Quickest Kosher Dills - or Dilly Beans or Pickled Carrots or...

It has been a long time since I posted. The best intentions have been left behind in a pile of sandy, wet beach towels and swimming costumes and in discarded tennis rackets (not mine) and ankle twisting balls. They are buried under a stack of art camp projects, library books (always very stressful if it is about to be returned unread) and six-paper drawings. They are left in the dust of learning to ride a bike between the rain showers and in trying to cram four months of catching up and memory making experiences into four short weeks of Daddy home time. The recipes and my barely used camera will sit and wait, my children do not. EVER.

I should say that those intentions have also fallen to the odd bit of real work, picnic preparation and to my late summer canning and preserving drive. My husband worries about space and shelf stability. I worry about what we will do if we run out of dill pickles in March. He reliably reminds me that there is a supermarket we can walk to in less than five minutes. I tell him it isn’t the same, he doesn’t understand. He says we don’t eat jam. I say it is to give as gifts. He asks how much money do you spend on jars. I tell him the lady I met at Canadian Tire gave me hundreds. He rolls his eyes. I know he knows I will not relent.

I am not going to bore you with telling you about everything I have made. I will tell you once again that if you can just eek out a few hours to put something up, you will be very happy you did. There is still plenty of lush inspiration - blueberries, tomatoes, plums, pears and apples.

Last year’s pickles did not work out very well. In fact, most of them wound up composted. I am not sure what I did or didn’t do but they weren’t for eating. This year, I wasn’t even going to bother making any. I then thought about making fermented ones but realized that I would actually have to remember that they were fermenting. Then, in my new carry-it-around-all-the-time favourite guide, I found a recipe for Quickest Kosher Dills and knew I would be making pickles after all.

This recipe can be used for carrots and beans as well.  With carrots, you can keep the spices pretty much the same. For beans, I would be inclined to make them a little spicier. I used fresh dill which is great especially if you can find some with big flowering heads just going to seed. You can also use the fresh feathery fronds, stalks and you can use dried dill seed as well. The original recipe calls for scuttermong or grape leaves which keeps pickles crisper apparently. Had my children not been in bed I may have asked my friend Nicki if I could nip over and snip a few leaves off her vines but I can not imagine how crisp a pickle would need to be to warrant disturbing that divine post-bedtime peace. So, I left it out and, although I have never used it before, I expect my pickles will be just fine.

The math is pretty simple here and, in order to change from pints to quarts(which you may want to use if you are making carrots), you may need to adjust your quantities, You will need about one cup of liquid for every pint, so that is two cups for every quart. This recipe will make enough for ten pints or five quarts. 

If you are making dill pickles, please use pickling cucumbers. The flavour and texture is much better than other cucumbers. How you slice them is up to you. I like small ones if I am leaving them whole and mediumish (3-inch) ones if I am slicing or quartering. If you are quartering, I suggest you use quart jars instead of pints. For carrots, if you have large ones you can just peel and slice them into quarters, sixths or eighths lengthwise and trim them to be long enough to sit just at the shoulders of the quart jar. Beans do well in a pint jar and again, topped to sit just at the shoulders.

Quickest Kosher Dills adapted from Canning for a New Generation by Liana Krissof

(makes 10 pints or 5 quarts)

2.5 kg (5lb 8oz.) pickling cucumbers(as I mentioned above, I like using +/- 3-inch ones)

5 cups natural white vinegar 

5 cups water

4 1/2 tablespoons kosher salt

10 teaspoons pickling spice

10 cloves garlic

Fresh dill

Clean 10 pint or 5 quart canning jars.

Rinse cucumbers in cold water. Remove the blossom end if you are quartering, remove both ends if you are slicing. Quarter or slice the cucumbers 1/4-inch thick.

Meanwhile heat your jars in a hot water bath.

Bring the vinegar, water and salt to a boil for five minutes, cover to avoid too much evaporation.

Put the lids in a bowl and pour some water from the hot water bath over them.

Carefully remove the jars from the hot water bath and, working quickly, put a teaspoon of pickling spice, a clove of garlic and a sprig of dill in the bottom of each jar. Pack the cucumber quarters or slices tightly.

Pour the hot vinegar mixture into the packed jars leaving 1/2-inch headspace. Wipe the rims and put the lids on. Screw on the rings until they are just finer tight.

Return the jars to the hot water bath, where they should be covered by one inch of water. Bring to a boil. Boil for ten minutes.

Remove the jars to a towel and leave for 12 hours. Check after an hour or two and if any jars haven’t sealed (if you can still press the lid down), put them in the fridge immediately.

