her able hands

I forgot to post this recipe! I’m not sure where it comes from, but it’s one my sister wrot e out on a recipe card for me while I was visiting her a couple of years ago. It’s my favorite thing to do with apples, now.

These babies came out of the oven and the entire neighborhood smelled like warm cinnamon and apples.

Apple Crostate
Makes 6 individual

Dough:
3 cups flour
1 tsp. salt
1 cup chilled, unsalted butter cut into small pieces
2 eggs lightly beaaten
1/2 cup sour cream.

Combine the flour & salt, work in the butter with a pastry knife until it just forms crumbs (I used the food processor because I had just finished using it to make the dough for the wonderful, blunderful Chard Tart). Combine the sour cream and eggs in a separate bowl, then add to the flour mixture (not in the food processor) and mix until just combined. Then knead until it just comes together. Form into 6 flat, round cakes. Wrap and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.

Filling:
6 large apples (Cortland, Rome Beauty, — I used Opalescent, a local heirloom variety.) peeled and sliced thin
3/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375*
Form tarts to liking– roll out on a lightly floured board, into thin circles about 9″ across. I floured the board with a 50/50 whole wheat and white mix, so the dough picked up luscious flakes of wheat.

Pile 1/6th of the apples onto one side, fold the dough over, fold the edges up and press down to seal. Repeat five more yummy times.

Move them to the ungreased baking sheet as you go.

Bake for 40-45 minutes, until crust is golden brown.

Cut one up into small pieces to appease the kids in the neighborhood who have now gathered around the picnic table.

Eat one yourself in place of dinner. Pick up and eat every little amazing flake of sweet and salty dough that has fallen on your shirt and lap. Lick the plate. Trust me.

Technorati Tags: recipes, apples, apple crostate, flaky dough, sour cream dough, autumn cooking

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This is a fairly straightforward recipe, but there’s one important step and that’s the step I skipped. When you roll out the dough, you’re going for a nice, even 15 inch circle. Easy enough, right? Except the recipe says to roll it out in between two sheets of wax paper so you can then lift it onto the baking pan without it tearing to ribbons. Well, I didn’t do that. Not only did I not do that, I also then piled my wet ingredients right on top of the thin dough, right there on my cutting board.

Then I folded the edges up, working counter-clockwise around the tart, until I had a neat little tarty package to pop in the oven.

Except, whoops! How am I going to move this nice neat tart onto the baking sheet? Hmmmm, braniac?

After some pulling and turning and dumping out of ingredients all over the place, I did manage to shift it onto the pan without tearing it asunder, though now it looked like a wrinkled old ball sac filled with chard. Sorry, but it’s true. And I kind of like it better. It’s even more rustic in appearance, with more texture than usual.

It was bittersweet making this recipe as it used up most of the rest of my chard. My fall plantings of greens have officially become the local buffet for another group of rabbits, so I won’t have any greens at Thanksgiving direct from the yard. Thank goodness Hilgert’s will have kale and collards.

So, on to the recipe!

Chard Tart
serves 4-6

Pastry
1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon salt, preferably kosher
1 1/2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
In a food processor, combine the flour, salt, oil, and butter, and process briefly. Drizzle in 1/3 cup cold water and process briefly. Test to see if the dough sticks together. If not, gradually add more water, a tablespoon at a time. Remove the dough from the processor, knead it a few times on a lightly floured surface, and form it into a ball. Flatten it a bit, wrap it in wax paper, and refrigerate for 1 hour or as long as 6 to 8 hours.

Filling
8 large Swiss chard leaves, stems removed, thinly sliced
Salt, preferably kosher
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 leek, white part only, washed and thinly sliced (I skipped the leek, but added a few baby shallots).
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
1 medium potato (or 1 large red), boiled until tender, peeled and cubed (I used 4 fingerling potatoes from the garden with skins on).
2 tablespoons chopped flat-leaf parsley
1 cup crumbled feta cheese
1/3 cup cubed Fontina cheese
Salt, preferably kosher
Freshly ground black pepper
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
4 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons freshly grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese (I used thick shaved Romano).
Preheat the oven to 375F. Place the Swiss chard in a colander, sprinkle with 1 1/2 teaspoons salt, and set the colander aside over a bowl for 30 minutes.

