Whoop whoop!

We were honored with a grant from the Vermont Working Lands Enterprise Fund yesterday!

Read the press release here.

There were a lot of photos happening...but I can't find any. More on that later hopefully.

Thank you Vermont. We plan to use this grant money to streamline packaging of Joe's Soups products and get some help with design. The idea is to sell more soup, which will mean purchasing more local agricultural products and creating more Vermont jobs. Yay!

Summer CSA: What and Where

Joe has been planning and networking with other farmers and food producers to put together an exciting mix of vegetables, meats, cheeses, fruits, and prepared foods for the Summer CSA. It will run from June 6 to Sept 19. That’s 16 weeks, with CSA pickup every week. Our goal for the summer CSA is to provide a diverse mix of the very best vegetables (and some fruits) from a bunch of local growers, including a few who are just getting started.

Each week, you’ll get the produce that is at the height of its growing season—the freshest of the fresh. And we‘re partnering with even more producers to spread our members’ local purchasing dollars far and wide among VT growers. Plus Joe will be making some great seasonal products like Gazpacho, Summer Salsa, Pesto, and BBQ sauce.

CSA pickup is Thursdays at these sites (so far)

• National Life (State of Vermont and National Life employees)
• Blue Cross Blue Shield (employees only)
• Central Vermont Medical Center (employees only)
• Downtown Montpelier: Montpelier Integrative Family Health Center at the round-about
• VT College of Fine Arts
• Calais: near Maple Corner
• Agency of Agriculture: 116 State St, Montpelier, VT (State of Vermont employees only)
• McFarland Building: 5 Perry Street, Barre VT (State of Vermont employees only)

Find out more or sign up now

Read more about the CSA or if you’re ready to join, sign up now.

Spring Chicken Share (#10) Tomorrow—Last one for the Winter

It’s kinda cool that we still have a little snow on the ground as we send out the last share of the winter. Here are a couple of reminders that Spring in Vermont has its own snowy (and muddy) charm.

Here’s what you’ll find in your share boxes:

Local Products

Roast Tomato Sauce from Joe’s Soups (Vegan and gluten-free, Ingredients: Tomato, Garlic, Olive Oil, Salt, Pepper)

*Chicken breast from Misty Knoll Farm

*Bread from Red Hen Baking Company

*Eggs from Gaylord Farm

Local Produce

Fresh spinach from Screamin' Ridge Farm

Salad Mix from Screamin' Ridge Farm

Frozen blueberries from Knoll Farm

Onions from Blackwell Roots Farm

Shallots from Blackwell Roots Farm

Carrots from Kingsbury Market Garden

Corolla potatoes from Blackwell Roots Farm

Sweet potatoes from Burnt Rock Farm

Substitutions

Chicken—Unseasoned Tempeh from Rhapsody Natural Foods or Tofu from Vermont Soy

Bread—Maple Vinaigrette from Joe's Soups

Eggs—Frozen Spinach or Fresh Spinach

Recipes and Ideas

Blueberries

Once again you have some tasty frozen blueberries from Knoll farm. We posted a few ideas for how to enjoy frozen blueberries a couple of posts ago. In case there was an idea there that you weren’t able to try last time we offered them, here is the link to that post.

Joe just read an article that said that frozen, fresh, or dried blueberries all have the same amount of anti-oxidants.

Roasted Tomato Spread

Enjoy this strong savory spread as is spread onto slices of Red Hen Bread (toasted or not). It would also be great slathered on the Misty Knoll Chicken breasts as they come out of the oven.

Roast Chicken Breast

We are thrilled to offer Misty Knoll Farm chicken breasts in this final share. There may not be 4 separate pieces, but there is enough chicken for four approximately 8 oz. servings. Should be enough for dinner with the possibility of leftovers for lunch (yum).

These chicken breasts are great braised then baked; here’s how you do it.

Preheat the oven to 350.

Slice some shallots and some onions (or just one or the other) and set aside.

Heat an oven-proof skillet with some oil until it’s smoking. Place the chicken, skin-side down in the pan and cook until golden to medium brown. Turn off the heat and pull the chicken breasts.

