Lemon-Ginger Sweet Potatoes

2 servings
50 minutes - 10 minutes prep time

3 medium sweet potatoes
the finely grated zest of 1 lemon
an equal amount of finely grated ginger
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons melted butter
the juice of 1/2 lemon

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Clean and trim the sweet potatoes, and cut them into slices about 1/2 cm thick. Put them in a shallow baking pan with the lemon zest, grated ginger, and salt and pepper. Melt the butter, and toss the sweet potato slices in the butter, making sure the seasonings are reasonably well distributed amongst them as well.

Bake the sweet potatoes for 20 minutes. At that point, give them a stir and pour over the lemon juice. Return them to the oven and bake them for another 20 minutes, until tender and slightly browned.

Spaghetti with Eggy Herb Sauce

This is sort of like spaghetti carbonara, only not. There's no bacon (or pancetta); instead there are cream and herbs. I doubt it's any less rich unfortunately, but it is very, very tasty. And it's pasta, so the call goes out to Presto-Pasta Nights at Once Upon a Feast.

Welsh onions, by the way, are like chives in that they are about the first edible things up in the garden. They taste like any other green onion, pretty much, but they are perennials. I've never seen them for sale as plants, and the seeds were sold with ornamental purposes in mind. I don't think they are terribly fast to get to a harvestable size, which is I guess why no-one sells them. But it's great to have a few plants in the garden for early green onion uses. They take up practically no room, and have charming round white flowers, so they can very well be stuck in a flower or herb bed.

2 to 4 servings
20 minutes - 10 minutes prep time


250 grams (1/2 pound) spaghetti or linguini

3 extra-large eggs
1/3 cup cream
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon black peppercorns, crushed
a good large handful mixed herbs
- chives, welsh onions, dill or fennel, mint or basil, and parsley
1 cup grated extra-old cheddar cheese, plus a little more to sprinkle on top

Put a large pot of salted water on to boil for the spaghetti. When it boils, add the spaghetti and cook until tender, stirring occasionally.

Meanwhile, beat the eggs with the cream. Beat in the sea salt and pepper. Clean and finely mince your herbs. I used a good bit of chives and welsh onions, with a little fennel, mint and basil. I would have liked to use parsley but I didn't have any. When your herbs are minced, beat them into the eggs.

Grate the cheese and set it aside.

When the spaghetti is done, drain it quickly and return it to the pot at once. Add the egg and herb mixture, tossing the spaghetti to coat it throughout with the mixture. Keep tossing until the sauce thickens and coats the spaghetti. Toss in the cheese. Serve at once, with a little extra grated cheese on top if you like.

Chicken with Mushrooms & Shallots in Cream Sauce

Here's the other half of my black giant Jersey chicken from Stone Meadow Farm. Deelicious!

2 servings
20 minutes - mostly prep time but not including cooking the chicken


the cooked meat from 1/2 of a 1.5 kilo (3 to 3 1/2 pound) chicken

4 to 5 shallots
6 to 8 medium-large button mushrooms
2 tablespoons butter
1 tablespoon finely grated ginger
1 teaspoon green peppercorns
1 teaspoon sea salt
2 tablespoons sherry, plus another
1/2 cup chicken stock
1 cup 10% cream
1 tablespoon cornstarch or arrowroot


Peel and slice the shallots thinly. Clean and slice the mushrooms. Heat the butter in a large skillet over medium heat, and add the shallots and mushrooms. Stir regularly. Once they begin to cook down, add the ginger. When the mushrooms and shallots are nicely done, add the chicken pieces, peppercorns, sea salt and 2 tablespoons of sherry. Continue to stir regularly. When the chicken is hot through, add the cream, with the starch well dissolved into it. Stir well. Cook until the sauce thickens, but do not let it boil, or it may curdle. Add the final tablespoon of sherry.

Serve over a barley pilaf or with rice, and with a green veggie.

Carrots & Asparagus with Sesame or Sunflower Seeds

I generally make this once a year. It's a kind of celebration or recognition that we are right on the cusp of the change of seasons. It is really tied to a very specific time: there are still a (very) few stored carrots around, and the very first asparagus is showing up, but it is scarce and expensive. So there's maybe a two week period when it makes sense to make this.

