Archive of Past News of the Farm:
Farm Lunch December 29, 2010 |
Farm Lunch
December 29, 2010
A Salad of Escarole and Radicchio, with slices of Orange Blossom Farm's Tangelos....
Greetings Friends of the Farm,
I’m big on lunch.
Not so much on breakfast however. I used to be big on breakfast -- my favorite meal -- but I soon realized that being big on breakfast made me bigger than I wanted to be.
It was because of the biscuits.
In my former life, I made biscuits. Not always well. Especially, when I was a young wife and mother, I was horrible at making them. I was so clueless about the chemical reactions pertaining to flour, baking powder and the other basic ingredients, that I resorted to cheating with Bisquick (a box of “dry mix” -- just add liquid) for my experiments.
The “drop biscuits” discussed on the back of the box did not seem like biscuits to me, so I steadfastly kept up the attempt to make a real biscuit, flat and round, but not so hard that it could crack the sheet rock if heaved.
Later, fueled by Larry’s love of biscuits, especially those remembered from his Nanny’s table (she cheated by using lard!), I became a biscuit enthusiast and narrowed my failures to just now and then. The failures were usually the result of too much loving on the dough -- which caused toughness -- and no lard. Being of the era when oleomargarine (“oleo”) was good and lard was bad, I subscribed only halfway to that “wisdom.” I dared to use butter.
Enough practice, unfortunately, will make, in addition to a happy man, every breakfast a fattening experience. These days, knowing that refined flour is the direct path to almost every disease currently under discussion, there has not been a biscuit come out of this kitchen since we went on the veggie wagon. That’s twenty years without a home-made biscuit.
I can still taste them. Umm...hot, flakey, tender, slathered with butter and honey.....
Even so, it’s not hard to give up the traditional breakfast in my line of work. To encourage vegetables to grow and be fruitful, one must bend over frequently. A big breakfast, then a morning full of semi-hand stands, is not a good combination, at least not for me. So, while reading the morning paper, I have my coffee and perhaps a couple of forkfuls of Straight from the Vine’s fermented sauerkraut, or a few dollops of my home-made kefir, and that’s enough to keep the creatures living in my gut happy for a few hours. Around mid morning, I may have a handful of nuts, and then I’m good until our farm lunch.
I’m big on that farm lunch.
I come inside, about thirty minutes ahead of the interns, and cook. At least two courses: a sauté, a salad, or a soup -- or if there’s left over soup, perhaps all three. I use the vegetables and greens that failed the cosmetic goals for market, or whatever was left over from yesterday’s market. Sometimes a bit of grass fed meat or farm stand cheese, sometimes quinoa, mostly just vegetables and lots of greens -- but definitely, a full plate of food. When farm hands work as hard as mine do, they need some substance at lunch. That is a tradition with a long history in this country. The farm wife cooks up big time at lunch. (Of course this farm wife is also a farmer, so the cooking can’t take all morning!) I ring the painted rooster bell on the porch, and the interns wash up and settle in, just like in the old days. (The tradition almost makes me want to throw on some biscuits too! But no.)
(Left, the Potatoes, rescued out of a bucket of defects, had their defects excised before cooking. Right, once done, I mashed the potatoes into a skillet slicked with butter [not oleo]. To the saute, I added our green onions and
bok choi -- and soy sauce. We had this saute alongside the escarole/radicchio salad for lunch today.)
(Above, this soup, made of Australian Butter Squash, lamb broth, and a bit of butter and goat milk would have been great for lunch, but there weren't any left overs the first time around.)
Dinner is lighter
but I prepare it from scratch or at least I heat up leftovers. Or, if
lunch was too enjoyable, I might have just some cashews and a piece of
cheese. And always, greens! Usually raw, like grated as a slaw. When Larry’s here, it depends on his lunch history.
Little Dove, my dearly departed mother (RIP 2001), worried -- when I informed her in 1991 that we would be farmers -- that we would “starve to death.” She lived on a tenant cotton farm in her early youth, and her family was poor. I know that her mother kept chickens, but I don’t know for sure if she had a kitchen garden. Perhaps not, as Dove’s fear was that farmers, always poor in general, starve to death. And since we were beginning farmers, perhaps we’d starve in the first week, watching the crops die, from weather or plagues.
