Berries

It’s peak season for summer fruit, without a doubt, and it’s hard to make a trip to the market these days without coming away with more berries, cherries and plums than a person can possibly consume. And the peaches are just getting started! My fridge and counters are currently overflowing with raspberries, currants, cherries, blueberries and strawberries (the ever-bearing variety are still growing).

No complaining, though. Now’s the time to gorge, whether it’s simply by handfuls as you pass through the kitchen or whether you’re feeling more ambitious – in which case there’s no shortage of recipes for crisps, cobblers, platzes and pies to be made.

Now’s also a great time to freeze those berries on cookie sheets (then baggies) for muffins, pancakes and smoothies – so we can at least have a tiny taste of summer freshness during the cold, dark days ahead. It’s my goal this year to tuck away as much local summer produce as I can, whether it’s frozen or preserved.

The latter is something I’m just wading into. All the crazy equipment, the boiling, the fear of botulism – it’s always seemed too daunting. But last week I got my feet wet by making five jars of achingly sweet, deep red summer berry jam. Indeed, it was a bit of a process. But on the scale of complicated cooking tasks, I’d say it ranked on the simpler end. Yes, my kitchen looked like a crime scene when I was done, thanks to the process of pitting cherries and crushing currants. But come January, I’ll be eating my jam-smothered toast with thanks.

Here’s the recipe for Four Fruit Red Jam (from my new – and now stained – summer companion, The Complete Book of Small-Batch Preserving by Canadian authors Ellie Topp and Margaret Howard). Now’s the time to make it; all four fruits are still in season – but not for long. This recipe made five 250mL jars.

Four Fruit Red Jam

2 cups raspberries, crushed
2 cups red currants, crushed
2 cups strawberries, crushed
1-1/2 cups sour cherries, crushed
4 cups granulated sugar
¼ cup lemon juice

1. Place raspberries, currants, strawberries, cherries, sugar and lemon joice in a large stainless steel or enamel saucepan. Cover and let stand 10 minutes.

2. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring constantly. Boil rapidly, uncovered, until mixture will form a gel, about 15 minutes, stirring frequently. Remove from heat.

3. Ladle into hot jars and process in a boiling-water canner for 10 minutes. (If you’re unsure about this step, consult a book or look online for rules on safe canning methods.)

Monforte Dairy Company

It is a testament to the success of Monforte Dairy Company that for months now I have been chasing its owner, Ruth Klahsen, for the opportunity to chat with her about her cheese.

When I first emailed her early in the spring, Klahsen was enthusiastic, but warned me that she was “drowning in milk.” She encouraged me to be persistent, and I was. And a recent visit to the dairy in nearby Millbank confirmed that she is, indeed, insanely busy.

Upon arrival, I was handed a hairnet, white coat and rubber boots and cheerfully encouraged to tag along as she cut wheels, wrapped and priced cheese, packed her son’s car with coolers headed for the farmer’s market, showed a couple of visiting Toronto chefs the ropes of making ricotta and generally dealt with anything requiring troubleshooting along the way.

Klahsen started Monforte (pronounced Mon-for-tay) in 2004 after having spent years as a chef in and around Stratford. She figured making cheese required the same skills “without the intensity” of restaurant service, and so she started with two cheeses – Paradiso (a semi-soft, washed rind cheese) and Toscano (a sharp, hard one).

Four years later, Klahsen is making roughly 20 types of sheep milk cheese and 10 kinds of goat. She is also the darling of chefs, food writers and gourmands alike. “The best cheeses in Ontario. Full stop,” Toronto Life recently trumpeted. Many of the province’s most buzzed-about menus include her products. And one can hardly open a magazine or newspaper that talks food and not encounter the Monforte name.

Klahsen has an artisinal approach to cheesemaking. She insists on small batches made by hand, and says she’s extremely picky not only about what goes into her cheese but about how the shepherds (19 Amish farmers near Ingersoll) handle the sheep. “They’re treated pretty naturally,” she says. “No herbicides or pesticides.”