I do like this better with sesame seeds, but of course when I went to look for them I discovered I didn't have any. The sunflower seeds at least have a fighting chance of being local, but they should have been chopped up or lightly crushed; they didn't stick to the vegetables in the way that the sesame seeds do being a bit too large. Tasted fine though.

2 servings
15 minutes - 10 minutes prep time


2 medium carrots
10 to 12 spears of asparagus
1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon sesame or crushed sunflower seeds

Peel the carrots and cut them into 4 quarters lengthwise, forming shapes similar to that of the asparagus. Clean the asparagus and snap off the tough ends.

Put the carrots in a pot where they can lie completely covered with water, and add water to just cover them. Cook them for 5 minutes. Add the asparagus, and cook for another 4 or 5 minutes.

Drain off the water, and set the vegetables aside. Add the butter and seeds, and cook for a minute until the seeds begin to brown. Add the vegetables back into the pan, and stir them gently to coat them in the butter and seeds.

Farfalle with Chicken & Asparagus in Saffron-Chive Broth

So I cooked one of my chickens from Stone Meadow Farms. This was one of my little black giant Jerseys. I was not quite sure what I was going to do, so I poached it and figured I'd come up with something later. I also figured it was good for 2 meals, so I'll be using the rest of it later this week. This recipe thus assumes that you have poached your chicken, and created a good batch of chicken stock. I just rinsed the chicken off and plonked it in a pot with a litre and a half of water, some salt and peppercorns, and couple of bay leaves. I figured 20 minutes per pound would be good, and indeed it was, although if you want falling-off-the-bones cooked, you should probably double that time. I turned it over once in the middle. It was on the lowest temperature my stove will do throughout that time, with the exception of the first five minutes or so when it was on high in order to get that water bubbling.

I deboned the chicken and cut it into bite-sized pieces. I then returned the skin and bones to the pot with the broth, added another litre of water, and simmered it for a few more hours. I strained it, and chilled it overnight. The next day I defatted it and proceeded with this recipe.

I have to say it's been a while since I've had any free-range chicken. Gosh, what a difference. When you are dealing with one you realize that regular commercial chicken isn't so much tender as flabby. Not surprising; I doubt they walk 50 metres in their entire lives, and I can't imagine they ever actually get airbourne. Let me hasten to add that my bird was not tough, but it did chew more like actual meat. The difference in the sturdiness of the bones and connective tissues was amazing. And the flavour - wow! Tasted like chicken, as they say. Frankly, most commercially raised chicken might as well be tofu for all the flavour it has.

And since this is a pasta dish, the call goes out to Presto Pasta Nights at Once Upon a Feast!

2 to 4 servings
20 minutes - not counting cooking the chicken


200 to 250 grams (1/2 pound) farfalle or other stubby pasta

2 litres (2 quarts) chicken stock
1/2 teaspoon saffron threads
sea salt & pepper
the cooked chicken from 1/2 of a 1.5 kilo (3 pound) chicken
300 grams (2/3 pound) asparagus
1/3 cup minced chives

Put a pot of salted water on to boil for the farfalle. Boil it until half done, about 6 minutes.

Meanwhile, add the crumbled saffron, and salt and pepper to taste to the chicken stock. Bring it to a boil, and add the drained, half-cooked farfalle. When the stock returns to the boil, add the chicken, cut into bite-sized pieces. After a minute or two, add the asparagus. When there is just a minute or less to go before the farfalle is cooked, add the chives. You may wish to save a few for garnishing. This was so simple, but so flavourful - fresh, quality ingredients make things great!

A Visit to Meeting Place Organic Farm

On Saturday we drove out past Wingham, to Meeting Place Organic Farm. They were having one of their twice-annual open houses. One is always on the mother's day weekend, and one is in the fall. We always try to go to the mother's day weekend in particular. Not only is it a very nice outing for the day, it is time to get our meat order in for the fall.


They are located on a minor side road (Creek Line), but their signage is good. You can see some of the electrified fences they use in their rotational grazing.


Next to an old barn which has been renovated into housing for apprentices and which is also sometimes used for Quaker meetings for worship, there was a stand with information about the farm, manned by one of the current farm apprentices.


And an information display board.


We walked back and looked at the sheep.


And some of the cattle. Both were in fairly small fields closed off with electrified fencing. The McQuails practice rotational grazing, meaning that their grazing animals are kept in small areas for sufficient time for them to crop it down thoroughly. Then they are moved to the next small area. This prevents them from over-grazing certain plants (their favourites) and ignoring others, thus leading to a proliferation of the least-desirable plants. It also helps prevent erosion and ensures that grazing is done when each field is at the most desirable level of growth.


They have a small orchard, in which one of their neighbours keeps bees. In turn, they sell some of the honey produced by the neighbour.


We checked out the main barn. Not too much action there today - most critters were outside.


This year the McQuails are not raising chickens for meat, just their usual egg-layers. Normally they have been out running around but this time they were in the pen. I suspect there have been problems with them getting underfoot during the open houses.


This is a picture from last years' open house. They didn't have any pigs during this open house, as they will be raising only one batch this year and the piglets won't arrive until they are pretty sure they have all their orders in.


There is a very nice greenhouse attached to the farmhouse, where Fran McQuail was selling vegetable starts, herbs and bedding plants.


They had maple syrup produced by one of their neighbours.


And the honey mentioned above, as well as apple butter and apple cider vinegar from their own apples.


Hmm, choices, choices... The plants were all very well labeled with a brief description. Many of the vegetable starts were of heirloom varieties.


Fran writes up an order.


Now for an open-house tradition - a hay-ride tour of the farm with Tony McQuail. And of course, Nate and Charlene.


Tony points something out to one of the passengers as he drives up the lane towards the house. One of the things I enjoy about the hay-ride is that there always seems to be at least one farmer making the trip, and asking all kinds of farmy questions. I learn something new every trip!


The farmhouse seen from the fields.


The community shared agriculture (vegetable) gardens.


One of two ponds on the farm, which supply water to the gardens and livestock.


The tour goes out to the farm woodlot before heading back in. The woodlot is an important part of the farm, and also supplies some income from sustainable harvesting of hardwood during the winter. (It's sustainable harvesting now; but the woodlot had basically been raped for every loggable tree before the McQuails bought the farm, and it took over 20 years to recover enough for gentle logging to resume.)

The horses, by the way, are not just there to pull the hay-ride around. They are an integral part of the farm. In the winter they are used to pull out the trees that have been cut down. The McQuails use the horses to pull their plows and other farm equipment. Unlike a tractor, they don't cost a bomb to run. And unlike tractors, they are reasonably self-repairing and self-replacing. They consume no oil; only fuel produced right on the farm. An idea who's time has come!?

Blogging With a Purpose

Thanks to Bellini Valli at More Than Burnt Toast for awarding me with a Blogging With a Purpose award last week! It is, I gather, for doing pretty much what the title says: blogging with particular purpose in mind.

Now it's my job (and pleasure) to pass it on to 5 other bloggers who bring a distinct and purposeful focus to their blogs. So, in no particular order:

nami-nami - a seasonally-focused Estonian food blog; incidentally, their seasons and available foods seem to run pretty concurrently with ours, making this a very good place for an Ontarian to look for seasonal ideas. And what fabulous ideas they are!

Blue Lotus - a seasonally-focused blog by a Canadian living in Japan. Not too pertinent for me, but great and educational reading!

Stuff to Read (Mostly about food) - is on a bit of a hiatus at the moment, but normally Kevin is cooking up a storm, often with food he has hunted himself. It's a Canadian tradition with which most of us city-dwellers are no longer in contact, and makes very interesting reading.

Gato Azul - Another seasonally focused Canadian food blog, this one out of Quebec and with spectacular photography. Bilingual, to boot!

Tastes Like Home - Yes I like to read blogs rooted in a place and the seasons. Alas, not my location and not my seasons, but Cynthia blogs about some great looking food that tastes like home.

Thanks for all the great blogs, guys, and pass it on!