Recipe: Fresh Garlic, Roma Tomato and Basil Confit with Angel Hair Pasta

The morning of the day we left for vacation I pulled my garlic bulbs.
Rain threatened, and my years of experience associate "vacation" with "rain".
The garlic could afford to die back another week - we'd only be gone for a week - but I figured that rain-fattened heads of garlic would split and dry badly, while the already dry bulbs I harvested would be perfect for drying tightly.
So I pulled them and laid them on racks in the garage to dry.

The back door was cracked open to allow the cats to go in and out (please do not bother to comment - my little mousers would have gone nuts trapped indoors for a week) and the air would circulate well enough.

When we returned a week later to a trashed garage, we soon figured out the culprit... Herb saw a racoon... cat food and birdseed were scattered everywhere, but my garlic was perfectly dried and ready to clean, trim, bunch and hang. The critters hadn't bothered the garlic, but neither had it kept them away.

The weather had turned- there was no rain all week, a dry north wind, the nights were cool and the days were warm. I could have left the garlic in the ground. C'est la vie.
I'm not sure which is which variety-wise. I bought a bunch of different varieties when we had a garlic farmer come to speak at our Herb Society tea a few years ago.
Of course I can tell the elephant from the others, and some are pink skinnned and some are white, but I'd have to find my notes to guess what they all are.
ANYHOW, I once read something about growing an optimum garlic for your own use, probably in Kitchen Garden or Organic Gardening magazines... that I'll share with you here.

You need to plant only your biggest cloves from the head. In the early autumn. In rich soil. And then do that again next year, and repeat again the year after. By the third year of selection and proper growing, your garlic should have adapted to your particular location... and you will have 'selected' the best for your location.

We ate the fish Fish FISH we caught, all week we ate fish*. Enough! I'm ready for fruits and veggies for the rest of the summer!

*However! we did get out between times to eat at Bortelli's (more fish, yes, but the setting on the Lake Michigan beach where we had our lunch has a million dollar view), Luciano's classic Italian, The Hamlin for breakfast, Ronnie's Ribs, and the Jamesport Brewery. You can eat well for a week in Ludington without nary a ringer.

Anyway, here's the recipe I meant to relate, what with all the sweet fresh garlic and the current basil blowout, and what with using up the last of the frozen Viva Italia tomatoes trying to make room in my freezer for the tomato harvest to come ...

Pasta with Tomato Confit

You'll need an oven proof casserole which will determine the size of your recipe.

Make a bed of basil leaves in the bottom of the casserole, depth depending on how much you love basil... Fit as many cored Roma (Italian paste) type tomatoes as will fit snugly, core side down, on the bed of basil. Tuck slivers of fresh garlic into the spaces.

Lightly season. Salt, ground black pepper.

Drizzle over enough olive oil to come halfway up the sides of the tomatoes.

Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees until the tomatoes become browned and carmelized, and softened. (About 1 hour or so.)

Cook the angel hair pasta (it takes like 2 minutes! or cook the pasta of your choice), drain and place in a large serving bowl. Yes, I cooked these birds nests of nidi capellini right in with the green beans - saved a pan!
Dump the hot tomato-basil confit over the pasta and toss gently. (Or, in this case I added the pasta right into the casserole of tomato confit.)

Plate it up while warm and top with freshly grated Parmesan cheese.

...life is good

...these are the good old days

A Herb or Not a Herb?

Useful plants is how I've always described herbs. My tree peony isn't useful, as far as I know, for medicine or flavoring or any of the other multiple ways herbies make use of plants. But there must a niche in the concept of usefulness that contains the usefulness of plants to memory, association and symbolism.
My youngest son brought me this 'Japanese tree peony' for mother's day, many years ago, before they became popular. It was the most unusual plant he could find at the nursery. I should have suspected then that he would grow up to be the wonderful and unusual young man that he is. If you were the mother of a strong willed child who marched to the beat of his own drum, then you will understand why I say that. But all of my children are unusual individuals.
See how this plant recalls associations for me? When it blooms every May, I always remember the day he gave it to me.

May magic

"They always called it Magic
and indeed it seemed like it
in the months that followed--
the wonderful months-- the
radiant months-- the amazing
ones. Oh! the things which
happened in that garden!
If you have never had a garden
you cannot understand, and if you have had a garden you will know that it would take a whole book to describe all that came to pass there."
The Secret Garden, by F.H.Burnett

Mrs. Beeton and The Martha

Herb is fishing up north of Wawa Ontario somewhere, and I'm right now watching a wonderful juicy Masterpiece Theatre Victorian version of the life of the original 'The Martha' ... Mrs. Isabella Beeton. The actress portraying Mrs. Beeton has a body language and facial expression and control that in her character's times of adversity will touch a chord. From beyond the grave her narration logically analyses and explains her life ... and reveals the human background to her 'Book of Household Management'.
Immediately I thought of the Gutenberg Project, and, applying Google, I found a zip file as well as a fine website allowing us to read the original online... I'd love to find a free online photocopy with the original typeset, like the American Victorian household management book I mentioned in an earlier post from the University of Michigan. Something to put on the to-do list for another day.
I must mention, that when I read 'Just Desserts' years ago, I had a new appreciation of Martha Stewart's rise to fame. There was a human story behind both of these household diva superstars. Never having been a soap fan or a watcher of television celebrity, I'm probably not as jaded as the average American to stories like these.

a little bit of my world

The path to the herb garden. Nothing fancy, and nothing here that anybody can't do. I've begun dragging the herb pots out of the garage.

