Putting Up Summer - A Challenge

The growing season is short here. And, it is about this time of year that a certain anxiety takes over me. Not so badly that I can’t enjoy summer but badly enough that I start scheduling life around the availability of fruits and vegetables.

Normally, I know in the back of my head that we will be going away for some portion of the winter months. This is the first time since I started doing any sort of preserving that I I am planning on being here for all of the winter months. So, my anxiety is at an all time high. 

As herbs start growing I whizz them into a ‘pesto’ and toss them in the freezer. By pesto, I mean any combination of herb mixed with olive oil and whizzed. I don’t use nuts or cheese in most so that they are that they are easier to toss in to anything for anyone. Swiss chard and spinach are getting blanched and frozen. Garlic scapes, a lot of them, have been pestoed and frozen or pickled. I am imagining pickled garlic scape tartar sauce as soon as they have sat for a few weeks. Strawberries have been picked, hulled and frozen. Others have been turned into jam, two types. 

For the first time in my jam making career, I didn’t muddle around with the recipe and low and behold, it looks like it has set. Just in time for my children to decide that they don’t like jam. The other type got muddled with and is a little runnier as the result of a little less sugar and some balsamic and black pepper. I can taste it with creamy goat cheese and it is going to be good.

Currently, there is a big jar of nasturtium seeds brining on my countertop. Who knew those things could be quite so stinky. There is a definite waft of boiled eggs as you walk in to our house, especially when the jar gets a little jiggle. I am told, by many folk and website, that they will be pretty similar to capers.

I have great plans for the rest of the summer’s produce. I have a new canning bible, Canning for a New Generation. All I can say is, it will likely teach you a ton of stuff, it has me. If you plan on putting up any amount of produce or you want to make some lovely gifts, this is a book I would get. 

I want to know what it is you ‘put up,’ if anything. And, to that end and without getting caught up in any social movement, I want to issue a challenge, a project if you will. It will just take a few hours, I know they aren’t often easy to come by. Think of something you buy through the winter, or something that you buy that you think you could make. Maybe it is jam or pickles. Maybe it is pesto or tomato sauce. Look up a recipe, I will gladly help if you get stuck. Spend a few hours getting everything ready and preserve something to use later on. You can turn it into a family project or just take some time for yourself and enjoy the satisfaction it offers.

You do not need any fancy equipment, a really big pot will help. If you have a canner in the basement, or attic, or your mother-in-law’s cupboard, you could use it but, unless you are making huge jars of something or lots of jars, you should be fine.

Ideally, and for best results, you should choose something at the peak of its growing season for a couple of reasons. The first is that it tastes the best and the second, well, it usually costs less.

So, tell me if you are up for the challenge. I am by no means an expert, but I will happily help anyone out as best I can. 

Grilled Nasturtium Leaf Wrapped Halloumi

In the Mediterranean, things like grape leaves abound. Fresh on the trees, in tins and jars, you would be hard pressed to find a culture that doesn’t use them for some form of cooking.

Here on the South Shore of Nova Scotia, the grape leaf, in any form, is a rare thing. It is the stuff of specialty grocers not located on the South Shore for the most part. So, in an effort to make do and to use what grows here and to justify the panic purchase of my four nasturtium baskets, I am determined to use as much of them as possible.

The seeds are going to get pickled, just as soon as I collect enough of them to fill a jar. The flowers get tossed into salad or used to decorate supper. The leaves are very delicious in salad and where you would use lettuce, especially in an egg sandwich. With such a proliferation of leaves though, I needed a new use.

I was googling around for some suggestions and I saw a recipe for nasturtium leaf dolma. Having eaten the little parcels all over the Eastern Med, I couldn’t face making a lame attempt at copying them and being disappointed. I did, however, recall that I had a piece of halloumi cheese in the fridge and got to thinking that wrapping the cheese before grilling it would be kind of well, kind of delicious.

Before you start thinking this is going to ruin your barbecue, it isn’t. Halloumi cheese does not melt the way most cheese does. It is a sheep and goat milk cheese traditionally made on Cyprus. It has an almost squeaky texture which, I admit, does not sound that nice but it is. Really, it is. Because it is made from heated curds, it has quite a high melting point and it grills, fries and flames up beautifully.

I am not going to ask you to flame it here, it is a practice not for the faint of heart or those unequipped with the appropriate safety equipment, read extinguishers and fire blanket. All you have to do is wrap it in some quickly blanched leaves and toss it on the grill with whatever is up for supper.

