Squash with Blossoms Intact & Sweetmeat Platter

This week I've been featuring the various vegetable sides I served with barbecued lamb last Friday night at the urban farm I was care-taking.

Barbara and Morris, whose farm it is, are back from their vacation. Barbara emailed me that she's been enjoying reading the posts about her garden. She was particularly taken with the idea of stuffed squash blossoms - she thought she might try and make them.

If you've been thinking you might like to try your hand at stuffing squash blossoms, and if you're also concerned with the work involved, you may prefer to try the vegetable side I'm featuring today.

Pan-sauteed summer squash, with blossom intact, (pic above) is the fourth and last vegetable side I prepared as an accompaniment to the barbecued lamb. Just as stuffed squash blossoms look pretty on the plate, so too do blossoming baby squash, and sauteing the whole baby squash is much easier and less fiddly than removing the blossom and stuffing it.

Having sung the aesthetic praises of the dish in the pic above, I have to admit I'm not a fan of the taste of yellow squash. I love the flavor of green zucchini, particularly baby zucchini, which is mild and indistinct. Conversely, yellow squash has a distinct flavor; it's not subtle like green zucchini.

Perhaps you feel differently or perhaps you hadn't detected a flavor difference. Regardless, do try impressing your friends or family with this pretty veggie.

Sauteed Squash with Blossoms Intact
1) If you can pick baby squash from your own garden do so, if not, you may be able to find squash with the blossom still intact at a gourmet grocer.
2) Wash squash and gently cut stamen from inside the blossom.
3) Heat a skillet lined with a little oil or butter or ghee. Ghee, or clarified butter, has a nutty flavor that will enrich the flavor of the squash.
4) Toss whole squash into skillet, moving skillet back and forth across the hot plate so squash doesn't burn on one side.
Note: Because lamb was on the menu, I tossed some sprigs of fresh rosemary into the skillet with the squash. Rosemary goes so well with lamb and because squash can be a bit like a sponge, I knew it would take on the flavor of the herb and act as a rosemary-infused veggie pairing to the lamb.
5) Once squash are lightly browned, turn hot plate to low, put lid on skillet, and allow squash to cook just a few more minutes. Don't overcook the baby squash, they only need a few minutes on the stove and can be served crisp and crunchy.

To Serve: Arrange squash decoratively on a serving platter, adding a few sprigs of rosemary. You might like to serve a small dipping bowl of melted ghee or clarified butter. Dipping the squash into the butter and then eating them with one's fingers is a real treat!

And for dessert, I decided a help-yourself platter of sweetmeats would suffice since lamb is heavy as are root vegetables.

Also, the vegetable sides served with dinner were sweet and earthy so I thought a platter with Barbara's wild strawberries, and the crisp tartness of Braeburn apples would follow well the main meal.

The addition of dried dates and almonds gives the platter a Middle Eastern feel (lamb with dates and almonds is particular to the Middle East). And at the same time, with the absence of soft summer fruits, the platter is very autumnal which also compliments the main meal of fall, root vegetables.

To enrich the platter, I added pieces of Chocolove Chocolate. And that caramel-colored chunk next to the chocolate is Gjetost cheese, a Norwegian goat cheese that's caramel-like with the distinct pungency of goat's milk. It's absolutely delicious with dried fruits, nuts, and crunchy fresh fruits like apple.

And so this is the end of my postings on meals made from Barbara and Morris' urban farm garden. Read back over the past two weeks of posts if you wish to revisit the farm, the photos, the stories, and the sides I made from the fabulous array of fresh-picked summer and fall vegetables.

Kumquat Beets & Buttered Carrots

When I picked the vegetables for the dinner I'm featuring this week, I have to say it was a far more pleasant experience doing so in the tranquility of Barbara's garden rather than at the grocery store.

What a pity that most of us rely on store-bought food over growing our own. However, such is life for people like me who don't have a plot of earth to tend. One day though ...

The beauty of having goats, chickens, and a compost area is that very little went to waste on the farm. I often wish there were something I could do with the tops of carrots, other than chopping them off and tossing them. While at the farm, I fed them to the goats, along with other vegetable trimmings (excluding allium; goats don't do well eating members of the onion family).

