Cook Here and Now

Food at Slow Food's Golden Glass

Buongiorno. Although I went to Slow Food's Golden Glass event this past Sunday, I spent very little time tasting wine. How can this be? Who in their right mind skips free, top-quality wine? Well... I ran into several local producers - some new to me and some familiar faces - showing off their latest creations. There were so many excellent treats to sample and discuss that without even realizing it, my glass had been empty for almost two hours. Shocking, I know.

What I found at Slow Food's Golden Glass:

Pescadero's Harley Farms Goat Dairy
I've been a fan of Dee Harley and her flower-studded Van Goat chevre and goat ricotta for a long time. Right now the goats are munching on blackberry bushes, Canada thistle, poison oak and even poison hemlock, and it's giving the ricotta a distinctively sweet, floral scent (no itchiness involved). Try it before the season changes, and the goats move on to other plants.  She's also hosting farm tours and farm-to-table dinners in the farm's wooden, rustic barn: book ahead, because these fill up fast.

California's organic Apollo extra virgin olive oil
Let's be honest here: there are so many self-anointed 'specialty' olive oils around that knowing which one is actually worth your hard-earned cash isn't easy. The last thing I thought I was going to get excited about at a wine event is extra-virgin olive oil, but then I met Pablo Voizuk, an enthusiastic, kind-mannered gentleman from Buenos Aires. He's very confident in Apollo's California-grown oil: he knew that if I smelled it, I'd want to have it. After all the labor I put into making organic home-baked breads, you know I wouldn't put just anything on them - but these are the kind of aromatic olive oils that can stand up to hearty, crusty bread.

• The Sierra needs robust flavors to balance its herbal, slightly bitter Tuscan-style aroma. A suitable match would be wheat bread, beef stew, a braised rabbit, or a Moroccan olive and oranges salad.
• The Barouni is made with a variety of olive originally from Tunisia. The trees were planted in California some 40 years ago and abandoned - and I'm so glad they found them. This oil has a pronounced pungency that comes back to your nose about ten seconds after you swallow it, slowly unfolding layers of cumin and pepper. I can't wait to sprinkle some of this one on a nice rack of lamb or rustic Italian loaf.

You can find Apollo's olive oil at Whole Foods, Rainbow, or at Bay Area farmers markets.

Boccalone's porchetta
Now I'm not such a fan of their salame and their standard Italian cured meats - their texture and flavor are not well-developed yet. But complimenti to them for branching off into Italian specialties like lardo (cured lard) and porchetta: a fully cooked pig that's gutted, boned, arranged carefully into layers of stuffing, meat, fat, and skin, then rolled, spitted, and roasted, traditionally over wood.

The Brentwood Agricultural Land Trust tour for chefs
My favorite find for the day: I'm going on the 29th from 9:30-1:30 to tour Brentwood-area farms - and I'm really looking forward to the Blenheim apricots. Let me know if you want to come along, to visit and sample from Frog Hollow farms, Brookside farms, Dwelley farms and Smith family farms.

MyFarm
Did you know we have 102 mini-farms in San Francisco's backyards? You can be the 103rd:  MyFarm will help you set up and maintain your backyard orchard, and share what you produce through a citywide CSA. How great is that?

Enjoy!
Marco Flavio

Farmers Market Watch: June 16th

Buongiorno. Summer is almost here - as if you couldn't tell from variety on the stands. Many of you asked about the duck eggs I used to make pasta at our last event, so here they are: you can get them at the Alemany farmers market from the egg vendor (by the middle doors). These are $10 for 20 eggs - let me know what you make with them.

Now that locally produced food is hitting the mainstream with the Obamas' garden at the White House, inevitably there are agribusiness naysayers who claim that eating local, seasonal and organic food is much more expensive than commercially produced supermarket produce. Say what?! I'm going to start posting prices of the things I buy at the farmers market, so you can be the judge.

Let me know what you think by posting comments at the bottom of this post.

Here's what else I liked this week at the San Francisco Alemany farmers market:

Italian Red Torpedo organic onions. Back in Italy we use these fresh in salads for their very mild, sweet flavor. They're also great for pickling or in spring soups. $1.50/bunch.

On the Tomatero Farm stand I also found organic Stockton yellow onions. These have a pungent, strong aroma tempered by a sweet tang, ideal for stews and braised dishes with savory meats. Try these braised onions with rosemary, a worthy side dish for beef Bourguignon. $1.50/bunch.

Very mild Montana giant garlic. These are about 4 feet tall and have a delicate lavender flower at the top (no garlic smell). Excellent for decorating the table or as a conversation starter as you log one around the market.

Thai chillies come in two flavours: punishing or mild. $1/lb.
Mild peppers recipes from Allrecipes and Epicurious.
Thai chilli recipes from Allrecipes of Epicurious.

Mild Thai chillies.

I found some tangy, juicy and savory Delta-grown blueberries that are worth their price: $6 for a large (2 pints), $3.50 for a pint or 3 pints for $10. I'm making pancakes and cornbread with them.

The full range of organic berries have arrived at the market: tayberries, raspberries, blackberries, and boysenberries. I made jams in all shades of red last weekend, including Eclair strawberries, tayberries and raspberries. Next week I'm moving on to ollalieberries and blackberries - can't wait to taste those next winter. The organic ones cost me $20 a flat (12 baskets).

