Simple Gifts

 

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Yellowknife was under fire threat, as more of the terrible forest fires that have ravaged the Canadian wilderness this year raged, moving south toward Great Slave Lake. As the town played a pivotal role in Fly Away Snow Goose and has become dear to my heart, I watched the progress with fear via YouTube. The population was asked to evacuate, and many of the 20,000 inhabitants got out by driving down the single two lane road that would take them out of harm's way. Some were flown out in an all airline effort. This was an all hands on deck emergency and the people of NWT rose to the occasion, as the elderly and the ill were transported to safety in other parts of Canada. 

I could write about causes of these fires, but it's all too dire to explore here. As the fire did not swallow the town as had seemed inevitable, the place was saved, unlike many others in Canada, which have been reduced to ashes during the last few years of extreme heat and drought in a land which is unaccustomed to that.

Instead, I will focus on my summer garden, which is a happier subject. It is also ephemeral, as are our lives on this planet. This year and this year only will my little garden produce this particular selection of vegetables, all planted in hope in the spring. I too have wrestled with early season drought, but, in the end, thanks to the garden hose and a good supply of groundwater in this part of PA, each raised bed has become a jungle of production, providing us with fresh organic food that's better than what can be found in the market. There is also that wonderful feeling of accomplishment that you get when you watch and tend plants from seed to fruit every year!

Tomatoes are now flooding in. My brother in law provided me with two straggly little plants early in the year, which I had to keep indoors for a time as this was before the last frost. Now, I can't keep up with these medium sized red tomatoes. They are tasty, hardy, and leave no leftovers when you are making just two salads at a time. The sweet, mellow cherry tomatoes I raised in the same upstairs window where I nursed red tomato sets. They have a catchy name: I seem to remember "Coyote." 

 

There are also collards, an heirloom variety that I have been lax about confronting yet. These Cabbage Collards aren't huge and they are also milder than the usual supermarket varieties. "Slave food," they are super easy to grow and pack a huge nutritional punch. It's time to get on top of them now, as I experiment with recipes other than the traditional hunk of salt pork or pig's foot bathed in stock simmered for a loooong time.

Next comes "the solution to too many tomatoes." This idea is all over the recipe section of YouTube, but here's mine in mid-process.

You take a big pan like this one, and add: 

Balsamic vinegar and olive oil in a generous first layer. Next:

Sliced tomatoes, sliced green Bell Peppers, lots of diced Vidalia onions, shredded greens and ditto carrots and yellow squash, well dressed with salt, pepper, red pepper, basil, oregano, leafy greens, parsley, chopped garlic, and whatever else you have too much of. The final step is to cover it all with a cup of good stock.

Next, bake in a slow oven until the whole thing looks like the picture above and has reached a sticky consistency. Let it cool at little, and then scoop into a deep bowl. Get your stick blender out, or use your blender, whichever, and whirl until the whole mass becomes a thick paste. 

You can freeze this in little tubs, smear it on chunks of toasted, buttered French bread, or crackers. You might wish to spread it on the cheese sandwich before you grill it. Scoops of the paste can be added to sphagetti sauce or chili really pep them up. (My sauce does anyway, because the one I made is full of garlic, basil and oregano, and, I believe, I also added cumin. 

Nasturtiums, which I grow every year because my Mom always did. These can be used in salads or to decorate homemade cakes. I am always stuffing a few leaves in my mouth as I pass by the garden, and I add them to salads too, for their spicy, peppery kick. 

And last but not least, I will end with an it-doesn't-do-it-justice picture of Ironweed, which is flourishing in various spots around the yard. Bees of all kinds and butterflies, wasps, and all the usual suspects of the pollination racket are delighted to find this "weed." I understand that neighbors call me "the weed lady" because I have native plants in the yard and diss the grass, but the heck with them! The bees and their compatriots are more important, really, in the grand scheme of things, don't you agree?

~~Juliet Waldron

All my historical novels, from Medieval, to 18th Century, to PA German may be found at:

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Brussel sprout stroganoff and fried grasshoppers... by Sheila Claydon

Is it me or a late onset problem with my wooden spoon, or are recipes just becoming more  complicated and less authentic?

I've eaten meals in many different countries, both in restaurants and in private homes, and because I enjoy trying new foods I have always paid attention to how people from different cultures cook and present their food. I ask questions too, and when I return home I sometimes try to replicate the recipes or incorporate a new technique into my cooking. This means that I can attempt many dishes from around the world as well as regional specialities from across the UK, and if I've been shown how or asked the right questions, I can usually produce something that is both recognisable and edible.

This is not the case with many modern recipes though. Rarely do the pictures match the final result and sometimes the list of ingredients are just plain off!  Much as I like vegetables I'm never going to find spaghetti tossed in a kale and spinach sauce and topped with a fillet of white fish appealing, and the same goes for a Brussel sprout stroganoff! Why even call it a stroganoff when it doesn't have a single authentic ingredient?

Nowadays magazines and newspapers compete with one another to print recipes and there are all those food blogs out there too, many of them supposedly to save us time. The selling point is that if we follow their method we can cook supper in a jiffy without having to wonder what we can produce out of the mix of ingredients in our larder and refrigerator. Sometimes this works but more often it doesn't, either because the ingredient list is too varied and exotic or because the mix of foods is too outlandish. Cauliflower pizza anyone?

Then there are the recipes sent in by the general public. The apple cake I tried because the writer said it was a firm family favourite, where I discovered that the only authentic word was firm because it came out of the oven squat and heavy and only suitable for a doorstop. And the meatloaf turned fish loaf recipe. I couldn't even try that.

Having tried the proliferation of recipes in all forms of the media for a long time, frequently unsuccessfully, I've decided it's my own fault. I have a kitchen shelf full of perfectly good cookbooks whose recipes have been tried and tested over the years, plus the knowledge that comes with preparing family meals day after day after day for what seems like forever, so why do I even read recipes that will never see the light of day in my kitchen. I guess it's because I like food and I'm always up for trying new flavours. After all I didn't expect the fried grasshoppers I ate in China to taste so good, nor the lassi yoghurt drink and the cauliflower curry in India, or the 4 hour cooked Christmas cabbage and rollmop herrings in Denmark. In Germany it was the weisswurst which is Avery unappetising looking but delicious white sausage, in France snails, in Australia alligator, in Scotland haggis and in Wales lava bread which is a special seaweed.  There have been many more but because they are culturally authentic dishes and snacks, lovingly prepared, they have all tasted good. Not so the many recipes that are now out there. Some of them work of course, but so many of them don't, so now I'm going back to basics. After all what is nicer than lemon and garlic chicken, a mushroom risotto or good old spaghetti bolognaise...and there is always steak and fries of course!

There are references to food in many of my books, and in a couple of cases actual recipes, but these are all things I've eaten and enjoyed, not suggestions plucked from a magazine, and when I wrote about them it took me right back to the pleasure of eating them. There is the cake my grandmother always made in Remembering Rose, the wonderful meal I ate in a tiny taverna at the top of a mountain in Italy in Mending Jodie's Heart and then there's the very simple early morning breakfast in a boat off Dolphin Key in Reluctant Date. Visit http://bwlpublishing.ca/authors/claydon-sheila-romance/ to find out more if, like me, you are a hopeful foodie.

                    

You can also find me at Sheila Claydon on facebook