I was trying to explain rhubarb to a customer last weekend and found myself fairly stumped. How DO you describe it? I settled for “icky raw, tart and unusual cooked, if you’re not into pies, just cook it in water and sugar and put it on anything”. I think that’s roughly true – you can strain off the syrup and use that in spritzers and cocktails, and the remaining compote can be dolled up with orange or lemon zest, strawberries, cardamom, or get really creative with Earl Grey tea or something wackier. Spoon over ice cream, pound cake, pancakes, even oatmeal! Or turn in into a curd, just like lemon curd with egg yolks and butter, for pouring on shortbread and make an elegant cookie, per this Rhubarb Curd Shortbread recipe from Food52.com. Better yet, grab brilliant neighborhood food blogger Mrs. Sokol and make her cough up her rhubarb ideas from Weekly Greens, including Rhubarb Mojitos and Spiced Rhubarb Chutney on Pork Tenderloin (or just for dipping your naan).
Events:
- Mt P Market Buskers are a mystery this weekend! Think you got what it takes to sit in the shade and strum a guitar? There’s a sign up sheet on the bandstand, we’ll get you on the calendar!
- Farmers’ Market Bike Clinic: Tent, tools, pump, stand, and helpful neighbors get together every Saturday to help each other out. Ask your bike clinician for an Rx for 10% off all your bike needs at Old School Hardware across the street – they’re stocked up on all the essentials like inner tubes, pumps, tools, lights, and more!
Local Foods:
Pleasant Pops: Strawberry Pop with berries from Quaker Valley Orchard, Strawberry Ginger Lemonade, Chongos (Mexican Sweet Cream and Cinnamon), and the Cucumber Chili is back!
People’s Bao: Chinese steamed buns with tender, slow roasted heirloom Berkshire pork shoulder or duck confit or savory Pennsylvania shiitake mushrooms and market fresh greens, and hopefully a homemade Ginger Ale!
V Picnic Club: Thai Red Curry Tofu Scramble Burritos, Kale Salad with Lemon Tahini Dressing (back by popular demand), Apple Ginger Tea…and maybe a surprise dessert if there’s time.
This season, VPC has taken steps to reduce plastic use, transitioning to paper cups and paper containers and a new product called the ecotensil for those who can’t wait to get home!
Earth Spring Farm: Lovely lettuce mix, radishes, kale. Garden starts in adorable clay pots: lettuce, beans, chard, spinach. Amish cheese! Mike is working on the Eshes about coming down some weekend to talk about dairying, cows and cheesemaking with interested customers. No mushrooms this week, Mike texted me the words, “drought gap”. You’ll have to ask him what that means…but the ’shroom room is looking good and will have some wonderful varieties coming!
Groff’s Content Farm: Plenty of good Spring lamb, all cuts of pork, pork sausages, bacon, lots of good beef steaks, roasts and ground beef. Eggs. Complete raw meat dog food. Tallow soaps.
Quaker Valley Orchards: New strawberries and greenhouse cucumbers! Fresh green and purple asparagus, Fuji apples, popcorn, honey, Honeycrisp apple sauce, tomato sauce, apple butter, dried apples, apple cider, canned peaches, and jams in Tart Cherry, Blueberry and Blackberry.
Reid Orchard: Kathy says they picked the first of their Pennsylvania strawberries this morning! Winter apples: Fuji, Cameo, and Golden Rush. Canned goods like preserves, apple butter, apple sauce. Sustainably grown garden starts: no chemicals, no hyper-fertilization, no growth regulators, just
sun + time + natural fish fertilizer. Hot and peppers plants (like Purple Beauty and Serrano del Sol), heirloom tomato plants (like Cherokee Purple and Green Zebra, but others less familiar like Hillbilly and Big Rainbow, Japanese Black Trifele, Abe Lincoln Original), cherry tomatoes (like the pink and sweet Rosalita cherry and the coveted Sungold), veggie starts (like Black Zucchini, watermelon, more!), hundreds of herb starts, mints you’ve never heard, 10 different kinds of basil, ground cover thymes, eatin’ thymes, and much much more.
Richfield Farm: Strawberries, asparagus, spinach, radishes, rhubarb and spring onions. Garden starts: award winning herb starts…8 varieties of thyme, 8 varieties of basil, dozens of mints, sage, cilantro, lavender, and pretty echinacea flowers. Also, lush hanging baskets of nasturtiums and petunias.
Truck Patch Farms: Strawberries and asparagus. Spinach, curly kale, dino kale, mesclun, swiss chard, Red Detroit beets, spring onions, garlic chives, regular chives and mint.
Truck Patch Farms Meat Department: All cuts of pork. Eggs. Chicken parts. Boneless turkey breast and turkey bacon. Try ground turkey in white chili for more flavor.
Atwater’s Bread: Naturally leavened, hand shaped loaves like Peasant Wheat, Caraway Rye, Cranberry Pecan, Kalamata Olive, traditional San Francisco Sourdough, Ciabatta, Country White, Chili Cheddar, Spelt, Sunflower Flax, more. Ned Atwater does slow fermentation with carefully tended starters and wild yeast, organic stone ground flour from a family mill in North Carolina. Also yeasted breads like the slightly sweet, traditional Irish Struan bread. Great scones, muffins, cookies, brownies, granola, bagels and delicious soups to take home!