That didn’t happen and Dove was eventually reassured -- when she saw our Early Girl tomatoes on the tables at Whole Foods Market -- that we really could have success with the crops, and we even looked reasonably healthy.
But partly, that was because the biscuits were long gone.
Carol Ann
Not so much on breakfast however. I used to be big on breakfast -- my favorite meal -- but I soon realized that being big on breakfast made me bigger than I wanted to be.
It was because of the biscuits.
In my former life, I made biscuits. Not always well. Especially, when I was a young wife and mother, I was horrible at making them. I was so clueless about the chemical reactions pertaining to flour, baking powder and the other basic ingredients, that I resorted to cheating with Bisquick (a box of “dry mix” -- just add liquid) for my experiments.
The “drop biscuits” discussed on the back of the box did not seem like biscuits to me, so I steadfastly kept up the attempt to make a real biscuit, flat and round, but not so hard that it could crack the sheet rock if heaved.
Later, fueled by Larry’s love of biscuits, especially those remembered from his Nanny’s table (she cheated by using lard!), I became a biscuit enthusiast and narrowed my failures to just now and then. The failures were usually the result of too much loving on the dough -- which caused toughness -- and no lard. Being of the era when oleomargarine (“oleo”) was good and lard was bad, I subscribed only halfway to that “wisdom.” I dared to use butter.
Enough practice, unfortunately, will make, in addition to a happy man, every breakfast a fattening experience. These days, knowing that refined flour is the direct path to almost every disease currently under discussion, there has not been a biscuit come out of this kitchen since we went on the veggie wagon. That’s twenty years without a home-made biscuit.
I can still taste them. Umm...hot, flakey, tender, slathered with butter and honey.....
Even so, it’s not hard to give up the traditional breakfast in my line of work. To encourage vegetables to grow and be fruitful, one must bend over frequently. A big breakfast, then a morning full of semi-hand stands, is not a good combination, at least not for me. So, while reading the morning paper, I have my coffee and perhaps a couple of forkfuls of Straight from the Vine’s fermented sauerkraut, or a few dollops of my home-made kefir, and that’s enough to keep the creatures living in my gut happy for a few hours. Around mid morning, I may have a handful of nuts, and then I’m good until our farm lunch.
I’m big on that farm lunch.
I come inside, about thirty minutes ahead of the interns, and cook. At least two courses: a sauté, a salad, or a soup -- or if there’s left over soup, perhaps all three. I use the vegetables and greens that failed the cosmetic goals for market, or whatever was left over from yesterday’s market. Sometimes a bit of grass fed meat or farm stand cheese, sometimes quinoa, mostly just vegetables and lots of greens -- but definitely, a full plate of food. When farm hands work as hard as mine do, they need some substance at lunch. That is a tradition with a long history in this country. The farm wife cooks up big time at lunch. (Of course this farm wife is also a farmer, so the cooking can’t take all morning!) I ring the painted rooster bell on the porch, and the interns wash up and settle in, just like in the old days. (The tradition almost makes me want to throw on some biscuits too! But no.)
(Left, the Potatoes, rescued out of a bucket of defects, had their defects excised before cooking. Right, once done, I mashed the potatoes into a skillet slicked with butter [not oleo]. To the saute, I added our green onions and
bok choi -- and soy sauce. We had this saute alongside the escarole/radicchio salad for lunch today.)
(Above, this soup, made of Australian Butter Squash, lamb broth, and a bit of butter and goat milk would have been great for lunch, but there weren't any left overs the first time around.)
Little Dove, my dearly departed mother (RIP 2001), worried -- when I informed her in 1991 that we would be farmers -- that we would “starve to death.” She lived on a tenant cotton farm in her early youth, and her family was poor. I know that her mother kept chickens, but I don’t know for sure if she had a kitchen garden. Perhaps not, as Dove’s fear was that farmers, always poor in general, starve to death. And since we were beginning farmers, perhaps we’d starve in the first week, watching the crops die, from weather or plagues.
That didn’t happen and Dove was eventually reassured -- when she saw our Early Girl tomatoes on the tables at Whole Foods Market -- that we really could have success with the crops, and we even looked reasonably healthy.
But partly, that was because the biscuits were long gone.
Carol Ann
(We're eating a lot of carrots for lunch these days, but of course, just the stumps and two-legged ones!) Back