Hello.
Welcome to the Acre, where I share my gardening & foraging adventures, trying to use every bit of what I grow & forage to make, cook or preserve.
Welcome to the Acre, where I share my gardening & foraging adventures, trying to use every bit of what I grow & forage to make, cook or preserve.
A perfect end to a summer day is a bowl of ice cream. I created this simple no-churn ice cream to capture the flavor of wild black raspberries. Every summer in my parent’s woods on the Fourth of July weekend the black raspberries ripen. Deeply purple tiny beads of summer, each berry is an explosion of tart, intense berry flavor. My dad picks colanders full, heaping piles of warm berries ready to be enjoyed. My favorite way to eat them as a kid was combined with a little sugar and heaped on a scoop of vanilla ice cream. Perfection. This recipe highlights the flavor and intense color of these berries in a perfect summer treat.
I wanted to play with a pesto that combined two harvests that coincide - the first of the garlic scapes and the last of the arugula. Both create delicious pesto on their own but combined create something extra special. The addition of toasted garlic cloves adds richness and mellowness in contrast to the peppery punch of this pesto.
Once they are cooked, that is where the magic happens. Their flavor changes into a sweet, mellow green, fresh and delectable. They remind me of asparagus and green beans combined, with similar textures and their own unique flavor.
This simple syrup uses up plenty of rhubarb and makes the perfect addition to a summer cocktail, or to create a simple rhubarb soda. I was also amazed at the intense pink color of the syrup, making it a stunning drink to serve at our summer gatherings.
It is an incredibly simple salad, just crisp spring lettuce, green onions, and poppy seed dressing. When both are fresh from the garden, this salad sings. The tangy and sweet dressing marries everything together beautifully. In my garden I like to grow a crunchy texture lettuce - my grandmother grew butterhead type lettuce, which has a soft, buttery texture.
One of the first dishes of the night was guacamole with shelling peas. It was incredible. The spicy and creamy guacamole was elevated by the perfect balance of fresh peas, adding texture and sweet contrast to the dip. Of all the food we enjoyed that night, I could not forget that simple dish.
Both these tender thinnings and more mature carrot greens make a wonderfully velvety, fresh, and bright pesto. If the carrot tops are from more mature carrots, use only the leaves and add a squeeze of lemon to cut any bitterness in the sauce. This pesto makes a delicious spring appetizer spread on toasted baguettes.
This scramble combines crispy buttery mushrooms atop pillowy soft eggs and crusty, tangy bread. The ricotta is folded into the eggs right as they finish cooking to add pockets of cheese and rich flavor to the scramble. Try different mushrooms throughout the year as they become available - we love this dish with a mix of yellow oyster and shiitake mushrooms as well. A side of market canteloupe makes a perfect summer brunch. I cannot wait to head to the market to make this meal again.
Yesterday my husband and I had a wonderful morning at the Mill City Farmer’s Market. I was asked to shop the market and create a simple meal from what we purchase. We meandered the aisles, chatting with vendors about the mushrooms in season, the best bundle of beets and how to create the best sourdough bread. We spent a couple hours taking it all in, stopping for breakfast to mull over meal ideas and finally filled our basket to the brim with stunning produce.
Now the fun part! Let's start talking vegetables! Dreaming about plants is so much fun. I love to think though all different varieties, even way more than I could plant, then hone into the very best plants to grow for our palette, yield, and growing season. I also like to include a few varieties of things I have never grown or cooked to keep things interesting in the garden and kitchen.
Every year I try to bring in new varieties of fruits and vegetables inspired by something we enjoyed from our local farmer’s market or from our travels. Many of the new vegetables I have chosen this season are from our vacations. I love how these vegetables where discovered through an experience or memory, and cannot wait to see how they grow in my own garden.
The last few days we have opened up the windows, let the crisp spring air into the house, listening to the birds sing, welcoming in the beginning of spring. This time of year I long to be in the woods, seeing what is poking its green tips out of the ground, what animals are stirring, and hypothesize which trees with produce mushrooms this year.
I grew up in woods filled with white oak trees. The big beautiful trees would drop their tiny capped seeds each season, covering the ground with a blanket of acorns. As I have experimented more with natural dyeing, I have discovered acorns produce incredible colors in the dye bath. On their own, they produce soft and rich shades of golden brown, and when dipped in a second bath of iron water, they produce stunning shades of gray, from soft and dusty dove to rich charcoal.
One goal I had for our trip to Italy last year was to experience fruits and vegetables in season in the part of the world that grows them best. As a gardener and cook, you never know what may inspire you, what you may find to grow in your own garden. Having a garden inspired by travel is so exciting, it’s like reliving the experience of enjoying the vegetable in a whole new way. I am so excited to share some of my favorite vegetable flavors and experiences from our trip. Check out the previous post to hear the first half of our trip starting in Rome and driving to Tuscany in our cute little Fiat Fabio.
Our trip to Italy last June was a dream. From walking the streets of Rome, eating divine gelato, to winding our way through Venice to find the gelato, we enjoyed every second (I promise there was more then gelato).
This year I grew my very first batch of winter squash. I loved watching the vines creep and grow, winding there way up the lattice at the back of my garden bed, and even climbing up the deck stairs! The squash started out so small, swelling throughout the season and transforming into beautifully orange, perfectly tiny honeynut squash.
