The summer of cooking continues.

Since summer vegetable season has really hit its stride, summer pickling season is now in full swing. Though I have one more tiny batch of kohlrabi pickles to process, we are now mostly talking in quarts and gallons instead of pints.

My beet pickled turnips turned out like they are supposed to, I believe, which is beautiful but terrible. I went back and read some of the recipes and they seem often to use those key words that mean inedible. Many say things like, "I wasn't sure at first, but I can't stop eating them." In other words, "I thought they tasted terrible, but you can still manage to choke them down." That is about where mine are at. Dave, Sebastian and I sampled them on Sunday and agreed that this was a one-bite sort of pickle. They are a little spongy and very, very intense. I think I may finally agree to give up on purple top turnips. But did I mention those Hakurai pickles I made... Now I know what to plant next year.

This week, we started harvesting pickling cukes from the Goat Lady. My goal is to make a bunch of different kinds of fermented cucumber pickles and to take careful notes, so I can figure out what works and what doesn't. I took home a bucket full on Tuesday, and Hollie and I spent Wednesday morning packing them into two gallon jars. I used a recipe from The Joy of Pickling called "No Dill Crock Pickles" because I didn't have any dill on hand. We packed them in salt brine with some white vinegar, allspice, fennel seed, black pepper and lemon peel.

I also took home about 10 pounds of yellow squash, which Hollie and I processed with some onions and salted so it could drain overnight.

Yesterday, I went out to the Goat Lady (kids in tow) to harvest more cucumbers and finish and can the squash. I picked another bucket full of cukes, and packed two more gallons of fermented pickles. The first was based on Chris Schlesinger's Westport Barrel Cukes recipe. I used small whole cukes, packed them in salt brine with some white vinegar, lots of fresh dill, sliced onions, a few cloves of garlic, some jalapenos, mustard seed, and about 1/2 a cup of horseradish.

For the second gallon, I used the larger cukes, cut into spears, and added a little cider vinegar to the brine along with a few green chiles and a handful of pickling spice, which included allspice, cloves, bay leaves, red pepper, and black pepper, and maybe a few other things.

We cooked the squash according to a bread and butter zucchini recipe out of The Joy of Pickling. We rinsed the squash and onion well; cooked them in vinegar and sugar with mustard seed, caraway, and turmeric; packed them in quarts; and processed them in a water bath. They turned out really beautiful. The yellow squash with the yellow turmeric combines for a great, golden effect.

We'll see how they taste.

Today, while the kids are asleep, I plan to process the remaining cucumbers and get them soaking in lime. Lime has really gone out of style in the past few years because it is a total pain, but I think it is worth it. It gives the veggies a dense, crunchiness that is often (I think falsely) described as crispness. Pickles made with lime don't snap in your mouth, they just have a really good bite to them. I think it is essential to making authentic Carolina-style sweet pickles, my personal favorite.

Cooking at the Dairy

On Monday I officially became the staff chef at the Goat Lady Dairy (a title I hope to grow into.) My official duties are to cook the farm staff lunch Monday-Wednesday, to bake bread for the week, and to preserve and can the produce that cannot be eaten or served at their public dinners. It is kind of a lovely challenge because I am essentially cooking right out of the fields. I harvest whatever is ready and then figure out what to do with it.

This week we were heavy on onions and chard. There are also ripe beets, leeks, and lettuce, but Steve wanted me to save those in case Chris needed them for this weekend's dinners and brunch. (I won't bother introducing everyone, you--my imaginary reader--will figure it out.) But I imagine that I will be able to use all that stuff next week, because there was too much there to serve in one weekend.

Since Monday was my first day, I wanted to start out with something I knew would turn out well (can't get myself fired on day one,) so I made a chard frittata with onions. The eggs came from the farm's chickens, the milk came from the goats, and I harvested the onions and chard from the garden. To go with it I sauteed some broccoli and quick pickled some cabbage (from the garden) in cider vinegar with sorghum molasses, crushed red pepper, garlic, fresh Thai basil (from the garden) and lots of ginger. I made an orange-ade by boiling mint (from the garden) with some sugar and mixing it with a little orange juice (left over from brunch) and some lemon juice. Finally, we ate some shortcakes left over from the dinners with goat yogurt and some mulberies that I picked and macerated in sugar.

Generally, I think it went over pretty well. The pickle turned out pretty spicy, but really good. And I didn't burn the fritatta, top or bottom--amazing.

On Tuesday, I got a little more adventurous. I was instructed to use up some of the pulled pork that is left over from the open house. Chris over estimated his barbeque-sandwich needs, and so left us with TONs of unseasoned pulled smoked pork. Since we have already had a bunch of barbeque days since then, I figured I should go a little farther afield. I ended up usuing a recipe for Malaysian-style coconut curry. It was intended to go with chicken, but I figured it would convert well, and it did.

I have never been a big curry fan myself, and I had never cooked anything like it before, but it turned out to be surprisingly easy, although it had a lot of ingredients. Since the pork was already cooked, I was able to make the curry first thing in the morning and then just reheat it with the meat right before lunch.

First I fried up a pile of onions (from the garden) with some garlic, then I added curry powder, cumin, and bay leaves. I omitted the chili powder that the recipe called for, because I worried about making something too spicy, but in the end I regretted that move. I also replaced the paprika the recipe called for with a cup of chopped roasted red peppers. Next I diced some potatoes and sliced some carrots and added those to the pan. Then I added the coconut milk and water and let the potatoes cook until they were soft.

I heated the pork in a separate pan and pulled off some of the fat, because between the coconut and the pork, I worried things might get too heavy. Then I mixed everything together, let it heat, and garnished it with cilantro and Thai basil. Oh, wait. Obviously there was quite a bit of salt and some pepper involved somewhere.

I served it over rice (learning to cook rice in a pot again after so long with a rice cooker is a minor adventure.) It was delicious but very mild. I thought a good kick would have done it some good.

I also stewed some tomatoes (hothouse, from the farmer's market) with some chard (duh, from the garden) and garlic. And I braised some chard ribs. The latter was kind of an adventure based on a braised celery recipe from the joy of cooking. Basically I combined some cleaned, sliced chard ribs with butter, a little water, and some indian spices (garam masala, some curry, cinnamon) and some salt. I covered them closely with tinfoil and then simmered them for about 25 mins. They turned out better than I expected. The bright colors faded, but did not disappear completely, so I ended up with these lovely little jewels of vegetables. And they didn't taste like celery, so that's a plus.

Again, it went over reasonably well, although I think the spice was missed.

I brought them a loaf of multigrain bread that I baked at home, but it turns out that Carrie can't eat sesame seeds. Everyone else seemed to like the bread, but I will switch multi-grain mixes to accommodate Carrie. On Wednesday, Jenn and I went to Lindley Mills and picked up some flour. They have a 7 grain mix that I will try instead. I really like the one I have been using, but now we have 50 lbs of the new one, so...