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Posts from the ‘snacks’ Category

Aug 3

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beef empanadas with green olives and raisins

Often when I tell people about the farm, I find myself talking about time. As quickly as my college days went by, they were structured neatly into classes and midterms and semesters, and time works differently as a farm apprentice. Instead of weekends you have ever-changing days off, so it’s easy to go long stretches of time without knowing whether or not it’s Monday. Each workday is structured in much the same way, so everything tends to link together into one continuous stretch of time instead of the usual weeks and months. As Ross put it jokingly, it feels a bit like you’re “trapped in an alternate universe,” one where you wake up at 6:30 every morning and start easing towards bed every night around 10:00.

All that was an elaborate build-up to saying how unusual it is for me to be up until midnight. Visiting my sister in Berkeley on my days off this week (a Monday and Tuesday—but it felt like a weekend) was a bit like stepping briefly into another life, one where I could happily throw on high tops, a chunky sweater I stole from the couch at the cottage, and enormous headphones and wander around the campus with my sci-fi novel pretending to be a Berkeley hipster. And going to bed around midnight was a thrill indeed, especially since it involved all my favorite elements of Barbour sister-time:  eating, trading music, re-watching British tween romantic comedies on youtube, more eating, and Milo (a “chocolate malt beverage” that is ubiquitous everywhere but the US).

Eating is a prominent theme in our family, and Rae and I both took up the mantle with gusto when we chose to go to college in New York City and Berkeley. In my 48-hour visit we hopped from bakery to restaurant to market, our trajectory marked by a fresh honey whole wheat loaf (perfect moistness) that we enjoyed with homemade goat cheese, cardamom rose ice cream, thai bubble tea, fried eggs with thyme, and Dahi Papdi Chaat at my favorite Indian place Viks. And then there were the empanadas, a cooking inspiration that involved just about all my favorite things: pastry, ground beef, briny olives, raisins, and a healthy dose of spice. We ate them hot from the oven and then it was back to part 7 of Angus, Thongs, and Perfect Snogging—just the kind of night to stay up late.

Beef Empanadas with Green Olives and Raisins

(Adapted from SmittenKitchen.com)

for the pastry:

2 1/4 cups flour

1 stick butter

1 egg

1/3 cup water

1 Tbs rice vinegar

for the filling:

1 medium onion

3 cloves garlic, crushed

cumin

cinnamon

salt

thyme

red pepper flakes

1 lb ground beef

1 cup green olives with pimientos, chopped

1/2 cup raisins

1 14oz can tomatoes

1 egg

To make the pastry, cut butter into small cubes and add to the flour, mushing together with your fingertips until the mixture is light and crumbly. Beat the egg with the water and vinegar and add to the flour mixture, stirring and pressing to form a ball of dough. Refrigerate for at least one hour.

For the filling, chop the onion and saute in a large saucepan with olive oil. Add the crushed garlic, then add the cumin, cinnamon, salt, thyme, and red pepper flakes to taste. When the onions are translucent, add the ground beef and cook until browned. Add the raisins, olives, and tomatoes and simmer until most of the liquid has cooked off and the meat filling is thick and fragrant.

Roll out the dough to your preferred thickness and use a small bowl to cut out rounds. Add a large tablespoon of the meat filling to a pastry round and fold closed, pressing the edges with a fork. Arrange the empanadas on a baking sheet and brush with beaten egg before cooking at 400 degrees for 20-25 minutes.

Jul 27

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pasta with parmesan, olive oil, and pepper

A little while ago I wrote an essay on the things I like about being alone. Not to say that I don’t enjoy being with people, but I’m very much the classic introvert—at the end of the day, my first impulse is to curl up somewhere and recharge quietly thinking things over. In my essay there was one example, however, where I swore I diverged from my loner ways: at mealtime. Spurred by painful memories of solo dinners as a freshman in John Jay Dining Hall, I was convinced eating alone was the ultimate form of social rejection. Reading, going for a walk, lying in bed staring aimlessly at the ceiling—all perfectly acceptable forms of solitude. But eating? I couldn’t admit to a meal alone, not even to my creative writing class (and if ever a bunch of college-age misfits convenes, I can guarantee they will be some sort of creative writing class).

The thing is, the more I think about it, the more I realize I wasn’t being entirely truthful. Eating alone surrounded by people may breed feelings of overwhelming rejection, but sitting by myself in the kitchen, the kettle close to boiling and two pancakes with a fried egg on top sitting neatly on the table in front of me, is truly one of life’s great pleasures. When you eat alone, it’s just you and your food—a near perfect relationship if there ever is one. There’s no need to impress, and alone I find myself going for simple, savory things that don’t take long to make and are primarily flavored with salt and pepper.

