Ramps

The ground is finally breaking. The green stuff is forcing its way through the soil and our taste buds are eagerly awaiting the full-grown splendor.

It will be a short few weeks until we can enjoy rhubarb and asparagus, but a couple of items are ready to captivate our palates as we speak. For starters, if you've spent any time in the woods lately, you may have noticed the smell of wild onion in the air.

Those would be ramps you're sniffing. Otherwise known as wild leeks or wild onions, they are a member of the allium or lily family. They're native to eastern Canada and the U.S., have long green leaves and white bulbs and they taste fresh and mild -- but with a little zing. They're the perfect ingredient with which to kick off the coming months of abundance.

Misha Winterfeld, an 18-year-old student at Rockway Mennonite Collegiate, goes foraging for ramps annually at this time of year. He and a buddy scour the bush of his friend's property near Tavistock; on a good day, they can pick anywhere from 75 to 100 pounds of wild onions.

"They're pretty easy to spot," says Winterfeld. "They're distinctive so they're hard to miss when you find a patch of them. We actually eat them plain when we pick them because they're very sweet. The texture is really crunchy and they're very nice to eat raw when you pick them fresh."

Last year Winterfeld sold some of his ramps to Vincenzo's in Kitchener (which I unwittingly came across when I stopped in one night -- I excitedly bought a couple of bunches to take home and experiment with). He hopes to do the same this year, and also plans to get in touch with some other local foodie shops and restaurants to see if they're interested.

"They go to the end of May, just about," Winterfeld says of the growing season. "Then they start wilting away. i think that they grow wild like that is what kind of makes them a delicacy."

Jackie McMillan, a Kitchener forager, agrees, but warns that strapping on your hiking boots and trapsing through the trails is not necessarily the way to go about getting your hands on fresh ramps.

First there are the environmental concerns -- you'd be robbing a woodlot of its native plants. Then there's that mistaken identity thing.

"They look a bit like lily," McMillan says of ramps, "so that's something to be careful of. There are some lilies that have an oniony flavour but lily isn't particularly good for you. So ramps are not unmistakable."

So unless you live on a big property with access to the woods (and possess some botanical savvy), you might be better to hit up the farmers' markets and hope that someone has done the foraging for you. Chances are good you'll have success.

And if you do, let the creativity -- and the salivation -- begin. Really, any place you'd use scallions or leeks is a suitable place to use ramps. Chopped up in scrambled eggs or buttermilk biscuits, sauteed with pasta or in risotto. Grilled simply and served up with a steak. Like a green onion, you can use the whole shebang, leaves included.

McMillan says wild leeks make a great partner to spring's bitter greens, like dandelion or mustard. "Bitter gets a lot more yummy when you combine it with savoury," she says, adding that she likes to steam the two together.

Pesto is another great option. One recipe I found in Gourmet recommends blanching half a pound of ramps in boiling water for about five seconds, then popping them in the food processor with a quarter cup of olive oil and the zest of a lemon (give or take). Cook up the pasta of your choice, then add about a half-cup of that nice, starchy pasta water to the food processor, toss your sauce with the noodles and finish with some grated parmesan and salt and pepper to taste.

Here's a more official recipe for Wild Leek Pesto. This one comes from Lucy Waverman via an old spring copy of Food & Drink magazine. She served the pesto with with linguini, oven-roasted tomatoes and goat cheese but you could use it anywhere your little heart -- or palate -- desires.

Wild Leek Pesto

2 tbsp hazlenuts

1 cup chopped wild leeks (ramps)

1/4 cup olive oil

1/4 cup grated parmesan cheese

Place hazelnuts in food processor and grind until roughly chopped. Add leeks and olive oil and process until still slightly chunky. Stir in parmesan cheese.

Greenhouse Tomatoes

In a matter of a couple of weeks, the season of freshness -- thank goodness -- will be upon us. Though we go through the same cycle year after year, that first taste of locally grown goodness never ceases to thrill. The wait, like the cold weather itself, always seems endless.

