BostonZest

Fennel and Pickled Onion Salad: Quick, Easy, and Delicious!

When we have hot weather, you can be pretty sure we'll be eating cool food. Something like this fennel and pickled onion salad is perfect. It's easy to make, refreshing, and healthy.

On the last day of a recent heatwave, Penny found a bulb of fennel in our crisper drawer. She had a jar of red onion pickled in apple cider vinegar, salt, and sugar. (This was the remainder of a red onion she used to make our favorite version of gazpacho on the first hot day.) 

She cut the fennel into thin slices, added a bit of scallion for color, and drizzled the pickled onion and some of the pickling liquid onto the fennel. Then it just took a few dollops of olive oil and a few grinds of black pepper to have this salad on our table.

This batch of pickled onion developed a pretty pink hue that really looked great on the plate. We've had batches that have had a much deeper tone like the one above. 

We're already thinking up items to add to this dish for some variety. Penny wished she had a tart apple like a Granny Smith today, so the next time we have it, thin slices of apple may make an appearance. 

Here are a couple more of our pickled onion posts:

It's Great to Have Pickled Red Onion on Hand. My Two-Ingredient Method and Tips for Enjoying Your Treasure

A Follow-Up on Our Pickled Red Onion Post

 

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: ©2017 Penny & Ed Cherubino 

Different Cooks Have Different Styles of Meal Planning

For us, meal planning becomes far easier when the local farmers market swings into town with an evolving selection of seasonal food. Our food selections for the week start at the market. We call it our “walk-the-market, chat-with-farmers, buy-what-looks-great, and plan-for-what’s-coming” method of shopping. We visit one or more farmers markets a week.

If this walk-around, scout-the-best-system doesn’t suit you, consult a seasonal vegetable chart available from a site like www.farmfresh.org. There you can enter your zip code, select the harvest calendar, and see a full-season chart of what’s expected to be fresh each month. If you combine this with social media updates from your favorite farms, you can plan your meals from your desktop.

Star of the Day!

When asparagus appears on farm stands, we plan meals around that short-lived, local season. Yes, we can buy asparagus other times of the year. But, while nice, the asparagus that appears in the mass market just doesn’t compare to what sprouts from rich Hadley, Massachusetts soil.

In season we tend to eat the freshest crops we can find, as simply as possible. This might mean steamed asparagus with hard boiled eggs and a hollandaise sauce on the side. At other times of year, the star of supper might be tomatoes, corn, or Brussels sprouts.

Watch the Sales

Sometimes we plan our week around something we found on special when we shopped, or at a good price because of a seasonal supply at our fishmonger or butcher shop. In winter we watch for sales on organic vegetables and fruit.

The price for the Faroe Islands salmon (above) was exceptionally good. Penny bought enough for two portions for one meal and leftovers for another. She sous vide cooked our Faroe Islands salmon to 115 degrees and then seared it in a blazing hot pan.

The leftovers became part of our salad bowl-for-two the next day.

Look at Your Schedule

There are weeks when Penny will have time to cook a few meals and weeks when her schedule means that there will be a bit of cooking and a bit of takeout to get us through some busy days. Shopping and cooking take time. If you try to cram both into an already full week, you’ll only add stress to your life.

 

Two of Penny's new, favorite, inspiring cookbooks are Scandinavian Comfort Food by Trine Hahnemann and A Change of Appetite by Diana Henry.  

Find a New Recipe

Most cooks have a handful of meals they make all the time without a formal recipe in sight.

If you are ready for a change in routine or if you have a special occasion, pull out a cookbook or visit a favorite food site and find a variation on one of your family favorites.

If your beef meatloaf is met with yawns, find a recipe that uses a different meat, spice, or glaze. Instead of your usual lasagna, find one that features a new vegetable, sauce, or cheese.

Here’s where it’s important to know which cookbooks, websites, and resources will give you well-tested recipes that work the first time you follow them. Food sites that include recipe testers’ comments along with the recipe are favorites around here. Two sites we trust are www.Epicurious.com and www.LeitesCulinaria.com.

Some cooks accomplish meal planning on the run by standing in front of the open refrigerator and seeing what’s on hand. Others plan a week by having special days like meatless Monday or Sunday roast. You may write out the week’s plan on a blackboard or ad lib around what you found in the marketplace.

All these forms of meal planning are great, especially if, by the end of the week, you and your family have had a nutritious, balanced diet that included a lot of whole grains, fruit, and vegetables.