In a small saucepan, heat the 2T olive oil over medium heat. Add leek and onion stirring until softened, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a large bowl. Add the chard to the bowl, along with potato, parsley, feta, Fontina, salt and pepper, eggs, and 2T of the extra-virgin olive oil. Mix well.

Lightly flour a sheet of wax paper, and place the dough on it. Flour the dough lightly and cover with a piece of wax paper. Roll the dough out to form a 15-inch circle. Remove the top piece of wax paper. Invert the dough round onto an oiled baking sheet and remove the other piece of wax paper.

Spread the filling on the dough, leaving a 1 1/2-inch border all around. Fold the border over the filling, overlapping itself slightly every 2 inches or so. Brush the dough with 1 tablespoon of the extra-virgin olive oil. Sprinkle filling with the Parmigiano-Reggiano, and drizzle with the remaining 1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil. Bake for 30 minutes, or until the crust and filling are lightly browned. Slice, and serve hot or at room temperature.

All this dish needs is a bright salad and a glass of chilled Rose to make it a perfect meal. But it’s also quite scrumptious eaten while standing over the hot pan.

Technorati Tags: recipes, chard, chard tart, feta cheese, eat local, locavore, garden, kitchen garden

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This is more of a round-up last weekend and Monday. It’s late because I’ve had something going on every night after work and have slept late every morning because I’m fighting a bit of ick, but keeping it at bay with lots of water, vitamins and herbs. Though I’m less hopeful after last night’s class meeting at the preschool. I walked out of there feeling like about a thousand little germies had hitched a ride home in my head and this morning my throat is all sore and my nose has the onset of viral infection garbage smell when I breathe in. I’m popping cold care and stopping at the pharmacy for some zinc on my way in to work.

I should probably also make a big, spicy pot of garlic and escarole soup with my homemade chili powder.

I dehydrated a bunch of the hot peppers I picked at the farm two weeks ago, a mix of banana peppers that had turned red, chilis and cherry hots. While we waited for Chris to get home from work on Saturday, Lila played on the swingset with her friend Fatou, and I set up at the picnic table with all of my half-finished food preservation projects. The day was hot, but not insufferably so because a light breeze kept the air moving and the shadows are so long that we stayed in partial shade.

I worked the dry pepper bits into flakes and some powder with the mortar and pestle and as I worked I thought about my sister, so when I finished that task, I sat down and wrote her a letter to send along with a little baggie of the pepper.

I miss her more than I could possibly communicate here and hope that one day we’ll be able to live close to each other so we can get our food and garden geek on together on a regular basis.

I started this labor-intensive red pepper relish on Friday night. The recipe for Pugliese Pepper Relish—which I got from the great site, Kitchen Gardeners International—takes three days to complete. What you see here is the vegetables soaking in salt and their own juices.

Shortly after I snapped this shot, I dumped them into a colander and rinsed the heck out of them, let them drain, then dumped them back into the bowl and covered with the vinegar. I didn’t have enough white wine vinegar so I mixed in some cider. I guess it won’t taste quite as refined, but that’s okay, this kind of substitution suits my peasant nature.

I’ve been meaning to take a photo of the twelve half-pints of finished relish, but anytime I’m home it’s dark and my indoors nighttime shots are worthless. You’ll just have to believe me when I tell you that, hott damn, they’re red and purty. I can’t wait to pop open a jar to smother on some fish or chicken or something.

So now we arrive at the question of the pot of cooked plum tomatoes sitting in the fridge. I cleaned off the food mill and while the girls lay back in the grass and chatted, I eavesdropped on their deep conversation, lulled by the turning of the handle.

Lila: But if you die then I will die too. Right?

