After a cool and rainy week on the Palouse, the weather was perfect for Lentil Festival weekend in Pullman, and for the farmer’s market in Moscow, which didn’t appear to suffer any loss of customers to the Lentil Festival. The huge bowl of lentil chili is always an awesome sight, especially the guy up on top stirring it with a canoe paddle; I love the way they fill up pitchers of the stuff from the faucet at the bottom of the pot and then serve it into paper cups for the hordes.
We went to the farmer’s market this morning with our friends Pat and Kathy who were visiting from Kamiah, and came home with two flats of Oregon blueberries (24 generous pints), 10 ears of corn, and a flat of peaches. Also I got some fresh tomatoes from Kate Jaeckel at Orchard Farm, who was so proud to have harvested some 100 lbs. of them this week, thanks to her crop being protected during the early season by a hoop house. With snow on June 10 and frost in early July, it’s a wonder we can get tomatoes at all. We promptly turned them into BLT’s for lunch, accompanied by the boiled sweet corn that Reed and Pat shucked and silked for us.
I put one pint of berries in the fridge and poured the rest straight into Ziploc bags and stuck them – all 18 pounds of them - into the freezer. At a cost of $53 for the two flats, I got 18 lbs. of fresh blueberries for just under $3/lb. Considering that they cost at least twice that in the freezer section of the grocery store I’m feeling great, and that’s before I even pop any into my mouth, which is simply unadulterated pleasure. And for only $3/lb.!!
Monday, 25 August 2008
Sunday, 17 August 2008
Spoiled for Choice
Cherries macerating in vodka
Saturday - I went to the Moscow Farmer’s Market this morning on my bike, arriving just a few minutes after the opening bell at 8 a.m. I thought I would beat the crowds as in days of yore but wow, the crowds were out in full force, purposefully carrying away flats of blueberries, peaches, tomatoes, sweet corn, cumbersome melons, bags of green beans, new potatoes… just about anything you want vegetable wise is available on the Palouse in mid-August. It’s been hot this week so the tomatoes are finally ready, and we’re fortunate to have the Lewiston/Clarkston valley just an hour away, where the temperature along the Snake River is about 10 degrees warmer than the Palouse all year round. Also, Tonnemaker’s from further west in Washington have milder weather than us, giving them an advantage in the stone fruits and warm weather vegetables.
Way more people at the market than there were a year ago, before we left on our sabbatical. I thought maybe Moscow’s “groovy quotient” had risen but Walt and I both observed that people were really serious about the food – and so perhaps it’s less about what’s groovy and more about what’s economical and even better, what tastes good.
All I had room to carry on my bike were potatoes, onions, peaches, tomatoes, apples, eggs, basil, and blueberries, which I got from 3 different stands in order to spread the wealth around. Simple economics forced me to forgo the $15/qt. huckleberries, much as we love them.
When I got home I made a breakfast of blueberries and peaches with yogurt and granola; for lunch we made a tomato salad with finely diced fresh red onion, fresh basil, salt and pepper, and balsamic vinegar and olive oil; which we ate alongside homemade bread (made with Montana flour) spread with my son Reed’s special garlic/basil cream cheese, and some scrambled organic eggs from Avon Farm in Deary, Idaho, where the chickens are “living good like chickens should.”
We’re debating the location of our backyard chicken run, but we’ll have to decide soon, as we’re due to get our four hens from Zakarison’s outside Pullman WA in a few weeks.
Cherry Update: My fingers are still blackened from slicing and pitting 6 quarts of sweet cherries for my batch of cherry liqueur. I used almost the whole large bottle of 100 proof vodka for that many cherries, but there’s a little left over for vodka tonics. I didn’t use the Idaho vodka, though, since it was only 80 proof. Only!
Saturday - I went to the Moscow Farmer’s Market this morning on my bike, arriving just a few minutes after the opening bell at 8 a.m. I thought I would beat the crowds as in days of yore but wow, the crowds were out in full force, purposefully carrying away flats of blueberries, peaches, tomatoes, sweet corn, cumbersome melons, bags of green beans, new potatoes… just about anything you want vegetable wise is available on the Palouse in mid-August. It’s been hot this week so the tomatoes are finally ready, and we’re fortunate to have the Lewiston/Clarkston valley just an hour away, where the temperature along the Snake River is about 10 degrees warmer than the Palouse all year round. Also, Tonnemaker’s from further west in Washington have milder weather than us, giving them an advantage in the stone fruits and warm weather vegetables.
Way more people at the market than there were a year ago, before we left on our sabbatical. I thought maybe Moscow’s “groovy quotient” had risen but Walt and I both observed that people were really serious about the food – and so perhaps it’s less about what’s groovy and more about what’s economical and even better, what tastes good.
All I had room to carry on my bike were potatoes, onions, peaches, tomatoes, apples, eggs, basil, and blueberries, which I got from 3 different stands in order to spread the wealth around. Simple economics forced me to forgo the $15/qt. huckleberries, much as we love them.
