Friday, August 31, 2012

Second Call for Recipes for Lehigh Valley Farmers' Market Cookbook: Fall!

If you've just stumbled upon this page, welcome. Thanks for stopping by. You must like good food, such as these roasted brussel sprouts from Salvaterra's Gardens.




But I digress! 

Here's the scoop about the Lehigh Valley Farmers' Market Cookbook. Laini Abraham and I are going to publish a cookbook. I'm the cooking/writing half; she's the designing/publishing half. The recipes will be original and culled from various sources: my own brain, farmers and vendors who know well what to do with their wares; food writers and chefs who shop at the markets and/or collaborate with the markets in cooking demonstrations; and finally—you, the market-shopping public. We want your delicious recipes.

To that end, we're  putting out the SECOND call for recipe submissions for dishes you would typically make from September through Thanksgiving. Now that the Easton Farmers' Market is staying open through the winter, and many other markets in the valley are doing the same, we're going to put a THIRD call out for winter recipes later in the fall. Here's what we're looking for:
   Recipes must be complete, clearly written, and include instructions that can be easily reproduced; make sure amounts are specified, cooking temperatures, number of servings, etc. If you don't know for sure, please try to make an estimated guess.
   Please write a short statement (a few sentences) about the genesis of the recipe: What's the story behind it? When do you make it? How and why do you make it? The stories are as important as the recipes.
   We cannot simply reprint established, published recipes. However, if you have adapted a recipe from somewhere else, please explain to us how you adapted it, why yours is different, and please indicate where it comes from, by providing the name of the book, the cook or chef and/or the URL, depending on the source.
   Please specify the market at which you shop and identify, in your recipe, the vendors you typically use for each item, where applicable. It’s also fine to just say “fresh spinach” or “carrots” if that's all you need, but we also would love recipes that specify particular varieties, such as a Brandywine tomato or dinosaur (lacinato) kale, or Jimmy Nardello red pepper. If the ingredients are more specialized, such as pea shoots or fresh chevre or elephant garlic, you'll want to tell us exactly from which vendor you bought them.
   A minimum of 1/2 of the recipe ingredients should be locally sourced. We don't expect you to be able to locally source pantry staples, beans/grains/pasta, lemons, certain cheeses, and spices (salt and pepper for example), so those won't count in that total. You may of course use something you purchased at a local store and in which case (I'm thinking of Seasons in Bethlehem for oils and vinegars), please tell us. Anything that's a fruit, vegetable, wine, or animal product (even honey!) should be available at a Lehigh Valley Farmers' Market.
   Please think seasonally! Think about what you're trying to do these days with all the remaining peaches, tomatoes, and corn, and how exciting it is to see the cooler weather crops return, such as greens, broccoli, and fall/winter squashes. What do you eat from September through November? Let that guide you.
   Please submit no more than THREE recipes. We need to play fair; it's a big Valley with lots of people. We won't likely publish more than one recipe per individual.
   If your recipe is selected for the book, we will contact you by the end of the market season (Winter 2013). The recipe will be printed with your name along with it and you will receive a copy of the cookbook upon publication.
   Please submit the spring and summer recipes via email to lvfmcookbook@gmail.com no later than October 19, so as to provide ample time for me (and my squadron of testers) to test and photograph those we've selected. The sooner, the better!
You can follow the progress right here on this blog, and also on Facebook and Twitter.
And thank you!

Thursday, August 16, 2012

High Season Testing

We're in high season recipe testing mode here. I've got recipes for the following dishes: egg and veg bread volcano (a.k.a. bread bowl quiche) which I adapted from a conversation I had with Jesse at Primorida Mushroom Farm; a three-cheese quiche from Jo at the Quadrant in downtown Easton; fruit cordials from Sue Newquist; French potato salad; Panzanella (bread salad with tomatoes); Scholl Orchard cobbler (which I think I might call an inside out cobbler); and, my personal favorite for its name alone, Mexylvania Dutch Hot Bacon Dressing Salad, from my food writer friend Lenora Dannelke.

I also have three great looking recipes--one with kale and spicy bison sausage; one with steak and a mint salsa verde; and a black-eyed peas salad with lots of fresh summer veggies.

In the meantime, here's a photo of the Egg and Veg Volcano. I call it a volcano because it oozed egg lava a couple times during baking. It's basically a quiche baked in a bread bowl. It turned out to be a great way to use up both stale-ish bread and veggies at the end of the week, when you want to clean out before your new CSA pick-up.


If you want to get on board and test some of these using produce from any of the farmers' markets here in the Lehigh Valley, please email me at lvfmcookbook at gmail dot com --and happy eating! I'm looking to get these tested by August 31, so there's a bit of time. Thanks!

