The first few years we were a part of his CSA, Leigh Hauter always had a few pigs running around part of his property. They were not only for meat but were intended as (yet another) deterrent to the deer; the theory was that the pigs would smell things up so bad up and down their enclosure that the deer would stay away. It sort of worked; the deer stayed out of the pigs enclosures and instead assaulted the fields by alternative vectors. Leigh’s pigs had from ¼ to ½ and acre of forest to root around in, they had plenty of space to remain active, and in addition to some supplemental grain, they ate roots and whatever vegetables were too far gone to go out in the shares.

They made for some really good eatin’, too. This was the first meat I had ever had where I not only knew the farmer but knew the animals. I thought that the fresh, rich taste was just because it was not coming from some mass-producing factory farm, but I discovered that there was something else to it.

What do you do with a whole pig? Make bacon, of course!

Leigh got tired of having to deal with pigs, so he stopped raising them and instead hooked us up with his friend Susannah who raises pigs and poultry on her farm in southern Fauquier County. She also grows corn organically and uses that as feed for her animals.  Now, do not get me wrong, Susannah raises some fine hogs, but there just seemed to be something missing from the meat we were used to having.

It did not really hit me until I was at Eastern Market one day and saw that Jose Canales had a sign up for Jamon Iberico. This is a very special and very rare type of cured ham from Spain. The hogs are sent up into the mountains to forage and gorge themselves on acorns before being slaughtered. Because of their diet and exercise the pig’s meat has a distinctly rich flavor which is further enhanced and concentrated by curing and aging. Mr. Canales sliced off about a quarter pound for me after giving me the short version of why Iberico is so special.

He did not have to try very hard; I told him about how I had noticed the difference in taste and texture between the hogs we had purchased and he nodded his head in agreement.

So when I saw what Bill had to offer, I knew I would have to make room in my freezer.

This is Kevin Bacon, the stud pig from Babes in the Woods. He is a cross of a Duroc boar with Tamworth sows. Handsome, isn't he....

It took two years for the timing to work out (we had to finish the pig we had, then we bought a quarter beef and we had to finish that) but we finally have one of his pigs.

Up Next: This Years’ Pig, Part II: Adventures in Curing

Did I mention I cure my own meats? Here’s a little photo to wet your appetite for part two of the story.

Let the curing begin.... this will be Guanciale - Jowl Bacon (More on this in Part Two)

Pumpkins and Squash at Comus Market

Have you ever been out to the Comus Market?  Art has it inked on our calendar for November every year now.  They have the most incredible selection of locally grown squash!    It’s located in Montgomery County, MD — about 45 minutes from the District.

Favorite picture of Art from last year's trip! Check out my pumpkin!

My favorites for looks are the fairytale pumpkins, but we’re really buying them to eat.

Wonder if this will make good carriage? These were there just a week ago!

We already had a “volunteer” fairytale from our own garden,  so Art insisted we buy other things this year.  If you buy them, please don’t just use them as decoration!  They are so pretty, but also good to eat.  Most fall squash and pumpkins will last for a really long time.  They are a great food for getting fresh local vegetables in the winter.  Stock up now before they are gone.

If you go, take

He was Pushed!

The perils of CSA deliveries.

We had seedless sugar baby watermelons last week. I managed to drop only one of them; I opened the back of the van and it escaped. For the delivery I laid all of them out on the grass and let people pick theirs. One shareholder came around with, as he usually does, his five-year-old son. Paul had a good deal of fun rolling them around in the grass, which I did not mind at all. But then he picked one up and hurled it. Without my having to say a word about it the boy’s father scolded him, “We do not throw the watermelons! That one’s ours now.” he said picking up the cracked fruit. I felt relieved; the dad did not ask if there were any extra he could take instead of the damaged one. A small example of a responsible shareholder and parent.

No more sweet potatoes!

Our fruit share is not grown on the farm; Leigh goes out once or twice a week to the orchards and farms in his area and purchases peaches, apples, and such from them. It is still local fruit, and still community supported agriculture and he is upfront about the arrangement when people sign on.

So he and his wife, Wenonah, were out at one of these orchards when Wenonah noticed that the farmer had crates and crates of potatoes. She asked what he was planning on doing with them. “I’ve got so many, I don’t know where I’m going to sell them” he said. It has, I believe, been a banner year for potatoes in Virginia. My sister-in-law’s CSA has given her so many potatoes that she is pretty much sick of them, ‘I’m potatoes everyday. Sometimes twice a day. Potato soup, potato salad….” she went on a while, suffice it to say, she has been getting a LOT of potatoes in her share.

