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| We move into day four of Zucchini Week with a heavily modified version of our recipe. My mandoline didn’t have a plate that would slice wide but thin slices of zucchini for proper pappardelle noodles (think wide fettuccine), so i went with the square-spaghetti-sized slicer instead. This gave me these awesome zucchini spaghetti noodles and I was just in total awe. Why hadn’t I thought of this before! Ingenius. Michael Chiarello uses a whole bunch of spices and ingredients that I just didn’t have and was not going to go out and buy just for this recipe, so I improvised. A LOT. Sweet smoked Spanish paprika? Grey Salt?! Yeah. I had regular old paprika and table salt, and those worked out just fine. Instead of arugula, I happened to have some red leaf lettuce in the fridge and went with that. The feta is a goat’s milk feta that I’ve been layering on sandwiches all week. I still had two heirloom tomatoes from last week’s farmer’s market run and used those in place of the cherry tomatoes, sliced thin. I didn’t have olives, so they didn’t make it into this dish. Overall though, I think this worked out well and the idea of the recipe is still there. The warm tomatoes and zucchini noodles over lettuce made for a really great, refreshing and light lunch. | Zucchini Pappardelle Salad – Recipe on FoodNetwork.com |
| Ingredients Used: *Zucchini – my garden *Lettuce – Kimberton Whole Foods locally grown *Tomatoes – North Star Orchard *Feta – Amazing Acres |
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Blog Archives
Zucchini Week: Day 4
Posted on 30 July 2009
Zucchini Week: Day 2
Posted on 28 July 2009
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| Day two of zucchini week brings us to Stuffed Zucchini. As usual, I used the recipe as a guideline and substituted a few things using ingredients found locally. For the ground turkey, I used hot italian turkey sausage. Instead of Parmesan Cheese, I threw in Sharp II Chevre. Tomatoes were both from a local source and even last year’s garden in the form of sun-dried roma tomatoes. Mushrooms are also local mushrooms of the Crimini variety, bought from my favorite farmer’s market. The zucchini used here is a monster zucchini, probably a little past its prime, and a result of a neglectful gardener who didn’t want to go out picking through her garden during the heat, humidity, and thunderstorms we’ve been having lately. However, those three things have given me quite the harvest, so I suppose I shouldn’t complain too much. Now if only I could find a way to combine both zucchini and cucumbers into one dish! | Stuffed Zucchini – Recipe on SimplyRecipes.com |
| Ingredients Used: *Zucchini – my garden *Basil – my herb garden *Egg – Mt. View Organics *Sausage – Mt. View Organics *Onion – North Star Orchard *Tomatoes – North Star Orchard *Cheese – Shellbark Hollow Farms *Mushrooms – Oley Valley Mushrooms |
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Zucchini Week: Day 1
Posted on 27 July 2009
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| For day one of zucchini week, I decided to try something new and different. I just love Elise’s website for recipes and this one jumped right out at me as being something relatively easy and delicious and above all, different from the normal uses for zucchini. The Zucchini Fritters were all of those things and this is definitely going see many repeat performances! I switched out the scallions for a locally grown onion, and used goat’s milk yogurt and cheese, both from local farms. The cheese in little lumps at the back of the plate is a spicy chipotle chevre and since I like a bit of tabasco sauce with anything involving egg, this pleased my palate to no end. This may not be a whole meal, but it’s a great use for at least one of those zucchini! | Zucchini Fritters – Recipe on SimplyRecipes.com |
| Ingredients Used: *Zucchini – my own garden *Egg – Mt. View Organics *Onion – North Star Orchard *Flour – Mill at Anselma *Yogurt – Shellbark Hollow Farms *Cheese – Amazing Acres |
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OLS: Week 8
Posted on 25 July 2009
Pizza for Week Eight! I saw the post on FarmToPhilly.com about making pizza and I just *had* to! This has become a popular item in the house since the crust is actually done on the grill. I usually do a big batch of them at once and then stick them in the freezer or fridge and throw toppings on later and stick them in the microwave or toaster oven to melt the cheese really quick. It saves time, the crust comes out nice and crispy without using a pizza stone. I’m giving credit to Bobby Flay for this one since we saw it on Food Network a while ago and I thought it was absolute genius. Cooking in the house during the summer is just TOO hot sometimes, so taking everything outside to the grill is a great option. The show featured this recipe, and I really just only use the flatbread part and make my own toppings. On to the ingredients!
Crust: Whole Wheat pastry flour from the Mill at Anselma. Non-local Olive Oil, Salt, Yeast
Toppings: Heirloom Tomatoes and onions (hiding underneath) from the North Star Orchard, Colby Cheese from Agape Acres, and a little basil from the back deck. Couldn’t find a local Mozzarella, and really, all cheese is delicious in my humble opinion, so Colby it was. I didn’t even bother with sauce since the tomatoes were nice and juicy.
The pizza made for a quick and easy meal. I actually botched a batch of the pasta dough from last week by using a bad recipe that had me adding way too much water. I decided to throw in some more flour and gave up after a certain point, added yeast, and let it sit to see if it would work for pizza dough. Happily, it worked out just fine. After the flatbread was grilled up, I turned the heat down low and set the flatbread with toppings off the direct heat, closed the lid, and came back in about 15 minutes. The cheese had melted nicely and it looked perfect.
