Farmer's market bounty, part 2 (or: Once you go heirloom, you don't go back)

When last we left our heroine, she had just bought some lovely produce from the farmer's market down the street. But how to use it all up before it spoils?

On Monday night, I began by trying out this recipe (found by Googling "heirloom cherry tomato recipes" and picking one that didn't require, like, two pounds of tomatoes). I used cod instead of halibut 'cause that's what I had on hand, and I added a couple tablespoons of wine to the tomatoes as they cooked. The result, served with couscous:


OK, so the fish was overcooked (the result of trying to sear cod) and the couscous was dry (because it came out of the freezer instead of fresh from the pot), but I didn't care, because those tomatoes? Holy crap, those tomatoes were good. I mean, seriously, wow. I loved them so much that I was really happy the recipe called for only half of them, because that meant I got to make them again on Thursday night! (That time, I served them over chicken and had roasted potatoes on the side.)

(By the way, is there any better smell in the universe than garlic sautéing in olive oil? Why is there no Yankee Candle for that smell?)

Tuesday, I boiled some pasta and opened up my paper bag of mushrooms - only to find that they had shriveled to about half of their original volume. But no matter: a half-hour soaking in some water perked them back up.

So, butter and a little olive oil; garlic; the mushrooms, all diced up; some wine; sea salt and pepper; some basil at the end. (It's basically the tomatoes all over again.) Add the pasta to the pan and toss; serve with lots of Parmesan. (No picture this time; I forgot, but it wasn't that pretty anyway.) It was tasty, but the reconstituted mushrooms still wound up being pretty insubstantial. $4 for 4 oz is probably not the best use of your farmer's market dollar.

So that just leaves the rest of the basil, which I stripped the leaves from yesterday. I've got about two cups, so I think I'll halve this pesto recipe ...

LATER. Welp, that's done. I took a picture but decided not to post it because it didn't look very appetizing. Good thing it tastes so delicious.

So that's the end of the farmer's market veggies! Yay! Aaaand I've got a special treat for anyone who was interested in the fate of Wilty the Kalewhale: he did not get thrown out! Instead, he and some of his veggie friends (who I save in a freezer bag for just such an occasion) got tossed into a Crock-Pot with some water for 12 hours. The result: six cups of vegetable stock, which are now stacked neatly in my freezer:



The V written on each container stands for "victory over wastefulness"! (OK, it also stands for "veggie.")

Farmer's market bounty

Heirloom cherry tomatoes ...

... sweet basil, and ...

... oyster mushrooms! (OK, the mushrooms are a little hard to see.)

Finding myself actually awake and dressed before noon on a Sunday, I decided to walk over to the farmers' market (in Hyde Park, to be known henceforth as Oakley near) to see what I could see. $9.50 got me this lovely produce, which I am bound and determined to use before it spoils for once. (Wilting bunch of kale in the fridge, this is for you.)

My dishwasher runs on faith

Recently, Mr. W told me he doesn't think my little dishwasher works very well. I think his exact words were, "If I had that dishwasher, I wouldn't bother to use it."

Ever since then, I can't help but notice that my dishes don't seem to be getting as clean as I remember.

Am I giving the dishes more scrutiny since he said that? Is it the cheap-o soap I recently bought? Or is it that my dishwasher just can't handle knowing that someone out there doesn't believe in it?

I think it's the last one. So I added a quarter-cup of vinegar to the rinse dispenser and told the dishwasher it was magic elixir. Already I've been seeing improvement.

Animals I saw out the car window on the trip to DC

- Cows (many, including some calves)
- Horses (many, including one rolling around on its back)
- Llamas (!)
- Goats (I had been looking for sheep, but they worked too)
- Deer (one, a fawn, nibbling grass off the side of the highway)
- Pigs (at first I thought they were sheep, because they were huge and kind of pillowy)
- Sheep (finally, between Columbus and Cincinnati on the way home - and in a pen with one llama!)