Place the sliced onions/shallots in the pan and place the chicken breasts on top. Salt and pepper liberally and bake for about 20 min or until the chicken reaches an internal temperature of 165.

You may want to spread some of Joe’s Roast Tomato Spread liberally on top of the meat right when you pull it out of the oven.

An alternative is to braise and bake the chicken without the onion/shallots, and instead, serve it with spinach sauteed with shallots.

Sauteed Spinach with Shallots

This is pretty basic, just slice some shallot nice and thin. Heat a pan with olive oil, then add the shallots and cook until they just begin to turn golden. Add the spinach and stir quickly. It will cook down in just 2-3 minutes. Season with salt and pepper. This is a nice alternative to cooking spinach with garlic.

Corolla potatoes

The Corolla potatoes you have in this share are an old heirloom with great flavor (much better than a Yukon gold). Peel and cut them to the size of a quarter, then simply roast them with a bit of olive oil and salt and pepper in a 375 degree oven. It helps to start them up on the stove top to get some color. Another great side with the chicken breast.

 Sweet Potatoes

Sweet potatoes are great sliced into thick slabs and cooked on the grill—brush them with just enough oil to make a sprinkling of salt stick.

I also like to dice them up very small and then sautee them with olive oil and just a touch of honey and lemon. Salt and pepper too. Very tasty and different.

Carrots

Here is a great recipe that you can feel free to tailor to the contents of your refrigerator (or CSA share box).

Mexican Share (#9), Thursday March 14

The second to last share of the season includes sauce, beans, and some vegetables for preparing Mexican food, plus some late winter vegetables, and the first salad of the Spring season.

Here are the CSA share contents (substitution options for items with asterisks):

Local Products

Refried Beans from Joe’s Soups

Enchilada Sauce from Joe’s Soups

*Cheese from Willow Moon Farm

*Eggs from Gaylord Farm

Local Produce

Onions from Blackwell Roots Farm

Shallots from Blackwell Roots Farm

Carrots from Kingsbury Market Garden

Fresh spinach/salad from Screamin' Ridge Farm

Empire Apples from Champlain Orchards

Marfax beans from Vermont Bean Crafters

Elba Potato from Blackwell Roots Farm

Substitutions

Eggs—Teryaki Tempeh from Rhapsody Natural Foods or Tofu from Vermont Soy

Cheese—Eggplant Spread from Joe's Soups or fresh salad mix from Screamin Ridge Farm

Recipe Ideas and Descriptions

Enchilada Sauce

The Enchilada Sauce in your box is a little bit different than the canned enchilada sauce you can find in the Mexican isle at Shaw’s. Traditional enchilada sauce is pretty much like gravy made with chili powder rather than flour. Joe made this enchilada sauce with a healthy serving of chili powder, but also with a lot of tomatillos that he grew last summer. Seasonings are jalapenos, anaheim chilis, garlic, and onions. The result is that this sauce has a bunch of different flavors in it; it’s a little more tart than traditional enchilada sauce—the better to go with rich fillings and extra sour cream on top. Here are instructions for making enchiladas.

[photo from Champlain Orchard website]

Apples

The apples in this share and the cider in the last share are from Champlain Orchards. Their slogan is “Vermont fruit grown with a conscience”. They have a nice recipe book that can be downloaded from their website; here is a link. We usually just eat apples as a snack or make applesauce with them (our 16-year old loves applesauce made from empire or macintosh apples)

Apple Sauce

Peel and core the apples, then cut each apple into 6-8 pieces. Put the apples in a heavy bottom pan with about ¼ cup apple cider (or water). Add a few drops of lemon juice if desired to keep the sauce from browning. Simmer on low heat while stirring occasionally for 15–30 min.

If you like smooth applesauce, run it through a food mill or use a potato masher to crush the apples. We usually keep our sauce on the chunky side. You really don’t need sweetener because the apples are so sweet, but you can put a little maple syrup, sugar, or honey if you want your applesauce sweeter. Season with a tiny bit of cinnamon and a small pat of butter. This will store in the refrigerator for at least a week.