German Inspired Potato Salad

It is new potato time of year here. Those of you to the south and west of us here in Nova Scotia may be thinking, ‘what, it’s been new potato time for a while now Leah, wake up.’ Really though, they are just getting plentiful here.

I truly believe that there is not much finer than a new potato smothered in a healthy amount of butter and salt and pepper. There are occasions, however, when something a little bit more composed is called for. There are also occasions when getting half of supper done ahead of time is a nice treat as well.

I thought, for the odd day when it is actually warm enough that you don’t want to cook, that this makes a nice change to the mayonnaise doused potato salad that is a summer staple and which I love. Sadly, my behind and hips love it too much. So, to lighten things up we had this the other day.

Sometimes, I might be inclined to add some bacon, nicely crisped, to this. There were two reasons I didn’t on this occasion. The first, that there was already beef, bangers and  chicken going on the barbecue and the bacon just seemed excessive. For the second, you should reread the previous paragraph and, as with the first reason, the bacon just seemed excessive.

People may say that this should be served warm, and they would be correct. It is very nice warm. If you would rather go to the beach until supper time, I think it is perfectly acceptable to make it ahead of time and, if you really want to have it warm, put it in a heatproof bowl on the warming rack of your barbecue while everything else cooks. It is, cold or hot, a very fine potato salad.

German Inspired Potato Salad (Warm or Cold)

2 pounds small new potatoes halved

Vinaigrette

1/4 red onion finely chopped (about 1/2 cup)

1 tablespoon mustard

2 tablespoons white wine vinegar

1/4 cup olive oil

1/2 cup chicken stock

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon celery seed

1 teaspoon fresh thyme leaves

2 tablespoons green onion finely sliced

1/2 cup chopped parsley (a handful)

In a medium pot, cover potatoes with water and bring to a boil, reduce heat to allow a gentle boil and cook until just tender. It is important not to overcook them. It will take about ten minutes, once they are boiling

Meanwhile, mix all the ingredients for the vinaigrette together.

When the potatoes are cooked, drain them well and transfer them to a baking tray.

Heat the vinaigrette in a small pot just until it boils. Remove from heat and gently pour over the potatoes. After a few minutes, gently turn the potatoes, making sure the vinaigrette coats them completely.

Cool, or don’t, and serve.

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.

Toasted Fregola and Tomatoes

Shortly before we left San Diego, I discovered the wonders of Little Italy. I knew it was there and had briefly strolled down India Street but, with two hooligan girls in tow, you don’t go in to shops. 

The farmers’ market on Saturday was incredible and, if we hadn’t had the Hillcrest Market around the corner, I would have made more trips to Little Italy on Saturdays. Sadly, Stephen is a less then avid market goer, and I can’t bring myself to cajole him into going on his all too short weekends.

Finally though, taunted by the sight of fresh pastas and cheeses and all the way from Italy dry goods, I started taking my bribed-into-good-behaviour girls into the little shops and our grocery bill took a little leap.

The Sardinians make a type of couscous called fregola. It is usually shaped like Israeli couscous but is toasted. Sometimes it is a little rougher in texture which, I think, is great as it holds any sauce better. It is available at any good Italian market and best of all, there are often recipes like this one on the back of the packet.

Like all good Italian cooking, this is about simplicity and excellent ingredients. It is a great step away from the spaghetti rut. The fact that it is toasted lends a little toasty nuttiness and depth but not so obvious that your children are going to turn their noses up.

I used tinned cherry tomatoes for this. I was lucky enough to find them. I would recommend using diced tinned tomatoes but try and use the best you can afford, and try for San Marzano if you can find them, you will be happy you did. If tomatoes are in season, you could use chopped fresh but you may need some extra stock. I would also suggest that you use a fairly large pan, otherwise you will stir and wind up with something like this.

Toasted Fregola with Tomatoes (adapted from the back of the packet)

1 large onion finely chopped

4 large cloves garlic minced

250 grams toasted fregola

3 tablespoons olive oil

4 cups stock (I used chicken, you can use vegetable)

1 large (28 ounce) tin tomatoes

Chopped fresh parsley

Basil pesto to serve (if desired)

Salt and pepper to taste

Sauté onions and garlic with olive oil in a large pan. 

Add tomatoes and stock and bring to a boil.

Stir in fregola and return to boil. Reduce heat and simmer for 15-20 minutes or until the desired tenderness is reached.

Stir in some chopped parsley and season to taste.