But up at Stuart Horst's farm north of Elmira, just a stone's throw from Floradale, harvest started about six weeks ago. The beefsteak and grape tomatoes he planted in his greenhouse back in late December began to ripen in early March and from there in, Horst, his family, and staff have been busily packaging up and selling their wares to those of us eager for a taste of homegrown freshness.

Shopping at Vincenzo's, one of the region's farmers' markets or at Elmira Foodland, you may have seen the clear, plastic pint-sized containers of grape tomatoes sold under the Elmira's Own label -- these come from Horst's Floralane Produce. He sells about 10 per cent of his grape tomatoes and 25 per cent of his beefsteaks at the farm gate; the rest can be found at the locations above. It's possible you might be eating them when dining out, too -- at Crossroads Restaurant in Elmira or Charbries in Uptown Waterloo, for starters.

What makes Horst's grape tomatoes tastier than those little plastic containers shipped up from Mexico?

"We leave them on the vine until they're riper," Horst, an Old Order Mennonite, explains. "That helps to create a flavour that people like. We don't have to ship them far, so we can let them ripen longer."

Mexican tomatoes are picked before they're ripe, partly because they have so much further to travel before they're sold, and partly so they can be churned out faster because, the sooner they're picked, the sooner the plant can produce more fruit. "You can get more poundage if you grow that way," Horst says.

Ah, but you don't get that sweet flavour.

In the greenhouse industry, output is measured by kilograms per square metre. Last year, Floralane grew 50 kilograms per square metre of beefsteak tomatoes and 20 kilograms per square metre of grape tomatoes. They produced 29,000 pints of grape tomatoes and hope to do the same in 2009.

Horst grows his tomatoes without chemicals. "I'm very excited about our biological program," he says. "I was just in putting more bugs into the greenhouse, wasps and so on to eat up the crop damaging pests. It seems to work well."

New this year are green beans from the greenhouses, too, although, laughs Horst, "I dare not mention them. People are fighting for them already and we don't have near enough. I've got orders on the board filled before they've even grown."

Business at Floralane is ever-expanding. On top of the half-acre tomato greenhouse, there are smaller ones sheltering flowers for the bedding plants and baskets they sell in spring and summer, chickens bearing eggs, and, in warm weather, a shop that sells produce and baked goods (they also plan to sell their own brand of homemade salsa this summer, too).

The family also runs a community supported agriculture (CSA) program that has customers pay upfront in spring for a share of the farm's weekly vegetables right through until the growing season ends.

Growing business means Horst has added to his staff this year; the family suffered a tragedy last December when Horst's business partner, Melvin Martin, was killed while riding his bicycle. "It was a great loss to us here," he says, adding that Martin's widow "still enjoys working in the greenhouse with her four little daughters."

Elmira's Own Tomatoes will be grown and sold right through summer until early December. At that point, they'll replant, let the greenhouse work its magic until March, and the harvest will start all over again.
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Hot Cross Buns

I've never before given any thought to hot cross buns. They've always reminded me a bit of Christmas fruit cake with their raisins, spices and bits of fruit. Meh.

This year, I'm reconsidering for several reasons. First, there is what seems to be the inevitable but gradual giving of second thought to all the edibles you once thought gross when young and foolish (boozy desserts and mincemeat also fall into this category).

Second, there has been the temptation by way of intriguing recipes accompanied by glossy photos -- this month's LCBO mag, Food & Drink, has four takes on the hot cross bun in their current spring issue, including chocolate cranberry and brown butter almond. Blasphemous to the the traditionalists, to be sure, but that's what I'll be prepping to share with the family for Easter Sunday breaky. (I'll be bucking tradition there, too -- HCBs are traditionally served on Good Friday. Ah, well).

These little treats have got quite the fascinating history, too, if you believe all the folklore. Some say they actually originate in the pagan tradition, with the four sections created by the cross referring to the phases of the moon. Others attribute their origins to the Greeks. At some point, the Christians reportedly claimed them as their own, calling the cross a cross, and Elizabeth I is rumoured to have banned them from Protestant England, feeling they were too remniscent of the Catholicism she aimed to quash.

Bakeries around the region are also getting in on the hot cross bun action, as they often do at this time of year. At least three that I frequent -- Golden Hearth and Nougat in Kitchener and Grain Harvest Breadhouse (with locations in both Kitchener and Waterloo) -- will be selling their own versions of the bun this weekend.

