stories back up with the way these salads are going lately. If it weren't for the feedback I received last time I ran the serial I would fire up a new episode right here.

Everyone's a critic!



For the main course I rendered some bacon, seared some duck breasts, and cooked up some collard greens with a little apple cider vinegar. I then made a quick creamy polenta with Parmigianno Reggiano, not sure if Jen loved or hated polenta. It turns out she loved it so it was a lucky turn of events.

For dessert we had some leftover angel food cake and whipped cream. We also watched the Tour de France and pretended that we hadn't had the race's outcome spoiled to us throughout the course of the day. That's the problem with a sporting event that is all wrapped up by 11:00AM every day while you're at work. Now that every professional cyclist is now on Twitter it makes it even more difficult to avoid than last year when no cyclists (or anyone for that matter) had even heard of Twitter.

It only takes a maximum of 140 characters to bring sadness to cycling fans in America.

Life is a Bowl of Cherries (or Several Bowls of Cherries)

There isn't much better than a day off in July. July means beautiful weather, sunning myself in the park, sailing in the Hudson, long journeys into the city, doing yardwork, and falling asleep under the cherry tree watching the Tour de France and playing The Sims 3!

Boo ya!

Nothing beats waking up in the early morning, watching bicycle racing then playing a mess of The Sims. All before it's even time for lunch!

And speaking of lunch . . .



I used some leftover bread and the cherry preserves I made with last week's farm cherries to make this delicious peanut butter and jelly sandwich. It may be the best peanut butter and jelly sandwich I've had since I visited that gourmet place called PB&J (or PB&J's) at the airport in Detroit.

The best thing about peanut butter and jelly is that Jen hates it! That means more for me! Apparently in Canada they operate under the false assumption that peanut butter sandwiches must be eaten with only two ingredients: peanut butter and bread. The saddest part is that they they don't even know that they've got it all wrong! The only thing better than peanut butter and jelly is peanut butter, jelly, and fluff. However, those sandwiches should be reserved only for very special occasions, like high school graduations or weddings.



For the salad I finished up the Locally Grown greens (which by this point were locally blown -- zing!) with some additional cherries from this week which I marinated in a little balsamic vinegar and drizzled with some olive oil and chopped almonds.



For the main course I made a spatchcock chicken which I pan roasted with a cherry glaze made with some ruby port, sugar, and a touch of orange juice. I glazed the chicken at the very end then served some additional glaze over the top when it came out of the oven.

I also steamed both tiny heads of broccoli and made some butter-boiled turnips with parsley as an accompaniment.



For wine I opened a bottle of Il Bastardo Sangiovese. It's hard to tell from all the cherries of the evening but I think it might have been a little off. Not off enough to prevent me from happily having a glass, but off nonetheless.



For dessert: brandy-soaked cherries with chocolate angel food cake and maraschino whipped cream. In hindsight I would have made an amaretto whipped cream and topped it with sliced almonds. Unfortunately I only thought of this after I'd started whipping the cream.

I like cherries but I may have reached my 2009 annual limit for cherry consumption. Fingers crossed that some other fruit arrives next week. I think I need a cherry vacation.

It's like a really sweet vacation from the 80's. "Man, this vacation is cherry!"

Cod and Red Wine

After a brief hiatus we return to bring you the latest installment of our culinary "adventures." It's Tuesday so that means a trip up to the church, a wait in line with the crunchy neighborhood yuppies, and a dinner filled with farm fresh vegetables!



Today we received: Japanese turnips, collard greens, kale, sugar snap peas, cherries, cucumbers, broccoli, the tiniest head of lettuce I have ever seen, and scallions. The unusually large amount of rain we've received has hampered growing a bit and ruined a few crops with unseasonably cold temperatures.



I used some more of the Locally Known mixed greens to make a simple tomato and lemon salad. Unfortunately they didn't age particularly well. They weren't inedible but they definitely haven't improved in quality over the last five days in the fridge.

Go figure.



I got a beautiful piece of cod from my local fishmonger today. Well, he's not super local but he is in New York City so that's got to count for something.

I seared it with a little olive oil, salt, pepper, and Old Bay, then finished it in the oven. I threw in the turnip greens and sugar snap peas for the last two minutes and served them all together with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice.



