Category Archives: spring

Mini Rhubarb Pie

13 June 2015 by local kitchen

Mini pie! Though they can be a bit tough to find, I love my mini, 7-inch pie plates. I have two, actually: one in the classic heron pattern used by Tai’s Uncle Charlie at Hog Bay Pottery, and one deep-dish 7-inch by Emile Henry that I snagged years ago at a little shop in Bedford Village. And they are not so mini, really: a quarter of the pie is still a hefty serving, and with ice cream the pie could […]

Categories: baking, dessert, pie, rhubarb, spring, whole wheat flour • Tags: baking, cooking, food, local, recipes, rhubarb

Spring Poached Chicken & Vegetables

10 June 2015 by local kitchen

The weather has been simply glorious in New York, hasn’t it? Especially if you are a plant: misty, rainy mornings, hot, sunny afternoons, cool, crisp evenings. It’s like garden Nirvana out there, and even this black thumb can’t keep the plants on the back deck from overflowing with joy. It’s a perfect time, then, to try out this oddbin little recipe from Jamie Oliver: a whole chicken, poached in water flavored with herbs, vegetables, and the chicken itself. Nothing more […]

Categories: 100% local, chicken, main course, spring • Tags: chicken, cooking, food, local, recipes

Ramp Powder

5 June 2015 by local kitchen

A couple of weeks ago, I took a sunny drive out to Holbrook Farm and picked up what had to be the last ramps of the season: they were huge, with big, fat bulbs, and the slightly yellow-green leaves that say the end of ramp season is nigh. It’s been a busy Spring, and my visits to the farm have been few and far between, so it’s just possible that I picked up everything else in the store as well. […]

Categories: 100% local, drying, leek, preserving, spring • Tags: cooking, food, local, preserving, quick & easy, ramps, recipes

Spring Wheat Berry Salad with Lemon Sumac Dressing

29 May 2015 by local kitchen

Variety is the spice of life. Or so they say. But if so, it’s funny how often we stick to the tried & true, the comfortable familiarity of our regular routine. There are over 4,000 varieties of potato, 40,000 of rice, 30,000 varieties of wheat alone. How many varieties have you had lately? I’ve never cooked wheat berries at home. I’ve had them, of course; at restaurants, at potlucks, at the Whole Foods salad bar. But not often, surely. And […]

Categories: citrus, grains & legumes, mint, peas, salad, side dish, spring, vegetarian • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes, vegetarian

Blueberry Meyer Lemon Cake

8 May 2015 by local kitchen

See that cake up there? That was my breakfast. No one, including me, should try to tell you that cake is a nutritious option for breakfast – there is plenty of butter and sugar in there, after all, and those two aren’t exactly nutrient dense. Strangely enough, however, despite my rather non-nutritionally-stellar breakfast, I haven’t “crashed” this afternoon (fiber in whole grains delays absorption of simple carbohydrates and prevents spikes in insulin), I have managed to perform complex mathematical equations […]

Categories: baking, berries, breakfast, cake, citrus, dessert, snack, spring, summer, whole wheat flour • Tags: baking, cake, cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes

Mirepoix, Sofrito, & Soup Base for the Freezer

16 October 2014 by local kitchen

Have you ever noticed how each season’s preserving takes on a life of its own? Sure, you have the standards that you put up every year: canned tomatoes, your husband’s favorite pickle, ears and ears of frozen grilled corn. But each season it seems a certain method of preservation wins the day. Either the canning pot is bubbling away non-stop, or you have six different crocks fermenting on the counter, or everything in sight gets spread out in the dehydrator. […]

Categories: 100% local, freezing, preserving, soup, spring, summer • Tags: cooking, food, local, preserving, recipes

Candied Ramp & Fennel Jam

13 May 2014 by local kitchen

Speaking of sugar: how about some candied ramp & fennel jam? Just a quick one today, as I am drowning in data and have been for days, but I took a half-hour lunch break to whip up this small-batch jam from a lovely bunch of ramps Tai brought home from Holbrook Farm the other day. With leaves finally filling out the trees, ramp season will soon be behind us as the sun gets blocked from the forest floor. I’m squeezing […]

Categories: fennel, jams, leek, quick & easy, spring • Tags: cooking, food, local, preserving, quick & easy, recipes

Potato Ramp Soup

2 May 2014 by local kitchen

More ramps, you say? Don’t mind if I do! This one is a riff on the classic potato leek soup, but while that number is often loaded down with bacon & heavy cream, this version is light and Springy with lemon and just-barely poached ramp leaves. The wild, earthy ramp flavor is subtle (since I only had one bunch of ramps on hand) though distinctive, and I like the simplicity of flavors: potatoes, ramps, lemon, a touch of butter & […]