Wenonah decided that these potatoes might be a good addition to the shares this week, so they drove off with a few crates. They’re relatively small, but tasty, sort of like new potatoes, and boil up quite quickly.

They are also a welcome departure from the sweet potatoes which have been a staple of OUR shares the past few weeks!

Zingiber officinale

I had hoped to hit a different market this weekend, but with house guests and a whole mess of other things happening, I had to go with the familiar. (Really, I needed one that was open at 9:00 on Sunday and was close to me).

Among the vendors in the bank parking lot, I cannot for the life of me remember their name right now, was one selling fresh local ginger root. That’s right, Zingiber officinale itself grown right in our own backyard. I grabbed one of the roots and then decided that having two would be better. You see at home, The Wife was in the first few days of a cold, nursing a sore throat among other symptoms.

If you did not know, ginger has been shown to aid “…the motility of the gastrointestinal tract and have analgesic, sedative, antipyretic and antibacterial properties. “ (Wikipedia) In other words, it’s a good home remedy for relief of symptoms from a common cold.

Heading home I hit on an even better idea: ginger would be good for her cold, and what’s good for a sore throat? Ice cream, of course! Even better if it’s sweetened with honey from Maryland instead of sugar! I went up to Glut Food and picked up some Trickling Springs heavy cream and half & half and went home to cook up some medicine. This locally-made, locally-sourced ginger ice cream would be, of course, for medicinal purposes only.

It was not to be used as some dessert, it would be strictly medicinal!

Now We're Just Showing Off...

Menu: Cibola Farms Bison Hot Dogs wrapped in Torpedo onions and beet greens from Tree and Leaf Farm and topped with Fields of Grace Gouda and homemade Green Tomato Ketchup. Tomatoes on the side from Bull Run Mountain Farm (also the source of the green tomatoes) with Fields of Grace mozzarella. The buns are Homemade from Moutoux Orchard Whole Wheat Flour.

The hot dogs were excellent; the inch-plus wide links come fully cooked and had enough flavor that we did not feel like we were eating something meant for kids. I halved the torpedo onions and wrapped some of the larger shells around the dogs before putting them in the frying pan with a bit of water. They are good onions, but I undercooked them and had a hard time biting through the thick pieces.   The beet greens were intended to add a bit of astringency to the dish. The raw milk Gouda was perfect for this, I put it on at the end so it would melt just a touch. Fields of Grace’s Mozzarella is the pre-packaged low-moisture kind and I must confess a strong preference for the fresh variety. Still, F of G’s is far better than any store-bought version and I would love to try it on a pizza sometime.

For the buns I used a fairly straightforward recipe for an old issue of Cooking Light (I checked the site and can’t find it there, so no link) which i have used again and again with various flours in different proportions. This time I used 100% whole wheat flour from Moutoux. It was a little dense since it was all whole-wheat, but rose and baked well. It is a bit more coarse than, say, King Arthur’s w.w. flour. The only real quibble that I have with Moutoux is that the paper bags the flour comes in are a bit too thin! One more sharp turn on the way home and I might have floured the car. I will get their flour again, but will bring some appropriate plastic tub with me to put it in right away.

Now We're Just Showing Off...

The Menu:

• Hot Dogs:  Cibola Farms Bison Dogs
• Onions:  Tree and Leaf Farm torpedo Onions
• Cheese: Fields of Grace
• Buns: Homemade from Moutoux Whole Wheat Flour
• Tomatoes: Bull Run Mountain CSA
• Green Tomato Ketchup: Homemade from Bull Run CSA tomatoes

It’s Labor Day weekend.  The time we take off from work and cook meat over an open fire.  There’s no reason you can’t have an amazing locavore Labor Day!   I definitely think it would be overboard for most people to make their own hotdog buns from locally grown and milled flour, but it’s not a stretch to get locally, humanely raised hotdogs.  Labor Day weekend is the perfect time to share the joy of eating local.  People will be asking where you got the amazing burgers, and you can tell them with relish. (pun intended)

Almost all farmers markets have vendors that sell locally raised beef, chicken, lamb, and pork.  Cibola farms, who we used gives you the chance to try bison burgers – how awesome is that?  Needless to say you can also get just about any kind of cheese you’d like too. If your cookout is Sunday or Monday, there is plenty of time to head to the market!

What’s on your grill this weekend?

Locally grown and milled flour!

I get asked all the time if I know a place to get locally grown & milled flour.  Somehow, I’ve miss Moutoux Orchards all these years.  They are a local CSA/Direct farm that grows the standard fruits and vegetables, but also has grains.    Art D. and I took our first trip over to the Falls Church farmers market and were really pleased by what we found.  This market isn’t exactly nearby for us, but somehow I think we’ll be find excuses to head out there more often.

