OLS Week#12: Fun, friends, food

My little apartment kitchen is too small for the things I try to do in it. That’s the honest truth. I come home from the farm with boxes of fresh produce, covered in mud, harboring any number of insects and the only proper place for it to reside is on the bar stool against the kitchen wall. It might stay there, dried onion tops peeking out one side, until I begin to wonder if the contents are still usable. I’m usually pretty good about staying on top of my projects and eating the things I bring home – because lets face it, I don’t have much else to eat – but sometimes work and life things get ahead of my bright ideas and so the box sits.

Of course, using the produce inside only spreads the mud and fruit flies around; bits of onion to fall to the floor unnoticed and the flecks of clay stick to the trail of water left from the dog bowl. I like to pretend that the kitchen is the cleanest room in my apartment, being that I scrub it down almost every night, but in reality it may well be the grimiest just given the amount of farm material moving into and out of it.

In the middle of all this, with every inch of counter space consumed, I have to find some way to work in the kitchen. As I’m roasting peppers and steaming sweet potatoes, making two batches of hummus at once, and baking pitas to boot, the dirty dishes begin to pile up, bowls filled with eggs, flour, compost begin to clutter every surface imaginable. Things spill. The dog runs in to lick them up. Its a miracle I manage to get anything done. Yes, my kitchen just wasn’t made for the level of activity that typically occurs within.

I really shouldn’t complain about free produce, though. Being able to bring home vegetables from the farm, other than keeping me fed, allows me to be creative. It’s not all that fun to eat peppers, tomatoes and squash the same way all summer; there has to be new possibilities. Luckily, the excessive supply leftover after marketing means that I have a plethora of produce to experiment on. It’s impossible to go wrong.

My latest fascination has been roasted red peppers. I’ve never made them, but I relish eating them on pizzas, pasta, bruschetta, hummus, etc. They’re a nice touch to almost any meal and, to my prior knowledge, come in somewhat sketchy jars filled with oil. In appearance, it would be easy to pass them over – their slimy, flaccid disposition leaves a lot to be desired – but, if you can get past that, it’s worth it.

Another wonderful trend that seems to come with excessive harvests this time of year is parties, and there’s always a reason. I’ve attended harvest parties on two work crews, at different farms, over the last handful of years and I’m pretty sure that when the days get long and the work gets hard, the need to find something positive is a given. People love to celebrate the end results of their efforts and what better way to do that than share food that you’ve grown from seed to fruit with your own hands. This weekend we celebrated a housewarming and a goodbye for a coworker on Saturday night with a display of food that could satisfy the gods.

Having freshly roasted red peppers, I made a favorite – roasted red pepper hummus. I also made a sweet potato hummus I had been anxious to try. A batch of pita bread. Some cucumber sticks. I went a little overboard, but it was superbly delicious and will last long enough to feed me well into the future (there’s even jars of hummus in the freezer!)

Roasted Red Pepper Hummus

1 3/4 cup of cooked, drained chickpeas (or 1 15oz can). Reserve juice.
1/2cup diced roasted red pepper
3Tbs tahini
2Tbs lemon juice
1 large clove of garlic
1tsp cumin
2tsp coriander
1tsp salt

Mix all in a food processor.

If using dry chickpeas, soak for at least 2-3 hours. Cook in fresh water; bring to a boil and cook on low for 2-3 hours, until chickpeas are soft.

If roasting red peppers, Preheat oven to 450 at BROIL. Place peppers on a baking sheet under broiler for 30min, turn every 5-10 minutes as peppers blacken. Remove to a bowl and cover with plastic wrap; let sit 20 minutes. When peppers are cool enough to handle, peel off skin and remove stem and seeds.