I have so many ideas for using local ingredients in meals, I feel like there won’t be enough weeks for all of them!
OLS: Week 3
Posted on 22 June 2009
I’m a little late on this one, but we spent all of week 3 in Scotland. So, I think that’s okay, right?
For the record, this was a lunch meal and I tend to go heavier on the green things and lighter on the meat for lunches, hence the big blob of green on the plate and little bitty blob of chicken. In the back is red lettuce from Kimberton Whole Foods, marked as grown locally, unknown farm. On top of the salad are little turnip chips – dehydrated turnip slices from turnips found at the Phoenixville Farmer’s Market during Week 1. In the very front is that delicious back-porch dill and goat’s milk yogurt from Week 2 (frozen while we were away, and then thawed to enjoy again). The chicken roulade is made with chicken again from Eberly Poultry – pounded out thin. Inside the chicken is dill and basil from the deck, bacon from Country Time Farm, sundried tomatoes from last year’s garden, and ‘Dillicious’ cheese from Clover Creek Cheese Cellar.
Not Local: Olive oil for cooking the roulade and the salad dressing.
This meal gave me a whole lot of leftovers since I used the whole pound of chicken for the roulade and will likely keep me well fed for the week. I still have the leftovers from last week’s meal in the freezer too! I think I’ll make a trip to the Anselma Market on Wednesday to find ingredients for Week four. If anyone knows of a source of local flour, I’d love to hear about it! I might be up to try my hand at home made pasta for something different.
OLS: Week 2
Posted on 11 June 2009
Week 2 of One Local Summer is cooked and consumed already.
I did say dill last week right? I should’ve said yogurt would be the theme of this week’s meal. Let’s go over what’s on that plate. In the front, Sugar Snap Peas picked up at Kimberton Whole Foods (KWF) in Kimberton, PA. They were labelled as being grown locally, but didn’t mention which farm. The skewered chicken, also found at KWF is from Eberly Poultry and was marinated in olive oil and lemon juice before being tossed on the grill. The sauce over the chicken is a sort of cucumberless tzatziki sauce using goat’s milk yogurt from Shellbark Hollow Farm and dill from the deck planter. In the back is wilted turnip greens from the Phoenixville Farmer’s Market with a few sun-dried tomatoes from last year’s garden (roasted and then frozen, thawed, dehydrated). Dessert is the same goat’s milk yogurt with some fresh Lancaster County farm-stand strawberries blended in.
Non-local ingredients: Olive Oil, lemon juice, spices (marinade for the chicken)
Now let’s go over why I LOVE LOVE LOVE this meal. First, my obsession with dill – it’s limitless. I pretty much believe that dill belongs in everything and I love the Oregon Herb bread that the Great Harvest Bread Company makes because the herb pretty much means dill. Sadly, I don’t think cucumbers are in season around here yet, but even without the cucumber, that tzatziki sauce was delicious. MMMmm dill. And the chicken with the marinade worked out perfectly – so soft and juicy and DELICIOUS. But, my new find of the week and a new favorite is that goat’s milk yogurt from Shellbark Hollow Farm. There’s something about the goat’s milk that gives the yogurt a little extra zip or zing or pizzazz. You should go and check out the website for Shellbark Hollow and watching the “awwwww” inspiring videos on the goat of the month page. I have a feeling that the goat’s milk products will be making a regular appearance in my diet now that I’ve found out how incredible they taste. And now, as I sit here and digest that wonderful meal, I’m already making plans for the leftovers.. Frozen Goat’s Milk Strawberry Yogurt anyone?
OLS: Week 1
Posted on 6 June 2009
This is my first week doing the One Local Summer challenge. Here’s my entry!
In the front are some DELICIOUS oyster mushrooms from Oley Valley Mushrooms. In the back is a turkey breast from Mountain View Poultry, cooked up using the rotisserie in our mega toaster oven. That toaster oven sees way more action than our big oven since it makes more sense for the two of us (and usually the one of me), using less energy and not heating up the whole house like the big oven does. A 9×9 pan fits comfortably in the toaster oven which is generally more than enough for me. The pesto sauce was made from the container full of basil on the back deck and was brushed on while the turkey was cooking as well as on the finished product. Salad greens are from, well I can’t remember which farm was selling them at the Phoenixville Farmer’s Market, but they were the highlight of the whole plate, honest. Crisp and fresh and very tasty.
Non-local items used: Olive oil (on the mushrooms, salad, and in the pesto sauce), Salt, Pepper, Pine nuts (Pesto sauce), and vinegar (salad).
Not bad for a first try, huh? I found it really challenging to come up with something not using olive oil – I use it all the time and it’s difficult to think up a meal that doesn’t need some king of oil when cooking. For next week, I think the dill plant will be up for a serious pruning. 
One Local Summer
Posted on 30 May 2009
I remember seeing the One Local Summer blog posts when we were getting settled into our new home that is conveniently located within walking distance of our local farmer’s market. We have some really fantastic vendors and it’s a thing I’ve grown to love in the two years that we’ve lived here. SUCH a wide variety of goods from bison to chicken and pork to all sorts of vegetables and some of the best bread I’ve ever had. Having never participated, I figured this would be the year! Admittedly, I’m not much of a cook, but I can do the basics when I have to and this gives me a fun summer goal and a way to eat better and eat locally grown goods. So, here’s to the start of one local summer!