Categories: 100% local, leek, potato, soup, spring, vegetarian • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes, soup, vegetarian

Ramp & White Bean Fritters with Sriracha-Marmalade Sauce

25 April 2014 by local kitchen

“Oh, ramps,” I hear you sigh, sniffing delicately. “That’s so last year.” To be sure, ramp mania seems to have dimmed somewhat, after a strong showing in the opening years of the decade, to be replaced by new must-have food items such as artisanal toast and eggs that are scrambled in the shell. Which is a good thing, really, as ramps have been dangerously over-harvested in recent years: perhaps everyone has finally gotten the message about sustainable ramp foraging? Or, perhaps, it […]

Categories: appetizer, beans, leek, snack, spring, vegetarian, wild foods • Tags: beans, cooking, food, local, recipes, spring, vegetarian

Kami’s Birthday Cake 2014

10 April 2014 by local kitchen

I loved this cake. I loved its perfectly imperfect messy abandon. I loved its sweet-tart Meyer cloud cream, made with the very last of my Meyer lemon stash, and generously dolloped between layers of cake. I loved those layers of cake: orange-zest-spiked, tender and moist, perfectly flat. I loved the droopy, thick & luscious cream cheese icing, made a glorious pinky-purple with a reduced beet purée, and I loved the finishing touch, a light sprinkle of homemade orange sugar, for […]

Categories: baking, cake, citrus, dessert, holiday, spring, whole wheat flour, winter, year round • Tags: baking, cooking, food, recipes

All The Crunchy Things

2 April 2014 by local kitchen

Red cabbage, radish, slivered Brussels sprouts, carrots, celery, flat-leaf parsley and Meyer lemon vinaigrette. Spring can’t come soon enough.

Categories: salad, spring • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy

Candied Fennel Stalks + Fennel Frond Salt

17 January 2014 by local kitchen

I’ve been on a bit of a fennel kick lately: not that I would ever consider the dreaded “D” word, but it’s nice to have something crisp and fresh and sweet yet mildly grassy after the excesses of the holidays. Fennel is pretty amazing in that every part of the plant is edible: bulb, stalks, fronds, seeds and pollen; and while they all have that distinctive licorice-y flavor, each part of the plant tastes subtly different, and the overall flavor is […]

Categories: fennel, preserving, quick & easy, spring, winter • Tags: cooking, food, local, preserving, quick & easy, recipes

Sweet Cherry, Rhubarb & Meyer Lemon Pie (with a lattice top)

30 August 2013 by local kitchen

“Grief,” I said to my good friend Karen, “makes people crazy.” That was back in December, when Karen’s Mom had just passed away, and as she had been for many years the charismatic matriarch of a large Irish clan, friends, relatives and neighbors were pouring in from all over the country for the wake and funeral services. And, inevitably, making crazy demands, asking inappropriate questions, offering unsolicited advice. Why? Because grief makes people crazy. It’s a horrible thing, grief: it […]

Categories: baking, cherries, dessert, pastry, pie, rhubarb, spring, summer, year round • Tags: cooking, dessert, food, local, pie, recipes

Ginger-Chile Stir-Fried Lettuce

6 July 2013 by local kitchen

Another answer to that age-old question: What the hell am I going to do with all of this lettuce? Though the last few days have been tropical in New York; sunny, very hot and very humid; early summer has shown us nearly perfect growing conditions for lettuce: sunny, reasonably cool and plenty of rain. Hence, lettuce heads have grown to epic proportions and those of us with gardens or CSAs are eating salad with every meal. However, as there is only so […]

Categories: fall, hot chile peppers, lettuce, side dish, spring, summer • Tags: cooking, local, quick & easy, recipes, side dish

Tepary Bean, Sausage & Chard Soup

19 June 2013 by local kitchen

The verdict is in and the peoples: they like the chard. The professional chefs, recipe developers and cookbook authors? Not so much (except for Martha Rose, who, as ever, is awesome. The other Martha gets a nod too, mostly for the cool, seasonal, by-ingredient recipe index she’s got going on.). I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: I just don’t understand why everyone in the culinary world has a love affair with kale, but ignores her milder, softer, […]

Categories: garlic, heirloom beans, kale & leafy greens, sausage, spring, summer • Tags: cooking, food, local, preserving, quick & easy, recipes