Serve with a drizzle of pesto or extra virgin olive oil or some shaved parmesan.

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.

A Little Roasted for Your Crunch

There seems to have been a recent glut of broccoli in California. Our local market has literally had tons of it, all shapes and varieties, for cheap. Consequently, we have been eating it a lot.

Looking for a little something outside the steamed broccoli realm, I thought about the ubiquitous Broccoli Crunch Salad. It really is everywhere. It sits on salad bars in every corner of North America. You can buy a kit to make it in your local big box store. 

There is nothing really wrong with it. It is, usually, pretty tasty. A creamy dressing with some sweetness and some tang coat raw broccoli florets (I really don’t like that word), tossed with some sort of nut, raisins or dried cranberries adding some extra sweetness, and usually there is some salty bacon in there. It ticks all the boxes of taste and texture to qualify as a salad. I’ll even admit to scoffing quite a lot of it more than once or twice.

The thing is is that when I eat salad, I want to feel a little virtuous; a little bit like I am doing my body a favour. The creamy dressing and bacon while tasty, sometimes measure up a little heavy.

The raw broccoli is really delicious but I am going to admit that I think it is a little bit like hard work. I know it sounds like I want all the benefits without the effort but my jaw is almost sore after eating it sometimes. I knew that steaming the broccoli would wind up in a big soggy mistake unless it was treated to nothing but the shortest of steam baths. Roasting the broccoli, like I do cauliflower, seemed like a good and flavour intensifying idea though. You can still preserve some of the crunch as well.

To be honest, I have been roasting all of our brassicas, even the cauliflower for cauliflower and cheese. Everyone has been eating it up.

I lightened up the dressing for the salad by using a slightly sweet vinaigrette with a little bit of nuttiness from some toasted sesame oil. There will be twice as much vinaigrette as you need but it is a handy thing to have in your fridge, just store it in the jar you shake it in. The raisins and onions soak in the vinaigrette for as long as you have time to let them. The raisins plump and the onions mellow so the longer they soak the plumper and mellower your salad will be.

I skipped the bacon, to much guffawing, but you could easily toss some in if you need it. 

This makes quite a lot but two adults and two children polished all but a tiny bit off in one meal.

Roasted Broccoli Salad

8 cups broccoli cut into small flowerlike pieces

2 tablespoons olive oil

1/2 teaspoon salt

Fresh ground black pepper to taste

1/2 cup diced red onion

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 cup toasted almond slivers

Vinaigrette

2 tablespoons grainy mustard

1 tablespoon honey

1/4 cup white wine vinegar

1/3 cup olive oil

1 tablespoon toasted sesame oil

1/4 teaspoon salt

Fresh ground black pepper to taste

Preheat oven to 450º.

Toss the broccoli pieces with 2 tablespoons olive oil, salt and pepper. Place on a baking sheet and roast for about 15 minutes, until they are spot browned. Remove from oven and cool.

Put the ingredients for the vinaigrette in a jar that will hold at least 250ml (1 cup). Put the lid on the jar and shake until the vinaigrette is emulsified. Check the bottom of the jar and make sure that all the honey is mixed in and isn’t stuck to the bottom.

In a medium bowl, use whatever bowl you want to serve this in, soak the raisins and onions in about 1/2 cup of the vinaigrette.

Just before serving, toss the roasted and cooled broccoli and the toasted almonds in the vinaigrette.

An Unrecipe

I made something the other day. I have been debating whether to post it or not. It isn't nice. It was pretty but not nice. It was delicious but not nice. Even as I write these words, I wonder whether I should do it or not. I have been lucky enough to be spending the last few months in a seasonless oasis. But, I have decided, if things like this make their way into my market basket, there is little i can do but share it. Throwing caution to the wind, I am going to post this. Not in a nah-nah-nah-nah-nah-nah way. In a please enjoy and share and remember there is only five more weeks of winter.

***

You don't need a recipe to make hash. It is a pretty simple thing. It can be made plain or fancy. It can be eaten any time of day. It fits every meal.

You take some potatoes and onions and sauté them. You add some meat or fish or, in this case, beautiful green goodness and you sauté it a little more. Add some green onions near the end of the cooking time, almost no matter what kind of hash you are making.If you are want to get carried away, you can top it off with something. It would be the rare combination that a soft poached egg wouldn't suit. Poppy and Stephen think bacon is pretty nice too. Tilly even eats the green bits, but only because they are covered in egg yolk.

Anyway you put it together, it is simple and good and wholesome. It makes you feel good and cozy and that is important.