For most of the winter, our weekends are missing something. We are left wondering what to do with our Saturday mornings. Sure, we could make the hour long drive to town and enjoy what is over-wintering at the Halifax Farmer’s Market but, Poppy can’t fish for sharks in a small stream there. She can’t run around, hand in hand with her best bud, charming vendors and, we assume, safely disappearing down trails through the woods. She tells me that the cupcakes aren’t as good as at our market. And, there is no burly German baker man to give her cinnamon buns just because she happened to pass by and say hi.
So, now that our Saturday mornings are peaceful and we are no longer at a loss for things to do, we get to spend the rest of the day thinking of how we will use our market bounty. It is early days for most produce here in Nova Scotia but we managed a decent haul in spite of our not-quite-warm-enough-yet days.
I found cremini and portobello mushrooms, radishes and some crunchy sprouts, which I was compelled to buy even though I have about five kilos of unsprouted crunchy sprout mix here in my kitchen. I got spinach and mixed greens and beet greens with gorgeous almost baby beets on the bottom . I got whole wheat bread with poppy seeds, of course, from Chris, the above mentioned burly German baker man and, to Poppy’s great delight and despite arriving late-ish in the morning, a package of his always-sold-out-it-seems juniper ham.
The ham is always gone by the time we arrive, even if we get there shortly after eight, Chris is inevitably selling the last package to the person in front of us. To his credit, he has tried to steal the last package back out of the unsuspecting person’s basket just to try and please Poppy, but in the end he had to fall back on the cinnamon bun to cheer her up.
We like brunch at our house and Saturday’s haul, rounded out by a few local eggs, left us well set up to breakfastize something we saw Anna Olson cooking up on TV. She made her mushrooms with brandy and cream and her bread was a sourdough rye from Ravine in St. David’s, around the corner from my grandmother’s which is where we were staying when we saw the TV show. And, Anna used a mixture of wild mushrooms but we had nothing in the house except for what we got at the market on Saturday and sometimes, simpler is just better.
Poppy Seed French Toast with Sautéed Cremini Mushrooms and Juniper Ham
400 grams (4 heaping cups) quartered or halved, depending on size, cremini mushrooms
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
Salt and pepper to taste
4 slices of good bread (use what you like)
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons milk
Salt and pepper
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 tablespoon butter
4 slices of really good ham (optional)
Fresh chives, chopped
Heat heavy bottomed pan and add 1 tablespoon of olive oil and 1 of butter. Add mushrooms. I like to add the salt at this point when I sauté mushrooms, it is one of the few things I season before I am finished cooking. Cook the mushrooms over medium high heat until they start to brown. They will go a bit grey and get a little watery first and then the water will evaporate and the flavour will concentrate and they will start to brown. Remove the mushrooms from the pan.
While the mushrooms are cooking, whisk eggs with milk and a little salt and pepper in a shallow dish.
In the same pan, without washing, heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil and 1 of butter. soak each side of each slice of bread in the egg mixture and transfer them to the hot pan. Cook until golden brown, about a minute on each side.
Transfer each slice to a plate, top with ham and share mushrooms between the four slices. Sprinkle with chives.
Poppy had her’s with ham, I had mine without and next time, I will be putting a little wilted spinach on mine.
