Green Chicago! a visit to the markets.

Back in Chicago to visit family, the documentary superheroes at MeerkatMedia.org sent along a mission: find and film urban beekeepers. A few trips to some spectacular farm markets later, I was off and running to visit the Chicago Honey Coop.

I met up with Dr. Israel in a beautiful community garden/urban apiary to talk about colony collapse, the taste of city honey, and everything bee. Over the course of the interview, in a reinvented abandoned lot on the South West side, I was stung three times on the head. Here Dr. Israel walks through his community garden at sunset, towards the apiaries.

Here are some other city pics: an urban garden against the skyline, lovely sprouts from Bill's market stand near Lincoln Park Zoo, and a garage crushed by a tornado near my aunt's house. Yes: tornado.

Easy Tasty Rice with Plums

I had leftover wild rice (actually a grass!) and a bunch of sweet, slightly brusied plums from the Tompkin Square farmers' market. Here's what happened.

Lightly butter a pan. Throw in the cooked rice. Cut plums, add with pine nuts (or walnuts) and saute until warm and juicy. Keep stirring so rice doesn't stick. Remove from heat. Add a heaping spoonful of goat cheese. Stir. Serve. Admire the salty-sweet-savory-nutty flavor. Beg for more.

You can make this with any fruit, any nut, any cheese and any grain. This one just happened to become the most lovely of pinks.

Butter-Fried Pumpkin Gnocchi

A foray along our garden fence through the forest of basil and tomatoes that guard it revealed, hurrah, our first fall pumpkin. With any squash, my first move is always to cut it in half, put it on a pan with a 1/2" of water, throw it in the oven at 350*F---and then use the next 45 min-1 hour while it cooks to thumb through all my recipe books deciding what to do. Soup, pies, pasta---squash is the reason I don't groan at the creeping cold. Happy September, and here's a really easy recipe that I'm making right now. Literally. There's flour on the keyboard.

Butter-Fried Pumpkin Gnocchi

1/2 cup pureed pumpkin
1 large egg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon grated nutmeg
1/8 teaspoon (generous) baking powder
1/2 cup all purpose flour

3 tablespoons butter (I used Ronnybrook, as always)
1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese

Bring large pot of salted water to boil. Whisk pumpkin, egg, salt, nutmeg and baking powder in large bowl to blend. Mix in flour (dough will be soft).

Dip 1/2-teaspoon measuring spoon into boiling water to moisten. Scoop up generous 1/2 teaspoon of dough and return spoon to water, allowing dough to drop. Working in 2 batches, repeat dropping 1/2 teaspoonfuls of dough into water, first dipping spoon into water to moisten each time. Boil dumpling until cooked through, about 10 minutes. Using slotted spoon, transfer to colander and drain.

Melt butter in heavy large skillet over medium heat. Add dumplings. Sauté until beginning to brown, about 8 minutes. Transfer dumplings to bowl. Sprinkle with cheese and serve. This recipe is also delicious with fried sage or thyme. The fresh leaves can be tossed into the pumpkin puree, or flash-fried until crispy to use as a garnish.

Makes 4 Side-Dish Servings.

Melon Salsa

For Graduation Day at the Botanical Gardens, we encored our Peach-Corn salsa (with Sungold Cherry tomatoes, etc). Examining our pepper plants, we found their beautiful chocolate-red-green tie-dyed skin had contracted some sort of patchy black rot.

Melon Salsa is another refeshing twist on the same theme--and melons should be available at the farmer's market for at least another week. Thai basil, a cinnamony, darker-flavored (and somewhat purple-stemmed) version of your normal Sweet Genovese, is also available. I found it at Kira's stand, Evolutionary Organics, both in Union Sq (Weds) and Grand Army Plaza (Saturdays).


MELON SALSA

Ingredients
1 deseeded, diced melon
1 peeled, diced seedless cucumber
zest and juice of 1 lime
1 tablespoon gently shredded Thai basil
1 tablespoon chopped mint
1 jalapeno pepper, deseeded and diced
1 knob ginger, peeled and diced
salt to taste

Watermelon Gazpacho Soup

Check it out: watermelon and corn! Of all the plants we've grown this year, I'm clearly most excited about their success. To celebrate, then: watermelon gazpacho. It's almost the end of summer--what could be better? The only foodstuffs I couldn't find locally were the citrus.

2 cups 1/4-inch-diced watermelon
2 cups orange juice
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 (seedless if you can find it) cucumber, cut into 1/4-inch dice
1 small yellow bell pepper, seeded and cut into 1/4-inch dice
1 small onion, cut into 1/4-inch dice
2 medium garlic cloves, minced
1 small jalapeno pepper, seeded and minced (optional)
3 tablespoons fresh lime juice
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley, basil or cilantro
* Salt and freshly ground black pepper


Process 1/2 cup of watermelon, along with the orange juice and oil, in a blender or food processor until pureed. Transfer to a medium bowl, along with remaining ingredients. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Refrigerate until ready to serve. (Can be made several hours before serving.)

Crepes and Saucy Fruit

As August closes, we're going to have to say a fond farewell to our East Coast peaches, apricots, and plumps. I'm mourning them with a simple crepe recipe. You can pick up really good fruit at Toigo Farms--Sundays at Avenue A and 10th, and Wednesdays in Tribeca by Fulton and Chambers.


Dice fruit. Place in a lightly buttered saucepan* with 2 cinnamon sticks and a dash of salt. Simmer until broken down, about 1/2 hour. Serve hot, warm or cold as a garnish for:

CREPES
1 large egg
1 1/4 cup milk
1 cup flour
1/4 teaspoon (a "dash") of salt

Using a few drops of extra virgin olive oil or butter for the pan (oil tends to hold better w/out burning longer), pour only a thin layer of batter. Flip as soon as the bottom holds.

Crepes are a delicate art: they aren't pancakes! Don't put too much batter on the pan, and keep an eagle-eye on them so they don't burn or cook unevenly. They are fast, tasty, and if you look in the fall recipes from last year, you can make 'em with all sorts of goodies.

*You can also use enough water to protect the bottom of the saucepan and skip buttering your fruit. Don't forget, though, as the fruit breaks down it's going to get juicy! So you may have to strain your sauce.

Pumpkins!

Thanks, mom! The seeds have
taken well and "off the grow". I'm hoping we have pumpkins ready for halloween.

The little sprouts alongside the larger pumpkin are morning glory, which, aaaack, never seem to stop self-seeding.