Though everyone else is gushing, Klahsen remains modest, chalking her success up to simply being in the right place at the right time. She is also her own worst critic, insisting her cheeses are “not good enough yet. They could get way better.”

Sadly, Klahsen has not had a great deal of success in the Kitchener-Waterloo market. She had a small booth at St. Jacob’s market for awhile, but pulled the plug when she couldn’t cover the rental costs (more than she pays at St. Lawrence Market, interestingly) due to poor sales. A persistent expectation that food should be cheap, she believes, is part of the problem.

“I’d make less than $1000 in two to three days,” she told me. Meanwhile, she recently cleared $6500 in one day of sales in Toronto. She (with help from her son Ben and eight to 10 employees) covers 12 markets there on various days, and also has a strong presence at both Stratford and Guelph’s farmer’s markets.

And that, unfortunately, is where K-W cheese lovers will have to go to check out the full spectrum of Monforte’s products. Vincenzo’s in Waterloo does carry a select few, as does Knechtel’s Cheese at the Kitchener market.

Do be sure to try the herb-covered Piacere (pee-uh-cherry), which made Toronto Life’s list of 100 Tastes to Try Before You Die last December. And if you get your hands on a little tub of the spreadable, lemony Blossom, it’s total heaven smeared on a piece of crusty baguette and topped with a drizzle of honey.

As for where she sees Monforte going, Klahsen says she hopes to branch out into making more goat cheese and wants to experiment with water buffalo and cow’s milk, too. A slow food advocate, she has no plans to send cheese outside Ontario, preferring to stay local.

What makes her proudest, she says, is her collaboration with farmers – and the fact that 19 shepherds are thriving thanks to Monforte.

“When I’m dead and gone,” she says, “I hope people will say, ‘She helped save some family farms.’ And maybe, ‘She made good cheese, too.’ But mostly, ‘She helped save farms.’ ”

Urban Agriculture

I’ve written in this spot before about my own lack of gardening prowess, especially when it comes to edibles.

This year, I’ve broadened the range of potted herbs on my front porch. I’ve even branched out into heirloom tomatoes thanks to my mom, who started several plants from seed in the spring and gifted me with a couple that are now waist high.

But I guess I’ve always figured sustaining one’s self on homegrown produce was more effectively left to those in rural parts – people with acres of property, a barnful of seeds and tools, an encyclopedic how-to knowledge and a feverish work ethic.

That was, of course, until recently, after numerous encounters with various regular folks around K-W who are practically farming in their own backyards – right in the city. It’s been referred to as “urban agriculture” or “urban homesteading.” Some like to think of it as the “100 foot diet.” And during a time when many of us are thinking about food miles, fuel costs and the origin of what’s on our plates, it certainly makes sense.

Karin Kliewer, an avid organic gardener who lives in Kitchener, says she partner Greg Roberts are eating what they cultivate in their Duke Street backyard from March to December. In fact, they’re able to go all summer without buying produce.

Indeed, when I stopped by to visit, Kliewer made us a snack of flat breads (baked in an outdoor cob oven and topped with homegrown asparagus, greens, garlic scapes and fresh herbs) and homemade herbal tea.

Name it and it’s probably in their garden – grapes, apples, currants, shitake mushrooms, peas, lettuce, carrots, peppers, edible flowers, sorrel, borage, 20 varieties of heirloom tomatoes, the biggest oregano plant (no, shrub) I’ve ever seen. You get the idea. Everything is grown sustainably according to principles of permaculture – a somewhat complicated concept to explain in a short space, but one based on the notion that it’s better to work with nature than against it.

Kliewer says she and Roberts enjoy the perks of living in the city – being able to walk to work, for example – but felt they could still incorporate aspects of what most of us tend to think of as “rural living” into their lifestyle.

