The Inadvertent Gardener » Friends

Roasted fingerling potato salad

inadvertentgardener — Fri, 20 Jan 2012 01:16:23 +0000

The Unicorn has lots of lovable qualities, but among them is this: He is a fantastic giver of gifts.

He is not a fan of the gift list—he’d much rather pay attention to the recipient, think hard about something they would love to have but would never buy for themselves, and then give them that. I don’t know many people who operate like this, and it’s pretty spectacular to be on the receiving end.

This year, that meant he gave me a controller that turns my slow cooker into a sous-vide machine, along with some other accessories perfect for making the sous-vide process easier. Not only would I not have bought one of these, I didn’t even know it existed. How The Unicorn found the dude in Canada who makes these things, I do not know, but he made it happen.

Of course, as I am wont to do, this meant that I let my excitement about my new toy get the better of me. I planned out four recipes, all vegetable-based, to start with in the cooker. None of them required long cooking times, but they did require the water to stay at a pretty hefty temperature.

I could not get the water to stay at that temperature on the first try. I should also mention that the first try lasted about ten hours, while I became more and more freaked out about the amount of raw ingredients I’d just bought for these dishes and how they were going to go to waste. Let it not be said I can’t turn what starts as a fun cooking day into something akin to a panic attack. I have mad skills in this area, folks. Mad skills.

One of the dishes I was going to make was a fingerling potato salad, and when it became obvious that the sous-vide solution was not forthcoming that evening, I varied the recipe to use the oven instead of the slow cooker. The result was outstanding: a bacony, rich dish that rides the line between German potato salad and the American rendition.

Even if it meant I didn’t get to use The Unicorn’s gift for this dish, it yielded a recipe I’ll return to. I hope you will try it, and return to it yourself.

Roasted Fingerling Potato Salad
(Serves 8-10)

3 pounds fingerling potatoes, cleaned and skins left on
2 TBSP olive oil
1 TBSP salt
¼ pound bacon, diced
2 carrots, diced
3 shallots, diced
2 garlic cloves, diced
1 celery stalk, diced
¼ c. homemade mayonnaise (To make this, I recommend following the directions located here, but substitute red wine vinegar for the lemon juice, and leave out the garlic and basil.)
2 TBSP apple cider vinegar
2 TBSP Dijon mustard
2 TBSP chopped parsley
1 TBSP chopped tarragon

Boil the potatoes in heavily salted water until they are just starting to get tender. Meanwhile, preheat your oven to 450 degrees.
Drain the potatoes and let them cool a bit. At this point, if you have a lot of variation in size, cut the larger ones in half, then toss the whole batch into a roasting pan. Drizzle with the olive oil, then toss with the salt. Roast in the oven for about 25-30 minutes, or until the potato skins are crisping and starting to brown.
While the potatoes are roasting, saute the bacon in a pan over medium heat until it begins to crisp and the fat begins to render. Add the carrots, garlic, shallots and celery to the pan and cook approximately five minutes, or until the shallots and garlic become soft.
Remove the potatoes from the oven and place them in a large bowl. Add the onion-garlic-bacon mixture and mix.
In a separate bowl, mix the mayonnaise, vinegar and mustard. Pour that mixture on top of the potato mixture and mix well. Sprinkle the herbs on top and serve immediately.

Introducing The Unicorn

inadvertentgardener — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 15:14:42 +0000

So, I have come to the point where I can’t tell any more stories without introducing you, Good People of the Internet, to someone new.

To be fair, he’s not so new to me (though he makes every day feel new, which is, perhaps, better than his actually being new). But until now (admittedly because I haven’t been blogging much…), I’ve managed to keep him under wraps.

Now, however, I’m getting to the part where he’s going to come up in conversation.

He and I talked about this, the issue of how he might appear on the blog, back in April. “At some point, I’m going to have to write about you,” I said. “There’s no way you can’t be part of the story.”

“That’s fine,” he said. “Just don’t use my real name.”

(“He’s a smart man,” said my father, when I told him about this exchange.)

“What do you want to be called?” I asked. “You don’t have to answer right away.”

“You can call me whatever you want,” he said.

So I thought about it, and I thought about a conversation I’d had with a friend shortly after he and I decided to call what we had together something more, well, perennial.

She and I were headed into the city to meet him and some other friends for karaoke. While we rode BART, I told her how I’d never dated anyone who matched me so well, who shared so many of my interests, who challenged me so thoroughly, and who could not only keep up with me, but might very well be able to outpace me, if given a chance.

“It’s a miracle,” she said. “You’ve found a unicorn!”

“Yes,” I said. “I have found a unicorn.”

And then, about an hour later, when he got up and started singing karaoke and revealed his amazing voice, she turned to me, wide-eyed and said, “MOTORCYCLE-RIDING UNICORN.”