Grain Harvest started making hot cross buns the same year their original Waterloo bakery opened in the late 1980s. (Now with three locations and a busy wholesale business that ships baked goods from Windsor to Ottawa, they'll celebrate their 20th anniversary this September).

"They always contain raisins," says Roland Berchtold, one of Grain Harvest's founders, says of his HCBs.

"Some have cut fruit, too. There are many varieties. We put lemon and orange peel in, and either raisins or sultanas. But what really makes them is the cinnamon and clove. That's what binds it all together. And, of course, there's freshness. We're baking every night fresh and that's the absolute key."

Grain Harvest actually starts selling hot cross buns in mid-February and continues to sell them beyond Easter. "As long as people will buy them," says Berchtold. "Usually when the weather starts to get warm, people look to other things."

Should you have a little time on your hands this weekend, or be looking for a last minute traditional treat for your beloveds, here is Berchtold's recipe for hot cross buns -- slightly tweaked.

"My usual recipe starts with something like 45 pounds of flour," he laughs. " So this recipe is very close to what we do but it's in cups and so on."

Grain Harvest's Traditional Hot Cross Buns

Dough

1/4 cup water, room temperature

1/2 cup warm milk

1/4 cup melted butter

1 egg

3-1/2 cups all purpose flour

1/4 cup raw sugar

1-1/2 tsp dry active yeast

1 tbsp cinnamon

pinch nutmeg

pinch ground cloves

1/2 tbsp salt

1/2 cup raisins

1/2 cup chopped mixed candied fruit

Icing

1/2 cup confectioners sugar

2 tbsp water

Mix all dough ingredients except raisins and fruit for five minutes or until smooth dough has formed. Add raisins and fruit. Cover dough and let rest for 15 min.

Cut dough into pieces of desired size (12 to 15 pieces total), shape into balls and place on greased baking sheet. Let rise to double the size.

Bake at 370 for 15 to 17 min. Let cool.

Use icing to decorate, making crosses using a piping bag or a baggie with the corner tip cut off.

Maple Syrup

Many of you may not know that writing is not my full-time gig. During the bulk of my workweek I am quite busy solving the problems and celebrating the successes of kids -- I am, quite fortunately, an elementary school teacher at a rural school near Elmira.

The extra hours of daylight and the rising mercury give all of us an extra spring in our step at this time of the year. Most of us would call that spring fever, but, at my school, it would be better described as maple syrup fever.

For those city slickers who attend the Elmira Maple Syrup Festival, which takes place today, maple syrup fever lasts but a day. But the excitement north of Waterloo dates back to early March, when those daytime temperatures first break the zero mark.

The first student to tell me their family has begun tapping trees signals the beginning of the end of winter. It's a welcome reminder that soon, we'll all be putting away our woolens and trading our winter boots for rubber ones -- the frigid temperatures and whipping wind (and I swear it's always five degrees colder up there than it is in Kitchener) will finally cease. The only surer sign of warmth among our students is the swapping of felt and velveteen caps for straw hats and bonnets.

The straw hats and bonnets bit might tip you off that, indeed, a high percentage of the kids at my school are of Mennonite background, many of them David Martin Mennonite. Though they ride the yellow bus to and from school, their usual method of transportation is the horse and buggy. Many of their families tap their trees in spring and operate sugar shacks.

Post-March Break, the suntans of teachers and kids who've been to sunny climes are usually matched by the brown, freckled faces of boys who've been out helping their dad collect sap (minus the still-pale foreheads, which were covered up by caps).

Then come the taffy cones, which the kids make at home and bring in to sell -- mini ice-cream cones filled with maple taffy. Our Grade 7 and 8 boys are budding entrepreneurs, and announce the forthcoming day's sale over the P.A. system before the afternoon bell. A taffy cone definitely makes for a good morning-recess pick-me-up but you've got to be quick because they inevitably sell out. And here's a sure sign of current economic climes -- this year, they went up in price. After many years of selling for a quarter, they're now 35 cents. Sometimes, there's maple sugar candy (my favourite), too -- three for a dollar.

