Archive for December 2008

Most two-year-olds can identify a banana. Most two-year-olds can identify a banana. A reasonably dexterous kindergartener can draw a recognizable apple. Yet ask an average adult what rhubarb looks like and you can expect little more than a blank stare. Rhubarb, that delicious pie-crust resident,deserves more respect than that.

Taking its name from the river Rha (now the Volga), the rhubarb plant (Rheum rhabarbarum) features heart-shaped leaves and red celery-like stalks and is often mistaken for a fruit because of its tart taste. This relatively easy-to-grow member of the buckwheat family was used by the Chinese for medicine long before it was noted as a food plant in Europe, circa 1630. It arrived stateside around 1800.

Since then, rhubarb has kept a fairly low profile—except when it became slang for a fight (particularly during a baseball game) and was used as the title for a film about a cat that inherits a baseball team. A pair of scientists from Yale even found that rhubarb helps cut down on Freon and other ozone-damaging CFCs.

But, still, it hasn’t landed the status of its vegetable cousins. Perhaps that’s because it’s commonly known for only one purpose—the one celebrated here. That’s as a delicious filling in pies. The stems are stewed to create the sauce, which can be combined with apples or strawberries or, as we like it, left to its own elegant simplicity.

Our 9-inch rhubarb pie sticks to those basics. Featuring fresh rhubarb, sugar, flour, shortening, salt, milk, and egg, its secret is in the careful preparation of the filling and the watchful baking to ensure a delicious, flaky crust.

Want to try growing your own rhubarb? If you live in a cool climate, your chances of success are greater. Rhubarb grows best when planted from existing plants, not from seeds. As a perennial, a single rhubarb plant can continue producing for 15 years and requires very little attention.

Still can’t get enough of rhubarb? Consider a trip to one of the handful of rhubarb festivals around the country. One we know of occurs in May in Aledo, Illinois.

Of course, the best place to start is with a delicious rhubarb pie delivered to your door. We ship Wednesday-Friday and you can place your order easily by going to our baked pie page.

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With all produce, nothing compares to growing your own, and onions are no exception. Onions are a requisite ingredient in kitchens throughout the world. Some varieties are excellent raw, whether sliced on burgers, or chopped in cold salads. Others are preferred for cooking, because their more pungent flavor or firmer texture holds up better in heat or liquids. Luckily, there are varieties to suit all cuisines and preparations. And growing onions is a snap, if you follow some simple guidelines. Since most cooks use onions in nearly every meal, it’s wise, if you have a sizable garden, to dedicate a lot of space to growing them.

Onions can be grown in most parts of the U.S., but each plant is intended for a specific type of growing region, based on the amount of sunlight per day. Determine your summer day length and choose from short day, intermediate day or long day varieties as recommended. Onions are mostly biennial, meaning they don’t bloom until the 2nd year. Patience is a gardener’s greatest ally!

Sets, direct seeding, and transplanting are the three options for planting onions. Sets are like baby onions, planted from seed the previous year. Sets tolerate light frost and can be planted earlier than the last frost date, but they also have a shorter storage life after harvest. Onions planted from seed have a longer storage life, but they’re slower to produce. For the earliest produce, start with transplants. Transplants also are prized for the best flavor and heartiest, largest bulbs.

If you’re going to plant transplants, you can raise seedlings indoors 8 to 12 weeks before you plan to transplant in the garden. Or, you can buy transplants ready to transfer to your garden. Choose onion plants from a reputable grower who will provide you the healthiest onion plants to start with.

Transplants should be planted at a depth of around 1 inch, to support the plant and keep it from falling over. Transplants are 8- to 10-week-old plants that haven’t gone through the bulbing process yet. They’ll produce the largest bulbs as they grow.

Onions can be harvested and eaten at any stage in their growth. They’re ripe when the tops start falling over and the bulbs have developed a papery skin. They’re at their peak ripeness when most of the foliage has fallen over. If onions bolt, or go to seed, they’ll develop a rigid center stem. It’s best to just pull that onion and use it right away, as the bulb will stop growing anyway.

Onions seem to attract weeds, so make sure you weed regularly. Some onions grow well in clusters, others need space and thinning out. Keep soil watered, but don’t let it get saturated, or the onions will rot.

Harvest onions late in the summer. Pull up gently on the green foliage and lift the onions up. Allow them to dry out in the sun for a few hours each of a few days, bringing them indoors at night. This cures them and prepares them for storage in a dry, dark place with good ventilation where they’ll keep over an entire winter, if conditions are maintained.

To store onions, make sure you have an area that will promote dormancy, with temperatures between 32 and 40 degrees. Onions will sprout at 40 degrees and higher.

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Sweet potatoes have been cultivated for eons because they are tasty, nutritious and versatile. This tuberous root vegetable is easy to grow, and it’s easy to prepare.

If you haven’t tasted sweet potato pie, you probably have never visited the South. With the bright, rich orange interior color, soft, delicate texture and sweet flavor, sweet potatoes are popular as a side dish or dessert ingredient—and sweet potato pie is a dessert no one can resist. Sweet potato melds well with the flavors of cinnamon, honey, coconut, pecans, ginger, butter, and nutmeg, which is why it’s a great ingredient in many breads, puddings, custards, and baked desserts—and sweet potato is equally delicious blended with fruits like apples and berries in casseroles. More savory spices such as green herbs and chili peppers also complement the sweet vegetable in casseroles and stews.

