Keeping Local Alive
Sorry, no food in today’s post. Instead, I have a somewhat urgent plea directed towards those of you that are here with me in Philadelphia and a general “post-it note” for those of you with a “local” mind-set everywhere. I just found out that my favorite of all bookstores is on the brink of closing its doors. Walk a Crooked Mile is a local shop I’ve featured on the blog before. It’s a community institution in Mt. Airy, my neighborhood, and has been a source of countless hours of pleasurable lazy afternoon book browsing for myself and many others. Hearing how the economy has taken its toll on Walk a Crooked Mile reminds me how precious and fragile our local businesses – those that have such “personality” and really contribute to the fabric of our communities – are and how quickly something that’s “been around forever” can suddenly be “closed for good.”
With the holidays fast approaching again, I’d encourage you to start making your shopping lists in a very different manner. Rather than think about what everyone on your list wants in a generic sense, why not make a list of shops in your community that you’d really like to support and then put the names of people you’re buying for next to the shops where you’ll probably find something they like. Then go out and support local businesses by finding unique gifts for everyone on your list in those local stores. I know it can be a little more expensive sometimes, but think about how boring life would be if our only merchants were cheap big box stores and fast food chains. Gift certificates to local businesses are another great way to get your friends and family to go check out the local scene and appreciate all it has to offer. Several stores, including Walk a Crooked Mile, sell their wares online so you’re not limited to giving gift certificates to those folks that live in the same ‘hood as you.
I am going to be doing some early holiday shopping and stock up on some of the excellent gardening and food reference books that Walk a Crooked Mile always has on hand. If you’re in Philly, why not make an afternoon of it – take the R7 to the Mt. Airy stop and have a free cup of tea or coffee and pet C.C. the resident cat while you take in the nostalgic aroma of old books and soak up the puddles of sunshine that always seem to be streaming through the windows at Walk a Crooked Mile. If you’re not in Philadelphia, but have a heart of gold, you can still help keep this beautiful book store in business by making a donation online.
4 comments November 2, 2009
Canning Pears
I hinted in the last post that I’d been doing a lot of canning recently. I grew up with canning, helping my mom put up all sorts of fruits and vegetables for our family’s winter eating. Sadly, I didn’t always appreciate the font of knowledge that was before me at the time. Nor did I really embrace canning again until last year. This autumn I’ve been a woman on a mission, intent on returning to the traditions of putting up plenty of jars to “keep on keepin’ on” with the local eating long after the garden is in its wintery bed.
The recipe I’m giving you today isn’t exactly the one my mom uses because I like to add a few bits of warm spices to mine, but the concept is very much the same. I used pears from the same tree in the side yard of our family farm that my grandmother used when she was my age. I also happen to use the same canning kettle and jar rack as my grandmother. She gave them to me at Christmas last year. I was extremely sad when she did, because it meant that she herself would never use them again (she’s 90 and unable to see well enough to can anymore) . Once I got started using the kettle though, I felt incredibly grateful to her and to my mom for passing down both the tools and know-how to preserve my own food. As I lifted the heavy jars full of ripe pears into the kettle to be processed, I couldn’t help but feel deeply connected to my family and its heritage as my hands were holding the same handles as my grandmother’s had so many times over so many years.
What follows is a pictorial guide to canning pears with the recipe at the end. This same method can be used to can fresh peaches.
7 comments October 31, 2009
Vegetarian Stuffed Patty Pan Squash
I’m sitting on the porch today to write this post, soaking up the autumn rays of the heavy late-afternoon sun. It requires a good deal of squinting to see my laptop’s screen, but it’s worth it . I can understand why the pilgrims chose this time of the year to give thanks. Every warm moment in the fading fall sun seems like a precious gift. And really, when I think about my life right now, hectic as heck and strung out as it is, I’m really really lucky to have so many good things and good people bumping along with me on this mysterious ride.
Sorry if I’m a bit moody and wordy today. In addition to the amber autumn sunbeams making me warm and fuzzy, I’ve had an interesting week with lots of “potential” for fulfilling some of my quirky visions for the future and lots of opportunities to reflect on my past while peeling and canning gobs of fruit and vegetables. More details on all of that later. All you really need to know is that my mind is in an interesting place at the moment.
There is a recipe in here somewhere, I swear. But let me bend your ear for just a bit longer. As you know, cooking holds a lot of memories for me. And local food holds a lot of passion for me. And urban farming stirs my imagination in ways I will only hint at most of the time for fear you all think I’m nuts. One reason I find these three things so compelling is the fact food is so critical to the welfare of our community – not just for nutritional value, but also as a means for mending neighborhoods and bringing families and strangers alike together.