When I got home I made a breakfast of blueberries and peaches with yogurt and granola; for lunch we made a tomato salad with finely diced fresh red onion, fresh basil, salt and pepper, and balsamic vinegar and olive oil; which we ate alongside homemade bread (made with Montana flour) spread with my son Reed’s special garlic/basil cream cheese, and some scrambled organic eggs from Avon Farm in Deary, Idaho, where the chickens are “living good like chickens should.”
We’re debating the location of our backyard chicken run, but we’ll have to decide soon, as we’re due to get our four hens from Zakarison’s outside Pullman WA in a few weeks.
Cherry Update: My fingers are still blackened from slicing and pitting 6 quarts of sweet cherries for my batch of cherry liqueur. I used almost the whole large bottle of 100 proof vodka for that many cherries, but there’s a little left over for vodka tonics. I didn’t use the Idaho vodka, though, since it was only 80 proof. Only!
Wednesday, 13 August 2008
Cherry Carnage
The kitchen looked like I murdered a small animal but in reality all I'd been doing was pitting cherries that my husband picked from our neighbor Kate's tree. Normally we harvest cherries in July on the Palouse but it was a long winter so they were waiting for us when we arrived home from our European sabbatical last week. Walt doesn't actually love cherries that much - too bad since his birthday is in July - but he admitted they are "fun to pick," because you can grab them in bunches, which is very satisfying. They are huge, sweet, and almost black, and when I pit them on my homemade nail-on-a-board pitter, the best ones burst open with a geyser-like squirt of blood-red juice. My glasses, my face, the cupboards, the counter: everything is blessed with syrupy spatters.
First we ate some fresh for dessert. Then I froze several gallons of plain cherries for making cherry crisp this winter. Then, I made cherry jam, or, if it doesn't quite set up, cherry compote. Either way is fine, because the intended use is as a topping for breakfast oatmeal, or on yogurt or ice cream for dessert. The next bucket that Walt picks for me will be dedicated to cherry liqueur. Served on its own as a dessert drink or in white wine or sparkling white wine as a kir or kir royale aperitif, I predict it will be the essence of summer in a glass. Everyone we stayed with in France last year had a well-stocked cupboard of homemade liqueurs, and I intend to follow their example.
If you want to find cherries to pick in your area try the website www.pickyourown.org. Normally the Tukey Orchard at WSU in Pullman has U-pick cherries in July but I believe that most of them were used for research this year - ain't that the pits!
Here is the recipe I'll use for cherry liqueur. I don't know why the quantities are so funky - when I figure out more normal sounding measurements I'll replace this recipe with my own.
2½ c., (591 ml.) sweet cherries (Bing)
12.7 oz., (376 ml.) 100° proof Vodka (non-flavored)
5 oz., (148 ml.) simple syrup (two parts sugar dissolved in one part water)
2-6 drops lemon extract
• Into a quart jar, add cherries that have been cut in half and pitted. Add alcohol and water to cover cherries. Macerate—tightly covered 2 to 3 weeks at room temperature, shaking daily. Filter through cheesecloth and then through a coffee filter; add simple syrup and lemon extract (optional). Next add (top with) water to bring the total volume up to 25.4 ounces. The liqueur is very good at this point; it will become smoother if it is aged for a few weeks or more.
Note: You can also make this recipe using 80° vodka, 16 oz. (476 ml.).
24% Alc. by Vol. (48°). Makes 750 ml.
First we ate some fresh for dessert. Then I froze several gallons of plain cherries for making cherry crisp this winter. Then, I made cherry jam, or, if it doesn't quite set up, cherry compote. Either way is fine, because the intended use is as a topping for breakfast oatmeal, or on yogurt or ice cream for dessert. The next bucket that Walt picks for me will be dedicated to cherry liqueur. Served on its own as a dessert drink or in white wine or sparkling white wine as a kir or kir royale aperitif, I predict it will be the essence of summer in a glass. Everyone we stayed with in France last year had a well-stocked cupboard of homemade liqueurs, and I intend to follow their example.
If you want to find cherries to pick in your area try the website www.pickyourown.org. Normally the Tukey Orchard at WSU in Pullman has U-pick cherries in July but I believe that most of them were used for research this year - ain't that the pits!
Here is the recipe I'll use for cherry liqueur. I don't know why the quantities are so funky - when I figure out more normal sounding measurements I'll replace this recipe with my own.
2½ c., (591 ml.) sweet cherries (Bing)
12.7 oz., (376 ml.) 100° proof Vodka (non-flavored)
5 oz., (148 ml.) simple syrup (two parts sugar dissolved in one part water)
2-6 drops lemon extract
• Into a quart jar, add cherries that have been cut in half and pitted. Add alcohol and water to cover cherries. Macerate—tightly covered 2 to 3 weeks at room temperature, shaking daily. Filter through cheesecloth and then through a coffee filter; add simple syrup and lemon extract (optional). Next add (top with) water to bring the total volume up to 25.4 ounces. The liqueur is very good at this point; it will become smoother if it is aged for a few weeks or more.
Note: You can also make this recipe using 80° vodka, 16 oz. (476 ml.).
24% Alc. by Vol. (48°). Makes 750 ml.
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