Blog Archives

One Local Summer 2011 – Week 18

Posted on 2 October 2011
by

DSC_2651

This one was pretty simple. We were getting ready for vacation and I had little time to get something together, so I went with what I’d already stashed in the freezer. The pasta was made a while back and frozen, the sausage was frozen as well, and the peppers and tomatoes came from the garden. Pretty simple, but it counts as local, and even super local considering the maybe 100ft walk from the house to the garden.

Pasta with Peppers and Tomatoes:
Whole Wheat Pastry Flour – Mill at Anselma
Peppers – My Garden
Tomatoes – My Garden
Chicken Sausage – Mountain View Poultry
Non Local – Olive Oil

Share
Leave a Reply ?

One Local Summer 2011 – Week 17

Posted on 8 September 2011
by

DSC_2583

Gnocchi!  This was my first time ever making gnocchi, and I think we did alright!  It was pretty simple – boil about 1lb potatoes for an hour, or until tender, then rice or mash or make them smooshy and non-lumpy as best as possible, add about a cup of flour, shape, dust with flour, and then boil until they float.  Husband worked up the sauce from our own tomatoes canned this year, a load of peppers from the garden (SO MANY PEPPERS THIS YEAR), an onion, and some Ground Bison.  This is really my idea of comfort food, and it fit the bill.  Most of the ingredients came from a farm stand we passed on the way home from a trip to Lancaster, and I neglected to get the name of the farm.  Suffice to say, they weren’t shipped in from California, but from just a county away.

Gnocchi with Bison Sauce:
Whole Wheat Pastry Flour – Mill at Anselma
Potatoes – Lancaster Farm Stand
Bison – Backyard Bison
Tomato sauce – My Garden
Onion – Lancaster Farm Stand
Non Local – Spices, Salt, Pepper

Share
Leave a Reply ?

One Local Summer 2011 – Week 14

Posted on 13 August 2011
by

DSC_2184

I was having trouble coming up with ideas this week and was feeling pretty uninspired. I had pork in the freezer, but didn’t know where else to go from there. So I googled and found Pork Afritada.  Not bad!  I had all the ingredients on hand except for the carrot, so I went for it.  Really easy to prepare and it’s sort of like a stew with a tomato base.  I did use water instead of broth and sliced tomatoes instead of sauce, but we’ve got plenty of tomatoes, so that was no problem.  Served the whole thing over bread to soak up the liquid and it was delicious (and deliciously simple)!

Pork Afritada:
Pork Cutlets – Countrytime Farm
Potato – North Star Orchard
Tomatoes – My Garden
Pepper – My Garden
Onion – North Star Orchard
Garlic – Charlestown Farm
Non Local – Salt, Pepper, Bay leaves, olive oil

Share
Leave a Reply ?

One Local Summer 2011 – Week 13

Posted on 5 August 2011
by

DSC_1758

This one is pretty basic, but sometimes something simple is all you need.  Plus, I’d gathered about 8 green peppers from our two plants in the garden and this seemed like the best idea, especially after I found the FrankenOnion at the farmer’s market.  Seriously, the biggest onion I’ve ever, ever seen.  Add in some yummy bison sausage, and folks, we have a meal.  Minimal cooking and prep time, and it was just perfect.

 

Sausage and Peppers:
Bison Sausage – Backyard Bison
Green Peppers – My Garden
FrankenOnion – North Star Orchards
Blue Cheese – Birchrun Hills Farm
Bread – Sweetwater Baking
Non Local – Olive oil, salt, pepper

Share
Leave a Reply ?

One Local Summer – Week 11

Posted on 31 July 2010
by

DSC_2893

I’m a little behind on blog posts, but better late than never! This week I fired up the grill and stuffed some chicken breasts. Lettuce, in July, you say? YES! Brogue Hydroponics grows it all year round, and by now, I think the One Local Summer readers know that I love my greens.  So, clockwise, starting on the left, we have grilled squash, in the back is a salad with lettuce, mushrooms, and my first cucumbers from the garden, and in the front chicken stuffed with chevre, mushrooms, and peppers and grilled with a peach slice on top.  Detail of the ingredients follows and this was certainly a delicious and filling meal!

Squash:
Zucchini – Smith’s Produce
Yellow Squash – Smith’s Produce

Salad:
Lettuce – Brogue Hydroponics
Mushrooms – Oley Valley Mushrooms, Crimini variety
Cucumbers – My garden! White Ghost variety
Non-Local – Salad dressing

Chicken:
Chicken breast – Mountain View Organics
Mushrooms – Oley Valley Mushrooms, Crimini variety
Peppers – That same producer at Anselma Mill that I can’t remember the name (still!)
Chevre – Shellbark Hollow Farm. This is their Sharp II Chevre.
Peach – Northstar Orchard

Share
Leave a Reply ?