Yams and sweet potatoes are sometimes used interchangeably, but yams have a coarse, rough skin, and sweet potatoes have a smooth, thin skin. They’re actually the products of unrelated families of plants. The cooked sweet potato flesh is moister than a yam’s. If you’re trying to increase your beta carotene intake, sweet potatoes are way ahead of yams. Choose potatoes with the deepest orange color for the most beta carotene content. Sweet potatoes are also a good source of Vitamins A and C, calcium, and iron, and although they’re carbohydrate and calorie dense, they’re low in fat and high in fiber.

Sweet potatoes were first discovered in South America but now they’re grown in the U.S., while yams are all imported from the Caribbean. If you buy sweet potatoes in the supermarket, choose plump, firm roots. Store them in a dry, cool place, but never refrigerate uncooked sweet potatoes. Cook them by boiling, baking, frying, char-grilling or broiling. Dishes prepared with sweet potatoes will generally freeze well. Cooked sweet potatoes can also be stored in the refrigerator for a week or more. Sweet potatoes can be canned and stored for months. Although not the healthiest option, sweet potato chips or fries are a very interesting variation from the traditional white potato chips and fries.

Growing sweet potatoes couldn’t be easier, as long as they have a 80-120-day growing season, and plenty of space to spread out. They thrive in most soils, including sandy to heavy clay. Sweet potato plants ‘slips’ should be planted a full 2 weeks past the last frost. Till the soil to a depth of 8 to 10 inches, then add compost to keep the soil loose, making it easier to dig out your treasures in the fall. Make sure plants have 12 inches of space between them. Keep soil moist with at least 1 inch of water per week.

When it’s time to unearth your produce, most of the potatoes will be in a tight cluster just below the main stem. However, some may spread out below the soil, so start digging 18 inches out from the stem and work your way in, being careful not to damage the stray roots. Once the potatoes have been allowed to thoroughly dry in the sun for a few hours, move them to a protected area for a week or 10 days. This allows the skin to toughen, to protect the potatoes for a long storage life. It’s best to wait 6-8 weeks after harvest before sweet potatoes reach peak sweetness when baked. The ideal temperatures for storage are 50 to 60 degrees, with 60 to 70 percent humidity. Proper curing and storage should help the potatoes last for several months.

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Summer squashes (green and yellow) have a soft skin that’s edible, and they are meant to be harvested when the seeds and entire interiors are soft enough to eat, as well. Winter squash is different in that the seeds are mature and hard, and the skin is a rind—tough and hard, and not meant to be consumed. Remove the skin and seeds, and what’s left is flesh that is a culinary treasure. The hard outer skin on winter squash is what protects it and allows it to be stored over 3-6 months, through the winter and into the spring.

Squash is a vegetable that mostly grows on sturdy vines, but some can also be semi-vining or bushy plants. The most common types of winter squash are acorn, butternut and spaghetti—the one with the interior that becomes stringy like long noodles when it’s cooked. There are numerous specialized varieties, as well. Each has a unique flavor, and ranging from slightly sweet to peanuty. Some common seasonings used with cooked squash are butter, cinnamon, nutmeg, maple syrup, and ginger.

The difference between winter squash and pumpkins is mostly nomenclature. Some people interchange the terms. And, some cooks interchange them in pies, with squash doing a superb job without being detected as a faux pumpkin. Winter squash can have skin that is smooth or bumpy, thin or thick, and in colors ranging from light yellow to blue-grey to dark green to vibrant orange. They also vary greatly in size and shape. All contain flesh that is light yellow to deep, rich orange.

Plant winter squash in the spring. It will mature over the summer and be ready for an autumn harvest, before the first frost. Most winter squashes will store wonderfully over several months in a cool cellar throughout the winter. Some varieties benefit from an initial curing stage immediately after harvest, kept at around 70 degrees for 10 to 20 days, then moved to a cool, dry place, with 45- to 60-degree temps.

For the health-conscious, squash ranks high on the charts of nutrition-dense foods. It is high in fiber, and also contains potassium, niacin, iron and beta carotene, which converts to Vitamin A in the body.

Winter squash will be the sweetest and mildest when prepared with the seeds scraped out before cooking. The skin can be removed either before or after cooking. The flesh can be boiled, broiled, baked, or steamed. Then, it can be cubed, mashed, pureed, or in the case of spaghetti squash, used in place of pasta, for a healthier, lower calorie and more flavorful base for marinara sauce.

Squash seeds can be roasted with a little salt or tamari (soy) sauce and eaten as a healthy snack. Butternut squash soup is simple to prepare, with most recipes calling for few ingredients, and it’s popular with meat and potatoes gangs as well as uber-gourmets. Cooked squash freezes well, whether alone or in prepared dishes and soups.

Most vining squash plants will require a lot of room, so plan your garden space accordingly, and try a few varieties, to keep a range of flavors to enjoy over the winter months.

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