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: ©2017 Penny & Ed Cherubino 
(Adapted for BostonZest from one of our Fresh & Local newspaper columns.)

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Fig, Arugula & Goat Cheese Salad

Occasionally, Penny will follow a recipe from a new cookbook to the letter, to be sure her results are the same as the author. It's a good way to test the reliability of the instructions. But, sometimes, there is no way for us to enjoy the recipe as written because of an allergy to an ingredient or because we would have to shop for a few items before we could try it. 

This fig and arugula salad is a good example. Penny spotted figs in the grocery store and remembered a recipe she had marked in Naturally Nourished: Healthy, Delicious Meals Made with Everyday Ingredients by Sarah Britton.

Sarah's recipe was dressed with a toasted walnut sauce which would not work with one of our allergies. But the combo of arugula and figs was certainly worth exploring.

We had an open package of goat cheese that was waiting to be used, so some of that was sprinkled around the figs and greens. For a dressing Penny made a raspberry vinaigrette. (That was made with a local organic gem, Silferleaf Farm Raspberry Infusion Sweet Vinegar.)

This salad was not just delicious, it was spectacular! What's more, it will become a model for salads that can keep us eating healthy all summer long. We'll combine one tangy seasonal green with one ripe and luscious fruit and some dabs of creamy cheese and top with a dressing that will bring out the best in that combination.

 

What's on your Food Lover's Shopping List?

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: ©2017 Penny & Ed Cherubino 

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Julia Child Said You Should Make “... Good Food From Fresh Ingredients.”

“You don't have to cook fancy or complicated masterpieces - just good food from fresh ingredients.” Julia Child

This plate of fresh goodness only required a little scrubbing, slicing, and seasoning to become a supper for two on Sunday evening. With a plate of good bread off to the side, we were both happy.

That meal began with a basket full of fresh organic produce from the Copley Farmers Market. For information on area farmers markets, we have a post we're keeping updated. 

Boston Area Spring-to-Fall Farmers Market Opening Dates

On Monday we added some of those goodies to a beautiful gazpacho. We try to shop with care – buy what we can use up while it's at its best, reduce the amount of food we waste, and get the best value out of our food dollars.

We think Julia would approve of our food philosophy. 

Related Post:

Garnish Gazpacho with Avocado Like Panificio Does!

About Photo Tales & Quotes: We keep hearing that people miss our cover photos that ran for years in the Back Bay Sun. That assignment was to provide a photo that showed what the week was like in the neighborhood. Often the photos illustrated favorite quotations. Photo Tales & Quotes is an occasional offering to our BostonZest readers featuring photos along the same theme but taken wherever we happen to be.

Do you have an Amazon Gift Certificate to use? Or do you need to buy one for a gift? Remember to click over to Amazon from here to support this site!

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photography: © 2017 Penny Cherubino  

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Minestrone: a Soup for All Seasons

When was your last bowl of hearty, delicious, nutritious minestrone? This classic but adaptable vegetable soup seems to have slipped off menus and off the radar of home cooks like me. Yet, it deserves to be rediscovered, explored, and adapted for today’s food lovers.

Jacqueline Church’s pot of minestrone is not only delicious, nutritious, filling, and economical, it’s also vegan. A soup for all eaters! (photo credit: Jacqueline Church)

Great Minds …

Food writer Rachel Roddy featured minestrone in one of her recent columns for the Guardian. She wrote that minestrone, “... sums up the Italian knack for taking the most basic and economic ingredients and bringing them together in a delicious way.” She referred to her trusted Italian food experts, like Marcella Hazan, when writing about all the regional and seasonal variations on this pot of goodness.

 

Roddy's book My Kitchen in Rome: Recipes and Notes on Italian Cooking is one of my favorite cookbooks from the past year.

From my own bookshelf, I reached for Lynne Rossetto Kasper’s “The Italian Country Table” and found a summer minestrone that she says should be served at room temperature. This was followed by her more traditional recipe for the soup with serving variations and a brilliant two-page spread of tips for perfecting your own pot of vegetables and broth.  

"Eating Down the Fridge’ Meal ..."

A few days later, Jacqueline Church, culinary instructor at Brookline Adult & Community Education and private cooking coach, posted a photo of a steaming pot of vegan minestrone on her Facebook feed. Since I always seem to learn something new from this food educator, I asked her what she loves about this soup.