Wandering through the gym supervising while the students eat lunch, you see maple syrup creeping its way into the metal lunchboxes, too. I quizzed a group of boys the other day on their preferred way of eating syrup. "Maple syrup bun," one Grade 3 fella told me, matter-of-factly. This is really just a bun soaked in syrup. You'll also see buttered bread doused in the stuff, or a little container of syrup with bread for dipping. Last year I had the pleasure of trying to conduct a meeting (among adults) at a table a boy had eaten just that very snack on, and had to interrupt it midway through to fetch a damp sponge because our papers kept sticking together.

Maple syrup creates a blip of excitement that breaks us out of the winter blahs -- especially the boys. Some of my students are kids of few words, but start asking them questions about the sugar shack and they'll suddenly become talkative. More funny are the exchanged looks and giggles they give you when you get curious on them and ask all the basic questions about how syrup is made. You know they're wondering, "Geez, doesn't everybody know this stuff?"

Some of you heading up to Elmira today may encounter my students, capitalizing on everyone's love of the sugary goodness, be it through taffy cones or brimming bottles and jugs for your pancakes and french toast. Tell them I said hello! I'll be at home in the city, avoiding the crowds and waiting until Monday to fill my maple craving with a mid-morning taffy cone. Just another April school day.

Ewenity

Lovely as it is to indulge in a French brie, a Greek feta or a Spanish manchego, imported isn't necessarily better when it comes to cheese. Look closely, and you'll find some wonderful stuff made close to home.

A good place to start if you're looking for a lovely Ontario cheese is with some of the great sheep milk stuff made by Ewenity Dairy Co-operative and Best Baa Dairy. Though based in Conn, Ontario, just outside of Arthur, the dairy's plant and store -- where you'll find their full repertoire of cheese (as well as milk, ice cream and yogurt) -- are just up the road in Fergus.

The milk itself comes from seven or eight farmers who together make up the Ewenity co-op. Many are Mennonite farmers from the Kincardine area. The co-op formed seven or eight years ago when Elisabeth and Eric Bzikot, English farmers by way of Manitoba, moved to the Conn area to milk sheep and settle into "semi-retirement."

So much for that. Now, they're running a busy little operation along with the help of their son Peter and his wife Nicole, a self-professed city girl who bought cheese from her husband at the St. Lawrence Market until he finally asked her out -- "Then I sold my little condo and here I am," she tells me over the phone from their home in Conn.

Though the farmers in the co-op are clearly interested in selling their milk, they're not necessarily interested in the production, marketing and sales of the product. So the processing and development is left to Best Baa Dairy, the Bzikots themselves. Elisabeth is the cheesemaker (she and Eric also look after the flock, even growing their own feed); Peter and Nicole handle the business side of things.

"My mother-in-law is Swiss-German and my father-in-law is Polish," explains Nicole. "They both have family memories of making cheeses. Elisabeth is very adventurous. She's developed such a great product line. Some things have fallen by the wayside along the way because they're not excellent, and others have really stood strong."

Among the cleverly-named products available: Ramembert (a camembert-style cheese), Sheep in the Meadow (a gorgeous fresh cheese rolled in herbes de provence), Eweda, an aged, semi-hard cheese and a Greek-style feta. Most cheeses are available either in raw milk or pasteurized form. Interestingly, Bzikot says people often opt for raw milk given the choice.

Nicole's personal favourite is Mouton Rouge, a firm, washed-rind, raw milk cheese aged 60 days. "It's caught on all over the place," she says. "It's kind of a comfort cheese, but not stinky. You don't have to be tough to enjoy it. It's palatable for a variety of people."

As for farming philosophy, Elisabeth, says Nicole, "treats her livestock like family. Even though we're not certified organic, we're really good to our animals. They have an excellent life. The boys' lives aren't as long, unfortunately, because they end up going for meat."

Next on the agenda for the folks at Best Baa is to delve further into ice cream. Before, it was more of a passive project but they recently received a grant, invested in a machine, and are experimenting with new flavours. "It's really good," Nicole says. "There's a huge market of people who are intolerant of cow's milk, so we're excited about it."