The brown or inedible beet leaves, I either tossed out to the free-range chickens or fed to the goats, and the beet leaves that were in good order, I washed, drained, and stored in the fridge. Beet greens are delicious braised in a little oil or butter. Such is the beauty of beets; you can eat both the red bulb and the green leaves.

Barbara's carrots were about 2 -3 inches long. Some were a bit gnarly. Noting the natural imperfection of the carrots' shape, I was reminded of my culinary training days and the tedious hours we spent learning how to shape or turn vegetables.

Because they're dense, root vegetables lend themselves well to the art of reshaping, which is done with a small paring knife.

Traditionally, the vegetable is carved into small oblong shapes, which is the intention of turning -- creating a perfect, symmetrical shape from an otherwise gnarly, misshaped carrot, potato, beet, turnip etc.

The vegetable shavings cut away in the process of creating the oblong shape, were, in my class, never wasted but used to make stock.

Turning was my least favorite lesson. I couldn't help but wonder "why?" "what for?" despite the fact that once cooked and on the plate, I could see that a turned veggie had eye-appeal. In other words, it looks really pretty.

Probably I questioned turning because I wasn't very good at it. Much to my chagrin, there was a woman in my class who was. In fact, she was an artist at turning vegetables and she was apprenticed to a chef at one of Melbourne's top restaurants where she created masterpieces out of gnarled vegetables. I can't believe I was jealous of her talent, but I was.

As you can see from the picture above, I simply cut the carrots I harvested from the garden into chunks. There is not one turned carrot in that dish. In fact if you look closely, you'll see that all the gnarly little bits are still intact.

Buttered Carrots
1) Place carrot chunks in pot of water. Bring to boil. Boil rapidly for about 5 mins. or until carrot is slightly soft on the outside, but still crisp to bite, rather than soft and mushy all the way through.
Note: Root veggies are placed in cold water and brought to the boil, whereas green veggies are plunged into rapidly boiling water.
2) Drain carrots, return to pot, and return pot to a warm hot plate. Toss in a chunk of butter and a handful of chopped parsley. Spoon carrots into a serving bowl as in the picture above.
Note: Here's an easy way to chop parsley: shove a washed and dried handful into a coffee mug, and using kitchen scissors, chop the parsley in the mug.

Kumquat Beets
1) Wash and scrub a couple of beet bulbs, trimming the beets of hairy tentacles. Leave skin on.
2) Toss into a pot and cover with water.
3) Boil gently for about 20 mins.
4) Drain and cool; once cool, peel beets by slipping the tip of a paring knife under the skin and peeling the skin back.
5) Slice peeled beets into quarters.

6) Toss beet quarters back into a pot, return pot to stove and medium heat. Add a glob of kumquat marmalade, or your favorite orange marmalade. Gently stir with wooden spoon till marmalade has melted and coated the beet pieces. Warm the beets through; though be careful not to burn the marmalade.
7) Wash and chop a handful of fresh chives. Spoon beets into a serving bowl, sprinkle chives over beets, decorate with a sprig of green.

Note: There are all sorts of delicious marmalade combination available now: orange/ginger, orange/lemon, plain orange, kumquat/orange, etc. etc. Any of these would work well with beets since it's the citrus bite of the orange, lemon or kumquat that pairs so well with the sweet earthiness of the beets.

Caramelized Shallots

As I mentioned yesterday, root vegetables are ready for harvest now, that is, late summer into early fall.

Unlike the delicate flavor of above ground mid-summer salad vegetables like lettuce, cucumber, tomato, and corn, vegetables that grow under ground are typically denser in texture with an almost earthy flavor.

The earthiness of root veggies means they're great flavor pals to the stronger, sometimes slightly gamey flavor of meats like beef, pork, and lamb.

And as the weather transitions from hot summer days and our inclination to eat cooling, water-dense salads to much cooler early-fall evenings, the warming quality of earthy root vegetables at dinner are a natural.

