the august kitchen

My kitchen is a sauna.

On any given evening this month, you will find three of my four burners and one impossibly small oven in use. Jars are in the oven keeping hot, a pot of simmering tomatoes, pickling brine, or fruit of the day is bubbling on one burner, a small pan of hot water for sterilizing canning lids and bands is on another, and on the back, boiling and gurgling away, sits the water bath canner.
Batch by batch I'm pickling, jamming and preserving my way through all the irresistible edibles of the August garden...

...and stopping here and there to sample some things picked straight away.


A pretty post not long ago reminded me that there are bouquets of edible arugula flowers in my herb bed that I've been meaning to taste. I hadn't realized the flowers were edible until earlier this year when I saw intriguing bags of the dainty white blossoms for sale at the farmer's market, and I had forgotten about them entirely until Lucy reminded me.

Some just-unearthed potatoes from a friend and a few handfuls of spicy arugula and cooling burnet were on hand, and since the kitchen was already a steamy tangle of pots and pans, I thought, why not boil another kettleful of water? Let's have pasta.


Ziti with Potatoes, Arugula and Burnet
(adapted from Alice Water's recipe for Pasta with Potatoes, Rocket and Rosemary in the Chez Panisse Vegetables cookbook and remembered from this post back in the spring)


Ingredients:


2 potatoes, sliced in halve lengthwise, then into 2/3-inch half-rounds
olive oil
salt and freshly ground pepper
1 sprig of fresh rosemary, leaves stripped, stems discarded
4 cloves garlic
1 small red onion, thinly sliced
3/4 Lb ziti (or other pasta)
1/4 Lb mixed arugula and salad burnet (about 3 cups), washed and spun dry
juice of 1/2 a lemon
a handful of fresh arugula blossoms


Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Toss the sliced potatoes with some olive oil and salt and pepper. Spread them in one layer on a baking sheet, and bake until golden - about 25 minutes. Remove from the oven and set aside. (I found it useful to 'un-stick' the cooked slices from the baking sheet using a spatula soon after they came out of the oven).

While the potatoes cook, heat a pot of salted water for the pasta and mince together the garlic and rosemary.

When the potatoes are done, cook the pasta.

While the pasta is cooking, heat a bit of olive oil in a large saucepan and saute the sliced onion for a few minutes, or until beginning to brown. Add the garlic and rosemary mixture and cook for just another minute. Add the sliced, cooked potatoes and toss to coat. Add the cooked and drained pasta and the mixed greens, stirring gently to combine and wilt the greens just a bit. Remove the pan from the heat and add the lemon juice, tossing to combine. Transfer the pasta to a serving dish, scatter the arugula blossoms on top and serve.

spring in full swing

Rhubarb is here, spring is in full swing, and I'm ready to start making jam. I should be outside working in the garden, but surely one of the greatest joys of having one's own garden is the time spent in the kitchen getting to know the harvest - and I still have a lot to get to know about rhubarb. I don't yet grow rhubarb in my own patch, but it is readily available at local farmer's markets and some grocery stores for a few weeks in the spring.

Since the first signs of spring I'd been dreaming of making a rhubarb jam. I'd imagined a blushing pink hue and pleasant tart-sweet flavor, maybe flecked with tiny vanilla seeds (as a friend cleverly suggested), or perhaps bits of chopped figs. I'd never tried rhubarb in jam form, but there was just something quite appealing to me in the idea.

In flipping through some inspirational books, I came across the recipe for Rhubarb Grapefruit Preserves in the Chez Panisse Fruit book. The simplicity of the recipes in the Chez Panisse books always wins me over, though I couldn't resist the addition of dried figs which I found sweetened the jam just a touch and seemed to blend rather nicely with the intensely fragrant grapefruit.

Here is my adaptation of the recipe:
Rhubarb, Fig & Grapefruit Jam
(adapted from the Alice Waters' recipe for 'Rhubarb Grapefruit Preserves' in the Chez Panisse Fruit cookbook)

yields approximately 3 1/2 pints of jam

Ingredients:

2 Lbs. rhubarb stalks, cut into 1/2 inch chunks
2 grapefruit, peeled and juiced, pith removed and the rind chopped very fine
4 cups sugar
8 oz. dried Black Mission Figs (or other dried figs of your choosing), chopped - stems removed

Method:

Place a plate or two in the freezer for testing the jam later.

Prepare canning jars and lids.

In a large stockpot with a lid, combing the chopped rhubarb, grapefruit rind, grapefruit juice (strained), and sugar. Cover and let sit overnight.

Bring the rhubarb mixture to a boil, uncovered, over high heat. Continue to cook, skimming off any foam rising to the surface, until the jam is thickened and reaches the 'gel stage' when placed on a cold plate. (This took me roughly 15 -20 minutes)
When the jam has reached the gel stage, turn the heat off, and begin ladling the hot jam into the hot, sterilized jars, being sure to leave 1/4 inch head space. Wipe the rims clean with a clean, damp towel, place the lids on and screw down the bands just until finger-tight. Process in a water bath canner with the lid on for 10 minutes. Remove the lid and process for 5 minutes more. Remove the jars from the canner and test the seals. Any jars that do not seal may be placed in the refrigerator and will be good for several weeks.

bliss!

Really, what can I say?

I'm still tickled.

Over these:

I really don't even have words to describe my enthusiasm. I'd like to just type paragraphs of exclamation points. Is that over the top? I don't care! Can you believe I came away from the market with this treasure of just-foraged morels?!?! This is the first time I can ever remember seeing wild mushrooms at a local farmer's market, and curiously I had just recently discussed this lack of fungi with a few sympathizers. Happy to be proven wrong. Thank you foragers!
Seems a bit cruel to cut up such glorious haul, but trust me. Or rather, trust Alice. This salad is divine. Coupled with a handful of herb-roasted new potatoes and a cool glass of wine - bliss. Roasted Wild Mushroom Salad with Parmesan

from Alice Water's Chez Panisse Vegetables