Just returned from the Dupont Freshfarm Market with a bunch of things, including two new items for testing this week:
Now i’ve had red cabbage before, but I’ve never cooked it myself - so this is something new, in a sense. And the Chinese broccoli is completely new to me, so that’ll be fun.
So one of my goals for the eating locally challenge was to sample a new food each week. Last week’s stinging nettles was a great success, leaving us excited to try something else. Unfortunately, we slept in last Sunday and my top two new samples — rhubarb and duck eggs — had already sold out. There didn’t seem to be a lot there that we hadn’t tried before, so we bought some dandelion greens, figuring we could make them into a salad or stir-fry.
Everyone knows the dandelion. It runs rampant everywhere, delighting children when it goes to seed and vexing gardeners and lawn-mowers alike. A member of the aster family, the dandelion goes beyond its decorative purpose and can be used as a food source. (If you use fertilizer on your lawn or have pets that use the backyard as a bathroom, I would not recommend picking your own; otherwise, go ahead.)
Dandelion flowers can be used to make wine. The iron-rich leaves can be used as a salad green, in a stir-fry, or in soup. Its roots are similar to chicory’s and, when roasted, can be used as a coffee substitute for those who like the taste. Dandelion root is also sold as a diuretic in pharmacies in many countries, where it is drunk, I believe, as a tea. Finally (and in a non-culinary use), some people use the milky sap from the dandelion stem as either a mosquito repellent, a wart cure, or as a rubber substitute (the last using the Russian variety).
A confession here: I don’t particularly like bitter foods. I have a sweet tooth. I enjoy salt. I like spicy and I like sour.
So it should not perhaps, come as a surprise, that when Rudi came up with a salad on the internet that was comprised of raw dandelion greens and tomato combined with a balsamic vinaigrette that it was not immediately going to wow me.
I wanted to like it. I did. I like the smell of dandelions and the greens taste almost exactly like the flowers smell. And it was palatable when I put some ranch dressing on top. But I would not intentionally choose to make a salad with dandelion greens on their own again because it was just really not that pleasant to eat.
It could be that our leaves were older ones and therefore more bitter than you would usually include in a salad. Or, perhaps, mixed with milder lettuces, like butter or romaine, dandelion could add some flavor to the combination. And we have yet to try it in a stir-fry, where bitter greens tend to work extremely well.
We did well for ourselves during the first week of the eating locally challenge.
Monday: Rudi whipped up a stirfry for supper, combining marinated tofu and rice with local baby tat soi, broccoli, and sweet potato.
Tuesday: Rudi decided to make his own pasta sauce for the first time. He combined canned tomatoes with dried basil from last summer’s plant, green garlic and garlic chives.
Wednesday: We had local greens and tomatoes on our tuna sandwiches for lunch. Also, the strawberries were beginning to look a little sad, so I trimmed them, added some sugar, and used them and some fresh whipped cream to top the leftover cake Gramma made for Easter. Yummy!
Thursday: Nettle soup
Friday: I had read that hardboiled egg both contrasts well color-wise and tastes good with the nettle soup. It also added a little hardiness to the soup that was nice. (Particularly right before an all-nighter.)
Saturday: I believe this would the day off for the week. I ate peanut butter balls sold by (and thus presumably made locally) the Howard County 4-H folks, but that might be pushing it to include them.
Sunday: Blueberry scones with local mascarpone and farm-fresh yogurt made for a quick, but tasty brunch right before a ballgame. And dinner was pasta with more of Rudi’s homemade sauce.
We got to this week’s farmers’ market too late for rhubarb and there were no duck eggs (my back-up plan), so we came home with dandelion greens to make something with this week. We’ll let you know how it goes!
As Kirstin said earlier, we’re trying to eat as much local produce as possible this month. So when the local farm market had stinging nettles, we decided to take the plunge and try them out.
Nettles are a family of flowering plant that’s native in the greater DC area. The plants are covered in small, brittle hairs that contain a chemical cocktail that stings if it pierces the skin - they’re the embodiment of the attack plants in the Harry Potter series of books. This is a natural defense for the nettle in the wild, and a deterrent to many amateur chefs. The sign over the basket containing bags of nettles said “wear rubber gloves when handling them.”
And they’re correct: the things do sting, even through thin work gloves. Apparently it is possible to avoid the sting with careful handling, but better safe than uncomfortable. And the best thing: cooking or crushing the nettles destroys the defense mechanism, and they’re very tasty, nutrient-rich, and their deep green color adds a nice contrast to soups and sauces.
So last night, I donned the gloves and made my first nettle dish. A big tip ‘o the hat to Chocolate & Zucchini for the recipe.
Nettle Soup (Soupe aux Orties)
* - I didn’t peel the white potatoes I used, and the soup’s consistency was fine. I’d imagine that a tough-skinned russet might be a bit too fibrous, though.
Serve hot, preferably with fresh, crusty bread.
Notes:
I used thin vinyl “handyman” gloves, and still got stung in a few places, so if you’re using something thin, double-layer. The sting wears off in about a day, give or take. Aloe and cortisone creams can help alleviate the itch and burn.
Also, the amount of salt listed in the recipe was a bit too little for the batch I made - thus the call to adjust seasonings in the end. If you want more kick, add a little cayenne pepper toward the end, before blending.
A big tip ‘o the hat to Chocolate & Zucchini for the recipe.
May is the month-long Eat Locally challenge sponsored by Life Begins at 30 and Locavores.
Some people go whole-hog and refuse even to drink beverages or use spices that aren’t locally produced. I am not so die-hard nor so willing to sacrifice. My aspirations are decidedly smaller, but I’m content with them:
We at Off the Eaten Path will strive to eat something locally produced every day. We also will consume something new from the farmer’s market each week in May in order to broaden our horizons about the types of food that are available and that we enjoy. Finally, we also will try a local restaurant this month where we have not eaten before in order to support local food businesses.
Our local farmers’ market defines local as within 150 miles of Washington, D.C., and that seems reasonable to me.
We reserve the right to take one day off a week (although we’ll try not to need to).
To find new foods to add to the repertoire. To continue to support local agriculture. To consume what we buy without waste. To try some new recipes. To blog here more often about our experiences in the kitchen and with the local restaurant scene. And most of all I hope to be pleasantly surprised that this will not be a stretch for us taking into consideration that we already buy a large portion of our food locally at the farmers’ market.