My most recent eating-alone obsession fits this bill. It has only five ingredients, if you count the salt and pepper but not the pasta water (which is, however, a crucial element). I’ve always been a lover of spaghetti with cheese—it’s a comforting throwback to those childhood days when carbs and dairy were the only things my sister and I accepted on our USA geography and solar system place mats. Traditionally I’ve always gone with extra-sharp cheddar (the day I ran a half marathon I received a number of raised eyebrows en route to a friend’s room when I stood by the elevator wrapped in a blanket with an enormous Tupperware of pasta, a giant block of cheddar, and a cheese grater). Last week, however, alone in the kitchen on my day off, I made a wonderful discovery. I couldn’t find the colander and had a quarter inch of pasta water left after inadequate draining; then I lazily decided to forgo a plate and grate a chunk of parmesan directly into the pot. A slip of the hand left me with a generous coating of black pepper, so I added in an equally generous glug of olive oil to loosen things up. A sprinkling of salt, a few whirs with a fork, and I had magic—cheesy, peppery spaghetti made creamy by the leftover pasta water. I ate it alone with relish, and it was lovely solitude indeed.

Pasta with Parmesan, Olive Oil, and Pepper

1/4 – 1/3 package spaghetti

parmesan

olive oil

salt

black pepper

Bring a small pot of heavily salted water to a boil and add in the spaghetti, stirring well to keep from sticking. When the pasta is very al dente (I like it verging on chewy) bring the pot to the sink and drain almost all of the water, reserving a 1/4 to 1/2 inch or so of water at the bottom. Place your pot on an unheated surface and add a generous glug of olive oil, then grate a healthy amount of parmesan over the spaghetti and finish with lots of black pepper. Stir well and eat hot–from the pot, of course.

Jul 23

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garden beignets

It was 6:15 on a foggy Friday morning and there I was, crouched over an orange bucket with my hand plunged up to the elbow in icy water mixed with ground quartz. Next to me Zach and Ross knelt hand-stirring the mixture in their buckets, and eight other apprentices and farm staff stood silently around us waiting their turn, Cynthia holding the cow horn in which the quartz had been buried for six months. We were completing the final stage of biodynamic prep 501, a soil preparation used in the biodynamic system of farming that Love Apple is committed to following. The preparation is stirred and applied at dawn, when the light filtering through the morning clouds can illuminate the quartz mixture as it is sprayed above the plants in the garden.

Biodynamics is the agricultural practice developed by philosopher Rudolf Steiner, and while creating preparations for soil health out of stuffed cow horns and intestines may seem strange to some, when Cynthia told us the quartz prep had to be stirred clockwise and counter-clockwise for an hour to combine order and chaos, it made sense. In the past two months I’ve been on the farm I’ve acutely felt the balance of order and chaos in my life—the order of milking the goats each morning, eight-hour farm days, and sitting around the kitchen table each night, and the chaos of being thrown into a new place and life where you live, work, eat, and drink with an ever-shifting group of people. At 6:45 that morning as we stirred, Ellen—the baby of our group at 19, the greenhouse pro from Maine who’s been here seven months—quietly went round and said her goodbyes, and we were still stirring as she left the garden for the last time. That afternoon we saw off Tory, a two-week volunteer from Manresa who made us breakfast sandwiches and seemed to always have been here, and this week we say goodbye to Phillip, our constant source of new music (listen to this) and amazing grilled food. There’s order and chaos in all relationships, and in life, Cynthia said softly as we continued to stir, and it made me realize that letting go of people who’ve become such good friends—both on the farm and off it—is a chaos that’s never easy to be prepared for.

Part of spraying the soil prep is investing it with energy and positive thought, so as I misted our quartz mixture over the garden beds I decided I would do just that. I thought of the night before, when Tory made Manresa’s famous garden beignets for farm dinner while we laughed as everyone at the table had to put on their best foreign accent. I thought of Ellen and Tory and Phillip, the things they’ll go on to do  in college and culinary school and landscape architecture, and then I thought of all my other apprentice friends, the people they are now and the people they’ll be after they leave. I thought of people I love outside the farm, friendships I’ve let lapse as I’ve become more rooted here. Did I feel a little bit corny? You bet. But when I was done I felt as though a bit more order had been restored to the chaos that  always comes with saying goodbye.

Manresa’s Garden Beignets

The recipe for these delicious savory beignets was just added to the Bon Appetit website as a part of the story on Love Apple and Manresa in the August issue. They are absolutely amazing, and having made them every night at the restaurant for the past few months Tory was an expert. They may look tricky, but don’t worry–the process is actually not as intimidating as it may seem, and the results are well worth the effort. Enjoy!

Jul 19

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caramelized onion tart with parmesan

It was an exciting weekend here at Love Apple. The farm and Chef David Kinch of Manresa (the two-Michelin star restaurant for which we grow all our produce) are featured in the August issue of Bon Appetit, with a spread that includes photos of our veggies and garden terraces as well as recipes Chef Kinch has crafted based on what we harvest for him each week. I haven’t been to Manresa yet (it’s a tad above the farm apprentice budget), but I can’t wait to try the recipe for these roasted cucumber sandwiches—particularly because I watched Chef Kinch roast our farm cucumbers this past Sunday afternoon.

