This is pretty straight forward and is all about the farm fresh shallots I got in my last shipment, some quality pork belly, and some excellent blue mexican shrimp. For good measure I made some very, very simple farm carrots and asparagus.

Carrot-Kaboucha Crostini
4 large, fresh spring carrots
1/2 kaboucha squash (1-1.5lb), roasted with olive oil at 350 until soft
sesame seeds (or toasted sesame & salt mixture)
2 T butter
salt & pepper
macadamia oil
water

You will need a food processor. Cut roughly your carrots and sautee with salt & pepper in 1T butter until soft and bright. Place into food processor. Add 1/2 C water and then 1/4 C water at a time as needed, and puree. Add 1-3 T macadamia oil to taste. Add 1 T sesame seed to taste. Blend and puree. Add liquid as needed keeping it as minimal as possible while achieving the smoothness. When smooth, add the kaboucha squash, and puree, adding water as needed. Adjust seasoning, add 1 T butter and puree, and you’re done.

Beet Greens & Red Onion Crostini
Optional: Add sheeps milk in a shaved slice on top, over the warm mixture.
Greens and Stems from 2-3 fresh red beets, cleaned and seperated
1 T butter
1 large red onion
2 T fresh parsley, minced
salt & pepper

In a non stick pan, sautee finely chopped beet stems until softened. Add thinly chopped red onion and sautee until soft. Add medium to fine chopped beet greens and cook until wilted and bright. Take off heat and add parsley. Serve with sheetps milk cheese (like pecorino) on top if you like.

Artichoke & Bacon Crostini
4 small to medium artichokes
1/4-1/3 lb thick cut bacon (thick is important in this one)
1/3 C sour cream
3 T grated Parmesan or other grating cheese

I used previously grilled artichokes for this, but you can use fresh ones. If you are using fresh ones, clean & trim the artichokes, and steam/simmer until tender. Remove the hearts and chop coursely but smaller than bite size.

My artichokes were not fully cooked (hence why they survived the aftermath of the grill–I didn’t blanch them long enough before), so I removed the hearts, chopped them, and added them to a sautee pan with some water and steamed them for a bit.

Add your artichokes to a pan and turn the heat to medium high. Add a touch of water and let it evaporate after a while. Add pepper. When water is evaporated, add bacon (cut it into small strips first). The thickness of the bacon is important in order to contrast with the artichoke size. Fry the artichokes with the bacon until all is colored and bacon is crispy. Remove with tons and place on paper towels and allow to drain a bit.

Finely grate the cheese and mix it with the sour cream. Slowly incorporate the artichokes and bacon (after draining). It should be thoroughly coated without an excess of sour cream.

Quinoa
1 C quinoa
1 1/4 C water

Wash quinoa with fine mesh strainer, then combine water and quinoa in a pan. Bring to boil, reduce to light simmer and add lid, cooking about 15 minutes until fluffy but not sticky.

Asian Flank Steak (“Bulgogi light”)
1.5 lb flank steak
olive oil
soy sauce
whiskey or other spirit (tawny port, brandy, etc)
6-10 garlic cloves
crushed red pepper
salt & pepper

Combine enough of the above ingredients to cover the flank steak. Marinade at least 30 minutes, and up to 1.5 days. Toss it onto the grill and cook until medium, medium well. Cut counter-grain.

Ginger Sesame Bok Choy & Mushrooms
3-4 heads baby bok choy
1 C mushrooms
1 tsp ginger powder (to taste)
salt & pepper
toasted sesame-salt mixture
butter

In 1 T butter, heated and water gone, sautee sliced mushrooms until colored. Add ground sesame mixture generously, then additional pepper and touch of salt. Add ginger powder sprinkling as to not clump. Add bok choy stems, sliced moderate thinly. Cook until softened, add green part of bok choy. Cook until brightened, serve.

Serves 3-4

We had it with a cheap Cote du Rhone.

In the tradition of what American’s mispercieve as French souffle, this baked pancake could also be called domestically “souffle” though internationally I’d argue it’s not.

I received a set of Penzey’s spices from my mother some time ago and have been slowly making my way through the spices. Since that time, they’ve sent me catalogs, which I am mostly uninterested in and ought to call and have myself removed as I do with everything else–but back to the point, this one had a recipe that looked good.

As an aside, they carry much the same quality and even often from the same suppliers as The Spice House in Chicago, and in fact, the families behind each are closely related (brothers) and it’s some sort of feud that causes them to have seperate and competing businesses. I’d recommend either for a variety of reasons, for online ordering.

Back to the point: There was an eye catching recipe for an apple pancake using their “cinnamon sugar” mixture (it’s the lazy man’s mixtures that turn me off from Penzey’s as a serious cook), and I do have a ton of apples left from my Farm Fresh to You shipment, so I figured hey, why not?

I used half the recipe but the full amount of milk, and made a few adjustments such as making my own cinnamon heavy “cinnamon sugar”, using more vanilla extract than required, and per usual using organic free range blah blah everything. It does taste better to do so, though, most of the time if not for anything else but the care and quality put into it vs mass produce. Half the recipe served 2 of us with nothing else for breakfast, I think this would be a great brunch dish to have a small slice of.