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

Testing, 1, 2, 3-- Coming Soon!

Ladies and gentlemen, I'm writing to say that I've got a stockpile of recipes here (probably about ten) that I'd love to get rolling and get tested.

I took a brief hiatus after the last round (spring rolls, cole slaw, peach cobbler) because many of my faithful testers have been on vacation. But we're looking at the following, roughly speaking:

Bread bowl quiche, panzanella, three dishes from another cookbook author in the Lehigh Valley that are surefire winners and which include meat from Breakaway Farms, cucumber salad, potato salad....

In the world of baking and fruits, I've got a fruit cordial that needs testing and can take any summer fruit you want, a peach cobbler recipe we need more feedback on (from Scholl Orchard), and a zucchini-carrot bread recipe.

Here's the preliminary look at the peach cobbler, which is unusual, my friend Martha and I agreed, because it's got the peaches on the top and the batter on the bottom. It's old-school, to be sure, and comes from June Scholl via her daughter-in-law Sofia. I'm guessing it goes back even further than that, to June's mom, but I haven't done full reconnaissance on the recipe's genesis yet!


We've got even more to come, as I'm working with many restaurants and chefs and known foodies in the Lehigh Valley to get their recipes for beautiful summer produce. I don't want to spill it until the recipes are in hand--but please stay tuned.

If you would like to test any of these recipes, please email me at lvfmcookbook at gmail dot com. I'm aiming to have a handful together no later than August 8.  I kindly request that you do not share the recipe with anyone because I don't want these circulating before the recipes are tested and finalized, and the book is published. Let's keep it special, shall we? 

And please, enjoy your farmers' markets. They need all the love we can give them. The future of delicious, sustainable food depends up on us. We can do it!

Saturday, July 7, 2012

Farmers' Market Debut

Today was a hot one!

Laini and I sat under the shade of an oak tree in Center Square and did our small part to help celebrate the 260th anniversary of the Easton Farmers' Market.  Megan McBride generously offered us table space so we could promote our project and get people to send us recipes and so forth. We met lots of great people; one woman even wrote a recipe for "Awesome Salsa" right off the top of her head, and her son vouched for its awesomeness.

I was downwind of Scholl Orchards' amazing peaches: they're completely symmetrical, the size of baseballs, and truly picked at the peak of perfection. They look like an agricultural textbook (does this even make sense?) version of what a peach should be. Seriously. When I asked, Sophia Scholl told me they went through 30 bushels in less than two hours. If you have never had them before, I can't endorse them highly enough. Local food is the way to go, but there's something extra sweet and beautiful about local fruit.






The other part of my view? Gorgeous bounty from Blooming Glen Acres, in Bucks County. Check out the heirloom tomatoes--notice how they are displayed in such a way that bruising of the tomatoes is kept to a minimum.

Special thanks to Jeff Gilbert for selecting some beautiful tomatoes for me while I was at the table.




If you're reading this, and you want to submit, check out this earlier post--it highlights all the things we're looking for in a good farm-fresh recipe. What did you enjoy today about the farmers' market celebration? What did you buy, and what are you going to do with it? Inquiring minds wanna know! 


Sunday, June 17, 2012

Not Your Mother's Tuna Salad

I've been telling people how much I a. dislike cold salads with mayo and b. I don't really like tuna that much but c. I really like this salad.  It came as a result of necessity--isn't that how the best things come about?--when it was nearly 90 degrees and John wanted a cold salad to with the sausage from Saylor's and Company we were grilling. It was too late to start a potato salad, so I looked in the fridge. And then I saw the radish dip from Salvaterra's Gardens. And then I thought, couldn't we use this in a tuna salad, instead of mayo?

And I did. I tried a small sample first, of elbow macs and some good quality tuna packed in olive oil, and it was good. Bright with the herbs parsley and dill and with chopped radish and green onion, this dip just screams spring. Chill it in the fridge for a couple of hours and then zest a lemon on top, and toss to combine. My friend Lenora says it begs to be eaten with smoked salmon. Oh wait. Maybe this should be used in a salmon salad. Oh, this is getting interesting......

I'm fairly certain that this one is going to be in the cookbook. But now I'm wondering if it's worth exploring with good canned salmon. What do you think?




Thursday, June 7, 2012

Sour Cherry Love

Who's looking for some cherry love? This is a good contender, I think, for the cookbook. It's adapted from Bon Appetit but it seems like this recipe has gotten a lot of play around the Internets, with quite a few adaptations.

