Tag Archives: vegetable

by | September 30, 2023 · 11:42 pm

Recipes for: Snap Beans

Back in May I wrote about the importance of knowing how to use the diverse foods we grow. Even though this has been a low production year for a lot of crops, a few finally kicked in and started to overwhelm us – beans in particular. Focusing on snap beans in this post, this year we grew rattlesnake, blue lake pole and concador yellow bush beans (the concadors were not a big success). Because snap beans have a short shelf life, they either need to be cooked or put up for the winter within a few days of picking. Here’s how I use them that I enjoy and that can extend the season.

First, we eat them! My favorite recipe for fresh picked beans we call Cheesy Beans. Here it is:

1 pound snap beans, ends removed and cut to the size you like

1 onion, diced

6 garlic cloves, diced

1/8 cup sunflower seeds

1 cup grated cheese (I like Monterey jack)

a little fat – oil or lard

salt to taste

Take a covered baking dish, put in the onion, garlic and fat, then the beans, and sprinkle the seeds and salt on top. I bake that at 350F for 45 minutes or until the beans are tender. When I remove it from the oven I top it with the grated cheese.

I love this dish, but only like it with fresh rather than frozen beans. So, it is a regular on our table during bean harvest, then disappears from the menu until next year.

Since I have such great luck with growing beans, we always end up with more than we can eat at the time. For awhile that was a problem, because I couldn’t find a way to use frozen beans that I liked. You can put them in winter soups and stews, but I don’t love them that way. Then, a few years ago I rediscovered Three Bean Salad. My mother made a bean salad when I was a kid, using canned beans. For some reason the dish came back to my mind and I adapted it for home-grown instead of canned beans. Here’s how I do it:

2 cups snap beans, frozen (or start with fresh snap beans, cook them, and use them without freezing them)

2 cups garbanzo beans, cooked

2 cups dry beans (kidney is traditional, I use Good Mother Stallards since I grow them), cooked

¼ cup red onion, diced

1/3 cup apple cider vinegar

½ cup olive oil

1 tblsp honey

1 tsp salt

Toss it all together and let it marinate for a day before eating.

When I freeze beans I do blanch them first (steam them for a short amount of time). Others tell me they do it without, but I find the beans can get mushy if I don’t blanch.

Three Bean Salad also uses dry beans, which I grow even more of than snap. Dried beans are harvested in the fall and have a really long shelf life, so there is no rush to get them picked and processed which I appreciate. I use especially use them in the winter, so maybe I’ll write more about them then.

Do any of you have beans recipes to share?

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by | May 31, 2023 · 2:10 am

Recipes for Diversity

A few years ago I attended a panel about local food where a speaker asked the audience: “who here is trying to eat more vegetables?” I was one of the few people who did not raise their hand. I love vegetables, I’m great at growing them, and I eat lots of them. In fact, I just planted a garden full of them!

A Diverse Harvest

That said, I’m always happy to expand what I grow to add more variety, for my health as an eater and my resilience as a gardener. Permaculture principle #10 tells us to Use and Value Diversity and this is one place I can implement it.

In terms of health, there is always controversy over what an ideal diet is, but I am convinced that eating a wide range of foods is wise.

That has proven true for me. In my 20s I tried several restricted diets, for ethics and because of health problems. I eliminated processed white sugar with positive results, but all the other experiments failed: vegetarian, vegan, low-fat, candida, suspected food allergy elimination diets… In those cases, my health declined and I felt immediately better when I expanded my options again.

As humans evolved, we know that foraging hunter-gatherers (which we were for more than 90% of our existence as a species) ate a much wider range of foods than we have since we started settling and farming.  Then, over the last hundred years or so, the array of farmed foods has been shrinking dramatically.  There are even campaigns and programs now working to call attention to this issue. 

Sadly, no peaches this year

As a grower, I see how diversity is necessary for resilience. Most crops have good years and bad years. This winter’s temperature fluctuations killed all the peach blossoms in New England, however our berry crop looks great. In a hot, dry summer the tomatoes and eggplant often produce heavily, while the broccoli is not so big and healthy. When it’s cooler and wet the brassicas thrive while the tomato plants die of blight. Some years the squash borers kill most of our squash plants, while other years they barely make a dent. Every year is different (and the shifts are likely to become more extreme) and having lots going on means no year is ever a total loss.

At the same time – I do not want to grow food that I don’t want to eat. I see too many folks grow what is easy for them but then not want to eat it. That’s a good way to get turned off of gardening.

I’ve found the key is in getting good recipes or cooking directions. That can turn a food I didn’t think I liked into a favorite. Brussels sprouts are a great example. It wasn’t until someone roasted them in olive oil sprinkled in salt that I realized I don’t just not hate them but I absolutely loved them! Learning how to make a good salad dressing saved lettuce for me (along with the fun, fancy lettuce varieties). Mashed potatoes bore me, but roasted with garlic and onions in olive oil I rarely tire of. I started growing lots of snap beans after learning to roast them with onions then topping them with shredded cheese at the end of baking. I still didn’t like freezing them for the winter until I found a great three bean salad recipe.

Weird but Gorgeous – Beets

My latest discovery involves beets. I am an excellent beet grower and I enjoy growing them. I love how long lasting they are, and know they are really nutritious. But I just couldn’t find many ways I liked eating them. A few in a larger root veggies roast, ok, a bit of pickled beets in a salad, yes, but not much more. So, 10# a year was all I managed to eat when I could easily grow 50#. Then last summer, my neighbor & friend, Anna, brought a beet & kale salad to a potluck. It might not sound that special – but it is! I ended up buying beets this winter after we ran out so I could keep making it!

You can never have enough kale recipes!

