STUFFED SAVOY CABBAGE

INGREDIENTS

savoy cabbage - about 4 lbs

vinegar - 1 tbls
olive oil
onion - 2 cups, chopped
garlic - 1 clove, chopped
ground sausage (chicken or pork) or shitakke mushrooms- 14 oz
breadcrumbs - 7 slices of wholegrain bread or 7 oz
salt and pepper
nutmeg - pinch
parsley - 2 tbls
egg - 1

butter- 2 tbls
carrots - 1 cup
onion - 2 cup
celery - 1 cup
dry white wine - 1/2 cup
stock - 1 cup
bay leaf - 1
Find a medium to large pot and bring salted water to a boil. Add a dash of vinegar.
Separate all of the leaves of the cabbage and rinse each leaf.
Boil 6 or 7 leaves at a time, for 5-8 minutes, until tender. Drain the leaves in a colander in your sink.

To make the breadcrumbs:
Cut the bread into quarters and toast the bread in the oven at 300' for 25 - 40 minutes until dry...cool and crumble in a blender or food processor.

For the stuffing:
Saute the onion in a large frying pan over medium heat until tender.
Add the garlic and sausage meat and cook until tender but not browned.
In a large bowl, combine the sausage meant, breadcrumbs, salt, pepper, nutmeg, parsley and egg.
Mix thoroughly.

To assemble:
Create 4 piles of cabbage leaves by size. Arrange the largest leaves in a circle, overlapping them slightly and placing the curling edges up. Place 1/3 of the stuffing on top of the cabbage leaves. Top this with another layer of the next smallest leaves over the stuffing. Place another 1/3rd of the stuffing on top of those leaves. Do this one more time.

Take a long piece of cotton string and place it under the layers of cabbage and filling. Pull the string up around to the top bringing the bottom layers of cabbage up so it looks like a big cabbage; cross the string and bring it back down to the bottom. Cross the strin over and under the cabbage 2 or 3 times to hold the shape of the head. Flip the whole thing over. I hope this is easier than it sounds...you want to have a cabbage leaves on the outside and the stuffing inside.

Sauce:
Heat the butter over medium heat. Add the vegetables and cook for about 5 minutes. Add the wine, stock and bay leaf and cook for 2 minutes more.

Bake:
Place the stuffed cabbage in a deep baking pan surrounded by the sauce. Cover and bake at 375' for 50 to 60 minutes.

To serve:
Place the cabbage on a serving platter surrounded by the sauce and vegetables. Cut and remove the string and cut into wedges to serve.

PEA SHOOTS

It has been a month since I planted the peas and now I've begun to harvest the shoots. The seed was purchased from Evergreen Oriental Seed Company for $27.00 a lb. and is called Dou Miao or Muy Caro thought Steve when I told him how much I'd paid for it. I am new to this and thought I should buy the seed that explictly said "Olivia, this is the seed for growing the pea shoots".
Later my web search told me you can also use Oregon sugar pod II and Oregon giant, all disease-resistant bush snow peas developed at OSU or Dwarf Grey Sugar Peas. Also suitable is Cascadia, a disease resistant variety of snap pea also developed at OSU. They can be purchased for around only $8.00/lb. Snow peas are the flat edible peas and snap peas are the plump edible peas. I planted the seed in two long rows (Steve would know how many linear feet the rows are).

Last week my pea shoots looked to be about 6 inches tall, tall enough thought the internet; so I picked some. The stir-fry I made tasted a bit like fried compost. Different web information said pick only the end shoots having 3 or 4 leaves. On Saturday Devin and I crawled down the rows on our hands and knees and picked 6 small cups of pea shoots, three-quarters of the way down the row (Steve would know how many linear knees we had travelled) and after about 1 hour, we were both done! I immediately put the peas into the refrigerator of my EuroVan and later soaked and spun them dry.

At the farmer's market on Sunday I was unsure of my shoots. I gave a bag to Grace to munch on when she came by. I sold a bag to the amazing chef, Claude Mann for $2.00 instead of $3.00. Later that evening we were fiddleing around at the farm when Steve noticed his farmer's market chicken was warming up nicely on the front seat of his truck. We decided that was a message from someone much smarter than us, to go home. As I walked in the door I put it in a pot, poured a beer over it, threw in some leeks and fennel and turned on the heat. The phone rang, the cafe was slammed and we needed to go back to the Farmer and the Cook. Oh... how I wanted to stay home. We returned to the house at 8 pm and sat down to a perfectly cooked chicken and a simple pea shoot and kumquat salad. Today Liz and I planted 20 square feet of peas.