Marfax beans

Joe found an interesting blog post that describes a little bit about the history of marfax beans. Apparently they are perfect for classic New England baked beans. But we prefer to prepare them simply and serve with rice and a green vegetable. Here’s how we prepare them:

Soak beans overnight in enough water to thoroughly cover the beans (even after they swell)

Pour off the water, put the beans in a heavy bottom pot, and add fresh water to cover the beans. Cook on high until the beans come to a boil, then reduce the heat to a lively simmer (med to med-low). Add water if needed to keep the beans covered. Cook until the beans are almost as soft as you like them—about 30-45 min. Add salt, pepper, and garlic or sauteed onions to taste (taste both a couple of beans and the cooking liquid to judge the level of seasoning). Stop adding water and stir more frequently as you let the excess liquid boil away. Keep cooking until beans are the softness you prefer (we like them nice and soft).

Shallots

Shallots are basically posh onions. Blackwell Roots Farm had a great shallot season last summer and we have been fortunate to enjoy that bumper crop all winter. Shallots' sweet, delicate taste and crispy texture is really good with other light-tasting foods. Try them sauteed with fried or scrambled eggs, thinly sliced and raw on top of your salad, or cooked into potatoes au gratin in place of onions.

Brunch Share (#8) Thursday, Feb 28

Brunch Share Contents

This CSA share is all about brunch!  There may be no nicer, gentler way of waking up your family than cooking bacon and letting the smell coax them out of bed (to get a piece before it’s all eaten). Here are the CSA share contents (substitution options with asterisks):

Local Products

*Bread (Cyrus Pringle) from Red Hen Baking Co.

*Eggs from Gaylord Farm

*Bacon from Jacob Finsen

*Milk from Sweet Rowan Farm (1/2 gal whole milk)

Maple Syrup from Templeton Farm

Frozen blueberries from Knoll Farm

Roasted Eggplant Spread from Joe’s Soups (Vegan) (Ingredients: Eggplant, Olive Oil, Garlic, Peppers, Onion, Oregano, Parsley, Tomato, Lemon, Salt, Pepper)

Local Vegetables

Spinach from Screamin’ Ridge Farm

Elba Potatoes from Blackwell Roots Farm

Onions from Blackwell Roots Farm

Carrots from Kingsbury Market Garden

Substitutions

Instead of bread: Maple Vinaigrette from Joe’s Sauces or Smoked jalapeno hot sauce from Joe’s Sauces

Replace eggs with Merlot beans (an heirloom variety) from Vermont Bean Crafters

Instead of bacon, you can choose Tofu from Vermont Soy

Replace milk with fresh spinach from Screamin’ Ridge Farm

Recipes

The Blueberry Muffin and Pancake recipes are adapted from The King Arthur Flour, Bakers Companion. This cookbook is fantastic. We use it all the time and pretty much every recipe is a hit. The book is often a little overzealous with the vanilla, but that is our only complaint. You can feel confident that anything you choose to make from this book will turn out delicious.

Blueberry Muffins

(adapted from The King Arthur Flour, Bakers Companion)

• 4 oz. butter (1 stick)
• 1 cup (7 oz.) sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 eggs
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 cups (8.5 oz.) flour
• 1/2 cup (4 oz.) milk
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2.5 cups frozen blueberries (partially or thoroughly thawed)
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon sugar

Preheat oven to 375. Line cupcake tin with papers or a light coating of butter or oil.

Cream butter, sugar and salt together with a mixer until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs one at a time. Beat in the baking powder. Beat in half the flour, then half the milk, and repeat until all of both is added. If desired, mash ½ cup of blueberries and mix into the batter to give a blue tint. Finally stir in the remaining blueberries and the vanilla.

Pour into muffin tins and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar. Bake 30 minutes or until done. Remove from the oven and let sit for 5 min before removing muffins form the tin.