Fatou: But if I die my mommy will be sad. Right?

Lila: Yeah, but if you die then I will be sad too, right?

Fatou: Uh-huh.

Lila: My Grandpa Ron died. His body stopped working. He’s in the trees and the stars now, right?

Fatou: Uh-huh. My Grandpa lives in Japan, right?

Lila: Well, my other Grandpa isn’t dead and he lives with Pink Grandma Carol in Massatoooshits, right?

Fatou: Uh-huh.

I ended up with a quart of juice that might be nice for Bloody Marys with Sunday brunch, but I’m not seeing an open Sunday for a few weeks, so I need to get it into the freezer. For the sauce, I sautéed a bunch of vegetables (garlic, onion, red and green pepper, mushroom and carrots) to add to the tomato, which I simmered with some of my dried herbs, then fresh basil and parsley at the end. This sauce made a great topping for the pan of stuffed red peppers I made the night before. I missed out on one more photo of red with that meal, too.

At midday, just before we left to head down to the old house to mow and grab another load of crap we have no room for, I took this blown-out shot of the same Dahlia from last week. Totally the wrong time of day to take picture, but goodness, this flower is incredible.

I remember my teacher back in New York, Fiona, telling me to give plenty of attention to the deep and bright colors of autumn, to really take them into my body. The reds and golds and oranges would help sustain my energy through the gray, cold days of winter. I do this with my pantry, as well.

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Okay, so I apparently have to learn this lesson yet again.

So, yes, universe…I give. Hands up, white flag a-wavin’. There are only so many hours in the day. There are only so many free hours in the week. I remember. I may have forgotten while making all of those grandiose plans to pick vegetables off-site, and do all of that canning and freezing.

But the fact is, I’m out of room in the freezer and I don’t have time to go buy one this weekend, and I don’t have time to go pick beans this weekend. And I don’t have time to can tomatoes, because the pot of cooked down tomatoes I made earlier in the week is still in the fridge waiting to be run through the food mill. And have I mentioned that I’m out of room in the freezer? And that I don’t have time to do any canning? So we’re going to have to just eat the sauce or give it away.

This weekend we have to finish up at the old house so the rent-to-owners can move in next weekend. Period. No time for much of anything else because this is it, the final push and jeepers am I looking forward to crossing “mow at the old house” off the weekend to-do list. Amen.

Will there be beans next weekend? Perhaps. Perhaps not. Right at this moment I couldn’t care less. But, you know, don’t hold me to it.

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I woke up Saturday morning to the cold and thought to myself, I think we’ll go out to the farm and pick peppers, tomatoes and beans. Then I’ll have to go buy a small freezer. Roasted red peppers, oh my.

I lay in bed with the sun streaming past the window (the bedroom window faces southwest) and relished the idea of being out in the fields in the warm sun and the cool air, but had to invent the warm part because goodness was it cold on Saturday. The kind of cold that’s the harbinger of what’s to come, where the husband bolts out of bed at four in the morning to dig the down comforter from the stack under the desk—and tosses it on top of the resentful, perimenopausal wife who was in the middle of a great dream and just fine under the flannel quilt, thankyew—he shivering and mumbling something about how f*cking cold it is, and holy crap what happened to summer. We woke up to 38*, but the forecast promised a high in the mid 60s. Perfect picking weather. And fortunately, no frost here because I totally forgot to pick the rest of my tomatoes the night before.

It was 90* just last week, wasn’t it?

After breakfast, the kids and I packed up a few snacks, some water and my camera (which I forgot to use but for a couple of shots of the future*) and made the half-hour ride out to Hilgert’s. We started with tomatoes, but the woman running the buckets and cash looked at me ruefully and intoned, “Plum tomatoes are hard to come by right now.” as she waved her hand at the rows of plants all flat on the ground with thousands of semi-ripe and overripe, rotting tomatoes just lying on the black plastic in a vinegary, fermented haze. Yuck. We picked half a bucket and decided to pay the extra $4 a bushel for picked tomatoes at another farm stand.

