beeft stew

Lots of beets and lots of stew meat means getting as close to borscht as we can. This can take a long time to make so it's a perfect weekend afternoon stew.

3 lbs of chuck eye steak
2 large vidalia onions
1 tsp sugar
6 beets
3 cups beef stock

1 sprig of thyme

salt and pepper
butter
oil

Slice onions, cut beets into small pieces and cut meat into 1 inch pieces.

In a dutch oven, heat the oil until hot. Working in batches, brown the meat on all sides. Transfer the browned meat to a plate and repeat until all the meat is browned.

Add the butter and onions to the dutch oven and stir occasionally until the onions start to soften, 5-10 minutes. Reduce the heat to medium and sprinkle in the sugar. Continue to cook, stirring occasionally, until golden brown, about 10 minutes. Add the beets and cook until they begin to release their juices, 10 minutes. Stir in the broth and bring to a boil.

Add the meat and the accumulated juices on the plate, and the thyme, to the dutch oven and bring back up to a boil, then reduce the heat to low, cover, and simmer for 1 1/2 to 2 hours.

the best pork roast ever

This is similar to a pork chop and sauce recipe we love that transfers extremely well to a pork roast. The fat cap on top creates a crust that tastes just like pork belly and the thickness of the pork roast means this is the juiciest pork you've ever had.

2 lb pork loin roast with a fat cap
3 3/4 teaspoons french sea salt
3 teaspoons coriander
2 1/4 teaspoons mustard seeds
1 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons olive oil

Pre-heat oven to 500 degrees with roasting pan inside. Crush coriander, mustard seeds, salt and pepper in a mortar and pestle. Rub all of the spice mixture all over the pork loin including the ends and coat with olive oil.

Add the pork loin to the roasting pan fat side up and cook, undisturbed, for 15 minutes at 500 degrees and then turn the oven down to 350 degrees and cook for 45 minutes.

Remove from the oven and let it rest for 10 minutes. Slice to serve.

umami chard

We saw this recipe on Man Fire Food but couldn't find it anywhere online so we made up the proportions. It is so good - a combination of flavors we would never think to put together. I imagine these flavors would be good with collard greens, spinach, or anything green and leafy.

2-3 slices of bacon
1 onion
1 shallot
1 garlic clove
honey
red wine vinegar
red pepper flakes
chard

Chop the slices of bacon into small pieces. Roughly chop the onion, shallot and garlic. In a cast iron pan, fry the bacon until the fat has rendered. Add the onion, shallot and garlic and fry until softened and fragrant. Pour in the honey and red wine vinegar and add the red pepper flakes. Stir to combine. Add the chard and stir until chard is covered with sauce. Cover the pan and cook for 8 minutes.

it's nota frittata – no egg veggie casserole

With all the farm share veggies we get frittatas are a good way of stuffing a lot of different vegetables into a single, easy-to-make dish. But wow do I get sick of eggs fast. This dish helps clear out the veggies without the need for eggs and the flavors come together in a surprisingly delicious way.

I have updated the amounts of each of the ingredients used from the original recipe to reflect the sizes and amount of veggies we get in our CSA.

2 tablespoons butter
2 small to medium onions, chopped
Olive oil cooking spray
4-5 small farm potatoes (color/type doesn't matter), sliced
2 cups of zucchini, sliced
3-4 medium to large tomatoes, sliced and halved
1 1/2 teaspoons kosher salt
3/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
2-3 tablespoons butter, melted
1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Preheat oven to 400°. Melt 2 Tbsp. butter in a medium skillet over medium heat; add onions, and sauté 10 to 12 minutes or until tender and onions begin to caramelize.

Spoon onions into a 10-inch dish coated with cooking spray. Toss together potatoes, zucchini, salt and pepper. Salt and pepper tomato slices separately so they don't break up. Layer potatoes, zucchini, and tomatoes over onions, alternating and overlapping slightly. Drizzle with 2-4 Tbsp. melted butter. Cover with aluminum foil.