Pancakes (with or without blueberries)

(adapted from The King Arthur Flour, Bakers Companion) 

• 2 eggs
• 1.25 cup (10 oz.) milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 3 tablespoons (1.5 oz.) melted butter
• 1.5 cups (6.25 oz.) flour
• ¾ teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 tablespoons sugar
• Optional: blueberries (partially or thoroughly thawed)

Whisk the dry ingredients together and set aside. Beat the eggs, milk, and vanilla until light and foamy. We use our immersion blender for this; it takes about a minute, but you could also use a whisk or the whisk attachment of your mixer for 2-3 minutes. Stir the melted butter into the wet ingredients. Next, add the dry ingredients and stir quickly—don’t overmix. Let the batter rest for a few minutes while you turn on the pan or griddle to medium or medium low.

Make sure your pan or griddle is fully preheated, add some vegetable oil, and pour ¼ to ½ cup of batter per pancake into/onto the pan or griddle. Immediately throw some blueberries into the uncooked pancake batter to make blueberry pancakes. Use just a half dozen or really load them up with blueberries.

Resist the urge to peek and see if pancakes are done. Instead wait until there are bubbles all through the pancake, then flip and cook the other side. I think it's a good idea to start with one pancake and adjust the heat up or down based on how the first pancake cooks.

French Toast

Red Hen Baking Company’s Cyrus Pringle bread makes great French Toast. It’s slight sourdough-ness gives it robust flavor and nice texture.

The evening before you want to have French toast, whisk together 2 eggs and 1.5 cups of milk. Add a tablespoon or two of maple syrup or brown sugar, and about a half teaspoon of cinnamon. You can also add ¼ teaspoon vanilla extract. Whisk again until you have a smooth mixture, then pour the mixture over 4-6 slices of bread in a casserole dish. Flip the bread over and get all the slices pretty thoroughly soaked. Cover and leave in the refrigerator overnight.

In the morning, heat a pan or griddle to medium or medium low. When fully preheated, add some butter or vegetable oil and place the bread slices from the bottom of your casserole dish on to cook first (the ones that were sitting in liquid). Cook until nice and golden brown on both sides. Let the remaining bread slices soak in the leftover liquid while the first batch is cooking.

Serve with blueberries and maple syrup.

Hash Browns

Time to get out the cheese grater. Wash the potatoes really well. Leave the skins on and grate the potatoes on the large holes of the grater into a bowl or colander. Squeeze the excess liquid out. Then (in a bowl) mix the shredded potato with some salt, pepper, and one egg.  Heat a non stick pan or cast iron skillet with a bit of olive oil on medium-low. When hot, pack the potato mix into the pan as one big hash brown or make several small ones. Let brown slowly on one side then flip and continue. These can also be done on a cookie sheet in the oven at 375. Keeping an eye on them and flipping them occasionally.

Poached eggs (the master class)

I love these, and although they are a little intimidating, it is actually pretty easy to make poached eggs.  You need a pot that is big enough to let you maneuver a slotted spoon and a few eggs in the pan. Put 2-3 inches of water in the pan and add 2 tablespoons of white vinegar. The vinegar helps the eggs set. Turn on the heat and let the water come to a gentle boil. Then crack the eggs right into the water. The boiling action (bubbles) should cause the egg white to envelope the yolk. Have a timer hand and let them poach for 3 minutes. Longer or shorter depending on how runny you like them.  Just scoop them out onto some sautéed spinach or a buttered English muffin or toast.  A touch of salt and pepper.

Ideas for some of the other share contents

Spinach: Make a spinach bacon salad with sliced hard-boiled eggs.

Tofu: We always like to squeeze some of the water out of the tofu for about an hour before cooking it. To do this, cut in half so that instead of one thick block, you two thinner sheets of tofu. Lay the pieces inside a folded kitchen towel (fold the towel to have as many layers as possible. Put a weight on top—we usually use a cast iron pan. After squeezing the water out, soak the tofu in your favorite marinade. Our go-to marinade is tamari diluted about 1:1 with water, grated ginger, and chopped garlic. The squeezed tofu will absorb a lot more marinade than unsqueezed tofu.

Eggplant Spread: This spread is made from our own eggplants harvested last August. We had an abundance of them so we roasted some with olive oil and garlic, and froze the puree. To make this spread, we added lemon and our own frozen oven-roasted tomatoes to make a really tasty spread. Great on toasted Cyrus Pringle bread slices.