Despite the tightening of budgets, Nicole says they've found that "cheese is one of those things people don't skimp on." Indeed, she says, they remain as popular as ever at farmers markets (they're at several across Toronto, as well as in Guelph), which they particularly enjoy because "it's an opportunity for us to chat with people and visit with friends."

Though they're not yet selling at the markets in Waterloo region, the Kitchener market, Nicole says, is one they "might consider."

And though you'd have to head up to Fergus to find the full scope of Ewenity's products, you can find select items at several locations in the area, including Vincenzo's and Nougat Bakery and Delicatessen, both in Kitchener, and a handful of health food stores.

Check out www.ewenity.com and click on Where to Buy for a more extensive list.
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The Perfect Winter Breakfast

I am not one of those people who can't eat in the morning. I wake up with a growling stomach and among the first three thoughts in my head is, "What's for breakfast?" I can't wait to eat.

There are a handful of things I have for breakfast, weekday or weekend, usually involving some combination of granola or cereal, yogurt or milk and fruit. Or maybe some good bread, toasted with some PB and jam.

In cold weather, I'm partial to oatmeal. It's a great whole grain and it's easy to find locally grown, organic varieties. But it presents a few problems.

First off -- the better tasting (and better for you) the oatmeal, the longer it takes to cook. Steel cut oats take about 20 to 30 minutes on the stove top and I don't give myself lots of time to linger in the morning. You can make it ahead, put it in the fridge, and heat it up day by day, but then I'm committing to having it several days in a row and I like some variety.

Then there's the question of protein. A bowl of stick-to-your-ribs oatmeal, while full of fibre and other good things, doesn't really give me a protein kick, which, I've learned, is important. And fibrous as it is, I'm always looking to get an extra boost of that, too.

Lucky for me, the perfect solution arrived in my email inbox this winter by way of a newsletter from my naturopath, Dr. Joanna Thiessen, at George Street Naturopathic Medicine in Waterloo.

In her newsletter, Joanna shared her Winter Breakfast Recipe, a great porridge that mixes oats with bran, flax and ground nuts and seeds. It's oatmeal but with a boost of extra fibre, protein and omega-3s. And -- most exciting of all -- it doesn't need to be cooked! You soak it in milk overnight and just warm it up when you're ready to eat.

I've been eating Joanna's porridge a few times a week now for the last few months and have shared the recipe with a few people, including my mom, who is also hooked, and who recently made a batch to take to a friend she was visiting for the weekend along with a copy of the recipe. (Something a little different than the token bottle of thanks-for-having-me wine).

I have been so chuffed about the porridge that I thought it only fair that I share the recipe with you, so I emailed Joanna this week to find out the particulars on why it's especially good for us.

"It's very high in fibre," she explained, "particularly soluble fibre. This is primarily due to the oat bran, but also the oats and ground flax."

Soluble fibre lowers cholesterol and keeps the heart healthy. Then there's the insoluble fibre from the flax, which keeps the bowels working nicely.

As for the protein, that comes from the ground almonds and sunflower seeds.

"Protein is essential for proper functioning of our immune system, and also helps to keep our blood sugar stable," Joanna said. "Eating protein in the morning will also get our metabolism and energy production off to a good start, and this is very important for helping us to maintain a healthy body weight."

And so, without further delay, here's the Winter Breakfast Recipe. I know spring (mercifully) officially arrives today but let's not get carried away and think we won't have any more mornings that don't have us hankering for a warm breakfast. Plus I think this would be good cold in the summer months, topped with fresh berries and a bit of extra cold milk.

A trip to the bulk food store will stock you up on most, if not all, of these ingredients. I bought the sunflower seeds whole and ground them myself in a food processor.

Winter Breakfast Recipe

4 cups oatmeal

2 cups oatbran

1 cup ground flaxseed

1 cup ground almonds

1 cup ground sunflower seeds

In a large bowl, mix all ingredients together. Store in a container in the fridge. Joanna says to use it up within four weeks but I think I've had mine slightly longer than that and so far, so good.

