Category Archives: salad

Fresh Sweet Corn Relish: a “no cooking needed” recipe!

picture of recipe ingredients — The ingredients, with option olive that I did not use for the market demo

In honor of the summery weather and full harvest time, I made a fresh corn relish highlighting a number of veggies along with, of course, fresh corn. It was a bit hit! And, for once, I made the recipe as written. Well, almost. <grin>

Quick, easy, tasty, it can be a side dish, a dip, a topping or garnish for fish, (salmon comes to my mind) pork, or whatever strikes your fancy. Here it is, with a few notes.

2 cups fresh corn kernels from the cob (I used 4 ears) *
1/2 cup finely diced red bell pepper
1/2 cup finely diced red onion
1/2 cup finely diced tomatoes
1/3 cup deseeded, deveined, finely diced jalapeno or other hot pepper.**
1/2 cup white vinegar
2 tablespoons chopped fresh basil (or 1 tablespoon dried – use the olive oil if using dried basil)
1/2 teaspoon minced garlic
1-2 tablespoons olive oil (optional)
salt & pepper to taste

* Click HERE for a video showing how to get kernels off the cob without the mess!

**I used moon peppers, more commonly called Bishop’s crown peppers, from Flats Mentor Farm.

Toss together the corn kernels, finely diced red bell pepper, red onion, tomatoes, and hot pepper.

picture of fresh corn relish — Ready to eat!

Mix the vinegar, salt, pepper, and basil together in a separate bowl and then add to the veggies and toss to cover.

It is ready to eat, but you can also store, covered, in the fridge for up to 4-5 days or more, but keep an eye on the tomatoes!

Watermelon, Peach, and Tomato Salad: Delectably Refreshing

When Farmer Jane of Farmer Dave’s said that they would have a lot of watermelon, peaches, and tomatoes, I typed those words into a search engine and voila! I discovered that Watermelon, Peach, and Tomato Salad is a “thing.” That was easy! I made a few changes from the original recipe created by Anne Byrn for The Old Mill to keep things dairy and nut-free, and left out fresh basil and mint since none of the former was available and not much of the latter. But truly, the produce shines on its own. Just add or adjust ingredients to suit your taste.

Here are the ingredients from the original recipe with my changed noted in parentheses:

6 cups seedless watermelon chunks, cut into 1-inch chunks
4 cups good, ripe heirloom tomatoes, cut into 1-inch chunks
1/2 to 1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 cups sliced, peeled ripe peaches
6 cups fresh arugula or your favorite salad greens (I used a bunch chopped small for sample servings)
4 tablespoons olive oil (I used 2 T)
1 1/2 tablespoons white or red wine vinegar (I used 1 T)
3 tablespoons chopped fresh mint or basil, or a combination (if desired)
1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese (if desired)
2 tablespoons toasted sliced almonds (if desired or use other toppings)

bowls of watermelon and tomato, salted. — Salted and sitting for 1/2 an hour.

Place the watermelon and tomatoes in a mixing bowl and season with salt. Toss to coat, and let the fruit sit for 30 minutes. Drain well.
Fold the peaches into the watermelon and tomato mixture. To serve, spoon the fruit on top of the salad greens. Drizzle with oil and vinegar. Garnish the top with chopped fresh herbs, feta cheese, and toasted almonds. NOTE: I drained again after adding the peaches, and at least once more time during the demo. Note to self – save the liquid. It will make great base for a mixed drink!

Here are some handy notes excerpted from/based on those in the original recipe:

Use fresh, ripe fruits of any color and sprinkle the watermelon and tomatoes with a little kosher salt ahead of time. It not only draws out the moisture, but it intensifies the flavor of the fruit.
Prepare ingredients separately. Once you are ready to serve, pile the watermelon, peaches, and tomatoes on top of your favorite lettuce, sprinkle with the oil, vinegar and fresh herbs, and then garnish with the feta and almonds, if using the latter two.
Don’t have feta? Use cubes of fresh mozzarella. Or use toasted pecans instead of the almonds. And if you don’t have basil or mint, use what you have – chives, dill, or parsley. There could not be a more adaptable, stunning, and easy-to-fix salad that salutes the end of summer in a big way.

This really is a lovely recipe as written or as a basis for your own ideas or available ingredients. The stars of the recipe should be available from our farmers for at least a few more weeks, so keep this one in mind to enjoy it with the freshest of fruits and greens.

Keeping Things Cool: Cucumber Blueberry Salad. And Quick Pickles!

How hot was it? We don’t need to relive that. 🙂 But, cucumbers worked well as the star ingredient of the WFM cooking demo on July 20! And, since all our produce farmers had plenty of cukes and/or blueberries for sale, a cucumber and blueberry salad seems a good choice. Plus, I brought back the Quick and Simple Pickles recipe from last August with just a minor twist, using maple syrup from our own Ackermann’s Maple Farm as the sweetener.