I’ve been asking our farming friends what they thought of the “winter”. Bryan of Truck Patch Farm said this seems to happen about every five years and remembers wearing shorts in the winter at Dupont Circle Far Mar back in 2006 or so. Mike Nolan of Earth Spring Farm says he’s looking at more produce in the ground than ever before – and a new lease on 40 acres of certified organic land. His methods are already well beyond organic, but now he can work more quickly towards the official status. This crazy weather has been great for early field prep – you need dry days to get out there and turn under the winter cover crops, lay out rows, establish new fields, and seed without ruining the soil. Strawberries were almost frighteningly early – a cooler April helped slow them down so we’d still have some in May.
May 19 – Strawberry Smoothies
New: Havarti cheese and Pohu oyster mushrooms at Earth Spring Farm, perfect bun-size sausages at Groff’s Content.
Is it a coincidence that Bike To Work Day falls right smack during our super-abundance of strawberries? I’m no holy man, but I think there might be some cosmic righteous alignment going on. Because what could be a better biker’s recovery drink than homemade Strawberry Milk? Bubble together on the stove a 1/3 cup of sugar, a cup of water and a cup of strawberries, preferably the slightly unsightly ones, the overripe ones or the tartish ones, 10 minutes. Strain the syrup into glasses of chilled whole fat cow milk or delicious almond milk, save the solids for pancake topping or homemade fruit-at-the-bottom yogurt cups to send to school. Include a cherry chocolate granola bar from Atwater to crumble on top, if you really love them.
Events:
Local Foods:
Pleasant Pops: Strawberry n’ Cream, Strawberry Ginger Lemonade, Strawberry Banana, Chongos (Mexican Sweet Cream and Cinnamon). Yum!
People’s Bao: Chinese steamed buns with tender, slow roasted heirloom Berkshire pork shoulder or duck confit or savory Pennsylvania shiitake mushrooms and market fresh greens, and hopefully a homemade Ginger Ale!
V Picnic Club: Every other week, so this is Jill’s week off…
Earth Spring Farm: Mushrooms are back! Pohu Oyster mushrooms are mild flavored with delicate texture. Gorgeous red and green lettuce heads, maybe some red butterheads too, gotta look under the row covers. Lots of pre-washed loose spinach and baby rainbow Swiss chard. Asparagus. Radishes: Easter egg and the sell-out Shungiku. Curly Siberian, Red Russian, regular Curly and black Toscano kale. Large, tender collard greens. Scallions, chives. Garden starts in adorable clay pots: lettuce, beans, chard, spinach. Amish cheese: havarti, cheddars and jacks, in plain and herb flavors.
Groff’s Content Farm: Plenty of good Spring lamb, all cuts of pork, pork sausages, bacon, lots of good beef steaks, roasts and ground beef. Eggs. Complete raw meat dog food. Tallow soaps.
Reid Orchard: A variety of Pennsylvania strawberries. Fuji and Cameo apples. Canned goods like preserves, apple butter, apple sauce. Chemical free garden starts with great advice on what grows well where, including what’s a good container plant (for tomatoes try Beefsteak, Celebrity, Patio, Roma Window Box, Sweet Million Cherry, Black Cherry, Tigerella, Sun Sugar, Sugary, Super Sweet 100, or Green Zebra; or try several herbs and lettuces) and great herbal tea combos (like soothing and refreshing: Kentucky Colonel Spearmint + Pineapple Sage + Lemon Verbena. Lettuce starts: Italian Misticanza mix and All American Wildfire Mix. Hot and sweet peppers plants, heirloom tomato plants, cherry tomatoes, veggie starts and hundreds of herb starts.
Quaker Valley Orchards: New strawberries and greenhouse cucumbers! Fresh green and purple asparagus, Fuji apples, popcorn, honey, Honeycrisp apple sauce, tomato sauce, apple butter, dried apples, apple cider, canned peaches, and jams in Tart Cherry, Blueberry and Blackberry.
Richfield Farm: Strawberries, asparagus, spinach, radishes, rhubarb and spring onions. Herb garden starts and lush flower hanging baskets.
Truck Patch Farms: Strawberries and asparagus. Spinach, curly kale, dino kale, mesclun, swiss chard, Red Detroit beets, spring onions, garlic chives, regular chives and mint.
Truck Patch Farms Meat Department: All cuts of pork. Eggs. Chicken parts. Boneless turkey breast and turkey bacon. Try ground turkey in white chili for more flavor.
Atwater’s Bread: Naturally leavened, hand shaped loaves like Peasant Wheat, Caraway Rye, Cranberry Pecan, Kalamata Olive, traditional San Francisco Sourdough, Ciabatta, Country White, Chili Cheddar, Spelt, Sunflower Flax, more. Ned Atwater does slow fermentation with carefully tended starters and wild yeast, organic stone ground flour from a family mill in North Carolina. Also yeasted breads like the slightly sweet, traditional Irish Struan bread. Great scones, muffins, cookies, brownies, granola, bagels and delicious soups to take home!