Homemade

In this simple living, self-sufficiency project I'm undergoing, I'd like to be able to harvest all my food from my garden, but that's simply not possible. Given that limitation, I'm trying to do the next best thing. I cook from scratch whenever possible, and buy very few processed foods. Three staples that I've been cooking regularly are bread, noodles, and tortillas. I can't grow wheat for the flour, but flour is very cheap, and all of these things taste better homemade than store bought.

Homemade bread is pretty common, and everyone loves it, but I hate turning the oven on in the summer time. Mom has a bread-maker, and she uses it regularly, but I found another alternative. Mother Earth has a great recipe for five minute bread. The dough is made in advanced, and the bread is made on the stove-top anytime bread is wanted. It's absolutely delicious, and I can use it in conjunction with other homemade foods, such as hummus and pesto. It also works really well for stove-top pizza.

The other two are a little less common. I love making homemade noodles. It's a great way to use my excess basil. In a food processor, it's extremely simple. I toss a cup of basil, two cups of flour, two eggs, and a teaspoon of salt. I turn it on until a ball forms. After letting the dough rest for about a half-hour; I role it flat with a rolling pin, cut it up, and drop it in the pot for a few minutes. I topped it off with a simple homemade tomato sauce, and some freshly grated Parmesan cheese. 

Homemade tortillas are even simpler, and just as important, they are infinitely better than most store-bought tortillas. I've been making these regularly, because we've been eating a lot of mom's homemade salsa from last year, and I'll be making them a lot when the tomatoes ripen, and I can start making some raw salsa. Like the noodles, a food processor makes these extremely easy, but they are easy enough without it. There are many variations, but the simplest one I found has 3 c. of flour, 1/3 c. oil, 1 tsp. salt, and 1 c. of warm water. Put it all in the food processor till it forms a ball, flour the counter and roll them out with a rolling pin. Fry them up, and that's all there is too it.

Harvest is Gaining Momentum

I'm starting to have a hard time keeping up with the garden's production. This is a very nice problem to have, and I'll enjoy it while it lasts, because my supply of root vegetables (with the exception of potatoes) is dwindling. I did plant some more turnips and beets a couple of weeks ago, so hopefully, I'll have another round of root vegetables coming up. For the time being, I've been pulling up lots of turnips, beets, carrots, and onions. I don't know if I'll ever be able to construct an entire dinner with ingredients  solely from the garden, because I'll never be making my own vegetable oil or salt. Nevertheless, I'm beginning to make meals that are made mostly from vegetables and herbs from the garden. Most recently I made Cheesy Turnips and Carrots a recipe I got from my favorite online recipe source, allrecipes.com. It's a simple recipe that enabled me to use turnips, carrots, onions, and celery from the garden.

In addition to that dish, I made beet and goat cheese gratin from my favorite cookbook, How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Simple Meatless Recipes for Great Food by Mark Bittman. Like everything I cook, it's simple and healthy. After roasting the beets in advance, I tossed them in olive oil and salt and pepper. I then put them in a baking dish and sprinkled fresh time on them (from my herb garden, of course). Then I crumbled some goat cheese over the top, and put it under the broiler for about 5 minutes.

With the potatoes coming on strong, I hope my first round of root vegetables will last me until the tomatoes start coming on in a couple of weeks. Right now, the plants are loaded with green tomatoes and blossoms, so it looks like it's going to be a great crop.

Harvest Time

Even though I do enjoy all the work I do in the garden, it's the harvest that makes it all worth while. So far I've been able to grab a bunch of radishes here, a handful of peas there, or a few leaves of lettuce for a salad, but until today, I haven't been able to make a meal out of a harvest. I pulled out 9 turnips (about 3 pounds worth), and I still have a little over a dozen left (plus the seedlings I just planted).

I used them to cook braised and glazed turnips from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian: Simple Meatless Recipes for Great Food. Like most of Bittman's recipes it's quite simple:

• 2 tbs. butter/oil
• 1 lbs. turnips
• 1/2 c. vegetable stock
• Salt & pepper
• Lemon juice
• Chopped parsley

Combine butter, turnips, stock, and S&P. Bring to a boil, turn it down and let it simmer until the turnips are tender (15-20 min.).

Uncover and raise the heat until almost all the liquid has boiled off. Turn off the heat and garnish with the lemon juice and chopped parsley.