Jalapeno Poppers

Posted on 20 September 2009
by

DSC_5407

My two little jalapeno pepper plants were VERY good to me this year. TWO POUNDS OF PEPPERS good to me. The first pound went to jalapeno pepper jelly which quickly became a favorite with the husband. The most recent pound was waiting for me in the fridge since I wasn’t sure quite what to do with that many jalapenos. Someone suggested jalapeno poppers, but since I’m not a big fan of frying and have never really been able to get that whole breading thing right, the idea was pretty much abandoned.  Then I happened upon this recipe and decided to give it a go. The process involves cutting and de-seeding all of the peppers, dipping them in milk, then flour and after a quick dry, two rounds through milk and bread crumbs. It’s time consuming (especially when there are 56 poppers to make), but the result is a PERFECT jalapeno popper. I’m really kind of shocked that these came out so well. Served up with a little sour cream, they make a great snack.  I plan on freezing most of them to save for later since there are 56!

Share
Leave a Reply ?

OLS: Week 13

Posted on 30 August 2009
by

DSC_5177

One Local Summer’s last meal is on the table and consumed already.  I can’t believe we made it to the end of the challenge and participated in every single week!  This week, we threw a whole chicken in the smoker with some barbeque sauce leftover from the pulled pork sandwiches and let her cook up while some zucchini, garlic, basil, onions, and peppers were simmered together with last year’s tomato sauce from the garden.  I decided to pop open a jar of the zucchini pickles, and WOW are they delicious.  Definitely worth doing again next year.  Non-Local ingredients include some vinegar, mustard seed, turmeric (pickles), olive oil, and McCormick’s Chicken Rub.  Here’s the rundown of local ingredients.

Zucchini: My Garden
Basil: Back Deck Garden
Peppers: My Garden
Garlic: Willow Creek
Onions: North Star Orchard
Chicken: Mt. View Organics
Barbeque sauce: Leftover from Week 11
Wine: New Hope Winery’s Raspberry Wine

Final thoughts – I’m SO glad I participated in this year’s challenge and I can’t wait to do it again.  This challenge has gotten me into local foods and has actually gotten me cooking (something that shocked and amazed my family and friends).  I hope to continue doing one local meal a week since our Phoenixville Farmer’s Market is open year-round and I can get most items (except for seasonal vegetables) regularly.  Thanks to the folks at FarmToPhilly.com for hosting the challenge!

Share
[ 1 Reply ]

OLS: Week 10

Posted on 9 August 2009
by

DSC_3973

Week ten of one local summer is cooked and consumed already. The husband is home again and decided to try something different – tacos! I was in charge of the taco shells and toppings while he did the filling. I found a good shell recipe here which used both cornmeal and flour.  I went with whole wheat flour instead of regular old all-purpose flour and it didn’t seem to make a difference.  They were surprisingly easy to make and then form inside of a napkin holder lined with some tin foil.  It looked a little funny, but it worked out well!  The husband improvised a taco spice recipe (sadly, none of those are local, but it tasted great!) which he added to some ground bison and onions. I also found these curious little mexican gherkin cucumbers at the farmer’s market on saturday and just had to bring them home after Jack let me taste one.  They’re sweet, with a little sour and just perfectly bite sized.  It’s really amazing me, week by week, the different things we can make using local ingredients that I never even thought of doing (making taco shells from scratch?!).  This is totally spoiling my ideas of store-bought and semi-homemade that I had been used to cooking (and mostly microwaving), but all in a good way.  I’ve recently been doing some canning and preserving and I should do a post on that too – it’s another new thing this year that I’m trying and is again, surprisingly easy – much easier than I had thought!

There were a few non-local ingredients in this week’s meal which included salt, canola oil, and the taco spices.  Here are the local ingredients:
Ground Bison – Backyard Bison
Onions – North Star Orchard
Tomatoes – Our Backyard Garden
Peppers – Cressley’s Greenhouse
Mexican Gherkins – Jack’s Farm
Fat Cat Cheese – Birchrun Hills Farm
Lettuce – Willow Creek
Corn Meal – Mill at Anselma
Whole Wheat Pastry Flour – Mill at Anselma

Share
Leave a Reply ?