Not too far down the road in downtown Kitchener, Tim Simpson and partner Aura Hertzog have a somewhat smaller but nevertheless substantial plot in their backyard – they like to call it their “urban farm.”

Simpson grows his plants from organic heirloom seeds and is able to harvest and eat “things you’d never find in a grocery store” – Armenian cucumbers, strawberry spinach and Black Aztec corn, for starters.

Though his 22 tomato plants will yield more than the family can eat this summer, he’ll busy himself making tomato sauces and relishes. He’ll also do some freezing and plans to build a fruit cellar in the basement to house some canning and preserving. This way, Simpson says, they can extend their backyard eating into the winter and beyond.

Nina Bailey-Dick, a local food champion and yet another urban homesteader (beyond the fruits and vegetables, she has two hens in her Waterloo yard providing her family with eggs), says it’s all about starting small. A cherry tomato plant is a good place to begin. Or maybe some sugar snap peas instead of the typical clematis for your trellis.

“Just do one thing,” she says to those who might be intimidated by the notion of growing their own food. “You’ll be overwhelmed if you try to do everything at once. Just take one step at a time.”

Fresh Garlic

It’s the dry, grown-in-China garlic most of us are accustomed to – the kind that sprouts bitter green while sitting on the kitchen counter, the dehydrated cloves shrinking away from their brittle paper. Both are telltale signs it’s not fresh. And how can it be when it’s flown in from the opposite side of the earth?

Cooking with homegrown garlic, though, is mercifully dissimilar.

In spring, garlic can be harvested as “green garlic,” which looks more like scallions or thin leeks. Not long after come the scapes – long, curly stems ending in a flower bud. Farmers snap these off of garlic stalks to redirect the plant’s energy into growing a bigger bulb (instead of into producing a flower). They’re lovely and mild and can be chopped up and added to anything in place of garlic or onion. There are plenty of unique ways to use them, too. A friend recently brought me a jar of her homemade spinach-scape pesto.

Scape season is just ending – if you’re lucky, you might still find some at the farmers’ markets, but last week a couple of vendors told me that I was likely seeing the last of them. Not to worry, though, as there is plenty of young garlic for sale at the markets – these are early harvest bulbs with their tall, green stalks still attached that have not yet developed their papery skin. They’re more delicately flavoured than mature garlic and are practically juicy – a far cry from that awful, shrively stuff.

Here’s a recipe to inspire you. I used scapes, but if you can’t find any, substitute a head or two of fresh, thinly-sliced young garlic. Minced pancetta makes a nice addition, too – if you use it, throw it in at the same time as the scapes or garlic.

Barley Risotto with Fresh Peas, Garlic Scapes and Mint

3 quarts peas, shelled (reserve pods)
8 cups water
Salt
3 tablespoons butter
1 cup garlic scapes (or sliced young garlic)
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1-1/2 cups pearl barley
Freshly ground pepper
1/2 cup freshly grated parmigiano reggiano
A handful of fresh mint, thinly sliced

Rinse the pea pods and place in a sauce pan with lightly salted water. Bring to a boil over medium heat, reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer up to an hour. Strain and discard pods. Return broth to pot and keep warm over low heat.

In a large pot, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter over medium heat. Add your scapes or garlic, stirring often until soft. Add the peas and 1/2 cup of the warm broth and cook until the liquid has disappeared. Add the olive oil and, when it’s hot, add the barley and stir to coat well. Reduce heat to medium low, add about 3/4 cup of the broth and, again, cook, stirring often, until most of it is absorbed. Continue adding the broth 3/4 cup at a time, always waiting until each batch is nearly absorbed before adding the next batch. You’ll know it’s ready when the barley is tender and creamy but the inside is still firm to the bite. You likely won’t use all the broth. And be forewarned, this process requires some patience. So it is with risotto – but it’s worth it!

Remove the pan from the heat, season to taste with salt and pepper. Stir in the remaining tablespoon of butter and 1/4 cup of the cheese. Stir in the mint. Pass the remaining cheese at the table.
(Serves 4. Adapted from a Saveur magazine recipe).