Bake at 400° for 30 minutes. Remove foil, and sprinkle with cheese. Bake 30 minutes or until golden brown. Let stand 10 minutes before serving.

fig & honey heaven

It's fig season and I couldn't be happier! Usually we just roast them in the oven with some honey but the below recipe is an even better version of that.

Fresh figs
1-2 tablespoons of butter
2-3 tablespoons of honey
fresh whipped cream

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Wash and trim both ends of the figs. Put the figs, cut side up, in a baking dish. Melt the butter in a bowl in the microwave, add the honey and heat another 30 seconds. Whisk to combine. Drizzle the hot honey butter over the figs and roast in oven until very soft, 15 minutes.

Add the cooked figs to a bowl, top with whipped cream and drizzle with the honey butter sauce from the bottom of the baking dish.

Adapted from Food Network

making greens meaty

A spring CSA means loads of greens. So far this season we've had mustard greens, turnip greens, beet greens, tokyo bekana (a mild mustard green), arugula, swiss chard, kohlrabi greens and so much lettuce. We've tried a number of different preparations and have actually gotten through just about everything, but a favorite so far has been a quick stir fry.

We had both tokyo bekana and chard and a little bit of cottage bacon. We fried up the cottage bacon pieces in a cast iron pan until browned, added the greens with the stems removed from the chard. When the greens were just about done we added a splash of 18-year balsamic vinegar and then cooked everything for another minute or two. A bit of salt and pepper to taste and you're done.

red beans and rice take two

We enjoy Roger Mooking's Man, Fire, Food quite a bit and recently caught an episode that included red beans and rice and tons of smoked meat. The version of that recipe we tried, while similar to mine, threw in enough new ingredients, and turned out well enough, that I wanted to write down what I did before I forget.

1 package pork belly (we get it from Trader Joe's)
1 link linguica
1 package andouille sausage (we love North Country's)
1 onion
2-3 garlic cloves
12 ounces of water
2 16 ounce cans of dark red kidney beans
cajun seasoning
Worcestershire sauce
Crystal's hot sauce
Cooked rice

Cut up all three meats into bite sized pieces (we did smallish chunks for the pork belly, cubes for the linguica and rounds for the andouille). Place the pork belly in a Dutch oven and heat on high until the pork belly gets crusty and brown. Add the other meats, onion and garlic and cook until onions become translucent. Add the water and kidney beans and stir. Add cajun seasoning to taste, as well as 2 to 3 glugs each of Worcestershire sauce and Crystal's hot sauce. Heat at medium high until the liquid has thickened and reduced, or until the rice is ready.

We also steamed some spinach and vitaminna with just salt and pepper and it complemented the heaviness of the dish nicely.

Adapted from Cooking Channel

chicken corn chowda

This was an incredibly easy and delicious chowder - most of the work goes into chopping everything, but once that's done it all comes together very quickly. Good for a hearty weeknight meal.

2 cups half and half
2 cups fresh or frozen corn kernels
2 tablespoons butter
2 lbs skinless, boneless chicken thighs
1/4 cup chopped onion
1/4 cup chopped celery
1 jalapeño pepper, seeded and minced
2 tablespoons corn starch
3 cups milk
1 1/2 cups fresh or frozen corn kernels (about 3 ears)
1 teaspoon chopped fresh or 1/4 teaspoon dried thyme
1/4 teaspoon ground red pepper
1/8 teaspoon salt

Combine the half and half with the first 2 cups of corn in a saucepan. Heat over medium heat, but watch to make sure it doesn't boil over. Stir regularly and cook for approx. 15 minutes until the half and half is infused with corn flavor.

Cut the chicken thighs into bite sized pieces. Season with salt and pepper. Melt the butter in a large Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the chicken and brown until cooked through. Remove the chicken to a separate dish.

Add onion, celery, and jalapeño to the Dutch oven; cook for 3 minutes or until tender, stirring frequently. Add corn starch; cook 1 minute, stirring constantly. Stir in milk, chicken, the half and half and corn mixture and remaining ingredients. Bring to a boil; cook until thick (about 5 minutes).

