Stem Pickles, of the Swiss Chard Variety (Part 1)

Leafing through one of my cooking magazines the other day, I came across (and have since been unable to find!) a blurb about a bartender or chef who turns swiss chard stems into refrigerator pickles. After last summer's success with pickled sugar snap peas, and in my effort to use every edible part of all of our vegetables, I have decided to give the pickled stems a try. Tonight. Because I have nothing better to do and a huge bowl of fuchsia stems in the kitchen, winking prettily at me, asking to be made into something other than compost.

Because I can't find the official recipe (did I dream it up? and if so, what does it mean that I'm dreaming about pickles?), I altered a promising recipe for asparagus pickles that I found online and followed the sugar snap pickle protocol:

1. Sterilize a quart jar and lid.

2. Boil equal parts water and vinegar with some salt and sugar--in this case, 2 C each water and cider vinegar, with 1/2 T salt and 1/8 C sugar.

3. Put 2 smashed garlic cloves, 2 red chilies, some dill and some mustard seeds, along with the chard stems, into the sterilized jar.

4. Pour the boiling vinegar brine into the jar, using a funnel if you're spill-prone.

5. Seal and store in the fridge. Can be made up to a month in advance.

In my (trivial) pickling experience, the pickles will start to taste snappy in about 24 hours, but will increase in flavor over the next couple of weeks. I'll keep you posted on the result, but my intended use for the pickled stems is for cheese and pickle sandwiches, or what we around here call "jungle style." I imagine they'll also taste nice in Bloody Marys, for those of you in the cocktail set.

Japanese Turnips

Before you navigate away, because the word "turnip" is not only boring but sounds like something your grandparents were forced to eat as children, know that I am discussing Japanese turnips. And unlike their American relatives, which are rock hard and rooty, these delicate white veggies are crisp, juicy, sweet and fresh. They can be enjoyed raw like jicama, or roasted or sauteed in olive oil and garlic. The first method is refreshing, the second as savory as potato and as juicy as fresh pear.

We've been getting large bunches of them in our CSA tote each week, and at first I sliced them thinly and ate them for breakfast on buttered toast with a sprinkling of smoked salt. Then I shredded them into a lemony salad with young beets and sunflower seeds. The next time I parboiled them and rolled them in a bit of butter and coarse salt. And yesterday I did the best thing yet, which was to slice them thinly, toss them with a bit of olive oil and a lot of minced garlic, and roast the bejeezus out of them. The resultant "chips" were salty and golden, and juicy as hell. I nibbled a few out of the pan and tossed the rest for lunch today with brown rice, black beans, cherry tomatoes and feta.

If you think you dislike turnips, or are finding large quantities of them at the farmer's market or in your own CSA tote, try the below recipe. It would make a nice accompaniment to any type of roast or richer fish; or, eat them on their own, as I did, standing at the pan with a glass of wine.

Simple Roasted Japanese Turnips
Note: All of the literature I've found on Japanese turnips say they're spicy and strongly flavored. Ours have been sweet without even the slightest radishy kick, but it might be best to taste one raw before determining what to do with your bunch.

Japanese turnips
olive oil
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
coarse salt
pepper

Preheat oven to 425 F.
Trim and thinly slice turnips (1/4"), setting aside the greens for sauteing.
Toss the turnip slices with a healthy lug of olive oil, the minced garlic and a pinch of salt, and spread into one layer.
Bake until the turnips are starting to turn tender and golden, then flip with a spatula.
Continue baking until golden and somewhat shriveled, but not dry or burnt.

This all takes roughly 45 minutes, but as I didn't watch the clock (I was watching Buffy), be sure to check the veggies occasionally to get the texture you like.

Fudgesicles, Jessica-style

It's happening.

The rainy hours are growing fewer and the blue skyed moments are beckoning us outdoors to sit in puddles of sunshine. My brandywine and roma tomatoes are reaching upwards, and the yellow squash adds a new leaf each week. The strawberries are putting forth green fruit, and the sage looks like it will take over the world.