Her answer was, “It's perfect for an ‘eating down the fridge’ meal, key ingredients can be kept on hand in the pantry: box or can of beans, dried porcini, handful of pasta, can or box of tomatoes. In the fridge, we almost always have carrots, celery, onion. Add a bit of cabbage languishing in the bin, some seasonal squash (zucchini in the summer, butternut in the winter) a few potatoes. With kidney beans and porcini you've got umami (strain the soaking liquid and add that) so the whole thing can be customized to what you have on hand. Hearty and satisfying, it may be the ultimate comfort food!”

   

Finally, one of the chilly days we spent in Provincetown recently was warmed by a "Spring Minestrone" with chard, peas, carrots, and chicken from the wonderful food team at The Canteen.

Learning Experience

This is also an excellent soup for cooks to learn basic skills. Roddy writes, “Minestrone is made with a staggered march into the pan. By adding the ingredients gradually you lay down foundations of flavour, one thing sizzling gently while you chop the next. Once everything is in the pan – including the marvellous, umami parmesan rind if you have one – let everything simmer, slowly, until the flavours have come together.”

The Italians call this process, “insaporire” which sort of translates to “making tasty.” Marcella Hazan describes it as drawing out the flavor of an ingredient or set of ingredients before adding the next one. It’s like sweating onions, celery, and carrots in oil before adding broth or meat.

Big Soup!

Perhaps restaurants found that if customers ordered a bowl of minestrone, they filled up on it and didn’t order much food to follow. In Italian the word for soup is minestra. The suffix “-one” adds the concept of “big.” Therefore minestrone means big soup.

But that doesn't mean it has to be a heavy, wintertime soup. Perhaps this is the time of year for a green minestrone. I found Joanne Weir’s recipe for that in Food and Wine. She uses many of the first green vegetables we find at the farmers markets. It has leeks, fennel, peas, asparagus, Swiss chard, and mint with just a shaving of Parmesan on top.

Buon Appetito!

 

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photos: ©2017 Penny & Ed Cherubino 

(Adapted for BostonZest from one of our Fresh & Local newspaper columns.)

 

 

Boston Area Spring-to-Fall Farmers Market Opening Dates

Pull out your calendars and mark the dates when you can go and see our Boston area farmers market friends at their outdoor spots. These dates are for the 2017 spring-to-fall season. This will now be a permanent resource page on this topic so bookmark it and come back when you need the information and we'll update it as we have new information.

First, The News!

With the Boston Public Market (100 Hanover Street) established as a permanent, indoor, year-round stop for shoppers to support local food growers and producers, the Boston Public Market Association will not be running a seasonal farmers market along the Greenway adjacent to their indoor location this year. They will focus on supporting the vendors at the BPM and their Dewey Square farmers market location.

Again this year there will be a second day for the South End/SoWa Farmers Market on Harrison Avenue. You can shop for local food at this popular venue on both Saturdays and Sundays. Neighbors have expressed concerns about the popularity of this market and the second day of the market was in question for a short time.

As shoppers we can help with this situation by being considerate of the market neighbors. If you can walk to the market, please do so. The Silver Line runs nearby Harrison Avenue so the MBTA should be your second choice. If you do come by car, be aware that traffic and parking are difficult not only for you, but also for the folks who live there. This same is true of any farmers market you visit.

May Markets

Boston Public Market: Open daily, year-round 

South End/SoWa Open Market: April 29th (Saturdays & Sundays)

Egleston Jamaica Plain: May 6th (Saturdays)

Jamaica Plain (677 Centre Street): May 7th (Saturdays) 

Copley Square: May 12th (Tuesdays & Fridays)

Union Square, Somerville: May 13th (Saturdays)

Central Square, Cambridge: May 15th (Mondays)

South Station/Dewey Square: May 16th (Tuesdays & Thursdays)

Davis Square, Somerville: May 17th (Wednesdays)

Cambridge Center (Kendall MBTA): May 17th (Wednesdays)

June Markets

Brookline/Coolidge Corner: June 1st (Thursdays)

Roslindale: June 3rd (Saturdays) 

Harvard University Farmers Market, Cambridge: June 6th (Tuesdays) (no market 7/4, 8/22 & 29, 10/24)

Oak Square, Brighton: June 7th (Wednesdays) 

Dorchester/Ashmont/Peabody Square: June 23rd (Fridays)

Allston/Harvard Farmers Market: June (Fridays) (Not confirmed)

Allston Village, 500 Cambridge St: June (Saturdays) (Not confirmed)

Cambridgeport: June (Saturdays) (Not confirmed)

Boston Medical Center Shapiro Lobby, 840 Harrison Avenue: June (Thursdays)

Mission Hill/Roxbury, Brigham Circle: Mid-June (Thursdays) 

July Markets

 Charlestown: Thompson Square at Main & Austin Street: July (Wednesdays)

 East Boston/Central Square 209 Summer Street: July (Wednesdays)

If you have confirmed dates for your favorite farmers market, please tell us in a comment or send us an email and we'll add it as an update to this post.

