K’s Kitchen: Simple tips for dealing with summer’s harvest
By Kathryn Reed
Beets keep arriving in the harvest basket. Luckily this past week’s came with some suggestions with what to do with them.
But what surprised me is the folks at the Natural Trading Co. said the greens should not be thrown away.
“A quick sauté of beet greens provides a delicious dish that contains vitamins A and C. Chop the greens, sauté them in 1 tablespoon olive oil for 10 minutes over medium heat and you’ll have a delicious side dish for grilled fish or chicken,” the farmers wrote in their weekly newsletter.
I’ll have to try this one day. Mine keep ending up in the garbage.
I’m in the habit now of taking off the greens of anything. This is because Joy, whose box this really is, told me that’s the way to make sure carrots stay fresh. She’s right. They were going limp with the greens on them.
Another thing I’ve started doing after reading about it multiple places is not putting basil in the fridge. Instead, I set it at room temperature in a glass of cold water. It stays much longer.
I’ve already started making batches of pesto to freeze for winter and spring use. This summer I’m using walnuts because pine nuts are so dang expensive. I put the green stuff in a freezer bag, lay it flat in the freezer and then have fresh pesto when basil is harder to come by or it tastes less than ideal. And homemade pesto is always better than store bought.
Never put tomatoes in the fridge. It just zaps the flavor from them. Store them on the counter and don’t stack them.
When choosing tomatoes and you know you will be cooking them, don’t worry about how they look. Flavor is what counts.
Consider buying cherry or grape tomatoes as a snack. Put a bunch in a bowl and eat them like candy.
To test if your knives are sharp try slicing through the skin of a tomato. It should be easy.
What tips do you have to share?
Don’t EVER put potatoes in the refrigerator, they will change flavor and potatoes do NOT taste good if sweet.
Don’t over cook corn on the cob; cook it immediately after purchase; kernel size is not necessarily an indication of sweetness, sometimes larger kernels are quite sweet and even milky…squeeze one maybe an inch or two back from the tassle end before purchasing; as dried stalk ends are not the best indication of freshness.
Chives grow nicely here at Tahoe, in just about any yard, cut a few stems and then finely cut with scissors, add to soups, baked potatoes, etc.
Very LIGHTLY roast pine nuts in a saucepan, not enough to change color very much…will add a much more intense nutty flavor to them.
One could make a very long list of these sorts of things.
I built one of the 1st veggie and flower greenhouses that I know of in my Al Tahoe backyard in 1978. We used mostly scrap lumber and a few cheap pine boards from Meek’s and used 4ml. polyurethane plastic to cover it every year and grew all sorts of stuff in raised beds. There’s nothing like going out to the yard and picking fresh lettuce, tomatoes, herbs, zucchinis, beans, snap peas etc. for your dinner. It’s still standing.
Sun ,good soil and water. You can grow all kinds of vegetables here at Tahoe. Watch your yard for the places that get the most sun and plan for next spring. You also will need to add compost to your soil(I went thru 35 bags this year!). Tahoe soil is good for growing pine trees but not much else. Once you turn your soil and stir in the compost your ready to plant.
Here’s whats worked for me. Carrots, Lettuce, Snow Peas, Green Onions, Radishes, Spinach, green beans, Zucchini, Potatos and some other things I planted late in the season just to see if they would grow in my ever expanding garden.
If you don’t believe me, drive down Knox steet and look for the lot with the two carved trees out front (Thank you Gerald Toste) and check it out. If I’m here I’ll let you pick a few things. Nothng like freshly picked vegetables!
Take care,Old Long Skiis …and start a garden, it’s not that hard!