It's springtime in Portland. When summer seems almost possible.

And because we Portlanders go a little crazy when we see the sun, we drag out the summer dresses and the pale ale and tbe BBQ well before the weather warrants. We do crazy things, like shiver sweaterless on the patio and make popsicles that we have to eat indoors.

As if to tease, and in the time-traveling way of all food magazines, my Bon Appetit and Food and Wine are arriving with the brazen heat of midsummer in their recipes, all ice creams and cold seafood salads. And even though no reader above the Mason-Dixon line has access yet to local heirloom tomatoes or watermelon, it's hard to resist the urge to run out and buy all of the shipped-from-overseas produce that you can hold, so that you too can eat fig and feta salad and fried squash blossoms. I practically sit on my hands on our backdoor stoop, whispering to my plants to grow, grow, grow into such marvelous meals.

Luckily, one doesn't need to wait for hot weather to make popsicles. And when I saw Deb's recipe for fudgesicles on Smitten Kitchen, all of my memories of the 3pm summer camp ice cream ritual arose and I knew I had to make them, rain or shine.

First I went out and bought the cheapest, most colorful popsicle set I could find (Jelly Belly brand, in case you're interested). And then I bought organic dark chocolate and hemp milk, because my sister Jessica can't eat dairy. And then I got to work.

This recipe takes ten minutes. Substitute whole milk or any other alternative "milk" for the hemp; I like to use hemp milk in vegan baking because it's tremendously rich and creamy, and full of omega-3 fatty acids. It doesn't taste great straight out of the box, though. A little...plant-y. You can also use semi-sweet chocolate for a milder flavor; again, I had to avoid dairy and dark chocolate is a lot more appealing than carob.



Fudgesicles (makes 4)

2 T chopped semi-sweet or dark chocolate

1/3 C sugar

1 T cornstarch

1.5 T cocoa

1.25 C whole or vegan milk

pinch of salt

1/2 tsp vanilla

1/2 T butter


Melt the chocolate in a heavy pan over low heat. Whisk in the milk, cocoa, cornstarch and salt and cook (5-10 minutes) until thickened. Remove from the heat and whisk in the vanilla and butter. Cool slightly and pour into the popsicle molds. Freeze.

the girl next door

We have a new neighbor.

She's like chartreuse molasses, or something else similarly vibrant and spaced out; maybe she's a neon flower through the haze in an opium den.

She came to the door in black clothes and a beige beret and stayed for an hour. I know about her previous relationship in Georgia; her injuries as a dancer and photographer in New York City; her need to repaint her bedroom turquoise because the sage color is too deadening. Her love of curtains, and how she doesn't really drink much, but a beer on a hot day in the backyard is really nice. And she'll be drying her unmentionables on a laundry line out back.

I was in the middle of playing hooky to grade papers all day when she rang the bell, and the whole time she stood here, petting the cat, drawling sweetly about this and that, I couldn't decide if I'd met my new best friend or someone I will spend the next several months studiously avoiding by allowing the dinosaur ferns out front to finally obscure the front door.

I'm charmed by her friendliness and her weirdness (she kept referring with nostalgia to her "old neighborhood," which it turns out is a few blocks north of here, about five minutes away), but a little worried that the (miniscule) backyard is about to be invaded by 8,000 carefree artist types plunking away on guitars to all hours, amid the fuschia underpants swinging drowsily from the clothes line.

And then, what's so terrible about that? I'm always bemoaning the lack of community in our short row of apartments, and a super friendly neighbor who loves our cats and vintage furniture and fabrics and, okay, adds a little quirk to our backyard sounds fun. I think I've become so used to people being inaccessible--maybe to being a little bit that way myself--that someone so un-anxiously outgoing is a bit of a shock.

It's almost like Pippi Longstocking went to Sarah Lawrence, mated with Phoebe from Friends, and then the issue of that union moved in next door.

Readers, I sense a story.