Adapted from Cooking Light

non-caramel caramel pork

We stumbled across this caramel pork recipe when looking recipes using fish sauce and while it doesn't really smell very good the flavor was outstanding. The original recipe called for raw cabbage but we found the slightly wilted flavor much more appealing.

2 tablespoons dark sesame oil
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 pounds ground pork
1 cup chopped onion
1 tablespoon minced peeled fresh ginger
5 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
2 cup unsalted chicken stock
6 tablespoons brown sugar
2 tablespoon fish sauce
2 tablespoon soy sauce
4 teaspoons cornstarch
4 teaspoons rice vinegar
1 teaspoon crushed red pepper
sushi rice
3 cup thinly sliced napa (Chinese) cabbage
1/4 cup chopped unsalted roasted peanuts
1/4 cup cilantro leaves
4 lime wedges

Heat large skillet over high heat. Add 1 tablespoon sesame oil to pan; swirl to coat. Add ground pork; stir-fry 6 minutes, until cooked through. Remove pork from pan. Add onion, ginger, and garlic to pan; stir-fry 4 minutes. Combine stock and next 6 ingredients (through red pepper) in a bowl, stirring with a whisk. Add stock mixture to pan; bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer 4 minutes or until sauce is thick and bubbly. Return pork to pan; cook 1 minute, stirring to coat.

In a separate skillet heat second tablespoon of sesame oil and olive oil. Add cabbage and salt and pepper to taste. Cook until wilted and just beginning to brown.

Spoon 1/2 cup rice onto each of 4 plates; top each serving with 3/4 cup pork mixture and 1/4 cup cabbage. Sprinkle each serving with 1 tablespoon peanuts and 1 tablespoon cilantro. Serve with lime wedges.

Adapted from Cooking Light

lettuce mix

We eat salad at least once a week, and now that our spring farm share has started off with delicious lettuce mix it just makes us want to eat even more salads.

A few options for when we're forgetful:

Steak and Blueberry Salad

steak seasoned with salt and pepper only
blueberries
goat cheese
lettuce mix

For the dressing we used black cherry balsamic, olive oil and salt and pepper. We used Denver cut steak and it was amazing.

Pulled Pork Salad

leftover bbq pulled pork
tomatoes
orange
lettuce
goat cheese

For the dressing we used cara cara vanilla balsamic, olive oil and salt and pepper.

Pork Chop Salad

Pork Belly and Roasted Root Veggie Salad
For this you can throw in any root veggies you have. We did it with:
baby carrots
small turnips
kohlrabi
radishes

We roasted all of the veggies in a marinade of honey, olive oil, cara cara vanilla balsamic and pineapple white balsamic, salt and pepper for 45 minutes at 400 and 15 minutes at 415 degrees.

We made a vinaigrette using the pineapple balsamic, coated the lettuce, added the fried pork belly and roasted veggies and a little bit of goat cheese.

restaurant pork sauce

This turned out as well as anything we could get in a restaurant.

1 pork tenderloin
salt
pepper
garlic powder
olive oil
butter
lemon juice
parsley
thyme
sweet white wine

Preheat oven to 425°F. Season pork with salt, pepper and garlic powder and brush with 1 tablespoon olive oil.

Heat 1 tablespoon of butter and 1 tablespoon olive oil in large ovenproof skillet over medium-high heat. Add pork and cook until brown on all sides, turning often, about 5 minutes. Transfer skillet to oven, and roast pork about 15 minutes. Remove skillet from oven and let pork stand 10 minutes. Cut pork crosswise into 1/2-inch-thick slices.

Add 4 tablespoons lemon juice to the hot skillet the pork was cooked in and scrape up browned bits with a spoon while heating over medium high heat. Sprinkle in parsley, thyme, garlic, salt, and pepper. Add 1/4 cup of sweet white wine and reduce until slightly thickened.

Add pork slices back into the pan with the sauce and coat. Serve sliced pork with extra sauce.