photo by Karen Brooks
Yesterday, Portland Monthly Magazine’s food editor, Karen Brooks, posted a grand write-up about what I’ve been doing as of late, on the magazine’s food blog, Eat Beat.
Here’s the link:
Mentioned in the article is next week’s Dia de los Muertos Mexican Feast. The dinner is Monday, November 5th. You can find details on The Farmer’s Feast page on Facebook (see “events” on the page). To make reservations (there are a few still available), contact me at wildeats@msn.com.
If you hurry on down to the Farmers’ Market, you just may be able to find enough end-of-season cucumbers to put up a batch. (I nabbed several pounds of perfect, sleek Pakistan cucumbers from Gee Creek Farm just last Wednesday). If, on the other hand, fall has fastened to the vines, and pickling cucumbers are but a memory of summer, don’t fret – squirrel away the recipe for now & you’ll be ready to take the briny plunge…jump into the pickle barrel with both feet…throw cornichons to the wind….next season.
Place the cucumber slices and onion strips into a clean non-reactive bowl. Add the salt and 2 quarts of ice, and place the mixture in the refrigerator for 3 hours. 
Turn the flame to high. Bring just to a simmer, but do not boil. Remove the pot from the burner, fill the jars with pickles & brine, wipe the edges and seal with flat lids & screw bands. Place the sealed jars in the hot water-filled pot in which you sterilized your jars. Bring to a boil. Process in a boiling waterbath for 10-15 minutes (for pint jars). Carefully remove the processed jars from the waterbath and allow them to cool, undisturbed, for 24 hours. Shortly after you remove the jars from the canner you will hear a “ping” as the jar seals. After 24 hours, check the seal by unscrewing the ring band from the jar and lifting the jar by the flat lid. If you can lift it in this manner, consider the seal tight – label & store your pickles in your pantry. 
These pickles are good right away, & better in a month. Stored properly, they will last about a year.Mealtime Makeover happens today at the Buckman Market. Join me for cooking demonstrations & kitchen tips as we serve up lunch ideas!
Class begins at 4 & runs ’till 6. Want to come prepared?
And here’s a recipe we’ll be demonstrating & sampling today. It’s from a wonderful book, The Homemade Pantry – 101 Foods You Can Stop Buying & Start Making by Alana Cernila. I adore this book - the recipes provide really simple ways to make favorite treats from childhood in your own kitchen. Toaster pastries, granola bars, peanut butter cups, maple popcorn, graham crackers. Plus, there are endearing stories with each recipe.
Makes 2 baking sheets or 2 dehydrator trays
If you don’t have applesauce on hand, it’s easy to cook up some apples alongside the fruit for the rollups. They take about the same amount of time to cook. When the apples have softened, ust mash them up & voila! Applesauce.
Combine the fruit & lemon juice in a nonreactive medium saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring occasionally, for about 20 minutes or until the fruit is entirely softened (alternatively, use a crock pot). Pass the puree through a food mill or fine-meshed sieve. Add the honey & applesauce and stir thoroughly. Taste & adjust the honey to your desired sweetness.
If using an oven, line 2 baking sheets with parchment. Pour the puree onto the baking sheets & bake at the lowest possible temperature for your oven (165˚ F is ideal) for 12 to 20 hours, or until dry to the touch with just a bit of stickiness.
If using a dehydrator, follow the directions provided with your machine. Make sure that you pour the puree as thin as possible, and that you dehydrate the sheets until they are mostly dry to the touch with just a bit of stickiness. This will take between 12 & 20 hours, depending on your mixture.
For either the oven or dehydrator, the drying time will depend on your equipment & the fruit that you use. Go by feel rather than time. If the rollups get too crisp for rolling up, eat them as “fruit chips” instead!
Lay the finished sheets over parchment, and with scissors, cut both layers together in rectangles. Roll the fruit & parchment together in small rolls.
