Happy Halloween!

The very best holiday of the year...

Autumn Eats

The onset of fall always makes me want to cook cozy, warm, spiced foods. Last weekend saw the advent of "Apple Butter 2.0". The apple butter I made last year was tasty - it's been long gone from the pantry - but I must admit, I can tell that even though I cooked it for a little over an hour, I didn't cook it long enough to get that signature smooth texture. This year I was determined to achieve it, even if it meant hours on the stove.

My husband and I drove the 40 or so minutes east to Milford to check out Rousters Apple House for some locally grown apples. Last year's experience at Iron's Fruit Farm was a tad more fulfilling because we were actually able to pick our own apples. At Rousters the fruit is already picked. Even still, the rustic barn that housed all of their apples was homey and smelled enticingly of warm apple fritters.

They had close to ten different varieties, ranging from tart to sweet. I wanted a good tart-to-sweet ratio for the butter, so I settled on half Jonathan (tart, on the left) and half Honeycrisp (sweet, on the right). I also picked up a small carton of Rouster's Apple Cider for the butter - more flavor than water.


Once I got home, I ended up slowly cooking the butter for a little over TWO hours. Now I understand why some people prefer to do this in the crock pot. However, after much spitting and plopping and bubbling, I achieved my goal - smooth, spiced, comforting apple butter.


In addition to apples, I always get a hankering to cook with squash and sweet potatoes in the fall. One of my favorite soup recipes is Moosewood's Gypsy Soup. Onion, celery, garlic, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, bell pepper, tomatoes, garbanzo beans, spiced with paprika, turmeric, basil, cayenne, bay leaf, and a dash of cinnamon - YUM!


All of my ingredients came from our local farmer's markets, and the tomatoes and tomato juice came from my canning efforts earlier this summer. Using canned homegrown tomatoes makes all the difference in a dish, especially soup. I'd take homemade tomato juice over a storebought stock any day.

I paired the soup with a loaf of my homemade kalamata olive bread, and voila, a perfectly cozy meal for two on a brisk fall evening.

Plums!

I think it can officially be said that I am a "Mad Canner", as my aunt would say. I just finished putting up five half pints of plum preserves.

It's a herculean task for me to make weekly trips to the farmer's market and see all of the beautiful produce that is in season and to NOT think wildly about how I'd love to savor it. This weekend I fell head-over-heels for some adorable local Stanley Plums from Backyard Orchards at the Hyde Park Farmer's Market.

I'm pretty clueless when it comes to types of plums and what holds up better when canning. I bought about 2 lbs of the Stanley Plums, which were the only kind available today. These little guys were about the size and shape of an egg and a beautiful dusky purple hue. The flesh was a surprisingly golden yellow color.


I'm working on mastering the art of finding the "gel point" for jams. Very tricky. Basically you cook the fruit and sugar slowly first, and then quickly at a hard rolling boil until it reaches the "gel point" where the liquid sheets off of a spoon instead of dripping like water. It's important to master this art if you want to have jams and preserves that are not too runny yet not so solid that they won't spread. I think that's the hardest part for me when it comes to canning jams - getting that consistency just right.

After boiling the diced plums for a while, the purple skins infused the jam with a lush deep magenta color. Since the batch was not a huge one, I used my special "fancy" Ball jars that I've been saving:


I have to say I think I like the old fashioned quilted Ball jam/jelly jars the best. I love the rustic look and it's easier to get the nectar out of every last nook and cranny.

Black Krim

After months of patient waiting - waiting for the sun to burn hot and for the squirrels to stop pilfering - I have finally had the pleasure of picking my first (and perhaps only) Black Krim tomato.

Aside from a handful of Gold Nuggets and Black Cherries, I haven't had any other luck with my larger tomato plants this season. The weather hasn't been quite hot and sunny enough, and more importantly, animals have eaten every large tomato while it's still green. I had 10-15 nice large Pink Brandywines, Green Zebras, and Black Krims, but they were all eaten before they even started to ripen.

By some stroke of luck, this single Black Krim was allowed to soak up the sun and finally turn the characteristic rusty burnt orange with green hips. While it was only about the size of a tennis ball, I treasured all 3 or 4 bites. I have never had a tomato that tasted so smokey. I swore to my husband that someone had snuck some bacon in there somewhere. It would be killer on a faux BLT sandwich. Absolutely delicious.

Along with Black Krim, I also picked a handful of assorted cherries tonight. Quite a pretty rainbow, Mother Nature - the colors of late summer.