So, readers of mine, consider yourself introduced to the newest character in this tale of food and things that grow from the dirt, this man who has utterly stolen my heart, and who will show up in the very next story I tell: The Unicorn.

Similar Posts:

Kettle padróns

inadvertentgardener — Wed, 11 Aug 2010 14:25:17 +0000

Last night, Fatemeh assigned me the job of side dishes to go with pork chops. Roasted fingerlings, I decided, and roasted green beans tossed with preserved rangpur lime, because in the Bay Area, summer is so damn chilly and foggy that it’s quite normal to be able to roast up some vegetables a la winter.

While she was off gallivanting around the neighborhood, I pulled the vegetables from the crisper and realized I had some baby padróns that I needed to cook. “I’m making them as an appetizer,” I said when she arrived back at the apartment. I sautéed them up in olive oil, and dumped them in a bowl to add salt.

At this point, Fatemeh was mixing a marinade for the pork. “One of these days,” she said, gesturing at the bag of brown sugar on the counter and then at the peppers, “I want to hit those with that and caramelize them.”

“Do it,” I said. “Now.”

She tossed some brown sugar into the hot pan, and I dumped the blistered padróns back in. “Can I add salt to them?” I asked.

“Of course,” she said, in the tone that finishes the sentence with the implied dumbass.

“Kettle padróns,” I said. “We’re making kettle padróns!”

We made them, and then we ate them. All of them. With our fingers. While standing up at the counter.

“The kettle padróns were gone in under five minutes. We have a problem,” Tweeted Fatemeh. “Either that or a business plan.”

Kettle Padróns
(Serves 1-2, hastily)

1 pint padrón peppers (No need to seed or stem them…)
2 Tbsp olive oil
1 ½ Tbsp brown sugar
½ Tbsp kosher salt or sea salt

Heat the olive oil in a sauté pan over medium-high heat. When the oil is just about to smoke, toss in the padróns. Sauté them until they’re starting to blacken and blister.
Add in the brown sugar and continue stirring for about three or four minutes, until the sugar’s melted and starting to brown.
Transfer the caramelized peppers to a bowl. Add the salt.
Eat the shit out of them. Then email me and Fatemeh and thank us for this discovery.

Similar Posts:

A tomato seedling delivery

inadvertentgardener — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 01:51:09 +0000

While we were in the midst of sorting out the HOA problems, I received a cheery email from my coworker, Pilar, who was in the midst of nurturing tomato seedlings on my behalf. They were just about ready for delivery, she said, and she’d bring them in after the weekend.

This presented a dilemma. Tell? Or not to tell? Luckily, I fell ill the following Monday and Tuesday and didn’t return to the office until Wednesday, which meant I could put off the conversation for a couple of days. I’ve never been so grateful to get a cough in my life.

But Wednesday, it was time to face reality. Pilar arrived in my office bearing a bag of four different varietals, all just a bit leggy but looking beautiful.

“I have to admit, I’m really sorry to see them go,” she said. “I’m going to miss them. Take good care of them.”

I gulped.

“Right, so, I hadn’t exactly gotten a chance to tell you,” I said. “We’re having a little problem with the homeowners’ association at my building, so I’m not entirely sure when I’ll be able to plant them.”

Her face turned just a touch sad.

“But I’ll figure something out,” I said, rushing into promises I had no idea if I could keep. “I’ll find somewhere to plant them. I don’t know where, but somewhere.”

“No,” she said, touching the leaves. “It’s not a problem if you let them die.”

My Catholic guilt blared at me like a siren. Kill tomato plants? Not on purpose. No way.

I carried them home carefully the next night on the bus, giving them the window seat. Then I set them up on the dining room table at the apartment, hoping a reprieve would come through before they wilted.

Similar Posts:

Guest Post: Fairies inspire a young gardener

inadvertentgardener — Wed, 19 May 2010 12:54:55 +0000

[Editor's Note: This post is from Ysa, the step-daughter of one of my co-workers. She's making her first foray into gardening this years, and I invited her to make an appearance here. Please give her a warm welcome!]

Hi. I am doing a guest post. I am 7 years old and I have a garden. I first got interested in gardening when I looked at my fairy book, and it showed how to find Flower Fairies by planting flowers. The Fairy Garden was a bunch of flowers planted in a tub. I watered it every other day and then it was doing well. I checked on it every day and once I saw a fairy in it! She was small, had hair to her shoulders and purple wings. She had a dress made out of petals, and she had bare feet and a hat made from an upside-down purple flower. I wrote a note to the fairies, and in the morning, on the back of the note a fairy had responded, and it said “Thank you” in big curvy letters.