3 comments October 26, 2009
Roasted Plum & Lemon Cake
Oh, I do have a treat for you today! A densely moist and richly flavored Roasted Plum and Lemon Cake to be precise. Since childhood, I’ve adored plums, ripe and sweet, ready to eat out of hand. I think it had to do with them being a “kid sized” fruit. Apples and peaches were always a little too hefty. It might also have been because my aunts would bring them as a treat that I got to eat at my grandma’s house. Everyone always loves anything they eat at grandma’s house, right? And then too, there was the fact that I loved to…err, um, maybe this is too weird to share. Oh what the heck! I loved to slowly suck away the plum flesh from the pit and keep the pit in my mouth for quite some time. Farm kid candy, I guess.
Weird childhood behaviors aside, I didn’t cross paths with a cooked plum until I was an adult. I have to say I preferred them raw still…until I tasted a roasted plum. Oh my. My oh my. Just as with anything roasted, plums take on a deeper sweetness, an aromatic allure, and any hints of spices you might add. In a word, they’re decadent. The juices get drawn out and mingle with the spices before everything softens and caramelizes just a tad. Put roasted plums on just about anything: ice cream, yogurt and homemade granola, cupcakes, French toast, waffles… But, really, first you must put them on this unbaked cake!
Lemon, while not typically a local fruit here in Pennsylvania (though it is possible), is the perfect companion to the roasted plums in this cake. The citrus cuts through the intensity of the plums and contributes to the color of the moist crumb. I have to tell you though that the real color agent in the cake I baked were the intense orange yolks of the local farm fresh brown eggs. Never underestimate the power of those fresh local eggs.
And while we’re on the subject of local farm products, find yourself a pint of local heavy whipping cream and flog it into soft peaks with just a touch of confectioners sugar or honey to adorn each slice of cake. Trust me, it’s both worth the effort to seek out a local creamery for the cream and the effort to whip your own as it takes this cake from decadent to downright divine!
5 comments October 21, 2009
Alternative Cherries
This autumn I was taking an interesting and unique class in edible ornamental plants – in other words, eating things you usually put in the landscape to make it look pretty. It was a very fun class that opened my eyes up to a lot of new “alternative edibles” and reminded me of a few I’d eaten a lot as a kid but hadn’t thought of in quite awhile.
One of the plants/fruit we studied was Cornus mas or cornelian cherry. Normally this oversized shrub or undersized tree, depending on how you look at it, is use solely for its glorious sunshiny display of yellow flowers in very early spring when nothing else is in bloom or even green for that matter. As it turns out, this pretty plant also bears some delicious ruby red fruit. While the fruit, called cornelian cherries, is pretty small (about the size of a skinny cranberry) it is very prolific so it’s not hard to pick a hefty pail’s worth quickly. It has a decidedly tart taste so it’s not very good eaten raw. Instead, cook it up into sauces and jam with a sizable scoop of sugar, and it’s a suitable stand-in for any recipe using the more popular cranberry. The only real drawback to using cornelian cherries is the pesky pit – just like a regular cherry – that requires an extra processing step to remove. Still it’s worth the work to give this new “alternative edible” a try.
Cornelian cherries are available in the fall, usually in September, though different trees ripen up at different times, depending on the little microclimate surrounding that particular tree. The tree I was picking from was actually right next to three others, two of which weren’t even close to being ready and one that had already passed, the birds having stripped it clean. It can be a little challenging to identify a Cornus mas if you didn’t plant it yourself. My best advice to you, considering they’re over for this year already anyway, is to pay attention in the spring for any bright yellow flowering shrubs/trees that aren’t a forsythia bush. Make a note of where you saw it and revisit that plant in the fall to see if it has these fruit on it.
In addition to the Cornus mas fruit, there’s another oddball cherry in this post. That’s the tasty candy-like Physalis pruinosa or ground cherry that I’ve featured in this recipe, and this recipe, and this recipe in the past. I really love these golden orbs. I discovered over the summer that this plant grows very well in a container on a baking hot deck in the city so I’d definitely suggest it for other urbanites looking for a highly productive food crop that’s versatile in the kitchen. Nothing quite like popping these puppies out of their husk and straight into your waiting mouth.
So this post gives you two recipes for the price of one – Cornelian & Ground Cherry Sauce along with Cornelian Cherry Jam – mostly because I forgot to take pictures of the jam before it all got gobbled up on whole grain toast over the course of a week’s breakfast. I really like the tart sweet combination the cornelian cherry adds to both these preparations.
8 comments October 16, 2009