When we paid up, I saw a bucket with some lovely globe-shaped eggplants and asked if they were for sale. I could have as many as I like for 50 cents a piece, but she had to cut them for me because people tend to rip the plants right up out of the ground. Goodness, who knew people could be so brutal?

Harvesting is not just a skill, it’s an art. One must know exactly how a ripe fruit or vegetable looks and feels before attempting to separate it from its parent plant. Force it before its time and you could lose both. Eggplant is definitely better harvested by sharp knife blade than by yanking it from the vine. And tomatoes will tell you when they’re ready if you just gently tug on the plump fruit. The flesh will give ever so slightly under your fingers and you’ll feel the breaking point in the stem before it even snaps. As if the tomato wants to go to the kitchen now, thanks. Maybe a little salt and pepper?

So I thanked her as she trudged off into the eggplant rows, then thanked her again for her help as I imagined several more containers of my roasted ratatouille (yes, I know, I make it sans zucchini) stacked neatly in my freezer (yes, I know, I’ll need to clean out the freezer if I want to see any neat stacks of anything) and drove off to the pepper fields with a dozen dark purple globes of love.

I really wish I’d taken some pictures of the pepper fields, because here I’ve been all these four years in northeast Ohio, convinced that a local red pepper was a figment of my imagination. But no! Row upon row of sweet, ripe, firm red peppers stretched out before me and it only took about 15 minutes for us to fill two five gallon buckets.

This evening I got home and fired up the grill and filled the sink to wash off the clay spots.

This was the contents of one bag, an overflowing bucket’s worth, all had for $8. A little jar of roasted red peppers in oil at the grocery? Anywhere from $2-$5, depending on how gourmet the marketing shtick. I still have one more big bag of sweets and one big bag of medium hots. I’m intending to dry some hot peppers for chili powder, and will likely just chop, blanch and freeze some of the remaining sweets.

The knuckles on my right hand are all singed because my grill tongs, while quite long and unruly, and nearly impossible to use without getting a cramp in my hand, are about 6″ too short for this kind of grilling. I have to keep the peppers all along the back half of the grill where the heat’s intense enough to blacken the skin quickly and not turn the flesh to mush. After about 45 minutes, I had this:

Boy, howdy that makes me happy. I was feeling so bereft about the lack of food put back for winter, and dreading having to shop for every blasted ingredient in the frigid months to come. But now with this little project almost under my ample belt (I do still need to peel, seed and de-vein the little bastids, then get them into the freezer, separated by strips of wax paper and nestled together in ziploc bags.) That’s a job for tomorrow morning, because I want them to cool completely and it’s just about bedtime on the ranch.

Have I mentioned how much this full-time work thing is cramping my urban homesteading style?

Jeesh.

So anyway, we ran out of steam after the peppers. I probably could have kept on, but only if in the company of happy adults who were equally obsessed with the idea of stocking up, rather than a Very Hungry Teenager Who Wanted a Hamburger and a Preschooler who Really Had to Poop, and in her Own Potty, Please. So maybe next weekend we’ll run out for beans if they haven’t lost them to frost. And I do still have to buy the tomatoes from the other market—I want to can some roasted tomato soup and some tomato sauce.

On the way home I kept hearing forced air leakage coming from Tyler’s seat. After about ten minutes of that, I asked him if he had a problem. He sat up straight and got all blushy and assured me, “No! I’m just blowing my hair out of my eyes! I had a great time. I’m really glad I came. Seriously.”

Well, naturally I stopped for ice cream on the way home. Not that he could get any sweeter.

*Then! Then comes October, people. Look what I get to go pick in October!

Yes! That’s a whole field of gorgeous collard greens. Isn’t it a stunner? And look at this!

You got it! A whole field of curly kale.

People, I’m swooning.

And running out of room in the freezer.

Technorati Tags: Roasted Red Pepeprs, freezing, canning, preserving, preserving the harvest, u-pick, cooking greens

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