The monthly cooking classes taught by Chef Kinch and Pim  are events to anticipate—I was lucky enough to assist in the June class my first day as an apprentice, and since then I’ve been eagerly waiting for my next opportunity to watch Chef and Pim at work (while washing 100 or so dishes of course). This Sunday’s class did not disappoint: it was held outside on the sunny farm patio, and the menu included grilled rack of lamb with fresh herbs, a fregola salad with roasted squash, fennel, and cucumbers, and a fig and plum tart smeared with frangipane (my new favorite condiment: almonds, sugar, egg and butter). I did my best to listen closely while bustling around the patio chopping herbs and collecting utensils, and I was well-rewarded when Chef Kinch gave us some advice that I immediately filed in my mental favorites folder: “Good cooking is the judicious use of salt.” (Tip of the day: if you salt your dish at multiple stages during cooking—instead of throwing in several liberal pinches at the end, like I do—it results in an increased complexity of flavor from salt cooked for various lengths of time).

The class also ended up giving me a surprise chance to display my (non-existent) tart-making skills. While the students mingled with wine before their farm tour, Pim came up to me and, looping her arm conspiratorially through mine, declared that I would be in charge of duplicating her tart in the kitchen after she made one outside for the students. Eyes peeled I watched her every move, then I hurried inside and attempted to reenact her expert dough folds and arrangement of plums and figs. Unfortunately compared to hers (above), mine (below) looked decidedly rustic, but what it lacked in prettiness it made up for in almondy, figgy tastiness.

Fortunately for me, that was not the last of the tarts that entered my day—with Pim’s leftover dough from class, Zach and I set about making two more tarts for our nightly apprentices’ feast. One was the plum dessert from class, but the other was a throwback to my second night on the farm, when we made the onion tart Chef and Pim had cooked for the students in June. Flaky pastry, buttery sweet caramelized onions, toasty melted parmesan… need I say more? To top it off, our tarts baked alongside Phillip’s enchiladas and roasted potatoes. When every oven rack is filled, you know it’s a good night.

(p.s. A friend was curious about my soundtrack to the farm, and it would definitely have to be this. Enjoy!)

Caramelized Onion Tart with Parmesan

(Adapted from June’s Day Off Dinners with Chef Kinch and Pim)

There are two secrets to this easy tart, and they are Pim’s recipe for pastry dough, and caramelizing your onions for much longer than you would imagine.

1 round of dough made using Pim’s recipe, chilled

3-4 large onions, sliced into rounds

1-2 Tbsp butter

1 egg, beaten

fresh grated parmesan

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Roll out the dough on a well-floured surface, shaping roughly into a circle before transferring to a cookie sheet lined with parchment paper. In a large saucepan, melt the butter and add the onions, stirring regularly until they are dark golden brown (about 45 or so minutes). Spread your caramelized onions on the dough, then fold in the edges and brush the dough with your beaten egg mixed with a little water. Finally, sprinkle your entire tart with the parmesan cheese and bake for 45 minutes.

Jul 12

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carrot zucchini cake with walnuts

Sitting here by the pool with the afternoon sun on my legs and a cascade of trumpet flowers draping off the pergola above my head, I have but one recurring thought: life is good on Love Apple Farms. Alright, I may not have been thinking that yesterday when I lugged an enormous bucket of biodynamic worm tea back and forth for several hours to hand fertilize 15 beds of produce. But as hard as the eight-hour workdays can be, there are a disproportionately large number of beautiful moments here on the farm compared to anywhere else I’ve lived.

I suppose my “beautiful moments” philosophy needs a bit of an explanation. At the risk of sounding like a complete hippie (a charge easy to make considering I now wear tie-dyed Love Apple shirts every other day), I have a thing for beautiful moments that started around the time that I began keeping journals. It began as a New Year’s resolution—think of a memorable moment from the day before falling asleep, and at the end of every month record the 10 best moments in a list. Unfortunately I’ve long since abandoned the practice of listing them, but I still think of moments before bed sometimes and wonder if there’s any way I could ever truly capture them in writing.

And here, every day an ordinary moment will strike me as strange or lovely or funny. Like sitting by the redwood trees at dusk, passing around the airsoft rifle and shooting soda cans off a pile of bricks. Stealing the single strawberry from the garden pots, warm and a little tart because I couldn’t wait for it to ripen. Smelling the aroma of simmering malted barley in a beer making class, or eating a crispy fried farm egg on toast with avocado. Lying on the roof of the garden classroom on a Monday night and watching the stars.

For me it’s always been the small things, small moments that add up to something like contentment. Which is why when, the other night, I found myself suddenly craving carrot cake at 5:30 in the afternoon, I just went into the kitchen and made it. No one else was around. I probably should have been making dinner, something savory and practical. But I felt like carrot cake—more than that, I felt like making carrot cake alone in the afternoon, humming to myself in my own little beautiful moment.

Carrot Zucchini Cake with Walnuts

2 cups flour

3/4 cup sugar

2 tsp baking soda

cinnamon

nutmeg

cloves

salt

4 eggs

1 cup oil

2 cups grated carrot

1 cup grated zucchini

1 cup walnut halves

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, sugar, and baking soda. Add in the spices to taste (I like a few good shakes of each) and finish with a pinch of salt. Add the eggs and combine, then pour in the oil and mix well. Lastly put in the grated carrot, zucchini, and walnuts and bake for 45 minutes, or until a knife comes out clean.

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