Poppy painstakingly made, with a table knife and a little bit of help in the interest of spped, a not-so-greek green olive salsa fresca to eat it with. It makes for a really light summery side or a quick starter plate.

Nasturtium Grilled Halloumi with Green Olive Salsa serves four as a light side or starter

16 nice big nasturtium leaves

8 1/4-inch slices halloumi cheese

Cracked black pepper

1/2 tablespoon olive oil

4 roma tomatoes

1/4 medium sweet onion finely diced

2 tablespoons green olives finely chopped

1 tablespoon white wine vinegar

1 tablespoon olive oil

1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley

Salt and pepper

Bring a pot of water to the boil. Make an ice bath by filling a bowl with ice and water.

Drop the nasturtium leaves, a few at a time, into the boiling water. After a few seconds, the leaves will darken. Gently transfer the leaves to the ice bath for a few seconds. Gently dry them on a clean towel and place them on a plate until you are ready to use them. Repeat until all the leaves are finished.

Remove the seeds from the tomatoes and dice them. Toss with the onion, olives, vinegar, olive oil, parsley and lightly season. Set aside.

Place each slice of halloumi on top of a nasturtium leaf, sprinkle with pepper and top with another leaf. Brush, very lightly, with olive oil.

Heat the barbecue and make sure the grill is clean. When the grill is hot, reduce heat to medium and gently place each slice on the grill.

After one to two minutes, or until grill marks are visible, flip the slices and grill for one to two minutes.

Transfer to a dish with some of the salsa on the bottom, spoon the remaining salsa over the top and drizzle with some extra olive oil if desired.

Sorrel Pesto - a.k.a Sour Duck Sauce

When I was little, I was a pretty good little forager. My folks fed me, I just liked to find things to eat in the ditch, on the lawn, in the woods or anywhere other than the conventional.

I ate, what we called, tea berries, fiddleheads (I am sure I likely ate some other ferns as well), blueberries from wherever I could find them, blackberries and wild raspberries, with scratches and scars to prove it and carefully guarded patches of wild strawberries spared the blades of the lawnmower. One of my greatest discoveries was sour ducks. I have no idea who introduced me to them or what possesses a fairly functional eight year old to eat sour weeds from the lawn but I would walk, head down, looking for the tell tale wispy red heads of the plant, all summer long. 

I tried to figure out what these things were, I was sure that it wasn’t really called sour duck. I asked lots of people, none seemed to have a clue what I was talking about and would raise an eyebrow. I, while by no means searching relentlessly, never gave up, my curiosity was still there.

Imagine my excitement and joy to be alive, when I finally realized what it was. It is actually an edible plant, in small quantities. Large quantities are apparently poisonous. A plant used, more and more, in food created by master chefs, not just hedgerow foragers. It is sorrel. 

While I am sure that what I ate, and what grows in my lawn, is a different variety to what grows, somewhat wildly and accidentally, in my garden, there is no mistaking the sour grassy taste of what is properly called sour dock, not sour duck.

While I like to make a chiffonade and add it to a salad, I understand that the raw, unadulterated flavour may not be to everyone’s taste. My girls seem to enjoy eating it straight out of the garden. Poppy put a few leaves on her lobster sandwich the other day and I realized that, mixed into some mayonnaise, it would be delicious with cold fish or seafood.

Sorrel has become popular as a cream sauce or butter flavour, especially in Europe, which is delicious when executed properly. In our CSA this past winter, we had bunches of the stuff and decided a pesto would be a great way to diversify its uses.

If you don’t have sorrel in your herb garden yet, I want to suggest you get a little pot and pop it in there. I did this last year and had a pretty unsuccessful crop, the bugs ate far more than we did. I didn’t expect it to survive the winter but I now have a big patch of limey green spinach like leaves which the bigs don’t even seem to be able to keep up with. 

I have used this to stuff salmon or spread it on top as a crust. It makes a delish primavera style pasta too. If you find the taste too sour, add an equal amount of fresh parsley and adjust the seasoning.

Sorrel Pesto

Large handful sorrel leaves (plus large handful of parsley if you are using)

1/2 cup slivered almonds (substitute pine nuts if you want to)

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/4 cup olive oil

3 cloves garlic 

Tear or chop sorrel leaves. In the bowl of your food processor, purée all the ingredients until smooth. 

Place in clean container and refrigerate until ready to use.

This is what I did with the latest batch.