Market Cookbooks

Beautiful as some of that produce is that we encounter in our farmers’ markets, sometimes a little inspiration is required. Such was my thought when I was handling some kohlrabi the other day: “If I buy this, what the heck am I going to do with it?”

I’ve similarly furrowed my brow over shell beans, beet greens and red cabbage, to name a few. There are always basic recipes – steam or boil or bake and eat it on the side – but the real fun, I think, is in creating something unexpected and exceptionally flavourful out of a simple vegetable you thought twice about buying in the first place.

Some of my favourite cookbooks – and certainly best-used (at least for half the year) – are those with a farmers’market theme. Here are a few that might generate some very tasty brainwaves as the farmers’ bounty starts rolling in:

The San Francisco Ferry Plaza Farmers’ Market Cookbook
By Christopher Hirsheimer and Peggy Knickerbocker
I visited this market building every day when I was in San Francisco a couple years ago – my own personal heaven and a market so deluxe, it gets its own book. This little guide (designed that way so you can take it to market with you) is sectioned by seasons and alphabetically lists a variety of produce. For each fruit and veg, there’s info about how to choose and store it along with a couple of recipes. Beets with Blue Cheese and Candied Walnuts is cooking perfection.

Local Flavors: Cooking and Eating from America’s Farmers’ Markets
By Deborah Madison
Madison, a Santa Fe chef, food writer and author known for her vegetarian cooking, traveled to markets all over the US in putting this book together. Many of them are profiled amongst the recipes, which are grouped according to category (greens, stone fruits, herbs and so on). There’s lots of useful info on fruit and vegetable varieties and some fun menu ideas, too. Last week I made Madison’s ragout with those aforementioned kohlrabis and some fresh peas, greens and herbs – yum. See the recipe below.

The Art of Simple Food: Notes, Lessons and Recipes from a Delicious Revolution
By Alice Waters
Another book from San Francisco – and not surprisingly, since the Californians have long been locavores. (A 12-month growing season helps). Much of the credit for that goes to Waters, founder of world-famous Berkeley restaurant Chez Panisse. This book doesn’t focus solely on farmers’ market fare, but, then again, because Waters is who she is, it kind-of does by proxy. See also Waters’ Chez Panisse Fruit and Chez Panisse Vegetables.

Jamie at Home
By Jamie Oliver
Perhaps you’ve seen the TV show companion to this book, where Oliver and his gardener putter about his vegetable patches and Jamie does his haphazard thing with what he grows in his outdoor kitchen. There are lots of fun, unpredictable ideas here –Hot and Sour Rhubarb with Crispy Pork and Noodles beats rhubarb pie for creativity any day.'

Simply in Season
By Mary Beth Lind and Cathleen Hockman-Wert
This little book with its comb binding was commissioned by the Mennonite Central Committee and is written by two American Mennonite women who thought, and rightly so, that we all needed to be reminded to connect with what we eat. They compiled the 300-plus recipes according to season and include a guide to choosing, storing, handling and serving various kinds of produce.

The Farmer’s Market Cookbook
By Richard Ruben
Grilled Summer Corn and Sugar Snap Pea Salad. Sweet Potato Braised in Apple Cider. Need I say more? Lots of beautiful ideas here, again all organized by season and with lots of info on produce varieties.

Market Ragout of Turnips, Kohlrabi and Peas

1 tbsp butter

6 spring onions or shallots, halved (I used a whole bulb of young garlic, sliced thinly)

6 or more small turnips, scrubbed and quartered (I omitted the turnip and used more kohlrabi)

2 or 3 small kohrabi, about golf ball size, peeled and quartered (I used fewer larger ones and diced)

1 thyme sprig

salt and freshly ground pepper

1 pound pod peas, shelled

a few handfuls baby spinach (I used beet greens because that's what I had in the fridge)

dollop creme fraiche (I omitted it)

4 large basil leaves

1. Melt the butter in a skillet and add the onions, turnips, kohlrabi and time. Add water to cover halfway and a teaspoon of salt. Simmer while you shuck the peas.

