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What’s Up at Harmonious Belly

Well, life is full of ups and downs, and boy has that been the case in the past week – hence the light posting. Thought you might like to know what’s been going on.

Life Changes

linus

1. Linus. Last Thursday, this little kitten appeared on the front steps of my apartment building as if out of nowhere. I couldn’t bear to leave him outside to fend for himself – he was obviously someone’s pet. I worked diligently to find his humans – posted flyers, communicated via my extensive social networks, contacted Animal Control – and no one came forth.

In the end, we chose to adopt him and name him Linus (Great Pumpkin/Peanuts reference appropriate for this time of year – thanks to my cousin for the suggestion!). He has a clean bill of health, for which I’m grateful. He’s very friendly and full of kitten energy. Marina, my long time kitty girl, is getting used to him, but is still a bit growly. Hopefully peace will come between them sooner than later.

marina

2. Marina. This is my “senior kitty” at 15 years. She’s been with me through thick and thin. She’s dealing with some health issues, and we are hoping and praying for a positive outcome. That said, she is looking so good these days! Beautiful soft coat, bright eyes, energy. We love her so much.

Harmonious Belly (and Meg) in the News

1. Audiofiles: DIY in NYC. Last month I met with a lovely woman, Michelle Bangert, a CUNY grad student, and we chatted about canning, food swaps, and gardening in NYC. She recorded all our exchanges and a small part of that made it into an episode of Audiofiles, broadcast on WBAI earlier this month. The segment on DIY starts at 25:00 and lasts approximately 4 minutes. You can hear me around 27:00.

Continue reading “What’s Up at Harmonious Belly”

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Hellgate CSA Week 14

CSA Week 14

This week we definitely got a glimpse of fall – enter the winter squash! Exciting, to say the least – I am a huge fan of winter squashes. Additionally, we got:

1 bunch carrots
1 pound green beans
1 head escarole
1 pound sweet peppers
1 pint mini tomatoes (not shown)
(1 acorn squash)
2 pounds apples
2 pounds pears
2 pound concord grapes

The carrots will be fermented; the green beans turned into dilly beans. The tomatoes have just been eaten out of hand pretty much. The escarole is quite bitter, so I’ll likely braise it somehow, perhaps with bacon!

I plan to pickle the grapes.

Apart from these fruits and vegetables, I received a tomato canning share – 20-25 pounds of plum tomatoes.

tomato share from hepworth farm

They look and feel great so far, and I plan to make crushed tomatoes with them. If they do as well as I expect they will, I’ll order another box for next week! Slow roasted tomatoes, yum.

This week was a meat & dairy week, so it was great to replenish my stock of ground beef and turkey sausage. I also ordered two cheese from Nettle Meadow Farm – Kunik and Three Sisters. Both are excellent, but Kunik is out of this world! A very luxurious cheese.

Also, I ordered a batch of “Battenkill Brittle,” which is a kind of crunchy, sweet, seedy brittle. It’s sweetened with brown rice syrup and maple syrup, though it’s not super sweet at all.

Quite a week this week!

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Hellgate CSA Week 8

Hellgate CSA week 8 collage

This is the share we got a couple of weeks ago, on August 2. This was the day before I left for Washington, so I left most of it for our housesitter. So, we got:

1 head of lettuce
1 bunch radishes
2 pounds mixed of summer squash and cucumber
2 bell peppers
1 pound white peaches
1 pound plums
1 pound donut peaches

I ate half the tomatoes the night before I left. I took a few donut peaches and plums with me on the airplane, and they were a welcome change from the starchy snacks I was offered there.

I ended up fermenting the radishes with carrots from the week prior, and am excited to see how this mixture comes out.  The white peaches ended up going into peach thyme jam this weekend.

The following week, Week 9, will not be documented, for a variety of logistical reasons. Week 10 is this week, though!

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Hellgate CSA Week 5

CSA Week 5
Week 5 shares from the Hellgate CSA

This week we resumed receiving CSA shares (last week there was no delivery due to the Independence Day holiday). The biggest surprise was a pint of cherry tomatoes in our fruit share!  All in all, we received:

1 pound of fava beans
1 bunch of fennel
1 bag of snap peas
1 head of lettuce
1 bunch of swiss chard (broccoli rabe was another choice)
two apples
2 pounds of yellow plums
1 quart of sour cherries

I’ve already eaten a lot of this. The tomatoes are gone – last night I cooked half them with two of the zucchinis in olive oils and garlic, plus fresh herbs from my deck. Today I had them in a raw salad with more zucchini. The favas were sauteed in olive oil with garlic at the end and topped with a little fleur de sel.

The sour cherries will become cherry liqueur and hot cherry preserves. As I write this the cherries are macerating with dried peppers, vanilla bean, and sugar for preserves, and the liqueur is coming to be with cherries and sugar sitting in rum and vodka.