Hence my reason for picking onion, beets, carrots and squash (though it's an above ground veggie) from Barbara's garden to go with lamb we barbecued last Friday for dinner.

Now, to tell you the truth, the onion I picked and caramelized isn't really a shallot, rather it's a sweet red onion. You can see it in the pic above. It has a reddish-purplish bulb with purplish-green stalk.

I cut away the stalk and peeled away the tougher outer skin to reveal the sweet inner bulb. Often there will be two or three bulbs inside the outer skin. The pic to the left shows clearly the white inner bulbs, and they do look a little like a shallot.

Sweet red onion is already sweet, though it is still pungent. Once caramelized, the pungency diminishes and the sweetness is enhanced, but the onion is still aromatic and slightly crisp.

I love caramelized onion (caramelized anything, actually) I have a wicked sweet tooth so whenever I cook steak or lamb, I love to saute sliced brown onion in butter and toss is a spoonful of brown sugar, which is the basic method for creating the side dish I'm featuring today.

Caramelized Shallots
1) Use either shallots or the sweet red onion I mention above. Peel outer skin to reveal the inner bulb.
2) Pop bulbs into a small pot with a chunk of butter.
3) Put pot on a stove and turn heat to med.
4) Allow butter to melt and coat onion bulbs. Turn heat to low, the onion will gently cook in the butter.
5) At around the 10 min mark, or as the bulbs are softening, add a tablespoon of brown sugar to the pot (about 1 tablespoon of sugar to 1 tablespoon of butter). Stir with a wooden spoon to blend sugar into butter and onion juices.
6) Make sure heat is on low; cook maybe another 5 - 7 mins. You don't want the heat much above low otherwise you'll run the risk of the butter and sugar burning.
7) Pour into a serving a bowl and I think if you do a taste test, you'll find that caramelized shallots don't need seasoning, however, season if you wish.

Garden Fresh Root Veggies with Lamb

When I signed off last week, I mentioned I was about to prepare another delicious feast from Barbara's garden to accompany Australian lamb, which my friend, Catherine (above), offered to contribute to the meal.

Friday was my second to last evening at the urban farm, which means this week I'm writing at a distance, using the photos taken mostly by Julie (in orange top below) as a reminder of the wonderful, late-summer week spent in this verdant oasis just east of the city of Boulder in Colorado.

Prior to dinner, I and my three friends pottered around the property, admiring the garden, playing with the dogs, feeding the goats and collecting the day's eggs from the chicken coop. The 23 chickens laid about 18 eggs a day, most of which I boxed up for Barbara's customers, though there was always some left over for personal consumption.

For last Friday night's meal, there were no eggs involved. And because we were having lamb, I decided to serve root vegetables, plus squash, using herbs again to add flavor to each side dish

I chose root vegetables to go with the lamb in part because it's nearing the end of summer and thus these vegetables are ripe for picking in Barbara's garden, and because they're a great accompaniment to lamb.

The earthy flavors of root veggies compliment the slightly gamey flavor of lamb.

The lamb chops Catherine bought along for our dinner were very thick. Without the time to marinade them, I simply plunged the tip of a knife into the center of each chop and shoving a sliver of garlic and a spring of rosemary into each, and then I seasoned and drizzled them with a little olive oil.

I had Cindy (in blue skirt above), who is more adept than I at lighting a gas barbie, put the chops onto a medium flame until they browned, at which point she turned the flame to low.

At around the 15 min mark, she turned the flame off completely. We left the chops there for another 15 mins or so, gently cooking until they were medium done or pinkish on the inside.

Meanwhile, I finished cooking the vegetable sides:

1. caramelized shallots
2. boiled beets tossed in kumquat marmalade and chopped chives
   
3. buttered baby carrots with parsley, and
   
4. pan-fried baby squash with blossoms intact.

Check back each day this week for simple, method-recipes detailing my approach to cooking each of these sides and for more stories about my week on Barbara's urban farm.

Toward the end of this week, I'll feature a gorgeous photo Julie took of the dessert platter I prepared for the girls, and which we ate sitting around a blazing camp-style fire lit to keep the wretched mozzies at bay.