2. As soon as the vegetables are tender, after 12 to 15 minutes, add the peas and spinach and cook until the spinach has wilted down, a few minutes more. Stir in the creme fraiche and add the basil. Tasted for salt and season with pepper. Serve as a side dish or a course by itself.

Serves 2 to 4.

Strawberry Ice Cream

For several weeks now, I’ve been obsessing about strawberry ice cream.

I’ve never been one to choose strawberry when perusing the thirty-two-or-however-many flavours. I tend to go for something nutty or chocolaty (or preferably both). Besides that, I’m not even a huge consumer of ice cream. I rarely buy it. It was just one of those unexplained cravings, I suppose.

About a month ago, I was gearing up to run a race I’d been training for and decided it was the optimal time to indulge in something horrifically caloric. So I pleaded my case to my husband, and out we went for huge ice cream cones.

Indeed, I picked strawberry. It was nice, but it didn’t really do it for me. The craving remained unsatisfied. So when I was out at the farmer’s market last Saturday morning and saw the first of the Ontario berries, I hatched a spontaneous plan to make my own. We were headed to friends’ for a barbecue by the pool that night and that was all the excuse I needed.

Not having an ice cream maker was not about to get in my way. I’d just pick one up. So I scoured the net for the perfect recipe (settling on one from a 1983 issue of Gourmet), scared up the rest of my ingredients, and set about making the custard (half-and-half, whipping cream, sugar, and many egg yolks – egad!) and the strawberry puree (those gorgeous homegrown berries and a good scoop of sugar), which then get combined and, eventually, frozen. I saved some chopped berries to add in at the last minute – chunks are essential.

In a mad rush (because I still had to make the salad I originally said I’d bring), I decided we’d simply leave for our friends’ place (in Toronto) a few minutes early and swing by a store up the road to grab an ice cream maker en route. Simple. Perfect.

Until I got to the store (already running an hour late) and they didn’t have one. And then went to another store that had every other small appliance imaginable, but no ice cream maker. And I had seven litres of custard to make strawberry ice cream sitting in a hot car. And we needed to stop for gas yet. And go to the liquor store. And my husband was losing patience, but silently so (which is almost worse).

One last stop at one last store and I had my ice cream maker. I had to buy the floor model and the thing cost me about double what I’d anticipated. But my plan was coming to fruition. Then I leafed through the instructional manual at a stoplight and discovered that the bowl insert in the machine needs to be frozen for six to twenty-two hours before it can be used. Oops.

So my machine remained in the car, and my ice cream mixture went into my girlfriend’s fridge, and then accompanied me home again that night. As I put the machine insert into my freezer, I wondered what the heck I was going to do with seven litres of strawberry ice cream and reminded myself of the dangers of spontaneity.

But, feeling less cranky the next morning, I realized I had the perfect Father’s Day treat to take both my dad and father-in-law. So I flipped on my little dream machine, poured in the creamy, strawberry goodness and went about my business for half an hour.

And when I came back, there it was. My perfect strawberry ice cream. Like silk. All the superlatives apply. Heavenly. Craving fulfilled (and still some left).

My new mission (aside from making margaritas in my new ice cream machine) is to continue to gorge on strawberries. Most of the region’s berry farms open this weekend (see Foodlink.ca for a list of local u-pick farms) and I can’t wait to get out in the field and start picking.

Strawberry Ice Cream

Adapted from Gourmet (May 1983)

1 pound (about 1 1/4 pints) strawberries, hulled and sliced

1 1/2 cups sugar
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

1 1/2 cups whipping cream

1 1/2 cups half-and-half

4 large egg yolks

1 teaspoon vanilla, or to taste

In a food processor fitted with the steel blade or in a blender in batches, puree the strawberries and transfer the puree to a bowl. Stir in 1/2 cup of the sugar and the lemon juice and chill the mixture, covered for two hours.