I may make a plum syrup with any of the plums we don’t eat simply out of hand.

Let me tell you – it is so great to have the veggies and fruit back!

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Hellgate CSA Week 3

CSA week 3 collage
Our third share of the season

This week’s superstar element in the CSA share was the two quarts of strawberries from Hepworth Farms – they are spectacular. Wonderful strawberry flavor and the texture is fantastic. Firm yet silky. We also got apples in our fruit share, which was a surprise, but shouldn’t have been – Hepworth Farms grows something like 40 different kinds of apples on their land in Milton, NY.

For the vegetable share, we also got:

1 HUGE head of green leaf lettuce (we are overwhelmed with greens)
1 bunch swiss chard
1 larger bag of snap peas
1 bunch of lavender (smells amazing)
1 pint of strawberries

All told, we received 10 cups of strawberries. Just… wow. I love this time of year!

More exciting news – next week I’ll be hosting at my apartment a canning workshop for my CSA, taught by my friend and fellow core group member AJ. He’ll be teaching us how to can strawberry lemon preserves, as well as teaching basic water bath canning best practices. It should be awesome.

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The End of Summer

Although it’s still warm here in NYC, since Labor Day it’s really felt like summer has ended. Once the temperatures become more moderate, it will really feel like fall.  I am of mixed feelings about this – normally I don’t care much about or for fall, in my mind it’s just the transition season to The Dreaded Winter.  I am not big on the frigid weather of the Northeast.  However, this year’s summer was so terribly scorching hot, with multiple 90+ degree temperature days in a row, cooler weather can’t come soon enough.  I am eager for fall.

First tipoff to the transition out of summer – I received an acorn squash in my CSA share this past week.  I’ll save it for a cooler day, though – I absolutely love winter squash of all kinds, so this is an awesome score!

I expect I’ll have some green tomatoes to fry later in the season.  To my surprise, my paste and Prudens Purple tomatoes are still producing!  I really thought the Prudens Purple tomato was on its way out for sure, but there are a few little tomatoes on the plant, and none have blossom end rot so far.

I think the BER problem really was with me – I don’t believe I watered the tomatoes nearly enough this year, which would explain how nutrients couldn’t get to the fruit.  I’ve been watering more intensely this past few weeks, and all the tomatoes are doing much, much better.  I have close to a dozen little paste tomatoes hanging on, too!

The mystery plant – the one that looked like a cucumber plant – is not a cucumber at all.  I think it might be a melon or a winter squash – the fruit is small and hard, about the size of a large fig.  I have no idea where it came from, but I’m enjoying watching it grow and do its thing.

In general, the garden is looking quite rag-tag. The lemon cucumbers are at their end; the tomatillos did not fruit one whit; the tomato plants are looking scraggly.  It’s a little scary looking out there right now.

I’ll be in Portland OR for a few days and hope to enjoy some of the delicious food in the Pacific Northwest.  I’ll bring my camera and take pictures and share some of them here after I return.

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CSA Bounty – Weeks Twelve and Thirteen

I neglected to post about last week’s CSA share, so I’m including it here.  Last week was a bust, in part to being sick on and off and feeling great fatigue.  I am feeling better, though, after sleeping a lot.  Sometimes the body just wants to rest more than at other times.  These 90 degrees + weather doesn’t help, either.  Anyway, the shares!

Week Twelve:

Week 12 collage

Pictured, left to right, top to bottom: green beans, plums, cubanelle peppers, cucumbers, yellow paste tomatoes, nectarines, basil, summer squash, green bell peppers, apples, tomatoes.

So many yummy things.  The tomatoes were fantastic, I must say – nothing beats an August tomato. I made a tomato mozzarella salad with them.

We got an interesting pepper, the cubanelle, which is sweet.  The basil was fabulous.  Cucumbers and summer squash, all very good.  I made zucchini fritters which turned out great; however I didn’t take a picture.  Next time.

The fruit is almost all gone, except for the plums, of which we got a lot.   I think it was 2 pounds of little baby plums!  So cute, and so many.

Week Thirteen:

Week 13 collage

Pictured, left to right, top to bottom: prunes, nectarines, peppers, leeks, yellow wax beans, cherry tomatoes, apples, summer squash, eggplant.

Last night I used the peppers, leeks, zucchini, and tomatoes in a farro salad (recipe to come).  It was marvelous!  Some of the tomatoes were a little overripe, but it didn’t matter with the salad.  Didn’t matter when I popped them on their own in my mouth, either!  So sweet and delicious.

I’ll roast the eggplant this week, and probably parboil and freeze the beans.  I don’t know what I’ll do with all the prunes I received – 2.5 pounds, which is plenty.  Must search for a recipe.  The apples got rave reviews at my home, and I expect we’ll finish those and the nectarines by next week.

These summer fruits and vegetables are so amazing, I almost can’t stand it!  I am so very, very fortunate to have access to such excellent local produce.