We use and highly recommend a Rolser Shopping Trolley for your farmers market visits. It stands on its own and can haul your purchases over city sidewalks without a problem.

See our review of The Boston Homegrown Cookbook: Local Food, Local Restaurants, Local Recipes. It's full of chefs, farmers, and food producers you know, and we highly recommend it. Remember, always click over to Amazon from here to support this site!

 

    

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photography: © 2017 Penny Cherubino  

Boston Area Winter Farmers Market Schedule: Our Updated Resource Page for 2017-2018 Season

The open air farmers market season is nearly over and it's time for us to start our list of the 2017-2018 Winter Farmers Markets in the Boston area. We'll add to this list as we discover more markets opening. And, if you bookmark this page, we'll keep it updated for future years as we hear of new dates and openings.

We have updated all the markets listed below for 2017-2018.

Boston Public Market

The Boston Public Market is open 7 days a week. Here you’ll find: farmers, craft brewers, cheesemakers, local meat, and Red's Best (an outstanding seafood vendor), bakeries, and artisan food producers.

Located at 100 Hanover Street, Boston, MA 02108. 

Hours: Monday - Saturday, 8am — 8pm, Sunday 10am — 8pm 

Check the market's twitter and facebook pages for specific weather and holiday closings.

Brookline Winter Farmers Market 

Winter Indoor Farmers Markets Around Boston 

Check the links to confirm details on these markets before you set out on your shopping trip.

Boston Public Market, 100 Hanover Street at Haymarket Station, Monday - Saturday, 8am - 8pm, Sunday 10am - 8pm (year-round)

Boston/Egleston Winter Farmers Market, Urbano Project, 29 Germania St, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130 (map) Saturdays, 10:00 am to 2:00 pm, (Every Saturday *: November - February *We are closed on Saturday, November 25, 2017 & December 23rd & 30th)

Brookline Winter Farmers Market at The Arcade Building, 318 Harvard Street, (map) Sundays
11:00 am to 3:00 pm (November 19, 2016 thru April 2018)

Somerville Winter Farmers Market, 191 Highland Avenue, (map) Saturdays, 9:30 am to 2:00 pm (December 2, 2017- April 14, 2018 )

Cambridge Winter Farmers Market, 5 Callender Street, (map) Saturdays, 10:00 am to 2:00 pm (January 6th-April 7th, 2018)

Dorchester/Codman Square Winter Farmers Market, 6 Norfolk Street, Dorchester, in the Great Hall (map) Saturdays 10 am to 1 pm (January 27to March 31) 

Chelmsford Agway Winter Farmers Market, 24 Maple Road, Chelmsford, MA (map) Saturdays, 10:00 am to 2:00 pm (November 4, 2017 - February 24, 2018) Thanks to the reader who sent this one our way. 

Roslindale Winter Farmers Market, 30 Birch Street, Roslindale, MA (map) Saturdays, 10:00 am to 2:00 pm (January 6th to March 31, 2018)

 

Destination Markets Worth the Trip

Wayland/Russell's Garden Center Winter Farmers Market, 397 Boston Post Road, Rte 20 (map) Saturdays, 10:00 am to 2:00 pm (January 6th - March 10th, 2018)

Newburyport Winter Farmers Market, Tannery Marketplace, 50 Water Street (map)
Sundays 9:00 am to 1:00 pm, Dec. 3 & 10, 2017, Jan. 7 & 21, Feb. 4 & 18, March 4 & 18, April 8 & 22, 2018

Plymouth Indoor Winter Market, 137 Warren Ave, Plymouth, MA (map) 2:30-6:30, Second Thursday of the month, November 2017 thru May 2018  

Stillman's Farm and Stillman Quality Meats will both be at the Boston Public Market.

Do you have a favorite place to shop for local foods in winter? Let us know!

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Do You Have a Great Farmers Market Plan & Kit? Tools We Use & Love!

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Do you have an Amazon Gift Certificate to use? Or do you need to buy one for a Holiday Gift? Remember to click over to Amazon from here to support this site!

 

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Words: Penny & Ed Cherubino
Photography: © 2011 - 2017 Penny & Ed Cherubino