Day 197-200 LocalrootZ Project (July 19-22, 2010)

And what a week so far... a bit of cheating but only for some special Birthday dinners for Cassi...

Another typical early morning breakfast to start my day...

A wonderful combination of fresh corn from Merriweather Farm (saw it on my spin home from work, going through the monday farmers market) sungolds, chard & zucchini from our garden

and a little raw cheddar to top it off... Yum

 the garden in its second stage... Huge tomatoes... they were overtaking the neighbors plot so I had to lasso them and tie them back into my "space".  Tons of tomatoes to come....

 Carrots and cukes are doing quite well...

I had to pull up most of the onions because the cukes were choking them out !

 Here is todays take... lots of baby onions, as well as some baby carrots because I needed to thin them out a bi...t as well as good batch of chard, cukes and zucchini !

 

After alot of weeding I made some tasty cherry ice cream with leftover cherries from Old Ocean Farm

 

the rooftop peppers are doing very well...

 as well as our grilled salad bowl...

 

 our first cayenne of the season....

 

another view...

 

lots of different tomatoes are greening up with fruit

 

eggplant is coming in too !

 

We are having an early birthday celebration with Cassi's Mom and her other half Rick.  Here is the ingredients I started with minus the roasting cauliflower and potatoes... our first eggplant and alot of other things from our garden !

 

 My first homemade rieta... a combination of fennel, cukes some creme fraiche and salt

 we took it outside and they brought some extra fixings to fill out the meal... samosas and naan as well as a bowl of basmati rice !

 

 It was very very good....

on Wednesday I took Cassi out for dinner @ Caiola's in the west end to celebrate her big day... a day early, because she had to work on her birthday.... I would highly recommend Caiola's to anyone looking for a well balanced, high end dinner with alot of great selections !

We had Polenta fries with red peppers sauce and whipped cheddar

A house salad with cider vinaigrette dressing

A mussel and saffron cream sauce pasta dish

A whole fennel crusted sea bass with broccoli raab on the side

We also indulged in many of their specialty drinks at the bar !

And then her birthday lunch...

 

Alot of leftovers from the week with a few added surprises for the special day !

Ok back on track... lets try this again what do ya say !  Gotta start taking it one day at a time...

Day 123 LocalrootZ Project (May 05,2010)

Breakfast

Plain Swallowtail Yogurt

w/ honey

Lunch
Maine Sea Biscuits

Dinner 

Spring Green Salad

 w/ fermented slaw

Baked Italian Style Haddock

w/ Spinach

Poverty Hill Farmhouse Cider

Today I replicated last weeks dinner of Italian style parm... starting with cornmeal and herb dusted haddock that pan fried in Caldwell Farm butter and sunflower oil.  That gets topped with a sauce concocted of Snell Farms green garlic onion, Olivia's Garden Cherry Tomatoes as well as the key ingredient which is lovage from Thirty Acre.  Lovage has a very celery like taste but when added to the sauce it opens into a more complex array of garden style veggies making it perfect for the early spring when resources are low ! After the sauce is laid, I grate a nice ball of Swallowtail Mozzarella and Ragged Island Romano cheeses on top and bake for about a half hour.  I like to serve it over a bed of fresh Rippling Waters Farm spinach to give it a little crunch and texture.  I was very pleased with the results the second time around... especially since it was shared with Cassi's mom Debbie and her other half, Rick.  They seemed to enjoy the dinner and were curious about the source of some of the ingredients as well as the preparation.  My favorite part of cooking dinner for friends and family is the act of inspiring people to cook more... and based on how the conversation dipped into making more time to cook a priority Id say we were successful at inspiring ! Any how it was a very pleasant meal and our attempt at a Mother's Day celebration.  A bit early I know but we have a wedding in Gloucester, MA this weekend and will be staying along the coast of Rockport leaving us many miles away on the actual date.

Transportation Today

Work Commute : 18 miles bicycle