Market to table - One local summer week 5

Is it Friday? Oh, thank heavens! It was an absolutely insane week, but it has passed, as weeks tend to do, and now it's time to relax and regroup. Let me admit up front, this week's OLS meals didn't all happen in one day (and didn't include dinner at all), but they did happen...

Breakfast: I was on a roll and for the third week in a row I tried a new pancake recipe using my local flours. Two weeks ago, I had whole wheat pancakes. Last week, I had rice flour pancakes. And this week? Cornmeal pancakes (something other than pancakes next week, I promise). I did a massive search on-line looking for the perfect recipe. Unfortunately, most of them called for some white flour, and I don't have any local white flour. Humph. Then I ran across a recipe from Gluten-free Mommy's website (rather than go into the whole thing, see recipe here). I made just a few alterations to increase the local-ness (is that a word?):

• instead of sugar I used local honey
  
• instead of 1-1/2 c. buttermilk, I used 1/2 cup local whole milk + 1 cup of homemade yogurt (made from local milk)

Actually, I had to add quite a bit more milk to the batter because the final pancakes were coming out too crumbly, but extra milk made them perfect, as you can see. The real dilemma, then, was I wasn't sure how to top them. Syrup didn't quite sound right, and neither did fruit, so I topped each pancake with a little of my homemade butter. It's not local, sorry, but I did make it myself. These local flapjacks were super tasty - just like warm buttered cornbread. Yum! I rounded out the meal with a side of peach peels (left over from making jam last week) and some of my homemade yogurt (made from local, raw milk).

Because I make pancakes in large batches and freeze them all, breakfasts are super easy - just pull a couple from the freezer and toss in the toaster oven for 5-6 minutes. So I can actually say that with very little effort, this week EVERY breakfast was local. The pancakes varied from day to day (sometimes local whole wheat, sometimes local rice flour, and of course the local cornmeal pancakes). And each day, a plate of these yummies was served with fresh, local fruit (watermelon or peaches) and my homemade-from-local-milk yogurt.

Lunch: I hit another winner for soup this week. With leftover veggies from the fridge, some italian sausage from our dairy, and vegetable stock I'd saved from steaming and boiling other veggies, I had the perfect combination for a hearty and mouthwatering feast. This week's soup started out with chopped onions, mushrooms, parsley, potato, green pepper, banana peppers and zucchini sauteed in a frying pan. While the veggies were softening, I cooked up the italian sausage links whole and cut them into slices. Then into the pot everything went - the sauteed veggies and the italian sausages as well as the grease, then I added about half a dozen chopped tomatoes, the stock I'd been saving in the fridge from other veggie dinners, and both black and navy beans that had been soaking overnight. I was a little short on liquid, so I tossed in a couple quarts of water, as well as some salt and pepper. Two hours of simmering later, I had this beautiful soup (sorry that it's difficult to see, I had packed my lunch for the workday). As a side, I pulled some of the polenta from last week out of the freezer and nuked it (my only cooking option at the office) until it was nice and warm. It's better when fried in oil or butter, but pretty good this way too. Yum!

Sorry. No dinners to report this week. I had a full week of VERY long days and by the time I got home, all I could muster the energy for was buttered toast (both homemade but not local), fruit (this is definitely local), and my homemade chocolate cake.

Let's see. The only non-local ingredients were baking powder, baking soda, salt, and canola oil in the pancakes; salt, pepper, and olive oil in the soup; and the tinsy bit of salt in the polenta.

Well, I hope everyone had a good week. More to come in local food soon, so stay tuned. 

For more ideas on eating local foods, check out the One Local Summer Challenge website (hosted by Farm to Philly) and see what others are eating (weekly OLS posts are made to theFarm to Philly website on Tuesdays of each week). Happy (and mindful) eating!