Then I got interested in planting other things. This year I am planting tomatoes, lettuce, and zucchini, and I am going to plant a pumpkin. And my yard has a baby lemon tree and a tall fig tree, and the lemon tree has a lemon that is almost ripe. And the fig tree has a bunch of little figs. I like to eat the figs right off the tree. I also like eating cherry tomatoes and strawberries right off the plants in my yard. And there are also lots and lots of different types of flowers in my yard.

The first thing I harvested this year was lettuce. I never thought that I could grow lettuce that well! Salad is always better from your garden than salad from the store, because if it’s grown in other parts of the world, it has to take a long trip on a ship to get to the store. But if it’s in your garden, you can just have the salad without having to buy it from the store. The lettuce was delicious!

I hope you like my guest post!

[Note from my coworker: She protested eating salad before last week when she tasted the first lettuce she grew herself! Even her older brother eats salad without complaining now, which wasn’t the case before! Peaceful dinners: one more reason home gardens rule!]

Similar Posts:

Smelly seedlings? That’s no insult…

inadvertentgardener — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 06:36:13 +0000

Earlier today, at the very beginning of our monthly staff meeting at work, my coworker Pilar leaned over and murmured, “Your tomato seedlings smell.”

Anyone listening carefully might have considered that an insult. Me? I considered it awesome.

Similar Posts:

A sunny African dinner option in the East Bay

inadvertentgardener — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 18:39:39 +0000

This world? It’s a small one. I have always known this, because I started traveling the world when I was a kid, and am amazed how often my path crosses and recrosses paths of others who I’ve met along the way.

Back in Iowa City, I got to know a fantastic chef named Soleil, who started by renting out a local restaurant for African dinners on Friday and Saturday nights, and eventually opened his own place in Coralville, Iowa. My friends and I used to visit for his delicious Sunshine Soup, his amazing Tanzanian Coconut Fish, and his Beignet de Banana that even wowed me (and I am not a big fan of the banana…).

But, best of all, Soleil greeted everyone with one of the warmest, most wonderful smiles in existence, and makes every diner feel at home in his dining room. Going to Soleil’s Place was more like going to a friend’s house than a restaurant — we brought some wine, tried different dishes, and the conversation flowed over the African rhythms in the background.

Then he disappeared, leaving the restaurant shuttered, and someone thought he might have come out to California, but no one really knew, and eventually I moved, and that was the end of that.

Until, just before Thanksgiving, when I stopped in the farmers’ market and food court at the Metreon in San Francisco for a quick bite before a movie. There, though it was closed for the evening, was a stand that said, “Soleil’s African Kitchen.”

No way, I thought. It cannot possibly be the same Soleil.

A quick Google search on the iPhone yielded his website. Indeed, it was the same Soleil, now living in the East Bay. I started laughing out loud right there in the food court. The empanada vendor stared at me like I was crazy. I didn’t try to explain.

Soleil’s back in the dinner business, as of this week, cooking up his African food at Zocalo Coffeehouse, 645 Bancroft Avenue, in San Leandro. Dinners will be held on Saturday nights at 7 p.m., except for the first Saturday of each month. He’s serving up a tight-but-diverse menu of African dishes, and you can bring your own wine for a $5 corkage fee. Reservations are available by calling 510-228-6747, and I encourage you to support this wonderful chef in this endeavor. One other note: Though it doesn’t appear on the menu attached to this post, there will definitely be a vegetarian entree option.

I know I, for one, cannot wait to dig in to another plate of the flavors that warmed me in Iowa City, time and time again. It’s a small, tasty world, and that puts a sunny smile on my face.

Similar Posts:

I’ve got friends in word places

inadvertentgardener — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 12:24:42 +0000

I have friends all over the place, most of whom I’ve met the old-fashioned way: in person, through some job or school or work or networking connection. But oh, how the Internet has enriched my life and brought me in touch with people who, otherwise, I might never have met.

Yeah, I’m pretty much going to count 75 percent of my friends in the Bay Area in that number, just by the way.

Let’s just take a look at The Tennessee Locavore, for example. Though we both attended BlogHer Food last year, I managed to miss her entirely during the operation, and instead we have been forced—FORCED, I SAY—to become friends via Twitter and Facebook instead.

What does this mean, you ask? This means that, on a day that was, for the most part, good, but due to a Very Strange and Disturbing Incident on the way home from San Francisco, I arrived home to a care package of local food goodness (Snickerdoodles, people, Snickerdoodles.) either baked in Kristina’s kitchen or procured in her locavore zone. Also, there was a sparkly and blinky ring, which, as a devotee of Burning Man, I promptly announced would make the 2010 trip with me to Black Rock City.