Step inside the herb garden. Forgive the mess, I haven't begun my spring maintenance yet.

The wildflower path, who knew these plants would go so crazy! I heart my Michigan spring.

Catching up on the spring photos

A bee working the Early Meadow Rue. Note that ants and ground beetles will pollinate the ginger growing below.

Mayapple

Bloodroot

A better photo of Lungwort

The veggies are under lights...

Stinging Nettles and the GCHS Brush with Fame

I was surfing the 'net this morning and came across
this cute article about a (Stinging) Nettles Day
celebration in Devon England:

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2007/05/national_be_nic.php

In the story was a link to this very nicely done page
that you could call an "on-line herb study" of nettles:

http://www.nettles.org.uk/

It ALMOST makes me wish I had a boatload of nettles
growing in my yard, but... maybe that statement IS
going a bit too far. I had a minor brush with a stinging
nettle (I immediately understood what it was) while
weeding a few years back.
While doing my usual bare-handed weed-pulling I
naively grabbed a single nettle plant and
I still recall the instant recognition of something I'd
only, until that moment, read about in books.
The seed had probably been brought in with a bag of
composted manure since the plant is not common in
my immediate neighborhood.
After reading these websites on the nettle I'm suddenly
interested in nettles, one sign of a true herbie.
I could probably put out the word and find a
gardening friend who would be willing to part with
some nettles... probably if I did her weeding.

You say nettles don't float your boat? and what did the
title of this message mean, the Genesee County Herb
Society's mysterious "brush with fame"?
Well, a few days ago on another surfing expedition,
I ran across a cooking blogger who listed
"the ten strangest cookbooks on his cookbook shelf",
and our GCHS "Herbal Favorites" was number 8!

The writer of
LunaPierCook (link) explained our selection:
it was the Nettle Soup recipe (as well as the highly
herbed Lavender Ice Cream recipe) that did
us in. But at least for a strange cookbook list, we
were in good company, along with Dixie Dave and Anthony Bourdain.

Happy May Day

Charming people celebrating Spring.

Garland Day

The Maypole Dance

and Morris Dancers

"A little madness in the spring
is wholesome even for the king."
-- Emily Dickenson

praying mantis

At our last Backyard Herbalist class, one of my students gave me a bag of praying mantis egg cases... the praying mantis has a long Latin name just like plants do... Tenodera aridifolia sinensis. They are carnivorous insects that will feed on almost any other insect they can overcome, including their own kind.


The case is a mass of hardened foam containing from 50 to 400 eggs, that the female secreted on twigs in late summer or autumn.


Purchased cases can be kept in a jar in the refrigerator until you want to release them in the spring. Attach the egg case to a stem a few feet off the ground.


I can have fun observing this case for signs of a hatch while I work on cleaning up the flower bed this weekend. Actually, the case doesn't change in appearance once the young hatch, and it may take up to 8 weeks, but I'll be around and looking for these interesting "pet bugs."

emerging herbs

dutchman's breeches


angelica


lovage


pulmonaria (lungwort)


hepatica (liverwort) - unfortunately, my first hepatica didn't like the location where I planted it. However! it apparently sowed a substitute plant for me about 10 feet to the very middle of a clump of soapwort. The photo is awful, but it is what it is.

I'm ignoring the FDA controversy

to post a photo of my ginger coming up... an ugly photo, but the leaves are like furry cat's ears, soft enough to pet...

...and posting photos of my spring beauties. Transplanted, with permission, from private property along the Flint River.



Why no ranting about the FDA? It's not the first time the FDA has threatened the so-called "alternative medicine" biz.

Here are some of the spring ephemerals that made it through the weird weather blast from the Arctic that Michigan experienced last week.
At one of my Lady's Garden Clubs today, everyone was reporting their mushy hyacinths and narcissi.
You recognise this corner ... I had no idea the hardy cyclamen would be hardier than the native bloodroot. And look, some of the winter aconite actually are setting seed, even through the adverse weather.