I'm at the point where I'm starting to plan what tomato varieties I'd like to grow next year, along with HOW I'd like to grow them. In other words, I'm going to need to animal-proof my containers with some sort of netting or fencing.

Black Krim is definitely a keeper in the taste department. I'm also very fond of the Black Cherries. The Gold Nuggets were very good, but a little too mild and low-acid for my taste. I like a tomato that has some bite, some tartness, paired with a sweet juiciness. I would like to give Green Zebras another chance, this time varmint-free.

My mom bought me a tomato "dictionary" a few weeks ago and I've been greedily reading through with visions dancing in my head.

Still plenty of time left to plan while this year's garden is starting to wind down.

Peach Preserves

My mom and I were discussing Red Haven peaches this week. Our family has long been of the opinion that these peaches, while smaller than average and full of stubborn pits, have the best flavor of any peach out there.

I have fond memories of day trips where our family would pile into the car and take a drive to more rural areas of Southwest Ohio, oftentimes searching for a park. Along the way we would see signs for farm stands and mom-and-pop produce carts. If we were lucky and it was the right season, we'd stop and fill up on some Red Haven deliciousness.

All this talk inspired me to make a batch of peach preserves this weekend. I HAD thought that I was done with canning for the year, but I've been giving away lots of jars to friends and relatives, and my husband has also been chipping away at our stash, so I figured what the heck.

Originally I was hoping to pick up some locally grown peaches at the Hyde Park Farmer's Market this morning, but unfortunately none of the vendors were selling peaches. On to Plan B, I popped up to Pipkins Fruit & Vegetable Market in Blue Ash in the hopes that they would have some farm fresh peaches, even if they weren't local. I was in luck - they had some very nice looking South Carolina peaches.


I brought them home and proceeded to dice, boil, sweeten, and jar. For some reason, this jam seems very feminine and beautiful. Not that my previous batches weren't easy on the eyes, but the soft sunglow color of today's preserves made me quite proud.


I can't wait to try some on a slice of homemade bread!

Baba Ghanoush

The past few weeks my mother has been bringing me some of the results of her bumper crop of Japanese Eggplant.


Eggplant is one of those vegetables that I'm pretty picky about. It has a texture that can be quite unpleasant if not prepared right. Nobody likes spongey or slimy eggplant. In my opinion, you can either bread/fry it, grill it, or roast it and puree into some yummy baba ghanoush, which is what I did today.

I roasted 6 or 7 long, thin eggplants until blistered and browned. You then take the smoky flesh and throw it in a food processor along with tahini, fresh garlic, fresh cilantro, lemon juice, olive oil, cumin, red pepper flakes, salt and pepper.


We've been snacking on this delicious dip all afternoon, interspersed with breaks for my current home project - painting the kitchen.

Nothing like a nice lazy Sunday at home...

Bounty

Lots of purty pictures to show off for ya. It's been a couple weeks and we've had some good fortune, both from my garden and from my parent's garden. I'll start with my garden.

My first cute Japanese Eggplant of the season, along with some Fish Peppers that have turned from a variegated green and white to a bright cherry red:


A good handful of Red Marconi Peppers - I finally let them stay on the vine long enough to turn a nice fire engine red. I roasted these guys in the oven last night and diced them into a pasta salad with smoked mozzarella, heirloom cherry tomatoes, and fresh basil:


Now onto the fruits of my parent's garden. While I didn't grow all of these beauties myself, I have to say that I'm still proud because they came from the seedlings I donated earlier this summer.

Firstly, some of those heirloom cherry tomato gems I mentioned earlier - these are from my adopted Gold Nugget and Black Cherry plants. They were both delicious, although I have to say I think the Black Cherries had a bit more flavor:


Kicking things up a notch, here is a MONSTER from the Pink Brandywine plant. I sliced this bad boy up tonight for dinner - heaaaaven! Juicy, meaty, sweet, and just the right amount of acidity. Definitely a keeper, although mine are nowhere near this size.


Lastly, my parents brought me two more flats of regular tomatoes for canning. On the heels of my whole-tomato fiesta the other week, I now had plans to can some tomato juice. Last night I canned 10 pints of tomato juice by simply cooking chunked tomatoes, sweet peppers, yellow onion, and a couple garlic cloves. This, along with the whole tomatoes, will make for great chili, marinara sauce, and sloppy joes this winter when the bounty of summer is long gone.

Before:


After:


This is the time of summer I love - when you're literally swimming in tomatoes. Not a meal goes by where you don't eat a fresh tomato of some sort.

Cheers!