What better to accompany some delicious cod loin than Brookyln Brewery's Summer Ale?



Well, how about a heavy red wine? I'm no wine expert but everyone knows that a heavy red wine is the perfect accompaniment to a white fish.

That's just basic wine knowledge.

Liquid Lunch . . . And Dinner

This morning I went downtown for a routine dental procedure that went horribly amiss. It started out badly with my doctor not taking his eyes off of his iPhone for a second to answer the nurse's questions about what he needed to proceed to put me into pain. After a moment he looked up and asked me what procedure he was supposed to be doing. Feeling extremely uneasy I answered him. He nodded and then went about asking the nurse to run in and out of the room about a dozen times to retrieve scalpels of varying lengths. It wasn't until just before the procedure that he mentioned he only asked about the procedure because it was hospital policy to make sure they had the right patient. This made me feel slightly more at ease.

After the procedure he decided to bring up that I should avoid solid foods for the next four days. Excellent. This would have been information that would have vastly changed the grocery shopping I did yesterday. However, since I lack the ability to turn back time I was forced to slightly alter dinner plans for this evening.

I stopped by the grocery store on my way home and stocked up on pudding, keffir, and smooth peanut butter.



For the first course I made this zucchini ribbon salad with thinly sliced zucchini, garlic scape, lemon, olive oil, salt, and pepper. I let it marinate for about an hour then served it over mixed greens. Jen tells me that this tasted good. I have to take her word for it.



I had no intention of making soup this evening, however, with an injured mouth I was forced to make something for dinner that was not pudding or peanut butter.

I browned some whole cloves of garlic and shopped onion then tossed in some peeled and cubed kohlrabi. I cooked it with chicken stock then pureed it with some milk and curry powder. I garnished it with a fried wonton. Sure it may look like a leftover fried tortilla from the other night but I assure you that is merely a coincidence.



The main course (the one I am most upset about not getting to eat) was this beautiful sushi grade tuna that I seared with a sesame crust. The crust was a little light on sesame seeds (because I ran out) so I also added a little wasabi powder as well.

I also made a lemon shallot vinaigrette which I drizzled over some mache greens and I made a wasabi mashed potato to accompany it. I wasn't sure about simply mashing the potatoes by hand. I contemplated putting them through a food processor but by the time 8:00PM rolled around I was tired of this whole liquid diet nonsense.



While we didn't have it for dessert I also made a cherry preserve out of the cherries which were mere hours away from becoming unusable. I'm a little worried I made the jam too loose to use for sandwiches but we'll see how it goes.

I have no lack of options for dessert with puddings and ice cream I purchased this afternoon. Jen and I even bandied about the idea of going to the ice cream truck for some soft serve. Soft serve ice cream: perfect for the wounded mouth.

I wonder if the Mr. Softee truck gives receipts. Maybe I'll mail it to my insurance company to see if they'll up the tab.

I'll let you know how that goes.

Lambs Eat Oats And We Eat Lamb

I heard a rumor that only people who follow our blog love us! What a shame if you think you love us only to find out that you actually don't because you're not following the blog.

That would be the most epically tragic tale I've ever heard.

I had a lot of elaborate plans for dinner rolling through my head all day but when I finally got home from work, spent 45 minutes driving around looking for a parking spot, did an ungodly amount of dishes and took a shower I had about 15 minutes to make dinner before Jen got home.

This is the sad meal that resulted:



You know what wasn't tragic? Tonight's salad! Well, it was a little tragic. I used some of the leftover strawberry dijon dressing in the fridge with some leftover blueberries, greens, and sliced almonds.



I got these wonderful lamb tenderloins that I seasoned up with salt, black pepper, garlic, paprika, rosemary, mint, and thyme. After roasting some shallots, celery, leftover potato wedges, and squash from the farm I tossed them into the pan for a couple of minutes then served them up with the roasted vegetables.

Tomorrow I may do something halfway inventive with the farm vegetables that are left. It will be my last dinner for a while as there will be a number of late nights and holidays lined up for me this weekend. So making something inventive will use up the vegetables before they spoil and will keep me sane after making such a boring meal tonight. Still, tonight's meal is the definition of extravagance compared to the three consecutive nights I will have a plain turkey sandwich for dinner at work.

My culinary adventures always cease at the opening of a brown paper bag.