First, click HERE for the link to the Quick Pickles recipe. I followed it as is except I used a scant tablespoon of maple syrup instead or the two tablespoons of honey I used last summer. The original recipe calls for up to two tablespoons of sugar, buts notes the sweetener as optional. Oh, I used pickling cukes. I tried a bite and found the peel to be bitter. It would not matter when using a heat pickling technique, but I opted to peel them for this recipe.

Now, on to the salad! So easy! I used regular cucumbers and followed this recipe except for changes noted:

Cucumber Blueberry Salad
1 cucumber (10 inches long and 2.5″ diameter or so)
2 cups (1 pint) fresh blueberries
2 tablespoons thinly sliced scallions
2 tablespoons olive oil
1+ tablespoon lime juice (I used freshly squeezed lemon juice)
1+ tablespoon rice vinegar (or type of your choice)
½ cup coarsely chopped cilantro or parsley leaves, loosely packed (I used parsley)
¼ teaspoon salt
1⁄8 teaspoon black pepper
½ cup (2 ounces) crumbled feta cheese, optional (No feta used but a great addition!)

Of course, adjust all seasonings/ingredients to taste!

Peel cucumbers if/as desired. With a sharp knife, cut the cucumber in half lengthwise. With the tip of a spoon, scrape out the seeds
Cut into thin slices. In a large bowl, toss cucumber, blueberries, scallions and. In a small bowl, whisk the olive oil, lime (or lemon) juice, parsley or cilantro , salt and pepper. Pour over the cucumber mixture and toss to combine.
Sprinkle with feta cheese, if desired (you could use a stronger vinegar if using feta). As I always say, use all recipes as a guideline. What tastes best to YOU is what matters. That and supporting our farmers and vendors, of course. Enjoy!

Raw Beet Salad is Just a Few Grates Away

Well, you can of course use the grating attachment with your food processor, but nothing can beat the utter simplicity of a grater, a knife, beets and a few good condiments and seasonings.

Here is the link to the recipe I used:

https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/7289-raw-beet-salad

And, here it is written out:

1 pound beets
1 large shallot *
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 teaspoons Dijon mustard, or to taste *
1 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons sherry vinegar or other good strong vinegar *
Minced parsley, dill, chervil, rosemary or tarragon *

* There were no shallots, so i substituted a comparable amount of scallions from Flats Mentor Farms, using mostly the white bulb and just a bit of the green. In lieu of Dijon, I opted for the Old School Kitchen Maple Bourbon Mustard from Jane of West River Creamery. I used a nice red wine vinegar that paired nicely with the beets, and I used fresh oregano from Fay Mountain Farm for the herb. the beautiful Golden Beets were from Farmer Dave’s.

Peel the beets and the shallot. Combine them in the bowl of a food processor fitted with the metal blade, and pulse carefully until the beets are shredded; do not puree. (Or grate the beets by hand and mince the shallots; combine, [as i did].) Scrape into a bowl.
Toss with the salt, pepper, mustard, oil and vinegar. Taste, and adjust seasoning. Toss in the herbs, and serve.

This is a quick, easy, and versatile salad, perfect for a hot summer day. Read the notes below the recipe on the NYtimes site for a number of ideas as to how you can jazz this one up. Enjoy!

And, a thank you to the woman who helped me determine the final adjustments of the seasonings!

Spinach, Strawberry, Cucumber Salad

What a super opening day we had on June 15! The weather was perfect, the produce was bountiful, and I got to cook with a professional chef. New Wakefield resident Katie Franzetti, who has offered to volunteer her talents to the WFM Cooking Demos and Farm/Food Eduction program, is a Certified Health Supportive Chef from The Natural Gourmet Institute in New York. We are excited to have her on board!

This week, we took advantage of the abundance of spinach from Farmer Dave’s, cucumber and basil from Kelly’s Farm, and strawberries from Fay Mountain Farm and made a simple yet lovely salad dressed with a light olive oil and rice vinegar dressing with a touch of lemon and honey that just radiated SUMMER!

Here is the recipe. Apologies in advance: the sampling was over and done with before we had a chance to take and picture of the finished product.

Spinach, Strawberry, and Cucumber Salad

Salad
¼ lb (or so) fresh spinach
1 pint strawberries
1 medium cucumber
Leaves from 3-4 stems of basil, to taste

Dressing
4 Tbsp olive oil
2 Tbsp rice vinegar*
2 tsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 ½ tsp honey
salt and pepper to taste

Rinse all the produce and pat dry. Remove any woody stems from the spinach and chop and/or tear the leaves to preferred size. Slice strawberries and cucumbers into thin slices and/or chunks. Tear or slice basil leaves very thin. Then gently toss it all together.

Whisk the dressing ingredients, adjust seasoning to taste, add to salad starting with half of it, gently toss, and add more as desired.

Serve as is, add some feta, nuts, seeds, or whatever strikes your fancy. Or put on each plate as a colorful bed for a serving of sautéed shrimp or other entrée.

Why rice vinegar? We like it because it is a bit less acidic than most other types, giving the signature tang but not overpowering other flavors. You can use your choice, but might need to adjust the other flavors.

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