Do you have any recipes or cooking tips that have made you appreciate a food that was previously unloved or unknown by you?  Any that you are looking for help bringing into your kitchen?

Here’s the Beet Kale Salad Recipe:

Roasted Beet Kale Salad with Goat Cheese and Walnuts

Ingredients

6 medium sized beets, any variety

2–3 T olive oil

6 c kale, chopped

4 oz fresh soft goat cheese, crumbled

1/2 c toasted walnuts or pecans

Balsamic Vinaigrette:

1/2 c olive oil

1/4 c balsamic vinegar

2 tsp maple syrup

2 tsp dijon mustard

Salt to taste

-Preheat oven to 400F

-Remove the tops and the roots of the beets. Cut the beets into 1-2 inch chunks. Arrange onto sheet pan, toss with olive oil and season well with salt. Roast for 35-45 minutes, tossing halfway, until beets are fork tender.

-Meanwhile, make the vinaigrette by combing all ingredients in a mixing bowl or mason jar. Shake or whisk; set aside.

-Place kale in a large bowl and drizzle with a few T oil. Using your hands, massage kale for 30-45 seconds; set aside.

-To assemble, top kale with roasted beets, nuts, and goat cheese. Add vinaigrette as desired.

Beets Growing in the Garden

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by | July 19, 2021 · 3:34 pm

Perennial Edible Vegetables

Rhubarb in April

For those of us in temperate areas, eating local means learning how to extend harvests into the less productive seasons. Last year I wrote about the many food preservation methods that we can use. Another strategy is to find ways to get your plants to produce earlier in the spring and later in the fall. Perennial edible vegetables are one way to get an earlier harvest. They have a lot of other benefits, too.

Asparagus Emerging in April

Most of the vegetables that we eat are annual plants or biennials that we harvest in their first year (most root crops are biennials, like carrots and beets). These need to be replanted every year, can be delicate and are not great at building soil. Perennials on the other hand, regrow all by themselves after getting established, can take much tougher conditions and offer year-round living space and food to many in the soil food web. We also noticed in this year’s spring drought, they did not need nearly as much watering as our tiny starts did. As our weather patterns continue to shift, more resilient plants are critical to invest in.

Because perennials can develop large root systems that feed them year after year, they have the chance to grow much earlier in spring. While I’m still babying many of my seedlings indoors and have only just started planting seeds, some perennial veggies are ready to be eaten!

There are resources and people who have extensive knowledge of many plants in this category. I especially recommend Stephen Barstow and Aaron Parker’s work if you want to delve deeply. I’ll just tell you about the handful of veggies that we have been working with here at Living Land.

Rhubarb grows well for us!

Some perennial edible veggies are already well-known and well-grown, in particular asparagus (Asparagus officinalis) and rhubarb (Rheum rhabarbarum). Asparagus needs a few years to really get established, then should produce for a minimum of 20 years (most sources say 10-20 years, but at farms where I worked we often were harvesting from beds at least double that). We’ve had great luck with rhubarb, with the plants usually being vigorous enough by their second year for us to begin harvesting from them. You probably already have recipes or ideas of how to use both of these, which helps greatly when all your work pays off and you have the food in your kitchen ready to use! We also tried something new this year – interplanting asparagus with strawberries. We read that they could be good companions, since they use different above ground space and root zones.

Dandelions – Gorgeous!

Next let me mention two very early producers which most people think of as an herb, a medicine or, sadly, a problematic weed: stinging nettles (Urtica dioica) and dandelions (Taraxacum officinale). They are super easy to grow and bring other benefits, too. Both are exceptional soil builders and dandelions are important pollinator plants. The early leaves of both of these plants are extremely nutritious. Dandelion leaves can be used in salads, braised, or added to soups. Nettles do need to be cooked for at least a few minutes to deactivate their sting, so are great as greens in veggie dishes. I also dry them for making herbal infusions.

Egyptian Onions in April

Egyptian walking onions (Allium proliferum) also appear early in the season, generally after the stored winter onions and overwintered leeks are running out. Perfect timing! There are actually various types of perennial onions to choose from.

Lovage in April

Lovage (Levisticum officinale) can also be considered an herb. This is essentially celery that comes back year after year. I don’t like celery or lovage, but Steve does and I have found many recipes out there to try if you are a fan.

True Solomon’s Seal has flowers all along the stem

Solomon’s Seal (Polygonatum biflorum) and hosta (Hosta spp.) you may know as ornamentals, but you can also eat their early shoots just like asparagus. Since they have been selected for how they look, their taste will vary from plant to plant. None will make you sick, but some will be more palatable than others. I like these in braised veggie dishes, soups and quiches. You will want to pick them when they are short, before they leaf out.

Sea Kale Florets in May

We have been working on getting Sea Kale (Crambe maritima) established here and seem to finally be succeeding. All parts of the plant are edible, especially the leaves and flower buds (like broccoli). This is another to cook up with various veggies for fresh spring dishes.

Turkish Rocket Florets in May

Our Turkish Rocket (Bunias orientalis) plant made it through one winter and produced some nice florets for Steve’s omelets. Turkish Rocket is especially known to be drought-tolerant so we are excited to have a nice bed set aside for it to fill in.

Ground Nuts Climbing

This year we started a bed of Ground Nuts (Apios americana) complete with a serious trellis for climbing, and Hablizia (Hablizia tamnoides) with space to climb as well. The ground nut tubers will be ready to start harvesting in two years. Hablizia’s spinach like leaves we can start eating as soon as the plant seems established enough. We look forward to trying them both.

There are many annual plants I don’t expect to ever give up, however for the sake of our soil and to have a resilient food supply, expanding our perennial food plantings makes a lot of sense. We plan to add more every year. How about you?

Asparagus interplanted with strawberries and basil

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