I have been working through the contents of this care package, and this week, made it to the Benton’s prosciutto, which I knew I wanted to save for something special. I cooked it up to add to a dinner of locally-made gnocchi, which seemed only appropriate considering the value Kristina puts on eating in one’s own foodshed. And it was, I must say, delicious. Even if you don’t have Benton’s prosciutto at hand, and even if you aren’t lucky enough to have a care package arrive that contains pork products, this recipe is simple and delicious, and you should make it.

And, Kristina? Though I have adored getting to know you through your words, enough already. We owe each other some in-person cocktails, and some hugs. And I promise the thank you note that I more than owe you is coming shortly.

Gnocchi with Sage and Prosciutto
(Serves 2-3, depending on how hungry you are)

2 Tbsp. butter
½ Tbsp. olive oil
8 oz. prosciutto, chopped
8 oz. sage, leaves stripped and chopped
12 oz. gnocchi

Bring a saucepan of water to a boil and salt it.
Melt the butter in a sauté pan, and add the olive oil. Warm over medium-high heat.
Add the prosciutto and cook it until it’s crispy.
Add the gnocchi to the water and cook until it just starts to float at the top of the boiling water.
While the gnocchi is cooking, add the sage to the prosciutto and sauté until the gnocchi is ready.
Drain the gnocchi and toss it with the butter-sage-prosciutto mixture. Serve immediately, sprinkled, if you would like, with some grated Parmiggiano Reggiano.

Similar Posts:

A Madison Harvest

inadvertentgardener — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 15:57:03 +0000

“There’s a restaurant downtown I think you’d like,” said my friend Amy when I visited her in Madison, Wis. last week.

Oh my friends, how they know me. Amy was, of course, totally right, and that is how we ended up at Harvest, a small, warm space on the square that features the state capitol, for a Sunday night dinner last weekend. This farm-to-table restaurant features seasonal, regional cuisine, and apparently the Executive Chef, Derek Rowe, is all about the challenge of keeping that rolling even through the harsh Wisconsin winters. I tip my hat—that’s more of a challenge than I was willing to manage for more than three of those Midwestern winters in a row.

It turned out we’d stumbled in on a night when the restaurant was hosting a fundraising dinner—they’ve been invited to host a dinner at the James Beard Foundation on April 6 in New York City, and proceeds from last Sunday night’s feast were slated to help get the staff to the East Coast for that event.

The $25 prix fixe menu featured a salad of field greens, radish, and sunchokes with a sherry-walnut vinaigrette or a curried parsnip soup with parsnip chips; a mushroom ragu with creamy polenta and spicy spinach, a pot roast of Wisconsin grass-fed beef brisket, or an incredibly light fish and chips served with a crisp winter coleslaw of cabbage rutabaga and turnip. Dessert options included a vanilla bean panna cotta with grapefruit supremes, a date walnut cake with mascarpone ice cream, or a house-made licorice gelato with an almond biscotti.

The locavore attitude extended even to the cocktail menu, which included my choice: The Door County Cherry Drop, made from Death’s Door Vodka (made with wheat from Washington Island, Wis.), Door County Montmorency Cherry Juice and fresh lemon juice.

Harvest will host two more James Beard Foundation fundraiser dinners: one tonight from 5 p.m. until closing, and another on March 21, also from 5 p.m. until closing. If you’re in Madison or passing through, I encourage you to check it this warm, welcoming space that supports local and regional farms and producers.

Similar Posts:

Seedlings, not seeds

inadvertentgardener — Fri, 12 Mar 2010 06:58:33 +0000

One of the most gratifying things about putting out the word that a patio garden is in the offing has been the offer of seeds from friends near and a little bit far. Seed shopping? Nope. Don’t need to.

One of the offers came from a coworker, who told me she had a variety of heirloom tomato seeds and some Tokyo onions, a varietal that she described as somewhere between a green onion and a leek, and that is excellent when doused with brown sugar and soy sauce and thrown on a grill until caramelized.

“We pretty much throw them in the dirt and they grow,” she said.

“That sounds like the right kind of plant for me,” I replied. “I’m definitely in.”

A few days later, she popped her head back in the office. “I’m afraid I’ve communicated incorrectly about the seeds,” she said. “I may have been unclear.”

I assumed that she was about to tell me she didn’t really have any seeds, and that I was pretty much SOL on that front. I have one of those minds that makes up the story in absence of any sort of facts, so sure enough, I was already figuring out which one of my other friends might be able to share some of their seeds.

“I can’t give you seeds,” she said. “I’m going to have to give you seedlings. I already have them all started.”

Good people of the Internet, I cannot emphasize enough what LITTLE problem this is. Someone else will have done the work for me. For all intents and purposes, this is like going to a store and buying seedlings, except I don’t have to buy them. All I will have to do is throw them in the dirt in the wine barrels and call it done.

Of course, there is no dirt in the wine barrels yet. So, there’s that to be taken care of. Ahem.

Similar Posts: