Beyond the Tomato: Making the Most with the Most Unconventional Farmers Market Finds
EATING LOCAL: The Cookbook Inspired by America’s Farmers
SEATTLE (June 30, 2010) –With farms and gardens nearing peak harvest nationwide, food lovers are reacquainting themselves with their local farmers’ market and rediscovering the joys of fresh, local produce. Know your lettuce, tomatoes and carrots? No problem. But what about kale, chard, kohlrabi and all the other unusual vegetables you discover at the market stands?
This summer, culinary trendsetter Sur La Table and award-winning author and journalist, Janet Fletcher, present Eating Local: The Cookbook Inspired by America’s Farmers (304 pgs; Andrews McMeel, $35). With a foreword by Alice Waters, the book helps farmers market shoppers and community supported agriculture (CSA) subscribers enjoy the full bounty of local harvests.
“Even committed locavores may not know how to use some of the produce they find at the farmers market or in their CSA boxes,” said Fletcher. “With this book they can be sure that nothing they buy will go to waste. The book is full of ideas for storing, preparing, and preserving the best of each season.”
Fun, fresh recipes the book offers for some of the more uncommon produce your area farmers produce throughout the season include:
Crispy Kale Chips
CSA farmers who grow kale say that many of their shareholders lack recipes for this highly nutritious leafy green. Kale chips to the rescue! Roasted in the oven, the leaves crackle when you eat them and dissolve like snowflakes on the tongue. No matter how many batches you make, they will disappear in an instant. (pg. 94)
Grilled Mozzarella and Anchovies in Chard Leaves
Save your salads for lettuce. Instead, use the big, floppy leaves of Swiss chard to make flexible wrappers for grilled foods. For example, try a slice of mozzarella, a pinch of oregano, and an anchovy fillet and warm over a crackling summer evening fire. The chard crisps and the cheese melts. Set the seared package on a thick piece of toast and serve it as a knife-and-fork first course. (pg. 66)
Sautéed Kohlrabi with Butter and Dill
Similar to turnips in both texture and flavor, kohlrabies make an excellent side dish. Grab a bunch at your market and prepare while a nice pork chop cooks slowly on your grill. The kohlrabi is best sliced thickly and sautéed with butter and dill. Grated raw kohlrabi can work well on sandwiches for crunch. (pg. 105)
Grilled Radicchio with Bagna Cauda
Italian for “hot bath”, bagna cauda is the world’s most aromatic dip: hot olive oil with anchovies and garlic melted in it. Although Italians typically dunk raw vegetables, such as fennel or celery, in this recipe bagna cauda is a sauce for radicchio. After grilling the radicchio, transfer it to a platter and drizzle with the warm bagna cauda, using about half and reserving the remainder for other recipes. (pg. 141)
In addition to providing recipes, Eating Local takes readers onto the land and into the homes of 10 of America’s best small farmers around the nation with inspiring photography and personal stories about the committed growers who make the locavore movement possible.
About Janet Fletcher
Author, journalist and cook Janet Fletcher trained at the Culinary Institute of America and at the celebrated Chez Panisse restaurant in Berkeley, California. Her writing for the San Francisco Chronicle has received three James Beard Awards. She has written for most of the nation’s premier food and wine publications and is the author or co-author of 20 cookbooks. A certified Master Gardener who maintains a large garden of perennials and edibles, Janet lives in Napa Valley with her winemaker husband.
About Sur La Table
Since 1972, chefs and home cooks with a love for fine cooking have flocked to this culinary mecca. With a successful direct mail catalog, e-commerce site, culinary class program and more than 75 stores nationwide, Sur La Table continues to share its passion for exploring the traditions of the world with people who love to cook and entertain.
Through its presentation of Eating Local, Sur La Table hopes readers will have a deeper understanding of and commitment to local food systems. Sur La Table supports the locavore movement and hopes the recipes and farmer profiles in this book will be an inspiration to experience the benefits of eating and cooking with food from local farmers.