In a heavy saucepan combine the cream, the milk, and the remaining 1 cup sugar and scald the mixture over moderate heat, stirring. In a bowl beat the egg yolks until they are light and thick and pour the milk mixture through a fine sieve in a stream, stirring. Transfer the custard to the pan and cook it over moderately low heat, stirring, until it coats the spoon. Transfer the custard to a metal bowl set in a bowl of cracked ice, stir in the vanilla, and let the custard cool, covered with a buttered round of wax paper. Chill the custard for 2 hours, stir in the strawberry mixture, and freeze according to manufacturer's instructions.

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Sweet Peas

Any day now, the fresh peas will make their debut at the farmer’s markets. Nerd that I am, I’ve been waiting with baited breath. I get more excited for peas than for any other farm-grown produce. They’re so sweet, so tiny and vibrant – and they have me dreaming with possibilities.

Shelling the peas, of course, is part of the experience – taking them out on the porch and toiling away mindlessly. Not everyone finds that part fun, though. One of my best friends, who grew up on a Manitoba farm, once told me she has serious misgivings about sweet peas. Though she’ll admit to their tastiness, she says they conjure up childhood memories of idyllic summer days interrupted by her mom, who would pass her off a bushel from the garden and instruct her to shell enough for dinner for their family of six – plus the farm help.

In these parts, for the farm-kids-turned-city-dwellers, like my friend – or for the lazy or otherwise harassed – peas can be had without the work courtesy of the Gingrich family at Winfield Produce near Wallenstein. Alvin and Nancy Gingrich and their children grow 30 to 40 acres of peas, which they sell shelled – thanks not to elbow grease but a pea combine.

“The combine does the shelling in the field, then brings them into the shed for washing, grading and packaging in one pound bags,” Alvin explained to me. “They’re chilled in ice water and then run through a spin drier and packed. They have a short shelf life – only four or five days.”

Which means the peas get to market quickly – and are wonderfully fresh. Gingrich says there is only one other producer he knows of in Ontario that sells fresh shelled peas at market, and that’s in Belleville, so we should consider ourselves lucky.

The Gingrichs don’t sell their peas at farm gate, but rather wholesale to other vendors. You can find them at the St. Jacob’s and Kitchener farmer’s markets, Herrle’s Country Farm Market and a variety of other spots. Look for them to arrive in the next week or two, as Gingrich told me it would be late June this year (due to that cool spring we had) before the peas were in full swing. He’ll be harvesting right through to mid-September, though, so we have all summer to get our fill.

Thank goodness for that. When I think peas, I think pasta – peas in risotto, with pancetta and tortellini, tossed into a carbonara or in orzo salad with mint, lemon and some salty feta. I love them in potato salad, too.

One of my favourite recipes of the last few years is for Sweet Pea Mash. I learned this one from a friend who worked at Toronto’s Dish Cooking Studio, where it originates.

Here’s a quick and dirty version: Blanch three cups of fresh peas in boiling water – just for a minute! – then drain and rinse with cold water. Throw a small shallot and a clove of garlic into your food processor, mince them up finely, then add your peas, half a cup of grated Parmesan, and a whole head of roasted garlic and pulse until smooth. Keep the machine running and drizzle in a quarter-cup of olive oil. Season your mash with salt and pepper to taste and smear it on crostini. I’m all for stirring some chopped, fresh mint into the mix – or sprinkling it on top – just because peas and mint are such a beautiful combo. But it’s lovely as is, too, and makes a great appetizer.

It feels a bit sacrilegious, maybe, to puree those perfectly round little peas into a mush. But if you didn’t shell them yourself, maybe it’s not so terrible? Regardless, all the more reason to start thinking about how to eat them next. I’d start simple – a big steamed bowl tossed with butter, salt and pepper. Summer perfection.
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