Crepes...nom, nom, nom!

Moutoux Orchard flours are just a small taste of what’s to be found there.  Sadly an ATM did not seem to be nearby, so our shopping was limited.  There are about 40 vendors at the summer market, so the selectionwas great.  There was even a crepe stand — something we’ve not seen at our usual stops (Takoma Park, Bloomingdale, and Dupont Circle)

Beetza is the flavor sensation that is rockin' the nation

Too hot to use the oven, so I fired up the grill. Whole wheat crust made form Raphine Mill flour, beets from Bloomingdale farmers market, Goat cheese from Cherry Glen Farm, fennel from Bull Run Mountain farm. Wood from my shop and the neighbor’s oak tree

Aug 23 Market Buys

One of the comments we hear a lot is  … so, the gooseberries are great and all, but I can’t make real meals just by shopping at the farmers markets.   And, even if I could, it would cost a fortune!

Well, we’re here to dispel those myths and show you how it can be done.  This week, my CSA brought me corn, summer squash, tomatoes, lettuce, and peaches.  At the market (see above), I bought peaches, pluots, eggplant, sweet potatoes, bell peppers, pimientos (the little red peppers), basil, chives, dandelion greens, sweet potato ravioli, garlic lingini, bread, mozarella cheese, and blackberry ice cream (Dolcezza is totally worth the $6 splurge!).  Here’s my plan for the week:

Monday: Summer squash and corn soup with chives and pimientos (good for a couple of lunches, too) and bread

Tuesday: Sweet potato ravioli (purchased from Smith Meadows Farms) with bell pepper and tomato sauce and feta (purchased last week at the 14th St Market)

Wednesday: Tomato/Basil/Mozarella sandwiches on toasted bread with green salad w/ peaches

Thursday: Linguini w/ feta, summer squash, and herbs (good for a couple lunches, too)

Friday: Scrambled eggs w/ dandelion greens and sweet potato hash

Saturday: Corn on the cob, panzanella (tomato, mozarella, and bread) salad, and blackberry ice cream

So, for $80 ($20 CSA, $60 market), I will make 6 dinners and ~4 lunches for myself and my husband.   That works out to $4/meal/person for local, mostly organic, super-healthy meals.  And, for snacks, I have plenty of fruit, and will make baba ganoush from the eggplant.

As you can see, I am a vegetarian most of the time.  I’ll buy fish 2-3 times per month, and cook with meat (small pieces in a larger veggie meal) maybe once a month.   If you’re more of a carnivore, there are many meat sellers at the markets.  You could add ground meat to the pasta dishes, or add some sausage links to the eggs and hash dinner, raising the price to $5-6/meal.

Tomatoes, Pluots and ... Cookies in the nomming bowl? How did those get there?

It was HOT today, but that didn’t seem to slow things down at the Takoma Park farmers market.  It was one of the biggest crowds I’ve seen all summer.   We (me and Art D.)  didn’t have a shopping list,  so there was nothing on the agenda to find today — other than fill the “nomming” bowl, of course.  And fill it we did.

The Pluots (plum/apricot) from Blackrock Orchard were one of the first things that really our attention today.  They looked yummy and ripe.  I’ve been hearing about pluots in the media lately because of the new book by Chip Brantley: The Perfect Fruit: Good Breeding, Bad Seeds, and the Hunt for the Elusive Pluot.   Yes, there is now a book about the Pluot. Are these going to be the newest “it” food?  Will they become the pomegranate or bacon of 2010?  Only time will tell!

Tomatoes were fantastic again this week too.  It was a veritable “tomato extravaganza!”

Tomato Extravaganza...Sunday! SunDAY! SUNDAY!!

Potomac Vegetable Farm had an amazing selection (photo above), in all colors shapes and sizes.  To be fair, a lot of the vendors did — but PVF had the best sign and they are who we bought from this week.   Plus, they were cutting up lots of yummy samples for me to taste.  One of the employees was even helping promote the tomatoes by chomping down on a HUGE yellow tomato like it was an apple.

We were also happy to see J&L Edleman Homestead Farms back — they were missing a couple of weeks ago.  I picked up a couple of their great “snack size” cantaloupes.  They are always really sweet and the small size makes them less threatening.  Don’t judge me. 

Finally, of course, we get to the cookies.  One of the great things about Takoma Park Farmers Market is the community atmosphere.  Kids were having a bake sale to raise money for two charities, and well — it was chocolate chip cookies!   We bought a half-dozen and into the “nomming” bowl they went!  And then promplty into our stomachs.