Now's the time to make Italian nocino (an herbal tasting, walnut-infused spirit) with these fresh unpeeled walnuts. Here's the recipe.

Organic Bing cherries for $2.50/lb. These were ready to be eaten: I bought them Saturday and finished them by Sunday evening.

Organic apricots, plums and pluots from Ferrari farms.The apricots are ready, but the plums and pluots are still a little too tart. Try this apricot leather: it's perfect for hiking. $1.50/lb.

Sour grapes for pickling - if you have a recipe, let me know. $3/lb.

Enjoy!
Marco Flavio

CH&N's main host is having a sale

Buongiorno. Zocalo, the host of our Cook Here and Now dinners is having an extensive warehouse sale the following two weekends. This will be their biggest and most diverse sale ever, featuring thousands of rugs, leather furniture, and bedroom, dining room, and entertainment furniture -- all at heavily discounted prices. For details and more information go to http://www.zocalo.org/.

Date/Time:
Friday and Saturday, June 12th and 13th • 11am-5pm
Friday, June 19th • 11am-5pm
Saturday, June 20th • noon-5pm

Warehouse Sale Questions:
whsale@zocalousa.com

Farmers Market Watch: June 4th

Buongiorno. Thanks to the 50 of you who participated in our Sunday dinner: that was inspired. Now please post your recipes in the forum. Grazie!

At the market the first sweet berries are showing up: raspberries, still-slightly-sour blackberries, and tayberries (see above). These Scottish raspberry and blackberry hybrids are a potent, juicy mix of the two flavors, with the size of a blackberry and the color of a raspberry. We're still devouring a flat of Albion strawberries at an alarming rate, but tayberries are next on the menu. When fresh-picked they're still a little sour, but they should get sweeter after a couple of days at room temperature. I say it's time to get those 3-berry tarts in the oven.

Here's what else I liked this week at the San Francisco Heart of the City farmers market:

My favorite tomato farm is back: certified organic 2 Dog Farms. We still have two months to go until their exceptional dry-farmed Early Girls, but meanwhile, they've got spinach for $1.50/bag, salad mixes at $4/lb, and lovely sunflowers to brighten up our San Francisco pseudo-summer days. 

 

Organic blackberries and raspberries have arrived alongside Albion strawberries. I'll trade you fresh duck-egg pasta for a three berry tart. Just post it in the forums. Any takers?

 

For you dedicated fans of Vietnamese cooking, there's a new herb stand that sells a thorough range of fresh herbs from around the globe: thyme, marjoram, three kinds of basil, dill, cilantro, an impressive range of mints, lemongrass, pennyworth, sorrel and shiso. Finally you can make those wonderful Vietnamese spring rolls at home. The pesto I made with his sweet purple basil won an encore at our Memorial Day lunch.

Summer squash for all your cooking needs, from very mild and floral to strong and herbaceous: Ronde de Nice, Romanesco, Crookneck and the just-waiting-to-be-stuffed flowers. At our Sunday CH&N event, Samsara's mom made deep-fried flowers stuffed with goat cheese using flowers picked from her garden that morning  ... I can't get them out of my head. Recipe, please!

For our Sunday event, I made a duck ragú and farm-fresh duck-egg pasta. Recently I met a woman who  rescues ducks, hens and quails, and sells me their eggs. Duck eggs are perfect for pasta, with a slightly higher protein content and a larger yolk yielding a toothsome, more richly colored dough. It was too hard for my pro Kitchen Aid 600 Watt mixer to handle, so I had to knead it by hand, but the results were well worth the trouble.

These are the pasta sheets drying out before rolling to make the pappardelle (ribbons).

Since I wanted a wider pasta than a fettuccine, I rolled the sheets and sliced them to my desired width to make pappardelle: a wide pasta that can hold more of the ragú sauce in every bite. This photo is about life-size:

Here's the final product: about 2 lbs. of golden ribbons ready to be cooked. They can also be refrigerated and cooked the next day. In Beverly Hills, there's a restaurant that fills reservations a month in advance for meals featuring duck-egg pasta - but with duck eggs from the Alemany Market and a little brute force, you can make it at home anytime.

Enjoy!
Marco Flavio

Two new Farmers Markets: Castro and Island Earth (Metreon)

Buongiorno. Summer is here and for lucky San Franciscans, it's easier than ever to get weekly groceries farm-fresh from the producers: the Island Earth Farmers Market has opened inside the Metreon, and the Castro Farmers Market is open after work.

The Castro Farmers Market (see above) takes place at Noe and Market 4-7pm every Wednesday from now until October 28th, rain or shine. This market is as fresh and funky as the neighborhood that hosts it, with lush displays of fresh produce, three stands of flowers and plants, my favorite California extra-virgin olive oil from Bariani and a couple of bakeries. All this, plus better people-watching than you get on a hot day at Café Flore.

The Island Earth Farmers Market is right on the ground floor of the Metreon building at 4th and Mission, facing Yerba Buena Gardens (where the Discovery Channel store used to be). This one runs year-round, 10am-8pm Monday - Saturday and Sunday 10am-7pm - pretty handy for lunchtime picnics, or a quick dinner before the movies. Besides produce, there are organic wine tastings, bakeries, orchid growers, and food stalls offering bargain organic dim sum, empanadas and falafel.

From the Castro Farmers Market:

From the Island Earth Farmers Market:

 

Enjoy!
Marco Flavio