From time immemorial, the cultures of the Mediterranean have been eating small, oily fish: sardines, smelts, anchovies, and mackerel. These have been out of favor for a long time in the US, and they are seriously underfished.  As such, you can eat all you want, and since they’re not predatory species they don’t have the concerns of pollutants concentrating in the flesh.  They’re also pretty cheap – a couple bucks a pound – and universally wild-caught.

What you need:
Vegetable or peanut oil – enough to fill a large skillet about ¾” to 1″ deep
A large cast iron skillet with high, straight sides
All-purpose flour
Old Bay or similar crab boil seasoning
Spring-loaded tongs
Several dozen smelts, heads on or off (about a pound)

What you do:
Liberally season about ½ cup of AP flour with the crab boil seasoning.
Heat the oil in the skillet over high heat to 375°F.
Coat the smelts, 8-10 at a time, in the seasoned flour.
Fry in the oil for 1½-2 minutes until lightly golden, then remove to a draining rack or paper towels to drain.
Season with additional crab boil, and serve hot.

Serving Suggestions:
Shake on a little rice wine or malt vinegar, or squeeze on a touch of fresh lemon or lime juice.
Serve over a salad of bitter greens (mustard, arugula, dandeloin, etc.) dressed with a light vinaigrette.
Eat with a hoppy beer like an IPA.

Just eat the whole fish – little bones and all, though I admit I usually break off the tailfin and discard. Acid and bitter accompaniments are best, as the fish itself is oily and rich and acid/bitter flavors help cut through. If you’re hungry, you can go through more than a dozen of these in a sitting. Give small fish a try – they’ll help your heart, the environment, and your budget.

Does maple syrup need to be refrigerated?

Because of its high moisture level and lack of preservatives, maple syrup is a perishable food product that is susceptible to the growth of yeasts, molds, and bacteria. Refrigeration not only helps maple syrup retain its flavor but prevents microorganisms from growing as well. Unopened, maple syrup will last several years stored in a cool, dark place. Once opened, it will keep six months to a year in the refrigerator.

But as maple syrup can be pricey, it can make sense to buy it in large quantities when seasonal. For long-term storage, we wondered if storing syrup in the freezer would work as well as refrigeration. We froze half the contents of one bottle of syrup, refrigerated the rest, and then conducted a comparative tasting. The syrup stored in the freezer never froze solid and, once warmed, was identical in taste to the refrigerated syrup. (The syrup never froze because of the high concentration of solids in the liquid–in this case, the sugar.) At most, the syrup will become thick, viscous, or crystallized during freezing, but a quick zap in the microwave will restore it so well that you would never know it had been “frozen.”

Ingredients:

1 frozen banana , cut into chunks
½ cup nonfat vanilla yogurt
1 cup soy milk or lowfat milk
Ground Cinnamon

Blend banana, milk, and yogurt until smooth.  Add a healthy pinch of ground cinnamon and blend again to combine.  Pour into glass and top with a sprinkle of cinnamon.

Substitutions:

• Replace vanilla yogurt with plain yogurt + 4 teaspoons honey
• Replace half the frozen banana with frozen berries
• Replace half the banana with frozen mango puree

Enjoy!

What is corked wine?  Why does it happen?  What should you do about it?

Wine is “corked” when naturally occurring fungi in the air convert chlorinate phenol compounds in the wine to trichloroanisole (TCA), a chemical that is detectable in very small quantities, and gives the wine an aroma and taste not unlike wet cardboard or musty books.  In addition, the desirable aromas of the wine are much reduced.  The chemical is harmless, but it destroys the aesthetic experience of the wine, and can render it unpalatable and undrinkable.

TCA contamination can be specific to a given bottle, or systemic in a bottling run.  Sometimes, just the individual cork is contaminated or improperly sanitized.  Rarely, a wooden cask or barrel used for aging can contaminate an entire bottling.  The latter almost never goes undetected by the winery, leaving corked bottles an infrequent and isolated incident.

Winemakers have taken a number of steps over the years to reduce or eliminate the risk of corking.  Composite corks, where the cork is primarily made of coarsely ground particles that are sanitized and reconstituted, are helpful because the greater surface area of the ground cork allows sanitizing agents to permeate most of the material.  Whole corks are now usually sanitized with hydrogen peroxide rather than chlorine bleach, to eliminate a possible source of chlorine ions that help make up TCA.

Synthetic corks and twist-caps are becoming more and more prevalent, even on premium wines.  Traditionalists decry their use, claiming that wines with these closures don’t age properly, given that they are not as permeable to oxygen as natural corks.  Slow oxidation is a component of wine’s life cycle, and some say that cutting off that oxygen supply leads to “reduction” flavors in the wines using non-permeable closures.  Reduction (chemically the opposite of oxidation) occurs in wine when certain compounds, primarily tannins, are deprived of oxygen and steal it from other molecules in the wine.  This is generally detectable as sulphur-like aromas – just-struck matches, “sewer”, burning rubber, rotten egg.  In most cases, all that’s needed is a little bit of air time before drinking, and decanting is an excellent remedy.