The fruit rollups keep in a covered container at room temperature for 1 month, in the fridge in a covered container for 2 months, or in the freezer, sealed in a bag, for 6 months (thaw at room temperature). 
The next class in the Buckman Farmers’ Market Mealtime Makeover series addresses the issue! Join me as I share ideas, recipes, & samples during a free cooking demonstration. Thursday, September 6th from 4-6 p.m. Of course kids are welcome – there will be tasty snacks & coloring sheets for them to work on while parents enjoy the demo!
School Lunch – It’s More Than Elementary!
See you at the market!
With new classes every week at Hillsdale Farmers’ Market this season, there’s hardly a moment between wrapping-up one week’s agenda and diving head first (or knife first) into the next lesson plan. So when Market Manager Eamon Molloy stopped by the “kitchen” (meaning my canopied kitchen at the Farmers’ Market) as last week’s cheese-making demo wrapped up, I posed the question, “From whom will we get the pork for next week’s meat curing demo?”
Kookoolan Farms was a natural choice. Farmer Chrissie Zaerpoor is now bringing pasture-raised heritage breed Red Wattle Pigs, that she tends with her husband Koorosh on their family farm, to market. The pork is sold in half & full carcass shares, and sometimes USDA cuts. “Talk to Chrissie and see what she has available,” offered Eamon.
What Chrissie had available took me aback a bit.
Chrissie posed, ”In your ideal world, what would you like to have for the demo?”
“Well, a belly piece, to demonstrate how easy it is to make bacon, and a piece of a hind leg to cure a ham in brine. That way, I can show 2 types of curing – brining & dry-rub.”
“I can get you a 5-pound pork belly,” she said. – Great!
“And I have a 19-pound bone-in, skin-on leg.”
Whoa.
I mean, well, honestly, my butchering skills are ok, but the thought of wrestling a 19-pound leg while demonstrating and talking sounded more challenging than I anticipated for this demo! I mean, I’ve already had one curve thrown my way when the “whole fish” for the fileting class arrived with guts in tact. A very spiny channel rockfish at that! (unlike me, the class was thrilled to see fish-gutting added to the demo, and cheered me on as I staggered through the process). I wasn’t sure I’d be up for another big undertaking in my primitive outdoor makeshift kitchen (professional kitchen with accoutrements is another story…as I say at the market – if I can do this out here, while talking as I go, you’ll have no problem in the cozy comfort of your home kitchen!)
But…thinking….dawning….my husband, Benny is a butcher….maybe I could persuade him….
And I did!
Benny will lead the class in a whole pork leg butchering demonstration. He will skin, remove the tricky aitch bone, seam-butcher, and show how to appropriately cut the leg for ham, including a bone-in shank-end ham.
Then we’ll get to the meat of the matter (bad pun intended) and proceed to curing.
American-style brined ham is on the agenda (which will later be smoked & glazed), and fresh bacon (which can be smoked or roasted).
Join us – the class is free & open to all. Hillsdale Farmers’ Market, Sunday, June 17th, 11am-1pm.See you at the market!
Thursday, June 7th, Portland Farmers’ Market launches a 4-part cooking basics series at their ultra-family-friendly Southeast Portland Buckman Market.
Take advantage of culinary basics skills classes led by a professional chef with over 20 years in the business. Learn how to hold, hone, and wield a knife. Basic vegetable cuts & terminology. The difference between stock & broth, and how to make them from scratch. The art of the simple sauté, plus how to sear protein & create a pan sauce. And this is just the first class!
Class begins at 4:00 PM and runs until 6:00 PM. Do your shopping, grab a market snack, pull up a chair, and make an afternoon of it…or stop by for a quick tip or two. Printed recipes will be provided, and there will be samples of the dishes to try.
The demos are held on the first Thursday of the month - mark your calendars!
Here is the summer schedule:
Buckman Farmers’ Market is located at SE 20th & SE Salmon (between Belmont & Hawthorne). Here is a link to the Buckman Farmers’ Market webpage.
See you at the Market!