To prepare, scoop 1/3 of a cup of the mix into a bowl (I use 1/2 cup scoops -- I told, you, I'm hungry in the morning!) Pour enough of the milk of your choice (cow, rice, almond, etc.) overtop to cover it, and, if you like, add dried or frozen fruit. Refrigerate overnight. 

In the morning, just heat it up. Joanna, being a naturopath, suggests warming it in a pot; convenience wins out for me in this case and I just use the microwave. Add a little more milk at this point to loosen it up, if need be.

Top with maple syrup or honey to taste (both great because they're natural sweeteners).

Making Stock

In winter, I practically live on homemade soup. Many Sunday afternoons are spent putting together a pot of something, which I then divvy up into single serving containers, pop in the freezer and take out one at a time the night before for quick lunches the following day. We'll have soup for dinner once every couple of weeks, too. With some lightly dressed greens and a piece of crusty bread, it's makes a warming, satisfying supper.

The stock dilemma is always a frustrating one for me. Chicken is my usual broth of choice but I'm not particularly interested in bouillon cubes. Something about all those living, breathing ingredients being shrunken down into a florescent yellow cube is off-putting.

Most often, I stand in the grocery aisle, staring at the options -- organic (but sodium-loaded); non-organic (and sodium-loaded) or non-organic (with less sodium). If I make it over to the health food store, I can find a good option that's both organic and low in sodium. But it costs quite a bit and with the amount of stock I go through, it seems indulgent.

The answer, of course, is to make my own stock, which I never seem to find the time for. In truth, it's quite easy and it's very cheap. The thing to do is to set aside an afternoon, borrow an extra stock pot, get myself a plethora of one-litre plastic containers, clear a spot in the freezer and make up a huge batch. This I vow to do at least once before winter is over.

My favourite spot for chicken in the city (and many others', too, based on the Saturday morning insanity) is Bloomingdale's Hilltop Acres Poultry, which is available most easily from St. Jacob's Market. Their chicken, while not organic, is free run and hormone and additive free.

Lynn Dettweiler, the retail sales manager (and sausage maker) for Hilltop, says bones of any kind will make good stock.

"You can use anything," she says. "Chicken feet make good gelatinous stock. It's thick and full of body and flavour. Necks work, too. Those are the most economical ones."

Indeed, a two-and-a-half pound bag of chicken feet at Hilltop will set you back a mere $2.50.

Lance Edwards, head chef at Waterloo restaurant Charbries, says he uses "anything that you can't eat. The tips of wings, chicken feet, necks and so on."

Stock is one of the simplest things to make, he says, but every chef has their own technique. Depending on what he's using the stock for, Edwards has different methods.

One worthwhile tip, he says, is to roast the bones first. "It's extra work but it does make for a deeper colour and flavour. When you do roast the bones, you also get rid of a lot of the fat so you don't have to work as hard to skim the stock later."

As for how to flavour your broth, Edwards recommends a classic mirepoix (carrot, onion and celery) and a bouquet garni (a bundle of fresh herbs like parsley, thyme and bay leaf) for starters. Peppercorns and salt are also important. A few tomato scraps are a worthwhie addition, he says. "It won't colour it, but it will help clarify it." And you can "break the rules" by adding leeks and other vegetable scraps, but steer clear of anything with strong flavour (like broccoli or cauliflower).

Here's a recipe slightly adapted from The Complete Canadian Living Cookbook to get you started. If you have two stockpots (or can borrow one), I suggest doubling this and making a big batch. Might as well. Refrigerate it (or stick it out on the front porch for a few hours) before skimming the fat off -- it's much easier. There's no salt in this recipe; you can add it later when you put your stock to use.

Chicken Stock

5 lbs chicken bones, backs and/or necks, cut into pieces

2 stalks celery, coarsely chopped

2 carrots, coarsely chopped

1 unpeeled onion, coarsely chopped

1 bay leaf

a few stems of fresh thyme and parsley

1 tbsp black peppercorns

Pour 16 cups (4 L) cold water into large stockpot. Add chicken bones. Bring to a boil and skim off any foam.

Add all other ingredients. Reduce heat and simmer for four hours. 

Strain into a large bowl, discarding vegetables and bones. Cool to let fat solidify on surface. Remove fat and refrigerate up to three days or freeze up to four months.