Here's a quick tease. Slices are available for consumption and enjoyment. If you are in the Easton area, please text me. I'll be happy to distribute some tonight, in my kitchen!


Saturday, June 2, 2012

First Round of Testing: Asparagus, Rhubarb and Strawberries

Today is the Strawberry Festival at the Easton Farmers' Market, and it was abuzz with strawberry lemonade, strawberry baklava, strawberry-chicken-goat cheese sandwiches and, of course, strawberry shortcake.

The inaugural batch of recipes is ready for testing, and they are as follows:

  • Rhubarb Soda, courtesy of Apple Ridge Farm, which I've adapted.
  • Spanish Grilled Asparagus, which comes from cookbook author, market enthusiast and Lehigh Valley resident Dave Joachim
  • Strawberry-Rhubarb Pie with a spelt-enhanced crust (from Cranberry Creek Farm's spelt flour), which I've adapted from a couple of places (Michael Ruhlman's Twenty and Smitten Kitchen for crust and filling, respectively)
  • Mushroom-Asparagus Pasta, which is an original creation and involves mushrooms from Primordia Mushroom, a vendor at the Easton Farmers' Market 

If any of these sound appealing, please let me know and I would be happy to send you the recipes for testing along with a feedback form to keep things organized. You can choose one, some or all of them; it's up to you. I would like to get them tested this week; ideally, by next weekend June 9-10. I've already got a few more waiting in the wings to go. Hooray!

Here's some food for thought, in the meantime. It's the strawberry-rhubarb pie, made with half spelt flour, half AP flour.




Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Call for Recipes!


Here's the scoop about the Lehigh Valley Farmers' Market Cookbook. You see, Laini Abraham and I are going to publish a cookbook together! I'm the cooking/writing half; she's the designing/publishing half. The recipes will be original and culled from various sources: my own brain, farmers and vendors who know well what to do with their wares; food writers and chefs who shop at the markets and/or collaborate with the markets in cooking demonstrations; and finally—you, the market-shopping public.

To that end, we're officially putting out the first call for recipe submissions for dishes you would typically make from May through August. We will put a second call out for recipes in the middle of the summer, for recipes that suit the harvest of September-November. I hope we receive more recipes than we can possibly handle; at least that's the ideal situation. Here's what we're looking for:
   Recipes must be complete, clearly written, and include instructions that can be easily reproduced; make sure amounts are specified, cooking temperatures, number of servings, etc.
   Please write a short statement (a few sentences) about the genesis of the recipe: What's the story behind it? When do you make it? How and why do you make it? The stories are as important as the recipes.
   We cannot simply reprint established, published recipes. However, if you have adapted a recipe from somewhere else, please explain to us how you adapted it, why yours is different, and please indicate where it comes from, by providing the name of the book, the cook or chef and/or the URL, depending on the source. This is VERY important.
   Please specify the market at which you shop and identify, in your recipe, the vendors you typically use for each item, where applicable. It’s also fine to just say “fresh spinach” or “carrots” or something of that ilk if that's all you need, but we also would love recipes that specify particular varieties, such as a Brandywine tomato or dinosaur (lacinato) kale, for example. If the ingredients are more specialized, such as pea shoots or fresh chevre, you'll want to tell us exactly from which vendor you bought them.
   A minimum of 1/2 of the recipe ingredients should be locally sourced. We don't expect you to be able to locally source pantry staples, beans/grains/pasta, lemons, certain cheeses, and spices (salt and pepper for example), so those won't count in that total. You may of course use something you purchased at a local store and in which case (I'm thinking of Seasons in Bethlehem for oils and vinegars), please tell us. Anything that's a fruit, vegetable, or animal product (even honey!) should be available at a Lehigh Valley Farmers' Market. We will of course make exceptions for great recipes that highlight a single ingredient but which may require supermarket ingredients.
   Please think seasonally! We don't want recipes that are heavy and/or require extensive use of high heat in the oven. What do you eat from May through August? Let that guide you.
   Please submit no more than THREE recipes per call for recipes. We need to play fair; it's a big Valley with lots of people. We won't likely publish more than one recipe per individual.
   If your recipe is selected for the book, we will contact you by the end of the market season (fall 2012). The recipe will be printed with your name along with it and you will receive a copy of the cookbook upon publication.
   Please submit the spring and summer recipes via email to lvfmcookbook@gmail.com no later than August 1, so as to provide ample time for me (and my squadron of testers) to test and photograph those we've selected. The sooner, the better, however, for fruits and veggies that will come and go in May and June.
You can follow the progress on Facebook and Twitter. I'll be making the rounds to all of the farmers’ markets, so stay tuned!
And thank you!