What do you do if you get a corked wine?  Most of the time, if it’s noticeable to the untrained palate, it’s severe enough to make the wine generally undrinkable.  What you do about that ruined bottle depends on how you acquired it.

If you order wine at a restaurant, the bottle will be opened at the table and you will be presented with the cork.  Look at it to ensure that it’s not damaged, doesn’t show signs of leakage, and isn’t spongy or deteriorating.  If it shows any of these defects, be on the alert and pay attention to what happens next.  The waiter or wine steward will pour a small amount for you – swirl it in the glass and smell it.  If it smells musty, fungal, or like wet dog, inform the server and send it back.  This is why this ritual is performed – it gives the customer the opportunity to reject a spoiled bottle.  A good restaurant will almost never dispute a returned bottle of wine, so refuse its service if you’re suspicious.  By the same token, don’t send a non-spoiled bottle back just because you don’t like the wine, though most of the time they’ll accept it (and serve it by the glass at the bar!).

If you purchased the wine directly from the winery, call them and let them know.  Most will be glad to replace the bottle, or offer an equivalent.  If the winery’s local, take it back to them.  If they’re at all interested in quality control and perception of their product, they’ll be interested in evaluating the bottle themselves.  If the winery’s not local, they may or may not arrange to have the spoiled bottle sent back to them.

Your local cut-rate liquor store may or may not offer an exchange, but a reputable wine shop should almost always exchange a corked bottle if it’s a recent purchase.  Returning a wine that’s been in the cellar for 10 years is likely out of the question, but if you’re a long-time regular customer, a good merchant may offer to make good.  It’s always good to get to know your wine dealer.  Talk to them when you’re in the store, make sure they know your name, and they’ll take care of you to ensure you stay a valued customer.

You can see the entire recipe here:

http://www.broccolirecipes.net/easy-quiche.html

BTW, I also found this ingredient:
“1 (1 pound) loaf processed cheese food, cubed”
Okay… I know that this is just Velveeta, but seriously? Yuck.

Still sounds appealing? The full recipe is here:

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Broccoli-Cheese-Soup/Detail.aspx

Here is a photo of some of the food I got at the Catonsville Farmers Market on a Wednesday in mid-August. The dark purple pods are okra. You can also see yellow and red peppers, corn on the cob, onions, peaches, beans, garlic and maybe some other kinds of produce.
The other photo is some of the August vine-ripened tomato harvest from our garden. So fresh and so good!

The second page includes a chart of scoop/disher sizes. Ice cream scoops come in many sizes for a variety of applications. Who knew? Alton Brown recommends using a #20 disher to scoop his cookie dough onto the cookie sheets. I researched what that meant and gathered the info to share with you all.

Theresa’s Decadent Chocolate Cookies

I bought these colorful carrots at the Farmers Market few weeks ago.  I served them with cheese ravioli.
The second photo shows them cut up so you can see the color was different on the inside.

Beets On the Way to Being Pickled

These colorful beets from the Farmers Market were so pretty that I wanted to share them with you. This photo was taken just before stirring all of the ingredients. This will be my second batch of pickled beets. I am using the “Red Turnip Pickles” recipe from American Home Cooking.  You can see it here: http://totallyrandomfiesta.blogspot.com/

free range ground beef (no hormones or antibiotics),  smoked rainbow trout, smoked hummus, Colby Longhorn cheese, cranberry-walnut bread and spelt bread, delicious, juicy, summer peaches, a large amount of golden apples and a crap-load of veggies.  I got some red okra and lots of peppers in all shades or green, yellow and red.  I got some cute little garlic and little onions.  I got several kinds of lettuce, yellow wax beans.  I even got a new cedar air freshener for the car.

]]> http://www.eatfreeordie.com/2009/08/farmers-market-shopping-list/feed/ 0 http://www.eatfreeordie.com/2009/08/smashed-chickpea-salad/ http://www.eatfreeordie.com/2009/08/smashed-chickpea-salad/#comments Fri, 21 Aug 2009 00:40:04 +0000 Theresa http://www.eatfreeordie.com/?p=360 At 7pm, I still didn’t know what I was going to make for dinner.  Fortunately, I had stocked up on canned chickpeas a couple of weeks ago.  Also, fortunately, I went to the Catonsville Farmers Market yesterday.

I Google-d “chick pea salad” and found a great recipe over at Smitten Kitchen.  I had all of the ingredients in the house.  Unfortunately, for the second time in a row, the dog ate the whole grain farmers market bread, so I had to scrounge crusts from the store bought.

I served the chick pea salad on the toasted crusts and over fresh local lettuce, garnished with diced fresh, local bright red and yellow peppers and more black olives.  It was very tasty and DH was still hungry afterwards.  We finished up by eating local cranberry-walnut bread and some fresh, delicious summer peaches.

You can find the recipe and photos here:

Smitten Kitchen’s “Smashed Chickpea Salad”