I baked it in a springform pan as we all know about my limited space and I haven’t room to stock both a pie pan and a springform.

Instead of syrup as the recipe suggests, I’d top it with powdered sugar.

Adapting a recipe from Orangette, I wanted to use up a few things from last week’s produce shipment in a soup and created this broccoli soup.

1 lb broccoli
1 qt stock (I use low sodium chicken stock in the paper containers, ideally would make it myself)
1/2 preserved lemon (can sub fresh lemon, check Orangette’s recipe)
1 red onion
sour cream
garlic
Parmesan & Parmesan rind
butter
olive oil
salt & pepper

Wash & chop coursley your broccoli. Meanwhile, heat in a soup pot 1T butter and 1T olive oil. Dice your red onion roughly. Add the red onion to the medium heated oil.

When translucent but not caramelized, add the garlic (5 cloves roughly), cooking for 2 minutes. Add the broccoli, parmesan rind, and the stock.  Bring to heavy simmer, reduce to light simmer, partially cover.

Clean & chop your chives, and finely mince additional garlic (2-4 cloves). Mix sour cream with chives, garlic, and several T of finely grated parmesan, with a twist of salt & pepper. Mince finely some preserved lemon (I made preserved meyer lemons in salt & lemon juice very simply this past fall, and this was the first time I had the delight of using them). Use a generous amount but check the taste as you add.

When broccoli is cooked through but not gray, use a blender or food processor to puree the soup in batches not overloading the device. Mix in roughly half the sour cream mixture, and serve with a bit on top.

We needed a side dish so I sliced and blanched fingerlings & peruvian potatoes, adding fresh carrot chunks towards the end, then tossed them in Chaat Masala spice mixture (dried mango, etc) with some salt & pepper, olive oil, lemon juice. They went under the broiler until they had a light crust.

Last weekend I went to visit my favorite fishmonger and life enthusiast Joey at JP Seafood. He sent me home with some gorgeous grouper filet and a beautiful cut of hamachi (yellowfin, sushi grade).

I am no sushi chef so I threw them both on the grill with very little fuss and cut up some lemons. The grouper was flavorful and buttery, the hamachi was butter soft and deserved a nice salad with a miso dressing or a glaze which I didn’t manage to put together.

I cut the artichokes I received in my produce shipment a week or two before, blanched them well in boiling water, sliced them in half and threw them on the grill too. I made some skewers of red onion (also from the shipment) and red bell pepper as well as some mushrooms and we made a feast, celebrating the return of grill season.

1 pork tenderloin
herbs de provence
olive oil
coarse sea salt
cracked pepper
1/4 C whiskey, brandy, or other liquor
1 bunch collard greens
deli/rustic mustard
dry mustard powder
cider vinegar
macadamia or olive oil
1/4 C walnuts
home made apple sauce or chunky store bought

Heat oven to 350. After trimming,coat tenderloin in olive oil, sea salt, pepper, and generous herbs de provence. Roast for 20-30 minutes or until firmed but not unresponsive to a squeeze with tongs. Add the liquor and put back in oven 5 more minutes.

While pork is roasting, in a large pan heat 2 T macadamia oil (olive oil if you must) to medium/medium low heat. Add to it 2-3 T mustard, plus 1-2 tsp mustard powder, salt, pepper, and 1-2 T cider vinegar.  Blend it together with a spoon or whisk, then add trimmed, cut, clean collards. Cook until tender, 15 minutes, reducing heat at end so as not to brown them. Add walnuts shortly before serving.

Serve on top of heated home made apple sauce (store bought if you must), in thin slices, with the collards.

Wine: A spicy red such as a tempranillo or other spanish or sicilian red would be great.

1 head baby fennel (or half regular), with fronds
1 piece fresh halibut, .5-.75 lb
mixed salad greens
juice of 1/2 lemon
olive oil + macadamia oil if possible
vanilla salt & pepper
raw pistachios
1/2 roasted red beet

Heat oven to 350. Clean the fennel and cut off the fronds, placing the fronds on a parchment lined baking sheet in a pile. Add your fish skin down onto the fronds and top with 1 tsp olive oil, vanilla salt, and pepper.  NOTE: you may make your own vanilla salt by mixing sea salt with the core of 1-2 vanilla beans in a clean spice jar. The salt should be saturated, so you may  minimize the amount of salt you make at once. Leave the cleaned out beans in the jar with the salt, it will create a stronger aroma over time.

Place the fish in the oven, you’ll be baking it 15-20 minutes depending on thickness. Should be opaque white and not jiggly when touched but the meat should not seperate when it’s done. Slice your fennel thinly from bottom to top, after removing the stiff core. Heat 1 tbsp olive oil in a nonstick pan on medium low heat; when heated, add the fennel, pepper, and vanilla salt. Toss occasionally until parts are golden and all is soft, about 15-20 minutes.

Meanwhile, make salad dressing by combining 1/2 juice of lemon (or just scant), and 1/2 as much olive oil as there is lemon juice. Add a dash of macadamia oil or use it exclusively if you like. Add regular salt & pepper, and emulsify with a whisk.  Add your washed and drained salad greens, tossing. Add pistachios to taste and your 1/2 roasted beet in cubes (I had one leftover, you may omit it, probably not worth making on its own).