PEA SHOOT AND KUMQUAT SALAD
pea shoots, 3 cups
kumquats, 4 sliced thinly
shallot, 1 small, minced
vinegar, 1 Tbls
olive oil, 2 Tbls
salt and freshly ground pepper

GOLDEN BEET & WALNUT SALAD

you will need: 1 saucepan, 2 small fry pans, colander, garlic press, measuring cups and spoons, cheese grater

gold beets, 4 to 5 medium
bay leaf
olive oil, 2 Tbls
leeks, 3-4
garlic cloves, 3
parsley, 1/4 cup, chopped
a pinch of fennel
sea salt
walnuts, 3/4 cup
a large pinch of dried herbs..thyme or marjoram
olive oil, 1/4 cup
marmalade, 2 Tbls
gruyere cheese, 3 oz

1. Boil the beets in a saucepan covered with salted water, with a bay leaf, until done. This will take anywhere between 20 - 35 minutes
2. Cut the leeks into rings, rinse in a colander to remove sand.
3. Press the garlic.
4. Saute the leeks, garlic and fennel in the oil until soft and lightly browned. Salt. Add the parsley at the very end.
5. In another pan saute the walnuts until browned adding the dried herbs at the end.
6. Cool the beets enought to handle and peel and slice them.
7. Combine the beets, sauted leeks and walnuts and toss with olive oil and citrus marmalade
8. Arrange on a platter of mixed greens.
9. Top with grated gruyere cheese

ROASTED GAILAN RECIPE

I roasted the gailan or Chinese brocolli as you would asparagus. In fact, at $1.50 a bunch, it is a very affordable alternative to asparagus. I removed the leaves from the the gailan stalks and rubbed the stalks with La Nogalera walnut oil (available at the Ojai Farmer's Market) and a small clove of garlic...a dash of salt and roasted the gailan in my little toaster oven at 350 degrees for only 10 minutes or until the stalks are tender.

HECHO A MANO CHILE POWDER

I grew so many chiles and knew eventually I would make a chile powder and so I have. I started by checking Paupered Chef's blog. He is a cook from Chicago who really delves into each recipe explored. I looked at his recipe for chile powder and then I looked at Alton Brown's recipe and sure enough they are almost identical. As is my nature, I too followed along. I started with three kinds of chiles, roasted some cumin seed, added garlic powder and followed that with oregano. I usually like to add ginger or cloves to my chile sauces but thought I would play with that later. By the way... i've planted cumin and Mexican oregano for next years chile powders.
The kitchen was full the day I made my powder, we had Justin, Katy, Erica and Megumi. We all discussed a possible name around our big wooden work table. I thought of calling the chile "handmade" but then Justin came up with the perfect name "hecho a mano" ... not only did we grow the chiles at Mano Farm but we roasted, ground and blended all of the spices by hand. The Spanish translation is perfecto.

I made a chili last night and it almost knocked Steve over, here's the recipe:

HECHO A MANO CHILI RECIPE

1 lb bison or beef steak cut into thin slices
1/2 cup beans, dry ( pintos or white)
2 Tbls olive oil
1 cup onion, finely diced
4 cloves of garlic, diced
1 green bell pepper, chopped
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 Tbls chile powder
2 cups tomato sauce
1 cup red wine
1 1/2 cups water

1. Cook the beans in 4 cups of water for about 1 hour or until soft.
2. Brown the sliced bison or beef in a deep skillet. Remove from the skillet onto a plate (to be added back later)
3. Heat the oil in the same skillet (don’t wash it out), saute the onion, garlic and bell pepper until the onions are lightly browned. Add the salt and chile powder.
4. Add the tomato sauce, red wine and water. Gently simmer for 20 minutes.
5. Add the bison or beef slices and beans back to the pot and simmer it all together for about 5 minutes…just enough to cook the meat.

OPTIONAL ..serve with chopped cilantro, chopped white onion, lime wedges and grated cheddar cheese...leave out the meat if you are vegetarian.

RED CHILE POLENTA CAKES RECIPE

you will need: a saucepan, measuring cups, wire whisk, muffin tins, parchment paper, cheese grater

3 1/2 cups water
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup organic polenta, dry
2 Tbls organic ancho chile powder
1 cup parmesan cheese
1/2 tsp salt

Add salt to the water and bring it to a rapid boil. Add the polenta slowly to the water. Stir with a wire whisk to avoid any clumps. Turn heat down to a very low and simmer for about 20 minutes, stir occasionally. During the last 5 minutes of cooking the polenta will begin to thicken and you should stir continuously. Add the chile powder and the parmesan cheese. Pour into 8 muffin molds. Bake for 15 minutes. Turn out and serve with a saute of vegetables or with chili.

PAELLA IN THE ORANGE ORCHARD

Here is the link to the article that just came out in the Sunday LA Times magazine ...when we were photographed eating a paella, prepared a hungry girl named Lara Zarubin.