My first bloomin' weed! A Buttercup, a.k.a. Ranunculus somethinornother... when the buttercups bloom, can the dandelions be close behind?

damage assessment

The arctic blast after all of those warm days in March 'did a job' on my spring bulbs. The snowdrops, crocuses, dutch irises and eranthus that usually enjoy long, cold early springs were hurried out in record time. The earlier than normal blooming hyacinths and daffs whose stems turned to mush will recover and bloom again next year.
May we all be here to see them bloom properly again.
The later to wake and rise bulbs in the same plantings will be fine, but the beds will be sparser.
The twinflower and bloodroots were hit hard, but surprisingly, the hardy cyclamen coum is still blooming prettily. The primroses are blooming fools. Scilla and pushkinia are perking up after laying down on their beds like femme fatales in a soap opera.
Spring Beauty, which the very mention of makes Herb laugh as being some kind of silly spring gardener joke, are just beginning to bloom.
And I'm out pruning woodies whenever I manage a conjunction of (my) schedule with outdoor temperature and sogginess of lawn. I wanted to tackle the roses yesterday, as the forsythia have been blooming for a few days, only the wind was turning the thorny stems into lethal weapons. But there is always something else to do.

a little arrow on tax day

I wrote an editorial this morning about pollution and paying taxes, but the political nature of it made me post it over on my environmental blog (link).

just sayin'

My very own piece of folk wisdom, "it always snows on the daffodils", has been validated once more... snowed last night. Here is a photo of some of my daffodils a few days ago, I'll have to take a snow picture after breakfast.

Happy Spring, Michigan!

ready for the rhubarb

This recipe makes topping for four fruit crisps. Use one portion and freeze the remaining three in separate containers, for preparing easy desserts on those days when you've spent all day out in the yard.

Crisp Topping for Fruit Crisps

2 cups flour
2 cups brown sugar
2 sticks (8 ounces) chilled unsalted butter, diced
1 cup rolled oats
1/2 t. grated nutmeg
2 cups walnuts, chopped (opt: pecans)

Cut together the flour, sugar and butter as for pastry. Stir in the
oats, nutmeg, and walnuts. Work together (with your fingers)
until the texture turns crumbly.
Ready to use, or to package and freeze.

To use:
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Crumble topping over a pie plate or shallow casserole of prepared fruit.
I like cinnamon spiced fillings of rhubarb, or apple, or peach, each
thickened according to my favorite pie recipes.
Bake for 35-40 minutes, until topping turns golden and the fruit
starts bubbling. Remove from oven and cool slightly before serving.

Oh ye of little faith

Tried following a "winter sowing" technique this year, and the parsley is UP!

I had no faith... none of the lists I read listed parsley as a winter sowing candidate, and then, after I set the sown milk jug out on the patio, the temperatures plunged into the teens for days.
I chalked it up to a 'nothing ventured, nothing gained' experience. What a pleasant surprise!
Next year I'm winter sowing!

more photos from yesterday in the backyard: Twinleaf

A rare plant for Michigan... at least I never met anyone growing it. Or seen it shown in a lecture or discussion hereabouts. Named after President Thomas Jefferson, also called twinleaf.
Jeffersonia diphylla pops up early, and this year I caught it before it even begins to 'green up'.

(with flash)

first wave of spring in my Michigan backyard

The primroses from Januaries past... they are hardy.


I always call these Dutch irises, I. reticulata, I think... my memory for the Latin nomenclature is shot these days.


Hardy cyclamen has a nice big tuber this year... not the easiest plant to situate, but I think it likes this spot.

Back!

Dropped off the face of the earth... no e-mail for three days, and too much to do.
But I'm back: all it took was a bribe of a nice Italian dinner to get the computer guy over to do his voodoo magic on my "settings" which *somehow* got out of whack.
But Thanks, Tony!
Good grief, if I could only read fast enough over his shoulder to figure out what he did to restore my connection.
I should take a class.

Speaking of classes, I brought this quick Lemon Tea Bread last week for my class to sample. The recipe is one of favorites of the ladies of the Genesee County Herb Society, and can be found in our book, "Herbal Favorites."

Lemon Tea Bread
Yield: one loaf

3/4 cup milk
1 Tbsp. finely chopped fresh lemon balm
1 Tbsp. finely chopped fresh lemon verbena
1 Tbsp. fresh lemon thyme leaves
2 cups flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
6 Tbsp. butter, room temperature
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 Tbsp. fresh grated lemon peel

Juice of two lemons
Confectioners sugar

Method:
Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
Grease a loaf pan or 3 small loaf pans.
Heat milk, stir in herbs, let steep 15 minutes until cooled.
Mix flour, baking powder and salt. Set aside.
In mixer bowl, cream butter and sugar until light. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Stir in lemon peel.
Add flour mixture to creamed mixture, stirring, alternately with herbed milk. Do not over stir. Pour into pan, and bake for 50-60 minutes.
While loaf is baking, combine lemon juice and confectioners’ sugar to form soft pourable paste.
While baked loaf is still hot, poke holes in top with skewer. Pour glaze over hot loaf and allow to cool.
Remove from pan, place on decorative plate. Here is where some sprigs of fresh herbs, preferably lemon-flavored, would make a lovely garnish. Slice to serve.